Oh Christmas Tree Oh Christmas Tree

The Monday before Thanksgiving we finally got our Christmas tree up (we meant to put it up the first week of November). I decided to let go of my "the ornaments need to be perfectly and evenly distributed around the whole tree" ways and let Lydia decide where everything went. 

Here she is giving orders.

Mary was being a grump, so we let her tear the room apart while
we decorated. It made for quite the mess, but it kept her occupied

Lydia's finished work. She wanted all of the red spirals and
red sparkly stars to be right next to each other because they
needed to "stay by their family" :)

Admiring her finished work. Side note: Lydia's hair is almost always out of control
by the end of the day. It just gets to the point where it's pointless fighting it.
What am I to do?!?

Lydia has decided that it is HER Christmas tree. Every morning the first thing she asks is, "Turn on my Christmas tree, please!" It's super cute. We are excited for all the Christmas fun since she "gets" it a lot more this year. Mary I'm sure will be excited the morning of too, but right now she has no idea what is coming :) It should be fun! Lots of memories ahead.

Rise and Shout - The Cougars are Out!!

We are so spoiled!! In the past month we had childless date nights 3 out of 4 weekends in a row! That's more than we had all of 2011 COMBINED! The BYU football team had a game at San Jose State 2 weekends ago and we scored some tickets from a friend and were offered some free babysitting. Yes and YESSSSS!! So off we went.

We started off the night with a fancy dinner at Taco Bell ;)

You wish you were as attractive as us while eating Americanized Mexican food.

Then it was off to the game. I find it ironic that we spent the first 2 and a half years of our marriage living within a mile of BYU, but it took us moving 800 miles away before we actually attended a game. Silly us! The last football game we had been to together was our junior year in high school. During the thick of our "Round 1" days, we went to the our high school's state championship football game together. It was fun to reminisce about that night :)

By halftime, it was pretty clear that BYU was going to lose and my constant headache was getting bad enough from cheering and sitting on the bleachers that we decided to leave. But we didn't want to waste our free babysitter time, so we went bowling! And you guys!!! A MIRACLE occurred! I WON!!! And not just once... TWICE!!! See for yourselves...

Please ignore the fact that I guttered both bowls in the 10th frame.
I couldn't handle the pressure of being in range of beating my personal
high score. I made up for it the second game.

I love this boy!!

And the scores from our second game...

I was pretty excited if you can't tell :)

133!! My new personal best!! I don't think you understand how out of the ordinary this was. To give you more of an idea look at this blog post from 2 years ago.

Even though this one was the third night without the kids we've had fairly recently it was much needed after a VERY stressful week. It was so nice to kick back and relax and just be with each other. I love my girls! And we love being a daddy and mommy, but it's always nice to remind ourselves that we are husband and wife too. :)

Mommy's Girl vs. Daddy's Girl

These pictures were right in a row on our camera and they totally crack me up. They perfectly capture my life right now.

Mommy's girl

Daddy's girl

Long story short, Lydia loves me right now, wants to copy everything I am doing, cracks me up all day long, and is happy just to cuddle with me on the couch. Mary, on the other hand, only wants Robert. When he is here she wants to be right by him nearly every second. When he leaves she's screaming for him until he comes home. She's always preferred him over me, but lately it's intensified. I don't know what I did wrong but I'm determined to win her back. She'll occasionally give me just enough love and cuddles to leave me wanting more and hold me through the next storm of disdain while Daddy's around. Just you wait Mary!! You'll idolize me soon enough! ;)

Impromptu Date Night

We watched Terrel and Jenn's kids overnight last week. When they came to pick their kids up they offered to stick around for a couple of hours while Robert and I went on a date. It's always great to get out without the kids, and what says date night more than Pac Man, Pizza, and Sweet Potato Fries?!?

I told him to look happy. This is what I got. No wonder where Lydia gets it.

After dinner we browsed through a few of the shops and listened to some of the street performers before heading home. It was quick, simple, and fun.

And just for kicks, I'll throw in this picture that Robert snapped later that night of me and the girls playing a rousing game of Pretty Pretty Princess. It's Lydia's current favorite :)

Good times!

Halloween Fun 2012

Pumpkin Lot

Our Lil' Pumpkins

She was so excited to pick her own special pumpkin

Showing Mary her pumpkin

She fits right in :)

Robert wanted to take a picture of Mary with a pumpkin as big as she is.

An unflattering picture of me with our bounty to prove I was there

Carving

The Seegmillers joined us for the monumental carving of the pumpkins.

Finished products. Lydia added the marker to her pumpkin :)

Ward Trunk-or-Treat

Lydia = Little Red Riding Hood, Mary = The Wolf, Me = The Grandma, Robert = The Woodsman

Trunk or treating. Lydia totally had the routine down this year.

Disposal of the pumpkin

Lydia overheard me telling Robert that it was time to throw away the pumpkins. She immediately got really sad and in a low, quiet voice, holding back tears said, "Bye punkin. Miss you." It broke my heart! It was as if we were throwing away her best friend. I asked her if she would be happier if we took a picture of her with it before we threw it away so she could look at it whenever she wanted. That cheered her right up :)

I told her to make the same face as the pumpkin. This is what I got :)

HAPPY BELATED HALLOWEEN!!! Bring on Thanksgiving :)

Let Them Be Little

(Warning: the following post contains a lot of writing)

So once upon a time, it was last Friday morning. Friday is always Robert's and my most hectic morning. This Friday morning was extra stressful for a number of reasons. Lydia was being an especially difficult child all morning. After the first hectic rush that included a couple of shop vac worthy messes, I loaded the kids into the car and went to a play group I have with some ladies in the ward every Friday where Lydia proceeded to be extra bully-ish and defiant. Then she and Mary screamed the entire way home. During the drive Lydia also managed to take both shoes off and nail me in the back of the head with them. (She's developed a great arm and aim) I had left play group later than planned and had a piano student that I still had to get some things ready for, so that was also adding to my stress. We finally got home. I put Mary down for her nap first thing, put a movie on for Lydia, and went upstairs to grab some things I had already printed out for the lesson and cut them out really quick. After the 5 minutes or less that it took to do that, I came back downstairs and I found that Lydia had gotten the water spray bottle down from the top of the entertainment center (nothing is out of her reach now days) and SOAKED the piano, a couple of books, and the laptop to the point of not working. I lost it! I just burst into tears, and took Lydia straight upstairs and put her in the crib for her nap over an hour earlier than normal. I then worked on drying up the mess through my sobbing tears (I also ended up starting my period later that day which always makes my emotions extra out of control...TMI?) The piano student ended up not showing because the mom had to work longer than usual. Good thing too, because I would have been a complete mess when they arrived. Robert walked in just as I was finishing drying up the mess. I had gotten my tears in control at that point, but when he walked in they started all over again. So I laid down on the couch and he rubbed my feet (such a great husband!), and right then my little brother and best friend, Preston, called. 

He doesn't call often but it is always right when I need it. He always starts off the conversation with, "I was just thinkin' about ya, and thought I'd check in." I immediately started crying again and just said, 

"Oh Preston it's been kind of a hard morning." 

Preston - "Oh no what's wrong?"

Me - "Lydia is two."

Preston - "Is that like a 'Lydia is growing up too fast' kind of two or a 'Lydia is being terrible' kind of two?"

Me - "The terrible kind"

Preston - "Heidi, (In an exaggerated country style singing voice) Let them be little!" 

It made me laugh and snapped me right out of my mood as Preston is always able to do so easily. He has a line from a song for any situation. I normally know whatever song he sings and am able to join right in, but this one I had never heard before. We talked for a bit longer and it totally brightened my day. I'm kind of bitter that he chose to move to Utah right after Robert and I moved away from Utah, literally the week after. Hopefully we'll live close together again someday so we can sing cheesy songs together all of the time ;) 

Anyway, later that day I looked up that song he had sung a line from and I totally bawled through the whole thing (remember I was extra emotional). Here it is.

It just reminded me once again that I need to focus more on the joyful moments and not let the not so joyful ones get me so down because the day will come when they won't be so little "'cause they're only that way for a while." I was reminded that again the next day when Robert and I went on our Saturday run. 

We've been letting Lydia get out of the stroller and walk/run alongside us during our 5-minute warm up and cool down walks at the beginning and end of our runs. We've felt safe about this because she has been really good lately about staying really close to us when she knows that there are cars or bikes close by. However after we got her out of the stroller at the end of the run she darted out into the path real quick just as a lady on a bike came by. The lady slammed on her brakes and was able to slow down and swerve enough that when she hit Lydia it was only enough to make Lydia sort of spin around and fall on her bum. Lydia even laughed a little bit and said "Haha, fall down on bum." It was a scary few seconds with nearly instant relief. Later, I was thinking about all of the "what ifs" of how it could have been so much worse. What if the lady on the bike didn't see Lydia and hadn't tried to stop at all, what if Lydia had darted into the street instead of just into the path, etc etc. It reaffirmed my testimony once again of the importance of counting your blessings and trying to enjoy every moment, good and bad. Not only will my girls not always be little, but I also can never know how long I will have them. How long I will be blessed to be their Mommy. This week I've started with renewed gratitude for this stage of life and a renewed commitment to do as the title of our blog says, find joy in the journey!

P.S. With a lot of TLC and a blow dryer I was able to get the laptop to work again :)

Mary's 1 Year-ish Stats

Technically these are 13+ months stats because we are a little behind on her well child checks. So this info is all as of October 9th.

Weight: 22 lb 4.5 oz (73rd percentile)

Height: 2' 7.5" (93rd percentile)

Head Circumference: 18.5" (88th percentile) Side note - her head growth is now on track for what it is supposed to be. No more concern about it getting too big.

Things to remember:

- She's walking all of the time now.
- She's very vocal. She will try to repeat almost anything and everything we say. With this she has a huge vocabulary of words that aren't clear enough for anyone to understand, including Mommy and Daddy, but I feel like within the next month or two the amount of clear words will multiply tenfold.

Words she can say somewhat clearly:

"Luvoo" = Love you          "Aa aan" = Again

"Dank Oo" = Thank you        "Yick" = Yucky

"Ma ma"          "Achoo"

"Daddy"           "Uh oh"

"Ashuh Ashuh Down" = Ashes ashes we all fall down

"Oh no" (with the cutest puckered lips ever! So sweet)

"Bye Bye" with a wave          "Hi"/"Hello"

- She LOVES to tickle people and be tickled. It's her favorite game.

- She has almost no interest in watching TV (So opposite of Lydia). She's our little bookworm. She will sit in the corner and turn through each page of all of her board books for a half hour or more at a time.

- She's developing all sorts of sass that has been fun to deal with recently. I think it's mainly been out of survival with a big sister. She uses her sass to stick up for herself when Lydia picks on her. It's kind of cute until the sass is turned on us.

- She, like Lydia, is a constant climber. Both of our girls were able to climb before they could full out crawl. Nothing is too high for her to get.
-She is TERRIFIED of swinging. Be it in a swing at the park or just swinging barely back and forth in my arms. She totally freaks out!
- She loves to rock and cuddle with dolls and stuffed animals.

- She and Lydia ALWAYS want the same toy or parent and NEVER want to share. We're working on it. :)

She's our sweet little baby. We love her to pieces!!!!

T.J.'s Baby Blessing

General Conference weekend we did a super quick trip to Arizona to attend Terrel and Jenn's baby T.J.'s baby blessing. We flew down early Saturday morning and back on Monday.

Flying in style

Not too bad for waking up at 4:30am

Funny Lydia moment: We had a layover in Burbank. There was no plane change so we just waited on the plane while they let off one batch of passengers and let a new one on. When someone new finally sat down behind us. Lydia jumped up and peaked over the back of the seat and said, "Hi! I'm Lydia! I'm shy!!!" I just laughed and said, "Lydia, you are anything BUT shy!" She then proceeded to sing, "But Shy!!!! But shy, but SHY! Buuuuuuuuuuuuut Shyyyyyyyyy!!" over and over until the plane took off. We are proud to have a "Butt shy" daughter ;)

Since all of Robert's family was together and we weren't sure when the next time is that that would happen we decided to do a spur-of-the-moment family picture in Robert's parents' living room between the afternoon session and the Priesthood session of General Conference. So here's the latest Richardson Family Photo.

If you're wondering how we got all 4 babies to look and smile... we didn't. I just know my way around some photo editing ;) Maybe that's another post for another day.

And a cute one of the grandbabies :)

Sunday morning we headed to my parent's for the morning session of conference. My dad kept the babies entertained with blocks while we watched.

I can't go without recording the momentous milestone that happened during this morning session, October 7, 2012. Our daughters successfully completed their first Mary throws a ball and Lydia catches it moment. Robert was beaming. You could practically see "I'm a proud Daddy!" written across his face.

Then back to Robert's parents' and after naps and the afternoon session we headed to the stake center for T.J.'s blessing. Terrel gave a beautiful blessing! We were so glad we were able to attend.

Quite the turn out, and Mary is a cutie :)

After the blessing and dinner at Robert's parents', we squeezed in one more quick visit to my Grandma Hall's

There were a couple of times this trip that I got really sentimental - as I watched my girls play blocks with my dad and as they played with these toys at my Grandma's. That robot is the same one I loved to play with when I was little. It just made me think of the memories I have of when I was little and we'd go over to Grandma and Grandpa Hall's house to watch General Conference. Then, there I was watching my daughters do the same thing at their grandparents'. It made me feel like our family is on the right track. It also made me once again wish that we lived closer, but made me so thankful that I have such a wonderful family to come home to.

Bright and early Monday morning we flew home. Our next trip isn't until Christmas, and we've done so many trips in the past couple of months that it will be nice to have a little bit of a break. At the same time, we already miss our family and can't wait until the holidays!!!

I Came, I Saw, I Paddleboarded!!

Add one more check to my bucket list! This past weekend, I went paddleboarding! It was a blast!!! A few of my Santa Cruz friends and I all wanted to go, and a Groupon came out with a good deal on some rentals. So we all bought the deal and and put it on our schedules over a month in advance. The day finally came and first thing Saturday morning we met at Santa Cruz Harbor.

Funny story, so the Groupon was just for the rental, but if you had never done it before, the rental place would make you pay extra money for a lesson and you would have to stay with one of their tour guides the whole time. The three of us pictured below, Kara (left), me, and Brittni (right) had never done it before, but we went with our friend, Melissa (taking the pictures) who is basically a master and was showing us all of the ropes. Robert and Devin (husband of Brittni) had already used their Groupon at this same place so I knew they'd be asking us if we had any SUP (stand up paddleboarding) experience. So when the question came, I was prepared with my bold face lie and basically made it sound like I had been a billion times. Kara also said she had done it before, and sweet Brittni, not knowing we were lying, said this was her first time. It still worked out that Brittni didn't have to stay with their tour guide or pay the extra money, but my immediate consequence for making myself sound pro was that they gave me a smaller board. Smaller boards are less stable. That's what I get for lying!! It worked out though. It was really hard at first, but the Wii Fit balance games paid off ;) Eventually I got my sea legs and was able to get around just fine. Lesson learned :)

See how much shorter and skinnier my board is compared to the others!

It was a foggy morning which added to the coolness of it I think :)

  

All three of us went out into the open ocean on our first time out!
We are awesome!! Or maybe we just had an awesome teacher ;)

I'm definitely hooked! I already want to go again, which is good because Robert and I both still have another Groupon that we need to use :) I love living here!!!!

Summer's End

I love this picture of Mary. I think it encapsulates our summer perfectly. Just kicking back at the park under the shade of a tree with perfect weather and beautiful surroundings.

We loved this past summer! It was a rough start with all of the sickness, but a great finish! We'll miss the weekly beach days/nights with friends, dollar nights at the Boardwalk, the major flexibility of our schedules, and more, but we also look forward to the crisp fall weather, all of the holidays, ward activities, piano students, and everything else fall and winter bring. What can I say? We love life no matter the season! :)

Here's Robert on his first day as a 2nd year PhD student! It's crazy to think how few of these "first day of school" pics there are left for him.

P.S. Robert didn't need to take his backpack to class on his first day, so I may or may not have made him put a completely empty backpack on anyway just so it would look more like a first day of school picture ;)

FAREWELL SUMMER! WELCOME FALL!!!

Hall Reunion 2012

Right before Robert started back up at school we squeezed one more trip to Arizona in for the Hall Reunion at Camp LoMia. As always, it was a whirlwind of a trip, but always so fun to see family. I couldn't find my camera for half the trip so I didn't get many pictures, but the few I got are keepers :)

My family met up at Taco Bell in Payson before going all the way to Camp LoMia. We basically took over half of the restaurant.

Photo bomb by Robert

Cutie Bryson

Even with the messy face she is still too cute!

The trio with their mini-me's

And we couldn't resist getting a picture of the August 2011 babies again 

Here's last year's picture just after they were all born.

They've all grown up way too fast. It really is a shame that we all live in three different states.

The whole reunion was a HUGE success. Aunt Marsha's family was in charge this year and they did a PHENOMENAL job. I can't wait for next year.

For past years go here: 2011 and 2010