Meeting Santa Claus for the First Time

On Sat the 11th my mom was in charge of putting on her wards Christmas Party so Kelvin and I headed down to go with them.  When we got to my parents house Dave and Paula happened to be there and said they wanted to go too.  So we all went to see the marvelous job she did and to meet Santa Claus for the very first time.  She actually did really well.  But this didn't surprise me too much because she is s little social butterfly.  It was fun to take pictures of her and that she wasn't scared (perhaps next year will be different).  When it was Samantha's turn, she would NOT sit on his lap.  In fact she was holding onto Paula so tight that when Paula totally let go of her she was hanging onto Paula's neck for the life of her. So funny.  She did however sit on her mom's lap while she sat on Santa's lap.

Hey Santa!!

She would take a candy cane even though it was from "him"!

My little social butterfly makes friends wherever she goes.

Sometimes Daddy Does it Best!

Lydia LOVES her daddy and lately he has been gone a lot while working his two jobs.  So when he is home she takes full advantage of him being with us, including falling asleep in his arms.  There are only 2 people lately that she has fallen asleep in their arms, my dad and her dad.  It was so cute as he was bouncing her on his knee while taking care of some work on the computer and she slowly drifted off to sleep.  This was a huge relief to me as she had been struggling taking naps because she has more teeth coming in and they really hurt her.  So all hail to the daddy's out their who take care of their little ones!

Tristan Mann

After a long wait we are so excited to have our newest little nephew Tristan here with us.  It was a crazy fast labor but Lisa is recovering well and is expecting to come home today.  He was born on the 8th at 3:42 am with less than 4 hours of labor.  Anxious little guy to get here.  I am very sad that we can't be there to hold the sweet little guy but we should be there in about 6 months so he will still be somewhat little.  Anyway congratulations to the Mann's.  We are so happy for you!

Such a sweet little guy!

Mommy and Baby!

Daddy and his little man!

Isabella was so excited to meet "her baby"!  Can't wait to see these two interact. 

Wiggle Time

Unfortunately where we live, there is not a lot of support for young mothers.  There are 2 other couples in our ward with a small child like Lydia, but they both work during the day and there is really not much for us to do or places for us to hang out.  So I went to the Library a couple days ago determined to get out of the house more with my daughter before we both go crazy and found out about a wiggle time they have for infants to 2 1/2 years of age.  I thought we better check it out.  The lady I was getting the info from told me that sometimes the younger kids can find it a little overwhelming, but I just smiled and said if there are kids, dancing and singing she will LOVE it!  Sure enough she did!  We went to our first class today and she had a ball.  She sat speechless for a while just staring at all the kids and everything going on and then she was all active and involved.  She was squealing and laughing the whole time.  I think this will become a good thing for us to do every week.  I now need to find other things that we can go and do on the other days that I get to have the car so we have more opportunity to get out of the house! 

Sunday Social Butterfly

Yesterday while we were sitting in Sacrament meeting everything was going normally.  Lydia was attracting the attention of a man across the isle and started to wave at him.  He was very sweet and seemed to be taken with her and was waving back.  Well after the sacrament she started to walk out of the bench into the isle.  Kelvin made sure that he still had her hand but she was determined to get across the row to the guy and his family on the other side.  Well after a few times when she put her hand out to touch his he picked her up and she had the time of her life the rest of the meeting.  It was kind of nice getting to sit and actually listen to the meeting without a child around to watch.  The guy and his family also had a ball with this little girl of ours and were all immediately smitten with her charm!  They really enjoyed playing with her as was evident of their great big smiles.  After sacrament and sunday school I headed to Young Womens for the first time.  I was quite nervous since I haven't been in Young Womens since I was a teen and they have changed a few things.  But it was really awesome and I loved it.  For those of you who don't know I was called to be the Young Womens personal progress adviser a few weeks ago.  As I walked in and sat down one of the girls came and sat next to me and said that I really needed to bring my baby to young womens.  She was asleep and so went with Kelvin to priesthood but I don't think I'm gonna be able to have her go with him every week since the whole room was in agreement that she needed to come with me.  Great!  That's all teenagers need, another distraction in church! But they were quite insistent and in fact one girl asked if she could babysit.  Then when I said sure she said when!  I was surprised with her intensity but thought it was funny.  I told her that we will probably need someone in a week or two.  So she wrote down her number and gave it to me right then and told me to call her!  So funny!  When we got home I warned Kelvin that he better beware because we might get invaded by a bunch of teenage girls.  He laughed and said it would be just like home.  (He grew up with 2 sisters and no brothers)  At least he'll be used to it.  I'm sure at some point in our marriage he will be with the young mens program and we will be invaded by teenage boys and then I will feel at home! LOL!!!  (I grew up with 5 brothers and no sisters.)  At least I will be able to make all sorts of food and know that it will get eaten by people other than us.  I think this just might work out.  Anyway, it was a fun Sunday and we had many many people come up to us and tel us we had the cutest baby ever.  She is so friendly and interactive.  Sundays may now get interesting!

Festival of Trees and Game Night

Lydia had shown some improvement with her health on Friday and so we decided to keep our plans with our friend Matt and go to the Festival of Trees!  We love going with Matt and once again had a blast.  I do have to say this year was a lot easier than last year as I was 7 months pregnant then and walking around for hours did a number on my feet and back.  This time however, Gregory carried Lydia!  Turnabouts fair play I guess.  While we didn't take pictures of the trees this year, we did take them of the incredible gingerbread houses. 

This was amazing!  It was very appropriately named candy land.  One of the coolest things at the festival.


Gregory really liked this house.


The Holy War house!  We thought it was pretty funny.  When we looked at the trees there were so many that were BYU and U of U. I guess that is what people had on their minds when donating trees.
 

Family Picture!  We took quite a few but they just didn't turn out right.  This is the best one we got unfortunately.


Matt!!  What more can say.  Who knows what this mastermind genius is up to now!



After the festival we all came back to our apartment and hung out for the rest of the afternoon.  That night Gregory and I dropped Lydia off at our friends house and went to have dinner with a work friend of his.  We had a great night!  There was another couple there that Kim and Brian knew and everyone is always afraid of the awkwardness that can accompany not knowing each other but we all got a long really well.  We played a game called the "The Game of Things".  We had so much fun and this game is now on our list of games to buy!  It was so nice to get out and be with other people and not have to worry about the squeaker.  We had a great night and it was just what we needed.  All in all it was a fantastic day!

Is Winter Over Yet???

THAT'S IT!!  I've had it with this blasted cold and sickness season! We are moving to Texas were it is warm 90% of the time.  Lydia has been off her antibiotic for a couple days now and she still isn't acting a whole lot better so I decided to take her into her normal pediatrician to see what he thought.  When I told him everything that the Dr said last week, our pediatrician started to get upset.  He didn't understand why the Dr did what he did or the reasoning behind it.  In fact at one point he stopped what he was doing and looked at me with his face aghast and asked "who was this Dr?"!!  I thought "oh dear!  Is everything okay?"  Luckily, we have a fantastic pediatrician and he was very thorough with his examination today.  The oral antibiotics should have been prescribed for 10 days but were only for 7.  he was not happy about this.  Our Dr told us that the infection can go away in 7 days but has a greater chance to come back and that's why it is usually prescribed for 10 days.  Then when I told him about the ear test, testing her ear drum, he looked at me and "well of course it didn't read on the machine!  There was too much ear wax blocking the sound waves!"  This was also his response to the antibiotic we would put in her ear.  It wouldn't have much of an effect because it couldn't get behind the ear drum to combat the inflammation and infection.  Like I said before, he was NOT happy!  He checked her ears and there was still wax built up so he gently removed it and her ears happily checked out fine.  He then did a good examination and found that she has a sore throat, bad cold and actually has the croup.  Poor little baby!  We got some medicine for the croup and he told me that I had to give it to her this afternoon so she could start to feel better by tomorrow.  If things get worse (and I pray that they don't) there could be some bigger problems to deal with.  I myself am still not feeling great.  I think I might have a cold because I feel all achy and have a bad headache.  I know that this is the season for sickness and so I ask again after dealing with a sick child for almost a month.....Is winter over yet?