What?!

Baby Alex may look like baby Hannah, but I'm pretty positive baby Alex would never do something like this:

Permanent marker. This is a repeat offense too. Friday night she got a hold of a sharpie and scribbled all over our couch, her chair, her puzzle and her sheet before anyone noticed. She got in so much trouble. Devan yelled at her when he saw it and then I yelled and her when he told me about it and then we put her to bed crying. Every time she stirred all night long, she'd let out a pathetic little whimper. And the next day she still wasn't quite herself. We broke her little spirit, and I've felt terrible about it for days. So when I saw the newest destruction I was really careful to stay calm and quietly put her in timeout. She didn't start crying until I wouldn't let her drink the bottle of nail polish remover we were using to clean the wall. Poor abused baby.

I don't know where she keeps finding these markers! Right before she did this I'd cleaned up the whole living room. She must have a stash somewhere.

She was good and helped clean though. I guess we'll keep her, but I think the new baby is quickly becoming my favorite. So far she's been nothing but quiet and polite.

And, in case you were wondering about the outcome of Friday, baking soda and toothpaste do a pretty good job of taking marker out of the only piece of furniture you've ever truly loved.

This is our new long-term plan for protecting the rest of our things...

Hannah or...?

I'm planning on doing a real post soon, but I'm always so so tired. Someday...

I almost forgot. We did do one exciting thing. We had a date night at a furniture store. We only found one piece we were interested in and it wasn't in our price range.

Potty, reading, and cars

I have no new pictures. We didn't really get out and do anything fun this week, but I do have a few pieces of news to report.

First, our car was totaled, but I'm pretty okay with it because they're giving us $1200 over the blue book cost of the vehicle. So, when (or if) we decide to buy a new car, we won't have to take out a very big loan. We have to give back the beautiful rental car on Wednesday and then learn how to be a one car family. I'm a little worried about it because of 3 factors: 1) Devan works somewhere different every day and usually at least 45 minutes away from home 2) I have to go to school 3) Hannah exists. I think if just one of those factors were gone it would be really easy to only have one car. But we'll see. Devan and I can carpool to school most mornings, the problem will just be getting to my night classes while he's at work. So, we're just going to play it by ear and if he ends up having to miss more work to drive me around than a car payment would cost, then we'll buy another one. But I am excited to only deal with the maintenance of one car. It seemed like between the two we were constantly having to fix something. All in all, I think Devan's car accident has ended up being a positive thing for us.

Second, ever since she first used the potty about a week ago, Hannah has used it at least twice a day. She doesn't always tell someone when she needs to go, but if I put her on the potty every couple of hours she will go and I don't have to change diapers. Great-grandma Smith sent Hannah Christmas money to buy a book with and we got a book about a little girl named Hannah who learns to use the potty. So, we read the book and she uses her potty and it's like a miracle.

Third, Hannah's Great-grandma and -grandpa Jones sent her a baby reading system for Christmas. We've only been doing it for 6 days now, but so far Hannah really likes it. There are six DVDs and you watch each one twice a day for a month. They show a word and then they talk about the word and show someone doing the word (like "clap" for example.) Everyday I ask her if she wants to watch her movie and she runs over to the TV. Then we do flashcards with the words from the movie on it. After 6 days, today she was able to read "hi", "baby", "tiger", "clap", "cats", and "dog". I was so excited. Some people have criticized teaching children to read this way because they're only memorizing words and not sounding them out, but how often do adults sound out words when they read? We just look at a word and know what it means because we've learned it already. And if we do come across a word we don't recognize and try to sound it out, we very often get it wrong because the English language is so confusing. I know that she will eventually have to learn what sounds the specific letters make, but for now we're having a lot of fun with what we're doing.

Fourth, I think I'm almost through my morning sickness. I was able to cook dinner 3 nights this week, which is probably more than I've cooked in the last 6 weeks combined. I think that I'm at 11 weeks, and that was when I started feeling better with Hannah, but I don't feel big enough to be 11 weeks. Last time, I was in maternity pants at 12 weeks and I'm not even close to that yet. I have my first prenatal appointment next week, so maybe Beccy will be able to give me a better guess based on how big I am. Either way, I'm excited to not be feeling so crummy and I'm happy that it's happening just in time for school.

That's about all that's new and exciting with our lives. Maybe next week we'll actually leave the house, so we have more interesting stories.

Good bye '09!

I remember figuring out in elementary school that I was going to turn 14 in the year 2000 and that seemed like forever in the future. I never even considered turning 24 in the year 2010! It's going to be a good year. I have only a few resolutions. One is to gain less than the 35 pounds I lost in 2009. Another is to visit all 8 temples that are within an hour drive from my house. I don't take as much advantage as I should of having so many temples so close. My third resolution is to not get sick this pregnancy so I can deliver at the birth center. Oh! And to exercise more this pregnancy than I did last (which was like once a month so I should be safe there.) Devan's resolution is to graduate from the LDS Business college at the end of the year. It's going to take some work because he'll have to take 17 credits each semester, plus a few in the summer. My school goal is to not take more than 6 months off with the baby so I don't have to start paying on my loan.

We had a lovely New Year's Eve bash. My mom and Kory were visiting this week so I got to spend my first New Year with them in I don't know how long. When I was in jr high and high school I always went out with my friends and my mom isn't much of a night owl. This actually may have been the first time I ever rang in the new year with my mom. Chad and Ashley and Devan's sister came over and we had a delicious time. We made sesame chicken and fried rice and stir-fry vegetables and later we had chocolate fondue. We were excited to finally use our fondue pot three years after getting it. We had a wonderful, rowdy time. Hannah was still running around crazy after 1 am, but she crashed real nice when we put her to bed.

I've already shut down a little because of the freezing weather, but we were able to do a few fun things while Mom and Kory were here.

Thursday we made a turkey and mashed potatoes and had a little Christmas. When I say "we" I mean everyone else with "supervision" from me. I don't cook anymore. Maybe I will again in a couple of weeks. Anyway, we didn't do anything special to the turkey and it came out so moist and wonderful.

Then we opened our presents to each other.

Hannah got a super fun Leap Frog drum from Aunt Dena and the cousins. She especially loved the chair it came in.

Mom got me some really cute shirts, but they were a little too smart for me.

Grandma got Hannah an easel. I was planning to get her one for her birthday, so I'm really excited that we don't have to buy her anything in April.

Mom wrapped up the paper separately and before I opened it I kept joking about it being a giant sausage. Hannah took me seriously.

That night we went to see the lights on Temple Square. Hannah thorougly enjoyed her first train ride.

One day we took a trip to visit the beautiful downtown library

We spent a lot of time riding the glass elevators and then explored their giant children's section.

Hannah got bored, but Dad needed to see how the book ended.

Hannah held us up on our way out because she had to stop and eat the snow. I seriously don't know who she saw doing that, but it was so gross!

Devan's little sister Nicole just finished her first semester of cosmetolgy school and mom needed a hair cut. Mom didn't have much confidence at first.

She cut a ton off!

Meanwhile, Kory started something he really couldn't finish.

He ended up pretty soaked. But we all loved Nicole's finished product!

She's going to be a great hair-cutter if she does that well after only studying for four months. Mom and Kory left this afternoon and we were very sad to see them leave. From the airport, we immediately dropped Hannah off at Nana's and went to dinner and for a nice long drive. It's so great to have the crazy holidays finally over and have some time by ourselves. I remember in high school my piano teacher once told me, "If you want to save your marriage, have a weekly date night." So true!

Then we came home and Devan changed Hannah's diaper. She didn't want to put her new diaper on so Devan told her to go sit on the potty. She sat there for about 5 minutes and finally peed! We were so excited. I gave her a Whopper (candy, not the burger. When I reread that it seemed a little misleading) for a job well done. I hope it does the trick. I wish someone gave me candy every time I peed.