Accountability

I haven't really ever been one to do New Year's resolutions, but this year I feel like I really need to do them. With having a baby I need to get my body back in shape and with living at my mom's house, I have felt a bit stuck, like I haven't progressed in any way.

I am going to post my resolutions up on the blog in the next week or so after I get them all figured out in detail, and I am looking to see if there are some people out there interested in being accountability partners! I will be the first to admit that when I say I am going to do something like workout everyday, I will easily give up on it and not hold to it. I need to tell other people and have them push me and check up on me in order to hold to it. So if anyone is like me and needs some accountability and push, I am willing to do it for you if you will do it for me. I may set up a rewards thing to help motivate me also.
For Christmas, James gave me money to buy a new swimsuit since my only tankini wore through the bum and wanted to play peek-a-boo, these are the two that I ordered.

I am hoping that it will help motivate me to get my body back to where it was so I will feel comfortable wearing them (maybe look like the models in them :)

Brooklyn's 1st Christmas

My step-sister Maria in China, she joined us via web cam for Christmas, she was a part of our opening circle. It was 1:00 am for her there.

My brother Greg (his hands), my mom, My step-dad Mark, and Maria's boyfriend Mike.

My step-brother Ray and younger brother Doug.

It snowed so much on Christmas that the Oak tree started drooping down.

We know it is odd, but we had a Christmas visit from 8 ducks. During the summer there is water in the stream and waterfall and 2 ducks lived here this summer. They must have returned with some friends wondering where the water was. We took good care of them by feeding them some bread, you could tell they were very grateful for it.

Here is a little clip of Brooklyn opening up her presents. We had to open hers later on in the day because when we started with the family, she was getting so upset because she was tired and hungry, so we had to wait after her nap.

She's discovered her Tongue!

Can I just say that I absolutely LOVE being a mom! She is so darn entertaining and cute. She has recently discovered her tongue and it is so funny to see her stick it out all the time and pull faces with it. She also has started grabbing onto her toes and curling up in a ball that way which is so cute.

It is absolutely a Winter Wonderland outside right now and we have a family party tonight, so I put her in her Bear snow outfit to see if it will fit her to go out in the snow and it was so darn cute that I had to take pictures of her in it. She got this little outfit from her Aunt Julie and Uncle Aaron in Colorado and it is so cute. And of course she started sticking her tongue out during.

It has Begun.....

So anyone who knows my husband, knows that this is his favorite time of year.....because of Christmas.......No......The snow has started falling, and that could only mean one thing to him....Snowmobiling up at our cabin. I have been excited because football season is practically over and I thought that I would finally have my husband back on Saturdays. He has had season tickets to BYU games and the days that he didn't go to them, he was home glued to the t.v. watching it (so pretty much like he wasn't home.) This has gone on since we have had Brooklyn and I was finally looking forward to him being home on the weekends, and I forgot about the snowmobiling season.......How could I forget?.......
My parents told my brother-in-law Rob and James that if they could find a good used machine, then they would pay for it. Well they jumped on that offer, found a machine and they picked it up yesterday. I have once again lost my husband on the weekends for probably the next 3-4 months. I normally would just go with the flow with him and go up on the weekends to do snowmobiling and come back either Saturday night or Sunday early morning, but now with Brooklyn, it is a little bit more difficult to just up and leave for one night, especially when we have to snowmobile everything in, including her. I think I need to start my own woman's club or at least go out with more of the girls since my husband seems to have his own Men's club going on all the time. It really isn't fair that the guys can just up and leave whenever they want, and the woman are always "stuck" (I don't like that word, but I can't think of a better one) watching the kids. I know I can't leave Brooklyn with nursing her, but I need to get out more and hang out with the girls if my husband is going to ditch me all the time! Anyone available?

Great Night!

After many weeks of trial and error of trying to get Brooklyn down at a decent time, we have come to the conclusion that putting her down between 9:30 & 10:00 is the best for her. We have tried putting her down at 9:00, 8:30, and 8:00, and every time we did, we were up alot in the night (and that is even changing her naps to earlier times also). Last night she went down at 10:00, and it was the best night we have ever had. She slept almost 12 hours straight without ever waking up! The most she has ever done in the past was maybe 9 hours, but usually 7. I hope she keeps this up, she will have a happy mama if she does :)

Christmas Clothes

Brooklyn in her Christmas dress after church with dad.

Our little chunkster.....I don't know what is with the faces she was pulling but they were so cute and funny.

I love this picture! She was pulling the funniest faces and this one reminds me of the baby grinch :) I laughed so hard when I took this one.

Both of these little outfits were from Grandma and Grandpa Gabler, so we had to take pictures of her in them since they aren't here to see her in person in them.

A visit from an old friend

On Wednesday the 10th, my childhood friend from Idaho, Candace, came down to Utah and spent the day with me and Brooklyn. Her husband was busy with things he needed to do, so we had a girls day out. I went and picked her up in Sandy and we went to lunch at the Paradise Bakery in American Fork. Then we went back to the house for a while and just sat and talked with my mom for hours. It was my neice Maddie's birthday, so later on we went back up to Sandy for her birthday party at Classic Skating, and Candace got to see Celeste and Greg who she hasn't seen since probably we left Idaho. Then her husband came and picked her up there. It was so good to see her and actually spend some time with her.

Brooklyn's T.V. experience

Brooklyn's first time watching the Baby Einstein show Baby Mozart! I think she really enjoyed it.

Here she was over at her cousins house watching the Backyardigans with them (Maddie & Sophie) and I thought it was so cute that she was actually watching the show and seemed into it.

We better be careful though, I don't want her to become attached to the t.v.

Advice Needed!

So instead of posting a Random Question this week, I really need advice on Brooklyn. We had a schedule down that was working for us, and she has decided this week not to go by that schedule and that she doesn't really want to eat during the day. Therefore she is waking up in the night, sometimes 3 or so times to eat.

She was normally going down for bed at 9:30 or 10:00 and I think I need to move that up because she sleeps in until 10:00 or 11:00 the next morning. If anyone can recommend me some books or just have some advice on the best bedtime for babies, sleeping, or getting her to eat normal again I would greatly appreciate it.

Baby Shower!

Yesterday my mom's close friends here in the ward through me a baby shower! They felt bad that they didn't do anything for me in the summer, so they decided to do a get together yesterday with a lite lunch and a "getting to know you" conversation. I have been in the ward since April, but because they put me in the primary right away, I hardly know anyone. I am just known as Kara's daughter. Everyone pitched in money to help us buy a crib, when that day comes. We don't have anywhere here at my mom's house to put a crib so it may have to wait until we move, whenever that will be. It was very sweet of them to do that and it was nice to talk to everyone, and they loved having Brooklyn there and holding her.

Rough Evening!

Last night we had our Relief Society Enrichment, which my mom and I were in charge of decorating a table for the dinner. I left Brooklyn home with dad and they were going to go out together. I purposely didn't feed Brooklyn before I left because she hasn't been taking a bottle lately and I thought if I wasn't around, she would take it from dad and help her get back to eating from it in case I ever had to leave her. Boy did that blow up in our face! I came home from enrichment at 9:00 to a SCREAMING baby! She was supposed to eat at 7:30 & wouldn't. She ended up falling asleep so it wasn't a big deal. I guess a few minutes before I got home she just lost it and started screaming. She has had a cold with a stuffy nose and cough, and she did throw up on me yesterday so I do know that that was the cause of this unfortunate evening. I got home and ran downstairs to feed her. She fed for about a minute before she started back up screaming. I think she was screaming for maybe 45 minutes with mom, dad, grandma, and grandpa all trying different things to calm her down and nothing being successful. Finally we stripped her down and decided that maybe a bath would calm her down. Right as I was about to put her in her tub, she threw up all over me! We got us both cleaned up and we put her in the tub. This worked! She calmed down and enjoyed her bath. We got her all ready for bed when she decided she was going to start back up again. Finally with dad walking around bouncing her and giving her a pacifier, she finally fell asleep. Brooklyn is such a well behaved baby that this was so out of character for her. I am sure her stomach was bothering her from being sick. She shortly woke back up just wanting to eat and then went right back to bed and slept through the night!

It really is true when they say that your child's pain hurts you more than your own pain does. I was on the verge of tears through all of it because I felt so bad that she wasn't feeling well, and that I had left her and didn't feed her. I guess for the next 9 months or so, she is pretty much going to be attached to me. I have a ton of frozen milk that I don't know what to do with now since she won't take it from the bottle anymore. I hate to see it go to waste.

I think Brooklyn is feeling a bit better today, she has been fairly happy, but has wanted to sleep alot. I hope she can shake this off soon, I hate seeing her sick!

Random Question

Ok....so last year at Christmas I asked my mother-in-law to use paper plates for Christmas dinner so that we wouldn't have dishes afterwards to do, and I think she was appalled at the fact that I even mentioned it. This year for Thanksgiving, we had paper plates sitting out waiting for us. I was so proud of Judy and we were able to enjoy the evening and not worry about dishes. My mom on the other hand had about 23 people at her house and she said that they were doing dishes until 9:00 that night.

So my question is....IS IT TACKY OR SMART TO USE PAPER PRODUCTS FOR THANKGIVING OR CHRISTMAS, WHICH ARE USUALLY NICER MEALS? I am a bit curious to see what all of you have to say.

Thanksgiving in Colorado

We took all of the babies on a walk Friday afternoon in the chilly weather.

Lily and Logan both asleep in the bean bag used for pictures. I can't wait to see the professional ones of the two of them.

We got professional pictures Friday morning and here is a picture I snapped while the 3 babies were getting there's done. I love the faces of all of them, it is so appropriate for each one. If you want a preview of the professional pictures, go to http://www.thecreativecorner.com/families.html, the photographer liked one of our pictures so much that she put it on the front page of her website. The second picture on the left.

Brooklyn in the Airport waiting. We expected Wednesday before Thanksgiving to be busy, but boy were we wrong. We walked right in and checked our bags and walked right through security and then sat and waited for 2 hours for our plane.

Every year we alternate families with the holidays and this year Thanksgiving was with James' family in Colorado. It was a nice "relaxing" weekend, as relaxing as it could be with 3 babies.

Brooklyn some how knew that we weren't home because she always sleeps through the night at home and she didn't once the whole time we were there. Sunday night I put her down at 9:30 and she woke up about 5-6 times before 4:00am which is when we had to be up and at it to catch our plane at 6:30am. It was a rough night, but Brooklyn and I came home and took a 3 1/2 hour nap while dad had to go to work :(. Last night was the first night back and she slept through the entire night. How is it at that young age, she knows when she is home or not?

Funny side note. We were expecting the airport on Wednesday to be busy and it wasn't at all. Monday morning we were expecting the airport to be dead and it wasn't. We barely made our flight with just a few minutes to spare before they shut the doors and got ready for take off. We really do get lucky sometimes.

Now we are home and Brooklyn has another cold with a stuffy nose and cough, and earlier today she projectile vomited all over me, my sheets, and her blanket. The poor thing, but afterwards she just looked up at me and smiled. Even when she is sick she is still such a happy baby.

This is just a video of the whole Gabler family during Thanksgiving weekend.

Monumental Moment!

Ok....so it's only a monumental moment for me, but it is a big deal. I can fit into my favorite pre-pregnancy jeans as of last night! I was very excited to be able to do up that button. They don't fit me quite like they did before, but I am sure in a short time I will have them fitting like normal :) My goal is 5-7 more lbs and I am back to my normal size!

Falling asleep

I was sitting at the computer and had Brooklyn laying on the bed under her toy and she was whining a bit, all of a sudden I looked over at her and she had whined herself to sleep. I promise we normally don't do this when she is sleeping, but we had to give her a bath and feed her before she went to sleep. We were trying to get her to wake up and it was funny what she was doing. She really is the best source of entertainment!

Random Question

I have decided to post next weeks question early because of Thanksgiving and people will be busy most of the week with family. I also wanted to give everyone time to think about this question before Thanksgiving.

WHAT ARE SOME UNUSUAL THINGS YOU ARE THANKFUL FOR?

This is something I have personally been thinking about this Thanksgiving season. We all know the obvious ones like Christ, Heavenly Father, the gospel, family, etc. which are all the best and biggest things to be grateful for, but have you thought about the wierd or random things in your life that you may not think about off the top of your head that you are grateful for? Example: I am truly grateful for ice cubes! I can't stand drinking water unless there is ice in it. Not something you would normally think about. Some of you may know, but my step-sister lives in China right now and she will be there until next summer. We talk to her every so often on web-cam, and seeing her life there has really made me appreciate the small, random things in our everyday life. Here in America, she was vegetarian and wouldn't come near alot of foods. In China, McDonalds is practically gourmet to her. Her electricity is rationed! She is aloted so much for the month and once she is out, she is out until the next month! Just some things to think about this next week.

Brooklyn Sleeping

Brooklyn has always liked to sleep on her side when she is cuddling with dad, and now she has figured out how to sleep on her side all by herself! It is so cute to watch her get herself on her side. If she could get her bottom arm out of the way then she would roll completely over! She hates being on her stomach so I don't think it is a good idea she do that. We will hear a scream the day she rolls all the way over because she will be so mad she is on her stomach.

Random Question

I have decided that every week I am going to post a random question on here just to see what people have to say about it. I like knowing random things about people that you normally wouldn't talk about in a casual conversation.

Question for this week.... What are your pet peeves?

Gingerbread House Festival

Last night we went to the Gingerbread House Festival with my mom, my sister Celeste and her family at Thanksgiving Point. It was kind of cool to see how creative some people can be. These houses that I took the pictures of though were absolutely amazing. Instead of using candy, they used dried foods. There was dried kiwis, cheese nips, sun chips, pretzels, pasta, etc. The pictures don't do them justice at all. They were SO CUTE!!!

Brooklyn has been kind of sick this week with a stuffy nose, cough, and has been having alot of stinky diapers in one day. Because she's been sick, she and I haven't left the house since church on Sunday, until the outing last night. It was nice to finally get out of the house for a bit.

The Jumper!

My siblings and I used this jumper when we were babies, it has gone through all of my nephews and nieces and now it's Brooklyn's turn. She hasn't quite grasped the concept of it but it is cute to see her try. We will post another video when she has it down and has gotten really good at it.

Our Music

James figured out how to put music on the blog last night and I thought I would give a little explanation on the songs I chose.....in case you were wondering :)

#1 Mika-Love Today
This is a happy song! We can't help but to dance to it everytime we hear it. And who couldn't use a little reminder to Love Today!
#2 I like to Move it-Madagascar
This is our #1 dance song......We love this song!
#3 Colbie Caillat-Capri
My sister-in-law Julie sent this song to me when we were both pregnant and I would totally cry to the words. So this is mine and Brooklyn's song, but I like to change Capri with Brookie when I sing it to her.
#4 You are loved-Josh Groban
My sister Celeste found this song before it had really come out on itunes right after our family went to a "self help" type seminar, and the words seemed appropriate for us at the time.
#5 Jesu, joy of man's desiring-Josh Groban
When we lived in Colorado the first part of our marriage, I drew a picture of the Idaho Falls temple for my brother Justin and his wife Denise when they were sealed. I listened to this song while I was drawing and I found it very inspiring.

I am sure we will add more songs to our list, but these first ones I could think of all had a meaning to me.

Help Me!!!

Ok....so I was proud of myself for finally figuring out how to blog....(I tried doing one a while ago and I honestly couldn't figure it out) and now that people sent me their blogs, I see how incredibly boring this one is. I need help on knowing how to do all of the cute backgrounds and layouts. I always thought I was quite computer savvy but I am now feeling like I am behind in the times. Please Help Me!!! I consider myself quite creative so I can't have an ugly, plain blog.

Brooklyn ready for church

Brooklyn in her dress that grandma and grandpa Gabler gave her when she was born. The whole outfit is so cute that we had to take pictures of her in it.

Our trip to Colorado

James' brother Aaron and sister-in-law Julie had their twins, Lily and Logan on October 29, 2008. We spontaneously flew out there on Halloween to see them. The twins were so tiny that Brooklyn only being 2 months older than them, looks like a giant next to Lily. It was Aaron and Julie's first time seeing Brooklyn so they had a bit of a shock seeing her next to their own babies.

We also attended the CSU vs. BYU game while we were there. James' younger brother Josh is a Strong Safety for CSU and we sat in the middle of the families. We were torn for which team to route for, we wanted to support Josh and we wanted him to have a good game, but we couldn't go against our team that James graduated from and that we have always supported. Luckily, it was a very good game & BYU won with just a few minutes to spare 45-48. This was Brooklyn's first football game & I think the noise bothered me more than it did her.

Brooklyn Laughing Video

James wanted to see if Brooklyn was big enough to sit in her Bumbo chair so he put her in it and started making her laugh. I came down and walked in on this and happened to have the camera in my hand to catch this!

Brooklyn's Baby Blessing

On October 12, 2008, we blessed Brooklyn! So many of you were able to come and support her and celebrate with us. She looked so pretty up there in her gorgeous white crocheted dress that grandma Kara gave to her. Thank You so much to all of you for the love and support you have given us through the pregnancy and the birth of Brooklyn. We are truly blessed with amazing friends and family.

We are joining the Blogging community!

We are feeling a bit left out since we are practically the only people who haven't had a blog, so we are now joining the blog community! This way our family members that live out of town can keep up with what Brooklyn is up to, (since we have recently discovered that we don't matter as much anymore:) .)