Camping at Lake Tahoe

We had a great camping vacation with my parents and sister up at Lake Tahoe in July. We took a hike down to Emerald Bay and it was beautiful. Pretty steep too. good thing we had 5 adults to push lizzy back up! Not to mention Cj sprained his ankle really bad a few days before we left home, but he was a trooper, not complaining just a lot of icing!



This was at the bottom of the hike, where others boated in.


During our rejuvenating snack for the trip up, Lizzy decided to be a hair stylist for her daddy!


This was actually on our way to Tahoe, we stopped for and ice cream sandwich, Lizzy ate too slow, and liked to pick the chocolate off.















Not the best pic of me and sis, but we had so much fun squeezed into the back of my dad's truck for 4 hours. But hey anything to save gas money right!














Cj showing off Lake Tahoe














Lizzy and Smokey the Bear being pals














Lizzy and mom throwing rocks into the lake as gma, gpa and auntie Misty kayaked!















All and all we had an awesome time and a tip to all you campers: Reeses peanut butter cups instead of hershey's chocolate on your smores and roasted starbursts! (just put it on the stick and let it melt once into the fire, take out and cool enough for a chewy, but hardend shell of flavor, also very good mashed with another color. I'm serious... try it!

Some common or not so common lizzy phrases

So Lizzy's most common thing to say is, "NO i wanna do it!) She is very independent, in her thinking and doing stuff anyway, she doesn't want me out of site otherwise. But she dresses herself everyday and usually she actually does pretty good, or i coax her a little, but this day she was adamant and why not, i'm sure you moms know what i'm talking about. Hey they're stripes right they should match. and at least she did something with her hair! its a new fashion just wait, you'll see!
However it went a little too far lately when she had to pick out my clothes to wear, yup thats right i couldn't even do it, i picked up a shirt and she said no and handed me a different one, do i need that much help????

One of Lizzy's most common things to do is grab a purse of backpack and say bye bye i'm going to a meeting, or temple, or work, but the other day she said,
bye bye i'm going to temple i luv you, then she turns around in a moment and says i back now.
Mom- Did you pray to Heavenly Father & Jesus?
liz: yes i have bread & water... bye bye i going to meeting how.
(clever how kids link things together)

I was cutting an avocado while lizzy was watching and she said, "whats that?"
mom: An Avocado
Liz: I want uncle Todno (she has an uncle todd that she loves to see)
Which reminds me , we were just getting to dinner last sunday at Cj's moms house and Cj started walking in the house as i got lizzy out of the car, she looked up and said their's uncle todd and then a second later says, "no thats daddy" (strong family resembrance?)

Lizzy is actually a very good talker, but of course she is 2 and just learning.
Liz: "i want stebetty"
Mom: "Stebetty"
Liz: " NO Stebetty!"
mom: oh spaghetti
Liz: yes
She really thinks she is saying spaghetti, it's so funny.

well i know there are a ton more things, but that'll do for now!

What do you think?

Okay i think this is out of control...... A mysterious red trashy van in the complex




and the only reason i know what it really is doing is because of the music playing, not to mention it is christmas music!



and the front "caution children" is painted with bad black paint job where they messed up on the caution part.

So my question to you is would you buy ice cream from this man?? too bad i didn't get a pic of him, not much better although he does have his son work with him! nice father/ son activity (take my poll, to the left)

I'm sure i over think it but, As for me I choose not to buy ice cream from these sketchy ice cream trucks (we actually have a couple different ones come through)

Shout out to my Hubby

CJ works some long and hard hours especially lately and i want him to know i am grateful for all his hard work. And on top ot that i am so impressed with how much he has accomplished and learned doing business over the last 3 years. I was thinking today how he has had his business for 3 years now, okay i guess 2.5 ,but if you say since 2005 it sounds longer. anyway just thought i'd post some of his latest work! (so all of you can be impressed too)

before:

after:

OOOOHHHHHHHHh! AAAAAHHHH!
before and after pics are the best!

Congrats to Darren and Manda!

We are so excited to have Baby Nyali here, and i know Manda was more than ready. It was a long horrible labor, but still a reward at the end. Congrats you guys and so glad you are close, so we get to hang out. and snuggle with Nyali

(for those that don't know Darren is my little bro)

Potty Party Sucess!

Well it has been weeks in the preparing and planning and shopping but it worked!


I read this book "Potty train your child in just one day" by teri crane. the whole idea of the book is to have a big potty theme party. I chose the beach theme because lizzy loves the ocean and swimming. So the idea was to give liz a doll that wets in the morning and have her train the doll, then after nap liz would get big girl panies and have a go herself. (Another reason i thought this would work for Lizzy is cause she loves her baby dolls and she LOVES parties and presents. (i know what kid doesn't, but everytime we go to a party she is adament it is her birthday too! So anyway long story short she wanted to put "big girls" on after just an hour with the doll in the morning, and then at lunch, for baby's party she was again adament that it was her party. So we adapted and threw away lizzy's diapers along with baby's. SO because of Lizzy's determination, and not wanting to be flexible and do it mom's way (or the books) we adjusted. But i am still pleased to say it worked out. We had about 4 succsses and 3 accidents(not to mention one was at our friends on tuesday when we started. Not bad for a first day. But Lizzy went full force and then some. WEd, thurs, and fri so far NO ACCIDENTS (don't worry i am knocking on wood right now). We even went to the park for 3 hours yesterday and two successful trips to the bathroom there. i mentioned and then some , because Lizzy is either overly concerned of having an accident, or she wants a sticker for trying, or the attention of mom following her to the bathroom, because she goes in to sit on the potty usually 3 or 4 times in between the times she really does go. But better that way than accidents on the floor! Anyway i know it goes back to her being ready and nothing i probably did, i'm just glad it is going so well and hopefully no regression! Here are some pics from the party!



The living room set up as the beach

Lizzy loved surfing


Lizzy's reward for no more diapers, a bike and a few beach toys

Lizzy and her potty party baby (the hats say potty animal)

We finally went on vacaion

Now many of you may not think that going to utah is a vacation, but anywhere with a change of scenery and living out of a suitcase is a vacation to me. However you look at it we had a blast! CJ's brother Danny graduated again!!! with another masters or something of that sort :) (Congrats again!) And our nephew Ben was Baptized, which left a mark on Lizzy. The other day as we were driving the primary song Baptized came on and she said, "Jesus baptized like Lucas" well she had the idea (Lucas is Ben's younger brother) She totally put it together! i was very impressed. We also got to be there for baby Rachel's blessing.
well i got a head of my self. Starting out the week we drove from san diego to vegas, where we had a 'free' two nights at imperial palace from a time share presentation. it ended up being fun, but we weren't so sure in the beginning. It was my first time ever to vegas, and while it is a lot of lights and impressive buildings, there is a different feel, at least were we were on the strip. But after arguing a little with the hotel we finally got a quiet room and no smoke, which was a safe haven away from the casino downstairs and all the characters that attracts. I serioulsy thought someone was going to come up and tell me it was illegal to have a 2 year old there. Anyway Lizzy loved the hotel stay...


So tuesday was a beautiful day and we set out to take in vegas, we had no idea where or what we were doing but we heard there was a aquarium at Mandalay Bay so we saw it on the monorail map and headed off, problem was the stop was a couple miles from the resort, we braved it anyway: no stroller+ 80 degree = big problem. not to mention Lizzy is such a mama's girl, she won't let CJ do anything for her. as seen in this pic when mom couldn't hold her any longer and made her go to daddy!

Finally indoors and the aquarium, at least there was one there!


After vegas we headed to Utah and stayed with Jill and Micah (good friends from byuh) We had a great time and can you believe it snowed while we were there. 80 degrees one day two days later snow. But it was still fun to see it, we haven't see snow for a loooooooooong time and lizzy never had.


We had a great time visiting with the smiths and our friends, the Brouwers, came to see us, (congrats again to Paul for making the cut to be a seminary teacher... we are still anxious to hear where!) Also thanks Tara for taking me out to lunch! Sorry to others we missed while there, the time went toooo fast, but we hope to see you soon!
Friday we headed up to Tooele to see my bro and family. We had a great time and they have all the pics from there. We went to temple sguare and no Lizzy will say, " Bye Bye i'm going temple square, see you later, i love you" this is a commom phrase recently, but she subs in school, meeting, temple, as she feels the need, so since utah and seeing her cousin halle she sometimes adds i'm going to 'temple square, get married' We also played a great game, with trains and the us map, can't quite remember the name , but it was really fun.
Then we went up to Ogden for the baptism and blessing on sunday in Clinton. We enjoyed each part of our trip, but decided sunday afternoon we'd better drive to vegas and break up the long trip on monday. So thanks to Kyle and Sam (Cj's high school friend) offering a place to stay in vegas we made it home monday afternoon in time to take care of a major work crisis.....
his employee put unleaded gas in his 2007 Ford Diesel Truck. OOOOOOOOOPPPPPPPPSSSS
Don't worry....a Tow, $758, 2 days, and no insurance to help us out (after they said they would) its as good as new! A big grain of salt after a great vacation!