You've had a birthday shout HOORAY!

Scarlet is now officially a one year old. Who knew the infamous 'one year old tantrums' start almost immediately?! I won't lie when I say her first birthday was pretty pathetic. Though their importance is very overrated, it's still the duty of every first parent to make a big deal of it because it's the first chance you get to celebrate one very life changing day.

I kept trying to remind Scarlet all day long that it was her birthday but it didn't elicit much reaction. But we went shopping that morning and bought her some presents (some new books and a set of magnetic blocks). I also let her wander around Toys R Us for a good half an hour and she got a kick out of that. She is at the perfect age to do that because all she really wants to do is push all the electronic buttons on all the toys. But she isn't old enough yet to realize that she could in theory take the toys home with her should her mom be generous enough. So she plays until she is bored and we walk out tear-free. These really are the good days.

Our friends Dale and Mindy Warren moved into our apartment that afternoon so we helped them move in a few boxes. Actually Jon helped them while I kept Scarlet from tearing too much of their stuff apart. Then afterwards we ate out with them at the Hash House - Twisted Farm Food. It's a seriously crazy restaurant with the largest serving sizes you have ever seen. The Carruths met us there as well and we were quite the one year old birthday party crowd. At least Jane (the Warren's 6 month old daughter) was there to bring down the median crowd age.

The cutest part about the evening is they brought out Scarlet a watermelon slice with a candle! It was dang good watermelon too...

It was really late when we got home so Scarlet got to enjoy her birthday cake the next day. I think she really liked it though.

Oh and I have to pay tribute to a HUGE victory last weekend. For those of you who haven't heard (or didn't care to know in the first place) the Moses Lake Drill Team went to Nationals in California and place FIRST in kick and hip hop and SECOND in military!!!!! For those not in the dance world, that is huge. They were against like 30 teams in each category and they just killed. The video is already online if you're interested. It's at http://www.varsity.com/vwired/08usa_spirit_dancedrill.asp. You can see their military under large military and the other two routines under exhibition. CONGRATS MOLAHIETTES!!!!

Scarlet Update

Jon and I just took some pictures with Scarlet in the backyard yesterday and since the grandparents have been complaining about my lack of pictures, I thought I would post them.

Oh but first, here are some pictures from this crazy plant nursery we have in town. They have parrots and all the big birds that talk just flying around. They have rabbits, cats, and these enormous tortoises. Scarlet is obsessed with animals right now and she got such a kick out of it. She is mostly into dogs... the turtles were a little slow for her. But she chased the cat halfway across the store.




Ok these are the ones in the backyard.

My daffodils!



Jon always has all these crazy ideas for pictures. This one is his attempt to toss Scarlet in the air and then put his hands down so it looks like she is just flying up there on her own.

She walks everywhere now and has no problem leaving my side to go explore and talk to anyone who will listen. She says hi, dad, mom, and dog but never when you ask her to. And she has the appetite of a small elephant... I cant even imagine what she will weigh at her next appointment.

Also hopefully soon to come, she has already developed three signature Scarlet dance moves. Unfortunately they don't come out once the camera comes on, but I'm gonna catch her one of these days.

So Nice To Be Back!

After digging through several boxes last night we finally found our way to all the necessary computer parts and set it up. We were crossing our fingers the whole time hoping against hope that some free floating wireless internet signal would be waiting for us. And joy of all joys... it was! OH HAPPY DAY!!

I can't even tell you how great it feels to be back from the stone age. And to be writing this while staring into my backyard where there are daffodils blooming around the hedge... I won't lie it's pretty dang fabulous.

We officially bought our first house on Friday and moved in on Saturday. The neighborhood came out to greet us that night... well more precisely the neighborhood livestock. Two cats decided to break in the lawn outside our bedroom window with some extremely loud frolicking. Then, in the wee early hours of the morning, who was there to greet us but the neighborhood rooster. Yes, there is a rooster. And no, I don't know exactly where it lives or the neighborhood rooster would be no more.

For those of you who know anything about Vegas we are now in southern downtown Vegas just north of Green Valley. We are literally minutes from the airport and minutes from Jon's office. And thanks to the new takeoff path which sends the planes over the expensive neighborhoods of Summerlin, we don't even have a lot of plane noise. So far it has been a nice little set up.

I haven't been able to take pictures of the house yet so I only have the realtor pictures but they give an interesting view of the place.

So here is the view from the front and then the backyard. I absolutely LOVE the backyard. As I said, there are beautiful flowers just popping up everywhere and two great big trees in the middle. So the front door is behind all those bushes and then the part to the side that looks like a garage is actually a studio apartment.

Now here are some of the inside. I can only find the downstairs photos for some reason.

The woman that lived here before us was pretty up there in age and seriously, it is walking into your grandmas house in almost every room. Our room upstairs even has the floral curtains with the large puff on top. It's pretty fun. And there are all these old appliances built into the kitchen. There is a toaster that pops out of the wall and this odd thing that looks like the bottom of a mixer and it comes with like 5 thousand parts. So far we've found attachments for an ice cream maker, meat grinder, knife sharpener, blender, mixer, and several other unidentifiable objects.

Upstairs, the kids got to pick their own carpet back in the day so Scarlet's room is painted pink on every inch of wall with long shag pink carpet on the floor. The room next door is the same in blue. The carpet would almost be amusingly charming but 30 year old shag carpet... totally grosses me out so it's soon out the door. But until then Scarlet is fascinated by it.

This weekend Scarlet and I are headed up to Washington for Today's Generation's first dance competition of the year. And while were gone, Jon is getting to work. First to go are the cottage cheese ceilings and the wood paneled walls. More pictures soon to come!

Where is she going now?

So after 2 1/2 years of free internet thanks to an open wireless signal from one of our gracious neighbors, we have been cut off. Yup, the guy added a password. So I have been stuck internet-less for the past 3 weeks. I have never felt so cut off from the world....

I am right now typing furiously on the library computer hoping I can get a few sentences down before Scarlet goes and finds another stranger. She has no qualms about leaving my side and finding whatever else looks more fun. It makes for some interesting experiences as I try to get things done while I jet around the library.

But a very quick update... yes we did buy a house and we are moving in two weeks from today YYYYEEEEAAAHHH! couldn't be more excited. pictures and details to come... whenever I get my internet back...

Everything else is good as usual. I am so sad I haven't been able to catch up on everyone else's blogs. I seriously feel the hole. I miss the blog world. Anyway, just wanted to make sure all knew we were still alive... just back in the stone age.

Proof

The quality of this video is pretty bad but I have spent WAY too many hours trying to get it on here so we're just gonna be ok with it.

Oh and she is wearing a beanie indoors because I just made it and I'm trying it on...it's not really cold or anything. And the audio wasn't working... so this video kinda sucks. Oh well!

10 Steps

It is an awe inspiring moment when the little bundle of chubs who was just shortly an infant in your arms takes off on those roly legs. Of course the moment only lasts a brief second before *CRASH* another head into the linoleum.

Scarlet officially set her own record this morning by taking 10 steps all on her own. She has successfully accomplished the two and three needed to get her from toy to next standing point. But this morning I sent her off walking to her dad and as dad kept backing up, Scarlet kept walking. Some of you might ask, Kacey of course you got those momentous moments from your first child on video or you at least took some pictures? You know when your child decides to make great strides 5 minutes after you should have already left for church, who's fault is it when it doesn't get recorded?! I'll just tape the next time and pretend it was the first.

We got to hang out at Sam and Kyles yesterday and to our great luck Grandma Earl drove into town and joined us! It was a great evening. We carted the 3 babies to a little mexican eatery and had a good meal then put the kids down for the evening while we played some games. Jon introduced us to a card game called Mao. You start the game not knowing how to play and the goal is to learn them as you go. Grandma is NOT a fan of Mao. She graciously put up with the first three rounds but the fourth round was more than she could handle and her cards did not leave the table in front of her :) We had a great time.

Pictures of something interesting to come...

So much to say

I have a lot of catching up to do so if you, my loyal blog readers, only scan the pictures I won't blame you in the slightest.

I just had an amazingly fun few weeks. My parents came down to celebrate Christmas with us in Las Vegas this year. I was so stressed about making sure we had enough planned and that every moment would be filled with fun so they wouldn't regret making the long drive down. I think all my planning worked... though they could all just be good liars.

They drove in Saturday afternoon and the boys (Jon, Bryan and my dad) headed to the BYU vs. UCLA game. The girls made a stop at Cafe Rio and then saw Mamma Mia. We had terrible seats, the absolutely last row, but the theater isn't all that big and they were really cheap so nobody complained too loudly.

Sunday, I got to cart all my family to our ward and my sisters almost doubled the population in Young Womens. There is a guy in our ward who is the head of lighting for Mystere (the Cirque de Soliel show) so we asked him if he could get us in. Turns out he had the whole week off except for later that evening... so we pulled the "hey, were on vacation!" excuse that isn't all that true and went to the show. We got there at 5:00 and got a backstage tour. We got to see all the costumes and props, we even got to walk around the stage. It was so awesome and made the show even more exciting for my brother and sisters. Not only that but we had amazing seats. It was such a blast.

Monday we took my family on a hike at Red Rock. It basically turned into one giant photo shoot...

Notice how I had to go butt-towards-camera so Scarlet could look good?! The sacrifices of motherhood...

Our "Lion King" impression.

Then Christmas was here. We got to talk to Brad soon after we woke up. It was so great to hear from him. It is a pretty tough mission, he knows every member in the country by name, but he just sounds so confident and mature.

We opened presents next. Jon got me a new bedroom set which I absolutely love, I gave him a nintendo DS and a few games. Scarlet got a few presents from us but my mom bought her a ton of toys. I really expected her to enjoy a bit of the paper ripping and then proceed to ribbon chewing and general disinterest in everything given to her. I was totally wrong. Turns out Scarlet is the best present receiver I've ever seen.

For example, Jon got Scarlet one of those big bouncy balls with disney princesses on it. She opened it while sitting on his lap and when she saw it her face lit up in a big smile. She hit it a few times to make it bounce then gave her dad a hug, then hit it a few more times, smiled at Jon and gave him another hug. Might be the cutest thing I have ever seen. She played with every toy she opened until we gave her a new one. It was so fun to watch.

I gave my parents tickets to Beatles Love for Christmas so they went and saw the show that night. The rest of us lounged in our pajamas and ate a lot of chocolate.

Wednesday we spent most of the day on the strip seeing some of the sights but we headed home early to get ready for Vegas night.

Vegas night was actually Jon's creation but it involved dressing up as gaudy and flashy as we could, going out to dinner, then going to see yet another show. Everyone looked fabulous! Courtney and Kylie wore some of their formal dresses and Kendall wore one of Kristy's and they looked so darn beautiful.

We went to eat at the Venetian and then we took some pictures around the hotel. For every flash of Jon's camera there were 5 other flashes behind it. There were SO many people taking our pictures! At one point Courtney and Kylie were off to the side when a large group of Chinese tourists walked by and almost every single of them asked if they could take a picture of them. It was too funny.

And then we saw Phantom of the Opera that night which was absolutely fabulous.

Thursday mostly involved shopping and eating good food as did Friday. We also got to see 27 Dresses, the movie with Kathleen Heigl. Totally enjoyable. Not necessarily one that needs to be seen in theaters but enjoyable. And James Marsden... great eye candy.

Happy 2008!

Oh P.S. we missed Kristy on Christmas day but we got to talk to her on Wednesday and she is also doing so well. Can't wait to go see her in April!