Christmas time

This time of year is my favorite for many reasons, and I am so happy that I've got 90% of my decorations up! The only thing missing is a tree. This year, we're opting for a small 4 ft or so tree to save money, and because we're going to be in Roosevelt for Christmas.

As I have grown older, I have realized more and more the importance and true meaning of Christmas and I can't help but say that I feel I have been blessed beyond all measure throughout my life. Even when I feel like times are tough and I may not be able to have everything I want, I am so thankful to have the basic necessities of life. I have definitely taken this for granted, and I hope that as I continue to mature and age I can realize the tender mercies and beautiful blessings around me more.

One thing I am extremely grateful for at this time of year is my family. I am so thankful to have all of my family within a few hours drive. It brings about a sense of security that I didn't know I had until we moved all the way across the country for the summer.

Our future is very much up in the air right now and I want to be able to have no regrets about the time I have left living so close to family and having that support near-by. Because this may or may not be our last Christmas in Utah, we are trying to do many fun things here and spend a lot of time with family and close friends before we're off to other adventures!

I'm looking forward to the upcoming month of December. I am so excited to start some traditions of our own with our little family and teach Ellie the traditions we each have brought into our family. I'm extra excited for Ellie's reactions to things like the Christmas tree once it's all decorated, the present opening and the toys that Santa will be bringing her!

This year went by SO quickly and as I think about how November is leaving us and December is knocking at the door, I'm feeling very bittersweet because that means my sweet little baby is turning 1! I am so thankful for her and every single day I get to stay home with her and watch her learn and grow!

I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas and you all get to do amazingly fun things this year!

731 days of wedded bliss...

On Sunday, we had officially been married for 2 years! I asked David & he said it was a better 2 years than his mission (thank goodness :D :D)

We celebrated our 2nd anniversary first, by attending the Temple. What a great way to celebrate being married! We hadn't had the opportunity to go to the Temple since February, so it was GREAT to go.

The Friday before our actual anniversary, we went out to dinner without Ellie (Thanks again, Hillary!!!) to P.F. Chang's. I'm not HUGE into Chinese, but this was spectacular. Lettuce wraps. MMM I think I could eat those every day. After dinner, we ran home to grab a blanket & to leave our car at our apartment so we could walk to the Roof Top Concert Series. It was a blast & a nice low-key evening out with my sweet husband.

The only picture from that night. ha ha

I made David a gift basket full of fun things & he got me a couple cami's that I've been dying to buy for the last few months!

We headed to Roosevelt the next day for Labor Day weekend, & we had a fun time there. Post about that to come soon!

Some days it feels like we've been married for years and years, but at the same time it feels like we were just married yesterday! Marriage is my favorite thing ever & marrying David was the best decision I've ever made. The 2nd best decision was having Ellie :)

3 months old!

Ellie turned 3 months old on April Fool's day, but it was no joke! It's crazy how quickly she's growing up and how much she changes day-to-day. I wish she could be little forever, but I know she'll just get more fun as time goes on. She's starting to do more and more fun things, and I love to see her grow and progress!!

Here are some notable things about Ellie at 3 months:

• She loves to eat her hands still, and sometimes she'll even try to suck on her binky AND her fingers. It's pretty hilarious to watch.

• She's gotten to the point where she actually likes tummy time and can really lift her head and upper body.

• She still really loves bath time and is learning that if she kicks her legs, water goes all over.

• She LOVES to talk to us and it's almost like she's having a conversation with us.

• She doesn't like the sound of the vacuum. It scares her and makes her cry a lot.

• She is getting to the point where she likes to sit in the swing, but it's still not her favorite.

• She doesn't like to be left in a room alone for more than 5 seconds, and she'll let you know it, too!

• She is still wearing 0-3 clothes and size 1-2 diapers.

• She weighs about 12 lbs 2 oz and is 23 ish inches long.

• She laughed for the first time on April 1st right before I left for work, and it gave me something happy to think about as I had to leave her with her sitter for the afternoon.

• She rolled over for the first time while we were getting her 3 month pictures taken, and she was VERY confused as to what had happened.

• She is SUCH a mommy's girl, and is always SO happy when I get home from work, and almost always demands that I nurse her the second I get home, regardless of when she ate last.

• She still loves to snuggle and falls asleep easily in our arms when she's tired.

• She doesn't like to lie down on anyone's lap, and if she has a hold of your hands, she tries to pull herself into a sitting position. She also REALLY likes to stand and bounce.

• When she's fussy in the car, all I have to do is start singing, and she'll instantly calm down and sleep.
  

I am sad to report that the lovely nights are gone, and we're back to the early days when Ellie didn't sleep through the night. She was being such a perfect little girl until just after the 3 month mark. She decided that she doesn't want to sleep through the night anymore, and that made me very very sad. Instead, she thinks that waking up every 2-3 hours during the night is much better, and fun! I kind of HATE how she's such a happy little girl at 3 a.m. and wants nothing more but to smile and coo at me. But at the same time, it's so hard to be mad that you're awake when you get to witness such sweetness from her. I guess I should have known that she wouldn't sleep through the night forever! I am thankful, however that she let me sleep all night for so long!

Ellie's such a cutie pie and we love to have her around! Funny thing about Ellie as of late...she has taken to mimicking us pretty well, and it is pretty awesome. About 3 weeks ago I started making faces at her including making noise while poking my tongue in and out of my mouth, well about 1 week ago, she discovered her tongue! She LOVES to stick her tongue out and thinks it's the funniest thing!

Exhibit A:
While getting her 3 month pictures taken, she stuck her little tongue out, and they caught it before she stuck it back in. I think it's the cutest thing ever, and she makes me laugh so much with the faces she pulls!

I'm so thankful to have this little sweet pea in my life and I love her SO so much! I honestly don't know what I'd do without her! She's the best and David and I can't imagine not having her in our lives.

Pictures from V-Day

So, I found the cable to my camera on the shelf of the computer desk. Right in front of my nose. Figures!

Here are the pics from V-Day and throughout the last month or so.

David and I decided to decorate cookies for V-Day and did so on Sunday. We had a lot of fun and the cookies were quite yummy, too!

This is the necklace & earring set David got for me.

Flowers and jewelry. Yay! :)

Valentine's Day Fun

I have a sweetheart of a hubby. Valentine's morning, while I was still in bed, he presented me with flowers. :) It was very sweet, and very unexpected.

After I got up, he had left a bag from my favorite boutique sitting on the counter. Inside of it was a necklace and earring set.

I decided to get D a box of See's chocolates for V-Day because he LOOOOVES sweets. He's lucky it hasn't all caught up to him yet--hopefully it never does! ;)

We gave Ellie the CUTEST little book called "I Love you Through and Through." She seems to like to listen to us read it to her, but it will be fun when she really enjoys story time more.

Because I have one of the best friends ever, D and I got to go out for dinner Valentine's night. She ditched FHE to come babysit! (THANKS SO MUCH HILLARY!! We LOVE Hillary lots and lots!!) We chose to go to Applebee's and luckily we didn't have to wait for a million years to be seated! I should have chosen something else to eat--because what I got (Some kind of southwest lime chicken or something) wasn't the best--but hey, I enjoyed my time alone D and the break from my house.

Before we got back from dinner--we stopped at a Redbox to get the movie "You Again". We started watching it, and D decided it was "too much" and "too cheesy" for him. So we stopped watching it and watched a couple episodes of "Lie to Me" on instant view Netflix instead.

As always when watching ANYTHING after 10 p.m., I fell asleep on the couch. After the second episode was over, D woke me up and was going to carry me to bed until I refused and told him I could walk.

Overall, a very happy V-Day. :)

I LOVE my hubby, and I'm thankful that he makes me feel special all the time, and not just on V-Day.

I'll have to put pictures up another time, because I can't locate the cable for my camera right now...

Stay tuned!

Baby Grigs updates

Where does the time keep going?? I swear it was only yesterday when I was all fidgety and anxious to find out if we were having a little boy or girl, and now I've only got 104 days left to go!

I'm at 25 weeks, 1 day today and things are going pretty well. I have an appointment on Tuesday to check up on things and I actually have a list of questions this time! Go me! I hate how every time I'm at the Dr. I can never think of questions to ask, but this time I am bringing a list of questions I have so I can remember what to ask.

Notable things about the past four-five weeks of pregnancy include:

• my belly button is starting to poke out on the top! AH! It's crazy!
• I'm finally looking somewhat pregnant, instead of just chubby.
• I've been exercising more which helps me feel loads better @ work while I sit at a desk for 8 hours (yuck!)
• My back is hurting more and more every day.
• Baby Grigs is almost always awake and kicking/rolling/punching/dancing/moving like crazy around 1-1:30 p.m., 3 p.m., 7:30 p.m., and bedtime.
• I feel incredible love for this little bundle of joy more and more each day, and I can't wait to meet her!
  

I'm starting to become more and more uncomfortable every day. It's very rare that I sleep through the night because I tend to get pretty uncomfortable in the middle of the night. And to think...I still have 14 weeks and 6 days before I'm due! I don't want to imagine the discomfort I'll be in during the coming weeks! It's all totally worth it (or so they say) because once she's here, I am sure I'll forgive her of any and all discomfort she's put me through.

According to thebump.com,
"Baby's now the size of an eggplant!
That oh-so-handy sense of equilibrium is kicking in, and baby's learning to distinguish right side up from upside down."

I can't believe this pregnancy is going by so quickly and it won't be too long until we get to meet her! Every day, I get more excited and more nervous thinking about her arrival. I am also super paranoid. It's ridiculous how paranoid I get about silly little things, but hey, I just want to do everything right so I don't screw something up, okay?

Anyway, I'd love to keep writing, but I'm very uncomfortable sitting in this chair.

Take a look @ a picture of the bump created by Baby Grigs.


This was at around 24 weeks.


until next time...

First anniversary

On September 4th, we celebrated our first anniversary. Can you believe it?? Where did the time go??? For our anniversary, we had crepes for breakfast, then decided to exchange gifts. Because the traditional gift for the 1st year is paper, I made David a picture book of our first year together, and got him a gift card to Amazon.com. He sent me on a scavenger hunt which was somewhat frustrating--because I don't like when I can't figure things out--and at the end of the hunt, there was a beautiful 160 GB iPod Classic just for me! Do I have a great hubby or what? ;) David also gave me roses, and they were very beautiful. We mustn't forget how we ate the top layer of our wedding cake! It was still pretty good considering it's been in a freezer for a year! Good job, Tabitha! I looooved our wedding cake!

Top layer of our wedding cake! Yum!

Roses from David.

After the gift giving, we got ready to go to the Draper Temple. I love that Temple (and all the others, too) SO much! The Draper Temple is so beautiful inside and I loved being there again. It brought back tons and tons of memories of our wedding day, and it was probably my favorite part of the day.


When there's nobody to take a picture for you, this is the kind of picture you end up with. :)

After we went to the Temple, we headed up to downtown SLC for dinner @ The Roof (Tenth floor of the Joseph Smith Memorial Building). The food was delicious, the atmosphere was perfect and we had an awesome view of the Salt Lake Temple from our table.

View of the Salt Lake Temple from our table.

Overall, our anniversary was GREAT! We kinda celebrated in two parts, because the Inn we wanted to go to that weekend was booked solid. This past weekend, we went up to the Inn at Snow Meadows at@ Bear Lake. We saw Bear Lake, played in the water a bit, and had an enjoyable time @ the Inn. Saturday morning, we had seriously the BEST breakfast I have ever had in my life. Super loaded omelets, Belgian waffles, hash browns, you name it, we had it! After breakfast, we got a raspberry shake (of course!) and headed to Logan. We walked around campus and drove around the town until we decided to leave.

Check out the pictures from Bear Lake:

We stayed in the "Fishing Room" and this was our super cozy bed.

I think this bathroom was bigger than our bedroom here in Provo! I was so nice!

There was a cozy little couch in our room as well.




Our Saturday of play ended with a trip to Ikea to find a great lamp for our bedroom, bumming at home and watching Date Night.

I think our fist anniversary was a hit all around--even if we celebrated two weekends. I'm so happy I met David way back when, and that we ended up together. I love him with all my heart and he's the best thing that's ever happened to me! Here's to many more anniversaries to come!

New Song

So, here are the cheesy lyrics to my new song...I wrote it all tonight. It took about 2 1/2 hours.

It has no title yet and I'm kinda chicken to put it up here, and I don't know how I feel about it quite yet, so just enjoy it and don't think I'm too much of a nerd!

title of the song goes *here* when and if it ever develops!

Verse 1:
Way back when she met him
it's like she wasn't there
he never paid attention
he never showed her care
then life moved on, they parted ways
she told herself, "There's better days."
The start of her crushed heart

Chorus:
It's alright, she'd always say
love will come to me someday
there's always something new to learn
this time, it's just not my turn.
I know my prince will come.

Verse 2:
Then grown up, much older
she thought she found the one
all her friends had told her
"girl, your heart is won!"
they made some plans, holding hands
but before too long, he'd be gone
apart is her crushed heart.

Chorus

Bridge:
she didn't see it quite like this
no she would have never guessed
so deep from her past
could it finally last?
He came back around
and she's now found.

Chorus modified:
'cause it's alright, she'll still say
love has come to me and hey
there's still something new to learn
even though, it's (could be) my turn.

Yeah, it's alright, she'll still say
love has come to me and hey,
there's still something new to learn
even though it's my turn.
I know my price has come!

So, this song basically is about my love life. However, if I tried writing one song for all the heartbreaks I've had, I think I could out-write most artists! Now, I haven't REALLY found love...it's too soon to tell, but this song was party inspired by a handsome man I've recently developed some feelings for....and I'm done writing before I spill my guts out! There's just something about a blog that makes you want to say so much! Good night blogging world!

Constructive criticism is always welcome, so please comment!