Give 'Em Cheese

This is Hazel's cheesy smile that she's been doing lately. You can tell that it's not her real smile because she does it when she knows we're smiling at her and she'll got from this face right back to a serious face. I love this little girl.

Some updates! Let's see...I am about to begin working on my first fiction manuscript once I finish this last book on editing that my boss wanted me to read. David is still doing a great job at NAI and is absolutely loving it. We got some work done on our house this weekend. David scraped and painted the hallway into our bathroom that had some old chipping paint on it and I started painting the frames for our new cabinets! David made us new cabinet doors for my birthday and so I'm removing the old yucky ones, painting the frames a bright clean white, and then I will start on painting the doors he made. Lots of work, but just one thing at a time...

I am so reluctant to share pictures until our house is totally done! but i know that's no fun, so give me just a little longer and I'll share our progress with all of you. boy, this house has turned out to be such a challenge, but it really has taught me so much. It's fun to start to know your house and its quirks, especially these older houses. I know that I have to unplug our space heater in the living room when I want to vacuum our rug because I'll pop the circuit breaker; in the mornings you can always hear this light tapping in the kitchen and I finally figured out that it's the birds getting their breakfast from our roof; we have two light switches for our bedroom and sometimes one of them decides not to work, but you can always count on the other one to pull through when that happens; and the one that used to freak me out the most--sometimes the wind will cause our door to make this sudden creak like someone is trying to force it open. I used to run to the door and see who was there, but nope, it was just our old door. Our old door that never closes all the way unless you lift the handle just slightly to help it get into place. I love our house.

Lyn and Jay's Wedding

My mom's dad was there to walk her down the "stairs" (aisle)

Bradley was the ring bearer

All the little girls (and there were lots) were the flower girls and wore these pretty white dresses.

My mom got married! On December 15th, 2007 my mom was married to Jay Grimshaw, a wonderful man who swept her off of her feet with his red Corvette at the end of the summer and is now part of our family. Mom and Jay met sometime in September at a singles' activity and became good friends which quickly became REALLY good friends, and now companions. We are so happy for both of them. They were married at Jay's home in Salt Lake City by my mom's bishop and dear friend Mike Rhodes. Close family and friends were present and everything was pretty much perfect. Mom and Jay and Bradley are now living in Liberty for a little while until they decide on a permanent place here in Utah. Congratulations!!

Army Duck

I had to post this picture because I always tease David and we're going to have all girls and he'll be surrounded by women for the rest of his life (he grew up with three brothers). So he came home one day with this rubber ducky that has camouflage gear so that Hazel has a "tougher" toy to play with.

Hazel loves real food!

At about five 1/2 months we started Hazel on rice cereal and worked our way into baby food and she LOVES it. She is quickly becoming a pro and now eats breakfast, lunch, and dinner--each meal consisting of two or more jars of food! We've also recently experimented with graham crackers and apple slices which she really enjoys, but it has to be right before bath time because it gets a little messy. As you can tell from these pics, she can get pretty messy with just about anything.

So this mess happened one day when I was feeding her some peas. Before I could stop her she rubbed her mouth and then went straight for her eyes. So instead of getting frustrated and trying to clean her up, I followed my Aunt Becky's advice and got the camera. Instead of getting upset, just turn it into a great Kodak moment. I love this little girl.

Phipps Famiy Christmas Party

Hazel and her cousin Sam thought they'd join in on the fun!


David, Collin, Chris, and Tyson Phipps (not the best picture of all of them; I caught them off guard)

(Left to Right) Vicki (David's mom), Janelle, Stacy (Chris' wife) and Ryan (Collin's girlfriend).


We had a blast up at David's parents' in Liberty for an early Christmas Party in mid-December. Collin, David's youngest brother received his mission call to Honolulu Hawaii and he left December 19th, so we celebrated a little early so that we could all be together. We sang Christmas songs, we ate lots of food, we played games--Twister was a big hit as you can see from the pictures above. David and his oldest brother, Chris, are two of the most competitive people I know. They even took Twister very seriously and contorted their bodies into extremely uncomfortable positions just to beat the other. I did chose the more appropriate pictures... It was so fun to have everyone together for one last time until Christmas 2009 (which will hopefully take place in Hawaii!!)

Let it Snow Let it Snow Let it Snow

So my sister-in-law let us borrow this snow suit that says it's 0-3 months, but it appears to run a little LARGE. So here is our little puff ball baby in her first snow suit. The best part is that we could just toss her into the snow and she didn't feel a thing! These pics were taken up at David's parents in Liberty just after a heavy snowfall.

The last picture is Hazel with her cousins, Kate and James.

Thanksgiving

For Thanksgiving this year we went down to Arizona to visit my mom's extended family. We had a HUGE dinner that everyone contributed to at my aunt Lol's; she has a beautiful spacious house in Globe, AZ where we all gather for these big events. Thanks Lol for a great Thanksgiving!

This is my beautiful cousin Summer that just turned 16. We had a "Leonard Ladies" party on Thursday night where we discussed the boys in Summer life, rules of dating, driving, etc., etc. So fun.
Here are all of the ladies of the Leonard family wearing their funky headbands that I made for them. (pattern is from Heather Bailey--so cute and easy!)

I forgot my camera on our trip to Tucson where we took a FIVE generation picture from Hazel up to her great-great grandmother. So I will post those pics as soon as I get them from my mom!