Loving School!

Gracie is LOVING school! She is so excited to go each day and loves her teachers. She has been working very hard to learn all of her letters and sounds. On Novemeber 30th she got her alphabet crown, meaning she passed off recognizing all her letters with their sounds as well as the long and short sounds of the vowels (or bowels as she says!) We are so proud of her!

Her class also did a Christmas singing program and it was soooo cute! They did Christmas songs along with some of the other songs they have been learning this year. Funny story...Jordan told Gracie one day that he was chubby and then she said back to him, "Dad you are chubby like a snowman." Jordan was trying not to feel so bad thinking she thought that he looked like a snowman to her. When we got to school we looked at the program and they were saying a poem called the "Chubby Snowman." Come to find out that she was just associating "chubby" with "snowman" because of the poem that she knew and when Jordan called himself that, well then he was like a snowman in her little mind!

First time on Santas lap was a success!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Good thing the pilgrams and the indians decided to be friends! It was a feast to always remember!

Missing pictures...

Apparently you can only have so many pictures on your blog, or picassa web album or gmail etc... and apparently I am out of storage! Well, I think I have fixed the problem and maybe the pictures will show up again sometime soon...Has anyone else had this problem?

The Binkie is gone!

I really didn't know how to get Gracie to be done with her Binkie. She really loved it! We were at Costco last week and I saw the big pack of Pet shop toys and told her that she could have it if she gave me her binkie. She surrendered right then. So, when we got home I opened the package and gave her a couple of them. She was so happy. When it was time for her nap, she went into her room and got in bed. I thought, wow, this is going to be easy. About 10 minutes later, I heard her door open and she came out and handed me the pet shops and said "I'm done. I want my binkie." Great!

So, when Jordan got home, I told him the story and we decided that for every binkie she trew away, she could get 5 pet shops out of the jar. 3 binkies went in the trash before the end of the night! The next morning, another. That afternoon, another. We were on a roll! (would you know that the week we were trying to get rid of them, I kept finding all of the lost ones!) The 3rd day there was only one left. Kathryn and the boys were over and Gracie came running in the room saying "I want to throw my binkie away!" Kathryn looked shocked like she had just experienced a miracle. I then explained the story. These are pictures of the last one going in the trash. That day was garbage day, so there was no turning back!

When it was time for bed, she was playing with her pet shops and saying "Gracie misses her binkie." The pet shops then explained (through me!) that they were glad she made the choice to get rid of them so that they could be her friends and that they would help her sleep. It all worked out in the end! The binkies have been gone for almost a week!

Halloween

This year Gracie actually knew what Halloween was, so it made it a little more fun. She really had a great time helping Jordan carve the pumpkin. She had her hands all the way in it helping to get out all of the seeds.

It took a while to get her to be happy with a costume choice. I kept asking her what she wanted to be and there was nothing that she liked. Finally we got an agreement with Sully from Monsters Inc. That's all she wanted to be. But, when I searched for costumes, I could only find infant ones. So, the search was back on. Then one night I was looking and found the jack pot. She loves animals and plays with her toy hippos all the time. So, when I found this one, I knew that it was it. The best part about it was that she kept referring to herself as "the hippo!" "The hippo is hungry." "The hippo got hurt." "The hippo found it." "The hippo's feet are getting heavy." All in the 3rd person! We got a great laugh out of it!

Ward Trunk-or-treat...eating a doughnut!

School costume parade...

She was standing really close to her friend and I couldn't figure out why. Then I realized that she was riding the horse with her friend. She waddled behind her the whole parade making sure that she was always on the horse. It was so funny!

Helping the witches find their brooms at school... This is when she said "The hippo found it!"

Money...

The day of Gracie's actual birthday, we gave her the cards and presents from grandparents. She had a great time opening them. There were a couple of cards that contained a small amount of cash (totaling $10). With the biggest smile on her face she announced "Now I can go on an airplane!" Where do they come up with these ideas? I guess this was just a confirmation that our family is way to spread out!

Gracie is 3!

This year Gracie turned 3. Can you believe it? We had a really fun party with all of her friends. They all dressed up, got make overs, had Afternoon Tea, opened presents, and ate cake! It was the event of the year! (not really, but Gracie thought so!)

Birthday cake...

Make overs...

All the guests of honor at their best...

Happy girl when we were singing Happy Birthday...

Thanks to everyone who helped make her day super special!

Update! FINALLY

I could possibly classify myself as the WORST blogger ever! This year has been very busy. My cake business has really taken off and consequently, things like blogs fell off the way side. Now that the summer has come to a close, I have found a little time to re-commit to the little things! So, here are some of the main events that have happened with in the last month. It would take all year to catch up the rest of the year!

First off, my sisters and I decided to be insane enough to try and do a triathlon. BUT...we did it! It was so much fun. This was August 14th, 2010. We did the Herriman spring Tri. This is a picture of us before the race. We are really as tough as we think we are! We all finished in one piece. If anyone is debating on if they should do one or not, do it! I now have the bug! I did another one yesterday! If there is one thing that it does, it keeps me motivated to keep exercising and that is hard to do!



Another big step this past month is that I took down Gracies crib and got her a toddler bed. She loves it. I didn't have any problems with her still being in her crib, I just thought that she would love it, and she does. Oh, and we have graduated to undies (as she calls them!) We haven't bought diapers for probably 3 months. Boy, doesn't that feel great. She did really well for the first little while and then, like I am sure most of you have experienced, she stopped going #2 on the potty and we had a lot of poopy undies. But, now we are back in the game and she is doing really great at being potty trained! Relief!

More change...Gracie started school. She goes on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons. I really struggled with what to do because her birthday is just past the deadline. So, she will have to do 3 years of preschool. But, I knew that she was ready. She has never had a problem going to school since she has started. She looks forward to it and is soooo excited about it. So, now I think that I made the right decision. I can tell that she is already learning so much! The other day we were driving in the car and she started repeating "e-a-i-o- u!" Jordan and I looked at each other like, where did that come from! It was cute. This picture is of her first day!



Finally, we have dance classes. There is a studio right down the street that I am so impressed with. They had ways of keeping the the attention of the class that were really cool. Gracie would have stayed all day if she could have. Funny story though, Gracie had to go potty the last minute of class. So, I ran her to the bathroom and when we came back class was over. She cried for 20 minutes because she didn't get that closure of the end of the class. She just kept saying that it wasn't over yet. I am so excited that she loves doing these fun things. I know that, at least for me, I was worried about overloading her. But, she is eating it up and is so excited for each day to start. It is so fun to see her grow up and excel at things.

So, there you have it... a catch up in our little world. I will TRY to do better!

Christmas in California!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

We have had a wonderful time this Holiday season spending it with the entire Pendleton clan. We all made the trip from Hawaii, Las Vegas and Utah to Rosevill CA to be with my parents on their mission for Christmas. It was perfect! Here are some of our favorite pictures! (There were probably 1400 pictures taken with all the cameras around here flashing!) Anyway, we had a great time and we already miss everyone! We hope that you all had a wonderful Christmas and here's to a great 2010!