Sunday Shenanigans

The girls looked especially sweet to me today as we were heading out the door for church. I plopped Annie on the couch, grabbed the camera, and tried to get a good sister shot in less than three minutes. It is getting harder and harder with Lily. She doesn't want to pose for the camera anymore. And we really needed to get out the door. Oh well! After church Annie got her first taste of vanilla ice cream. She was in heaven. Jeremy couldn't get it to her mouth fast enough. I love the picture with the spoon in her mouth - she's smiling while eating. Mmmmmmm!

Look Who Can Stand!

Annie just started crawling two weeks ago and now she can pull herself up to standing. She does the same thing Lily did at this age - once they are up, they are afraid to get back down. So they stand there and cry until someone comes to rescue them. If you look closely you can see the tears in Annie's eyes.

Weight Loss Tool

I forgot to mention the biggest tool that has helped me track my calories and food intake during this process. It is a free website called myfitnesspal.com. I use it everyday to input my food intake and keep myself within my daily calorie limits. The website has an extensive database of nutritional information for all kinds of foods and it has an option for entering your own recipes and determining their caloric content. If you want to try it you can add me as a friend and we can help each other. My name is listed as christinehall45.

Second Day in Salt Lake

I had a hard time getting Lily to cooperate with picture taking the first day so before we went home I tried to get some pictures of her on the temple grounds. She was not in the mood for having her picture taken, but she was in mood to be silly and wear her favorite hat. The pictures are cute anyway and it will be fun to remember how stubborn she was. At least, that's what I'm telling myself.

Temple Square

I love Temple Square in Salt Lake. Each time I walk through the gates I feel a rush of awe and gratitude for the pioneers who settled this area and sacrificed so much to build the beautiful temple and surrounding buildings. This is also the place where my parents and my in-laws were married, so it is the foundation point for my family. I was so excited to share the beauty of this place with the girls.
Pretty little Lily next to the great big temple.

Annie was a real trooper and let lots of people touch her and talk to her. I was stopped so many times by people who were amazed that I have two redheads.

On our first day in town we ate lunch on this bench in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building. We had a great view of the mountains and downtown. And we were the only ones there in that spot.


Lily was a great helper. She was so excited to be able to touch (climb on) the temple. There were so many brides on the grounds that day too. Lily loved all the beautiful dresses.

This is my favorite spot on Temple Square. Lily saw the statue and yelled "Jesus!" then she ran to him and tried to climb up and touch him. There were a lot of people in the visitor center that day so I couldn't get a shot of the girls near the statue. But we did sit on a bench for a few minutes and sing "I Am a Child of God." Lily loved singing to Jesus.....and so did Mommy.

He lives, my kind, wise heavenly friend.
He lives and loves me to the end.
He lives, and while he lives I'll sing.
He lives, my Prophet, Priest, and King.

He lives! All glory to his name!
He lives, my Savior, still the same.
Oh, sweet the joy this sentence gives:
"I know that my Redeemer lives!"

LDS Hymnbook, #136 - I Know That My Redeemer Lives"
Text: Samuel Medley, 1738-1799. Included in the first LDS hymnbook, 1835.

Annie's First Swim

Our hotel in Salt Lake had a nice little indoor pool. Lily couldn't wait to get in the water. Since I had to hold Annie the whole time we were in the water I didn't get very many good pictures of Lily. Annie really liked the pool and was all giggles and smiles. Lily loved playing on the pool stairs and splashing her feet in the hot jacuzzi tub. Daddy was hard at work all day so he never got a chance to swim with us. Lily took the picture of me and Annie with some help steadying the camera.

Memorial Day Owie

The weather was cold, windy, and wet this past Memorial Day. We were cooped up inside most of the day. When the sun made a brief afternoon appearance, I quickly loaded the girls in the car and drove to the nearest park to let them play. We had a wonderful hour on the playground. It was strange to be bundled up with gloves and hats so late in the month of May. Lily didn't seem to notice the cold. Annie was a little less thrilled to be out in the elements. Right before I decided it was time to leave, Lily took a head first spill down a small set of steps. Her face/eye took most of the impact. She was bleeding a lot. I was desperately trying to clean off the blood to locate the injury and determine if we needed to see a doctor while Annie and Lily screamed. Moments like that make me wonder how moms can possibly juggle more than two kids at once. I finally found that she had scratched her face and cut her eyelid. It looked worse than it was and it looked much better after everything was clean. Of course, being a blogger mom, I had to capture this moment. Here are the photos we took on Monday. Lily handled it pretty well and is healing quickly. She even wanted to go to the park the very next day. I love how resilient kids are!