big island

pre-marriage, ryan and i have both spent a lot of time in hawaii. ryan did his first two years of school at byu-h and he lived in kauai after he graduated byu and led SCUBA dives. i did one summer at byu-h and have been on vacation a lot there, but we've never been there together! and together is funnest.

the first few days our oahu friends brooke and thomas came to visit us. we love them! we did some exploring and got enough sunburns to last us the rest of the week. ryan and thomas even jumped off the southernest point of USA.

apparently i have been watching too much bachelor lately, since i got the idea that we needed to go on a helicopter ride. i've never been on one before but i wanted to see some lava. the helicopter was cool and the lava was hot. it's not like lava exploding from a volcano and burning your leg off. it was pretty tame. but lava is lava. lava lava lava.

we had some good beach time too, but i don't have pictures of that because i am too afraid of sand and robbers to take my camera to the beach.

i also don't have pictures of the manta ray night dive we did. definitely a highlight and seriously amazing. there were 17 manta rays the night of our dive. you sit on the bottom of the ocean (about 35 ft down) and shine your flashlight up, and the manta rays swim just right over your head. you could touch them. they are 10-20 feet across and so graceful. too cool to be freaky. but freaky.

did you notice yet that we left arden at home? well we did. my parents were good enough to not only let us stay in their kona condo for the week, but volunteered to watch arden. if that is not a good deal i don't know what is. arden had a great time with her grandparents. we were ready to come home because we missed arden but she was not very excited to come home with us. aloha!

arden thirteen months

arden is now 13 months old. arden is a big time sweet heart. she gives big hugs to her dolls and teddy bears. i never thought i'd be jealous of a teddy bear.

every morning she finds her toy pile and throws all her toys out of the basket, then she is done with her toys for the day. and goes on to exploring the rest of the house. she likes emptying cupboards and drawers. she loves pulling her dad's records off the shelves. i am pretty lenient about that but ryan is not as excited about it.

if arden needs help now she will grab something and crawl over to me until i help her. if she wants something she can't get she will point to it and yell until she gets it or gets distracted by something else. arden loves music and dances if something good comes on. still not walking nor intrested in walking. she sprouted two teeth this week (top front and top molar) and two more are about to come in.

arden has figured out how to go up stairs and down stairs (kind of) and how to get off couches and beds. here is a video of her getting off the bed. this girl has no fear.

arden's first birthday

arden's first birthday was feb 20, we sang happy birthday to her all day and i let her eat all her favorite foods: applesauce, goldfish, clementines, yogurt, refried beans. all at the same time. she got new shoes and toys and books.

we had a little birthday party on saturday to celebrate arden's first birthday. i put up some purple banners and purple balloons and picked up some cupcakes. of course i panicked saturday morning when it started blizzarding. but luckily it slowed down for a few hours in the afternoon.

we let arden choose her future by setting her in front of 5 objects representing her becoming artistic, scholarly, wealthy, musical, or athletic.

she crawled up and looked at the 5 things for a good minute before deciding on the money (wealthy). smart girl. she chose musical second.

we sang happy birthday to arden (beautiful cake made by sara)

but she was more interested in the balloons and not so much in the cake

she got into it a little bit but didn't seem to like the frosting on her fingers and didn't really want to eat it. maybe she is not used to eating purple food?

party photos courtesy of my mom

it was really fun to celebrate our sweet girl turning one. thanks to our family and friends that celebrated with us! i can't believe i have a 1 year old and she is the most special person i know. happy birthday arden! and to me because i turned 28 last week. and to my mom whose birthday was yesterday! this is just a great week for being born.

arden twelve months

well we did it, we all made it to one year, now we have a crazy little toddler on our hands. miss arden seems to get more personality every day. at twelve months arden's favorite thing is the dishwasher. if i open it and she is in another room she will drop everything and crawl so fast over to the dishwasher and try to grab the dishes out.

arden loves to point at things and people and especially balloons still floating around from valentine's day and her birthday party.

arden does not like wearing bows. she loves pulling bows out of her hair and they last no longer than 10 seconds in her hair. i have tried every trick. do you have any other tricks? people still think she is a boy even at church when she is wearing a dress and tights.

arden loves to put her blanket on her head. sometimes she will just leave it on and crawl around and bump into things.

arden is an expert and getting up and down from standing and is great at walking along furniture. she is not showing any interest in walking or standing on her own. if i go to set her down she will not put her feet down no longer how long i hold her 3 inches from the ground.

arden loves electronics. does she love them because we love them? or are computers just that great. sometimes i let her pound on the keyboard and it takes me a long time to figure out how to undo what she does.

well that is a wrap, i made it twelve months of blogging about arden's highlights and favorite things. i'm really glad i did because i have referenced this blog a lot since i have mom brain and can't remember when any milestones happened and i already forgot what she was like as a little baby and i kept a baby journal for a max of two days. i haven't decided if i will keep doing monthly updates, maybe i will until she is 2. or maybe i will just when something cool happens. but i think something cool is everything she does, so.

12 month stats:
height: 29.5 in, 63%
weight: 21.7 lbs, 60%
head: 17.9 in, 62%

arden eleven months

arden is now eleven months old. IS WHAT? almost one year. old.

at eleven months, arden loves books. i think her first non mama/dada word is "book". she waves bye, excels at patticake, and still loves exploring. she loves standing. she learned how to pull up in the past month and i swear she will just stand up for 30 minutes at a time and just look around at her domain. she just learned how to get down from standing a few days ago so maybe that is why she was standing for so long.

at eleven months, arden has dropped her morning nap. what? she finally is regularly sleeping well at night and then she decides she only needs one nap. not cool.

we sure love this girl. there is just nothing better.

arden ten months

 baby arden has now passed the 10 month mark. she had a big month, she started crawling and she sprouted her first two teeth. it's amazing to me how fast she picks up things. one day she spinning in circles, the next day she does a few scoots forward, and then i blink my eyes and she is crawling all over the house at lightning speed.

 at ten months, arden's favorite thing is exploring everything. her toys are only fun for a few minutes but remote controls, wires, drawers, chair legs, any pieces of trash, and plastic bags are endlessly enticing. she also has learned how to clap and loves to play peekaboo. she loves eating everything we are eating. if we're eating dinner and she has baby food, she refuses the baby food and only wants what we're having, and only off our utensils. which is fine with me, i'm happy to not have to make baby food anymore. her least favorite thing is getting her nose wiped, which is unfortunate because it seems like she has had a runny nose for 2 straight months.

thanksgiving

we had a really great and low key thanksgiving. we cooked a little thanksgiving dinner for us and for auntie stacey who was in town. i like cooking but don't really have time most days, so it was fun to have a day to cook and i think it all turned out great.

normally i do not get thanksgiving leftovers since i do not cook or host the dinner. but this year i still have so many leftovers, even though i bought the smallest turkey i could find (11 lbs). i have had enough turkey and pie to last me until the thanksgiving after the next thanksgiving.

this is the pie that i made from our halloween pumpkins. it was amazing, and i don't really like pie or pumpkin pie. but, it's mostly sugar and spices so who wouldn't.

happy thanksgiving! and now we do christmas.

arden nine months

arden is nine months old now and just gets more and more fun everyday. she is so social, i cannot take her anywhere without strangers stopping to baby talk with her.

we had our first big snow storm a few weekends ago, we got about 18" at our house and i think arden was pretty fascinated by the snow.

at nine months old, arden's favorite things are being in her jumperoo, laughing with you, putting fingers in other people's mouths, watching me clap, her bunny, and the abc song.

arden's least favorite thing is being quiet. she is non-stop chatter and squeals. i love it.

hanging out with cute baby friends hazel and penny and parker.

9 month stats:
height: 27.8 in, 58%
weight: 19.9 lbs, 70%
head: 17.7 in, 79%

halloween

it's official, holidays are 100x more fun with a baby.

even when the baby goes to bed at 7:30 and has no idea what is going on.

happy halloween! from baby arden our little fishy

arden eight months

baby arden is 8 months old now. sometimes when i go to pick her up from her naps i think who is this little toddler in my baby's bed? i wonder how other moms do not get sad to see their babies grow up so quickly. do you? i know for everything she grows out of i get something more and i am loving each stage, but it seems like it is all too fast and i'm already thinking she will be one year old soon. maybe this is why people have more babies. ?

anyway, we have been enjoying the beautiful fall season.

arden has been a much better sleeper these days. we did some "sleep training" at 6 months and now she goes to sleep on her own and sleeps pretty good at night. she will still usually wake up once but otherwise sleeps from 7:30 to 7:30. it is amazing. and by sleep training i mean cry it out, btw. you can judge me when you go 6 months without a decent nights sleep. we're all happy now.

at 8 months old, arden loves bath time in the big tub and her toyboat. arden loves thinking about crawling, but so far has only figured out how to move backwards which makes her mad. arden is loving all solids, especially butternut squash and peas and of course pears. arden loves the wind and crunching leaves in her hand and trying to eat leaves. and looking at the washing machine.

at 8 months old, arden suddenly doesn't like getting her diaper changed. and she hates avocado. more for me.

i love my girl. this video is not that interesting. it basically shows me trying to train arden to say "mama". and then when she says it in public i act surprised and delighted. well, i'm delighted. but i act surprised.