Fun Pics

Here is Jannika doing her favorite thing! She always wants to hold the baby and is constantly singing to her. Kirsten likes to hold her too but she doesn't hold her long enough for me to get a picture. She always says to me, "Mommy, can I hold Carisha?" (That's how she says the baby's name!) Then she holds her for a second and slowly and softly gives her a kiss on the forehead. It is so cute!
My sweet little Claire-Bear.

We just got a swing set and the kids LOVE it. Our backyard was so boring before so now they can go out and play all they want. Yay! P.S. Don't ever buy a swing set from Wal-mart, they are pretty cheap. Believe it or not this one is from K-mart and it is much better.

It's a Girl!

Here is our sweet little baby girl. We named her Clarissa Vay Beagley. Clarissa is a family name on my side and Vay is Kyle's grandma's name. She was born on Saturday morning just after midnight, April 5! I'm not due until the 20th but she is full term and beautiful and healthy! She weighed 6 lbs 8 oz and was 20 inches long. Kirsten had come really fast so we were afraid that this baby would come even faster so I was a little worried about how my labor would go. I had just gone about my regular day on Friday and then I started to bleed a little bit so we decided to go to the hospital and get checked. We kept thinking they would probably send us home since I wasn't feeling any contractions. The monitor was picking up contractions and I was progressing so they decided to keep us! We went in at 6 pm and she was born just after midnight. It was so strange to be in the hospital in labor and not be in panic mode like with our other kids. It was just calm as we sat and waited for my body to progress more. It was a great labor! Thanks to Grandma Gayle and Aunt Megan for watching our kids and now my mom is staying with us until Friday. We are so blessed to have great family to help us.

The last picture of me pregnant with Clarissa!

Jannika is in love with this baby. She wants to hold her all the time. What a great big sister!

Baby with Grandma Gayle.

Baby with Grandma Seely.

Happy Spring!

These are some decorations that I made for Easter and Spring. The pic below are some that I made for Valentine's Day. I am so glad that warmer weather is here!

This picture was taken the weekend before Easter when we took a trip down to Bryce Canyon and Tropic to visit Kyle's dad and his sister, Trista. You can't see the canyon very well in this picture but it is really pretty. The kids loved helping grandpa feed his horses and playing games with Grandma Deann.

These are some Easter decorations that Jannika made all by herself. I helped her with the first one so she would know what shape to make the eggs and then she had the idea to put them on the backs of all the chairs! We just got this new dining set which I LOVE. The legs and backs are all black and then the top of the table and seats of the chairs are cherry wood. And, as you can see in the background, we are starting our remodel on our kitchen. I hope we can get it done soon...

We spent Easter weekend up in Tooele because Kyle's brother, Judd was blessing their baby on Easter Sunday. We had lots of fun with our cousins going to the Easter egg hunt. Jannika also went with them to the children's museum at the Gateway. Kyle and I took Kirsten and went to Alpine where some of Kyle's mission pals were getting together. (Sorry I didn't get a picture of that.) Then we met up with the family for dinner at the Gateway. The blessing on Sunday was very nice and we had a great weekend!

The workin' man

Just thought I would post some pictures that Kyle has taken at work. He has gone out several times in a helicopter and airplane to do bighorn sheep and antelope surveys.

These next pics are of the guys catching and transplanting some moose. (They were female moose so they don't have horns). This one is slightly uphill from the truck but it still shows you how tall moose are.

Today he is doing snowmobile training...what a tough job!

Some Randomness

Jannika decided the other day that she wanted to wear a flower in her hair and she found this one and put it in! I think she can't decide right now whether she wants it to be winter or spring. She loves sledding but lately she has been wanting to go to the wave pool every day. Kyle took her the other day (It is outdoor but they have a big bubble over it). They were there for about 2 hours. What a nice daddy!

Kirsten has two new things in her life. She got a new toddler bed from some friends in our ward. It will be a good transition from her crib to her big bed. And, as you can see, she just got glasses. We had started to notice that her eye turned in slightly so I took her to the eye doctor and they discovered that she is far sighted and so her eye is turning in to try to squint and see things. (That is how I understood it anyway). And if anyone refers to her as having a lazy eye or being crosseyed, I will personally slug them. I am not down with those terms! Seriously...

We ordered these glasses in pink but they don't make the pink ones anymore so we just had to get gold frames. She is doing really well at keeping them on but she usually looks over the top of them. I guess we will have to patch her good eye for several hours a day probably until she is in kindergarten. We will get the particulars at her next appointment.

Other random stuff... I have been trying out freezer meals which at first I thought they wouldn't taste very good after being in the freezer for a while, but we have really liked them. Some things like lasagne and tator tot casserole taste just about the same whether from a freezer meal or not. For the lasagne, just make your usual lasagne recipe but don't cook the noodles. Just layer them and the other ingredients and freeze. For tator tot casserole, mix 1 can cream of chicken, 1 can cream of mushroom, 1 soup can of milk, browned hamburger and tator tots. Pour into a freezer ziplock bag and freeze. Thaw, pour into a casserole dish and top with cheese. I will post other good freezer recipes if anyone is interested.

Our new favorite cookies are these mint chocolate cookies. Here is the recipe: (it is the recipe for homemade oreo cookies)

1 devil's food cake mix

3/4 C shortening

2 eggs

A little milk or water

Mix together and add enough water or milk to make it mix. Form into balls and place on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 8 to 10 min. at 350 degrees. Do Not Overbake.

Frosting:

2 c. powdered sugar

1/4 c. butter - melted

2 1/2 Tbsp. milk

4 drops food coloring

1 tsp. mint or peppermint extract

Mix together. Usually I do green food coloring because that tells people that they are mint flavored. (Somehow the ones in the picture ended up pink--that's what you get when you have little girls!) These are soooo yummy!

Congrats!

So, I just wanted to say Congrats to our friends and family who have had babies recently! The top picture is Avey Violet, Kyle's brother's new little girl, born January 4. The middle pic is our friends', John and Nicole Zilles' two little boys, Taylor and baby Kayson, born Feb. 16. The bottom one is Miles Anson, our friends' Brian and Lexie's new little boy also born on the 16th. It is so fun to see these new little ones although I am kind of jealous of their moms that they are done being prego and I still have 8 weeks to go! I have also been hearing a lot of stories lately about babies being born in the car on the way to the hospital...Kyle...are you ready for that?! Just kidding (I hope). I really hope that since we only live a few minutes from the hospital that I will make it!

Anyway, I love these baby pics and we are so glad these babies are here and healthy!

6 Years!

Kyle and I just celebrated our 6th anniversary on February 1! Kyle had a work conference scheduled for last Wed-Friday at Zions National Park. This was where we went on our honeymoon so my sister watched our kids and I went with Kyle. He went to some of the meetings and then we did some fun things together including a trip to the St. George Temple and shopping and some sight seeing.

This is a book that I made for Kyle last year for our anniversary. It is called "51 reasons why I love you" (51 is because it was our 5th anniversary and because I didn't have time to do 101!)

It was so fun to make this book and think about all the things I love about Kyle. These are just some of the pages and I am so glad that I did it. I love my sweetheart and I am so glad that he wanted to marry me!