Happy Birthday, Anna!

I know I have tons of catching up to do on the blog, but at my mom's request for pictures from Anna's birthday, I'm just going to do that first. :)  Anna turned 2 on Thursday!  Her birthday party was so much fun!  I had planned to keep her party super simple...but then I got this magical idea to do a Candyland themed party (Anna loves the game) and couldn't get it out of my head.  So I just decided to go for it. Luckily, my mother-in-law flew in on New Year's Eve and jumped right in to help with all the food and decorating.

Anna woke up at about 6:30 a.m. on her birthday...not because she was excited for her birthday, just because she does that sometimes.  So with staying up until midnight the night before, it made for a short night for Mom and Dad.  After trying to get her to go back to sleep for an hour, we gave up and got up with her.  I made her blueberry pancakes, which are one of her favorites.  I tried to make a Mickey Mouse silhouette, but it didn't turn out so well.  But we decorated it with a whipped cream "A" and sprinkles, so she loved it anyway. :)

We spent the rest of the morning and afternoon cooking food and decorating for her party.  Everything was actually really easy and cheap to do...colored paper squares for the "gameboard" and tissue-wrapped paper plates for giant candies made simple decorations.  (At least it was simple in theory.  Unfortunately, the tape didn't stick to the wall very well, and since we decided to do that first thing, we spent the rest of the day re-taping them because they kept falling off the wall, haha).

Karry re-taping right before the party

"Quick, take a picture before they fall down again!"

But the thing I was proudest of was the food table. We made cupcakes and frosted them different colors to make the game board "squares."  Then we frosted a few pink ones to mark the different destinations of Candyland.  I found a bunch of pictures from the board game on google and made simple labels for all the food.  We had the "Peppermint Forrest", "Lollypop Woods", and "Chocolate Swamp" (all using leftover Christmas candy).  Then we had "Plumpy's Fruit Salad," "Rainbow Pass-ta Salad," "Gramma Nut's Trail Mix," "Lord Licorice Wands," and of course, "King Kandy's Castle Cake."  Oh and we made sherbet punch for "Queen Frostine's Ice Cream Sea."  It turned out so cute!

Karry did an amazing job on the castle cake!

We had a crowd of over 30 family members and friends, and Anna received quite the load of gifts.  It was so much fun to watch her open her presents.  Her reaction was, "Whoa!" or "Wow" or "Oooh!" for everything.

Opening gifts

Blowing out candles

She also had a blast eating the tower off of her castle cake.

Happy birthday, Anna!

Kentucky/Indiana Trip

We had the neat opportunity to visit Kentucky and southern Indiana over the July 4th weekend.  The Smith family reunion was held this year at Patoka Lake, IN which is near where my grandma grew up and where her sister Billie (who just recently passed away) lived.  Since the reunion location was so close to where Derek served his mission, we decided to spend an extra couple days touring Kentucky, and visiting some of his converts.  This was the first time Derek has been able to go back to Kentucky since his mission five years ago, and it was really special for us to go with him.  I can see now why he loves it there so much!

We flew into Cincinnati late on Wednesday, July 2nd and stayed the night there. Thursday morning, we drove about an hour to Louisville, Kentucky.  We spent the morning at the Louisville Waterfront Park along the Ohio River.  There's a cool pedestrian/bike bridge that goes over the river and a really fun playground where Anna had a blast.  We ate lunch at a Mexican restaurant that was also right there on the river.

After lunch, we drove to another park across town to meet up with Jay, one of Derek's converts.  When we were planning our trip, I asked Derek what he wanted to do while we were in Kentucky, and the first thing he said was, "I want to visit Jay." Jay is one of Derek's closest friends from his mission, and it was clear that the two have a close bond.  We wished we could have met his wife, who was just recently baptized, but she had to work late that day. But it was really special to get to meet and talk with him.

After saying goodbye to Jay, we drove to Patoka Lake for the reunion. All six of my grandma's kids and their spouses plus most of her grandchildren and great-grandchildren were able to attend.  It was quite the crew!  It was a little crazy and chaotic, but loads of fun. The weather really couldn't have been more perfect.  It was about 75 degrees and sunny the whole time we were there. We spent a lot of time swimming at the lake, catching fireflies at night, keeping track of all the little kids running around, and just visiting.  On the 4th, most of us drove to the next town over to watch the fireworks. And of course, the boys (and Megan) had to get a game of basketball in.  (They had to drive 45 minutes to the nearest court and then another 30 miles to the nearest Wal-Mart to find a ball, but they were determined to play!)

What a crew!

Anna at the beach

Bailey and Jackson

Charlotte

Maren and Anna

On Sunday morning, we left pretty early to drive to Bardstown, KY for church.  Bardstown was one of Derek's favorite areas, mostly due to the wonderful members of the little branch.  Everyone was so welcoming. Several people remembered Derek, and it was really neat to see the daughter of one of his converts there. Derek enjoyed visiting with the TWO sets of missionaries (elders and sisters) that were currently serving there.  We had a couple people ask us, "Are you moving to Bardstown?!" Honestly, by the end of the day, I was almost ready to!  It is such a neat little town with lots of old brick buildings, cobblestone paths, and tons of history.  And the people have such fun southern accents and big hearts.

At a Civil War memorial in  Bardstown

When church was over, we stopped by to visit with Angie, another of Derek's converts.  She welcomed us into her home and we were able to visit for a couple hours.  She is such a nice lady, and she just loved Anna!  I am sad we forgot to take a picture with her before leaving.

Next, we drove about 30 miles to Elizabethtown, another of Derek's areas.  We drove by his old apartment and the church building, and then drove to Fort Knox.  While Derek was in E-town, he had the opportunity to make weekly visits to Fort Knox to teach the soldiers training there.  The missionaries would also conduct Sunday worship services and hold baptisms almost every week.

We stayed the night in Bardstown and then drove the next morning to Frankfort, KY.  We took the scenic route through Versailles to see all the horse farms.  That drive was so pretty and better matched my vision of what Kentucky would look like.  The Louisville area has way more trees than I'd expected, but as we drove east, the trees cleared to make way for the rolling green hills I had pictured.  We made a couple stops to take some pictures with the horses.  These horses are some of the most spoiled horses in the world.  Their pastures and barns are huge!  (Derek told me he heard some of the barns even have chandeliers inside. What?!)

Definitely in the Bible Belt.  Love it!

In Frankfort, which is the capitol of Kentucky, we decided to do some of the "touristy" stuff.  We visited Daniel Boone's grave, did a quick tour of the capitol building, and ate lunch at this neat little southern-style seafood place by the river where I got to sample my very first hushpuppies.  We made a quick drive by Derek's mission apartment, and then it was time to head to the airport.  (I have to make a note here that Anna was a superb traveler.  She slept most of the time in the car as we drove around Kentucky, and she was really good on the airplane...until the last hour of the flight home. It was a 3 1/2 hour flight and it was late and she was really tired but would not fall asleep until five minutes AFTER we landed.  But other than that, she did really, really well.)  We wished we would have had time to visit Mt. Vernon, IN and Corbin, KY, Derek's first and last areas, but they were more out of the way and we weren't able to fit it in. But it was such a fun trip, and I'm so glad we were able to go!

Daniel Boone's Grave

It's not southern if it's not deep fried!

Anna liked the hushpuppies!

Anna Update!

I think we're definitely due for an Anna update, how about you?

Anna had a growth spurt in the last three months!  Since April, she has grown 2 1/2 inches taller...I knew she had grown, but I didn't realize how much!  She is now in the 46th percentile for height.  But in the same time period, she has only gained one pound and is in the 14th percentile for weight. She is a skinny little thing...her pants are almost always falling off her.

She had another eye appointment this month, and I'm sad to report that her eyes are crossing again.  It wasn't that much of a surprise...we've been noticing it for the last several months. Her doctor did a full eye exam and determined that she is a little farsighted.  So he wants to try glasses for a few months to see if they help with the crossing. (Everyone always asks, but no, I have no idea how he figured out what prescription a one-year-old needs. It's a complete mystery!)  Anyway, he gave it a 50% chance that glasses would help.  If not, it's another surgery.  So we're keeping our fingers crossed!  In the meantime, she looks dang cute in her little glasses!

Anna is learning tons of new words all the time.  Here's a list of words she can say: mama, dada, baba (bottle), bubo (bubbles), bye, hi, see ya, hey, me, uh-pee (up please/help me), ah-pee (happy), no, syeah (yes), yeah, yay, ayym (amen), mo (more), some, so bee (so big), my tuh (my turn), stop, boo (blue/blueberries), wa-wa (water/watermelon), ju (juice), noo (noodle) ba (ball), wu (one), two, eye, ahm (arm), shoes, suit (swimsuit), peasss (please...she says this one repeatedly when she wants to play on the iPad), nigh-nigh, baby.  That's all I can think of right now, but I know there's more.  She does a lot of first consonant sounds for words ("st" for stickers, "ch" for cheek/cheese etc) and she tries to repeat a lot of words we say.  The funniest talking moment happened the other night at dinner.  Anna always tries to stand up in her high chair and Derek always tells her "Sit down!" and points downward with his finger.  So the other night, Anna stands up and points with her finger and says "see dow!"  It was SO FUNNY.

Anna knows lots of animal sounds too.  Here's a video of her demonstrating a few.  Elephant is our favorite. :)

(Sorry the video is sideways)

Anna still loves to dance. Her dancing these days involves a lot of marching, bouncing, and spinning in circles.  (I sometimes miss the hip shaking and head bopping.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GdLFpi3lYA4

Anna has also started singing along with songs.  It started with just the oohs and ahhs and heys.  You know that song "Best Day of My Life" by American Authors that was on the radio all the time?  That was the first one she really started singing along with all the "ooh-ooh-ooh-oohs" and "whoa-oh-ohs" :)  And you know the part in "Let it Go? from Frozen where it says "Don't let them knooow, well now they knooooow."  Anna belts out the "KNOOOW" every time it comes on.  So funny.  She recognizes quite a few songs now and tries to sing along.  Some of her favorites are The Wheels on the Bus, Jesus Wants Me For a Sunbeam (she yells "bee!" for "beam"), and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.  We listen to the KidzBop Kids Pandora radio station almost daily, so she also knows all the current teeny-bop hits including "What does the Fox Say?", One Direction, and Selena Gomez.  She's pretty hip. :)

Anna was weaned at around 17 months. Yay! It actually was a lot easier than I thought it would be.  Once we got down to just twice a day, it was really easy to phase out the morning feeding.  And then I started giving her a bottle after nursing at bedtime.  Then we just eliminated the nursing altogether. Derek took over the feeding the first few nights and she was fine.  The next night, I tried just giving her a bottle, and she cried at first, but then took it and was fine.  Now baba is her favorite thing ever.  We have to hide it until right before bed because she won't want to brush her teeth or read stories or do anything else.  Even then, she will still sometimes say "baba, baba, baba" over and over again until we give it to her.  She only gets one at bedtime though.

The awesome thing about weaning is that she's sleeping a lot better.  She sleeps through the night now probably 5 out of 7 nights.  I don't know if it's because nursing during the night was a comfort thing and now she's not getting that so she's less inclined to wake up, or if she was waking because she was actually hungry and now she's getting fuller with the bottle than she was with nursing.  Either way, it's nice for me!

Anna is also eating a lot better these days.  Some of her current favorite foods are blueberries, corn on the cob, peas, animal crackers, watermelon, and noodles. She's still pretty much a vegetarian.  I don't know how she does it, but she KNOWS when something is meat.  It doesn't matter if it's a new dish or if we try to sneak it in with a bite of rice or vegetables, if meat is in there, she will turn her head away and refuse to take a bite. The only meat we've successfully been able to feed her is chicken nuggets. Do those even count as real meat?  I don't know.  Anna seems to eat better when other people feed her...she's such a mooch.  It seems like she charms people into sharing fruit snacks, crackers, and cookies almost everywhere we go.

After she picked out all the blueberries from her blueberry pancake :)

Making a fashion statement with pjs, a snazzy headband, and yogurt-covered mouth

Anna continues to be pretty affectionate and loves giving hugs and kisses.  When we skype with grandparents, she will give them kisses by kissing the ipad screen. :)  She's also started tickling people.  She just came up to me one day and put her fingers on my stomach and started saying "tee tee tee tee." She does it all the time now to Derek and I.  It is the cutest thing!

Giving a big hug to her cousin, Mason

Anna loves playing at the park.  The swings might still be her favorite, but she loves the slides now too. She's kind-of fearless.  She will climb up to the tallest part of the playground set and go down the biggest slide...all by herself.  It sometimes makes me a little nervous!

She also loves the water, and we've enjoyed playing at the splash pad and going swimming a lot this summer. Sometimes when I don't feel like filling up the kiddie pool, I'll just fill up some tupperware containers with water, give her some cups, and let her play on the back patio. She loves it!

Playing in the backyard pool with friends, Mercedez and Mckade

At the splash pad

Staying warm!

Anna continues to love "helping".  She helps carry groceries in, take things to the trash, pull weeds, water the garden, fold laundry, put laundry in the dryer, make cookies.  She is quite the little helper.  My challenge is to find tasks she can do on her own that take her several minutes so I can also get things done. :)

Anna is also all about being like Mom and Dad these days. When I'm putting lotion or chapstick on, she has to have some too.  If Derek puts salt on his food, Anna has to have some too.  If I give her a different cereal for breakfast, she cries until I give her the same kind I'm having.  We don't cut her food into little pieces anymore because she won't eat it if it looks different from ours.  And we all use plastic cups at dinner because she has to drink out of the same kind of cup Daddy and Mommy are using. I caught her trying to put my deodorant the other day...she pulled the lid off and was sticking it down her shirt.  She knew exactly what to do with it! She really is watching our every move.

Wearing Daddy's hat at the Bees game

Anna continues to be extremely animated.  When she gets really excited, she yells "Ohhhhh!" When she's sad, she covers her face with her hands and cries.  When she's really proud of something, she looks at you and gives you the biggest smile ever.  It is always so fun to watch her reactions to new things because she is so expressive.

Ohhh!

I'm SOOO happy!

We sure love that sweet and spunky little girl!

May

Here we are playing catch-up again. :)  I'm going to try really, really hard to get all caught up with everything by next week.  Wish me luck!

So the first weekend of May we got to go and watch Kyle and the rest of the BYU rugby team win their 3rd consecutive national championship.  Both Karry and Mike were able to come, as well as Grandpa Lontine, so that was really fun.  It was super hot that day so almost everyone on the east side of the stands (which was baking in the sun) moved to the shady west side by half time.  Both teams played really hard and it was a close game.  The final score was BYU: 43, California: 33.  Go Cougars!

So proud of our national champ!

I also need to brag about our garden.  Derek spent the last three weekends of April and the first two weekends of May building a retaining wall in the backyard for our garden.  It was definitely a bigger project than we anticipated.  But it looks really nice!  We planted our garden at the end of May and it is doing really well.  We've had lots of spinach and cilantro and basil already, and should get some tomatoes and zucchini soon.  Yum!

The finished product before planting

Mothers' Day was of course in May.  Derek woke up early to make me chocolate-chip pancakes, and Anna helped too. I love this picture of her haha.

We also attended the annual US Synthetic crawdad boil and picnic in May.  Anna didn't quite know what to think of the crawdads, but she loved getting to ride a pony!

At the end of May, Anna and I flew to South Dakota for a week to spend time with my family, especially with Maggie before she left on her mission.  Derek and Trevor and Megan (Who are ENGAGED! That also happened in May. :)) drove out on Friday and we were all together for Memorial Day weekend and Maggie's farewell talk.  It was fun to all be together.  Maggie did a great job on her talk, and she is already doing so great as a missionary. She has been in the Mexico City MTC for the past six weeks and just arrived in Florida this week.  Every email home is just bursting with enthusiasm and passion for what she is doing.  It is awesome!

At Lake Mitchell

Cheese!  (Photos courtesy of Aunt Megan) :)

Love this one

Aunt Maggie and Anna

Our family (We're on a hill...Derek isn't actually that tall haha)

The fab five :)

Hermana Smith in Mexico City!

Happy Birthday, Derek!

Most of this blog has been dedicated to Anna, but this one goes out to my wonderful husband, Derek.  He doesn't like it when I brag about him, probably because he tries really hard to pretend not to be as amazing as he really is.  Anyone who knows Derek knows he's a guy who loves to tease and joke around.  But as his wife, I am one of the I'm lucky few that gets to see the loving, sensitive side of him that his never-serious side tends to camouflage.  So here are 10 of my favorite things (including some that you might not know) about Derek.

1.) Derek is extremely calm in what I see as "crisis" situations.  For example, when I was going through a very rough first year of teaching and coming home in tears almost every day, Derek was my rock.  He would listen as I vented about everything that was going wrong and hold me as I had a good cry.  Then he would sit me down and talk me through whatever problems I was having with my class and help me figure out what I needed to do differently.  I don't know how I would have survived that school year without him!  Another example was when Anna was getting her first teeth. She was crying and crying and we could NOT get her to go to sleep.  I was getting so tired and frustrated and was ready to just let her cry it out.  But Derek was so patient, gave her a blessing, and then stayed up rocking her and singing to her for over an hour (with her screaming her head off the whole time) until she was finally able to fall asleep.

2.) Derek is kind-of sentimental.  He got a little emotional when we sold our well-worn Ford Taurus because it was the first car he drove when he turned 16.  He got a little teary a couple weeks ago watching old videos of Anna because it made him think about how much she's growing up.  He also always remembers things like the anniversary of our first date and reminds me that we've been together for now almost 8 (wow!!) years.

3.) Derek loves his family.  He always talks about how they're loud and drive him crazy, but, really, he would do anything for them. A perfect example was when his mom was hospitalized for appendicitis.  Derek was on the phone for over an hour calling everyone--her sister, her mom, friends from the ward---to make sure she had people to be with her and take care of her since he couldn't.

4. Derek loves to make people laugh. He is always cracking jokes (including some really bad puns), making goofy faces, or inventing ridiculous lyrics to songs to get people to laugh.  He loves it when people laugh, and I love that about him.

5. Derek is an extremely careful planner.  When we have to make important decisions, there are always very detailed pros and cons lists involved.  He has to look at all the data and weigh every option until he's sure we've made the best choice.  Sometimes it drives me nuts, but I really do appreciate that he is so conscientious about important decisions.  He is also a wiz with Excel, and we have spreadsheets and charts for everything.  He made this one for our mortgage that you can go in and play around with it and see if we increase our monthly payment by this amount, we'll pay it off this many months sooner.  It's pretty impressive.  In another life, he should have been a financial planner.  

6. Derek is really thoughtful.  It's true that sometimes he gets so focused on thinking about something (usually solving an engineering problem) that he's completely oblivious to what goes on around him. BUT when he's paying attention, he is extremely considerate of others.  I've watched him stand in the back during a church meeting until he was sure every other person had found a seat.  He once came to pick up Anna from the nursery at a Relief Society activity and then just stayed to help out because he could tell they needed some extra hands.  He will stop and offer rides to coworkers or neighbors when it's raining out.  One of my favorite memories is the first time we ever flew together. The plane needed to stop for repairs and then were stuck in the airport until we could find another flight home. After waiting there for SEVEN hours, we finally found a flight with available seats. But instead of taking them, Derek instead ran to tell this other family with three kids and made sure that they got onto the flight first.  (Thankfully, there ended up being enough seats for all of us!)

7. Derek knows how to take time to relax and have fun.  I used to always want to go, go, go and get things done, immediately moving from one thing to the next.  But Derek has taught me that sometimes it's important to slow down, enjoy the little moments, and take time to just be together without always having to go somewhere or do something.

8. Derek loves his field of work.  He definitely has the brain of an engineer and is always picking up objects, examining them from every angle, and taking them apart to figure out how they work.  He always comes home excited about different projects he's working on and tries to explain them to me in ways I can understand, which usually diagrams on napkins or building models with Anna's blocks (or whatever is available).  He loves the show "How it's Made," and he will often spend his free time looking up YouTube videos to learn about different processes or products.

9.  While much of his knowledge is engineering-related, he is surprisingly well-informed about lots of different topics.  He soaks up information like a sponge; I think he remembers almost everything he reads or hears...not necessarily the details, but the general ideas. I am always amazed at how many times I'll be wondering aloud about something, and he is able to explain it to me.

10. Lastly, Derek has a deep love for Jesus Christ and His Gospel.  He really seeks to better understand Christ's Atonement and how to apply it in his own life.  He likes to draw up these nerdy really great analogies to help him make sense of different gospel principles. (Ask him sometime to tell you about his elevator or bridge analogies...they're actually really good!)  He makes sure we have weekly family home evening lessons and daily family prayer, and he's really great about talking to Anna about Jesus in ways she can understand.

Happy Birthday, Derek!  You really are amazing.  :)