2007 Year of the Pig

Here's what we did last year!

Jan 2007


Trisha had a fun "Year of the Pig Party."
Luke was baptized.
I quit working at Jet Blue to do freelance work.
Tyler turned 29.
Ella started Dance lessons with her cousins Katie & Cait.

Feb. 2007
Ella and I went to Emily's for her Valentine Cookie Party.

We went to the zoo with my friend Heidi and her daughter who is also named Ella.
It was really cold, and no one was there, but we had a fun time.

March 2007
Started a new business "Paperella" Custom Invitations.

April 2007
Easter in St. George.
Found out we were going to have a baby!

May 2007
We went to the Zoo with Jamie, Katie, Brielle, and some others.


Went with some friends from to the National Stationery Show in NYC.
Went to the Martha Stewart show with Kathy.
Went to "Phantom of the Opera" on Broadway.

June 2007

Ryan Graduated from High School. Yea! Justin also graduated.



Ella turned 3! She had a blue cars birthday party. Most of her presents ended up being cars. She also got a parking garage & a toy car wash. Do you think she likes cars? When it was over, I looked at all the blue streamers & toys, and thought, "It looks like a little boy had a fun party."

Julie had a baby girl, a new cousin for Ella named Megan!

July 2007


For the 4th of July, Tyler, Ella, and I went to the Riverton Fair. Ella rode on some rides and we had popcorn and snowcones. Then we went to Breanna's birthday party.
Later that night we went to see the fireworks in Sandy.


Atwood Annual Camping trip.

Emily had a baby girl, another new cousin for Ella named Mayci.

We put our house up for sale.

Found out we were having a baby GIRL! Ella wanted to name her Blue Thunder, but after we convinced her that was a boy's name, she decided to call her Butterfly caterpillar.

August 2007

We shut down all our businesses. Tyler and I started a new business, Vinyl Wall Art.

Tyler, Ella, and I went to the hot air balloon festival in Sandy.
We also took a trip up to the Jones cabin in Park City.

September 2007


Ella started preschool this month.

Trisha took Ella to the Hill Air force Base Airplane museum. Ella talked about the airplanes the rest of the month.

October 2007
I turned 31.
My mom took Ella to St. George for a few days so I could get some work done.
I quit doing Freelance work for Stampin' Up! and other clients because my new job;
Vinyl Wall Art was keeping me too busy.

Ella was a Butterfly Princess for Halloween. Tyler took her trick-or-treating. She came home with loads of candy.

November 2007
This month we got all our Christmas shopping done, and tried to get ready for the new baby. I went shopping with my sisters and mom on Black Friday. We got lots of deals, but Trisha almost got killed by an impatient lady with a shopping cart at Target.

December 2007

Ella made lots of ornaments using all the blue cars she could find, and hair elastics. We let her decorate the Christmas tree this year, she had so much fun.


A new sister for Ella, Lily was born!
Ella was surprised she liked Lily so much. Every time she came to visit me in the hospital she would say, "I like her mom" (like she couldn't believe she actually liked her.)

Christmas. Ella got everything on her wish list. A Buzz Lightyear, a button that you push, and it goes up high in the sky (rocket ship), and a Monster Truck video that isn't scratched. (the one from the library had way too many scratches on it.)

7 inches

Tyler and I have spent so much time combing the snarls out of Ella's hair that we decided it was time to get it cut. Everyday I ask her if she's ready to get her hair cut, and every day she replies, "No, I like to have big hair." Today when I asked, she said "yes" so I took her right away before she could change her mind.
She got 7 inches cut off.

Tyler is a tease

Tyler loves to tease. (Just ask anyone who tries to call me, and he answers the phone.)
Here's just a few photos of him teasing our kids. I have several more. When Ella was little he used to put stickers on her nose all the time, especially when we were grocery shopping. Ella would leave the sticker on her nose the whole time, it was pretty funny. I used to baby sit Cait twice a week, and he would be late for work those days, because he would be too busy teasing Cait in the morning.
The first picture of Ella was at her 1st birthday party. Trisha had wrapped her gift to look like a pig to match the theme of the party. Tyler of course couldn't resist sticking the nose sticker to Ella's nose, and of course Ella left it on, so then he had to add more. Even when we put her cake in front of her to eat, she just sat there with her cute pig nose on.
Silly Dad. Silly Ella!

Jones Look-alike Meter

MyHeritage: Celebrity Collage - Pedigree

Look-alike Meter

MyHeritage: Family tree - Genealogy - Celebrity - Collage - Morph

My Ugly Blog

Emily was over tonight for Tyler's party, and she was showing Justin my blog on my computer. Anyhow, she was surprised that the colors weren't ugly. Apparently they show up differently on her computer, then Trisha said they were ugly colors on her computer too! I had no Idea my blog was so ugly, It looks just fine on my computer. Anyhow I apologize to my 4 readers about the ugliness. I'd fix it right now, but It's almost 10pm, and I have hours of work ahead of me tonight, so you may have to deal with its ugliness for a little while longer.

Happy Birthday Tyler

Happy Birthday to a great husband & Dad!
(photo taken by Ella)

Prison Break

I've never seen the show Prison Break, but Tyler watches it sometimes, so I've seen glimpses of it. Sometimes when Lily makes this face I see similarities between her and Wentworth Miller. Maybe it's their similar hair styles? Maybe it's their blue eyes? Maybe it's their facial expression? Tyler doesn't like me to compare the two, but I'm not saying she looks like a middle aged man, I'm just saying maybe Wentworth miller looks like my cute little baby girl. Or maybe I just need more sleep?

Ella in her dress

Ella in her blessing dress 3 and a half years ago.
I took Ella's picture in a cute shop at Gardner Village.
(I got permission first.)
I didn't want to take Lily out in the cold weather so I took her picture on my wedding dress.

Lily in her blessing dress

Oh Sweet Sadie Gift Show

I'm participating in the Oh Sweet Sadie Gift Show again.
If you haven't been to one of her boutiques, you really should go.
There are over 50 vendors selling things. It's by far the best
boutique I've ever been to. So many unique and fun gifts.

Feb. 8th & 9th in Herriman, Utah.

boingy

Ella: "I have a new teacher at church. Her (she) has boingy hair. Trisha has boingy hair too."

I've talked to Ella about curly hair before, but I don't recall ever using the word "Boingy" around her.

TMBG podcast

from Spot the dog to Prince Edward (AKA James Marsden)

We took Ella to see Enchanted after Thanksgiving. We asked her what her favorite part was, and she said she liked the prince the best. Today her Nana took her to see it again. When she got home, I asked her if she liked it. She replied: "The prince is really cute when he sings."
I'm glad she's showing interest in a human this time, last year she told me she wanted to marry Spot the Dog.

Things I Miss

Although I wouldn't trade working at home with my kids,
there are a few things I miss about my old job.

•Fun & creative co-workers including my sister Emily.

•Tiara Fridays

•Karaoke in the Artroom

•Surveys from HR:
In the bathroom are the toilet rolls
a) too high
b) too low
c) just right

•Convention mornings, loud music, crazy demonstrators, & dancing co-workers at 7AM

•The receptionist who's worked there longer than I have still trying to figure
out how to use the intercom system: "Hello, Stampin' Up!, Hello?"

•Getting paid to draw & look at Craft magazines all day.

•Lunch-n-Learns

•Stamping days

•The company blowout sale

•Company Updates (or as Emily and I called them, Stand-up Comedy Tryouts)

•Riding the elevator with Larry H. Miller
(old building)

•Eating at Cafe Rio every other day.

And of course cheesy Stampin' Up! theme music every July.

Ceiling Fan Blades

Last summer I illustrated & designed a bunch of ceiling fan blades for Sweet Pea Gallery.
Here they are:
Ballerina
Jungle
Fairy Princess
Sports
Transportation

My little helper

Ella is always trying to help me with everything I do. Work, wedding invitations, church stuff, everything! Kathy brought me some of the stamps I designed for the new Stampin Up! catalog today. While I was in the office, answering emails for work, Ella decided to mount my stamps for me. I think she did a good job. She put the right artwork onto the right size wood block, but she was unaware that the rubber needed to be trimmed prior to mounting.

Stealing candy from a baby

Lately all I do is:
1. Feed Lily
2. Talk to Ella about Underdog
3. Change Lily
4. Talk to Ella about Underdog
5. Fill Orders
6. Talk to Ella about Underdog
7. Repeat.
In one episode of Underdog. Riff Raff (one of the bad guys) steals candy from a baby. Ella is very worried about this. She thinks Riff Raff is going to come to our house and take candy from Lily (Because we always give our infant babies lots of candy to carry around).

One Month

I can't believe Lily is already one month old!

Myspace

Ella: Dad, I have a Myspace Page.
Tyler: You have what?
Ella: A Myspace page
Me: You have a Myspace page?
Ella: Uh hu!
Me: Where did you get one of those?
Ella: Cait got it for me.

Thanks Cait!

There's no need to fear...

...Underdog is here!

We checked out one of the old Underdog cartoons from the library last November, and ever since then, Ella and I have this very conversation several times a day:
Ella: Ask me what I want to be for Halloween.
Me: What do you want to be for Halloween?
Ella: Underdog! Can you make me into Underdog?
Me: Yep!
Ella: No, ask me again what I want to be for Halloween.
Me: What do you want to be?
Ella: A Christmas Advent Calender. Can you make me into that?
Me: Sure, It might be a little harder to make that costume though.
Ella: But I just want to be Underdog for Halloween, Can I?
Me: Yes, we'll talk about it again closer to Halloween.

Another baby?

Ella asked me today if I could have another baby. I told her that if I had another baby, it wouldn't be anytime soon, since we just got a new baby a month ago. She told me we needed to have a baby boy right away so she and I could take care of Lily and Tyler could take care of the new baby boy. Sorry Ella, but you haven't convinced me yet.

New Year, New Baby, New Blog

I used to have a blog a few years ago, then one day It disappeared. Emily had one too, and it disappeared as well. She went on and started a new one with blogger, but I never got around to it.
It was kind of nice to have, I would print the pages out to keep as a journal for Ella. (Much easier than scrapbooking.) Since It's a new year, and we have a new addition to our family I thought it would be a good time to start one again.

Happy 2008!