The Little Mermaid Debate

Matt does not like Disney's "The Little Mermaid" for the following 4 reasons:
1. She is scantily clad through most of the movie
2. She disobeys her father
3. She practices witchcraft
4. And then she gets everything she wants

I love "The Little Mermaid"! I think the music is fantastic, the story is fun and everyone lives happily ever after. I keep trying to explain to Matt that little girls don't see the movie the way he sees it. They just think its a fun, happy movie.

The other day I turned on "The Little Mermaid" cause I hadn't seen it in a long time. Kalianna really liked the bright colors as the fish swam around on screen. I sent a text picture to Matt at work of her playing with the movie box. He was horrified. I still love "The Little Mermaid". Matt still doesn't.

First Solids!

aka rice cereal. And she loved it! Still getting the hang of eating with a spoon, but she was definitely ready for solids and gobbled it up!

Ice Blocking

Thursday I went down to Salt Lake for the day and spent the afternoon with Bryan and his girlfriend, Ricci. She was in Brazil doing study abroad for the last three months, so she hadn't seen Kalianna since she was just a few weeks old! It was fun to hang out with her again. We missed you Ricci! Anyway, the four of us went downtown and walked around temple square for a bit. We stopped by my mom's work so she could show off her grand-daughter a little first. And she also gave us a parking pass. Score! Then later we met up with Kristine and Josh and Ian and went to the park for a picnic of KFC and some ice blocking down the big hill at Flat Iron. Matt and Logan joined us after they got off work. We had a blast and the boys loved it! Hint: The best thing for ice blocking is a diaper! It keeps your butt dry and it sticks well to the ice! (Kristine is the mastermind behind that one)

Gotta Love This Face

Falling asleep on mommy's shoulder

Pay It Forward #2

I got another present from someone's blog offer I responded to. This one is from my friend, Ashlee. She made us an 'I Spy' for church! Thanks Ashlee! I still haven't finished my own presents, but I promise they are still coming!

Free Sunday

First of all, Kalianna rolled over for the first time this morning!! And it was right in front of me so I got to see it. I tried to get her to do it again for daddy, but I guess once was enough for today.

When Matt and I took Institute together, there was a girl in our class who had never heard of General Conference. She was raised in the church but her parents called it "free Sunday" and twice a year they'd go boating on that Sunday or something. Sad, huh? (And yes, also a little funny). Well that's what we've been jokingly calling today. With the Oquirrh Mountain temple dedication, all church meetings have been canceled. Matt and I didn't get tickets, but we are enjoying the day together before school starts this week. Sleeping in, naps, we just finished lunch and now we are going to go on a nice walk together. Its a beautiful day!

Sugar & Spice & Everything Nice

My friend, Aubrey, and I are working on a project together. Aubrey is a photographer and I am a writer, so we are combining our talents and compiling a book of stories and poems about daughters/sisters/motherhood/little girls. And Aubrey is doing photographs to go with our book. That's where you come in. If you, or someone you know, has daughters under the age of 14, Aubrey will be hosting a photo shoot day where you can come and get portraits done for a very small sitting fee. Then we will use our favorite pictures (with your permission) for our book. If you are interested in letting us use your daughter as one of our models, and getting some super cute pictures, please e-mail me your address (pinkstacy@gmail.com) and I will make sure and get you an invitation.

*Any questions or if you have any cute experiences or stories we could write about, please let me know!

Midnight Phone Calls

To the person who text me at 11:00 pm...You suck!

To the person who called Matt at 11:45 pm...You suck too!

Am I missing something here? Since when was it appropriate to call or text people after 10:00 pm?? At the VERY latest?! I don't care if its a cell phone, we leave them on all night in case of emergencies. And I don't care if you think we're night owls. Sometimes we go to bed at midnight, sometimes we go to bed at 9:30. Honestly people. I thought this was common sense.

When do you think its too late to call people? Or too early in the morning?

For me its 10-10. Don't call people after 10:00 pm and don't call people before 10:00 am. There are occasional exceptions. But thats the rule I try and follow.

I think I'm a lizard

I am always cold. It can be 100 degrees outside, and I will be freezing! That is, until I go outside and sit in the sun for awhile. I can not get warm in the mornings, no matter how hard I try, until I've been outside. So you can just imagine how miserable winters can be for me. I can't get warm! Now as much as I love the sun, Fall is actually my favorite season. I love the colors, the brisk air, the "sweater weather'. But for as much as I love the Fall, I'm not ready for it yet! It has been really cool outside lately and all I want to do is put on socks and a fuzzy sweater and sit in front of the fireplace with a cup of hot cocoa. Socks! In August! I never wear socks in August! August is hot, barefeet weather! So beautiful, dear Sun please come back! I'm not ready to part with you yet!

Pandora

I love Pandora.com! If you've never been there, I highly recommend it! Its an online radio station that is completely free and commercial free. You type in a favorite song or a favorite artist and Pandora will find other artists similar to that one, and play only songs it thinks you will like. Pretty cool, right? Well it gets even cooler! You can save more than one station, so when you're in the mood for a certain type of music, you just click on the station you want to listen to. Its a great way to discover new favorite artists and hear new songs. There are also little 'thumbs up' and 'thumbs down' buttons on each song. If you really don't like a song, just click 'thumbs down' and it will never play that song again. If you love a song it plays, click 'thumbs up' and it will be sure to play that song multiple times on your station. I also love that Pandora continues to play, even when you have a different window open! So you can be working on other things on your computer and still listen to great music at the same time. We keep my little pink laptop, Ursula, in our kitchen. (Brownie points for anyone who knows why I named her Ursula. Hint: it has to do with my pink car...) So I can listen to music while I'm cooking and blogging and cleaning. Currently my Jason Mraz station is on. Its a favorite! And when I'm working in other rooms of the house but I still want music, I just plug some speakers in. Its fantastic! Matt said the other day, "why don't we get you an Ipod for Christmas this year?" I said "What do I need an Ipod for when I have Pandora!"

Little Girls

I'm working on a project with my friend and am requesting some help from mothers of daughters. What comes to mind when you think of little girls? Or let me know if you have any cute little girl or daughter stories. Thanks all!

4 Months

Kalianna turned four months on Saturday! Yesterday she had her 4 month checkup and shots. She is now 25.4 inches long. Which puts her in the 89%tile for height! Whereas she weighs 13 lbs 2 oz (38%tile for weight). She's a tall, skinny girl just like her mom! Kalianna's personality is becoming more and more distinct. She is starting to really giggle, which is the best sound in the world! She can completely hold her head up on her own now and she's getting closer with rolling over. She almost never stops talking, which makes going to church or restaurants or anywhere lots of fun. =) She has also learned how to make raspberry sounds with her mouth. She is also much more interested in toys; she has a couple dog rattles that she loves. And everything is starting to go in the mouth. I can't wait till she can start trying new foods.

Pay it Forward

Back in March I did a post on my blog in response to some other people's postings. It included making something for the first five people to respond to my post. But the catch was you had to post the same offer on your own blog. Well last weekend I got my first present! Thanks Krishele! Its beautiful!

Sveta

One of Matt's friends from his mission, Sveta, is in town for a while. Yesterday we had the opportunity to go to lunch with her and visit. Sveta just returned from serving a mission in Russia, so she had some fun stories to tell. It was awesome for Matt to get to use his Latvian for the day, which doesn't happen often. After lunch Sveta wanted to go to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple open house. We didn't have tickets or anything, but my uncle Trevor hooked us up with an invitation that allowed us to get in. It was the last day of the open house, so it was pretty busy. Sveta just amazes me! We were running pretty late and she had to meet a friend in Salt Lake at 4:00pm. But we didn't get to the super crowded open house until about 3:00. The line was moving amazingly fast though and we were able to get through most of it before having to cut out of line and leave. Sveta commented on how the Lord was blessing us so we could see the temple. It made Matt and I realize how often the Lord blesses us and helps us with the small day-to-day things and we don't even realize it! On our way to Salt Lake we got in a conversation about how much we take our temples for granted. In Latvija, the nearest temple is in Sweden. So the members can only go about once a year and when they do go, they go about 20 times in a week. But here we think we're doing good if we go once a month, or 12 times in a year. I'm always amazed when we get to visit with someone from Matt's mission. The members there are so strong!