Haylee the Ham

Haylee is totally our little ham. She loves to just "cheese" it for a picture. Here are some cute pictures of her being independant and feeding herself; and sitting in her beanbag that she LOVES:

More Happy Helpers. . . . .

A Day In the Life of a 1 Year-Old

We start our moring with exercise,

Play a little Peek-A-Boo for some fun and games,

Model some of Daddy's dirty socks,

Help Daddy take off his boots to get more dirty socks,

and finish off with some chores like hauling wood for example.

Pre-Halloween

Dress-up seems to be the theme at our house all the time, however Lexi got it in her head that we needed to practice for Halloween. She and Haylee got dressed up to practice Trick or Treating although Lexi isn't going to be a princess and Haylee isn't going to be a pumpkin princess so I'm not sure how much practice they got :)

My Helper

Haylee the helper!!!

Happy Birthday Haylee!

My baby is now one year old today. I can't believe she won't be such a baby anymore. Haylee is a very happy girl but when you make her mad, she goes straight to tantrum mad. Haylee laughs at everyone and everything. Her giggles are such a sweet sound to my ears. I love how she comes trucking down the hall just a giggling over something her sisters have said or did. She is a daddy's girl through and through. If a temper tantrum is inevitable, I just need to dial a certain number and a smile will appear back on her face. I think Cory enjoys being the center of her world right now. She will be crying for me one minute and as soon as she hears Cory's voice or sees him coming up the walk at night; she lights up with a twinkle in her eye and a giant grin on her face. Haylee is a big tease as well. One of the highlights of my day is when she comes to find me wherever I am and says "Mommy" while trying to run away and hide from me. Haylee can also say Dada, Keekee (for kitty and the dogs) Uh-oh, and "tank ewe" (for thank you).


I make a giant cupcake for her cake that I decorated in about twenty minutes. We weren't going to have a party because Haylee wasn't feeling well but then we decided to go ahead with it. She was one so she didn't see all the flaws in my decorating thank goodness!

Here's Sadie getting mad at Uncle Buzz because he was going to blow out Haylee's candle on her cake for her.



Finally happy after she got some cake even though she wasn't feeling well:

Grandma and Grandpa Bird got her the cutest little bath towel! Look at that cute pink zebra:

And of course what would be a birthday without "pig food" from Grandpa Bird:

She's a Climber Now!

Grandma Bird's stairs are the only place she really gets any practice. She caught on really well though and now we can't keep her off them!!! Way to go Haylee!

Haylee's Milestones

Haylee is growing up so fast these days. Lots of milestones for the month of May so far. She started scooting around May 3rd.

Crawling became no obstacle on May 15th.

And last but not least we are pulling our self up by the table, couch, etc. by May 21st! I'm not sure I like all this happening so fast. It seems every time I turn around I am baby proofing the next level of the house!

Mother's Day Weekend

On Saturday it was raining part of the afternoon, so Cory and I hurried outside to the corrals to feed the horses without any kids. That was a blessing in disguise we soon found as we came upon the pen to see that the kids' horse, Dolly, was laying on the ground shaking. We went to her to try and get her up but she wouldn't get up with my gentle tugging so Cory called the vet in Salmon to see if he could give us a diagnosis without making a trip out to see her. The vet gave us a few instructions on trying to get her up without success. he told us she probably had a stroke which is probable for a 26 year old horse. In the end we decided to put her down. The kids were devastated about it and I had my hands full the next few days to distract them from their void.

Mother's Day turned out nice for us though. My kids wished me Happy Mother's Day a TON which was so sweet. Cory bought my a new purse that I have been wanting which surprised me because he has been in Driggs for the last two weeks straight. Earlier we had decided this year to buy a grill for Mother's and Father's Day combined. We have never owned one so I'm way excited about that!!! My kids made fun little gifts in Primary which I always enjoy. We just took it easy and were lazy on Mother's Day which was nice for a change. However, the laziness only lasted for a short time when we had a few incidents later on. Lexi was playing on her bunk bed and decided to sit on the outside of her bed rail. Thus we heard a huge THUD and screaming to find that she had fallen off her bunk bed and smashed her face against the dresser. Her mouth suffered the most damage from her teeth cutting her lip and she also managed to get a black eye. But Cory fixed the screaming problem in a hurry with a cookie :) Then we had a power flicker which shut everything off. As Cory went to turn on the TV, all we got was a loud smoking POP! So our TV "died" as well. On the bright side of things, Haylee got her first tooth to appear this weekend!!! Solid foods here we come! YEA!



Where Cory has been working the weeks in Driggs, the weekends are a relief for me to have some help and backup. When he leaves, my week looks very LONG. Monday morning promised to be full of good-byes again and we were all still recovering from the horse ordeal. When Cory went outside to gather his tools for the week , he noticed that our puppy, Tom, was laying on the lawn and not moving. He called me outside to join him and as we played doctor once again we discovered that some animal had cut across Tom's neck and hurt him pretty bad. W decided to see if we could help him get better before we put him down. So as Cory left I was in charge of Tom's food and health as well as his fate. The next day I tried to get him up to see how extensive his injuries were. Cory's dad helped me with that, thankfully. Tom's jaw was broken thus why he hadn't eaten anything so Cory's dad put him down. My girls were learning real fast the lessons in life about death and how animals no matter how much we love and care for them, they might leave us. It was a rough week but a growing week for them too.


Now while we had this rough week, in the midst of it all the power went out for several hours during two different days. It was interesting to see how much you take having power for granted. I tried to be creative to find fun activities for the kids during the rainy days without power. My kids were great sports about it though, using their imaginations and settling for reading books, coloring, telling stories and dressing up for a picnic party in the house. I sure appreciate the power a lot more. Thank goodness my kids LOVE peanut butter and jam sandwiches! We had them five times that week with the power out!

Fun Pictures

The argument of what is better Pepsi or Mountain Dew is

finally settled. Grandma Bird will be so proud:

Lexi fell off the couch at Grandma Bird's house but I am still mystified as to how this happened on the ceramic cookie jar on the floor next to the couch. Her ear was pretty sore for a while but she was a trooper. I gave her some swedish fish for sitting there while I bandaged it up. Cory said she looked like a little lamb with her hear like that.

Proving why we nicknamed her "Smiles":

Sadie decided to make good use of the baby car seat readily available for her own needs:

A Time of Firsts

03/20/10 Sadie: The moment she has been asking for and waiting for has finally passed! Sadie lost her first tooth a few days ago!!! She has talked of nothing else since. She took a bit of her lunch and out it came. Back in the first of February she went to the dentist and he told her it was loose so we have been waiting, and waiting, and waiting until now:

Her Tooth Fairy Box to put beside her bed:

03/08/10 Lexi: For a two year old she still has no hair but we did give her her first haircut three weeks ago, it was annoying me the little tail of hair on the back of her neck so I just cut it one day on a whim.

Here is her face after I told her what I did:

I'm not sure if that is excitement or shock or a combination of both. Lexi has become the independent two-year old lately. I let her try things on her own until she eventually asks for my help. Her excitement was so contagious the other day when she came out and told me she put her coat on and zipped it up "all by myself". I think she got a little to excited to remember she wasn't all done yet. . . . . . . .

03/18/10 Haylee: My little baby is sitting by herself! Still a little tipsy, but she can do it when she's not mad and throws her head back. She's reaching for her toys and playing sitting up. My girls are growing up!

What a weekend!!!

Last weekend was really crazy around here. I somehow got asked to help with the Super Saturday crafts from my friend Aubree. We did some cute simple crafts but it still takes lots of effort and time to get everything ready as many of you probably know. We took a trip to Idaho Falls to go get all the supplies which ended up being an all day trip. We left about 8:30 a.m. and got home about 6 p.m. Four hours of that was driving time but the rest was running around finding everything. Of course getting the right amount of everything is the key here. We had sign up sheets but you just never know who might show up and want to do something so be bought plenty of extras as well. I turned out to be a great day on Saturday. We had a good turn out and sold most of the extras we bought. My kids were neglected all day at the church getting to eat snacks of all kinds and watch movies but they had fun running around the rooms and playing with Aubree's kids. We were the only ones with kids there. My two big girls and little Haylee were SOOOO GOOD though. Haylee was just a happy baby all day even when I thought she should be getting hungry, she never screamed or cried too much all day. Sadie and Lexi played and had a few moments of disgruntlement but all in all they did pretty well. And it was another long day too, we were at the church from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. ( 6 must be the magic number to get home by). Now I just have to have a day at my house to do my Super Saturday crafts, I was helping people or cutting things out with my Cricut that day!

On last Sunday we finally blessed Haylee. We had plenty of family come and friends that traveled too. I have never seen a bigger circle around an infant, and they were all family. We even had a few family members missing because of being sick. But we had a great time visiting with everyone afterwards and having a nice lunch. I love the fact that we can use the church for having those kinds of gatherings, there is only one ward here so it works out rather well considering our house wouldn't fit everyone anyway. Here are the best pictures from the day. Again my camera needs to be fixed or broken so I can get another one-the pictures are dark again. We took LOTS of pictures to get some good ones but you know how it is to try to get some with kids-they don't always turn out!!!

Below: The five birds in the Bird's Nest!

Below: Engberson four generation picture.

L to R- Cory, Grandma Engberson, Jan, Haylee

Below: Bird four generation picture

L to R-Kurt, Cory and Haylee, Grandma Bird, Grandpa Bird

It's Official, she's a Bird

Haylee is officially a member of the Bird family. The trademark traits are the bald head and chunkiness all over!!! I think she fits the profile. My pic looks dark again even though I took it in the daytime with the blinds open. I think I need a new camera. It is five years old now.
I can't believe she is three months old already. She's growing so big and smiling all the time. She talks quite a bit too and tries to sit up in her bouncy chair already!!! The other night, she was laying on the bed with Cory and she rolled on her side towards him. I think it was a chance encounter ( or so I hope ) so we shall see. I just love her big cheeks and huge grins!!!

A Happy Halloween

We had a fun time for Halloween this year. I let Sadie and Lexi decorate the house with me. They loved putting up the static window clings and coloring pages to hang on the walls. We bought pumpkins to carve, but we didn't get them carved to I let the girls help me make pumpkin pie instead!


Sadie couldn't WAIT until she could put on her costume. I bought costumes on clearance last year so it was great that she loved it so much! Sadie was Alexa from Barbie and the Diamond Castle, Lexi was a pumpkin princess and Haylee was Eyeore. I takes a lot of effort to get three girls ready for Halloween and out the door! I have pitty for those mothers out there with more than three kids! We went to the trunk or treat this year at the church and after that the YM and YW in our ward put on a Halloween carnival at the church. It was a big hit. The kids had lots of games to choose from and play. There were prizes at every booth so they had TONS of candy. We went back to Grandpa and Grandma Bird's house afterwards for family time with Cory's sister and her family. It was a terrific Halloween. The weather even cooperated and it didn't snow (which is a first for the last 6 years)

The Almost Blessing

We were supposed to bless Haylee this past Sunday, but due to events beyond our control it didn't happen. Many of you know all about this so bear with me if you do. We received a phone call from Cory's mom on Saturday morning saying that school was cancelled for Leadore on Monday because of so much flu and sickness going around. Over half of the school was out sick on Friday. So we called the bishop of our ward to see what they would be doing for church on Sunday. The bishop is also a school teacher so I found out the reasons for missing school as well. There were no reports of swine flu just a lot of colds and regular flu going around. So the bishop first told us that they would hold church regularly. We called all our traveling family and friends to warn them of the spreading sickness out here just as a courtesy. Then the bishop called me back to tell me that church had been changed to just sacrament at 10 a.m. So I made another round of phone calls to let them know of the change and found out people were not coming because of the time difference or because they didn't want to get sick so we decided it was in our best interest to cancel the blessing. Jenn and Clay were already planning on coming up so they came and we had a fun time with just the Andrus family. Here is the kids lined up eating dessert on Saturday night.





We all stayed home from church because we were healthy and I wanted it to stay that way for Haylee especially. It was nice outside so we let the kids to ride horses in the corral. They had as much fun playing in the chutes as riding the horses!

On Monday I found out that two cases of swine flu are reported here and one was a girl in the high school. I kept Sadie home from pre-school on Tuesday as well to find out that still half of the school kids were home sick. I think it is more prominent here where there are so few kids in the school but this flu bug seems to be kicking everyone in the rear!! Hope all you are healthy and staying out of this cold spell!

Camera Crazy!

Just thought I'd put some fun pictures I took the last couple days on here. Haylee is smiling a ton now and I got a great photo of it! My girls are getting to big on me, it's hard to imagine life without them.

Time Flies By

I can't believe Haylee is already a week and a half old! We are busy trying to fast and furiously finish our bully barn so we can move boxes out of the spare bedroom, which then will become Haylee's room. Right now she is sleeping in the pack and play in our room and her clothes are in boxes in the corner of our room. But all in all she is doing great. She still has her days and nights mixed up but she's a good little eater and is pretty content when she is awake.
Sadie is such a great helper and big sister! She really tries hard to play with Lexi while I feed Haylee, clean up the toys for me, hand me things I forget to grab before sitting down to my hour of chair time. She is great. She loves to hold Haylee and talk to her when she is sitting in the bouncy chair.
Lexi is very infatuated with her sister, she constantly thinks Haylee is in need of something. A blanket, then the plug, her diaper changed, a toy, another blanket, milk and so on. She tries to help and does pretty good, and she loves to give Haylee a kiss or love. Haylee gets about 50 a day from Lexi. It is cute to watch. Lexi gets a little jealous when I feed Haylee, that seems to be the time she wants to sit in my lap. But she handles it pretty well with a distraction from big sister.
Cory is wonderful about keeping Haylee during the night if I can't get her to go back to sleep after she is fed. He was up last night from 1 a.m. until 3 a.m. when she finally fell asleep. he doesn't complain about it and always takes a turn for me so I can sleep a portion of the night. Thanks Babe!
I am remembering the soreness, sleeplessness, and craziness of having a newborn in the house. Nursing is going quite well even though I am still pretty sore. The lack of sleep isn't the best but I will get over it. I have made a new commitment of going for a walk until I can do some other form of exercise. I currently get up at 5:45 and feed Haylee so I can go for a walk before my kids get up. It will be worth it in the end when I loose all this extra pregnancy weight. I hope to get a cart behind a bike and take Sadie to preschool this fall that way so I can get exercise and get Sadie to school in one whack. We'll see though if that actually happens. Many of you know what adding a third child is like and how crazy it gets. I don't think I need to elaborate there. I feel slightly outnumbered with a third kid. I need to be an octopus to keep up with them all right now!
We are slowly figuring out a schedule, somewhat, that fits us. It will still take some time but we seem to all be doing great for now. Here are some more cute pics of everyone. Enjoy!

Below: Lexi has to hold Haylee after she finishes breakfast, it is like her morning ritual.

Below: All my girls in one place for a split second! That rarely happens now. . .

Below: Haylee already has Cory wrapped around her little finger, he is such a softie!!!

Below: Cute as a button! I tried to get one without the plug, but it ended in tears.

Otherwise it ended in a nap so take your pick.