Seaquest Aquarium

We got together with my cousins today and went to the Seaquest Aquarium in Layton. Boy was it fun! As an animal lover, I'm not sure who loved it more, me or my mini animal lover (Greg was content to stay behind).

Let's begin by saying I fed a stingray...

The big one is Chuck

Pascal! (We're into Tangled right now)

She didn't want to sit on this turtle

A bird obviously landed on my head ...

Sof was having the time of her life.

Pringle break

Onto the stingrays

There is a fun little cubby you can go into under the stingray tank

They have tanks where you can stick your feet in and the fish eat them. I have ALWAYS wanted to do that. Sof was enthralled with the fish in that those tanks ...

The crew

On a side note, Sofia Lu is 21 months old today. How in the world did we reach the 21 month mark? She is so smart, now asks for naps when she needs them (I LOVE HER!) and gets smarter by the day. She will do great things!

In case you forgot, here is a flashback of her cuteness 1 year ago today. 

How did all that cuteness fit in one snow suit?

Boy was she bald.

More Holiday Fun

It was so fun to be able to spend time outside while down in Cedar. My parents have a fun swingset in the backyard so we spent some time on it. Sof hadn't been down for over 3 months and it was crazy to realize how much she has changed since then. I'm starting to come to terms with the fact that she's not a baby anymore.

We went out to eat one night to The Hong Kong Buffet. I went once in high school and remember thinking it was absolutely disgusting, but I came away that night thinking it was great! Crazy how my palate has changed since high school - being a poor college student had me eating all sorts of concoctions.

She was content to sit on the nasty floor (in everyone's way) and draw while we finished eating. Fine with me.

After we went on a fun light tour through the homes near the golf course. A lot has changed in 7 years.

Sof was in heaven crawling around her aunts in the back seat.

My sister gave Greg this awesome game called Watch Ya Mouth. It was hilarious! I have a funny video of my Dad and I but won't post it because it's not exactly politically correct.

He's a good sport.

Sof and her buddy Ridge. It was so cute to watch them follow each other around. I think they will be good friends one day.

My mom let Greg and I sneak away one night for a date. It has been way too long since we spent time with just us and I was reminded how much I love talking to Greg. It was fun to reconnect over Peruvian food.

All packed to go. She loves her couch.

It took until we were leaving for her to finally let Grandpa hold her.

Good-bye kisses.

We stopped by to see my Grandma. Sof warmed right up to her, and she loved to pet Dante.

We left our fish alone for 6 days and I was so happy to see him still swimming when we got home. I'm sure he was glad to see us too.

Blue in all his glory.

We had a fun Christmas and enjoyed being with family, but it sure was nice to be home. Sofi now sits on her couch surrounded by stuffed animals, Greg spends his nights reliving his childhood on his NES classic, and I jam in the kitchen while planning recipes for my pressure cooker. Life is good.

Christmas 2016

What fun we had at Christmas! We were delayed going down to Cedar by a day because of a huge storm around Cove Fort. Crazy stuff happens on that stretch of the highway and we have learned to avoid it if we can whenever a storm is brewing. We left Friday without a hitch and Sof entertained herself in the backseat for a whopping 3.5 hours by coloring, watching Frozen, coloring, reading, playing games and coloring. That girl is quite the traveler and no longer takes a nap to get her through - we can do hard things.

Greg was able to push snow on my Dad's 'Green Machine' Saturday, then spent the afternoon helping him on various projects. We displayed our talents and had the most irreverent Nativity ever, with Sofi vacuuming in the middle of everyone the whole time, but we did it and that's what counts. Sof opened Santa Christmas jammies and was my mini me for a day.

She loves rocking chairs

Christmas morning dawned and we all woke excited to see what Santa had brought us.

She loves Minnie Mouse!!!

Obviously he's thrilled

Not pictured is me beaming from excitement over my new pressure cooker and blutooth speaker!!!

After opening all of her presents, she went right over to this chalk board and started drawing. I now know what to get her for her birthday.

Christmas Jammies!!!

These two were best buddies the whole trip!

Her pants kept falling down to her ankles, so we used duct tape. Problem solved.

It was fun to have Christmas on a Sunday. The program at my home ward was short and sweet, and it was fun to catch up with people I haven't seen in a really long time. In the words of Sof, "Happy Jesus."

Jazz vs. Kings

Greg scored tickets to the Jazz game from work, so we were able to leave Sof behind while enjoying 8th row seats. I was 9 the last time I went to a Jazz game. Since then, the arena has been renamed and the colors have changed, but I still had a lot of fun. Greg even allowed me to get a pretzel; I love pretzels :).

There is something strangely attractive about watching Gordon Hayward play. I had a hard time watching the other players. I'm just going to go ahead and say that Greg agrees ...

Bowling Babes

Our Elder's Quorum put on a fun activity for the younger families in our ward. With the oldies looking out for themselves, it was nice to be around people our own age for a change. It has been years since we have bowled, and our scores showed it, but boy did we have fun!!

And, Release!

These cute girls are our neighbors and Sofi has so much fun with them! 

Yes, Sofi has a slice of pizza in her hand while bowling. I'm pretty sure it was her 3rd slice, in between her 2 cups of Root Beer. Like I said, it was a fun day.

Grand America

One night Greg took us on an adventure into Salt Lake City to the Grand America to see the giant gingerbread house everyone and their dog had been talking about. Just like everything else, this was mine and Sofi's first time. Parking was a fiasco and Greg and I were at our wits end. Luckily we parked before harsh words were spoken. But seeing the windows and gingerbread house turned out to be pretty fun. Aaannnddd we got a free cookie. I guess the hassle of parking was worth it.

Poor little deer didn't know what hit it

She tried to kiss it but hit her teeth instead. 

Free cookie!

She would plop down wherever she wanted just to enjoy her cookie

Macaroon snob (and please agree with me that her legs look long here!!)

It was a good cookie.

Sofi and Santa Claus

I knew what Sofi's reaction would be well before she even saw him, but that didn't stop me from trying to "temper the storm" so to speak.

Sofi knows who Santa is, and can point him out whenever she see's him, so this gave me a tiny bit of hope that she would like to see him. I was wrong. I kept telling her to give him a hug and high five, but she didn't remember to do any of those things.

Poor girl.

Stiff as a board sliding off Santa's lap.

She didn't forgive him until he handed her a candy cane which instantly calmed her down and made it so they were friends afterward. She kept saying, "Santa nice. Candy." Oh Sof....