Moab and Arches

On May 20, we drove down to Moab for a family reunion. I'd never really been to Moab before except just to drive through town on our way up from Texas. We'd heard it was worth stopping at Dead Horse Point and we made it there just as Evie was waking up and ready for a bottle. Evie didn't really want to wait for us to pay to get into the park and she was even less interested in waiting until we made it all the way out to the look out, so we stopped at the Visitor's Center. While Dan and Anna wandered, I fed Evie. I think we were the youngest people there. I guess Visitor's Centers are more for retired people, but they loved Evie.

After Evie had her lunch, the rest of us stopped and had our lunch. We tried to take as long as possible to actually get to the Point.

The Point was beautiful, but one of the first things I saw was a line of white RVs and other cars. Someone said Microsoft was down there shooting a commercial. So I feel like my view was marred by The Man. On a more interesting note, when we finally did make it out to the look out point, we saw all these women in sundresses and some men in ties. They didn't seem to fit in with the khaki/olive colored t-shirts and shorts that seemed to be the dress code. Then we heard whisperings of a wedding and as we were leaving, we saw the bride. I guess the couple decided that they wanted to get married out on the look out stand. I wanted to stick around, but Dan's not into people watching like I am, so we decided to head down to Moab.

After all the cold weather up north, we wanted to take advantage of the eighty-degree weather and go swimming, but the pool heater was broken and the water felt like snow melt. Of course, Anna didn't mind, so Dan was nice enough to get in and swim with her. We finally took her home when her lips turned blue.
Friday morning we made it into Arches and started off with Sand Dune Arch. That was probably a little anticlimactic, but it was nice to start off with a short hike for Anna and Evie.
We didn't stay at Sand Dune Arch long because the wind was kicking up a lot of sand, so we decided to go check out Broken Arch.



In the afternoon, my parents watched Anna and Evie during nap time so that we could go hike Delicate Arch with my siblings.

It was crazy windy up there by Delicate Arch. I was much more impressed by Delicate Arch than I thought I would be. I guess there's a reason why it is the iconic arch, but I just figured that it wouldn't be that cool.
And like most people, I underestimated the size of the arch, assuming that we could get a photo of us under the arch and still be recognizable in the picture. I guess I thought everyone else wasn't smart enough to get a little closer.
After a nice hike, we came home to a hysterical Evie. She had started crying an hour before we got home and continued to cry all evening. She was inconsolable. Finally after three hours of screaming, I thought to give her some ibuprofen and to call the Kids Care nurse in Salt Lake City. After the ibuprofen, Evie finally fell into an exhausted sleep. Anna on the other hand woke up around nine-thirty and didn't want to go back to bed. I think the sound of the wind scared her. So we took her to bed with us to get her settled. Around midnight, she finally fell into a relaxed sleep and we put her in her bed. Then at three in the morning all the smoke alarms in our condo started going off. We never found any sign of fire and after everyone (but Anna, thanks goodness) got up and out of bed, they mysteriously turned off. Evie went back to sleep fairly easily after I gave her a bottle and some more ibuprofen.

The next morning we decided that rather than race back to Salt Lake to take her to the doctor, we'd just take her into the urgent care in Moab. It didn't open until noon so my mom stayed with Evie, while Dan, Anna, and I hiked Park Avenue.
By this time, Anna was pretty tired of the wind and so was I. Every time the wind would blow, it would kick up sand and dirt, often blowing into our eyes. Anna would burrow her head into Dan's neck and cry. For almost a week after we got home, Anna was constantly rubbing her eyes and crying that she had something in her eye. And if the wind started to blow, which happens a lot at our house, she'd freak out.


Doesn't ice cream make everything better? When we got back home, Dan took Evie into the urgent care while I stayed with Anna. I guess the doctor took one look at Evie and said, "I know what her problem is--she's malnourished." Anyway, he couldn't find anything wrong with Evie and she was doing pretty well on the ibuprofen, so we decided to head home after dinner like we had originally planned. And I took Anna out to get ice cream.

Anna never naps well while we travel, and we hadn't even made it out of downtown Moab before Anna was crashed. She slept most of the way home and so did Evie, making the trip much easier. By Sunday evening Evie was getting fussy again and she was up several times that night despite the ibuprofen and the acetaminophen. I was pretty haggard looking Monday morning and decided I had to get some help, so I took Evie into the doctor again. She said Evie's throat looked irritated and found some fluid in one of Evie's ears, but I think she would have waited to write a prescription if I didn't look half crazed with exhaustion. Evie started doing better almost as soon as we got her on the antibiotics, but she decided that she liked waking up in the night, so it was a pretty rough week. I think it's always harder to go back to night wakings when they've been sleeping through the night. We were in survival mode all week, just trying to stay on top of the laundry and keep everyone fed, but by the weekend, she started to think about sleeping through the night again. She's still not sleeping through the night every night, but last night I put her to bed at 5:30 p.m. She woke up around seven and I rocked her back to sleep and then she slept until 7 a.m. I'll take it!

Sisters

Anna still loves Evie although I have noticed that whenever Evie wakes up from a nap, Anna often starts crying "huggy!" But when Evie cries, Anna will often stroke her face and say, "I sorry Evie" or pat Evie's back. She has also started calling her "Evie sweet girl."

Tulip Festival Again

The day before Mother's Day, Anna, Evie, and I met Heather at the Thanksgiving Point Gardens. There were even more tulips in bloom, so it was fun to be back and see all the new blooms. I love tulips.

This is what Anna looked like most of the time: running ahead of us and occasionally looking back to see if we were still there.

Evie's shirt says "Mommy Loves Me" which seems especially appropriate for the day before Mother's Day. But it was also spotted with blood from her finger where I had cut it while trying to cut her nail. As Heather pointed out, that was a bit ironic.

I miss all those bright pretty colors.

May's Snapshots

On one our our chilly days in May, Anna decided that she needed a hat, gloves, and her snow boots to go outside and play. Never mind the jacket. She reminds me a little of my sister Erica who never needed a jacket either.

Anna found this attachment to one of Dan's tools, stuck it on her finger, and started calling it a finger puppet.

Sandy found this cute apron for Anna. And there she is again in her snow boots, her favorite shoes. I finally hid them in the basement.

Anna stuck her foot in her toy train and thought it was cool to slide around on it. I tried to tell her that they make special shoes for that sort of thing, but since she doesn't own any of those special shoes, she didn't much care.

Evie kicks and wiggles so much that I gave up using her little plastic tub and now she takes her baths in the big bathtub. She doesn't like it much because water is often getting splashed in her eyes, but I love to watch her hair swirl in the water.

Last Sunday Evie met my dad's parents for the first time.

More Hair

Now that Anna's hair is longer, and she's become more patient with me playing with it, I've had some fun trying out new hairdos on her. Most of the time, we just stick to pigtails, but on Sundays and when I feel like I have some extra time, I try something new. There's a gal in my ward who has a hair blog and it's been a great resource since my hair knowledge is pretty limited.

Mindy calls the hairstyle below "Twistbacks."

These are just two french braids around the crown of the head.

I still don't know what to do with Evie's hair, mostly because I love how it sticks up. I've had some success with putting a clip in, but I thought it might be fun to try a little ponytail. She doesn't seem to mind.

Car Wash

A few weeks ago, Dan took Anna with him when he took the car through the car wash. She's been talking about it ever since. Dan says she got pretty scared about half way through and started screaming "momma!" Poor kid. So he reached back and held her hand. When she talks about it, the conversation usually follows this thread.

Anna: Car wash. Wash machine!

Parent: What color was the soap?

Anna: green

Parent: And?

Anna: Purple!

Parent: What do the brushes do?

Anna: (rolls her arms or just shakes them) brrrr! Hand.

Parent: Did you hold Daddy's hand?

Anna: yeah (nodding solemnly).

A few days after the car wash, she found this picture she had drawn several days before the car wash, but she decided it was about the car wash with green and purple soap and brushes. And that water circle where I so thoughtlessly placed my glass, that is the moon.

Four Months Old

On Evie's Four Month birthday, we drove down to Moab with a stop at Dead Horse Point on the way. She needed a bottle by the time we got to Dead Horse Point, and while I fed her she got plenty of comments on her hair. She's still got tons! At her well baby check a week later, she weighed 16 lbs. 6 oz. (93%) and was 24.5 inches long (56%). She's still our little sweet chunk and we love her.

These days Evie is still a very pleasant baby, although she stopped sleeping through the night this past week when she got an ear infection in while we were in Moab. She usually wakes up at midnight and then sometimes again at four which means that I'm tired all the time and I'm not going running in the morning. Maybe I shouldn't have signed up for that half marathon, but it's not until August, so I'm hopeful that I'll still have time to train for it.

Evie loves to chat and smile. Tonight while I was rocking her to sleep, she smiled up at me and chattered away with sweet coos. She loves grabbing for toys and sticking anything she can get her hands on in her mouth, including her hands. Sometimes we can hear loud sucking noises coming from her room when she stirs and starts sucking on her hand.



She also loves to wiggle and kick. Because she has some flat head issues, I bought bumpers for her head while she's in her car seat. Often after she's spent some time in the car seat, when I do get her out, she'll shake her head back and forth and kick and wiggle as if to say, "Ah! I'm free!