the hunt is on

It has begun. Thad had his first job interview today, and has another one on Thursday. The guy he talked to today was up in Heber and they build ginormo homes in Park City. And he tried to hire Thad on the spot. . . as in start full time tomorrow. But Thad reminded him he was still in school and had another job commitment, but the guy was really bent on hiring him so asked him how many hours a week he could possibly give him while still in school. So the guy said he'd call again in a week. Anyway, it seems right up Thad's alley as far as smaller company that rewards for hard work and ability to move up the ranks quickly. Only catch is we'd be living in Heber!
After this summer with Kiewit Thad really is looking for a small company and I'm thinking that means we are going to get stuck in Utah. I mean, how many out of state "small companies" are going to send recruiters to BYU or the CM competition in Reno? but hey, Heber is better than mountain view, WY. . . Target, Costco, the mall, all within a 30 min drive back to Provo. I have been anxiously awaiting the interview/job hunt time but now that it's here it's a huge decision to make and I'm a little stressed about it. But I am very excited at the same time.

so much to say

First of all I need to rant and rave about Costco for a minute. I am so tired of them randomly not carrying things! Last week I went to get the Orange Chicken that I have come to love because we were having a little oriental night with our neighbors. So I go and it's not there. Then I went to get regular chicken this week, and for a while they were carrying a different kind that I liked better and it's gone now too. Oh, and so is my favorite yogurt! Stupid Costco! Anyway, this week became very insane on Wednesday. I had no idea students started looking for spring/summer and fall/winter contracts in January. Well apparently they do because starting Wednesday my phone has been ringing off the hook! And today I showed 10 places. and I have appointments all week to show places and appointments to sign contracts and the phone keeps ringing. I finally stopped answering it this afternoon because I needed a break and within an hour I have 3 new messages. It's nuts. Andi is really becoming quite a character. She is constantly playing hide and go seek around the house, and has learned how to get behind things now to hide. She also likes the throw everything she can get her hands on in the bathtub or toilet. And she is very quick to find toys and stuffed animals at the store. . . any store. . . every store. right now she is hiding behind her laundry bag giggling. She thinks Thad is chasing her, but really he's lying on the living room floor calling her and pretending he's going to find her.
Thad has his first job interview Tuesday. It's with a co in Midway that builds "high end luxury homes" in park city. The guy called him out of the blue Friday so he is going to go check it out. See, I told you. The minute I started getting excited about getting out of Utah he's gonna get a job here. I want to say thank you to all of you who helped in my bangs/no bangs dilemma. Here is a pick of the new hair cut.

another day

It is always something with Andi. Now that we have her ears under control with tubes she gets tonsillitis. She comes by it rightfully though, I had my tonsils out when I was 5. And it looks like she will be following in mommy's footsteps. The way things are going she's gonna get my bad eyes, bad skin, bad curly-fro hair, and hey why not my asthma too. Poor girl. If she gets Thad's metabolism though, I think it will balance out because she'll never have to worry about being fat ;)


This pic is from yesterday, and I promise she climbed in that basket herself. She sat there and played for quite a while and then moved on to play behind that table. weirdo. Oh, and yesterday she decided is would be fun to drag the trash bag around the house before Thad took it outside.
We have been trying to get her to drink Milk instead of formula now, but for some reason she won't take it. She drinks strawberry lemon aid and anything else Thad tries to give her, but don't even think about milk, that's way too weird! Although it is whole milk, so I kinda don't blame her, that stuff is nasty. But I don't see how it's much worse than her fake milk formula. Any moms out there with advice?

More Firsts

Andi has had a couple more firsts this weekend. First of all she went sledding for the first time. We went to rock canyon park which is 2 minuted from our house and we'd never been, but it is an awesome sledding bowl! And she loved it. She actually like being pulled back up the hill better than sliding down it. But it was fun.

She also tried feeding herself with a spoon for the first time tonight. Obviously she didn't do very well, but she knew what she was supposed to do, just couldn't keep the food on the spoon long enough to get it in her mouth.
Unfortunately she has also learned to climb on the coffee table with no help. At first it wasn't bad because she would crawl around and then slide off on her tummy feet first. But now she stands on it and tries to walk off. I even let her fall a couple of times hoping she'd learn her lesson, but as soon as she stopped crying she climbed right back up. So I think the coffee table might go to the basement for a little while till she understands that she can't be on it.

1 year old!

Andi turned one yesterday! We had a little party for her with Michael &Cari & little Tino. I made Andi her own cake to destroy, and she did pretty well with it. For a complete play by play of the demolition check out Thad's website. www.et.byu.edu/~tsb43
She has also decided this week that she will now be a picky eater. We started feeding her the "graduates" dinners that are basically normal people food, and she won't eat it! We've had quite the battle the last few nights trying to get her to eat. She usually wins, but only because she has Thad on her team who gives in and makes her a sandwich or bottle.
I am taking her to play group this week for the first time. She loves running around with the other little kids at church so it should be fun.
Other than that we are just settling into to the new semester routine, and everything is going well.

Terrible what? . . . and pictures

So I really think that the fever Andi had with this last ear infection has melted her brain a little, or that whoever came up with the "terrible two's" seriously misspoke just to coin a phrase. Since we have been back she has started doing all kinds of weird things. First off she screams, and not in the "check out this cool new noise I can make" way either. It's a banshee wailing scream that is accompanied by flailing and rolling around on the ground. She has done this twice in the last week and the first time she did it I was actually afraid there was something wrong with her. Then I realized it was a tantrum and laughed at her. She is such a drama queen!
Secondly she makes these weird faces all the time. And will make them on command. If you make them at, her she will do it right back. And she knows it's funny because she laughs while she's doing it. Also she has discovered chocolate in all it's fabulous varieties. We had to put the candy dish away because she would yell and point at it whenever she caught a glimpse. I made brownies the other night and when they were sitting on top of the stove she yelled and pounded on the oven till we gave her some brownie. At lease we know where she gets this ;)
While she still doesn't say anything but daddy she has learned to point at whatever she wants, or wherever she wants to go, so she is communicating with us pretty effectively these days.
As for Thad and I we mostly just sit and laugh at her. Thad started school today. I know he wasn't looking forward to classes today, but I woke up in the best mood because it is his last semester. I have been very cheerful all day and just keep thinking how quickly the semester will go by and how soon we might be done with Provo! Of course now that I've said it out loud the semester will drag by and he will get a job in Provo and we'll be stuck here forever, just watch.
Anyway I promised Christmas pictures so here are a few.

this might be the longest post ever.

The fun never ends with Andi. Once we got to Bako and got rid of Andi's cold she started having issues with he ears. Every time she would burp or hiccup she would scream and grab her ears. By Wednesday she had green junk draining out of the tube which of course meant infection. The whole reason we did the tubes before we went out of town was so we wouldn't have to deal with an ear infection on vacation again. But we are just lucky because she had one. We took her to the surgeon today for a re-check and he said that 65% of kids who get tubes will have 1 ear infection within a year of the surgery, and she just got hers right away.
So Andi was miserable on Christmas and went back to bed before we even finished opening present. It's a good thing she won't remember this and will be able to have happy fun Christmas memories from here on out.
Other than that we had a really great time at home. We took new family pictures with Thad's fam on Christmas eve, an event over a year in the making. We haven't had the whole family together in forever! So it was really nice to have everyone there for a few days together.
Christmas morning we got up early as usual with my family. We had Kelsie and Cameron on the web cam so they could be apart of the morning, which tweaked bobby and bradon just a little. But only because it seriously slowed down the present opening process for a little while;) Then we had waffles because we all got new jazzy waffle makers. The ones you flip over and get perfect waffles every time. We went to Thad's parent's at 9 and I made omelette's for everyone and then we did the tree with them. Oh and we also did a white elephant exchange which was hilarious.
All the boys in my family got marshmallow guns and new Nerf guns with glow in the dark darts for Christmas, so as you can imagine the next few days the house was a battle field. They even went down to the church a couple nights to run around in the dark with their glowing darts.
We also had a surprise 50th wedding anniversary party for my grandparents while we were home. A bunch of family we hadn't seen in a while came so it was really fun. And the best part is that G&G had no idea! We headed back to bako the 30th and after some lame traffic and too many hours of baby einstein in the car we made it home at 1 am. Speaking of baby einstein we watched that for 3 days straight while she was sick because it was the only thing that kept her quiet. Thankfully when we got back she discovered care bears and will watch that now too. So we can have a little variety in our movies.
Now we are just relaxing and gearing up for Thad's last semester, yay! oh I had to post these picture of Andi and Walter. . .w e took them while we were home at the weddings last month but I couldn't post them because we framed them and gave it to my parents for christmas. Sorry I don't have any christmas pictures posted, but with Andi being as sick as she was I was way too distracted and my camera didn't even make it out of my bag. So I'm waiting on the ones from our parents cameras.