easter weekend 2011

we had a very crazy easter weekend!

on friday, kyle and i left at 5am for tennessee to go to shannon wight's (a good friend from school) wedding. jillian stayed home with the nelsons. we felt it would be cruel to make her drive 20 hours in 2 days!

we loved tennessee and the wedding! (but more on that later)

while we were at the wedding, the nelsons had their easter fun, so jillian had fun with them. they texted us pictures and said she loved hunting eggs!

we drove home on saturday night, and climbed into bed at 5am! yes, 5am. we were tired. we didn't even go home, we just crashed at the nelsons, where jillie was.

we then very slowly crawled out of bed at 9am. (we really really didn't want to miss church).

the 3 of us surprisingly made it to church on time!

{baby no.2 was there too! showing up a little earlier than i remember no.1 showing, btw!}

after church we made a quick trip to see all the nelsons who were in town and we'd missed all weekend.

then we had lunch at my parents and the kids hunted easter eggs.

{papa helping get her bunny ears all straight}

{us in all our craziness, all the cameras are kinda funny}

{this is how she carried her basket the whole time, so cute!}

jillian was serious business about hunting eggs!


i was shocked how good she was at just a year old.

{getting some pointers from daddy}

she would scope it out, put her basket down, and make a beeline for a few eggs, then bring them back to her basket. she filled it in no time, and we didn't help her at all!

i didn't get a picture of all the kids, but here's a few..

{andrew got some gummy teeth in on of his eggs}

{izzie getting her hunt on}

{haylie bug}

{looks like dellie was considering sharing with papa}

{she's just as happy with the eggs, as she is what's inside!}

{checking out her loot, once we came inside to cool off!}

and here we are easter weekend, last year. i was 41 weeks pregnant, and got induced at 5 am on monday morning!
crazy how much changes in just a year!

a whole year!

jillian is a year old.

she is not a toddler, though.

just a year old, walking baby.

last week was the most hectic/busy week we have had in a very long time!

we showed our house twice last week, so we had to keep it spotless, and we had my birthday and jillian's birthday. and every night we had plans doing one thing or another.

her birthday party was saturday evening. we just did super simple, with our families at our house. and it was a perfect little party!

the morning of her birthday, we let her have a powdered donut. i tried to get a picture, but she devoured it before i could! and immediately started crying when it was gone!

before her party, we tried to have a little photoshoot, but guests started to arrive.

{here is where she saw my parents come into the backyard}

{this makes me laugh so hard! she accidentally hiked it up.}

we had hamburgers and cupcakes, and i actually did not take a single picture of the table, decorations, cupcakes, anything! i couldn't believe it. we also didn't video singing happy birthday. i think we broke serious first birthday rules.


{isn't this just the picture of patience?}

{she definitely likes cupcakes!}


she got a "bike" which she just hopped on and started riding!


a baby and stroller, which has already been pushed many miles!

izzie and jillian both had a cup of ice and just went and sat in the empty kiddie pool, eating their ice and talking about something!


and tons of other super cute things (too much!) every gift she opened she just wanted to go play with it, so i basically had to hold her down to open them!

here's her birthday banner and cupcakes after the party. her banner is still up, but i don't want to take it down just yet!

we had so much fun with all family just hanging out! thanks everyone for making it special and fun!

eleven months!

our baby girl is actually going to be one year old next week! oh my!

i thought if i held this post off, then maybe it would give me a little longer!

her pictures were a tad difficult to capture this month.

the girl does not stop moving!!

i would get her in the chair, give her a cheerio, grab my camera..

and she would already be climbing out of the chair, on the floor, and outta the room.


camera down.

run get her.

put her back in chair.

repeat x 50ish pictures!


which apparently she thought was a hilarious game.

and i'm no newbie to this.

i have a serious system down.

i waste no time.

she just wastes less time than me!

{mischief anyone!?}

she is walking everywhere! crawling is no more.

she took her first steps right at 10 months, but didn't really take off full force until right at 11 months.

everyone told me i would dread the day she took off, and i will say, i think i actually like it better than crawling. she's still not quite as fast (that will change soon.)

and her clothes and toes of shoes are not completely filthy and worn out every day!

so yeah, walking agrees with us. for now.

that's the only big change this month.

but more than that, i need to get off the computer and work on her birthday invitations that should be mailed, oh, tomorrow!

so we're outta here!

bring on summer!

i have been soo excited for summer this year!

last year jillian was just a tiny baby, and even though we took her to the beach, it still kinda hindered what all we could do.

well, this year she is already loving all things summer!

i've been telling kyle since she was born, i can't wait until she is big enough to play in the water sprinklers!

we played in the sprinklers hours every day of summer when we were little! i think my parents decided they may actually save on the water bill if they put in a pool! so we got one of those later!
{barely getting sprinkled at this point, but having a blast! i love her face!}

{getting a little braver}

{all in! she made this face, every time it sprayed her in the face, but she still liked it}



i love watching her have this much fun!

after we went inside, she carried her swim suit around with her. i think she likes it!

it's gonna be a good summer.

t.r.o.u.b.l.e.

we have started working on getting our house ready to sell. {oh yeah, we bought a house, and are moving, by the way}.

so jillian helped with the pantry.


is that not the most mischievous face!?


making her getaway!


{the picture quality is quite terrible, but it was dark and i had to catch her quick!}

pizza pizza!!

we had pizza the other night, and decided to scrape the cheese off, and let have jillian have a bite. she ended up eating a whole piece of pizza!


and she enjoyed it quite a bit.


she'll fit in our family nicely.


i think she likes it.


like, a lot!

valentines..

{a few days late, because it's what i do}

this year, we decided to do valentines very low key.

we went to dinner last weekend, sans jillian. nothing fancy, but so nice to get away.

and determined that we would get eachother zero gifts. no reason, but just to be simple.

well, kyle broke the law, and got me flowers AND donuts! {i should've known}

so today, i went to the store and got him cokes and candy.

and we're all a happy couple again. {well, not that we weren't. now we're just even.}

we took zero pictures on/around valentines, so i just uploaded random pictures from our dating lives back in high school. we look like 8 years old!

the first picture was from our first valentines day together. it snowed and our parents made us stay home, so we just hung out and played in the snow.

kyle,
i love that you're ok with me loving simple things, and not always going for the fancy plans.

i love that we're just as happy with cokes, donuts, and candy, rather than expensive gifts.

i love that we're so alike, yet different as day and night.


that you know i make zero sense a lot of the time, and you're ok with that.


i love our family and home.

and i wouldn't change one single thing about our lives.

i love you!