Critter Crawler

My baby is six months old now and thinks he's a big man. He's pretty much unimpressed with the bottle lately and would rather eat just about anything from a spoon. He's been rolling for a while but decided one day that it wasn't just a trick he could do but a way to get around. A couple of days ago he started "crawling". It's not crawling like up on his knees or anything, but it gets him around. He goes for the remote every chance he gets so we have to keep it on the couch. See for yourself: (don't worry about turning up the volume, it's just me blabbering.)



And I am pretty proud of myself for figuring out how to take a video with my camera and how to post it both in less than half an hour.

Santa was here!

We had a really great holiday. We spent Christmas Eve at my parents' and Christmas Day with Mike's parents.

With nine grandkids, my two sisters and their husbands, one Hammy Great, my aunt and uncle, Cousin Ashley and her husband Tyler, Christmas Eve was wonderfully chaotic. The kids were all spoiled mercilessly and we didn't make out too bad either. The star of the evening was a seven-kid teeter-totter airplane that Hammy and Papa bought a few months ago and hid in the neighbor's backyard. How Hammy kept the secret for that long we may never know. Before the presents, Ashley gave Hammy Great a picture frame with an ultrasound print. She's due in June and we are all very excited for them.

Santa came to our house and left some surprises for the kids. They each got some toys that they are enjoying. Critter had a great time in the Saucer watching Ally open everything-- including all the presents with his name on them. Mike and I gave each other a house. Actually, Mike gave me the house and I gave him the bedroom downstairs with his weight set in it.

We went to Melissa's for breakfast Christmas morning and then to Mike's parents for more unwrapping fun. Once again the kids were spoiled like crazy, but we had a great time. It was a lot quieter and much less chaotic than at my parents'. It was just us, Mike's parents, his sister and brother-in-law and seven-year-old Jack.

Santa came through once again and it was great to finally have some time together outside of Home Depot. We have been so busy with house projects that staying home without something to do was really nice. Mike had 5 days off and we loved every second of it.




Ally got a "bideo game" and has barely turned it off for four days. It makes me feel better that it's educational.


Ally was almost more excited than Critter that he got a "favorite striped blankie" from Santa.


This was before we let Ally open anything Christmas morning. I think this may be the last year for our poor little tree. Next year's tree will be probably be a little bigger and will definately be pre-lit. You can't tell by looking at it, but I spent three hours putting the lights on the tree again this year.

My elves

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Maybe it's a tumor... It's not a tumah.

Ally's doctor called last night and said that her MRI was clear and didn't show any abnormalities. Her big brain is just prefect. We knew that already, but it's nice that science has now proven it.

She goes back on the 5th and there is a chance she'll get glasses, but until then it looks like everything is fine.

Critter went to the doctor yesterday for his 6 month check-up. The office is less than half a mile away and it was so nice to leave five minutes before our appointment time and still get there on time. He's doing great. He's 26 1/4" tall (50%) and 16 pounds 1 ounce (25%). I don't know how he got low stats; we are used to much larger babies around here. The doctor was impressed at all of his hair. Apparently they grow bald babies in Pleasant Grove.

MRI... I'm hungry, Mommy

Today was the big day I've been nervous about for 2 weeks. I took Ally to a pediatric ophthalmologist a couple of weeks ago because her eyes don't follow very well sometimes. We thought it was probably lazy eye and they'd have to watch it for a while, or, at worst, have to patch it for a while. He told us that it wasn't lazy eye and the problem was nystagmus (not a very attractive word, huh?). Her eyes shake when she tries to focus an there's a possibility it may be caused by a tumor. The doctor scheduled an MRI at Primary Children's. Today was the day.

Since she's only 3 and can't hold still in the machine for half an hour, she had to be sedated. She couldn't eat any solids this morning and only juice until two hours before. She had an IV (so she's braver than my mom) and was out for over 3 hours. She got a teddy bear from the nurse because she was so brave, though. She woke up really nice and the first thing she said was that she was hungry.

We won't know anything about her "big brains" until the radiologist calls. It all went better than expected and the nurses were fantastic. Unfortunately, the sedation medication will stay in her system for 24 hours so we're making her crawl instead of walk tonight. She's a little tipsy.

We left the house at 10:45 this morning and didn't get home until 6:30. It was a long day, but it all went much much much better than I thought it would. We went to the McDonalds drive-thru on the way home and she ate an entire chicken nuggets Happy Meal and then a cheeseburger. She really was hungry. Ally was a real trooper and we're both glad it's over.

Merry Christmas 2008

My mom has been after me for a while to write a Christmas letter, so instead of copying, folding, stuffing, sealing, stamping and addressing, I figured anyone we wanted to share our lives with would know about our blog. So, here goes. Our very first Christmas letter:

2008 has been one of the most exciting, surprising, and event-filled years we've ever had. Scratch that. It has been THE most exciting, surprising, and event-filled year we've ever had. So, in a nutshell, this is what we've been up to.

January brought a major milestone to our household: potty training! It was 36 intense hours, but couldn't have gone better. Some people may not be impressed by this major event, but when two first-timers are put together (Ally and me) you never know how it's going to turn out. Our standard of living improved dramatically afterward. We actually thanked her everytime we walked by the cases of diapers at Sam's Club without picking up a box. I am still really impressed with myself that it went so well. And I guess Ally deserves a little bit of the credit too.

What could top our spectacular January you ask? One word. February. First, Our Baby Girl turned 3 and decided she knew it all. Whoever came up with the term "terrible two's" never had a three year old. She can be a handful (mostly because she's so smart), but she's so sweet that she can melt our hearts.

Second, my 1991 Dodge Dynasty gave up after 17 years. She put up a good fight, but finally could last no longer. Unfortunately, she bit the dust in a ward member's driveway and had to be towed home by my parents.

Third and most exciting came the news that Ally would no longer be our only child. How do you find out you're pregnant in February and have a baby in June, you ask? Easy. Don't find out about it until you're 23 weeks along. (For the record, yes, that is 5 months.) I highly recommend the 4 month pregnancy. I don't know why everyone doesn't do it. The best part is having an ultrasound at the first doctor visit. They told us he was 100% boy. They couldn't have been more right.

Our fourth exciting February event came the day after we found out about the baby. We bought a minivan. And I'll admit it. I love it. I don't know that I could go back to a car. Ever.

Exciting thing number five (yes, this is still February we're talking about) came about two days after the van. We called a contractor to finish our basement. We decided a family of four would need a little more room than our house could offer.

The basement took up our March and April. We painted the whole basement over Conference Weekend. It took 20 gallons of primer and 15 gallons of paint to get the entire project done, but it turned out fantastic!

We spent May preparing for the baby and hoping we had everything ready. We didn't know how good we had it. No major life changes for an entire month.

Christian was born on June 17th after 3 trips to the hospital hoping he would come. After only 3 hours and an epidural, he was here and we couldn't have been more thrilled. He had to stay in the Level II Nursery and we couldn't bring him home until the day after I was released, but he's been doing great since he's been home.

July brought big news that brought about some more major life changes (are you beginning to sense a theme for the year yet?). Mike called me from work and said he had an interview with Millenniata, a new company in Springville. He would be working in the chemistry lab devising new ways to make DVDs. Would we be willing to move to Utah County? Surprisingly, I didn't feel nervous about it at all. We both felt that he should go for it and everthing would work out.

Mike was offered the job on August first and gave his notice to Kelly Scientific. We worked on fixing up the house and finally got it listed for sale (brand new basement and all) on Mike's first day of at his new job: August 15th. It was stressful, but after 3 weeks (thank you, Aaron), we were under contract. Mike's commute was at least an hour each way and it was starting to wear on us all.

We found this house and fell in love with it in September and spent most of the month packing everything we own into cardboard boxes. I had no idea we had so much stuff!

We closed on both houses on October 10th and were finally able to move in here on the 16th. You can probably guess how we spent our November.

So here we are in December. We are all happy, healthy, excited for the holidays and everything the new year has in store for us. We hope it is a little calmer, but we'll take it.

Drop in and see us whenever you can. Believe it or not, it will probably take you the same amount of time to get here as it did to get to our West Jordan house.

We hope you are all well and enjoying the holidays.

Love,
Mike, Amber, Ally, and Christian Miller

Dinner time

Critter started eating cereal last week. After 5 months of the same formula in every bottle, bland, flavorless rice cereal was probably a welcome change. I always think that I've mixed up too much, but he always downs the whole bowl. The best comparison I can make is a lion stalking its prey. He follows wherever the spoon goes and has his mouth open and ready for the next bite before I have it scooped. I guess not having teeth really cuts down on chewing time.

This picture is after an entire bowl of cereal. Yes, he really is that clean after eating. He rarely allows any precious morsels to escape. And he doesn't mind one bit when I scrape his chin with the spoon to capture any dribbles and put them back in.


We had a chicken pot pie for dinner tonight. I usually do it the cheater way and use Bisquick for the top, but tonight I decided to attempt pie crust for the first time ever. Ally wasn't very interested until I pulled out the rolling pin. It was apparently too fun to pass up. So we spent all of the baby's afternoon nap rolling out dough and trying not to squish it into our clothes.

She also ran to her bedroom to get her apron. I made it out of scraps after making a super hero cape and a pillowcase. I had no idea she'd get so much use out of it. She's being trained young that we like Utah and BYU stinks.

Outside

So I am totally outside right now. Ally is on her bike, (actually, she's in the garage and I should really check to make sure she's not drinking antifreeze or anything)and the baby's asleep (hooray!). We're waiting for a plumber to come and fix the water pressure in our house. It should be about 75 and it's 150. I don't really know what the numbers mean, but I guess it's twice what it's supposed to be and it's bad for the valves or something. All I know is that the bathtub fills up really fast, which I love, but the pipes squeal really bad. He should be here sometime this afternoon. I guess plumbers run on their own schedule.

Anyway, we are outside because our Christmas present finally came. I thought we were only getting a house for all the major gift-giving holidays for the next 30 years, but our house computer is on its last legs. It's five years old and the best years are far behind it.

Mike ordered this laptop last week and it came today just as I was going to pick up Ally from school. So far it is leaving our old one in the dust. It actually started without groaning, the screen has all the colors it should, and, did I mention, I'm outside?

I'm wondering right now if I should have put sunscreen on my daughter. It's not really something you think about the week before Thanksgiving.

Up to our ears in apples!

We have an apple tree in our front yard that I wanted to take out ASAP, but Mike wanted to keep it. Since he would be the one to to take it out (and I would have only a supervisory role in the removal of the tree), it looks like it will be staying. It has TONS and TONS of apples and after Mike took a pruning saw to it, it doesn't look all that bad.

Ally and I spent almost an hour on Friday picking up apples off the ground. There had to be hundreds. They all went into the garbage. Very few of them were rotten, so I felt kinda bad throwing so many away, but I couldn't do much else with them. They filled up half of our big garbage. Mike filled it up half way two weeks ago, too.



I went out later and picked a few to make an apple cobbler. It was delicious. If I ever learn to bottle applesauce, we will be able to live on it for months. Feel free to come visit and take a bucket of apples. Each one that gets picked is one less that I'll have to pick up later.

TCU 10 Utah 13

We FINALLY got the satellite hooked up yesterday. We've been living on PBS for three weeks and we were near the breaking point. I ordered before we moved, but it couldn't be installed until yesterday. I set the DVR to record the Utah/TCU game that started at 6:00. (If you didn't know Mike was a U fan, you need to come around more often.) Mike had a meeting and didn't get home until 6:30. I ran downstairs at 5:58 to make sure I set it up to record right. I turned it on and found out that we don't get that channel.

I ran to the phone and had to look up DirecTV's phone number on their website. It was now 5:59 and I was getting nervous that the game would start without us. I dialed the number and was immediately directed to the automated system. I was told by the friendly computer voice that they were experiencing unusually high call volume and I would be able to speak to a representative in approximately 5 minutes. Frantically I hit 0 repeatedly (and not without some extra force). A customer service rep answered almost immediately. (That's the tip of the day: press zero over and over to talk to a person.) It was now 6:00 and the opening kickoff would be happening any moment and quite possibly without us able to see it.

I told Lashawnda of our dire situation and asked what could possibly be done. Would we have to wait for a few minutes, or even days, to get the channel? How much would it cost? Would we be able to see the game? She said for $12 we could get the SportsPak which would allow us to instantly get access to the channel we needed and our evening would be saved. I said, "Do it!" I heard her press a magic button, and suddenly, there were the Utes, right in front of me on the TV screen (and in high definition, no less).

So in the end, our evening was saved, the Utes won, and it would have been an awful game to miss. We could actually see the tears the Horned Frogs were crying after their loss. Mike actually danced when it was over!

Thank you, DirecTV. You took your time getting us set up, but you really came through when I called. Now if you could just include all Utah games with the package we already had...
Go Utes!

Critter

Mike started calling him Critter the day he was born and it just stuck, so we all call him that. My mom and sisters think he's too cute for a nickname like that, but it just keeps sticking.

So he's pretty cute, huh? Trust me, he wasn't quite as lovable the night before last. He has always been a good sleeper and has slept all night from 3 weeks old. Except for Wednesday night. He woke up at midnight and I rocked him back to sleep for a minute and went back to bed. Then he woke up again... and again... so I got out of bed, rocked him and went back to bed SEVEN times that night. I think he was having bad dreams because he woke up screaming every time. So finally at 4:30 in the morning I took him to the living room and we just rocked until Mike got up at 7:00.

Last night I decided that maybe it was his blanket. He still likes to be swaddled and wrapped really tight at night, but he's growing out of his blankets and gets out. I got a bigger blanket and wrapped him as tight as I could to go to sleep last night. He slept for 12 1/2 hours! My good baby is back!

Ally's first day of school (again)

Ally started school again on Tuesday. It's in American Fork so it's a 7 minute drive each way, but it's worth it. She has really enjoyed it and wants to go back everyday. She goes on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday at 9:00. It's been a mad rush to get us all ready to go, but at least the baby can still be in pajamas until we get home. I guess she's learning something, because today she told me that when you count in the twenties you say twenty before each number. Then she counted from 20 to 29. It's just 10 thru19 that give her trouble. And occasionally she skips 5 and 6...

I am not Princess Belle, I am Ally Miller!

I put curlers in Ally's hair for Halloween and she borrowed one of the ladies' (her cousin's) dresses to be Princess Belle. We went to Wal-Mart when she still had the curlers in. We've never had so many old ladies smile at us.

She got mad when I called her Belle. I was repeatedly informed that she was just pretending to be Belle, but she didn't really change her name. Her hands are blurred because she was too anxious to get going that she couldn't hold still for pictures (imagine that, Ally not being able to hold still).

Critter was a tiger for Halloween. You can tell how excited he was about it. We went to Melissa's (Mike's sister) house for dinner and trick-or-treating then went back to their house for homemade donuts and hot chocolate. Mmmmmm! Ally had a great time and wants everyday to be Halloween. What's better than knocking on a door and getting candy just because you asked for it?

At Carrie's Request

My sister-in-law Carrie has made a request that my kids (namely my baby) be posted. I haven't downloaded our Halloween pictures yet, so these are the most recent I've got of both of them. The move really put a cramp in my picture taking (and downloading). I hope my son doesn't hold it against me when he's older that I completely missed several weeks of his early life because I had too much going on.This is Ally "helping" me with my birthday present. Yes, that's my hand holding her down so she couldn't hold the bow in front of her cute little face.


This is our cute boy Christian. I call him my accommodating baby. He is always happy--unless he's super hungry, really tired, or Uncle Travis is holding him. For not knowing about him for the first five months of his existence, he's really been forgiving. I don't know that I'd be quite as nice.


This is one of my favorite pictures of him. He loves the jumper and it's so cute when he turns himself around by standing on one foot. He goes full circle and looks so confused. He has no idea how he got himself there, but he's just happy to be here.

I'll have more recent pictures up soon. Ally starts school again the day after tomorrow. Thank goodness! We are getting flu shots tomorrow afternoon and I haven't told her about it yet. I'm trying to decide if I should let her know when we get there or just let her figure it out when she gets the poke. I predict a trip to Wendy's for a Frosty will be in the near future.

Our new house

So we have lived in lovely small town Pleasant Grove now for 16 days. So far we have really loved it. Amazingly it takes us the same amount of time to get to Mike's parents house from here as it did from West (west west) Jordan. And everything is so close. From driveway to parking lot, Macey's is only 4 minutes away. At the old house it was at least 7 minutes just to get out of the neighborhood.

Mike and I were talking the other night and it took us a couple of minutes to figure out if anything is a downgrade down here. We only came up with a couple. The doorknobs are pretty sad, the bathrooms don't have tile or windows, the light fixtures look (as Krista would say) like UFOs, and we are further from my parents. Only two of the downgrades won't be fixed with some serious updating over the next few months, but we really love this house.

Ally is finally able to ride her bike. She could ride it before, but I wasn't ever really up to pushing her back up the hill after she went screaming down. I think Critter even likes it here. He sometimes surprises me with a bad diaper after I've blamed the stink on the horses next door.

Here are a couple of pictures of the house. Ally is in a few because I can't pull out a camera without her pulling a face in front of it.

This is the sunrise yesterday from our back deck. Yes, I said sunrise. It's not hard to catch at the end of October.

This is the front. We cleaned out the garage today with the very very last of our storage and I can finally park my van in the garage again! This one is looking off of our back deck. There is a horse pasture to the east and north of us so we really only have one neighbor. We also have a view of the Mt. Timpanogos temple out our living room window. We can only see it at night, though, when it's all lit up.

This is the view from the front door. Post-vacuum but pre-putting that cabinet somewhere else. I don't know where Ally was in this one, but I'm sure she's sad she's not in it.



Oh, goody, we found her. This is the back yard. The windows are the living room.

This is the kitchen. Huge upgrade from West Jordan. I even have empty cupboards there are so many of them!


Ally's in the living room. I'm surprised she's not playing with the shutters in the windows.
So there it is. Now that I feel like everything is finally put away, we can enjoy it for a few weeks before the Christmas decorations find their way in from the garage.

Air Quotes

Okay, so it's kind of a dumb name for a blog, but it's a running joke in our little family. Ally has been airquoting us lately. You know, she puts up two fingers on each hand and bends them when she says something. My favorite is when she asks me in the morning, "Did Daddy go to 'work' today?" Of course he went to work. Where else would he be going at 7:00 in the morning? How she even knows what she's doing and how to do it correctly is really beyond me, but remember, she is my very smart husband's child.

So anyway, she asked us one day what two plus two is. I told her to hold up two fingers on one hand and two fingers on the other and see what it made. She put up her fingers and told me, "Two plus two is airquotes." She's brilliant.

Ally starts preschool on Tuesday and goes three hours a day three times a week (hallelujah) so I think I will be able to put something on here while she's in school. No promises, though, and please remember that I have no idea what I'm doing, so don't expect a lot.