A tough one

When we decided to move here last year, we just took a leap of faith and went for it. It really felt like the right thing for us to do, so we did it.

It has been a very challenging year. It hasn't been exactly what we imagined in some ways. We have gotten to spend much more time with family than we ever did in Philly, of course, but I think we imagined that we would have even more of a relationship with them, especially with our siblings. I know it's a 2 way street and our lack of effort is in part to blame for that.

We do not love it here. We still find ourselves wishing that we could just hop on the blue line downtown and walk around Reading Terminal Market or take a family walk scoping out cute old houses in our neighborhood. We miss our apartment there, where we never heard a peep out of our neighbors. We miss the walkability of our neighborhood. We tried to find that here, but aren't sure it really exists. But we are slowly finding our place here, learning to enjoy what is available to us.

Probably the hardest part of just moving here on a whim is that it has been more of a battle than we expected for Zack to find employment. It has been super stressful for all of us, and it has been a painful year financially.

I don't say all that to sound whiny.

The fact is things are turning around finally. Zack starts his new job tomorrow. We will be moving away from our awful neighbors in a few months (although who knows what our new ones will be like). We have the opportunities available to us to continue to spend time with family. Despite how hard this year has been, somehow we made it through together, and I'd like to think we're stronger for it.

So in a couple weeks, our second year back in Utah will begin. Here's to a less rocky year for our little family.

Noyce family photos

So this happened at the end of April. I got a little behind. Oopsies.

Thanksgiving Point Gardens

Zack's parents were kind enough to take us to see the Thanksgiving Point Gardens recently. It was really toasty out, but we really enjoyed walking around taking in the beautiful scenery. I love summer, and would rather be warm than cold anyway.

Koi fish

 The Monet pond

  The Secret Garden

 
I loved these pink flowers

Taking a little drink.

 The waterfalls

 Enjoying the view at the Vista Garden

 Apparently they are going to be removing a couple of the existing areas of the garden and putting in a Christ-themed garden. They had some statues on displaying showing samples of what will be in that new area.

 The Meadow Garden. I just loved this one. Those tall flowers are all so pretty. 

June Date

We are getting worse and worse at this monthly date thing. This time, we were a whole week into July by the time we got to our June date.
The info sheet

This time, we did a day date. We headed up to the Olympic Park near Park city. We had gotten a group buying deal for unlimited rides on the attractions there. We did the Alpine Slide 3 times. 1 was a wash because we got stuck behind some scared little girl. We also rode 2 different zip lines. We rode the bigger one twice. Of course this took a few hours because you have to ride the lift up to the attractions each time. It was a beautiful day. We forgot our sunblock so we both got quite sunburned, but we really had a blast.
Here's Zack on the lift going up the mountain.

 Me at the finish line of the alpine slide.

 Going up again.

 Ski jumps

 Alpine sliding again.

The original plan for this date was to just do a couple of the attractions (they are expensive!), then do lunch/dinner and some shopping at the outlets. But we ended up doing our date on this particular day because Zack had a job interview in Kamas. Plus we happened upon that unlimited rides group buying deal, which meant we could spend longer at the Olympic Park. We didn't want to leave our baby for the entire time it would have taken to do the job interview, ride the rides, sit down to eat, and shop. So we did the job interview, just grabbed a quick bite to eat on the way to the Olympic Park, rode the rides, and went home. We went shopping at the outlets another time to make up for missing that. We really had so much fun. I think this might have been one of my better ideas for dates.

Family reunion

It was time for my family reunion in St George a couple of weeks ago. We had debated a lot about if we should really go or not. Clara seems to be liking the car less and less lately and that's a long drive for a little baby. Plus the plan was to go to Sand Hollow Reservoir, which has swimmer's itch going on. No way I was going to let my baby go in the water there. But in the end, we decided to cowboy up and go. So I spent all day Friday getting ready and packing and cleaning. It was stressful and we got out of the door later than planned. So I called my mom to let her know we were getting out late.
S- "Hi Mom, are you there yet?"
M- "Am I where?"
S- "St. George"
M- "Why would I be in St. George?"
S- "Um.... the family reunion."
M- "That's next week"
S- "It is? No way"
Yup. I had the wrong week in my head. I have no idea where I got that date, but I had it in there for weeks, and I was sure that's when it was. I was wrong. Luckily, we hadn't gotten too far when I called her, so we decided to just go to Ikea, since we were close to Draper. So we did.
The next weekend was actually the right weekend, so I did it all again. Packing, cleaning, preparing. This time, things went smoother, perhaps because we had a practice run the week before. We got out the door as soon as Zack got off work, and made it down to St. George. Baby was okay on the car ride. She only slept about 45 minutes, which was kind of a bummer, and she was fussy some of the way, but not too bad.
So Saturday was reservoir day. As I mentioned before, I wasn't letting my child anywhere near that water. I wasn't interested in going in either. So we just went to the reservoir for a little bit in the morning, then returned to the hotel to give our baby a nap. After nap time, we went to the Pasta Factory with Michelle, Zach, and Mars, then we hit up the mall. We went for some ice cream with some more of my family, who were back from the reservoir by that time. In the evening, we went to a family dinner with everyone, and then we watched some skits some of the family prepared, but again the baby got too tired, so we cut out early. She zonked about 2 seconds after we got in the car, so we decided to go to the outlets, where we just carried her around sleeping. The next morning, we got together with the extended family again for a short time before heading home.
We didn't really get to spend much time with extended family because of the baby's schedule, because we did not want to go to the reservoir for long, and because it was a whopping 113 degrees outside on the Saturday (not keeping the baby outside in that), but we still had fun. It was nice to have a little change of scenery. Baby was a gem on the way home, sleeping 2 hours of the drive.
The only pictures we took the whole time were a couple of Clara and Mars on the little fire truck at the mall.

14 months

Our baby is now 14 months old. Crazy. Here are some tidbits about her.

- She is still breast feeding, mostly at night, usually only once or twice.

- She is still a way crappy sleeper. She goes down great but never sleeps more than about 3 hours at a time. She now naps in her crib. This is a pretty recent development and a big deal. I spent the first year of her life rocking her to sleep for all naps and then either holding her or laying next to her while she slept. It was the only thing that worked.

- She now says a few things, including mama, dada, this, Clara, and no. Today she said "bad dog" when the dog was barking at my parents' house.

- She does actions for "the itsy bitsy spider" and "popcorn popping". She will clap during "if you're happy and you know it". She also does a few actions along with some Sesame Street videos. 

- She knows up and down and will stand up or sit down when prompted (sometimes).

- She LOVES her cousin, and just laughs and laughs when they play together.

- She says " baaaaaaa" when you ask her what sound almost any animal makes. She does make a correct elephant, dog, and cat sound. She has been carrying our Lion King movie around the house, pointing at the cover, and saying "baaaaaaa".

- She has been a total champ in the car for most of her life, but that seems to be ending. She fusses a lot more these days.

- She does not like to ride in her stroller either, and prefers to walk wherever we are. She kind of wanders though, and it is difficult to get her to walk to where we want to go.

- She will not drink milk. I have tried everything. She just won't take it. Almond milk is out too.

- She thinks she is too busy to eat most of the time. She is less and less interested in baby food and likes to eat things she can eat by herself. She loves bananas, red berries, carrots, and beans. She likes apple juice. She loves to drink out of straws.

- She loves to help with the laundry. She likes to carry it all over the house, often putting it on her head. Sometimes she puts it over her face, walks around, and runs into things, then she gets upset. She has this skirt that she particularly loves to carry around. She will even ask me to get it out of the closet for her sometimes, in her baby way. I don't know how I know that's what she wants, I just do. Other popular laundry items are towels and bibs.

- She loves to open and close doors. She also loves to go up and down stairs.

- She likes to climb things, particularly furniture. 

- She always gives me huge smiles when she sees me through the car window.

- She is such a momma's girl.

- It's like she has a talent for knowing exactly what she should not be playing with. Then, of course, she wants to play with it. 

She is such a cutie, and so darn sweet. She really is a good natured baby. We know we are so lucky to have her in our family.

Independence Day

Yeah, I know I've been less than stellar at blogging lately.

I hope everyone had a fantastic 4th of July. I was at work, but it wasn't too bad. 

Zack and Clara were able to have some fun going to lunch at Blue Lemon, getting some frozen yogurt, and going to Liberty Park with Zack's family.

Since we have a baby, we just skipped fireworks, stayed home, and went to bed early. I do love fireworks but they are way past Clara's bedtime, not to mention the damage they could do to her hearing. 

We did miss being in Philly for all the festivities this year, but the trade off is getting to be with family. 

Here are a couple if pictures for your enjoyment.