McKel

McKel, McKel.
Little miss sunshine personality.  She is always making a goofy face, jumping up and down with excitement, kicking her legs in the air showing flexibility that came from who knows where... She is constant laughs.  You can't possibly be around her and not smile.  She adores her older sister and looks up to her like Avril is her idol.  She copies everything Avril does, yet does it in her own independent way that is totally McKel.  She asks why after nearly everything you say, and is curious about EVERYTHING.  She is clearly already very gifted athletically, although she isn't quite ready for sports because she has the attention span of a goldfish.  She loves her "brown bunny, and polka dot blanky."  You know when she's getting tired because her personality changes from fun and happy to making you want to put her down immediately.  You also know she's tired because she will ask for her brown bunny, her security.
She has gorgeous, thick, shiny hair, and the cutest smile you've ever seen, with bright baby blues and long eyelashes that go on for days.  You can't help but fall in love with this little gift from God.

This pictures cracks me up.  For Halloween, Mike took the girls up to see their dad.  He picked them up from school during nap time.  This is how he found McKel.  This is not an unusual sleeping position for her.



In Mike's truck on the way up to Logan... here she is being her goofy self, trying on Mike's hat.

Searching for goodies in the freezer... she knows just what she wants and isn't afraid to do things herself.  In fact, if you try to do anything for her she will bite your head off for it!

Another truck ride, eating a giant muffin.  Just plain adorableness...

We love you McKel!  Our spunky little ball of energy girl!

Happy Halloween!

This year the girls were assigned to spend Halloween with their dad, so we only got to dress them up in costumes in the morning, to wear to preschool.  Of course, Avril insisted that she dress up as a princess.  We let her pick out her very own princess dress at Walmart.  Mike found an adorable one for McKel as well.  We had a Queen of Hearts and an Ariel.  They were simply adorable, as usual...

Two princess sisters, at their school

Mike worked hard to carve out our wedding date in this pumpkin.  The circles are wedding rings, FYI.  Not lips.  He did a great job.  Just too bad the pumpkin we picked out was mold infested.  It didn't last long :(  But our marriage will!

Happy Halloween!!!

Avril

I happened to have some recent pics of Avril so I thought I would do an Avril focus/update today, and focus on McKel in a different post.
Avril holds true to her sweetheart persona.  She delights in thinking of things to do for others to make them happy.  She is constantly drawing and creating gifts for everyone she loves.  She loves to surprise mommy by getting ready without being asked, or by cleaning up her bedroom.  Don't get me wrong, the bedroom is usually not clean, but every so often Avril will be thinking of a nice gesture and decide on that one.  She comes up with saying that could melt a stone heart.  She often says, "Mommy, I will never stop loving you.  You are so pretty, you are the prettiest mommy I have ever seen."
Avril is most content with a pen and paper in her hand.  She loves practicing writing her letters, as well as working on any type of craft or artwork.
She also has a sweet tooth that is never satisfied.  And yet she remains skinny as a rail.
She loves her sister, McKel... that's not to say there is no sibling rivalry at play.  The normal sister picking on is often an issue.  McKel just idolizes her big sis, Avril though, often copying whatever Avril does.
Avril treasures the relationships she has in her life.  She misses her Nana and Papa and constantly talks about how much she loves them and misses them, as well as everyone in the family.  She especially loves to visit Nana and Papa's house because they have dress up clothes there for her downstairs.  Right when she walks in the door, she can't contain her excitement and runs down to the basement, only to come back up a couple minutes later in some kind of a princess dress, adorned with jewelry and the works...topped off with a gigantic smile on her face!
We certainly love our Avril sweetheart girl.

Avril focuses on writing letters, one of her favorite activities.

Riding a bike at Nana and Papa's house

Here we are testing out the new Curl Formers that mom purchased to do the girls' hair for the wedding.  Nana tested them out on Avril's hair.  Avril was so excited to have curly hair!

A back view...

The results:  Curly Sue!

Avril needed to get her pre-kindergarten shots. We tried out a new doctor by mommy's work in Draper. She was such a good sport, I was so proud of my brave girl. She did not even cry AT ALL, through all the shots. She was so proud of herself for not crying too. Poor thing, every time the doctor came near her she would clinch up because she thought he was going to give her a shot. He used the stethoscope to check her heart and she asked him if it was a shot, it was so cute :)  She is amazing, my sweet little Avril girl.  Love her.

Date

Sushi date after a long day of engagement photo-taking, with my honey!  Love him :)

The Crater

Our final scuba diving class was at a giant crater in Midway, Utah. This was where we tested our scuba diving skills and passed them all off to get certified. Mike brought along his GoPro and took a bunch of videos and pics to practice for our ocean dive we were planning on doing for the honeymoon. Next time I will have to make sure to steal Mike's camera so there are some shots of him!

Preparing for the final dive to get certified...

There were objects suspended in the crater for grabbing on to.  We used this one as a safety stop.

There's me!

The view above us...

Descending...

Practicing coming back up with the rope

Me again!  You have to love how my hair sticks straight up when I dive

This is a really long video of the crater dive.  I was messing around with the video editor program and added some music for fun.  I don't recommend watching all of it, its pretty boring.  But you can see some of it and get an idea of what the underwater experience was like.  :)  And now I'm officially scuba diving certified!  Next stop:  Fiji

Scuba Diving Class

I wanted to make sure I got Scuba Diving Certified before we got married, so that we could do a wicked awesome honeymoon and go diving.  Mike was already certified, so he did a refresher course with me.  He also bought a GoPro waterproof camera so we could take some fun photos and videos when we dive.  He had fun playing with it in our class :)

Getting set up with all the gear

Mike was already a pro

Excited to be learning a new skill together!

waving to the camera

I made a "W"

walking down to the bottom of the pool, so cool!  That rhymes

Silly videos

Good times dancing in the kitchen, and drawing tattoos on each other :)

Pumpkin Fun with the Fam!

I am very lucky. I have an amazing man in my life, who chose to love me, as well as my two adorable daughters. For a fun family outing, we saw this little pumpkin-themed amusement on the roadside. We took the girls to look for pumpkins and play on the giant bouncey slide. It was a happy time :) We took some cute pics! 

He puts the broken pieces in me back together.

The girls always have a blast if there are slides or bouncey things involved.  The giant bouncey slide includes both.  They never wanted to leave.

Nothing brings my heart more joy than seeing this girl happy...

...and this girl. She's all smiles

So happy!

My little princess angel girl

My spunky goofy ball of fun girl

Yay McKel!  This girl has no fear.

bouncey, bouncey, bouncey!

Sweet sisters :)



Thank you for the memory.  Love all these people.



Photo Shoot with Wendell

Our wonderful photographer, Wendell Pace, let us know he was doing a shoot in Salt Lake and asked if he could do a few quick engagement shots of us.  We agreed, and I'm so glad we were able to make it work, I am so pleased with the way they turned out!  He also did a whole other session for us up in Logan.  So many photos lately!!  But so glad for the amazing memories...

Thank you so much, Pace Photo!!  We are so happy with all the work you did to help us capture our special moments forever...