Is this not the sweetest girl?  I just wanted to write a little memory down so it doesn't go unremembered. 
Caroline is really receptive to learning about the gospel.  She loves to learn about Jesus and her favorite thing about Christmas is Baby Jesus.  She loves babies and Jesus so the fact that there is a whole holiday celebrating Baby Jesus just blows her mind! 
Here is the memory:
On Sundays we usually watch either general conference or the Mormon Messages videos.  Right now, on lds.org there is a beautiful video of the Nativity.  We watched it and she loved it.  There is another one on there featuring a piano and a cello playing "O Come, O Come Emmanuel" with scenes of the Saviors birth and life.  It is really really beautiful.  Everyone should watch it.  So, we were watching that and there is one scene where Christ heals a man, who rises and gives him a hug.  Caroline's eyes lit up and she said, "Hug Jesus?  Baby hug Jesus?"
 Sidenote: She refers to herself as "baby."
 I said, "You want to give Jesus a hug?"  She said, "Yes, hug Jesus."  I told her we can't literally give Jesus a hug right now in this life, but we can pray to Heavenly Father and tell him how much we love Jesus and that we want to hug him.  I asked her if she wanted to say a prayer and she said she did. 

Another side note/contradiction to an earlier statement: About two or three months ago Caroline was all about saying her prayers, and she wanted to say them for every meal.  And by say the prayer, I mean repeat what we told her to say.  But lately she has refused to say a prayer except for her bedtime prayer.

So this is the prayer that she said, repeating after me and pronouncing everything clearly (at least to me):

Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for Jesus, I love Jesus, I want to give Jesus a hug.  Thank you, in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

Now, imagine her saying that in her sweet little voice, and she really does have the sweetest little voice.

I'm not bragging on her, I just don't want to forget it.  Sometimes when she's screaming no at me or throwing a tantrum, and I'm sure the power struggles will get way worse, it's hard to remember that children really do come from a place where they knew what this whole life is about and they know exactly who their Heavenly Father is and who their Savior and Redeemer is.  They are so sensitive to the spirit and are such enormous blessings.  We can learn a lot from them about faith and what really matters in this life.  We are so blessed to have her.  This is what I will try to focus on this Christmas, just like Caroline, I want to really be so excited about Baby Jesus.  It really is the most wonderful thing to ever happen to this Earth. 

Merry Christmas!

(Minor) Home Improvements

We've recently added  a few things to the apartment.  Take a look.

           We found these wall stickers at Dollar Tree (which is my FAVORITE place).  It started with the animal stickers.  She loves zebras, and saw the zebra from across the aisle.  We put them on her wall and she loves them.  She goes up to them several times a day and points and names all of the animals.  Except for the rhino, for some reason she has no interest in the rhino.   So then, we decided the next time we were there to add the alphabet to the wall, for educational value, and the butterflies for fun, because she loves them.  I figured it's cheap, $1 each, and when we get sick of them we can just take them off.  Anyway, they are fun. 

I'm sure you've seen the tutorial for these prints all over the internet.  I just took the picture to staples, asked for an engineers print.  It was $3.50.  Then I got a foam board at Hobby Lobby and painted the edges black, and glued it on.  It was really easy, but the hardest part was finding a way to get it to hang on the wall. It took several days and failed attempts, but I finally found the command picture hooks.  They work really well.  I feel like I had done a lot of little things all over the apartment except in our room.  This really adds a little interest to our room.  I like it a lot. 

Caroline Update

Caroline is 20 months old now.  She is so much fun and is learning and growing so quickly.  Here are some of her new tricks.

• When saying goodbye to anything, for example the school bus that drives by, she says, "bye bus.  I love you bus."  And this includes the greeter at the grocery store, dogs, trucks, planes, friends, etc.
• She went to nursery this Sunday without crying for the first time!  This is huge!  Usually every week she cries like I'm about to drop her off and will never return.  She clings to me and screams.  This week when we walked in her there were already kids sitting at the table with playdough.  There was a seat open by her friend Ebby, she went right in and sat down and started playing.  Also, usually by the time I pick her up she's crying.  But this week she was pushing a baby stroller around and playing.  The nursery workers said she only cried once the whole time!  It was awesome.
• But, she still tries to get out of it.  Halfway through sacrament meeting she handed me my keys and said, "Keys, mommy, go, go, car, keys, mommy, go!"  Also, as soon as the closing prayer is said she starts crying.
• She now takes bubble baths without eating the bubbles.  Thank heaven for the dollar store bubbles.  I love our dollar store.  Everything is a dollar!  We love to get snacks, toys, gift bags, and now, bubbles.
• This week, she's been waking up about half an hour to an hour early.  Mommy is not happy about this.  I keep telling her I don't do things before 8, but she's not getting the message.  
• She is starting to understand directions and consequences.  For example, "If you eat your rice you can have dessert."  She's also starting to try to outsmart us.  For example, she ate three big spoonfuls of rice, then when she thought I wasn't looking, she spit it out into her lap, then asked for dessert.
• She loves to color after breakfast with me now.  She always asks me to draw an airplane, Elle Mae (grandma and grandpa's dog), Josh (Eli's brother), and snow.  She loves to draw.
• She loves to read books.  Her favorite books right now are The School Bus, How are you Peeling, Butterfly's Bath, and A Child's Treasury of Best Loved Poems.
• She loves to play with her daddy.  She always comes up to him, grabs his hand, and says, "come on daddy," and leads her to whatever fun activity she has planned.                                           

Here are some pictures for you.  She is so much fun and a joy to be around!  We love you Caroline!

Some of her best friends are Reese and Ebby.  They love to jump together in her bed when they come over.

And share elmo slippers.  They wore those for about forty minutes. 

She loves for me to line up all of her stuffed animals on the couch and sit beside them.  It's really cute.

wearing elmo slippers and reading books. 

She was crying, she was given those boots by our friend, but refuses to wear them.  I just wanted a picture to document how adorable they are. 

My grandma made me that rabbit, and Caroline loves it.   It makes me happy that she likes it, I know if Grandma was here she'd love to make one for her. 

October Fun

So, in my previous post I said we were all better.  Not quite.  I ended up getting bronchitis and the beginnings of pneumonia.  Luckily we are better now.  Or at least we were, this week is Eli's big test week, and he always gets a bad cold the week he studies his butt off.  Last test-time was when he got pneumonia.  But, I think it's not as bad this time though.

Anyway, we had a great October, despite the sickies.  We had a visit from Eli's step-mom Karen.  It was so much fun!  We had a great visit with her.  We did a lot of fun things with her: went to the beautiful Cave Hill Cemetery (which sounds creepy, but it is a beautiful, old, historic cemetery with lots of historic trees and beautiful scenery), walked along the river, watched movies, and the best part: went to our favorite pumpkin patch!  Thanks for making the trip Grandma!  It was a beautiful  fall, and Caroline really loved playing with her Grandma.  She kept giving her hugs and kisses, and loved to have her take care of her.  She even let Grandma get her up in the mornings and after naps, which means I got to sleep in and nap most morning!  I loved it, especially since I had bronchitis and didn't know it.

Enjoy the pictures!

At the petting zoo, this was the "animal" she kept wanting to come back and pet.

She only kind of liked feeding the animals.

The goats were funny

The turkeys were in that cage, and without any prodding she started walking like a turkey and making turkey noises.  It was hilarious.

Her other favorite part was the playground!

She liked the swing too.

She seriously loves playing basketball with Eli

She loved the tractors

All of us on a wagon ride around the farm

Going out to the pumpkin patch

She kept sitting on all the pumpkins!

This is my favorite

And she kept trying to pick them up

My other favorite!