Dad (Brett)
All around
rockstar geek. Brett enjoys his job as a Clinical Data Manager (helping research medical breakthroughs at Celgene); in his time off he enjoys reading books, watching movies, and learning new tricks on his camera and in Photoshop. He absolutely adores his wife and 2 daughters.
Mom (Erin)
Complete supermom. Erin loves her job as a Youth Field Researcher (aka 'mother'); in her plentiful spare time (ha!) she enjoys sleeping, re-reading Twilight or Harry Potter, and cuddling with Brett.
Aeriana ('Wacko', 'Princess')
Hybrid Angel/Devil. Aeriana loves her mommy and daddy, each of whom she loves to test at times and pretend innocence at others. A veritable sponge, Aeriana wants to do anything she sees an adult doing; she loves babies and especially adores her little sister, taking great care of her every need.
Zoe Jean ('Stinker', 'Cutie')
Growing fast, Zoe wants to be just like her big sister. Very goal oriented, she'll find a way to get that toy she's been looking at. She loves her pacifier and can't help but snuggle up to her blanket. Zoe is as relaxed as they come, she just loves chillin' out and watching TV.
My Morning Soundtrack 2
Aeriana knows she's supposed to stay in bed until the clock says 8:00; she's pretty good about it and when she wakes up earlier than that she usually talks to herself or sings quietly (sometimes not so quietly). This morning while getting ready for work I was able to hear her beautiful voice singing I Am A Child of God, Jesus Wants Me For A Sunbeam, and the following inspired twist on a classic.
One little monkey jumping on the bed,
he fell off and bonked his head.
Momma called the doctor and the doctor said,
Hello!
Two little monkeys jumping on the bed,
one fell off and bonked his head.
Momma called the doctor and the doctor said,
Hello!
Three little monkeys jumping on the bed,
one fell off and bonked his head.
Momma called the doctor and the doctor said,
Hello!
....
....
Nine little monkeys jumping on the bed,
one fell off and bonked his head.
Momma called the doctor and the doctor said,
Hello!
Ten little monkeys jumping on the bed,
Momma said "No more!"Aeriana knows well that mommy is in charge of when the monkeys should stop, not the doctor...
On another fun note, Aeriana played dress up for a little bit this weekend.
Labels: Aeriana, family, funny, music, pictures
Spring was supposed to have sprung...
I was all excited to post about how warm it has been and how much fun we've had outside...
Bubbles are so much fun!
And then this happened...
All I have to say is that the girls better be grateful I hadn't packed their snowsuits yet... lucky kids.
"Seriously mom, you're still taking pictures? I thought we were going to play!"
"Oooooh. Snow!"
"I fell! And it's Cold! And I don't like it!"
"Ooooh snow!" (Gotta love a 2 second attention span!)
What do you do at the end of March with snow on the ground? You make a snowman of course! It was perfect snowman snow! But you really do need your gloves to stay on...
Or maybe you don't.
At this point Zoe was done... "But I don't want to make a snowman!"
While Aeriana was far too wrapped up in the moment... "Something doesn't look right. I don't think it goes there."
While Zoe did a little more of this...
"It has to go on just right!"
"Is there anything else in there? I think we are still missing something."
"Why does Aeriana always get to do everything?"
"OK fine, maybe this can be fun..."
And of course my little princess modeling next to the snowman; I seriously don't know where she gets this. Notice the serious face.
Hey I managed to get a smile!
Then of course the questions start now that the snowman is all done and his hat is on.
"Mom... why is the snowman not talking?" (yes that is what she asked me)
And on that note... Who wants hot chocolate!
"Mmmmmm... tasty!"
"What? I'm not tried I don't know what your talking about!"
All in all not too bad of a day considering there is snow on the ground and it's almost April.
Happy Springtime!
Labels: Aeriana, Erin, family, pictures, Zoe
HAPPY ST. PARTRICK'S DAY!
We had an eventful evening last night and morning. We wanted to catch a leprechaun; those sneaky guys have candy and gold. Come on who wouldn't want someone like that? Aeriana was so excited!
We made a leprechaun trap to catch them. Glitter and all things green attract them. Didn't you know?
Aeriana so proud of her and Zoe's (but mostly her) creation.
The next morning we woke up to glitter everywhere and no leprechaun, but we must have scared him quite a bit, he dropped everything he was carrying. Poor guy.
Checking to see if we caught one!
Mmmmm. Green eggs and green milk. :)
All morning long all Aeriana could focus on was the huge mess the leprechaun made. Not that he turned our milk green (resulting in green eggs for breakfast) as well as our toilet water. No she was only concerned about the mess and wanted to clean it up. So that's exactly what we did. What kind of mother would i be if i said no to my child wanting to clean?
And of course after we were all done cleaning it was time to rest with a book.
You see this look... yeah I get the same one from Brett when I bother him when he's reading.
So lets review... loves presents and chocolate (just like Brett), can only focus on the mess (just like Brett), and when reading, which is often, do not disturb (I'm seeing a trend here). Is her being female the only genetic contribution i made? Oh well, maybe Zoe will be more like me.
Then again maybe not...
Happy St. Patrick's Day!
Labels: Aeriana, books, Brett, family, holidays, pictures, Zoe
Late, As Always
So the Garner family had a competition again... shocker I know. This time it was cookie decorating. This is Aeriana's submission. Hopefully mine will be up tomorrow, but I have a sick kid so I should get some leeway with the deadline right?
Well.. I had to try. :) Either way this is Aeriana's masterpiece!
Note the serious face... Yeah we don't mess around when it comes to making food look pretty. :)
I think she did a wonderful job. But I'm not biased or anything.
Labels: Aeriana, family, food
Happy Winter
Labels: Aeriana, family, pictures, Zoe
"I Love You Too Daddy"
Easily my favorite indication of Aeriana's ever-increasing articulation.
Labels: Aeriana, family
A Good Weekend
There's no better way to start a Saturday morning than to have a special date with daddy... Dunkin Donuts (pink frosted with sprinkles, of course) and chocolate milk in our pajamas!
Then there's no better way to start a Sunday morning than meeting an Apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ.
(Elder Christofferson came to our Stake Conference meetings this weekend; an absolutely incredible experience.)
Labels: Aeriana, family, food, pictures, religion, Zoe
Happy Halloween
Hope everyone had a Happy Halloween!
Labels: Aeriana, family, holidays, pictures, Zoe
That's My Girl!
On Sunday, coming home from church, I was carrying Aeriana inside and crossed the front lawn which has a large, blossoming tree. The blossoms had started to fall from the tree, creating a bright blanket of pedals on the grass. Aeriana proved she takes after her 'mess-averse' daddy when the following exchange occurred.
Aeriana: "Nasty!" (a new word she's learned)
Me: "What's nasty?"
Aeriana (pointing at the ground): "A mess!"
Me: "You don't like all the pedals on the ground?"
Aeriana: "No!"
A little later she was again proving to prefer things to be organized as she neatly lined up some plastic shapes in a perfect row, then making stacks of the same shapes on top of each other (square lined up perfectly on the other square, star lined up perfectly on the other star) when she gave us another laugh.
Mommy: "Aeriana, you are so daddy's girl."
Aeriana: "No!"
Mommy: "You're not daddy's girl?"
Aeriana: "No, daddy a boy."
Labels: Aeriana, family, funny
Go Duke!
With Duke going all the way, two things have happened.
First off, most of my family has decided they don't want to talk to me any more because I was rooting for 'Puke Duke'.
Second, I've taken 3rd place in the brackets for my family. All with my randomized method. Looks like I'll be employing the same method next year to see if I have similar luck.
P.S. Erin took 2nd place in the brackets. She picked teams based on whether or not she liked the name of the college (for example, she had Temple going to the Elite Eight because she likes going to the temple.)
Labels: family, sports
Still Playing 'Catch Up'
So I have officially been an epic failure when it comes to blogging. But I'm honestly going to try better ... again... And yes i realize i have said this before. Sorry... But I'm almost up to present time. :)
Aeriana and Zoe are the best of friends, and I love it. They play and giggle together all the time and Aeriana can always get Zoe to smile. I mean look how Zoe looks at Aeriana you can just tell she thinks Aeriana is the coolest.
We had a big snow storm and Brett got to work from home one day and they even closed the office the next day! It was awesome! The car was crazy stuck in the snow and we don't have a shovel, so Brett dug the car out with our ice scraper. Yeah... it took him forever. But then I made him hot chocolate to make him feel better. :)
This is a snow man that Aeriana and I had made a few hours prior, when it was only snowing a little...
This is later after it snowed a bunch more. Poor snow man got buried...
My good friend Crystal lives right up the street from me, she took the kiddos out while I stayed inside with the babies. (She had a little girl (Lillie) two weeks after Zoe was born, and Rebekah her other daughter was a month after Aeriana. We like being prego together, what can we say.)
It's hard to tell in these two pictures but Aeriana was having a blast picking up the snow and throwing it in the air.
This is Zoe and Lillie chillin' inside. I love Zoe's face, it says, "Seriously, you licked me. I can't believe you just did that."
We have a baby that loves the bumbo. :) It's awesome! (Aeriana
hated it.)
Zoe was super sick for about a month. It was so sad super high fevers and she had a horrible time breathing. She's all better now, but it took her forever!
One of Zoe's favorite things... Eating her giraffe and staring at herself in the mirror.
Speaking of giraffes, Aeriana has a giraffe too! And a pooh bear! And Bubblegum! And her Blanket! - all of which she wants to sleep with
every night. I think she's going to be one of those kids with a million stuffed animals on her bed where you can't even see the bed, but they swear it's comfortable.
I tried to curl Aeriana's hair... It didn't work. I think she would have to sleep in the curlers over-night and there is no way they would stay in her hair with the way she sleeps (which is every which way). Any idea anyone?
We started doing a cousin exchange this year and Aeriana got her very first laptop from Evie. She loves it! At first she would walk up to it and say "No, no!" thinking it was mommy and daddy's laptop, but once she figured out it was hers she couldn't put it down.
Here's Zoe being the happy baby that she is... happy but loud, man this kid can make noise! Currently her favorite noise making technique is blowing raspberries. (and yes i know this toy got recalled... I sent it in, no need to send the parent police after me.) ;)
Aeriana loves to read and her favorite book is Dora! Well, she loves anything Dora really. She's obsessed!
But obsessions sure are handy when your friends come into town and you want to play games (yay Agricola!) and not be bothered by a two year old. :) Notice Aeriana in the background... yeah she's watching Dora.
And sometimes Dora is just great, but Aeriana has lots of energy and needs to move around a little while she watches... sometimes she decides to undress herself.
She's starting to realize that undressing, and attempting to get re-dressed, can be fun... and the results can be rather interesting.
Anatomy of an Early Morning Wardrobe Change:
Pants removed - check!
Diaper 90% removed - check!
Pants inside out - check!
Both legs stuffed into a single pant-leg of the pajamas - check!
This is Zoe's favorite position, she does this all the time and the picture just doesn't do it justice. She arches her back in this really weird way just so she can look around and see what she wants to. She tends to use this most often when Dora is on the TV; being placed on the floor facing directly away from the TV is no problem for a master contortionist.
This is her other favorite position. Pacifier and foot!
Here's Aeriana having fun with friends. Hanging out watchin' a movie. Three peas in a fleecy-blanket lined pod.
Zoe, super comfy and totally relaxed... (this mastery of relaxation makes her daddy proud).
I love the bed-head and I can hear Aeriana as a teenager saying "Mom what do you want from me, I just woke up?"
Aeriana got her first hair cut. It was much needed she was starting to look mullet-ish. And I would have none of that!
Pierson and Aeriana hand in hand at the mall. She loves to hold other kids' hands; it's so cute, we see her walking down the halls at church with one of her friends hand-in-hand all the time.
And last but not least! Happy birthday Brett!!! I love you!
Well, that was another long post but no need to worry, there is more to come!
Labels: Aeriana, baby, Brett, Erin, family, holidays, pictures, Zoe
