Our life

Once again I am posting for the last few weeks, its been a whirlwind in our household and will continue to be so the rest of the holiday season so most likely there won't be another post til January. Sophie started walking the day after her 11month mark on November 20th! At first she wasn't that confident in herself but after a few days she's been cruising everywhere and already is trying to run. Her vocabulary consists of Mama, Daddy/dada, seven (we think she's trying to say sophie but hasn't gotten it yet), ba for ball and bottle, "Where did Daddy go?"- at least thats what it sounds like: she did that the other day when Cory called us from work and after we hung up she handed me the phone and said what I thought was where did daddy go so i had to call him back. :) The other phrase she says is if she wakes up during the night (which is rare) and Cory goes in to get her is "I want my mama"- again this is what it sounds like but she will repeat it over and over and cry until I take her. She loves to eat fruit, anything from the grain family, and cheese and meat but veggies are another story she likes corn and peas alone but everything else is a challenge that I end up mixing in with whatever else she is eating so she doesn't realize that she's having vegetables for dinner. The weird thing is she'll eat her veggies if they are the star of the show like if I make veggie strata, mac n cheese (that has squash mixed into the cheese mixture), or ratatouille tart but if they are a side dish then she is more likely to reject them.

It is such a joy seeing her grow and gain more of her personality each day! She loves to pretend to do her hair infront of the mirror while I'm getting ready for the day, is VERY attentive to the oven if there's anything baking she'll always make sure to be close to the kitchen so she can pop her head around the counter and look at the oven to see if its ready and the second the oven beeps that its done she gets all excited and starts jabbering and hurries over to the kitchen to watch me take the food out. it is very cute but somedays taxing cause I always have to make sure she's a safe distant away before I open the oven door. She loves to dance, play with balls, going outside, playing with her blocks, attempting to eat paper/cardboard, and loves to watch basketball.That is the latest update for our BabyGirl, who's going to be ONE in a few weeks!

Over Thanksgiving we decided to take a road trip out to Denver just to see the sights and check out the area. We went to the museums, checked out Cherry Creek Mall, went to the Denver Temple, drove past the Bronco Stadium, walked around downtown, and explored all the neighborhoods to get a feel of the area incase we ever move out of Utah and decide to live in Colorado. We checked out the Red Rock Amphitheater out in Morrison which is where they hold concerts during the summer, it was amazing to see and even though they don't hold concerts during the winter months it still gets a lot of use from the locals. It is a great place to run stairs or zig-zag your way up the aisles to the very top. And on the day we went there was even a boot camp class being held! On the way home we stopped in Boulder and drove up one of their mountain passes. I personally liked Boulder over Denver because its nestled at the foot of the mountains and has easy access to all the outdoor rec but I can settle in Denver too. Overall though Colorado seemed like it would fit our lifestyle well: family oriented, 300+ days of sunshine (a must in my book after experiencing gloomy newport for 4 months), LOTS of bike paths and running trails throughout the cities (colorado has been voted the healthiest state for years), great shopping, great restaurants, and lots of cultural things to do as well. The only downside I would have to say is while in Denver it was strange to see the mountains on one side of the city and then vast "nothingness"- the plains to the east. Below are the only pictures we took on our entire trip, we kinda forgot about taking pictures oops.

Red Rock Amphitheater, Denver is the grayish bluish line in the background.

View from the stage I'm in the orange coat wishing I had on my exercise clothes and running shoes instead of jeans and boots.
The Blue Cow Cafe located in Morrison. Highly recommend the omlets and pancakes for anyone that might take a trip out there!

The day after we got back from Colorado we headed up to Park City for a week at the Marriott Mountain Resort. Cory's parents have a timeshare and had gotten a suite for the entire family to use, no one was able to come during the week except us due to finals and having babies (Congrats to Tricia and Dustin on the birth of our newest nephew Ryan who was born on Dec 3rd!) so we had the place to ourselves til the weekend when a few of Cory's siblings finally made it up to play with us. Cory still had to work during the week so he made the commute to sl and back everyday and Sophie and I had a change of scenery from home. Our days consisted of riding the elevators, walking around town, climbing up and down the stairwells, swimming, watching the ski lifts and skiers, meeting people from all over- we met people from Europe, Texas, and New York, and just chilling in our rooms.

Sophie all bundled up during one of our strolls around the resorts watching the skiers. Few more years and we'll be going down the mountain with Sophie!Walking around the grounds of our resort, the pools/hot tubs, and ski lifts are just behind us.Swimming with daddy, not the best picture of Cory but Sophie has such a great expression that I had to post this one.Sophie falling asleep with me in our bed.