Merry Chirstmas

Okay, so I know it's the day after Christmas, but better late than never. Merry Christmas!! I just love this picture of baby Jesus (aka Bryndi). The Christ child must have been so sweet lying there in that manger.

Laughter

I absolutely love, love, love Bella's laugh. In this video she is laughing at a playful balloon which is being managed by her aunt Daneen.

Bryndi has a fun laugh too. And she loves to jump. She will jump anywhere. She prefers the couch or the bed, but the floor will do just fine too.

Bryndi is sick today. She was up crying with a fever last night. Since she has had strep throat twice in the last year, I took her to the doctor this morning. But no, she just has a generic "bug".

Vacation

We went on a vacation to Park City last week with our girls. We stayed at the Park Plaza resort. They have a big pool and Bryndi LOVED swimming. The water was a bit cold, so Bella wasn't too thrilled about it, but Bryndi would be shivering and covered in goosebumps and want to get back in the water again and again! Sorry I don't have any swimming pictures, but here are some pictures of our hike in the Uintahs.

We also went to the Hogle Zoo. Bryndi's favortie part was the snake slide.

Happy 5 months Bella!

In honor of Bella's five month birthday, I weighed and measured her. 18 pounds and 27 inches!

I had to take a picture of these legs. She has rolls on her knees! I love chubby baby legs!!

Bryndi has some cute pictures too.

Her language skills are coming along really well. She'll look right at Bella and say, "I love you Bella, I'm so proud of you!" and give her a kiss.

In her hands she has some soft bath toys, affectionately named Ribbit and Barney. She had to sleep with them last night and take them to church with her today.

No, no!

Bryndi is in to scolding inanimate objects lately. If the sun gets in her eyes while she's in the car she says, "No, no, sun! Stop! Don't get in my eyes!" and shakes her finger at it. Sometimes when the heater goes on, she'll look at the heater vent and say, "Heater! Don't take my blanky!" Not to mention when she's frustrated with any of her toys, shoes, clothes, etc. she'll say, "No, no, [insert name of object of frustration here]! No, no!" I can't say that I blame her. I myself often want to yell at things that don't work the way I want them to!

I don't have any new pictures, but I thought I would post these from warmer weather days. Bryndi went on her first pony ride at Thanksgiving point.

She would only smile for ONE picture!

Haircut and Halloween

It was pointed out to me the other day (thanks Kelly!) that I have a "burst" feature on my camera that will take several pictures in a row, instead of having a huge pause in between each picture. Look what it can do!

I decided to trim Bryndi's hair. This is the before picture. I only cut off about an inch, I think. Her hair would totally curl around my fingers as I tried to cut it.

Here are the after pictures. I dressed up as myself (a nurse) for halloween, so here is Bryndi playing with my stethoscope. Turns out Bella does have a heartbeat!

Bella was a black cat for Halloween.

Bryndi was a cat too.

How did the 'Diet' go?

(Richard here) So back in September we started a 4 week diet, ( http://justwinget.blogspot.com/2008/09/no-meat-no-dairy-no-sugar-no-happiness.html ) the whole experience was really interesting. First, I had foods that I didn't know existed, and many of them are recommendable. I also learned that I really enjoy meat and cheese. As those were sorely missed. I lost 17 lbs and gained 5 of them back shortly after the diet ended. I honestly don't know how much of that is what I wanted to get rid of and how much of it was muscle, but I don't feel weaker and I did drop an inch in the waist.

The real question is what was it like going off the diet. 1) It was fun, because we ate our favorite foods and they were better than usual. 2) I got sick and I couldn't eat big portions anymore, which is odd, because the phrase 'All you can eat' is the bane of any weight management system that I could ever implement. Usually and unfortunately (depending upon how you look at it), I can eat a lot and still feel comfortable. Thus becoming quite uncomfortable when I ate a normal size meal was unnerving and unnatural. I also reaffirmed that I don't like big dinners. A small pleasant meal is where it's at. I did have more energy toward the end of the diet and I felt good, but I usually feel good. We found that while it was emotionally painful to spend a lot for some food items, our spending on food stayed pretty level. Would I do it again? Sure, but I'd still want to be able to eat sugar ;)