Good News

So for all of you that are not aware of it yet, I wanted to let you know that we are expecting.

Gabbie is going to be a big sister and she gets really excited when we talk to her about it. We haven't been to the doctor yet but according to our calculations, we are six weeks along and the baby will be due in mid-July around the 15th. We'll let you all know for sure after we have been to the doctors.

I have been feeling okay. So far I have been nauseous a lot and more tired than usual but I haven't actually gotten sick yet. There are a lot of food smells, like the pork tenderloin we had for dinner last night, that have made me feel kind of sick to my stomach and nothing sounds good to me when I think about eating. The good thing though is that even ice cream doesn't sound good so maybe I won't gain as much weight this time! At least that's the goal.

Thanks for all the congrats we have already received and we will keep you posted.

Halloween

Halloween was another first time experience for us this year with a child. We went to our ward Trunk or Treat and walked around for a little bit then went out to dinner and came home to pass out candy. Unfortunately, we only had a few trick-or-treaters so Kyle had to give the ones that came fist fulls of candy so we didn't have a ton around the house to munch on.

Our beautiful little sunflower...

Gabbie, Kyle, and our friends that live below us... Batman is Jacob and the skeleton is Shannon. They love Gabbie and talk to her every time we walk outside.

Daddy and the little sunflower at trunk or treating, checking out the costumes and decorations in the trunks.

Isn't she the cutest little sunflower? She did really well with keeping the hood on during the night. We were lucky to get so many cute pictures. Hope you all had a good Halloween.

New Hobbies

Gabbie has found some new interests recently...

Here she is playing with a ball that I had from teaching. She can totally pick the thing up with one hand and palm it (of course it is one of those squishy balls so that's not really all that hard).

Our next basketball star...

Another new adventure is getting hosed down in the sink after eating. It is much easier to do this lately than get her to hold still so we can clean her up. Unfortunately, she gets all wet when Daddy does it because he uses the sprayer and Mom just sticks her hands under the faucet to clean. But we can all tell from these pictures which one she likes the best...

Doing a piggy back ride with daddy....she loves these. Whenever we put her on our back for a ride, she thinks its so funny and wants us to go super fast. While we run down the hall with her on our back, she giggles her head off and then tells us to 'go' when we stop (this wears you out after running up and down the hall a few times with 20+ pounds bouncing on your back, or we are just really out of shape).

Gabbie rocking out...she's actually just playing with the headphones.

A new treat...Mom got a bag of candy from her Visiting Teachers and Gabbie wanted to have a taste of some of it. This is probably completely against good oral hygiene/care but I just had to let her have a small taste. She tried to suck the whole thing into her mouth. It was very funny to watch because she looked like she was trying to suck the last drop out of her sippy cup or bottle.

And finally, a fun picture with Gabbie showing everyone her two teeth. She has a super strong bite and if she gets your fingers in her mouth, beware!

I sure love introducing her to all these new things and getting to watch as she gets so much enjoyment out of such small things.

Playing with Mom and Dad

Gabbie has been playing with Kyle and I a lot lately and she is getting super fun to play with. Her little laugh when she is excited is the cutest thing to listen to.

Stripped down ready to get cleaned up after eating dinner... she makes a huge mess every time she eats so we have to wet her down in the sink to wipe her off.

Helping Mom close the window...

Playing with the buttons on Dad's shirt...

Daddy teaching Gabs how to do a head stand...

Now Gabbie's turn to show her talent...

Going for a ride in the laundry basket before we go fold the clothes...

Conference Weekend (a month later)

Well, I know I'm about a month late but here are the pictures we took when we went up to Park City for General Conference with the family. Kyle's brother Matt and his family came down from Idaho and spent the weekend with us. This was the only time I brought the camera out so we didn't get too many pictures. Here are Matt, Kyle, Jake, Abbie, Annie, Parker, Lydia, and Gabbie playing in the pool.

Riding down to the pool on Daddy's shoulders.

It's Official...

Gabbie has had her first time being sick. We put her to bed last night at her normal time and then she woke us up at 11:45 crying. I walked into her room and she had thrown up all over her bed, floor, and animals. While I cleaned up, Kyle held her and tried to comfort her because she was super scared and had no idea what was going on. I had to run to the store to get some stuff for her at 12 then we tried to get her to sleep again. As she was dozing off, she threw up again and had to be completely stripped down to her diaper. She finally fell asleep cuddling in my arms with a blanket wrapped around her. Luckily she slept the rest of the night.

So for all those parents out there, what are some things that you do with/for your children when they are sick? (especially when they are still pretty young)

Cool Website

So if you are anything like me, you might get pretty tired of cooking the same thing month after month. I found this super cool website through my ward's blog. It is called Every Day Meals (www.everydaymeals.com). We usually plan out our dinner menu a week or two in advance and we were starting to get pretty tired of eating the same stuff every few weeks and I love to try new things when it comes to food.

This website is awesome. It actually plans out an entire month of meals for you. You can look at things day by day, week by week, or monthly. There is even a place where you can add in your own idea for food instead of what is already on there. Another super cool thing is that the website will generate a grocery list for you (which you can then uncheck the things that you already have at home). There are also a ton of recipes on the site.

We have experimented with the menu on the site for the last couple of weeks and have really liked all the things we made. So, if you want a little less hassle in making and knowing what to make (which is what I sometimes struggle with) then check it out.

One last Obama Post

So, as it has gotten closer and closer to the presidential election, it has seemed that Christy and I have had to repeatedly defend the reason why we are supporting Obama considering that we both were raised in fairly Republican families and we live in a very Republican state.

After itemizing my reasons on Facebook today (at the expense of all of my friends who were spammed because I didn't realize that a notification would be sent for every comment I made to my "status" (I apologize again for the spam) to all of my friends) and realizing that the election is only 3 weeks away, I decided that it might be a good idea to rewrite those reasons here on our blog so that people can better understand why we, two people whose votes for Obama will really not make much of a difference considering we live in Utah, would be such big supporters of him.

In posting this on here, I want it to be known to everyone that neither Christy or I have anything personal against John McCain, Sarah Palin (although she does annoy me on a regular basis), or the McCain Campaign. We have been troubled at times by our perception that he twists the truth or tells half-truths related to Obama's history, but we want it to be known that the only real reason why we do not support him is that we believe that we agree more with Obama than we do with McCain on the direction that our federal government needs to go in the next four years.

We are registered Unaffiliates.

(While I (Kyle) am the sole author of this blog post and take full credit for it's content, Christy has approved that I put it on here and has let me know that she is in agreement with all of the points that I am going to articulate here.)

We support Obama because we believe that trickle-down philosophies of government (the belief that if we support the upper classes and businesses of our country, and ensure that they remain wealthy, their wealth will "trickle-down" to even the lowest within the country and the whole will prosper) are faulty. We believe that prosperity and wealth abound when we "take care of the least among us".

We also support Obama because he believes that our government should have it's priorities centered in America before we should spend billions of dollars overseas fighting undefined wars.

We also support him in that he believes that true Democracy extends beyond our own government meaning that he understands that we need to participate in discourse ... Read Morewith other governments and come to a collective agreement on a course of action before we make decisions that will affect those who may not live on our soil (like, for instance, invading a country that we believe might house terrorists or nuclear weapons).

We also support him because his education policies center around: making sure that teachers are some of the ones who define the assessment of student success (rather than standardized tests), Creating and supporting ELL or ESL programs that try to bridge the language gap for immigrant students by appreciating their native languages and helping them to find common language ground (as opposed to having policies centered around English being the rule (American Native Language) and ELL programs designed to bring the students to the standard), restructuring the tenure idea based on teacher input before assigning merit pay, and budgeting additional federal funding for education.

We also support him because we believe that America's gun control laws need to be reformed. Like him, I believe that there is a big difference between a hunting rifle used in the Utah back-country and an assault rifle used in gangwars in Metro America.

While we disagree with Obama on the position of abortion (We believe that Roe V. Wade should be overturned as we believe that the woman had a choice at the time of intercourse, that there are other options for not having to care for a child (adoption, etc.), and we believe that a baby is a person from the time of their inception), we still support him because we have the belief that the only influence that the president will have on the issue of abortion is his appointment of judges. Because we believe that history has shown us that Supreme Court Judges are independent beings and they often rule different than the way the president who appointed them might have thought that they would, we don't believe that Obama would really have that much of an effect on this issue.

We also support him because he seems to place a priority on diversifying America's Energy usage.

We also support him because he believes in a tiered tax code (that those who make the most money will pay the most taxes and have the least amount of tax breaks, those who make the least will pay the least taxes and have the most tax breaks) and he has... Read More promised that there will be no tax hikes for anyone who makes less than $250,000.

We also support him because I believe that he has shown (through his previous relationships) that he is willing to participate in discourse with people who he doesn't completely agree with and tries to see where they are coming from. In cases of people with extreme ideals and philosophies he has shown that while he listens to them he makes decisions to keep his perspective even after seeing theirs.

Anyway, while I don't think that this is an exhaustive list of reasons why we support Obama, these are likely the biggest.

Tagged

I've been tagged by my friend Megan.

1- where did you meet your husband?
We lived in the same apartment complex. He used to hang around our apartment at the beginning of Fall semester trying to see which girl in the apartment would be nice to date. (Because he was flirty with all the girls in the apartment, I didn't give him the time of day. Plus I was totally crushing on someone else.)

2- what was the first thing you said to your husband?
Maybe something along the lines of: "Leave me alone, It's none of your business." (he was trying to get me to talk about the guy I had a crush on and I barely even knew him then)

3- where was your first date?
He claims that our first date was going out to lunch together. I have never considered that a date because at the time we were both still hung up on our ex's and spent the whole time at lunch talking about them. The summer we started dating, we spent tons of time together. I consider the Fourth of July as our first official 'date'. That's when we both knew we wanted to be together.

4- where was your first kiss?
He's probably going to kill me, but I don't exactly remember. I know we first held hands the night after the 4th while we were on a walk. ( I think it was in our apartment complex lounge while we were watching a movie. It's all running together now. Is it bad to not remember that?)

5- How long did you date for?
We started dating at the beginning of July, got engaged in November, and were married in February.

6- where did you get engaged?
It was during my intern year at Park View and I was there a ton and Kyle usually came to support me so I didn't have to be there by myself. Well on the 15th of November, his mom calls me and says that his sister has a project to do on rocks and she didn't go to the library before it closed so she wanted to know if I could go grab some books from my classroom. It's funny because I totally thought it was legit and on the drive down to Payson, I asked Kyle if he had my dad's phone number so he could call him (little did I know that he already had). So we pull up in front of the school and I get out all ready to go up the stairs and he stops and drops to his knees. Then he asks me to marry him and we see his family across the street hiding behind trees where they are taping it and singing "Kiss the Girl" from the Little Mermaid.

7- when and where were you married?
We got married in the Mount Timpanogos temple on February 17, 2007

8- how did the reception go?
It went really well. We moved the wedding up early so the reception stayed on the original wedding date. It was nice to be laid back. By then, I was already pregnant so we had to have my mom let my dress out so I could still wear it.

9- how was the honeymoon?
It was really nice. We spent a few days up in Park City (i couldn't go too far with school). It was beautiful and quiet. The only bad thing about the honeymoon was that Kyle got super sick the day we left to come home. We had to stop a few times to let him throw up on the side of the road. Then he gave it to me.

10. I tag Chelle, RaeAnna, Missie, Meshelle, Kate

Thanksgiving Point

We love Thanksgiving Point. It has become a haven for us to go and get away from the world. We have been to the Gardens a few times, the Dinosaur Museum, and the Animal Farm. Our favorite place is the waterfall. Gabbie loves to sit and watch all the different falls. There is definitely a feeling of peace here and it makes us feel closer to our Heavenly Father. It also makes us to be grateful for the beautiful earth He has given us.

The view standing across from the falls is amazing. We like to just sit, watch, and ponder on the events going on in our lives.

A beautiful view looking down from the top of one of our favorite gardens that is created to look like an ancient Greek city.

(Our favorite garden, courtesy of thanksgivingpoint.com)
Gabs and Daddy posing for some pictures...

Gabbie watching the water foam before it goes under the bridge to the fall...

Looking down at three of the falls...

Another favorite part of Thanksgiving Point is the animal farm. There are a ton of animals that you get to go visit with. They are used to being fed by people so they come right up to the bars and try to get some food from you. This little animal (I can't remember what it was but I think it was a lamb) wanted us to give it some food but we didn't have any. Gabbie sure did enjoy it coming so close though.

The cool thing about the animals is that you get a ticket for a horse or carriage ride with each person that purchases a ticket. Gabbie took Daddy's ticket and went for her first horse ride. She did not think it was too much fun at first. She was scared and instead of sitting up straight, she sprawled out across the horse to make herself feel safer.

The only time she really smiled was when she was on the opposite side of Mom and a bunch of ladies kept telling saying that she was soo cute. Anytime someone says that, she gets super excited and smiles at them as if to say "Yeah I know I'm cute!"

We love Thanksgiving Point. Because we are members, anyone that goes with us gets in for half off so let me know if you want to go with us the next time we go.

Are You Ready For Some Football?

BYU football season has begun. We were lucky enough this year to have the money saved up to purchase All Sports Passes. Last year we were too late and didn't get tickets to every game so we were super excited. We got all dressed up in the blue colors of our team and were ready to go to the game. First was a stop at Grandma Christensen's. She took some pictures for us so we could document the event.

Here we all are dressed up and ready to go to the first game of the season verse Northern Iowa.

Gabbie dressed up in her BYU shirt and super cute hair bow.

Mom and Gabbie playing before we left for Provo.

Gabs with her Daddy, who can't wait for her to get into the joys of football.

Sitting in our totally awesome seats, 5 rows from the north end zone, waiting for the game to start. Gabbie looked like she got burned really badly but her face is like Mom's in that it turns red when she is hot. Luckily, we have brought tons of sunblock and reapplied it numerous times during all the games.

Gabbie is already becoming a football fan. She loves to move to the music that the band plays during the game and after all the fans in the stadium stop screaming, she joins in and lets everyone know that she is there too. Her cuteness has earned some friends too; there is a young family that sits beside us who have this super cool water spraying thing that they let her use. She loves it! Kyle finally gets to raise his little girl to be a true blue fan.