Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas from our favorite little elf!!!

My Birthday

Saturday was my birthday and it was a great day. I got to spend it with two of my favorite people...my wonderful husband and my beautiful daughter! We went to see "Tangled" (Loved it!), went out to eat and saw the "Festival of Lights" in Spanish Fork. One of the best parts of the day was went Ross took care of Leah so I could have a baby-free nap! I also got lots of phone calls, texts, emails, cards and Facebook posts all wishing me a happy birthday. Thanks everyone!Isn't she so cute!

Here I am with a couple of my gifts...

For the rest of this post I took an idea I got from my sister-in-law. Since I just turned 33, I decided to post 33 random things about me. If you want to know a little more about me, read on...

1. I am the oldest of 5 children.
2. I am the favorite grandchild (don't believe me? just ask my grandparents!).
3. I'm also the favorite child (you could ask my parents, but they'll deny it because they don't want the others to feel bad).
4. My favorite color is green.
5. I love caramel. Caramel popcorn is a particular weakness of mine.
6. I like to eat vegetables raw - not cooked.
7. I do NOT eat seafood at all! (YUCK)
8. My last name is my best friend's first name (just spelled different).
9. Ross and I were set up on our first date by our bishop's wife and the 1st counselor's wife as part of our single ward's dating class.
10. I played volleyball in high school, on a club team and for the College of Eastern Utah (CEU).
11. I took dance lessons from the time I was 3 until I was 18.
12. I was in the Acting Company in junior high (though now I wonder WHY?-I hate acting).
13. I have read all the Harry Potter books at least once and have seen all but the latest movie.
14. I have not read any of the Eclipse books. I have not seen any of the movies either. And I have absolutely no desire to!
15. I love to put together puzzles.
16. I have spent about half of my life living in blue houses.
17. I do not like running.
18. I love to travel - especially if it involves an airplane.
19. Summer is my favorite season. I love it when it gets hot!
20. My childhood nick names were Cyssi and Doodles.
21. I love to watch "The Amazing Race."
22. I love to play games.
23. I have a bachelors degree from BYU.
24. I like to watch "Wizards of Waverly Place."
25. I like to watch shows on TLC especially "19 Kids and Counting."
26. Worms freak me out!
27. In junior high I took French classes. I learned Spanish in high school, sign language at CEU and Thai at BYU. Sadly, I'm not fluent in any of them.
28. I have been using the same radio alarm clock since elementary school.
29. My favorite ride at Disneyland is Splash Mountain.
30. I would rather die of heat than freeze to death.
31. I am a night person. I don't do mornings!
32. I'm missing a permanent tooth (a genetic abnormality).
33. I lived with my grandparents during my senior year of high school.

Leah @ 6 Months & Thanksgiving Weekend

Can you believe our baby girl is half a year old already? On Thanksgiving day she turned 6 months old. Here's a quick run down on how she's doing...

• weighs 14 lbs 1.5 oz and is 25 1/4 inches tall
• rolls from her tummy to her back
• sits up by herself, but is still a little wobbly
• started eating rice cereal and is pretty good at it
• loves to hear her own voice and can be pretty loud sometimes (especially if she thinks we aren't paying enough attention to her)
• is much better about going to other people, especially her daddy
• her favorite "toys" include the remote control, the lap top, my cell phone and especially the scriptures, (When we read scriptures together she is fascinated by them and tries so hard to reach over and touch or grab them. We try giving her a baby book to look at while we read but she still prefers the book her daddy is holding.), she also likes the Hymns book at church
• Still only cat naps during the day but is getting a little better at sleeping in her own bed at night
  

During football season, she has usually been hanging out at the house with her cousin Makynlee while Ross and I and Jason and Lyndsee go to the games. Here they are in their game day gear!One recent weekend, Amy and Jackson stayed with us while Ross's brother, Kyle (Amy's husband), and his mom were in Louisiana. So they got to hang out with Leah on game day too.

Here is Leah and her cousin Jackson in their matching BYU outfits. The difference between these two babies is about 4 months and maybe a pound! She's so little and he's so big. It is always so cute to see them together.
We have taken Leah to a few BYU basketball games. Overall she does pretty well as long as the crowd around us isn't too fired up. She actually sleeps through most of the game, even with the loud buzzers and the crowd cheering. Go figure. We had a great Thanksgiving weekend! We went to Ross's mom's house on Wednesday afternoon and spent the night there. We had lots of fun playing games with Kyle and Amy. Thanksgiving morning was too cold for the traditional Leslie family football game. Ross and Kyle did go out and play catch, but that only lasted about 10 minutes.

We went to my parents' house for Thanksgiving dinner and stayed with them through Saturday evening. It was a crazy weekend with lots going on, but we had a lot of fun. One of my favorite parts was being able to leave Leah with my parents and go to the Jordan River Temple with Ross on Friday. If you ever want to go to the temple when it is not busy, go on Black Friday. There were only 12 people on our session!

Leah did so well with everyone this weekend. She let everyone hold her (even Grandma Leslie and Grandpa Tucker) without any meltdowns! This was such a nice break for me!!

It's hard to say which one put the other to sleep here, but either way what a tender moment...
My parents have this Exersaucer for the grandkids at their house. Leah played in it a lot over the weekend. She loved it and so did we. She kept herself entertained for so long in it. It gave us a wonderful reprieve from having to hold her so much. We liked it so much in fact that we decided to order her one for Christmas (shh! don't tell her).
One of the main reasons for staying at my parents for the weekend was for the annual Putnam family Christmas party. It was great to see and visit with so many of my cousins, aunts and uncles.

I had to include this picture. This is my way cute nephew, Cameron. He LOVES Santa! He was so excited to get to see him and waited so patiently for his turn to sit on his lap. But then he couldn't get enough of Santa. He kept going back to sit on his lap and even cried most the way home because he couldn't go home with Santa. How cute is that???
I was afraid Leah would cry with Santa, but she did just fine. She just looked at him and studied him a lot, but never got upset. The same can't be said for some of her other cousins though.
Here we all are with Santa (except for Clayton and Jason who managed to get tickets to the BYU vs Utah football game-unfortunately our Cougars lost by just one point).
Our first family picture with Santa...
Here's Leah opening her first present. She usually likes to play with paper, but she wasn't really into open the gift. For those who are curious, she got a little baby doll and a pair of pajamas.
So here's the real reason that we get together each year. These are my WONDERFUL grandparents (aka Grandma and Grandpa Putnam) whom we all love SOOOO much! They are in their 80's and 90's now, but are thankfully still doing great. We love you Grandma and Grandpa. Thanks for all you do and Merry Christmas!

Thankful For Everything From A To Z

During November I've seen a few people posting something they were grateful for each day. I decided to take that idea and put a little spin on it. I've created just one post with an alpabetical list of things I'm grateful for. Since I am so blessed, this list is not all inclusive, but a good start...

A - America I'm grateful for the chance to be living in this great land of freedom. I'm also grateful for all those who have served and continue to serve to keep us safe and preserve our freedoms.

B - Brothers and Sisters I love my brothers and sisters so much! Like most families, we fought a lot growing up. But now we all get along really well. And we have lots of fun when get get together. I'm grateful for their great spouses too!

C - Cousins I have the very best cousins! Some of my best childhood memories are with my cousins. We've all had so much fun together over the years. I'm grateful to have these people in my life.

D - Dad My dad is WONDERFUL! I can't say enough good things about him. He has done and continues to do so much for our family. I'm grateful for the chance to be his daughter.I love you Dad!

E - Eyes & Ears I'm grateful for eyes to see and ears to hear. How empty my life would be without these two great blessings.

F - Friends Over the years I have been blessed with some pretty amazing friends. Some I haven't seen in years, others are still like family to me. Either way, I'm grateful for their friendship and the opportunity to know and learn from them.

G - Grandparents I have the very best grandparents anyone could ask for! Three of them are still alive and I get to see them often (though not often enough). And my dear Grandpa Tucker is already waiting for us in heaven. All of them have blessed me with a great legacy that I hope I can live up to.

H - Health Throughout my life I been blessed to have good health. This is a huge blessing for which I am very grateful.

I - In-Laws I really lucked out here. Ross has a great family and they have been so kind and welcoming to me from the time they met me. We've only been married two years, but I feel like I've been part of the family for much longer. I guess it was meant to be.

J - Jesus Christ I'm so grateful for my Savior and my Redeemer! Without Christ and His atoning sacrafice nothing else in life would matter. Because of Him, all the most important things in my life can be mine forever.

K - Knowledge I been blessed to get a lot of education in my life. Not just secular, but spiritual knowledge as well. I still like learning new things. But the knowledge I'm most grateful for is my testimony of my Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ and the gospel and all its wonderful truths.

L - Leah What a blessing this little girl has been in my life already. I am SOOOO grateful for this beautiful bundle of joy. I have never had someone love me as much as this sweet little girl does. She has given my life so much more meaning. And for this I am truely grateful.

M - Mom I love my mom so much! She has been a great example to me and as I get older I find that, without even trying, I am more and more like her each day. Her family is so important to her and she has done so much to selflessly serve us. We are all really blessed to call her Mom.

N - Nature Heavenly Father has created such beautiful things to gladen the heart and enliven the soul. I'm grateful that I live so close to the mountains and can enjoy those things so easily.

O - Opportunities Throughout my life I have been blessed with so many opportunities that have taught me so much and have allowed me to meet so many great people. I'm grateful for these opportunities.

P - Plan of Salvation The thing that makes life worth living! This is one of our greatest blessings from our Heavenly Father. I am so grateful that I know who I am, where I came from, why I'm here and where I will go after this life.

Q - Quilts Anyone who knows me knows that I hate to be cold. I am so grateful for things like quilts to keep me warm. I especially like quilts that were made by someone special to me.

R - Ross I have been blessed with a wonderful husband. He is always so good at doing the right thing. He is such a great example to me. Nearly every day I wonder how he has the patience to put up with me, but I'm so grateful that he does! I love you, Ross!

S - Summer I love the summertime! The long, hot, sunny days when you can go outside in just a t-shirt and shorts. It never comes soon enough and I'm sad at the first sign of it leaving. With the days so cold and dark now I am becoming even more grateful for summer.

T - Temples I am so grateful for the opportunity to escape the world and enter the beautiful houses of the Lord where I can feel the spirit so strongly and learn more about my Heavenly Father and his marvelous love for me. I'm also grateful for temple ordinances that allow me to be sealed to my family forever.

U - Uncles and Aunts I'm telling you, I have a great family. I have also been blessed with some great aunts and uncles. Over the years, so many of them have been such a great support to me. They are also a lot of fun to hang out with.

V - Vocation This is another word for a job. I'm grateful that Ross has a job to provide for our little family. I recently quit my job to stay home with Leah, but I'm also grateful for the opportunity I had to work at my last job which I actually really liked. I don't necessarily like working, but that was a great place and wonderful people to be working with.

W - Water What a great thing! I'm so grateful to be living in a time and place where I can get clean water out of my tap any time. I'm especially grateful that I have hot running water to shower and get clean every day.

X - X-rays To me this represents all the technological inventions that have been created to make the quality of our health and lives better. I'm grateful for the miracle of modern technology.

Y - Young Women I'm currently serving in our ward's young women presidency. I'm grateful for the opportunity to work with some of the greatest girls and leaders. My little Beehives are so sweet! While I'm at it, I'm also grateful for my own young women leaders who helped teach me so much so many years ago.

Z - Zippers What a great, simple, little invention. Look around you, they're everywhere. I for one am grateful that things, like my pants, have a zipper.

Leah's Photo Shoot

My wonderful cousin, Britta, took these pictures of Leah yesterday. I'm so excited about how they turned out that I couldn't wait to post them! Thank you again Britta!!!

Halloween 2010

We had a fun first Halloween with our Little Leah. I decided to make a cute little fairy costume to dress her up in. Here she is smiling up at her daddy! It started the week before Halloween. There was a carnival at Ross's elementary school that he helped out at, so we dressed up and went to check it out. Ross got to show off his cute little girl. We even had a stranger ask to take her home. Weird, but flattering, I guess...

On the Friday right before Halloween we went to Ross's mom's house to have homemade pizzas and watch "Young Frankenstein" with Mom, Kyle, Amy and Jackson. Here she is at Grandma Leslie's with her newest cousin, Jackson.

He was such a tired little boy. But oh he's soooo cute! On Saturday, our ward had a trunk-or-treat sponsored by the Elders Quorum. It poured down rain all afternoon and finally let up just before the event was planned to start. I wasn't sure they would go through with it, but Ross talked to his activities coordinator and they decided it was a go. So I bundled up Leah and took her over to the church. The rain stopped for about a half and hour and then started pouring again. I should have got pictures, but forgot. When the rain started coming down pretty hard, I took Leah to the car. And when it got worse, I took her home. Poor Ross was soaking wet since he stayed to help get things cleaned up. What a faithful Elders Quorum President! But the worse thing about that night was that we ran out of candy at the church so we couldn't even open our door to the trick-or-treaters that came to our house later. : (

On Sunday, aka Halloween, it was my Grandma Tucker's birthday. So the family took the occasion to all get together for a birthday dinner at my Aunt Julie and Uncle Ben's house. Since Grandma's birthday is on Halloween, she doesn't often get all of her family together for her birthday, so this was a real treat for her. And it was fun to see all the little kids dressed up in their Halloween costumes too!

Here Leah is with her Aunt MoMo.

Here are the girls together. There was Pocahontas, Cinderella, our fairy and Megan who was tired of dressing up by this time, but she had several different costumes over the weekend.

Then we added in Woody, Spiderman, Mickey Mouse and a pilot. But it was getting late by this time and the meltdown had already started to ensue. So this is the best shot we could get of all of them together. Quite a tired bunch!

I was able to snap this quick shot of Makynlee and Leah before complete meltdown.

These last pictures are just a few cute ones I shot at home. Enjoy!

5 Months

On October 25th our little girl turned 5 months old. She's growing so fast, it's hard to believe that it has been 5 months already. Here's a few highlights of what she's doing now and a few cute pictures of her...

• She has found her toes and loves to grab them especially when she's getting her diaper changed.
• She still doesn't roll yet and doesn't seem all that interested unless we're changing her diaper, then she wants to wiggle all over.
• She is starting to laugh more when I play with her, but it is still sometimes hard to get her laughing. She does smile a lot though.
• She is still a momma's girl. She is better about going to other people, but still prefers mom.
• She loves to hear her daddy's voice. When he is talking, she always has to stop what she's doing and watch him - especially when he's saying family prayer or when she's eating (he is very distracting for her when she eats which Ross finds really funny, so he tries to distract her even more).
• She is getting good at using her hands and likes to grab or touch anything nearby.
• I've been trying to teach her to blow raspberries with her tongue. It is funny because she is really trying, but it usually just comes out as a strange spitting sound that is more like a sneeze. In fact, when she starting doing it, I thought she was sneezing but when I paid closer attention I realized that she was actually trying to blow a raspberry. So funny!
• She loves to stand up on our laps. It seems to make her feel big.
• She is close to sitting up on her own. She sits up really well when she has some support.
  

Here she is in her cute Elmo outfit with her Elmo doll (which she does actually like - when we make him talk she always smiles). Thanks Lyndsee for the way cute outfit! And here she is with her rubber ducky and my favorite ducky jammies. She also likes to play with the ducky. She smiles a lot when we make it squeak.

We took her to her first BYU basketball game last week. It was just the Blue and White game, so there weren't as many people there. But she did great. She was watching the game so much that I had a hard time getting a picture of her. She is a people watcher so having so much going on around her kept her quite entertained. But she still feel asleep before the game was over.

Gotta love the chubby cheeks! Such a cute baby girl! We love her so much!