We're off to TEXAS!

Jared graduates tomorrow and we're off to Texas. Wish us luck on the 20 (probably like 26 with Kailee) hr. drive. Poor Kailee. Poor Mommy. We will miss Utah, BYU, Jared's family, all of our many friends, the mountains, and especially the snow...NOT. I wonder if we can make as good of friends in Texas as we have made here. We had the greatest church ward with sooooo many nice, wonderful people living right next to us. We sure will miss being able to step next door to borrow an egg, call our neighbor to watch Kailee for a few minutes while Mom goes to get the laundry, etc. If I ever wanted to learn how to do ANYTHING or needed anything, there was always a neighbor I could call. I have so many friends that shared recipes with me, 2 friends taught me how to sew, and I had so many friends to share mothering tips with. I got great advice almost everyday! We'll miss so many things about Wymount (our apartment complex). Though small (650 sq. ft.), it really is heaven on earth. Thank you to all of our friends in Utah for being our friends; we'll miss you! Bon Voyage!

Daddy's girl!! (But Mommy's girl too)

After about an hour of entertaining herself during Conference, Kailee was really craving some attention, so Daddy dumped out all of her toys and they played together. Kailee was so excited!

"Yee-Haw!"

Kailee LOVES books. She loves to bring us one book at a time and have us read it. Here Daddy is showing Kailee some cool, new books he bought her at school for a really good deal. Kailee was thrilled!
Night nights!
After loving Hadlie's binky, I gave Kailee her old binky she never liked to see if she liked it now and wala... she does. I just had to get a picture before Jared took the binky away. Though it's soooo cute, there's no need to start our 14 month old on a binky now.

Kailee's giggles!

Pouting!

Vocal exercises with Daddy!

Jared thought he was being so funny. It was cute, but I told him "let's just hope she doesn't start doing this in church!!"

Kailee and the Pacifier...

Here's a pretty Easter dress her Nana got for her!
Isn't she a doll?!
These are the bunny ears Granny got for her, which she loves!
Kailee sometimes does not like to wear bibs, so I put it on her doll instead and let her doll eat with her. I even pretended to feed the doll too and Kailee was so intrigued... she thought it was a very fun game!
Here she is puckered about to give her doll kisses!

Kailee has never liked pacifiers; when she was a baby, she would always spit them out. When the our dear friends, the Ballard's, came over for dinner, Kailee took Hadlie's pacifier and played with it for the rest of the evening. She loved sticking it in her mouth and walking to the mirror to look at herself. It was pretty cute and made me wish she was a binky girl. But, there's no use getting her addicted to the binky now.
This is Hadlie wondering why Kailee has overtaken her binky.

The Brains (and Looks) Behind this Operation

Hello, all. This is Jared here reporting with my first post to our family blog. I like to check the blog frequently and admire the great job that Shannon does. There is only one thing that I am disappointed in: there are not enough pictures of her! She seems to love writing about Kailee and I but is very modest in writing about herself. So today, I cracked open the old camera and voi-la!!!...here we are. I just wanted all of you bloggers to know what a great wife and mom Shannons is. She is so attentive to Kailee and I and always does her best to make us happy...even when we both get a little fussy at times (meaning Kailee and I--sometimes me more than Kailee!). For example, the other day I came home from school and this beautiful little creature above had cleaned the house, packed loads of boxes, taken care of Kailee, and had dinner on the table. On top of that she has been arranging all of our living affairs in Texas. She would never let you know this but she has even taken an active role in doing online job applications for me. To sum it up, Shannon is pretty great. She is my sugar-plum-hunny-bun. (Really her favorite nic-name is Shnooky-wookums.) I love her and I just wanted you all to know that I think she is the best. Lucky me. Lucky Kailee.

She LOVES walking!

Could my husband get any sweeter?

Jared left for 3 days to fly down to Texas for some teacher job fairs and to find us an apartment. The day before he brought these flowers home to me so that I'd have something to remember him by while he was gone. Aren't they beautiful! He also didn't like that the other ones were dying. I love beautiful flowers in springtime!

She gets smarter everyday!

Kailee has never walked around with her blanket before and tonight, she picked up her blanket from the living room and started walking toward her bedroom... could she be wanting to go night nights??
Sure enough, she walked into her dark and lonesome room by her crib and then just looked at me. What a doll! I was trying to keep her up a little later so that she'd wake up a little later and then be able to make it through church. But at 8:00, she let me know she was ready for bed!!
Kailee loves to hold everything I put in the cart, if I let her. She gets excited when I give her something to hold... like a carrot!

This is Kailee's baby brush that she often uses to attempt brushing her hair, though she often uses the wrong side of the brush.
Here, Kailee admires herself in the mirror as she brushes her hair with Mommy's big brush. She loves to play with my brush and comb. It's amazing what babies pick up on!

Our Sweetie!

"Hey Mom, take a picture of ME!"


Kailee thought it was hilarious that I kept taking pictures of her. I took like 10, but only made you look at 3!
I think Kailee looks like a Critchfield in this picture. Granny got Kailee this bunny for Easter and like most of her stuffed animals, she loves to hug and kiss it. Kailee sleeps with a bear Granny got her, a bunny Nana got her and her blankie. For about 3 weeks, Kailee allowed me to rock her to sleep or almost to sleep for naps and bedtime... It was so fun for me... precious times with my little girl! The past few days though, she has not wanted to be rocked, she wants to go to her crib right after she finishes her milk. So, I lay her down, put her blankie over her and give her her bear and bunny. She gets so excited. She hugs both, kisses them, and starts talking sweetly to them, often first saying "hi." She is so adorable. She falls asleep so easily. We have such an easy baby!!
I think Kailee looks like a Smith (my fam) in this pic.

Easter!

We made sugar cookies with our friends, the Ballards, (that's right... they are friends with us... aren't we cool?!!) We didn't get to make many because Kailee was ready for bed and Hadlie who was supposed to be asleep was not going to bed, so we called it a night! I spent the next morning cooking the rest of my sugar cookies and decorating them... aren't they cute!

Nana sent Kailee a little Easter basket and some plastic eggs, so of course we gave it to her and she had a ball... Mommy and Daddy ate her candy though! :)
"Should I keep this green egg... or go get that pink egg?"
I got this basket for Daddy mostly so that Kailee could play with it and that she did. She mostly just puts it over her head, lol.

Yeah for having a wonderful husband!

Not long ago, Jared started bringing me flowers home quite often, for no reason other than HE LOVES ME! First, they were white daisies, then pink tulips, and now these blue/magenta daisies (they were actually dyed). I have to put them behind the couch in front of the window if I want them to get any sunlight and it's great because Kailee can't get to them! Now that it's getting warmer, I love having flowers; it makes me feel like Spring is finally here!

Our Beautiful girl!

This outfit Julie Beck got her for her b-day; too bad you can't see the pants, but isn't she cute with a bow?!

Here, Kailee wanted so badly to participate in Mommy's workout, so I have her the light weights, and as you can see, it's pretty heavy for her. JK. She's actually crying (whining) because she didn't want the weight, she wanted me to read books with her, lol. So, as with anything else, I quit early to play with her!
Kailee always leans her head back on the couch and just chills there smiling at me or playing with a toy.
I am making girl #2 a blanket. Here is the very beginning of all the work I'll put into it. I'm pretty excited about it. It's going to have a 2 borders and a beautiful and soft pink, minky backing. More pics. to come!

FRIENDS

We had the Ballard's over for breakfast one Saturday morning after us girls went on a walk with the babies and Shawn and Jared went jogging. It was a great morning. Isn't Hadlie an angel face?

Here is Leighton, always putting the moves on Kailee. As you can see, she doesn't mind!
Leighton is sooon going to have a little sister so his parents are teaching him to be very gentle and loving. He softly pats Kailee on the back, gives her hugs, and kisses her tons! He's a sweet boy!
This is the fun Caterpillar Granny got Kailee for Christmas!!

Walking!

Kailee's been taking her first steps since about 11.5 months, but for the longest time, she's been so chicken to walk without holding our finger; as soon as we would let go, she would sit down. Now she freely lets go and enjoys walking off away from us. Though she still often falls. She can take a good 10-20 steps at a time. It's pretty cute! She loves walking outside, playing on the playground here in Wymount, and pushing the stroller. She is a fun baby to have around! As you can see from this video, Kailee enjoys daily dragging all of her books off the shelf and all her toys out. When she goes to sleep, I clean it all up so she can have fun doing it all over again. Maybe soon she'll understand the concept of cleaning up with me!

"Yellow"

Kailee randomly started saying "yellow" one night, so I got a video of it. She wouldn't eat, she just wanted to yell at Mommy for a while repeating "yellow". It was pretty cute. I know it's a long video, just listen to the beginning unless you are a grandparent!! I know long distance grandparents want to see every second of her that they can, hence the long video!

We're pregnant... and it's a GIRL!!

It's true! We kept it a secret for as long as we could! We wanted to wait and tell our parents when we found out the gender. That was especially easy to do with my parents since they live across the United States. Jared's family, on the other hand, we see all the time, so when I started showing, they found out! My Mom was in shock and did not believe me at first. She is so excited and just laughs at how deceiving I have been! My Dad said "you're kidding," lol. Jared's Mom was excited that we are keeping up the girl tradition in the family, so far, there are only girl grandchildren! Jared was so sure we were having a boy, so when the ultrasound guy said it's a girl, we just laughed... we both could not stop grinning. We are so thrilled Kailee will have a little sister. I just think Jared's greatest fear is having all girls and no boys, lol. It feels so real now that we know the gender and we will probably name her Ali, Alli, Ally... we haven't really thought about spellings yet. Maybe even Ally Anne Critchfield. Oh... the due date is July 27th! I will scan some ultrasound pictures in soon; I left them in the car!

Pizza time!

A couple weeks ago, Kailee had pizza for the first time. She ate a whole slice; I was so proud of her! I cut it in pieces and she chowed down. As you can see, it's all gone.

Kailee loves to get into anything she can reach. I often catch her taking out all of our magazines. She's developing a love of the Ensign at a very young age!
Kailee also loves to play in front of our mirror in the hallway. She will stand there and talk to herself for like 20 minutes.
Kailee's favorite spot in the house is probably her bookshelf. She takes all the books off one by one. As you can tell, she often reads upside down! It's so cute watching her look through books and talk to herself.
The lighting is bad here, but it's Kailee snuggling Daddy! It's Daddy's favorite thing to do when he gets home from a long school day. Of course, he prefers if I'm snuggling them too!
Kailee loves to play with friends. I babysat her friend Emery and they had a ball. I can't imagine Kailee 20 months old, but I know it will come all too quickly :(
Just as a side note, Kailee now says "please," though it sounds more like "peas." It's too cute.