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Thursday, December 27, 2007

Bricker Christmas 2007

We had a wonderful Christmas this year in St. George with my family! For starters I wasn't in the ER like I was last year so actually being able to BE with my family on Christams made a big difference! Secondly, we have Tyler to enjoy Christmas with this year and he was so much fun to watch and brings such a different spirit to the holiday! I basically have spent the last 5 days eating (my mom had the most delicious food for us EVERY day!) and playing games (my favorite!). My little brother and sisters LOVE Tyler and he was always with one of them...or the dog which he is in love with even though he's (the dog) about 5 times his size, so I had a nice break with all those babysitters!

Here are a couple random pictures from our week.

Giving Tyler a bath at Alisa's house. She gave him a cup to play with, but he kept dipping it in the water and then drinking it!


He would not stop crawling to the front of the tub, standing up and pulling up on the thingy that turns the shower on


He hated wearing his santa hat




Alisa opening her stocking


Tyler opening his FIRST Christmas present


A fire truck from Alisa!


Tyler's stocking


Tyler(who is not happy about taking a picture) and all his presents


G-ma and G-pa got Tyler his very first car! And he won't stop playing with it!!




Making the rounds


Monday, December 17, 2007

The Christmas Train

We had the BEST night on Friday! A client that Bobby works with invited us to his home to ride a Christmas train that he has running at his house. I wasn't quite sure what to expect and was a little bugged that we were going to have to take Tyler out in the freezing cold to ride some dink train around somebody's yard. I was very mistaken. It was amazing!!! Apparently this family owns an entire block and in each house (6) on the block lives a different member of this family with all of their family. The entire Jolly (that's their name) family dedicates their home, time, and money to this Christmas train every year. The train runs on a track in between and around all the homes. They have every outdoor Christams thing imaginable from HUGE nativity sets to blow up Santa Clauses to lighted reindeer and Christmas trees placed along the track with music playing the entire ride. The first half of the ride is fun with all the traditional Chrimtmas motif and then you take a break at the North Pole (one of the houses-literally, they turn their house into the North Pole). An elf welcomes you to the North Pole and you go inside to see Santa's workshop, Mrs. Cluase knitting, a fireplace with stockings and Santa Clause himself! All the children take turns sitting on Santa's lap and he gives them a candy cane. Then he talks a little bit about the real meaning of Christmas, which leads into the second half of the train ride. All along the track they now have tons of large pictures of Jesus and Jesus with the little children and Mary and Joseph and they play the more serious Christmas songs. After the train ride is over you go into a different house where the mother is making donuts and hot chocolate for everyone. Oh, and while you wait for your turn to ride the train you go into a large heated barn and watch a Christams movie on a huge projector (we got to watch part of The Polar Express!).

I was SO impressed by this family's dedication to serving others and bringing the spirit of Christams to so many. Everybody in the families participate whether it is running the train (they actually wear ear pieces and have walkie talkies to communicate to one another), driving the train, cooking the food, dressing up in the North Pole or whatever. And it's all FREE!!! They do accept donations, BUT not for themselves, for the Primary Children's Hospital. How incredible are these people!

Well, for as much as I've jabbered on about this, I still don't feel I did this place justice. You should check out their website (yes, they even have a website!)if you get a chance, it's really neat. www.stringtown.us

Bobby was in charge of the camera for the night. I think you'll be able to tell (No offense, babe!)

A piece of Santa's workshop


Santa in his chair


Tyler on Santa's lap. He didn't cry, but rather stared at Santa the whole time. I was finally able to get him to look at me, but he refused to smile!


Santa telling us about the true meaning of Christmas


Tyler and I getting back onto the train-Not IN the train, just getting in...silly Bobby

Saturday, December 15, 2007

Elf Yourself

This is the cutest thing ever! Some of you may have already seen this, but when Amanda showed it to me today i was laughing so hard, so I thought I'd share with yall. I was hoping there was a way I'd be able to post it on the blog, but I can't so if you click on this link you can see me and my family as elves! (It might take a second to load) The quality's not quite as good when you attach a link (the dance moves are slower than the music) so try it for your own family at www.elfyourself.com. I promise it's worth the 10 minuets!

Girls-Alisa, Angela, Alena, Amanda
http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1431032463

Boys-Bobby, Ty, Tyler, Dad
http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1429779836

Mom and Skyler
http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1441773882

Friday, December 14, 2007

Finally a video!

Now, you'll be able to see why I don't usually post videos. The quality is horrible on here b/c I'm just using the video recorder on our camera since we don't have a video camera. But you can kinda get the gist of Tyler walking so I'll post it anyway. He started back by the cabinents-where you see the toilet paper (which by the way please ignore, we don't usually store toilet paper in the kitchen, but we had just come back from Costco), but I didn't have time to turn the camera on before he took off so he's about halfway through the kitchen when the video starts. Also, notice that as soon as he realizes I have a camera he is distracted and falls down!

Actually, it kind of looks like he's floating :)

Monday, December 10, 2007

Step by Step

Tyler took his first step a little over 3 weeks ago and now we might have a full fledged walker on our hands! Since his first step, he would take a few steps every day but never more than 3 at a time. Yesterday he just took off walking, I was so shocked because it was completely unexpected. I was holding one of his hands and he had a teddy bear in the other and he was just standing there looking at his bear. Then all of a sudden he let go of my hand and walked several steps (I didn't count how many because I was totally in shock) before he fell down. I ran to get Bobby (I was so happy it was a Sun. so he was home) and we sat about 4 feet apart and he walked back and forth between us 6 times before he decided he was done. I thought it may have been some sort of fluke, but he's been walking just as much today. He'll be standing against the couch and then let go and walk over to his Spiderman couch with no prompting, so he's been walking back and forth between couches all day! I think he kinda feels that's his safety zone because he won't walk anywhere other than the living room. I can't decide if I should be happy about this milestone achievment or dreading it!!! I can't believe my little baby is actually growing up! Does anybody know of a magical potion that can stop this?!

Wednesday, December 5, 2007

A peek into the life of a stay-at-home mother

Over the past few months I've had several people ask me, "Don't you get so bored staying home with a baby?! You always say you're busy, but really, what do you do all day, watch Oprah and change diapers? How hard can that be?!" Although I do get my fair share of Oprah and more than my fair share of dirty diapers, there is much more to being a stay-at-home mom than one might think. Allow me to share with you how my day went yesterday.

7:15 Tyler wakes up
7:16 Bobby brings him into bed with us
7:16:30 Tyler is rubbing his hand across my face and babbling something that sounds like babababamamamananababamamadada
7:17 Tyler pulls on my lips and starts patting my mouth until I open it and bite his finger (gently), it makes him stop
7:17:15 Tyler is picking my nose
7:17:30 I get sick of his finger in my nose and roll over onto my side so he can't touch my face. I hope this will make him turn to his father so I can go back to sleep for just 1 more minute
7:18 Tyler climbs over me,is breathing in my face and picking at my eyelashes, which at this point, is more annoying than cute
7:19 I start to give up on the hope that Tyler is going to fall back to sleep with me and start to actually wake up
7:20 I open my eyes to see two blue eyes staring right into mine. This makes me laugh and Tyler is THRILLED that I am awake and starts smiling too. I decide he is just too cute to be grumpy at him for waking me up earlier than I wanted him to-last nights' game of scrabble with Bobby went a little longer than planned because we had to keep playing 'till he beat me. (Never happened:) )
7:21 I get out of bed and make Tyler breakfast
7:30 Tyler finishes his bottle, I change his diaper, put him in his high-chair and open a jar of baby food to feed him- Banana Pear Orange Grape medley (really Bobby? When you saw that sitting there on the Target shelf with all the other jars of food you thought, hmmm...that one sounds the best!?)
7:31 Tyler sticks his whole hand in the jar, when I look away for one second to pick up the spoon he just threw onto the floor, and I look up just in time to see a glass jar whirring past my head-missing me by centimeters-and landing smack in the middle of the tile floor shattering into pieces. Well, at least he doesn't have to eat the fruit medley and I don't have to feel bad about throwing it away.
7:32 Tyler is screaming because the shattering glass scared him, while I sweep up the mess.
7:40 I decide breakfast is a little overrated and opt to skip out on the baby food this morning. I take him out of his chair and my nose is immediately offended with an incredible odor coming from his back end area.
7:41 Change Tyler's diaper...again
8:00 I pull the sugar cookie dough I made last night out of the fridge and get ready to bake 4 dozen cookies for tonight's Christmas Enrichment activity at the church.
8:05 I begin to roll the dough out on the counter and it is sooooo sticky that I end up with dough stuck to everything but the counter. I get a little frustrated and add more flour to the counter to see if that helps. No such luck.
8:10 I get a little more frustrated because I have never made cookies from scratch (yea, I know...what?!) and have no idea what I'm doing, but I scrape everything I can manage to scrape off everything I can and start over. I put 1/2 a cup of flour on the counter, add some cookie dough, and start to roll. Nothing!
8:13 I am so mad! Wouldn't it have been easier just to buy the stupid cookies. And if not, couldn't I have used my own recipe that called for normal cookie things like sugar and vanilla rather than sour cream, nutmeg and 6 eggs (4 yolks and 2 whole eggs). "No, everyone is using the same recipe to bake all the cookies and the dough MUST be refrigerated overnight." UGGG!
8:15 Tyler is crying for me, pulling my pants as he climbs up my leg which makes me even more frustrated.
8:16 I carry him back into the living room, using my forearms, (for the 2nd time) to play with his toys, trying not to track dough all across the kitchen-with no success-and decide to start over with the cookies again.
8:20 I pour 1 cup of flour onto the counter, hardly any dough, and start to roll. Still not working!! Tyler crawls back into the kitchen, crying, and starts to pull down my pants. I slump down onto the kitchen floor and start to cry too. This sucks! I hold Tyler and we cry together. We are quite the sight now that we are both covered in dough and tears.
8:25 Amanda decides to wake up. Comes over and gets Tyler from me. She has beautiful timing.
8:26 Bobby comes out of the bedroom to leave for work, takes one look at me and...laughs! What?! He tells me I'm not using enough flour and proceeds to show me how to do it, managing to do it perfectly while getting NO dough anywhere on him. Hmmph! I want to be grumpy at him for laughing when I am obviously NOT a happy camper, but he got my dough to roll, so I give in and laugh too.
8:30 Bobby leaves for work and I give him a big hug and whisper, "please don't leave me" in his ear. He smiles and walks out the door.
8:32 I manage to roll the dough and cut out enough gingerbread men and stars for a dozen cookies and put them in the oven.
8:42 The cookies are done. They look disgusting and taste even worse.
9:30 I put the second dozen cookies in the oven (I have to wait about an hour between each dozen I cook so that the oven has time to cool down so that the cookies don't burn on the outside and stay gooey on the inside)
*So, doing the math, if I have to wait an hour between batches and I have 4 to make, I'm not done baking till approx. 12:00. I HATE baking!
9:45 My mom calls and we chat (okay, I vent), and she reassures me everything's going to be okay. I feel a little better and take a breath for the first time since 7:15 this morning
9:30-12:00 I alternate between rolling dough, cutting out cookies, baking them, cooling them, bagging them, and taking care of Tyler. He gets two more diaper changes, throws 3 tantrums, takes 1 short nap, and makes me laugh too many times to count. I decide I love this little boy to death and he's worth every amount of trouble he makes! This earns him hundreds of kisses! (which he does NOT love :) )
12:00 Tyler eats lunch and manages to keep more food in his mouth than his hair, which for us, means lunch was successful!
12:30 I get him dressed
12:40 I start loading up my car with everything I need to take to the church in 3 hours and 20 min.
1:00 I wrap the present we are bringing to Bobby's Christmas work party tonight. Yes, that's ALSO tonight!!!
1:15 I throw in a load of laundry
1:30 I clean up the HUGE mess in the kitchen, do all the dishes, pick up the living room, the bedrooms and the bathrooms.
2:30 I get in the shower. Yea, finally I get to get ready for the day!
2:45 I blow dry my hair
2:50 I know Tyler will be ready for his nap soon, so to calm him down I sit down with him and we watch Baby Einstein (this always puts him to sleep)
3:00 Tyler falls asleep in my arms. I remember how much I LOVE being a mom and give him lots of kisses because he can't push my face away.
3:05 I lay him down in his crib
3:06 I switch the, now lightly damp, clothes from the washer to the dryer and am dissapointed with myself for forgetting to do this as soon as the washer was done over an hour ago.
3:10 I finish getting ready and reward myself with a pat on the back for timing Tyler's nap perfectly with this part of my day.
3:55 I wake Tyler up from his nap so we can go to the church to help set up for tonight.
3:56 He's not very happy about being woken up, but cooperates with me while I put his shoes on, do his hair and pack up his diaper bag.
4:02 We're out the door
4:05 I pick up a girl on the committee that I told I would pick up on my way to the church, who mentions that I am 10 min. late (oh well she can just deal with it! I wanted to say, "if you had kids you'd understand", but thought that might be a bit harsh so just smiled and apologized)
4:10 We arrive at the church (yes, I'm aware I'm late!)
4:15 We begin setting up and Tyler cries the whole time because he wants to be held. Which frustrates me more than usual because he's not usually like that.
4:45 I frustratedly call Bobby and ask if he could possibly leave work 15 min. early and come pick up Tyler because I am being no help because I only have 1 hand to work with! He laughs and says he'll be right there. (It's a good thing I have a husband that can laugh when things go wrong because it totally makes me chill out!)
5:05 Bobby is not here yet.
5:07 Bobby is still not here.
5:10 Bobby is STILL not here. Doesn't he understand that if I ask him to do something, it should be done immedeatly?!?! I mean do I, or do I not, wear the pants in this family?! :)
5:23 Bobby shows up and apologizes for getting tied up at the office and not being able to leave when he said could. Now I laugh because NOW Tyler's being perfect and we're almost done setting up, but he takes him home anyway and I am grateful none-the-less.
5:35 We're done at the church so I leave to go home too.
5:45 I get ready for Bobby's work party.
6:10 We leave for the party. Tyler looks super cute! (sorry no pictures, we were in a hurry-or couldn't you tell from my day!)
6:25 We arrive and sit at a table with Bobby's best friend from home (isn't that cute that they work together?!) and his wife who is my really good friend.
6:40 My ex arrives with his pregnant wife who despises me (Yes my long time ex-boyfriend works with my husband...weird I know and extra weird long story, but such is my life, one big, long, weird story!!!)
6:41 They sit across the table from us because those are the seats that happen to be available...awkward!!!
6:45 We start eating. The food is not so great, which makes me very unhappy because I have not eaten anything today!!!
6:50 Tyler falls down and smacks his head on the wood chair. He screams the loudest I've ever heard him and everyone in the room turns and stares. Yes, I am a perfect mother.
6:51 The large red lump on the side of his head is now turning purple.
6:53 Tyler stops crying but people are still staring. Really, do the stares help people?! I don't need your, "Oh poor baby" looks directed towards my child. I am perfectly capable of handling this situation...obviously!:)
7:30 We do the gift exchange. We receive a little chicken in a santa suit that dances to We Wish you a Merry Christmas. Tyler loves it and it entertains him for the rest of the night.
8:00 We leave to go home
8:15 I drop off Bobby and Tyler
8:20 I arrive back at the church to help clean up after Enrichment is over (I felt bad about missing the whole thing), but it's totally worth it because my friends Jaime and Maranda are still there and I really need to talk to some friends!!! They reassure me that my cookies don't taste like playdough. They're lying, but I don't care, at least they're nice enough to lie! We gab for 40 min. and I do not help clean up. I am no help to the enrichment committee, who I'm sure are cursing my name under their breath because they are doing all the work while I talk. I would be mad too. But after the day I had, I just really needed some good girl gab!
9:00 My friends leave (after helping me pack my car-thank you!) and I help put away about 2 loads worth of stuff. I'll probably be released on Sun.
9:20 I leave to go home
9:25 I get home to find that Tyler has been fed, bathed and put to sleep, the house is still clean, and Bobby is doing homework.
9:30 I get ready for bed because I'm exhausted!
9:55 I go into Tyler's bedroom to give him a kiss goodnight and am once again reminded how lucky I am to be his mother. I am so in love with him!
10:00 Bobby and I talk for about an hour and a half till we fall asleep.
12:00 I am in la-la land dreaming about how much I love my job and am so thankful for everything I have in my life.

Just an average day on the job.

Monday, December 3, 2007

First snow!

Well Sat. (okay, I guess it was Fri. night but whatever) brought our first really big snow fall! When we woke up Sat. morning everything was completely covered in snow, it was SO pretty! I'm not really a huge fan of the snow, but the first snow is always exciting because it means Christmas is coming soon!! And how fitting that the first snow fell on Dec. 1st, what a great way to really kick off the season. We went right out and bought a sled and Bobby and Tyler used it that night!

Amanda bought Tyler this snow suit thingy which is still too big for him, but it kept him dry and warm!!


Waiting for Dad to finish putting the lights on the bushes so he could go sledding!


Going down the very small hill in front of our house


Zero facial expression whatsover


Going down a bigger hill on the side of our house


Apparantly this was way more fun for mom and dad!?!

Friday, November 30, 2007

Copy Cat Creativity

A couple nights ago I got together with some girls in our ward and we made some cards. I was secretly dreading it because I hate doing anything creative in front of other people, it gives me major anxiety because I feel that it's really a competition to see whose the most creative and I always lose! But my awesome friend Jaime convinced me to go and I'm so glad she did because I had the best time!! It ended up that everyone was supposed to make the same card so all I had to do was copy the one that was done for us...hey, I can do that! I know they're not perfect, but it was fun to try! Anyway, mine turned out to look like this:

The one on the left is a congratulations card for a girl and the one on the right is for a boy. If you click on it I think you'll be able to see it closer up.














Then last night I hung with two of my girlfriends and we made gingerbread houses and watched elf, and then talked till midnight! I just love those girls!! However, I once again felt intimidated by the creative geniuses of my girlfriends so I just copied the design that was on the box for the gingerbread kit. Really, how awesome am I?! :)

But hey, to be able to copy the box exactly takes some skills right?!?!
Side view


Front view-Notice that my Christmas tree is bare-I think I may have used all my candy up when I decorated the roof?!?!


Other side view


Ariel view

Thursday, November 29, 2007

OOPS!

Yesterday morning I made smoothies for breakfast (triple berry) and I took one over to Amanda who claims to have been sleeping on the couch. I say "claims" because we have an extremely loud blender that could have easily awoken the neighbors, but whatever! So I take her smoothie over and am holding it right above her face waiting for her to open her eyes and take it from me. (What, she couldn't "feel" my presence and know that I was there?!) After a couple seconds of no response I gently place the cold cup on her cheek, jokingly, because I thought for sure she was awake. Well, whether she was or was not awake, it must have startled her because her hands flew up and knocked the cup right out of my hand all over her! This is what it looked like AFTER we cleaned most of it up! :)


It was SOOO funny...at least I thought so!


It was all in her ear before she cleaned it out for the picture!




What, you don't think that would have been fun to wake up to?

Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Q. What is Santa Baby?

A. My favorite Christmas song!

It's officially Christmas time!! Yea!!! We've had our decorations up since last week, but I'm just now getting around to posting the pictures. (p.s. I apologize to those of you who have been trying to get ahold of me the past couple days, I have been CRAZY busy! Tyler has been a trial and a half-we think he might be teething, or just developing his "I need my mother every second of the day and if she's not right next to me I will scream until I turn purple and can't breathe (literally)" syndrome), but I promise I will get back to you!

My Christmas shrine-as Bobby calls it


I had decorations on the window sills too, but Bobby said it was way too much so I took them down and spread them out around the house


The tree-with no theme at all!


With the lights on


My buddy's first Christmas tree

Sunday, November 25, 2007

Gobble Gobble!

For Thanksgiving we went down to St. George to spend it with my family and my friend Stacie who came up from Houston. We were only able to stay for a couple days but had lots of fun and ate way too much food! (Sorry, there are tons of pictures!)

Tyler's Thanksgiving outfit (that he got made fun of relentlessly for by his uncles, but whatever I think it's cute!)




Someone got caught red-handed playing with the cell phone charger!


Tyler and Stacie


So confused about what's on Ty's head


Mom and Grandma cooking in the kitchen


Bobby, Skyler and Alisa taking advantage of the appetizers


Taking family pictures for the Christmas card (we took thousands, but these are the ones from my camera.Don't worry we did take family pictures with Skyler, Bobby and Tyler but whoever was taking the pictures with my camera didn't get any of those)






Skyler showing Bobby the rims Alisa got him for his birthday


In the back of Ty's truck




Four generations: Grandma, Dad (who looks awefully confused), me and Tyler




The fine fellas


The lovely ladies






Thanksgiving feast-Turkey was being carved on the counter


Tyler enjoying Thanksgiving dinner


Tyler REALLY enjoying Thanksgiving dinner


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