My Grams

So my Grandma Nielsen had to go in for surgery today on the right side of her face to remove a tumor! The surgery was 3-4 hours long, but luckily the tumor was benign so they won't need to do anymore surgery on that. But when they first found the tumor and did a CT scan on it they also saw that her thyroid gland is growing around her esophagus, so she'll have to go in again in about 3-6 months to have that operated on as well. Poor Grandma! But her surgery did go well today and at least she'll have plenty of time to heal before going to visit my aunt in Georgia. She's spending the night in the hospital and I'm going to go and visit her tomorrow, but please keep my Grandma in your prayers for her speedy recovery and for her next surgery when it comes time for that.

I love you Grandma! Glad you're okay!

Blowout!

Sophia and I, after having a wonderful day with Grandma Daugherty (Mom) had just settled down for a bit. Freshly changed and fed, she sat on my lap holding one of my fingers in each of her little hands while we watched American Idol. She was happy, I was happy, and we had fun relaxing.

Then, the sound came. Like a small explosion followed by a sound resembling thousands of tiny ketchup packets being smashed at the same time, it came. Now this sound is not uncommon in my household these days. Though surprising to hear coming from a sweet innocent little girl, it is something that occurs several times a day. Due to the familiarity of this would-be horrifying sound, I continued to fast-forward through my commercials to find out who would make it into the Top 24 on my show.

A few minutes later the smell came - like that of a movie theater garbage can, also known as the smell of "cine-muck". You know what I'm talking about. I think, "Oh boy, that's going to be fun to clean" and continue watching my show. Sophia is still just as happy as can be sitting in my lap, so I see no cause for alarm. After a few more minutes of this, I look down at Sophia to make some faces and try to coax a smile out of her, and instead I see a strange stain on the front of her onesie. At this point it's too late, so I sit her down to assess the damage. Here's what I found:

She's very smug about what she's done, because she knows what lies beneath the heart-dotted pink pants...

More ick.

Well, after rushing her to the changing table (and by rushing I mean stopping to take 6 pictures, laughing a little, and then walking to the changing table) I found more fun. While taking off her onesie I ended up smearing the nastiness all over her stomach and arm. Now I'm not laughing as much as trying to get her arm cleaned off before she tries to eat it. After getting the onesie safely off, the diaper off it's not looking good for the Resistance. 5 wipes later, I give up on that approach and run her into the bathroom, stick her in the sink and let the water rinse her off. That worked much better, but just to let me know who's boss she spit up about 4 times while I tried to get her clean. (Sigh) It's a good thing I love this little girl! :)

On the plus side, she slept 8 hours last night! Yay!

**Need a Home For Kitty**

Hey everyone, Jon and I really need to find a home for our cat as soon as possible. Here is some information on her:

She is almost three years old and we're the only owner's she's had. She is fixed, house trained very well, and very snuggly. We just clip her nails, so she is not declawed, but we haven't had any big issues with her clawing furniture or anything. She gets along great with dogs and is afraid to go outside in the daytime, so she won't run away. When she does go out, she stays in the yard. We need to give her up because 1) it's just hard to take care of her with a new baby, 2) my allergies are getting worse every year and 3) she's been getting too close for comfort with Sophia and it makes me nervous.

We love her very much and don't want her to have to go to the pound or whatever, so please if you are interested or if you know someone who is interested let me know. Thanks!

Sophia's Blessing!

Yesterday my sweet little angel was blessed! It was so nice to have a lot of our friends and family come to see her on her special day! I know a lot of people weren't able to make it, so I'm posting pictures of her day here! :) And if I forgot to get information about the blessing to anyone then I'm very sorry - we did it electronically because printing was just too expensive right now and I realize that some people may not have received it. Anyway, here are the pictures! :)

For her blessing she wore the same dress that I was blessed in. It's also the dress I was supposed to wear when my family was sealed in the temple, but the temple workers switched mine and my sisters dresses so Julie ended up wearing it. :) It was still in great shape and she looked very pretty in it! We also had a blessing blanket and bracelet we got from one of Jon's cousins, and some cute blessing slippers that a friend in our ward made for us! I just had to take pictures of all of her cute apparel. :)

All of her gear

Aren't those just so cute!?

Her cute bracelet

Her blanket

Her dress and the headband my sister in law let me borrow (thanks Laura!)

Just a closeup of the flower on her dress - you can tell the dress is a little older from the lace and stuff, but I still like it. :)

Her cute slippers and bracelet

This is the princess getting her beauty sleep before her big day.

I just love this girl!

This is Sophia's boyfriend Cayson. :) My friend Jonny and his wife Jalynn were able to come to the blessing and brought their adorable son with them. He's just over a month older than Sophia. :)

For some reason I don't have any pictures of just me, Jon and Sophia, but we did get some all around family pictures! Here's "The Kids". Julie, Sophia and me in the back, then in the front from left to right is Brian, Phillip (Julie's husband), Jon and Jeffrey

The whole crew! (My mom and dad didn't want to sit upside down with me and Julie, I don't know why) ;)

Ah my brothers - I sure do love those guys! :)

Julie playing with Sophia (such a proud aunt!)

Baby Brother Brian is all grown up. :)

Sophia's cute little feet! I love her toes, and she was crossing her legs so nicely I just had to take a picture! :)

Sophia on her blessing blanket

I know I know, again with the toes. :)

Her cute little slippers! Couldn't you just die? I love them!

Little hands showing off her cute bracelet

Another one of her shoes

Sophia on her blankie that her Great Grandma Nielsen made for her.

Ha ha, she can't always look like an angel though, sometimes she just has to be herself

She's a champ!

And again, I just can't get enough of her cute toes and shoes! I'm going to hang these in her room. :)

It was way fun and I'm so grateful for Jon and for Sophia and for all of our family and friends who are always there for us. I'm especially grateful to my inlaws for letting us have the luncheon there - it was perfect!

And just an update on what's going on with us - We're still looking for a home for our cat, but Ricky went to his new home right after the blessing and is adjusting well to his new family and Molly is still doing great with my aunt and uncle in Idaho. and I'm still working on my class while Jon is studying for the PCAT that he'll take later this year. As for Sophia, she is just getting bigger and cuter every day! She usually doesn't like to go to bed for good until anywhere from 1:30AM-2:30AM, but once she's asleep she'll sleep for 6-7 hours at a time on average! That has been fantastic! She has also been smiling a ton and has started cooing and jabbering a lot more, especially in the morning after she eats. :)

Anyway, that's us right now! Hope you enjoy the pictures! And don't forget to leave a comment! :)

Finally Pictures of Sophia!

So these (like the Christmas ones) are so out of order that it's really not even funny. :) The first few pictures were taken last Saturday, followed by a bunch in December, and then a bunch from the whole month of January. I'll try to let you know about how old she is as we go though in case it gets confusing. **Warning, there are a LOT of pictures here**

I love my little girl!

Mommy and Sophia

Yeah, she's cheering because she just farted...That's also why Dante looks so excited :)

She's very smiley when she first wakes up, it's so fun!

See what I mean? :)

This is from New Year's Eve when she's trying to decide what her resolution would be. (Okay, she just fell asleep like that, but it's believable, eh?)

Sophia when she was 1 month old (the flash went crazy but I love her eyes so I kept it)

1 month old

Daddy and Sophia (about 3-4 weeks old)

Her first bath! (2 1/2 weeks old) Yeah, she doesn't like the little bather thing, but she likes the big tub. :)

This was about 2 weeks ago (about 8 weeks). My mom had come to visit and bought her this way cute dress and I just had to take some pictures for her. :)

As you can see, Sophia really likes the dress too. :)

This was taken last week - Sophia LOVES the cradle swing that my sister-in-law has. She loves it so much that we had to order a cradle swing for her (we should get it by the end of this week or beginning of next, I can't wait!)

So these are the pictures from my Mom's visit mentioned earlier. I just love this one with my Mom and Sophia - so cute! (She's such a proud Grandma!)

Sophia decided to eat my mom's wrist. Yum?

She had smiled right before the camera took the picture, so I just missed it. But she's still cute - this is her "model" face

This is from the middle of January (the 18th). Daddy is helping Sophia excersice so she can be a basketball player

This is him trying to show off her muscles after their workout

Yay! I pooped! Victory is mine! (She had been struggling for quite a while before this)

This is her in her cute little coat

Sorry, I thought I had rotated this. Oh well, I'm leaving it sideways. Anyway, this is her in the swing that my co-workers bought for us - they got the aquarium one because Jon likes fish so much - very thoughtful of them. :) (btw, this picture was from right before Christmas time)

I just love my little girl and can't believe how fast she's been growing! I'll try to be better with posting pictures in a more timely manner in the future. :) Don't forget to leave comments!