The many faces of Brooke

I was talking to some of the girls at work the other day. They are so sweet to always ask about Brooke. I was saying that before, 7-10 months was my favorite age (of course, I have enjoyed her at every age, but I'm allowed to have my favorite stages), but now at 16 months it is my new favorite age. I just feel like Brooke is so fun and she is getting to where she understands what we are saying to her and her cute little personality is really showing. Here are a few of the things she is doing now:

1- She is obsessed with her Easter hat. I mentioned it before that she wouldn't take it off going over to Grandma Workman's. Now she will randomly come out with it on, take it off, put it back on, and so on. It's pretty cute.

2- She recognizes the pictures in her books. When we ask her where the horse, dog, cat, frog, snake, butterfly, etc. are she points to them. She also points to her daddy, mommy, and herself.

3- She is our little helper. One day Grandma Workman asked her to get her diaper and then to put it in the garbage. She was also fetching Kayden's blanket from the other room. She's so obedient.

4- She is such a girl. Her doll is her little best friend and she loves to take her for walks in the stroller. At night I put her doll sitting up facing her and give her a book. She falls asleep reading the book to her doll. We also have to make sure the the doll has her little blankie and that she gets fed with her little bottle.

5- She now says "dada", "mama", "papa", "Abba" (Abby), "Uh-oh", "Ssss" for a snake sound, and something that resembles apple. Tyler has been trying to get her to say "Dada love you" one word at a time. She says dada then something that I guess resembles 'love you'.

6. She loves to color or draw or anything dealing with a pen/pencil. She's pretty good at holding it correctly and lays her head down when she's drawing.

I do have to add a disclaimer that for as cute as she is, yesterday I offered to give her away. :) She is at that stage where she can throw tantrums and lets you know if she's not getting what she wants. Any advice? I'd like to nip that in the bud but I'm not quite sure how to.......

This is just a picture I took when she fell asleep with her feet through the crib. I thought it was kind of cool, but I could definitely use some photography skills... help Denee!

Finally, the tag

Britt tagged me sometime back in the dark ages and I'm finally getting to it. So here goes...

**Warning: This is a pretty long blog. It was fun to journal some of this since I haven't written it down anywhere. Also, you may not recognize the people in the pictures as marriage and childbirth has taken a toll**

How did you meet your spouse?

It depends who you ask. Do you want the real story or the one that we tell people because we are kind of embarrassed by the real story? The real story, ok, here goes. When I first moved here a friend invited me to be her friend on ldslinkup.com (for those who don't know, it's a place for lds people to meet other people). Anyway, I don't normally do that type of thing, but she sent me an invitation and I would feel bad if I sent someone an invitation to be my friend and they didn't want to. So I signed up and created a profile. It actually turned out to be pretty fun since I didn't know anyone I met quite a few friends on there. Well, I get an email from a guy named T-bone who happened to be searching on there for people who worked at UoP to see if anyone he knew was on there. He came across my profile because I was working there at the time, and emailed me. He invited me to go with a group of people and "hang out" doing whatever. I was certain that he was inviting 15 other girls to "hang out" and wasn't going to play that meat market game (I lived at the meat marked, aka BYU-Idaho for 4 years. I didn't need more of that). Then one day I was at a Fireside and was talking to another guy who I met playing softball. There was no interest in this guy, he was sort of special, but I was always nice to him. Tyler was there, recognized me, and came up to me and asked me if I was on linkup. I was super embarrassed since I didn't want to be on that type of website in the first place, much less be recognized from being on there. I said yes, he said he was T-Bone and we kind of talked for a minute. Then one of my guy friends that I had gone to the fireside came and said we were leaving. We said goodbye and I tried to get over the embarrassment. Then Tyler emails me again a few more times and I gave him my number. To be continued....

Where did you go on your first date?

He asked me on a date the week that I flew home for Christmas. When he asked me he didn't specify a time he was going to come pick me up. The day we were supposed to go out I got home from work and went to the gym. He called just as I was getting into the shower. After talking for about 2o minutes he had not said anything about when he was going to pick me up. I decided that he had changed his mind and told him that I should get to packing. He said later that he thought I was busy packing and that it was a bad time. Anyway, I showered, got packed to leave the next day and was in my bed at 10:30 when he calls. He asked me if I wanted to go get something to eat. I don't know why, but I said yes. He came with his friend and picked me up. It sounds weird, but in a way I thought that was considerate that he would bring a friend with him so that it wasn't just me and him that late on our first date. We went to Applebee's and from there it's history.

How long have you been together? This summer will be our 3 year Anniversary and we dated for 8 months before that.

Who eats more?Throughout the day, definitely Tyler. I sometimes can eat more than him at a meal because he gets full faster.

Who said I love you first? He did, for about a month before I ever said it. He says that he was getting sick of telling me and not having me say anything. I say that I had to be absolutely sure since he was the first person I told that to. I was in Idaho for my sister's wedding and we were talking on the phone. He said bye, I love you and I said it back. He was like 'What did you say?'. He couldn't believe I'd actually said it.

Who is taller? Luckily he is.

Who sings better? Tyler is awesome at singing. He even sings in the ward choir most of the time. He was in choir in high school.

Who is smarter? Umm... it depends. Tyler is very good at remembering numbers, in fact he doesn't have much of a contacts list in his phone because he remembers everyone's numbers. And, if they had a Who Wants to be a Millionaire, Sports Edition I'm pretty sure we'd be rich since he can name random facts and players even from his childhood. He is also very good at cramming at the last minute for a test and do pretty good on it (which drives me crazy!). However, since I worked very hard and long for my 3 college degrees, I'll take the credit on this one.

Who does the laundry? I do mine and Brooke's and the household laundry, and he does his own. I don't know how I managed to pull this one off, but he says that every time I wash his clothes I get something on them. Works for me!

Who does the dishes? Me.

Who sleeps on the right side of the bed? Looking at the bed from the bottom, Tyler. Is there some kind of psychological analysis to go along with whatever side of the bed you sleep on? Interesting....

Who pays the bills? He brings in the money (well, most of it), I pay the bills.

Who mows the lawn? Tyler does. He loves it, says that it's a stress relief. I don't get it though since he is always grumpy when he's out working and getting hot and sweaty. He's like his dad that way.

Who cooks dinner? Normally I do. Tyler loves to cook though. If I don't have anything planned for dinner he'll come up with some concoction that usually is very good. He likes to use a lot of spices and seasonings and I grew up in bland potato country so that's something I'm learning. He likes to grill also, so he's in charge of that. He wears my apron that is red and says "Beef- it's what's for dinner" and then he'll tell me he's a good cook.

Who drives when you are together? Always him. I'm usually playing with Brooke and keeping her entertained on the ride.

Who is more stubborn? We both are, but I learned my stubbornness from him. I wasn't stubborn before we got married.

Who is the first to admit when they're wrong? Funny you should ask. When we were first married his mom wanted to buy him a shirt that said "I may be wrong, but I doubt it" and it would have fit him. Now I've heard him say that he's not right about everything. Oh the way things change :)

Whose parents do you see the most? Tyler's parents, we are blessed to live within a few miles of them. We get to see my family a few times a year but wish it were more often.

Who kissed who first? Tyler kissed me on New Years 2006.

Who Proposed? Tyler did. Totally unexpected on Cinco de Mayo. He picked out the ring and everything on his own so I didn't even expect it. His mom didn't even know. After going out for mexican food at Serrano's We drove up to where we were over looking the city and he had a dozen roses in the trunk and gave them to me one by one with a message of why he loved me on each one. Then he totally pulled the bachelor thing and said that the last one was special and if I took it then I'd have to take something else. Then he pulled out the ring and asked me to marry him. Of course my dad knew what was happening since Tyler had talked to him. When we walked in the door at his parents his mom was sitting on the couch. I had my roses and she was like "Oh, what's this?" Then I showed her the ring and she couldn't believe it!

Who is more sensitive? Me. More so during pregnancy though, of course.

Who has more friends? Around here, Tyler since he grew up here. He is also more of a people person than me and can strike up a conversation with anyone. One of our first dates was to the Fiesta Bowl. We were sitting by a guy and his son who were cheering for Utah also. Tyler starts talking to him and they talked football most of the game. I didn't mind, especially since it was freezing and I didn't bring a jacket and they guy let me wear his.

Who has more siblings? I have 3 sisters and 1 brother. He has 2 sisters and 1 brother.

Who wears the pants in the family? Is this really a question? Of course I do but I like to let Tyler think he does.

If you haven't done this tag already, do it - It's fun.

The Latest...

I know I should be writing more about our cruise before I forget about it, but so much has been happening lately, it seems like our lives are in constant motion- chaos, actually! Brooke has been fighting off sickness for over a week now. Last Wednesday night we took her to the nighttime pediatric clinic because she woke up screaming and had a rash on one side of her face. She had been sneezing like crazy and coughing, which was starting to sound a little "barky". We took her hoping the y would give us something for the obvious seasonal allergies she has (and not tell us kids don't get allergies until they're 2.....whatever! She sneezes and gets a runny nose and cough every time something blooms!) Anyway, come to find out she was starting to get an ear infection and the croup again. We feel blessed that this is her first ear infection, but we were hoping to break a record and not have her get any. Oh well, we walked out of there having had a steroid shot and a script for Amoxicillin and Tylenol w/ codeine ( I guess one good thing out of this, I got $25 gift cards for each script :) I stayed home with her Thursday and she just didn't have much of an appetite. Friday I went to dinner with some friends while our hubbies were at Father and Sons, and on the way home Brooke threw up in her car seat. I think her stomach was too full when I gave her the Amoxicillin. She has just starting to act like herself again and not wanting to be held all the time. One thing that happens when she gets sick is that I let her watch Baby Einstein because she likes to just sit there. This time I think she is liking it a little too much. 10:00 last night she wakes up and the first thing she does is point to the tv wanting to watch it. If we are watching something she points to the tv and fusses until we let her watch it. She also likes to sit in the middle of the LoveSac when watching it, which kicks Tyler out of his place. I think it's pretty funny. That girl sure does love watching those animals!

Today when I was getting her dressed to go to grandma's, she saw her Easter hat in the closet and insisted that she wear it. She wouldn't even take it off to let me do her hair. I was thinking about the kids that you see that wear 4 different, non-coordinated pieces of clothes because they insist on wearing them and won't wear anything else. Are we headed for that?

In other news, Tyler finished up the last half of the semester with his history and math classes. Proud to say he got B's in both (thanks to his lovely, beautiful, talented and extremely smart wife). It's hard to celebrate too much since the next day he started two more classes - Business Communication and Microeconomics. His classes are pretty cool in that he takes 2 at a time for 8 weeks, then starts 2 more for 8 more weeks. It can be pretty intense but at least the classes don't drag on for a full 4 months. He also doesn't have midterms or finals, just assignments and discussion questions that are due each week. I kind of feel like it takes the whole college experience out of it when you never have to wake up at 4 in the morning to study for a final and to pray the whole way to the testing center since your grade depends on how you do. Oh well, I guess it's a blessing since I don't know any other way he'd be able to swing school along with his job, calling, and family.

Mother's Day was great. The talks in church were great about women from the scriptures and a lot about the huge role that mother's play with their children. It made me want to be a better mother and to establish the good habits that I wish to pass on to Brooke. It was crazy to remember 2 years ago on Mother's Day when were were calling my family to tell them that we were pregnant. Time flies! All in all it was a good day.