Yep, thats Ivy

"Hey mom, dess what?"
..what?
"chicken butt"
(I accidentally taught her that)

and then it started getting super annoying.
*eyeroll.
sooo I taught her

"Hey mom, dess what?"
..what?
"I love you, sweetie."
or
"I love ya, pal"

and that's much better, and never really gets annoying.


Wade and I have caught her having private conversations with herself. She pretends she's on the phone with her dentist. It goes something like this..

"Hi Dr. Wyan (Ryan), you brush my teeth? Whats up? Okay bye!"

She's been carrying around one of Wade's old phones from high school. She calls it her "mote" and sometimes her "puter"

Our friends Whitney and Zan got a puppy named Remmy. She talks about Remmy all the time, and whenever we tell her Whit and Zan are coming over, she always says "AND REMMY!?"

There is a little baby at Ivy's daycare named Tayla. Anytime we are talking too loud at the house, she tells us "shhh, baby Tayla sleeping mom!" She has about 5 babies and all of their names are Tayla. One is named Remmy.

She's figured out that boys are girls are different. She loves to say things like, "mom, grammy is a girl!" "mom, jack jack is a boy!" She thinks all dogs are girls. Our friend Nicole is also having a baby and it's a boy, but ivy won't let us tell her that! "Nicole baby is a girl!" haHAha.

All of her clothes are 3T, but I bought her some 4T clothes, and I'm just rolling with it. She fits into those..some are a little long, but seriously! She is growing like a weed! 

She's been potty trained for about 5 months. She has wet the bed probably 10 times since then..but throwing sheets in the washer isn't that hard. We just stopped giving her a sippy before bed, so hopefully that helps! She's doing good at wiping by herself (or at least trying for #1) and she's doing awesome at getting on her step stool and pulling her pants down and going by herself. She can also pull her pants up now, which is nice.

Her new things is "okay mom! Hold on!"
and my new thing to that is..
"umm..nope! Don't tell mom to hang on!"

That kid...she cracks us up and keeps us on her toes. Her personality is feisty, fierce, sassy, sensitive, silly and hilarious!

Ivy, the piranha

Last monday, I got a text during my lunch break that Ivy had bit one of the other little girls at the babysitters. I freaked out because she's never bit anyone before..she's never even tried. Sometimes we play around with her and pretend to "eat her" but nothing like crazy. When I picked her up, Keri (Ivy's babysitter) told me that after she bit the little girl, they put her in time out, and they talked to her. When I got there, I looked at the bite on the girls arm and we are talking like bite marks and bruises here! When Ivy and I got home, we talked a lot about how we don't bite. I found books on the iPad, youtube videos, and we just talked about it for the majority of the night. 

Tuesday was fine, but then Wednesday, while I was on my lunch break again, I got another text saying that she bit the same girl. When I asked Keri about it, she said that they weren't fighting or anything, they were just playing together and Ivy just bit her out of nowhere, both times. The mama bear came out in me, and since Keri only lives a couple minutes away from the school, I hurried and went over there. I grabbed Ivy and I took her in the garage and we had a long talk. I was SO frustrated! She knows better! I could';t figure out why she would be biting?! Ugh. It totally made me feel like a bad mom..I mean, I DIDN'T TEACH HER THAT. Anyways, I went back to school and then when I came back to get her, the little girls mom was there also. I kept apologizing, I felt so bad! I was so annoyed, and I did;t know what to do! (I still don't BTW!) 

Then yesterday during nursery, I made sure to tell her leaders just so that they would be aware. I told them to come get me if she was showing signs or if she bit anyone. When I went in after church to pick her up, one of the leaders told me that she just BARELY bit another girl on the finger!! WHAT THE HECK!? I just don't even know. 

A lot of people have been telling me it's just a phase. Others are telling me to bite her back. But I just can't. Ivy is a sassy little stink, but she's actually really sensitive and gets her feelings hurt really easily. The other day, when we were chatting about biting, I asked her if she wanted mama to bite her and how it would feel..and she said, "no mama, we don't bite! no biting!" and she started crying at the thought that I would do that to her..

which is why its so stinkin' confusing to me! She knows better, I know she knows she's not supposed to, I just can't get to the root of it..if she's not doing it out of spite..she's doing it for some kind of attention. It's just so frustrating! I started thinking that Ivy actually IS a little spoiled! She doesn't have any siblings. None of our friends that come over and hang out with us have any kids to play with..She has three sets of grandparents that live in town, and no cousins to share them with..like, she pretty much has all attention on her, 24/7..except at daycare. Because, how can she? IT's good for her, she just needs to learn how to channel her negative energy. She's never had any issues with hitting or anything like that, and hasn't had a problem at daycare, EVER! I just don't know! I know it is just a phase, but really...biting? It's just weird! 

Random iPhone photos

we had to take a picture of our matching blazers! 

She looked so big to me on this day! 

One of Ivy's good friends came over to play! Come back soon Drew! 

Took some family pictures after our annual FRIENDSGIVING!

Halloween 2015

I really count' decide what I wanted Ivy to be for Halloween. I knew if I bought her a princess dress, she would love it. But I feel like there are only so many years where I can dress her up and pick what she is going to be...so I decided on a Tiger. I don't know. I saw the accessories at the store and I thought, "Hey, I could figure something out for this.." So I got on Amazon and found a black white and orange tutu and dressed her up in black clothes with her boots, gave her some face painting and called it good. She was super funny about her tutu. When I pulled it out of the package, it poofed out pretty big and it freaked her out. She wouldn't touch it or go near it. We kept calling it her Tiger dress, her princess tiger skirt..nothing would work. She would scream if i brought it near her. Finally, a couple days before Halloween, we just held her down and it put it on her..she was kicking and screaming and freaking out and then she was looked down at it and was like, "oooh, wow mama, pretty!" insert eye roll here.

Anyways, Katrina and I went and got her and the girls' pictures taken. For Halloween, we went to my dads house and had pizza, went trick or treating with Ivy, played some games and then headed home. It was a fun night, and Ivy LOVED trick or treating. Once she figured out how it worked, she thought it was the best thing ever! 

Our school has a theme every year. Last year it was "Cloverdale is Groovy" so we dressed up as hippies. This year our theme is "Positive Energy drives Cloverdale" so we couldn't figure out what to dress up like, lightbulbs? A bus driver? Finally we decided to dress up like the Koo Koo Kangaroo guys. They are these two guys who make videos for kids (and teachers) to play at school..they have ridiculous dance moves and outfits..but they do bring lots of positive energy to our classrooms everyday! 

some of october!

General conference weekend was a blast. Ryan and Jordan and the kids came down and stayed with us at our house. Dani and Ty were in town but they stayed at my moms. My grandpa from Arizona flew down to spend some time with all of us and it was really great to see him. We hadn't seen him for a couple months since my grandma had passed away. It's pretty amazing how he can travel still at 93 years old! :) We had lots of yummy food, and went to some parks to play. We also watched conference and crafted and went to Koy's soccer game as well. 

We might have had a tiny mishap with some hot pink paint. No worries! Everything came out and it really made for a great laugh. Then and now. 

Near the end of October, we were able to miss a couple days of work and travel to Boise to watch Koy play soccer. Too bad we didn't get any pictures of him actually playing! They played two games, and lost them both and before we knew it, they were out of the tournament. We still had a fun time. We went to see my Aunt Mae and Uncle Luis and swam in their hot springs. Glen and Hailey also came from Washington so we were able to spend some time with them. We went to this crazy pumpkin farm and had a blast playing on the toys, petting the animals, seeing all the pumpkins and eating some crazy good food! Ivy and Olive had so much fun. 

Ivy turns 2

Wow! Two years old! How can I even have a two year old? How does it happen that one day she's 8 pounds and sleeping on my chest at the hospital, and another day she's running around the house like a psycho? I just can't even, it feels like yesterday and twenty years ago that she was born. I don't know how to explain it.

For her birthday, we had a little party at the Apple Athletic club swimming pool/splash pad. It was really fun and all of Ivy's friends and family came! It was a fun way to end the summer and see everyone. Ivy had a blast. Here are a couple things she's been up to lately.

-She's obsessed with mermaids (meh-maids) ..basically pronounced like mermaid but with an English accent. I don't know where she came up with that. But anyways. She is loving the Little Mermaid and Ariel. (Arrow) ha ha ha. She got a barbie Arial that swims in the bath with her. She is freaked out by it and wants nothing to do with it. I have no idea.

-When I go to wake her up in the morning, she throws her arms around me and says "I MISS YOU MUCH MOM!!" I die EVERYTIME.

-She loves to hide from dad when he gets home from work.

-Her prayers sound like this when she says them by herself, no matter where we are or what we are doing, "Hev Fadder, Day, Food, Keri, AMEN!" hahah Keri is her babysitter. :)

-She loves to color. We have to practice saying "We only color on..." and she'll say PAPER.

-Today, I walked in and she was eating/getting into Wade's athletes food cream. So there's that.

-She's been potty trained since June. It's nice, but she's not tall enough to get up on the toilet by herself, even with the step stool..so it's still a little annoying to have to take her every time. But, it beats wiping bums and poop and changing diapers. Even by just a little! ;)

-She loves cats and dogs, and every time we pass one, she insists on petting it.

-She wears 3T in everything, and has been on a growth spurt this last week or so! (Which is good, because for a while, she wasn't eating much!)

-At the doctors office, she weighed 31 pounds and had grown 2 inches since February..her little belly is gone, and it's sad! She just looks like a little girl now, and not so much a toddler. It's freaking me out.

-She makes us SO happy, all day, every day! I love every second that I am with her, even when she is whiny and tired! She makes our lives so much better and exciting and she always has us laughing! We love being parents and she has made this adventure so worth it! We love you Ivy Mae!

That one time

when Wade and I and all of our friends completed the SPUDMAN OLYMPIC TRI! It was a blast! I hurt my back about three weeks before the tri and was in a lot of pain during the race. The swim was my favorite, the bike was the longest and I feel like I rocked the run, because it's MY THING! :) I really want to do it again next year and hopefully improve my time! Nate and Nicole did awesome! Scott did awesome! Wade and Darren rocked it, AS PER USUAL! :) Anyways, here are some pictures!