Boise Christmas

After the New Years we made our way up to Boise to see the Sparks side of the family. I have to give credit for all these pictures to Ben's mom. When we first arrived we took all of our stuff upstairs and for some reason it seemed like so much work to walk upstairs and get the camera. We were lazy, I know. Luckily Nana took a whole bunch of pictures while we were there.

Papa and Evelyn playing with one of her Christmas gifts

Breakfast time! Evelyn has since improved in her eating skills. I still love this messy face :)

Evelyn seems to always enjoy her baths. She was loving playing with the water!

Kaylynn always wanted to hold Evelyn, it was really cute! She did such a good job holding on nice and tight so Evelyn would fall.

Kaylynn loved playing with Evelyn

While we were in Boise Nana put together a fun family party so everyone on the Sparks side could come and meet Evelyn. This is Evelyn with her cousin Ainsley...second cousin?...(Ben's cousin's little girl) who was born a few weeks before Evelyn.

Grandma with her two newest great grandbabies!

All ready for church...well except for her headband and flower :)

We also had family pictures while in Boise since there had been a new addition to the Sparks family within this last year.

The three of us

Ben and I

The girls

My sweet baby girl

I love this picture except for the advertisement right in the middle

My happy baby

California Christmas Part 2

My parents bought crabbing nets this last year and have told us all about going crabbing in Santa Cruz over the past few months. So one evening after Christmas we decided to head over and go crabbing since Ben and I thought it would be a ton of fun. It was so fogging when we were unloading the car that you couldn't even see the Boardwalk from the pier. Luckily before too long the fog cleared up a little. Jared, Tierney and Evan joined us too, but we didn't get a picture of them.

Me and my baby girl

Ben was so excited about his first crab of the night. Look closely because there is one in there!

Mom and Dad brought their new deep sea fishing poles to try out. Sadly nothing was biting that night.

Here are some of the crabs we caught. Only the large one was big enough to keep, the rest we threw back half way through the evening. We ended up catching 18 small crabs, 1 large crab and a whole bunch of snails.

So funny story. There was this group of kids who came by to see if we caught anything. The little boy in the picture was named Jack (of course right?). It happened to be his 10th birthday so we let them help us pull up the crab nets for a while. We caught this massive star fish while they were hanging out with us. Jack's mom snapped this picture of the group of kids and the star fish. I was so excited that I went to go grab our camera at the same time. While Ben was explaining how to throw the crab net back in (just like a frisbee) another little boy thought Ben was talking about the throwing the star fish back and launched it back into the ocean...before the rest of us could hold it or take a picture. We were all so bumbed but tried not to show it so the kid wouldn't feel bad. The mom felt so bad that she emailed us this picture so we could have proof of the star fish we caught.

Dad and Ben went to Hollister Hills the morning before we went to Santa Cruz. Ben had so much fun driving the jeep around through the obstacle course. He even managed to get the tire of the ground.

Evelyn turned 4 months while we were in California. We took her in to her 4 month appointment once we got home. So at 4 1/2 months she weighed in at 13 pounds 5 ounce (25-50%) was 25.5 inches (75%) and her head was in the 50% (I can't remember the measurement). The pediatrician said Evelyn finally slowed down on growing in length. She has been so much fun. She loves standing up with our help, eating baby food, sucking on her fingers and is as curious as ever. Since she has been on all gentlease formula and baby food/cereal she has slowed down in the spitting up department. Let's just say that mom is really happy and frequently makes it through the day without having to change her shirt.

Below are some pictures that Denise Shattuck took while we were visiting. I was surprised that she was about to get any cute pictures. Evelyn was tired and gave Denise a hard time.

Even though she is sucking on her fingers I love this picture because it totally captured Evelyn at this age. She is constantly sucking on her fingers. Today at church her dress was soaking wet on top and it wasn't from spit up this time...all drool!

I lOVE this last picture! So cute!

Christmas in California

I realized as I was looking through pictures for this post that we took a lot of pictures over the last month and a half. So...I decided to break it all down into a few different posts over the next few days. So these pictures are from our trip to California. Next to come are her 4 month pictures, Christmas in Boise, Family visiting Louisiana and Evelyn's blessing day.

Evelyn's first flight. She rocked it!! The best part is for the first flight there was one, maybe two extra seats and we happened to have one on our row. No one wanted to sit next to the "crying baby" but we fooled them! She didn't cry the whole flight!

Grandma reading to Evelyn. Evelyn loves books!

While in California we went on a cruise around the bay with my parents

I think Evelyn got a little sea sick. She was fussing a bit and then spit up all over my jacket and her clothes and then fell asleep.

The tour had a lovely audio tour, which meant all of us were decked out in these awesome headphones

Mom and Dad

It was a beautiful day on the bay. This tour took us out past the Golden Gate Bridge and then back past Alcatraz.

Grandpa enjoyed holding his two newest grandbabies, Evan and Evelyn!

The whole Kirk Clan minus Joél and Stephen

Our little family

Jack loved wearing this Santa hat every time he came over :)

Dear Little Laura

My parents are hardcore! Haha

Jeff

Ben having fun

Evan had a lot of fun opening gifts

Evelyn opening her first Christmas gift (Well technically Nana sent some in the mail before Christmas but this was the first one she opened)

Evelyn in her Christmas jammies opening her first Christmas sock. The sock was the same size as her haha

Evelyn on Christmas morning in her Christmas dress. This was seconds before she decided to spit up all over herself. Luckily with the dress she had you couldn't really tell unless you were close enough to smell the spit up on her. Oh well, not everything can be perfect right?

Getting ready to open gifts. Evelyn was tired and slept through most of it. She did manage to wake up and open some of her gifts before we were all done.

Grandma and Evelyn opening a Christmas present

While we were in California we started Evelyn on rice cereal and then baby food. I know some people were probably surprised because she wasn't quite 4 months old (which is when most people start) but the doctor said we could because she spit up so much. She loved it! We don't have a picture on here of the rice cereal because our camera's battery was having some issues but here is Evelyn trying sweet potatoes for the first time.

So one night Evelyn was playing before bed and she got her toy stuck on her face. It was so funny! She kept turning her head back and forth trying to figure out what happened. Finally after a picture we helped her out:) She did this again the other day and had the same reaction. Makes me laugh every time.

Evan and Evelyn had fun meeting for the first time. We took some other cuter pictures but I just loved this one of both of them sucking on their fingers. Evelyn became fascinated with her fingers. She doesn't have a favorite. She loves her fist, her index finger, her thumb, all four of her fingers, her right hand, her left hand...you name it!

I just love my baby girl! She is such a happy baby. Her first Christmas was a lot of fun. She grew and developed so much in the last few months. I learned a few things over the break...

1. She sleeps much better in her own bed at home than somewhere else

2. She gets overwhelmed when there are lots of people in one room

3. She will smile at everyone and anyone

4. She likes to feel her Christmas presents before Christmas (no wonder she liked her Aunt Laura :) )