My little monster

When Anastasia was starting to learn how to crawl we went through the whole house and thought we got it pretty much baby proof. Now that she is walking, the house will probably never be baby proof again! I have followed her and watch all the stuff that she knows how to get out and move things into those places that are safe for her to pull out. Well I am running out of places to put those things that she shouldn't be touching! So I have given up for the most part, and I am just constantly checking on her when it goes completely silent in the next room. Last night for example Mark and I were just in the kitchen cleaning up and we knew she was in the other room playing with her toys and all of a sudden it goes dead silent, so we hurry into the room to see what she is doing. She somehow found a fortune cookie, and got it open and was eating it! She still has no teeth so we don't know how she got the bag opened and how she broke the cookie into a pieces. Life never get dull with a child who knows how to walk!!! Here are some of the pictures that I took of all her messes that she has made.





she was very proud of herself in this picture!

Little Vacations

A lot has been going on these last couple of weekends, we have been traveling all over the place here in Utah at least. Labor day weekend we went up to Swiss days/Kamas and got some cool stuff and loved to go and see all the cool stuff. Then last weekend we went to St. George for a little family get away and for Mark's cousins wedding. It was a very busy weekend and I didn't get too many chances to take many pictures. So I have a few pictures that I did take, from Labor day weekend we went over to a friends house and got to ride some horses and Anastasia didn't want to get off, it was so fun and so cute to see her love the animals. Then I got some swimming pictures from the St. George trip.
Anastasia has also decided that she wants to walk full time, so she has many bumps on her head and legs from falling all the time. She has now started to walk everywhere and won't crawl that much anymore, it is so fun to have her do that and to watch her do it at such a young age. I still can't believe that in a month and a half she will be 1! It is so crazy how fast this time has gone. We are very excited to celebrate her birthday and to have it a Halloween themed birthday.





She always wants to wear ties.






Sorry the video isn't very long.. She gives up and just wants the camera so I had to make it fast!

Here we go again....

Mark and I are happy to announce that we are having another baby. Today we went and found out the sex of the baby and it is a BOY! SO here comes our little Jonathan, we are very excited and everything looks good. It is a big baby, they even moved my due date up a week! Which I am very excited about, now the due date is Jan. 17th. I know it will be very busy for the first couple of years but I am very excited to have another little friend for Anastasia.

2 Years.....

Now it is my turn. Just over three years ago I met Julie while working as an intern at a firm where she was the secretary. She had a boyfriend, and I had a girlfriend. As we started to get to know each other we hung out and eventually both moved on from our previous relationship and started dating each other. While away at school we had a rocky relationship for a while. After we smoothed things out we decided to get married. We have now been married for two years. While we, as all couples do, have had our ups an downs, I am happy to say there have been many more ups than downs.

Two years ago I thought Julie was my best friend. I promised to love her no matter what. I promised to support her despite her mood swings, stubborn times and occasional blond moments. As I have worked to do this to the best of my ability, I have realized that Julie is much more than my friend. She is my match. My partner. My equal. After fifteen months of marriage Julie gave birth to Anastasia. I had another deepening of my understanding of what she meant to me. The sacrifices that she made for our family amazed me. I love her so much. This video describes even more what Julie, and now Anastasia mean to me. I am so grateful to a merciful Father in Heaven who has seen past my weaknesses to bless me so deeply. I am even more so forever in His debt for the blessings of the women in my life.






I love you hun. Happy Anniversary.

I can't believe it

Today is our Anniversary, It still just boggles my mind that we have been married for two years! It really just seams like yesterday that we were doing the whole wedding day stuff. Looking back on the two years, there has been a lot of ups and a lot of downs. Out of all those ups and downs I am still really glad and happy for where we are and what has changed in our life. I couldn't be happier with where I am today, Mark is my best friend and I would die without having him in my life. I am very grateful for all the crap he has put up with especially all my lovely mood swings. So thanks Mark for all the stuff you put up with and always sticking by me, I love you.

Our Very Eventful Vacation

This past weekend the Hirst family rented out a townhouse in Wolfcreek and we all were together. All 27 of us in one house. It started out as a very good vacation. It was an amazing place to stay. It had a home theater in it, rooms just full with bunk beds, amazing bathrooms, our very own hot tub on the patio and a game room. It was a pretty amazing place.

Come Friday night we were up with Anastasia in the middle of the night with her just screaming. She was thirsty so we made her a bottle and she would drink a little bit of it and then just scream some more. So we knew right away that she had a sore throat and probably needed to go to the doctor to make sure it wasn't anything serious. Saturday morning we drive back to SLC to her pediatrician and they checked her out and she had a rash all over her body and a very bad sore throat and just told us it was viral bug and it will go away in 2-3 days. So we went back up to wolfcreek and continued our vacation. Well, come Saturday night she still wasn't drinking or eating ANYTHING! So we called the on-call doctor and he said if she doesn't have a wet diaper by 7 in the morning you will probably need to take her to the ER to get an IV. All night we just used a syringe to put as much liquid as we could down her, but by 7 am she still had a dry diaper. So she had then gone 36 hours without anything to drink or eat and 12 hours without a wet diaper. To make this story short, we took her to back to SLC to primary childrens hospital to get an IV and we were there from 10-3. IT WAS A LONG DAY, it was very hard to sit there and hold down Anastasia while they put the IV in her.
After they were done with the IV they wanted her to drink some liquid before she could go home, and of course she still wouldn't drink anything. So we went with the option of leaving the IV in her (in case she didn't drink anything and we had to take her back for more fluids) and having it taken out the next day. Monday was a long day also. Waiting until our 3pm doctors appointment was not very fun because it hurt her to crawl and to do anything. So she was very fussy all day. Now she is all healthy and back to normal which is WONDERFUL!!!!
Sorry that was such a long story, and if there are alot of errors.


Here are a couple of the pictures that I got a chance to take while we were up there.

Fun day at the Zoo

This past weekend we went to the Zoo with Nicole, Daniel and Liz. Anastasia loved all the animals and watching all the kids run around. We also got to see the new baby Giraffe, he was two days old! It was so cute and so little. We had a lot of fun but by the time noon came around it was so HOT, we decided it was time to go home. I am glad we went right when it opened because it was the perfect temperature. When we were leaving there were no parking spaces and people were walking long distances to get to the zoo, just to see the new giraffe.

Most kids like to watch the T.V. but not mine....

We were doing our normal washing of the clothes and Anastasia has always loved to watch the washing machine. She will sit there almost the whole cycle and just watch it. Who needs a T.V. when you have a washing machine! She is so funny...

Happy 4th of July

This past weekend we had quite the full weekend. On Friday Mark and I went to Lagoon and rode rides without our child. It was nice to get out and be alone for a while and just play. Then Friday night we went to my brother Mike's house to do the traditional Eaglewood fireworks. They always do such a great show and have amazing fireworks. When the fireworks started I wasn't sure how Anastasia was going to act with the loud noise. To our surprise the first one went off and then she started to laugh so everytime one went off she just giggled. It was very cute and entertained us all. I wasn't expecting her to act that way but I was glad she was laughing and not crying through the whole show. Then on Saturday we went up to Kaysville to watch the parade and then came home and we all took a long nap. So we didn't end up doing much on Saturday night because we were all tired and ready to just rest up. It was fun to be with family and friends.
All the kids got glow sticks for the fireworks and she thought it was really cool.

Right before we hiked up a HUGE hill to get to the fireworks

Her cute 4th outfit


This is how tired she was after the whole weekend. She just fell over and went to sleep in his arms

So today I needed to run and answer the phone and I went back into the family room thinking she was in there still playing with her toys. She was no where in site so I started to search the house and I found her here, in the bathroom pulling everything out! She just looked up at me and smiled and just finished what she was doing! She is pretty crazy but alot of fun! Lets just say my house is always a mess, no matter how many times I follow her and pick things up it is out in less then 30 seconds.

I can't believe it.

I was just thinking back on how fast time has really gone by with this daughter of mine! So I was going through all those cute pictures back when she was first born and how small and cuddly they are. Then just 8 months later they are crawling, standing, and trying to walk, pulling everything down from where you thought they couldn't reach. Finding them in places you didn't know how they got there in the first place, or how they are going to get out. It is has been so fun to watch her grow and interact with everyone and just learn so much. She is just learning so fast and I will be chasing her around the house in probably a month. I just can't believe how much time has passed. So when you do have children you really do need to enjoy the time you have when they will just sleep in your arms and go so many places and they don't even notice they have gone anywhere because they have slept through the whole thing. At the same time it is so fun to have them play at the park and just to get all the kids and keep up with them and interact with them. All stages with kids are really fun and make the most of every stage. That is pretty much what I have concluded with in my own mind.

Here is picture of the day after she was born and then of now.