Beep Beep Jeep

[The original photos from this post were lost, so I reused some from another trip]

As a graduation gift to himself, Dan sold his Scion (aka "The Barouche Box") and bought a small commuter car and a big fun car. The small commuter was out of commission two days after he bought it because some girl failed to yield right into the front of it (everyone is okay and the car is back at our house in working order now). The big fun car is a Jeep.

Dan has some good friends who helped him tow it back here from Richfield and then fix it up doing all kinds of manly things.

Which eventually allowed us to do this:

And go places like this:

We've got some fun times ahead of us. These mountains are the only things that keep Utah one step above Nevada ("The Kitty Litter State") aesthetically, so we look forward to more visits and some camping trips.

Especially our little 1940s starlet.

Some New Videos

The funniest moment from Anda's birthday party is in this video. If you don't have 30 seconds to waste listening to us sing to her, just skip to around :30.

She also thinks she's hilarious now when she sings the end of the ABCs. And she's right.

She's been able to do a somersault for some time now and I finally got around to posting the video.

But it's not all fun and games here. Sometimes she hides away for quite some time in her new office, ushering us out with a "bye bye" if we attempt to interrupt.

Yes, that is the pantry.

Yard

We became landed gentry last August, and while the house was great, the land itself left something to be desired.

However, for the past few weeks we have been working hard (and by that I mean "paying a group of men to work hard and also doing some hard work ourselves but mostly Dan and not me") to improve upon this. And we are quite pleased with the results.

We put in a second driveway to minimize further damage done by me to either the house or our vehicles due to the awkward angle of the first driveway.

We put in a back patio...

and a front patio.

We want to get furniture for these at some point, of course. Dan wants to get a bistro set for the front and have me open up a French pastry shop. I'm in.

We also put in lots of sod and flower beds. Dan put in most of the sod, with the help of some guys mostly from church, but I did help to patch it up where it was balding.

And Mr. Handy Man Dan, who built this workbench,

built me some super awesome garden boxes. Well, to give credit where credit is due, I did hold some of the screws and even drilled about 4 of the 14,000,000 holes required for the project. So you could say we built some super awesome garden boxes. Because we totally did.

Obviously we still need to get some plants and furniture, but we think it looks great so far.

You should probably come over for a barbecue. Bring a chair.

Easter

We have been known to accidentally miss Easter in the past. (Can we all just agree that going by the cycles of the moon or the Pope's Canasta schedule or whatever is a terrible idea? How about the third Sunday in April every year? Anyone?) But this year we had enough notice to get dressed up and even convince the Easter Bunny to leave a basket for the baby.

She must have been bitten by the offensively-stereotypical-comedian-or-sitcom-style girl bug, because she went straight for the shoes, which she also did on her birthday and does whenever we go to a clothing store. (Side story: When I was pregnant Dan wondered [aloud, to my face] how our daughter was going to learn to be feminine. Thanks.)

My parents were in town and I always forget to get pictures of Anda with them when they come, so I tried to take some Eastery ones. The sun was pretty bright, but they're all still cute.

The ones with my sisters did not turn out so well. Sorry, girls. You'll thank me for not keeping those ones. Happy Easter!

Birthday the Second

Anda's birthday was yesterday, but since my parents were out here for graduation last week, we decided to have a party last Saturday. It turned out that their trip crossed paths for one day with Dan's parents being in town also, so we ended up having two of Anda's aunts, all four of her grandparents, and her great grandmother on my side. It was fun. (Even though she decided overnight to take the terrible twos literally and unveil her new personality just in time for all the family to meet. Hooray!)

As soon as the guest of honor came downstairs, she ran straight to Grandpa Carter. Grandmas always seem to play second fiddle to grandpas, for some reason.

I turned our kitchen into the pink party zone.

Then we got to the presents. Her extended family sure took care of her! She got all kinds of fun toys and cute outfits.

We gave her the Mom and Dad presents on Saturday, along with one more from Grandma and Grandpa Carter. Great Grandma Carter got to be here that time. We got her a wagon and a tricycle. So far we all love the wagon, but only she seems to love the tricycle (Mom and Dad have to do all the work on both, but the tricycle requires that work to be done in a very awkward position).

Then my favorite part of a birthday party: the cake!

And yet her favorite part of all the festivities was the simplest of all.

Nobody loves balloons more than Anda.

Happy birthday, Chicken!

The Graduate

After starting his college career in the late 90s, Dan has finally earned his Bachelor of Science degree. Whew! I couldn't be more proud.

See if you can spot him in this picture.

Here he is waiting to receive his diploma.

And here are some of his fans.

It was a long ceremony with over 400 names read, but Anda was relatively good for it. Dan's commencement speaker was the same one as Amy's, so we got to hear the same speech twice. Don't worry, I zoned out for 90% of it both times.

Graduation gifts are the second best part of graduating (the first, of course, being freedom). I got Dan a miter saw which he has already used to build two significant projects (which will get their own post later).

My sister Amy graduated as well.

Technically she still has a calculus class to finish, but she's been working pretty diligently on it, so she got some gifts too.

Congratulations, graduates!

Hee Haw

On Saturday, we went to Hee Haw Farms with some friends. My camera is in the shop, but I think Dan's little Power Shot did a good job capturing the good times.

There were pony rides,

slides,

tractor rides,

and babies, babies, babies.

Hooray for spring.