Gone green

We're big fans of any holiday you get to celebrate by dressing up ridiculously and eating themed food. So obviously, after getting home from a week in Utah on Wednesday night, Thursday morning I left all of our luggage and laundry all over the house and got our green on for the parade!

Because we're die-hards, we got downtown early and scored prime curb spots.

Spotted our friends the Turners. Addy is a dork after my own heart.

Because the weather was amazing we walk a little farther down after the parade to see the canal dyed green. It was much brighter than it looks in this picture.

And, St. Patty's day happens to be Daf's 6 month birthday. She celebrate by licking the frosting off half a cupcake.

She was pretty pleased about it.

It's a girl thing

Have I ever mentioned that I love having a little girl? I mean, I'm sure I'd be crazy about a boy if I'd had one. But you can't (or at least shouldn't) do this with a boy...

manicuresMascara
So fun. And she's not even 6 months yet. I've got years of girl fun ahead of me!

5 months

My special someone hit 5 months last week. She is more fun than ever. Now she has mastered the art of rolling and can almost sit up on her own. She sleeps pretty well, but still insists on being swaddles. She's also in what we call her "zombie stage." When she sees something she wants, she reaches out for it with two hands, drools a little bit and grunts until she gets it.

Daphne loves to watch other kids and also loves to watch tv. She thinks our dogs are the funniest things in the world. We've started feeding her solid foods and she seems to enjoy 'em.

Daffy usually takes two two hour naps every day. It's so nice to have my hands and attention free during those time, but I have to say that I look forward to her waking up because I just can't get enough of the girl!

Happy happy happy

This time next month I'm going to be here:

Visiting some very special people. Am I excited? You betcha!

I'm so grateful my husband is a student right now so we get Spring Break. Speaking of spring, it's a glorious 65 degrees today. I spent an hour outside and it didn't even bother me that I spent that hour picking up dog poop. We are ready for some sumptuous weather.

Doesn't great weather just fill you with hope and make you feel optimistic?
Me too!

Hope you're having a day filled with love and happiness.

Saturday night we went to the annual V-day ball that the dental school puts on. It's so fun to get dressed up fancy and go dancing with our friends.

We've made our heart shaped sugar cookies and we have some pink flowers on the table. Tonight the three of us are going to have a lovely dinner, with diner's choice of baby oatmeal or manicotti.

Lots of love to you!

OPRAH!

Did you watch Oprah on Wednesday? Me neither. But if you had, and you hit pause at just the right second when two guests were walking out of the back tunnel you would have seen me and three of my friends wildly jumping up and down and pretending for all the world like we knew who those two people were and we were exccited about it.

That's right, I went to see Oprah a week and a half ago. Now, I know what you're thinking... Doesn't Oprah always give her studio audience some fabulous prize during the course of the show? You'll have to wait to hear about that.

Early Friday morning Jenna, Lindsey, Kim and I squeezed into my car and headed for Chicago. Thankfully, the roads were clear of ice and snow and weather was great. When we arrived we had a few hours to kill so we had breakfast at Le Peep and perused the Oprah Store. Did you know you can buy items from Oprah's personal wardrobe? (Is that the smell of success or body odor?)

We then trudged back through the knee deep snow to Harpo Studios where we waited an additional 2.5 hours for our show to start.

Having to sit backstage for so long did afford its amusements. We saw Jennifer Hudson being literally carried onto the stage by two assistants because her stilettos were about six inches tall and needle thin. We also saw some guy from Project Runway being escorted past us. We got to hear them both being interviewed about how Oprah has changed them, the world, etc.

Finally it was time. The theme was Soap Opera stars. I was severely disappointed no characters from my Soap, Days, were featured. And to be perfectly honest, it wasn't as overwhelmingly awesome I expected, but it was definitely cool.

After the show we had an amazing dinner at Maggiano's, (more lemon aioli sauce, please!) And headed to our hotel. I felt like I was back at BYU living with roommates. Talked and laughed long into the night then fell asleep just after 11pm. What can I say, we're all moms of little babies and looked forward to a restful, full night of sleep.

We headed home to our babies early Saturday morning and after one blizzard and a 45 segment of stand still traffic we made it home.

I can't even emphasize how much fun I had with these girls. I could do without Oprah. Give me a weekend with friends any time!

Oh yeah, our fabulous prizes...nada. No cruise, no car, not even a pencil. Can you even believe it? Oh well, the memory is the real treasure, right?

(Ellen DeGeneres, if you're reading this, you are now and will always be my favorite. You are way better than Oprah and I would love to come to your twelve days of Christmas show next year.)

Ice, ice baby!

Here in the midwest we got hit hard by the icestorm of 2011. The Monday before it hit we joined other frenzied Hoosiers in our preparations for the big freeze. After listening to the forecasts and dire warning of impending weather, we headed to walmart where we filled a cart with milk, flashlights, bottled water and 6 cases of firewood. We were ready for every possible scenario.

As it turned out, our power lines stayed on, we didn't get iced in and everything was fine. What we did get was three days of school canceled for Bryce. We loved the time together with nothing else to do but sit around in our pajamas playing wii, drooling over our adorable baby and taking lots of long naps. We also played on the ice and felt grateful we didn't have it very bad. My biggest concern through all the drama of weather alerts and frozen roads was that I wouldn't get to go to Chicago to see Oprah (next post).

Right now it 51 degrees, and our driveway is visible for the first time in 2 weeks. Looks and feels a lot like spring...I'm keeping my fingers crossed.