Eva enjoying her Birthday Cake like it's an every day occurence

Happy Birthday to our little Eva!

Wow the time has flown. I was thinking back on this precious day one year ago and love the fond memories I have of seeing this little girl come into my life. I was induced the night before and was able to sleep fairly well considering the beds are quite uncomfortable. I was able to endure the pain of contractions much easier than when I was in labor with Maren. I got an epidural early the next morning and she came at 11:15 am. When I first laid eyes on her I saw my mom. I could recognize her and felt an instant connection to her. I was fortunate to have my mom and dad in town and loved watching them hold her as I recovered in the hospital. Her first year was not always easy. She was colicky so nights were stressful and at 7 weeks old she caught RSV and needed emergency room care. By the time we grew out of the colic stage things got easier and we were able to enjoy her. Personality began showing up everywhere. She started walking at 8 months and is the most determined child. She tells you pretty clearly what she wants and learns so fast. We can't stop laughing at her.

Today, its icy and cold out. but her little banner brings sunshine into the room just as...

...this face does. We are so lucky to have her! Happy Birthday to our little Eva! 

Eva's Birthday

Eva's first year of pictures.

I had a lot of fun putting together Eva's Ice Cream Cone themed birthday party for last Saturday. Her official birthday is today. We had the birthday at Grandma and Grandpa Garlick's house. It was a lot of fun.

The giant pink ice cream cone is a pinata I made. It cost $2.50 to make! All the ideas I got came from good old Pinterest. The basket has ice cream cone sugar cookies as party favors.

Signs for the ice cream sundays we had for dessert.

Eva's cake.

The ice cream cone birthday girl.

Eva's stripped down and ready to dive in to her cake!

It was fun to have Grandma and Grandpa Haymond there as well. They gave her 4 Dr Seuss board books. Maren was loving them.

The pinata burst pretty easily considering I made it only 2 layers thick.

The ice cream shoppe goodies.

Eva (Maren really) opening gifts with Uncle Joe

Grandma made Eva a stuffed kitty that as soon as Eva laid eyes on it she had to have it.

The girls loved playing with the balloons. It was action packed and a lot of fun!

Down, Set, hike!

Somehow Eva learned how to say down, set, hike while holding a football in her hands. Must be from all that football that was on this last 6 months cause I sure did not teach it to her!

Inside Activities -Baby, its cold outside!

We've had a whole lot of  this and gray 10-20 degree weather so we have been doing a whole lot of this...

Playing dress up and tea party. Maren has introduced Eva to the only dress that will fit her.

Eva plans to be daddy's optician when she grows up. She loves fitting glasses to daddy's face. He is showing her the technique here.

Disney Headbanz! Fun game.

Accomplishing difficult feats-Climbing the tool box and proudly sitting on it. Notice her feet don't touch the floor.

Hanging out with mom. She is a cute cuddler when she wants to be.

Perfect Snow

This year after Christmas the perfect snow fell and made for some fun times. This is Eva's first real experience with it. She lasted about 20 minutes. She loved it.

Snow angels were not her thing.

Maren loved it too.

Fun with Uncle Ike

The infamous swings. I only have about 20 trillion pictures of my kids on them.

It was a picture perfect day. Glad we captured it because the entire month following this day has been pretty disgusting. Gray, cold and full of inversion. 

Time with grandma

New Year's Eve

We spent New Year's Eve at Spencers' cousin's house which was a lot of fun since many of them live out of town.

Some of Spencer's closest cousins and friends and their growing families.

The great-grandchildren. 8 girls and 1 boy!

Optometry Friend Holiday Party

We got the chance to get together with the local optometry friends during the break after Christmas.

Maren went crazy realizing how deprived she was of friends her age.

It was great catching up with these lovely ladies.

Crazy to think that when we started Optometry school only 3 of these little ones existed. How the numbers have grown.

11 months

No, Eva is not 11 months today she is ONE YEARS OLD! I realized I never posted her picture at this age so here it is . We are love love loving this little girl! I don't want her to grow up!

Highlights of December 2012 all out of order.... but there.

We had a great December! We kicked off the season at the Festival of Trees. We met up with our friends the Campbell's and walked through thousands of trees that are decorated and donated to be auctioned off to raise money for Primary Children's Hospital. It is amazing what people put into their decorations. Maren loved all of the girly pink ones. Lyndsie's family donated a tree in memory of her grandpa who loved fishing. It was a fun event.

After the festival Maren and I were invited to the Nutcracker Tea Party with Spencer's family. Grandpa Garlick played Clara's uncle in a short segment to get the kids excited to go see the ballet.The tea party took place at this beautiful place Maren thought was a castle.

A bit out of order, at the festival of trees they also had a display of gingerbread houses that were pretty amazing.

Another highlight and must see if you live in Utah is the lights at Temple Square. Always a great place to be and incredible to see massive trees covered in lights.

Another "highlight" of December was cleaning up after this little girl. Lovely. Don't worry, I got the toys out before I hosed her down.

Another night, we went to Gateway Mall and saw their giant lit up tree change patterns and colors while synced to christmas music. It was pretty well done. Maren was really excited.

Give him a wig and I would be married to Willy Wonka. We went into a vintage toy store called Blickenstaff's.

The tree at Gateway.

Eva has a love for stuffed animals. She was in heaven riding this giant alligator.

Here is our little bum child. She just received a sum of money from a kind-hearted stranger and decided to go on a shopping spree at Blickenstaff's instead of use it on necessities like food and shelter.

Just found a new dollar store other than Dollar Tree. Eva was loving all they had to offer. I couldn't get her to let go of the plunger.

Every Christmas at the Conference Center the Mormon Tabernacle Choir sings with a famous professional. This year they featured Alfie Boe, the voice of Jean Valjean on Broadway.  He was part of the 25th Anniversary cast that comes on PBS periodically. Amazing. Tom Brockaw was also there as an incredible storyteller. A memorable night for sure!

We spent a lot of time with family down in American Fork this year. We created a lot of great memories. It had been so great for the kids to be close by and have that time with family.

We paired up and made gingerbread houses. Maren was paired up with Uncle Joe. He did everything she wanted him to. A perfect partner. This was there finished product. Maren was so proud.

As I am going through all of these pictures seeing all of the things we did I am reminded of all the awesome things you can do in Utah! We were fortunate to get tickets to see the Nutcracker put on by the Utah Regional Ballet. Their company has great dancers and it was a great production. I got to see one of my students from Mountain Ridge Junior High perform as one of the top dancers. Maren loved every minute of it. Hopefully we can start this tradition to go every year wherever we live. 

Again out of order but you can see that Maren is working well with her building partner. I love the expression on her face as she discusses design and decoration.

Christmas Sunday.

Christmas morning!

Minnie!

Christmas Eve Dinner. I made the  traditional Danish Christmas meal. Our Haymond grandparents came which made it all that much more fun for me since Grandma Haymond is half Danish too!

Maren and her 2nd cousin Ella. They hit it right off at the Haymond Christmas party. SO funny.

We had a beautiful white Christmas. After opening gifts we went sledding at a nearby park. Some of us sledded anyway, others attempted crazy stunts.

Learning to knit with Grandma.Very determined.