Beach Family Pics

While we were in San Diego for Christmas we took advantage of being all together and got some great family pictures on the beach. Livy wasn't a big fan of the sand, so we were grateful for at least a few pictures of her not crying. The pictures turned out so great. It was a beautiful day, no wind, and a perfect day for pictures.

 

 The original Farnsworth Clan. 

15 months

Our little Livster is already 15 months old. She is walking and getting faster and more confident every day. She is quite the talker. She is communicating so well, if she can't say what she wants, she is very good at pointing, making eye contact, and saying "aba-daba-da!". She can say: cheese, please, keys, Jesus, "baba" (bottle), "da" (all done), and "C" (Sarge).

She loves to giggle and laugh. We have many tickle fights. Except when I tickle her, she starts tickling herself, it's the funniest thing ever. 

Livy loves to line little figurines and little people up. She likes to take them from one piece of furniture to another. She likes to always be holding one in each hand. 

Livy now likes to eat with a fork. She often will still take it off the fork and eat with her hands, but she is getting very good at stabbing her food. 

She has the cutest curly hair. It's getting pretty long, and the curls are just getting that much cuter. she has pigtails a lot because her hair doesn't look as frizzy and crazy. 

Livy has also been sick quite a few times the last few months, but hopefully that just means it's building her immune system and she won't be as sick when she's older! We're hoping.  

We are having too much fun with this little girl. That's just the thing, she is such a little girl, she is my little buddy. She is great running errands with me, as long as I have lots of food and snacks. Trying to get her to stay still is nearly impossible. Now that she knows she can walk, so wants to go go go. She's just keeping us on our toes!  

More Pics from Christmas

I just got a whole bunch of pictures from my sister from our vacation in San Diego. So I had to share them. Livy and Lucy enjoyed eating next to each other, they often switched food, stole food, and apparently Livy wasn't too happy about something.

 These babies loved the stairs. We did a lot of following them up the stairs, and not much going down.

Our cute little graham cracker house, actually it was a house-boat. The M&Ms are water. You can see Santa chillin' on the back porch, he doesn't wear his hat in Lake Powell. 

 The two little gummy bears getting a suntan. You can also see our awesome slide from the top deck.

 Livy loved helping decorate the tree. She loved the ornaments, especially trying to put the ornament hooks in her mouth.

Apparently we need to work on the sharing issue. I love this face, haha. 

 Whenever Livy gets startled, she flutters her eyes, and this was mid startle eye flutter.

Christmas Card 2011

The Year 2011 in 11 days

- January 2^nd: Our sweet Olivia was given a name and a blessing. She was blessed in the same dress her mommy wore on her blessing day.

- March 3^rd: Said goodbye to family and friends, and started a long drive across the country with our baby and dog to Minnesota.

- April 23^rd: We flew home to Utah for Becca’s sisters’ wedding. Becca finally got her “Daddy-Daughter Dance”. Ryan couldn’t take any time off work so he was in UT for less than 24 hours. We loved being with the entire Farnsworth family.

- June 1^st: We went to Myrtle Beach with the Jackson family, and Livy loved playing with all of her cousins.

- July 4^th: We drove into Utah County from a 2-day, twenty hour drive from Minnesota. We loved everything about Minnesota – great friends, wonderful ward, and the fun adventures being in a new place. But a better opportunity with Qualtrics here in Utah is where we needed to be.

- September 1^st: Becca started a business from home making and selling little baby boots. It’s been exciting and keeping her busy when Livy takes nice long naps.

- October 1^st: We trained for and ran the St. George Marathon. We never thought we’d run a marathon, and we’re excited to check it off the “bucket list”.

- October 9^th: Our sweet little Olivia turned 1. Our little newborn baby has become a toddler, and will be walking and talking any day. She is the light of our lives. She makes us so happy, and makes us want to be better people every day.

- November 23^rd: We went to Park City for Thanksgiving Weekend and got to spend a few days with the Jacksons and a few days with the Farnsworths. We celebrated Ryan’s 27^th birthday, and Becca’s 100^th sale.

- December 21^st: We are looking forward to going to San Diego for Christmas with the Farnsworths. We can’t wait for Livy to play with all 4 of her girl cousins. Then we get to come home to Utah to spend another Christmas with the Jacksons.

- December 29^th: We will celebrate our 5^th Anniversary!!!

It’s definitely been a year to remember.  We are so appreciative of friends and family, and cherish every moment we have with them. We are so grateful for the gospel in our lives and for our Savior and Redeemer. We hope you all have had a great year. We are excited to see what this next year will bring!!

Love,

 The Ryan & Becca Jackson Family

5 Years Down, Eternity to Go

On December 29th, 2006, one crazy young man was daring enough to marry and even crazier and even younger young woman. 5 years later, we're as happy as can be, love life, loving each other, and loving our baby girl more than anything. To celebrate, Ryan took me to Sundance for dinner at The Tree Room. It was beyond delicious, amazing and extraordinary. We were the first and only people there right at 5 pm when they opened. We were seated right away, and had wonderful service the entire night. We don't usually ever eat at such a high-end restaurant as this, so we couldn't help but laugh when we were given an AmuseBouche, which is single, bite-sized palette "tingler", as an offering from the chef. Last time I checked I didn't get

anything like that from the grill-man at Outback. 

We then had the most delicious bread that had some sunflower seeds and white raisins in it, accompanied by 

some olives and thyme drizzle in olive oil. We both got a started spinach salad with dried fruit, candied pecans

and a savory-sweet vinaigrette.We had been given a large recommendation to order the Pepper Steak, 

so we couldn't resist. This is the picture I literally took of my plate. Now tell me your mouth isn't watering.

We then split a chocolate molten cake (they had a much fancier name for it) with hazelnut ice cream. Sorry Chili's, they're chocolate cake blows yours right out of the water, hands down. Ok, so maybe I've written a whole lot more about our food instead of how much I love my hubby, and how amazing these last 5 years have been - but my thinking is...the more detailed I make this post, the better, so I can have Ry read it in 11 months to remind him what I think we should do for our 6th wedding anniversary! 

We then went and saw Mission Impossible 4! Great movie, highly recommend it. It was the perfect way to celebrate these perfect 5 years. I love you honey!!

Take Advantage

If I had my child to raise all over again,

I'd build self esteem first, and the house later.

I'd fingerpaint more, and point the finger less.

I would do less correcting and more connecting.

I'd take my eyes off my watch, and watch with my eyes.

I would care to know less and know to care more.

I'd take more hikes and fly more kites.

I'd stop playing serious, and seriously play.

I would run through more fields and gaze at more stars.

I'd do more hugging and less tugging.

I'd see the oak tree in the acorn more often.

I would be firm less often, and affirm much more.

I'd model less about the love of power,

And more about the power of love.

by Diane Loomans

I read this poem on my friend Courtney's blog, and it's a poem I want to read and remember for years to come. As we come into this new year, 2012, I want to take advantage of every single day I have with my little Livy. I have some personal goals of things I want to do better in my life. But I also have some Mommy goals, and this poem pretty much sums it up. 

- Teach Livy how to pray

- Read the stories of the Book of Mormon together

- Have "Art" time at least once a week (hopefully everyday as she gets older!)

- Have "Music" time at least once a week (ditto above)

- Go on some kind of adventure every week (museum, duck pond, hike, zoo, etc.)

- Give her hugs and kisses and tell her I love her every single day 

- Be more patient and remember that she is still learning

- Take swimming lessons together

- Teach her to be polite (say please and thank you...)

- Learn to share (especially as she goes into Nursery at church in April...woot woot!)

- Try to always provide good and healthy meals for my growing girl

- Try to document her life the best I can (pictures and journal)

That list will have to do for now. Last year was the year of the newborn, and here's the year of the toddler! 

Love you Livy Jean!

 

Daniel's Summit Lodge

Sue, my mother-in-law, had a last minute idea to head up the canyon and go snowmobiling. It was a perfect day to do so too. It wasn't too cold, there were clear skies, and it was a fun activity to do all together. We went up to Daniels Summit about 20 minutes past Heber, and stayed in the nice lodge they have up there as well. 

 After snowmobiling we ate at a delicious little restaurant they have there. Livy was extremely tired (little did we know how long of a night it was going to be...), so Grammy kept her pretty well entertained while we waited for our food. Livy's new obsession is putting things on her hands - obviously gloves, but she loves putting her socks and shoes on her hands as well. Silly Livy.

We went for a late night hot tub run after Livy went to bed (Grammy was nice enough to stay with her). Then came back to a few rounds of Scum, and watched the Jazz lose (again). Livy went to bed at 7:30 pm...but then she woke up at 10:30..and 11...and stayed awake till midnight..then woke up again at 12:15..and finally when she woke up at 1 am (and by "waking up" I mean crying uncontrollably and taking a lot of TLC to try to calm her down) we decided it wasn't worth it. We weren't going to get any sleep, so we packed up our things, and drove back home to Provo. We drove super slow on the way down the canyon (we saw 7 deer and a fox on the road), and finally got home just before 2:30 am. Livy fell asleep in the car and slept until 9am the next morning. What a night to remember.