Sadness.....

So, a bit of bad news.

We have had a death in the family. She was so young. Only about two years old. I don't know what got her in the end, if it was her CPU or her motherboard. I have not had a chance to do a complete autopsy yet. So far all I know is that the power supply comes on, but the computer completely fails to POST. No signal to the monitor, no beeps, no keyboard lights. The fans spin up. The optical drives have power. The optical mouse lights up. But the system is completely unresponsive. It could be the RAM, but usually I get SOME post beeps if it is a RAM problem. I guess I need to pull the CPU from the other machine to test in it. That is a MAJOR pain, however, as the cooler is massive and almost impossible to remove. Oh well. It must be done.

Sadness....

Accepting components in lieu of flowers. ;)

What do Lilly and Gollum Have in Common?

" Thirty white horses on a red hill,

First they champ,

Then they stamp,

Then they stand still."

Gollum's answer to this riddle is also the answer to my riddle:

"Teeth! teeth! my preciousss; but we only has six!"

Do I normally go around comparing my darling little girl with Gollum? No, but I thought all you Tolkien fans might get a kick out of it anyway.

Tech Support

Just a quick blast.

I happened upon this while reading up on some news this morning. Click the link above, or the picture on the left. Trust me. It is worth your time.

Funny Fingers

Lilly has always had a strange facination with socks, and other articles of clothing that she can put on her hands. She is especially fond of oven mits if you put them on and sing the Jaws theme and tickling her. A couple days ago she figured out how to put the oven mit on herself, and tried to do Jaws at papa. If you listen very closely you can even hear her trying to sing the Jaws song.

The other video is one of her playing with a pair of gloves at grandmas house. She likes to do the same thing with her socks if you put them on her hands, but the gloves look funnier.

Summertime fun

this post should be chronologically before the last one, but I had trouble getting the pictures off of my camera.

two of our adventures thus far this summer have been planting a "garden," or two tomato plants in pots on our front porch, and taking an spur of the moment trip to Cheyenne Wyoming. Lilly's favorite thing about the garden was the bucket of dirt she got to play in before we planted the tomatos. Although she still enjoys going outside to see them everyday they are much less interesting now that they are more than dirt.

The trip to Cheyenne was the first overnight trip we have taken with Lilly so it was extra fun. She was really good about riding so far, but she did get pretty tired of the car by the time we got there. She was extra happy when we stopped for lunch at a park in Rock Springs and she got to get out and play on the grass with her papa for a few minutes. The weather was not very nice in Cheyenne, so we didn't get to see much of the city. Mostly we saw all of the different stores as we were hunting for a jacket so that we could go outside without getting soaked. We did brave the rain to see the Big Boy steam engine there. It was pretty amazing to see just how massive it really is. I couldn't get the whole thing in a picture because it was too long. I would have had to go back across the highway to get a wide enough veiw.

Lilly walking

Lilly started walking a little the week of mother's day, but wasn't really interested in doing it a whole lot. last week we went to a birthday party for her little friend who had just learned to walk, and she watched him all night. The next day this is what she decided to do.

Easter, Mother's Day and Life With Lilly

As you may have noticed, it has been a day or two since last we posted anything on the blog, so I will attempt to catch you up on a few things that have happened in the last few months.  

Lilly got to have her first Easter egg hunt and was so proud of the egg she got.  I don't think she had any clue why she was supposed to be excited about it, but everyone else was so she got excited too.  I tried to get a few pictures of her looking cute in her easter dress, but she gets too interested in the camera, and doesn't cooperate too well with getting her picture taken, so these are the best I was able to get.

Our next great adventure was a trip to temple square. Lilly and I went down to a wedding reception with some friends and while they went through the temple we wandered around temple square.  I tried to get a good shot of her and the christus, but she was more interested in the hole in the side of the bench, so I got kind of a silly one instead.  She did enjoy looking at the pictures, flowers and birds, and all of the sister missionaries knew her by name by the time we left, so it was a fun trip.

That night when we got home there was a surprize waitin

g on the bed for Mother's day.  I got a great big stuffed dog from my wonderful husband, which Lilly quickly claimed as her new best friend.  The pictures were taken the next morning, so she has her nice sheepdog hairdo going on.  

The last few pictures are some that I managed to catch of her playing.  She loves books, and her doll.  I was lucky enough to catch her reading a story to her doll before she reaized I had the camera out, so now you can see just how cute she is.  There are also a few of her sitting on the grass.  She hasn't had much experience with outside before and has decided she loves it, but isn't so sure about the grass. 

First Christmas

Here are a few pictures for anyone who would like to share in the fun of Lilly's first Christmas. She got really good at eating wrapping paper by the time we finished opening presents. On a silly side note, we finally got her to smile for a picture by having Mike sing the pink panther theme song (her favorite song) to her while I took the pictures. That is why she is looking up instead of at the camera.

Christmas Letter, Sort of

This is the time of year when you are supposed to write a letter to everybody to tell them what you have done this year, and basically let them know you are still alive. I do not have addresses for half of the people I would want to send this to, and honestly I have no desire to risk getting a papercut on my tongue by licking envelopes to send letters to the rest of you, so you will just have to be happy with this.
I spent the first five months of the year teaching kindergarten at Willard Elementary. It was an exhausting, but great experience for me. I loved helping my kids learn, and listening to thier stories. They were all facinated by the idea of me having a baby, and brought me so many gifts for her that I didn't have to worry about clothes for her for the first three months. I do miss teaching, but I don't want to go back and miss out on time with Lilly.
July brought the biggest change to our lives this year with the birth of our little girl. The details of that event are already on this blog, so I will just say it was an adventure that has turned our lives upside down. Lilly is a very easy going kid as long as she isn't sleepy or sick she is happy. Her favorite hobbies are rolling over onto her tummy, playing with her stuffed animals, playing in her bouncy chair, playing with her papa, having conversations with anyone who will talk to her, but mostly papa, and going for walks to the post office. Her most recent accomplishments include sitting up by herself, and rolling from her belly to her back (she just did that for the first time about ten minutes ago, so it is really recent).
That last paragaph should give you a pretty good idea of what I have been doing the last five months as well. Watching, marveling, and helping Lilly learn all sorts of amazing new things, and attempting to keep the house clean, and my husband fed along with it. My challange for the moment is learning to use the serger Mike bought me for my birthday/christmas present this year (yes, I know I am spoiled rotten). It seems to be going well since I haven't broken it or sworn at it yet, and most of the things I have tried to make on it have come out looking somewhat like clothing.
My wonderful husband is working as a security guard at ATK Thiokol. He seems to be enjoying his job quite a bit despite the insane schedule. On his days off he hangs out with me and Lilly, or visits the guns at Impact or Al's Sporting Goods so they don't get lonely.
I hope that all of you have had a great year too, and are happy and healthy. Have a Merry Christmas, and a wonderful happy New Year!

Temple Square Lights

The first week in December we took Lilly down to Salt Lake to see the lights on Temple Square because she loves lights so much. We hung out in Ogden until it got dark, doing some Christmas shopping, and stopping for dinner at a chinese buffet. It was Lilly's first experience with eating out, so that was an adventure. It went pretty well. She ate apple sauce while we had our chinese. The only mishap we had was when she dipped her teething ring in my ice cream before I could move it out of the way.

It was very cold when we finally got to Salt Lake so we bundled her up in her snow suit, and blankets. Every few minutes we would wander through one of the buildings to warm up. All of the sister missionaries thought she was so cute in her little bear suit, which she was as you can see. We didn't get to stay long because she got tired and hungry. Despite the shortness of our visit we had a great time. It is so much fun to experience things with Lilly for the first time.