In Honor of Words

Alisa is quickly outgrowing any resemblance to babytalk that she had. At two years and three months old, she can speak very well. Before she gets rid of all of her "mispronunciations," I thought I would share a few of our favorites; you know, the ones that you keep repeating long after they have corrected themselves.

• spa-eggi (spaghetti)
• e-den (the end)
• honeydew lemon (honeydew melon)
• pim-pess (princess)
• licolas (nicolas)
• da-ee (daddy)
• pellow (pillow)
• sprink-er (sprinkler)
• I ga-got (I forgot. She doesn't say this anymore but I love it)
• family home-meem-ming (family home evening)
• goggos (goggles)
• noodo (noodle)
• e-body (everybody)
• swimming su-suit (swimming suit)
• la-lou (love you)
• I wiw (I will-said with emphasis)
  

And two of Nicolas':

• begending (beginning)
• binocliars (binoculars)

Now for a couple of funny word stories:

• Alisa wanted to play that she was the mom and I was Alisa. So I said, "can I have a snack?" (This is a perpetual refrain in our house.) Her reply as the mother was, "No, but you may have dinner." Hmm, who do you think she got that from?
• Nicolas was making Diego hide under a blanket to play some game. Eventually Diego threw off the blanket. Of course, Nicolas started to protest and Diego defended himself by saying he was hot. Nicolas replied, "well, Dad, I was hot too but I just dealt with it."
• I was asking Nicolas to please clean up his room. He walked by and said, "mom, it's just not my thing."

Aaaahh . . . Pine Valley

We have taken a couple of trips up to Pine Valley in the past few weeks to do some picnicking. It is about an hour from our house and is like a magic land to me. We drive for 45 minutes in 110 degree weather, sagebrush, cactus and red dirt. Then when we round the corner into the valley, we drop into a open valley full of meadows, pioneer homes, and pastures. The valley is surrounded on all sides by real mountains covered in towering pine trees. Real pine trees and rocks and streams and sticks! The temperature is 30 degrees cooler. As the sun sets, it's literally too cold to sit around without a jacket. It is such a relief from August in St. George. Of course, the kids need no entertaining as the mountains are endlessly entertaining for them. I always wonder if houses are not the natural habitat of children. Maybe we were born to live in nature and have to be conditioned to live inside.










Here is Alisa's first ponytail. We have been waiting a long time for her to have enough hair to do different hairstyles.


Nicolas wanted me to put this picture on the blog because he said this is his favorite outfit. Apparently it is a "baseball outfit."



Diego took some pictures of the princess singing and dancing. She's quite talented, you know.

Heartbeats . . .

Two hearts beat as ooooonnne . . . . because there are officially two hearts beating inside of me; my own and my baby's. Today was my first prenatal visit for my pregnancy. I heard that little heartbeat for the first time. Ironically, I think my own heart skipped a beat when I heard it. And even though this is my third time on the baby-go-round, it still made me feel like crying. It's miraculous. There is already a life growing inside of me.

For those of you who I haven't talked to recently, I am in my 11th week of pregnancy. It's been a rough first trimester, my roughest. Lots of throwing up, moaning on the couch, heaving at the sight of the fridge, and hardly able to get out of bed. I am doing slightly better now. On the plus side, I haven't gained the ten pounds that I normally gain the first trimester. I think I would rather be fat. Although . . . normally I am sick and still gain the ten pounds. Whatever.

On a side note, I always see polygamist women when I go to the dr/hospital and today was no exception. I noticed today that they were dressing a little nicer. Hmm. Maybe Warren Jeff's absence has loosened things. They're really slacking off (I saw some LACE!).