Christmas and a Challenge

I feel like I've been a big slacker because I haven't blogged in so long. Our Christmas was great! My sister and my parents came for about a week. It was nice to have our house because I didn't feel like we were stepping on each other the whole time. On Christmas morning Jordan's parents and his Grandma Beebe came over to open presents and to have breakfast. Shelby is getting really good at opening presents! She is probably still looking for presents to open. Jordan and I got her a Mustang (power wheels) and we parked it in the garage. She opened the door and walked out and all she said was, "Where's the keys?" It was pretty cute and she was able to drive it up and down the sidewalk with some assistance. But, out of all the toys that she got, her favorite is Mr. Potato Head. It's true that kids really don't need much to be entertained. How could a $5 toy be better than a whole car? Oh well, at least she's happy.
Addilyn had a good Christmas too, She looked happy while Shelby opened her presents for her. She got a glow worm that Shelby calls her "baby." She seems to like it a lot. She is still a happy baby. She is very content to lay on the floor and look around while Shelby plays near her. She is 4 months old now and she has started to eat some cereal. She loves it! I haven't cleaned up any spit-up from that!
Anyway, life in Rexburg is good. We just got a bunch of snow and I'm sure the farmers are happy because we haven't had very much lately! We will have to go out and build a snowman soon because Shelby is dying to!

Okay, now for the Challenge. I have decided to participate in the "Eat from your pantry" Challenge. This means that in the month of January 2010 I am going to try to make most of our food from our pantry. Here are my goals:
1. Make freezer meals at the beginning of the month to eat throughout the month.

2. Spend less than $50 on groceries this month. We normally spend about $150 a month on groceries so I think that a 1/3 of the budget is a good idea.

3. Try to make HEALTHY meals with the food that we have. For me, Mac 'n Cheese every night is not going to cut it.

So, with this in mind, whose with me? If you want to join me please do! I'm pretty excited about all of this so leave a comment and let me know if you have any suggestions to help me do this.

I'm going to be updating here with how much money I have spent so far. I have purchased fruits and veggies from Bountiful Baskets for $18. So, do you think that this should count for December? or January? I paid for it already but I don't pick it up until Jan.2. Let me know what you think. If it's for January my running total is: $18.
If you do want to participate here are some guidelines from Life as Mom:

• Reduce grocery spending. We're talking about reducing grocery spending this month, not eliminating it. Set a goal that is lower than your regular food budget and shoot for not exceeding it.
• Take stock. Take an afternoon and empty your pantry, freezer, and refrigerator. Ditch what's gone bad and make a list of what's left. Knowing what you have will make you less likely to buy more.
• Use what you have. Check your pantry before you meal plan or head off to the store. Develop meals based on what you have rather than buying new.

Potty Training

Selby is Potty Trained! She has been going potty for about 2 weeks now. We used the 3 day potty method and it is amazing! I never thought it would work but, it did! The first three days I wanted to poke my eyes out and cut off my nose so I couldn't see or smell what was going on in my house but it was all worth it in the end. I have to say we are not perfect yet but we will be soon, hopefully!
Here is my proud potty girl! She is showing off her new cute fairy underwear.

Halloween

This year for Halloween we decided to go to a pumpkin Patch to get our pumpkins. There is one in Idaho Falls and so for FHE we took a trip down there. It was actually really fun! They have a train (that Shelby thought was wonderful), a cute red barn, and enough pumpkins for the whole state of Idaho. They were trying to clear them out so we got a really good deal, two huge pumpkins, one Sweet pumpkin, and a tiny pumpkin all for $10. This farm is run by a few teenage boys and their grandpa. They are using this money to finance their missions and their schooling, so how could you not support that?

Shelby has been kind of sick this past week but since she didn't get to go trick or treating last year (due to being in the hospital) we had to let her go this year. She dressed as a cat and was very cute. Addilyn didn't really dress up, she's a little too young for trick or treating, maybe next year. She stayed home with me and passed out candy.

For dinner on Halloween night I decided to make pumpkin stew in a pumpkin shell. I thought it was delicious. Jordan liked it but he didn't eat any of the pumpkin. Oh well, his loss. We still had a fun time and Shelby ended up getting a little bit sicker because of her late nights but I'm sure she would say it was worth it.

Life with two daughters

I never thought having two kids would keep me so busy. I can't believe it has taken me so long to post. I decided I'd better hurry before Cinderella ends and Addilyn gets sick of swinging. We haven't done much since my last post but Addilyn is now two months old and she is a lot of fun! I can't imagine life without her. She has started to smile and loves to show those gums after she gets a big meal. She is also gaining weight, a she is pretty cute pudgy.

Shelby still likes her, luckily. This morning I got out of the shower to find her in Addilyn's crib, turning on her music and trying to play with her. She also likes to give her toys and "share" with her (as long as it's Addilyn's stuff).

Addilyn was also blessed this month. I was told she stayed awake the entire time and looked around like, "what is going on?"

The last thing that happened was I broke down and said okay to getting a dog. His name is Toby and he is a Bichon Frise. He's cute and fluffy. He is still in puppy mode with bitting and Shelby doesn't understand that he is just trying to play with her. She has renamed him Stinky Pete after the Prospector on Toy Story 2.

It's been a fun two months and I am going to try to post more often!
P.S. We still love our house! It's been great having it before Addilyn was born!

Addilyn Kaydee Frisby

The new addition to our family came last night at 8:07pm. Addilyn was 6 pounds, 6 ounces and she is 19 inches long. We are so happy to finally have her here!
I went to the doctor yesterday morning and didn't have any labor pains, I walked out with a lot of pain but didn't think that I was going to be going to end up in the hospital later that day. Two hours later my contractions were 5 minutes apart (a totally new experience for me because with Shelby my water broke first). I called Jordan at 1:30pm and he came home to pick me up and take me to the hospital. We slowly made our way to the hospital and then walked around before deciding to check in.
We checked in at about 3pm and I got my epidural at 4pm. After that it was just a waiting game until it was time to push her out. It didn't take me long. The nurse actually had to stop me because she was almost out.
I was amazed that this birth was so much different than Shelby's. Shelby lasted 18 hours, I pushed for 3 hours, I tore, and was exhausted. Addilyn lasted 7 hours, pushed for a 1/2 hour, didn't tear, and had so much energy I probably could have pushed another one out.
Anyway, we're still in the hospital because she has had a hard time eating today but that is getting better so hopefully we will be home tomorrow morning.
Now, for what everyone has been waiting for: pictures.
Jordan, Shelby, and Addilyn just an hour or so after she was born.


Our new family of four, Shelby just loves her little sister already.

The proud daddy.

I am always amazed that dads can sleep on these "beds" but Jordan says that you are just so exhausted that you don't even care how uncomfortable you are. I had to take this of him because he never brings comfortable clothes either. This is about 6am.

I'll post again when we have better pictures of Addilyn.

It's Done!

Our house is finally finished and it's finally ours! It has been done for about a week and we signed all the papers today. They're not kidding when they say that you sign your life away. Jordan and I were both pretty nervous about the closing but it turned out great!
The most exciting news is: We are moving before the baby's born! I never thought that would happen. We were told that it would be done the last week of August or the first week in September. Well, here we are on August 19th!
Another exciting thing that is happening in our lives is our 4th anniversary is tomorrow. I can't believe that it has been that long already. It seems like just yesterday that Jordan and I got married! Anyway, it has been a very happy 4 years and I can't wait to spend the rest of Eternity with Jordan.
Here's a little recap of what happened 4 years ago tomorrow:

Huckleberry picking

This Saturday we went Huckleberry picking with Jordan's parents. It was kind of a cool day and we were a little worried about finding some but we were very fortunate and we found a ton! We were relieved because Jordan's grandma was just sure that we weren't going to find any and there would be snow on the ground! We decided that even if we had to buy some we were coming home with huckleberries!
Here's a good picture of Jordan and Shelby picking. Shelby really liked sitting on this rock and eating everything in her bucket.

This is what I saw whenever I turned to look at Shelby. I'm surprised that she wasn't sick later. She ate everything she saw.
These berries didn't stay in her bucket long. After awhile she got bored with picking and eating and she found a flower and said, "This is my microphone." She started singing and we never had to worry about where she was because you could hear her from 3 mountains away.


This is what I looked like before we left. I know I never take pictures of myself when I'm pregnant so I had Jordan take one since I only have 3 weeks left.
Here are our berries. We came home with almost a gallon and we figure Jordan's parents had about the same amount. Not too bad for a few hours of picking!

Painting

Last week was a crazy one for us. We decided that we would paint our house ourselves so that we could save a little money and move our kitchen from the front of the house to the back. If I had known how much work it was I might have seriously rethought that decision. We were very fortunate to have friends and family help. Jordan's dad was with him almost every night (sometimes until 1am), his mom watched Shelby so I could go and help during the day, his brother came up from Utah to fill nail holes (I think one of the worst jobs), a few friends from around here came to help, and our good friends from Logan came up for the weekend to finish up the painting. Needless to say by the end of it all, we were exhausted! Jordan slept for at least 11 hours straight yesterday and he could have slept more. He even slept through church!
Anyway, here is what our house looks like now on the outside.Here are some pictures of what the inside is looking like. I need to take pictures of the finished painted rooms.


Jordan hard at work. He said I needed to take this picture so people knew that his dad didn't do all the work.

This is the finished wall that Jordan was working on.


Here is our finished bedroom. I'm a little afraid of the color but we'll see what it looks like with carpet and furniture.
This is our good friend Matt, he and his wife came up this weekend to help us paint. Can you tell we got bored? This is Whitney's heart.
Here is Matt's drawing. That's a lot better than I could do. If you look at the wall just right you can still see the "monster." By the way, he's eating chocolate because this room looks like a big chocolate bar. The paint looked good enough to eat.

Update on our house

The day that Shelby and I went to California I took a picture of our new house. It looked like this:
When we came home a week later it looked like this:

Later that day they actually finished roofing it. They move so fast with our house it's hard to keep up. I went to my friend's house yesterday (she lives next door), we went down to Idaho Falls and when we came back they had poured the cement for the porch.

Jordan walked through the house with the builder on Monday and it sounds like it is really moving! It should be getting sheet rock tomorrow and it will be ready for paint on the 20th of this month. That was good to know because Jordan is going to be doing all the painting himself. We bought all of our paint on Saturday, it was crazy! I have never seen so much paint (except in the store).

I know that I have neglected to let everyone know the particulars of our house so here we go: It is 3 bedroom, 2 bath. The finished sq footage is almost 1400 sq ft. The total sq footage is 2500 sq ft. When our house is completely finished it will have 2 more bedrooms, 1 bathroom, a laundry room, and a family room. That seems to be it. We can't wait for it to be finished. They told us that it should be finished around the first week of September. Wish me luck because the baby is due August 29th!

Ode to My Passat

Good-bye faithful blue Passat! Oh, how I loved this car! This is the first car Jordan and I bought together. We had only been married a month when we bought it. I'm so glad that it finally sold! Since we are building our house we need the money more than we need our 4 cars. So, my car had to go. I get to drive the Jeep now, I know it won't have the gas mileage but that's okay. One great thing about the Passat being gone is that the payment goes with it!
So, fairwell my cute little car! I'll miss you!

Jordan's project

For almost a year now Jordan has been working on a VW Bus (or Westfalia). It's been kind of hard to find time with work and spending time with us. But, finally, it is out of our garage and painted! Jordan does all the work himself. I wish I would have been taking pictures of it the whole time, but, it had a big dent in the front and a small one in the back. It had one rust spot and it just needed to be painted and needed the interior put together. So, he's not done yet but here are some pictures of it right now.
This is not the color he chose. The guy he's fixing it up for wanted to keep it the original color. It makes it easier on Jordan because then he didn't have to paint the inside or the door jams. Hopefully, just a little bit more time and he will be done and it will be up for sale! Anyone interested? You can go camping in it!

Our house!

Some of you probably know that Jordan and I have been trying to build or buy a house for some time now. Well, it is finally happening! We signed a contract with Kartchner homes and we are building a house in Henderson Subdivision in our ward. We are only going to be a few blocks away from where we live now. We are so excited to be living next door to the Hymas' families! Our house started yesterday and according to Kartchner it will take about 90 days.
They told us the house will be done at the end of August or the beginning of Sept. So, basically when I'm in labor our house will be finishing up. Here are some pictures of "our hole."I don't really know what the strange island is in the middle of our house but I guess it will be fun later, right?


Here is our backyard. Sorry, Raygon I was walking on your grass. Now, you'll never want to be neighbors!

Madsen Bikes

I was reading Shelly's blog today about her sister getting this new bike. I want one! They look awesome! The only problem is they are about $1,200. That's totally out of my price range! So, they are having a give away in July. I need everyone's help. Please click on the link on the side so that they will see that I am sending traffic their way (don't worry you don't have to buy anything). I just want to be entered into the drawing for the bike. Just picture it! I could be cruising around town on it. It would be pretty fun!!

It's a Girl!

Today has been very busy! After work today, Jordan, Shelby and I went up to the doctor's to find out what the baby is. We were very excited to find out that we are having a girl! We're both a little relieved that we won't have to buy very much stuff. Jordan said that if it was a boy it would have to go naked so it's a good thing it's a girl! I will post a picture of the ultrasound in just a little bit.

Pinching my pennies!

Last night I went to a "class" on this website called Pinching Your Pennies. It's not a very user friendly website so when I found out about this class I had to go.

The way I found out about this lady was very strange. I was watching the 10:00 news last month, saw a lady in Pocatello talking about this free class that she teaches. It had her email address so I decided, "what the heck?" I emailed her. I told her I would be happy to come all the way down for this class, then she said that there was someone who taught the class in Idaho Falls.

So, last night I got in my car and drove down to Idaho Falls not really sure what to expect. The whole time I was freaking myself out with different things that could happen to me. I didn't know this lady at ALL! I'd never even seen her!

This is what I was thinking during the 1/2 hour drive. . . What if I'm the only one there? What if she lives in a bad neighborhood? What if she steals all my money (not that I had much to steal)? What if she smokes? What if she has a cat (I'm allergic)? What if she hurts me?

Okay, now I'm starting to think that I'm paranoid. Anyway, I get to her house (in a good neighborhood). There are like 10 cars outside so I know I'm in the right place. She is obviously LDS. She has pictures of Christ and total Mormon sayings. Needless to say she didn't steal my money or beat me up. She is just a mom of 4 that wants to help others save money. Isn't that cool? If anyone is interested I highly recommend her class. It was two hours of my time, but I think it will be worth it in the long run!

Oh . . .and she didn't have a cat.

Super long post of Shelby

I forgot that some of these pictures were on my camera. First we have my project on Saturday. I guess I can't get all the credit. Jordan sanded and painted the bed on Friday evening and then finished putting it together for me on Saturday before the Priesthood Session.
This is when I remembered to get out my camera to take a picture of the crib being taken apart. Shelby was so excited she could hardly stand it. She had to get right in there with a screwdriver to help me get the screws out.

Here is Shelby getting in the way of my work, but she is having so much fun!
This is her bed all put together, I promise I did rotate the picture but Blogger didn't get the memo. Anyway, That night it took an hour to get her down and the next night it took about half the time but we were awakened at about 10 to 7 this morning by cries. She had fallen out of bed! Luckily it was only a foot off the ground. If you ask her what happened she will say, "I fell down! Out of Bed!" She is napping in it right now so I guess there is no permanent damage.

This picture I thought was too cute to past on. It is a very tired Daddy and a pretend sleeping Shelby. She is having the time of her life teasing her dad. I just love that cute little bum in the air (Shelby's that is).


This last picture is something I caught Shelby doing one day while walking through the living room. I was putting something in the freezer, as I walked by she said "Ohhh Baby!" I thought there was a baby on TV. Then when I walked back through I noticed she was hard at work. She had changed several icon names to whatever she wanted. This is how you know you spend way too much time on the computer in this position! I'm just surprised she got the computer open.

St. Paddy's Day

St. Paddy's Day at our house was pretty fun. I dyed the milk green, made a pot of gold, and cut out Leprechaun footprints for Shelby to follow. My parents did that once for my sister and I to follow that led us to what they left for us. I thought that Shelby would appreciate it. She picked up the footprints and looked at me like, what is this? Then we went into the kitchen and she got so excited about the green milk. I'm a little worried that the milk will have to be green from here on out. Pot of Gold, if it can't be money why not candy?

Wouldn't this be really scary? I wouldn't want a very small person coming in through my window.


It all was worth it, Shelby loved it.


For me, this is the best part of St. Paddy's Day. Corned Beef, cabbage, carrots and potatoes. Even Shelby enjoyed it.

Our new car

Jordan finds good deals on cars sometimes and he has been looking for a good car to fix up for us. He found it just the other day, it's a 1995 Jeep Grand Cherokee Limited. It's white and has leather interior and the body is in perfect shape. It does have an engine knock and so Jordan is trying to decide weather to just have the crankshaft redone and some bearings or to get a new engine from a junk yard. I hope it's the cheaper one but either one will make it a really good car for cheap.
Last night we went up to get the Jeep. Jordan's friend and his family have a truck that could tow the trailer and hold all 6 of us. So, me, Jordan, and Shelby as well as Kirk, Heather, and their 8 month old baby drove up to Island Park last night. We got home about 11pm last night and were very tired but we are pretty excited about our new car. Here are some pictures of it.Here is our white Jeep. It has a roof rack, mud tires, and it's lifted a little bit.

Here's the back of it. As you can see the body is in good shape.

This is the front seats. I had to climb up on the trailer to actually look inside. Not an easy task when your 4 months pregnant.

Monday Night Bowling

For family home evening Shelby's choice was to go to The Rex and go bowling. It turns out that she is a pro bowler in the making! I took a bunch of pictures of her first official bowling trip.
Here is Shelby showing me her awesome bowling shoes.

I asked Shelby to stand next to the bowling balls so she backed up against the ball holder and stood all proper. She gets really funny when the camera comes out.

Here is my bowling champion with her "helper." I never saw a strike from her but she did have a few spares.

This is the end result. As you can see Shelby kicked our butts! How is this possible? She is the first bowler, I'm number 2, and Jordan is number 3. We wanted to play another game so that we could beat her but she wouldn't hear of it.