It Occured to me Today...

So I have no real reason for thinking this at all.  It didn't happen to me, or anyone I know really.  But as I was buckling Cortney into her booster seat for some reason I thought - what if I accidentally locked her in the car, and I couldn't get her out (see I have no reason to think like that).  But then I thought, she would be ok.  She is a big girl, who is good at taking direction from me, I could get her to get out of her chair, climb up front and unlock the doors!  Then I felt much better.   Hopefully it never happens, I don't see why it would, but if it did at least I know we would be ok! 

Side note, ballet went well this week!  Chris is enjoying his job, and after being an intern for so long in Salt Lake is enjoying all the responsibilities he has!  And I also realized we never made a post about getting a new car!  It is very exciting for us, and we are loving having 2 cars, and at least one of them with AC!!!  Probably one of my favorite parts!  I also enjoying having a beep beep that works really well, the ones for our volvo were getting a little old and you had to stand right next to the car to push the button to unlock the doors, at least they still worked though.

Oh, thought of another fun Cortney story.  The other day one of her toys was having a birthday party while we were playing in her room.  I asked how old the toy (a little Belle Doll - from beauty and the beast)  was.  And she said, she was turning 8! 

So I asked her, "How old is mom?"

"8!"  (I know my whole life I have looked younger than I really am, but that is a little bit of stretch)

"I am 25 years old!"  I said

She started laughing at me for a minute then said, "What?!  25, that is old!"  So it is official: now I am old :)

Ballet, Berries, & Jenn's Baby!

It has been a busy couple of weeks!  Cortney has started ballet, which is adorable to watch.  We have been picking berries and finding delicious ones at a growers market.  And we went to visit Jenn and Spencer with their new baby Aniston!

First Ballet!
First Day of Ballet!  Cortney was the youngest of all the girls, half of which had already had a class, so between that and her being so excited, lets just say she was a little wiggly, but she looked darling!  There are also some pictures of the second class as well.  Right now she is in a 6 week program for the summer, still deciding whether or not to put her in it for the school year too.  She did do much better listening in the second class!

There is a little lounge we can sit in to watch the girls do ballet it is Disney themed - it even has a little castle thing the girls loved playing in!  Also without knowing it 3 people from our ward signed up for the same class - kind of fun to have all the girls in there together.  Cortney is at the bottom of the picture showing me a book.

Here are some of the fun things they get to do! (This is the view I have when I watch her!)

First they sit and stretch on this parachute

She has a great teacher, Miss Melissa, who is very good with the girls!  The older girl in the pictures is her daughter Anna.

She looks a little bored in this one, but the class in the in morning, I think she was just a little tired still.

Then they get to play!

This is one of those times Cort had a hard time listening, luckily the next class was much better!

She is doing better in this picture though - still learning how to point her toes out!

They also do this thing where they pretend they sleep, then they wake up and dance around, it is cute to watch them all lay down and pretend to sleep!

At the end they do this little course the teacher sets up - this is Cortneys favorite part.  They call it the princess dance, and they play Ariel music with it, so she loves it!  Again - props to the teacher, she is so good!

Cortney was so tired after the first day she feel asleep right in the middle of lunch!  In case you are wondering what is on her plate it is a quesadilla, made with a green wrap tortilla.

Pictures from ballet class #2
Cortney is on the very far side, which is why it is hard to see her in this one.

Berries!  The other day we went blueberry picking!  Fun and yummy!

Caught in the act!  (PS - the little boy is Blake, and the girl behind her is Audrey - She is in Corts ballet class, they have become fast friends!

We picked about 14 cups of blueberries!  So yummy - I put the apple in to give you a sense of scale:

We also went to a growers market where I found the most amazing strawberries I have ever eaten!  They are completely juicy and sweet - almost no tart at all.  They are red all the way through instead of white like the ones you buy at the store.  I bought 3 little baskets worth and we are already into the last basket the next day!  I will be going back next week for sure!





Jenn's Baby!
Cortney and I went to Idaho to visit with baby Aniston!  This is Cort's first cousin so it was pretty exciting!  I also took newborn pictures which turned out great!

Aniston has the chubbiest little baby checks ever!  She also eats just like Cortney used to.  Cortney had a lot of fun looking at and helping with the baby.  She has this obsession with baby hands, and loved to look at them:  Here are a couple pictures of them together.   PS - Aniston has Jaundice - she is doing better now but I'm afraid in these pictures she is a little orange - just wanted to make sure you knew why she was that color.

It was a fun trip!  And exciting that Cortney finally has a cousin to share at least one of her grandparents with!  Still the only grandchild on the Nield side.  We will being seeing them again at the begining of september for Anistons baby blessing in Utah!

I'm an Aunt! And the mom of the cutest ballerina ever!

Late last night I became an Aunt!   Cute little girl she is too, but sorry no pictures yet, I'm not there and all the ones of facebook are not wanting to be posted on here, so for now, all you need to know is her name is Aniston Kate.  Cortney and I will be visiting in a couple days to meet her, so more updates and pictures will come then.

This Monday Cortney is going to start a ballet class!  Today we went out and got her little outfit!  Can you say adorable?!  I was so taken with her I had to take tons of pictures...I know there are a lot on here, but this isn't the half of them.  Seeing Jenns baby today and then seeing Cortney reminds me how big Cortney has grown!  Besides looking a ton like me, in these pictures I also see my little cousin Sage in some of them, and also Jake in one of them - you can totally tell which one too!  Without further adieu here is my little (or not so little) ballerina!

 First off this one!  Love her eyes - and yes it does look like she is drooling...she was sticking her tongue out and blowing it so she has slobber all over her face...still I love those eyes!

Cute little ballerina feet! 

She looks so big in this one, I think she looks so much older because she just had another growth spurt and so she is very slender right now, which helps make her look taller too.   I know it is a little blurry, I was just so surprised how old she looked!

Here are some sitting on the stairs

Does she look like Jake or what?  I guess that is what happens when she spends so much time with him, gotta love uncle Jake!

This was another one where she looked older, whew...cannot believe how much she has grown!

Maybe it is the way she is tilting her head, but this is one of those pictures that reminds me of Sage.

My beautiful little girl!

Stay Tuned...there will be more pictures on Monday of her in her class!

July 3rd & 4th!

We had a fun 3rd and 4th of July! 
 

On the 3rd some people from the ward got together and made these cute little firework shirts!  There is the pavilion in our complex right next to a big grassy area, so the moms made the shirts and the kids ran around and played.  

We made the shirts with little pipe cleaners and fabric paint - word to the wise: if you are going to do this, make sure and use sliver first, or it will get all muddy with the other colors.

This is Cortney and her friend Audrey - kind of funny how so many of the kids here have the same names as the kids in Salt Lake did.  Audrey is about 5 months older than Cortney and they live in the same apartments we do, but there are like 12 buildings or something and they live clear on the other end.  Her mom Karrie was telling me how Audrey was calling Cortney, Lewis.  Ha ha.  She has no idea where she got the name from but I thought it was funny.  I told Cortney about it and she was like, "Lewis?  What?  My name is NOT Lewis, I am a Cortney."  So Audrey did a good job looking and smiling...Cortney was not, story of her life though.

Then on the 4th we had a festive breakfast, which was also very yummy!  French Toast with homemade Strawberry and Blueberry topping with powdered sugar on top!

It was nice to have Chris home and not have many errands to run so we played games.  Cortney is really into uno - I have been secretly teaching her how to play it for over a year now by playing simpler games with the cards and now (as long as she has the attention span for it) she can actually play!  She loves saying "Reverse Reverse!"   Just like they do in that song, I don't know what the name is but the one that tells you what moves you are supposed to do.

We also played the Wii with Cortney.  It was the first real time she sat down and played, she even won a round of Mario Party when Chris was really trying to win, go Cortney!

 

 This is when Cortney found out that she was the winner, she was so excited - as you can see she also took, her hair out so it was kind of crazy...you have been warned.

And I also made a couple danishes yummy!  But things cook so differently here, still getting used to that.

Here is that shirt that I made Cortney, I have like 10 pictures with Cort with her eyes closed and one with it open...here is one of each.

When some people in the neighborhood started shooting off fireworks all the kids went and sat down, so cute, PS there was one other girl there but Cort was the only one sitting on the curb with all the boys.

From left to right Cole, Austin, Ethan, Cortney, and Blake.  She was having lots of fun!

Sparklers!

I love this one!

I was playing around with different settings on my camera, loved taking pictures with this setting for the fireworks and sparklers.  Although Corts face is a little crazy

Here is one of Austin, he stood still and was waving it around.

Here are a couple fireworks we watched:

It was a really fun day!  The BBQ and fireworks with friends was really fun, and there were people in our neighborhood who bought tons of nice expensive ones they were fun to watch.  Probably one of my favorite things is when the fireworks were going off Cort would sing Disney songs.   I guess when she thinks when fireworks goes off you hear Disney songs in the background, what can I say she loved Disneyland!





It was a great Independence day!