The Zoo

It was Lois' first time.  Verdict?  I think she loved it!  

chillin' with the giraffes

looking at the monkeys

loving the zebras

hanging out with her buddies - Jack, Callie and Avery

And me hanging out with my buddies, Kat (L) and Addie (R)

Jack's crazy hair! Love it.

Callie being a turtle.  She hung out in there for quite a while.  

I think she really liked being a turtle.

It was a fun day.  We'll definitely be going back soon!  

Celebrating 10 months

Things are going great here in the Wright household.  Lois has started to crawl - although it isn't a consistent crawl yet.  But it's exciting and she seems to be excited about her new skills, too.   We are looking forward to a week in Salt Lake City to visit both sets of grandparents and to enjoy conference with them!  We're sad to be leaving Jason behind - we'll miss him lots!  It's been a really busy month for him and next month will be even crazier!  We are so grateful that he's willing to work so hard on our behalf!  

Here she is in her crawling position!

And this one?  It's just because I think it's the cutest picture ever!

Lois loves mandarin oranges and string cheese and is getting really good at feeding herself.

Stuffing her face! YUM!

Lois loves reading books a lot.  Sometimes we'll catch her playing with her books pointing at the pictures and talking (imitating what Jason and I do with her) and it's just about the cutest thing you've ever seen.  Look at that face!

She had a low-grade fever for about three days.  The fun part about this was that she was extra cuddly.  The awful part?  She had a really hard time sleeping.

 Here she is hanging out with her daddy.

It's also been a rough couple of weeks for our little lady...

And we've been seeing a lot of these faces lately.

Poor girl.  Please, teeth.  Come through soon.  

Actually, I'd appreciate it if you'd all come at once, lest I continue to have episodes of crazy detailed in my last blog post.

Oh, I think there's a smile in there...

Nope, it's gone.

Wish me luck on the plane ride!  I hope the person next to me has ear plugs, because this one has a madly high-pitched scream!

You know you're going cRaZy 

when...

Now, brace yourselves.   

So, there I was. Sitting on the ground amongst the plethora of toys that we have for Lois scattered all over the floor.   This is pretty normal (the toys all over the floor at the end of the day.)

Cue the not-so-normal:  Jason leaves the room to use the loo and when he comes back, I'm still sitting on the floor...

BUT...

(And this is a big but)

I am playing with my daughter's doll, singing, Frosty, the Snowman and moving it's legs in a corresponding rhythm.

Wow. I think I need to get out more.

And consequently, now my husband thinks I'm going loco - which entirely might be true.  He started petting my head and saying, "please don't go crazy."  

Too late, honey.  Too late.

Folks,  I'm pretty sure this is what a teething, cranky and non-sleeping baby will do to you.

Until my next crazy moment...

Oh, and I need to add - LOIS WAS IN BED.  Sleeping.

So, no.  I was not entertaining a child. :-)

Happy Birthday, 

T-A-N-D-I !!

We just wanted to wish a happy birthday to our beautiful sister-in-law, TANDI!  Among many other great qualities,  she is talented in decorating and photography, funny, beautiful and such a great mom and aunt!  We couldn't be more grateful that Raleigh found her...what a blessing!  I couldn't have picked a better match for him and she adds so much to our family.  We love you and hope you have a wonderful day today!  And we can't wait to meet the newest addition when she arrives in August!   You are the best and we love you!

Raleigh, Tandi and Stella came down to Tucson last winter and we went to the rodeo!  Yee-haw!

Tandi and Raleigh = match made in heaven!  What a great couple!

Here Tandi is with Stella and Lois when we were in Seattle for Jordan's wedding.  Lois loves her Aunt Tandi!

Tandi and Stella-bella!

I totally lucked out.  I have such awesome sisters-in-law.  Keep 'em coming, brothers of mine!

And this is very important, because I'm the ONLY girl out of five kids!  I've come to realize that sisters rock!

March Days

We are loving this March weather here in Tucson, so we've been taking advantage of it and getting outside a lot.  Last week, Lois and I took a walk with a bunch of moms up Sabino Canyon.  I'll never tire of this place - it's so beautiful!  We've also been walking along our River path and enjoying the sunshine.  We're hoping to get to the pool again soon because Lois loved it so much!

Lois is now a little over nine months old and she's growing so fast!  We took her for your nine-month check up and here's her most recent stats:

• Weight: 20 lbs, 4 oz  - 70th percentile
• Length: 30 inches - 94th percentile
• Head size: 17.5 inches - 70th percentile

At her six-month appointment, Lois weighed almost 20 pounds - so in three months, she's gained only about a pound and grown a whole two inches!  She's certainly "thinning" out, going from the 94th percentile for weight to the 70th.   And for our journaling purposes, here's some of her milestones:

• She's only got two teeth - still!  We're patiently waiting for more to make their arrival so she'll be able to eat food a little more easily!
• She has mastered rolling - back to front, front to back and can now go from laying down to sitting position very easily.  This has just been in the past week and a half that she's figured out the sitting thing.
• She's talking more and more - lots of mama's, dada's, duh's, sweet whisperings, highly pitched shrills of excitement (mostly used right during sacrament meeting) and just overall babbling.  She totally acts like we know what she's saying and when you talk back, she responds back.  So cute.  This one's gonna be a talker!
• She's started to notice dogs and other animals and gets really excited when she sees them.
• She loves watching baby einsteins and little einsteins.  This results in squeals of excitement...
• She's now getting into a crawling position - but no crawling.  She's working on pulling herself up to things, but hasn't quite figured out how to get her whole body up.  We are in no hurry for this.  Believe me, when she starts moving, she's not going to stop!!
• She loves to eat "real people" food - none of that baby food mush!  Some of her favorites?  Fettucine Alfredo (she's got some grandma janny genes in there!), string cheese, mashed potatoes, guacamole and many other things.  
• She's sleeping pretty well these days.  Takes 2-3 naps a day and sleeps through the night.  Now, if only I could get her to sleep beyond 5:30 am!  No matter WHAT time this kid goes to bed, she's up bright and early.  I'm not sure she got sent to the right mommy. :-)

And now for more interesting things:

Today, my friend Addie and I went to the park, ate a picnic, fed the ducks and enjoyed the swings with our girls.  

Callie, Avery, Addie and Lois

Lois loving her swinging.  She was laughing and having a blast!

Avery and Lois - BFF's in the making

How cute is she?  I mean, really.  So cute, right?

We fed the ducks - Lois was loving them!

Here's our nakey baby!  What a body, huh?  So chubbalicious and so kissable!!

Those pearly whites are fully grown in.

Here she is in her crawling position

In recent weeks, I've taken up sewing again!  I hadn't gotten out my machine since about my sophomore year of high school.  Thanks to my good friend Kat, we started up a small sewing group and I am loving trying new things and using it as an artistic/creative outlet.  I have also become obsessed with cute fabrics and wished I had thousands to spend on beautiful fabrics!  Thanks Kat for getting me started.  I've started a quilt, made a few taggies and nursing covers and have completed a couple of those hooded blankets (pictured below.)  

Here's a picture of the hooded blanket I made for Lois' boyfriend, Ben (my friend Jen's boy.) She picked the fabric and I sewed away!  

And that's about it!  We are excited to head to Utah to see family and friends in the beginning of April.  While we'll miss Jason lots, he'll be spending most of his time at the hospital anyway.  He works so hard for us!  Thanks, honey!  He's got two months of craziness and then we'll be back to Utah in June to celebrate Lois' first birthday (really?!?) and enjoying time with family.

Oh yeah...some other great news?  Jason's brother Nate got engaged last week and we're so excited for him!!  He's marrying a great girl named Kristen and they'll be tying the knot in the end of August in Oakland!  Congratulations, guys!  We love you and are so happy for you!

Ain't no sunshine...

When they leave.  

We're a little sad now that my mom and Clara have left.  We miss having you here.  Thank goodness we'll be seeing you in less than a month.  

Thanks for such a great week.  We love you!

The farewell picture

Last picture with Grandma

Clara and I got pedicures (Clara's first!) and the lady did some fancy rockin' design on Clara's toes. 

And don't be jealous. I know I have the prettiest feet on the block.

Swimmin'

On Wednesday, we decided to go swimming.  This was Lois' first time in the pool and she loved it!  I was itching for a reason to bust out her new little swimming suit and once I put it on her, I couldn't stop loving on her because she looked so stinkin' cute in it!  I'm sure she was so sick of all my kisses and giggles that day.  

Lois is back to making her scrunchy face all the time now.  This look in no way shows her true love for the pool.  She was splashing and kicking and loving every minute of it.

Clara, me and Lois

Lois and me

Here's the whole gang 

On a side note, I was razzing my mom on how she didn't use the zoom at all for any of these pictures (I mean, I think pool water is pretty and all, but when the pool to face ratio is like 1 to 1,000 - it's getting a little out of hand.)  We started joking that one day Lois will look at these and say, "Oh, that little dot is me!"  We might have to have a grandma camera tutorial on how to zoom in so future generations will actually be able to see our faces!  But at least we caught this Lois first on camera.  A+ for the effort, mom.  However, I'm giving you a C- for your technical ability.

"It's a beautiful day"

-U2-

This U2 song should be the theme song for Tucson.  It was and still is a beautiful day - everyday.  You can't beat 80 degree weather and sunshine.  I love this place.

Tandi and Stella (my SIL and my niece) were staying in Phoenix with Tandi's sister Kami and her daughter Makayla.  So they decided to come down to Tucson to party!  We took advantage of the great weather and decided to ride the tram up Sabino Canyon.

Here's the crew all ready for the canyon 

(Tandi and Stella are to the right of me.)

Clara and Lois

Lois was pretty excited I let her play with my sunglasses  

Here we all are waiting for the tram to take us back down the canyon.  

Quite the crew!

Here's where we stopped to play in the water

Lois loving being outside

Fearless Stella dug right in!  She loved it. 

Stella and Makayla

Playing in the rocks

Clara was such a great help with all these girls!

Lois totally conked out in my arms on the ride up the canyon.  She's never done that before!  She even stayed asleep as we got off the tram and transferred her to her stroller.  I love how her foot was propped up on her stroller.  I can't get enough of this little rugrat!

Hanging out with Grandma before bedtime.  Look at those eyes!