Children's Museum Continued...

Well, I will try not to post too many more pictures of the Children's Museum, as it is probably getting old. But it will be a weekly thing for Sarah and I. I have decided to go every Friday afternoon (based on my sissy's recommendation). It gives Sarah and I something to look forward to each week. So hopefully I can keep this post interesting!

Right by the entrance to the Mr. Rogers area there is this huge wall that has a giant maze built into it. It is great for letting Sarah climb around in and burn off some energy. She usually manages to find some older kid to help her get up and down in the higher places. She is my little monkey and loves to climb around in this.

A musical ball thingy - you put the balls at the top and they hit bells on the way down.

Us up on the water floor. Sarah and Abby enjoying themselves.

There is this little nook where if you push a button it plays a quiet song. It is to help parents learn to make a space for children to just have some time to themselves. Sarah loved pushing the button and reaching up trying to putter her fingers through the star cutouts.

Abby found her fist while Sarah was playing at the bird seed table.

As I promised, here is a picture of the light bright wall.

I think it is pretty awesome!

Well that was our Fun Friday a the Museum. The rest of the day was filled with driving around getting lost in Pittsburgh. I have yet to make it to the Museum with out turning on/off the wrong street on the way. One day I have a better idea of how long it is supposed to take to drive there. *sigh*

Lil' Abby

As promised, here are some pictures of Abigail!

Okay, I need to pull out my camera more, I have mulitple pictures of Abby in the same outfit and same spot (you know trying to get a cute picture, thank goodness for digital!).

I need some variety though. I will be better. Love you all!

Bob, Frick and Craigslist

Well we are starting to do some fun things here in Pittsburgh. My family gave me a gift membership to the Pittsburgh Children's Museum (thanks to my sissy for organizing that). So Sarah and I have already gone a couple of times. The first time we went just for an hour or two to check it out and learn how to get there (I still don't know really because I got lost both times I've gone...*sigh*). The second time I was going to go for most of the day but I had to wait around all day for the dang cable guy to show up. I had planned on going at 11am but didn't end up leaving until closer to two! It was still fun though. I went with Tiffany, a new sister in my ward and her two cute kids Cody (4) and Kylee (1). Sarah was so excited to have a friend to play with. It was hard because we ended up going right at the time Sarah usually naps, and so toward the end she was not the most pleasant person in the world.

The museum had a traveling display of Bob the Builder. I was surprised at how much fun Sarah had even though she has never really watched the show.

There was an awesome art section where you could paint, sculpt clay, make your own paper, creat a screen print and make seed balls. It was really cool and Sarah loved it!

Another fun part of this museum is that the entire 3rd floor is a giant water play area. There are large tables of water to experiment floating things, and a splash pad area when you can create your own sprinkling system (Sarah didn't quite figure that out).

The second floor is dedicated to infants and toddlers. All of the toys are baby friendly and it is interesting how much fun Sarah has playing with the baby toys (she never did as a baby). Another really cool thing is they have a wall that is a giant LiteBright board. Very cool!
(Sorry no picture of that).

Another fun thing that goes on here is playgroup with the ward. Every Tuesday from 10am to noon there are playgroups rotating at various parks. Today was the first one that I have attended and only one other sister was there. I was a little bumbed but Sarah still had lots of fun. The name of the park is Frick Park, and each week of the month the playgroup rotates to a different park. I guess a lot of the moms were more focused on the first week of school than with coming to playgroup. Sarah had fun. The playground equipment was really fun (lots of things to climb, her favorite) and there is an old cement slide built into the side of a hill (I'll get a picture of it the next time I go). The kids take pieces of cardboard and slide down on it and it get really fast. Sarah of course, on her death rampage of her pants, decided it would be easier just to slide down straight on her bumb. We'll see how her shorts fare after I wash them.

This is how Abby enjoyed her park experience. She looked around in her carseat and then finally just drifted off to sleep. She is such an angel baby. What a blessing!

I love Craigslist! It is the best, and people in Pittsburgh actually use it. One really cool thing is that people give away awesome free stuff! They'll post "Curb Alert" and give an address and list the free junk that is sitting on the curb to be thrown away (the garbage men will haul anything off, full couches, tables, chairs, you name it, they'll take it). So far I have found a cute dresser for Sarah's room. It needed a new coat of paint but it is all ready to go in her room now.

We also found a KITTY!!! My sister/landlord suggested that we get one to keep the mice and RATS out of the basement. Mice I can handle, but not rats. Plus, I LOVE kitties. It has been so long since I have had a little kitty. I was checking craigslist everyonce and a while and then I found someone who was getting rid of this kitty. She is 12 weeks (so still really small) and has be spayed, vaccinated and has a microchip. This family adopted her from PetSearch and later discovered that their little 4 year old is allergic. So sad! But I am grateful. They gave her to us for free, which was a blessing because all of that vet stuff is expensive. We don't have a name yet, so if you have any suggestions let me know. Sarah adores her and won't leave her alone. Poor kitty. I have to close it in the bathroom, or lock the childgate at the top of the stairs so she can get a break. She is sweet though, very cuddly.

Here are some other fun pictures, enjoy!

Sarah eating peanut butter. It was runny and got EVERYWHERE!

Sarah loves this hat, G'ma Newey found because Sarah love Monster's Inc. Unfortunately we don't have a copy ourselves, but she still loves to where the hat.

I think I am going to do a new post of just Abby Pictures. :)

New to the blogging world

Okay, so I am a little frustrated. My last blog that I posted the formating got all messed up. I guess I just don't really know how to work the whole blogging thing. So if any of you have an suggestions and tips for blogging on blogger I am open to them.

Thanks everyone.

The Pittsburgh Adventure!

WARNING: This maybe one of the longest blogs ever, but it is the first and had a lot of catching up to do, I promise to keep them shorter in the future. :)

Well it feels like a whirlwind has come and changed our lives completely. There were a few things that happened before we left for the grand ole' Pittsburgh, thus the reason for the long blog, I will catch everyone up.

Before we left we blessed lil' Abby on August 2nd. It was a great last full day in Utah before we headed out. Thanks to everyone who came and supported the birth of our new baby girl.

Sarah had a fun time playing with her cousins one last time and saying goodbye to

friends and family. Here are a cute photos from the event.

If you'll notice in this picture practically every girl is dressed in black. It was like we were dying or something and they were attending our funeral! NOT SO!

We are still alive here in Pittsburgh!!!! Don't forget us!

Cousin Hallie & Aunt Em Cousin Eleanor & Sarah Uncle Pat, Aunt Deb & June

Ryan, Girls & Grandpa Keith Uncle Erich & Girlfriend Jen Sarah & Cousin Wimmie

I was really bad about taking pictures at this event. These are some of the only ones that I got. Sorry I missed so many of you! It was a great shin-dig though. :)

The next day was what felt like the longest day ever! Ryan and I stayed up until 3 or 4 the night before and then got up at six that morning (crazy, I know!). Ryan headed off to meet the moving truck at our storage unit while I stayed home to finish the laundry, cleaning and packing of the minivan (which by the way is still nameless, any suggestions?) At around

3 o'clock we were all packed up and said our goodbyes and was on the road by four.

Yes one of the tightest packed vans in the history of man! And after a final sweep of the house we found half of our bed frame was still in the basement and had to squeeze it in! How we did it I don't know. I think we had the help of Mary Poppin's magic on this feat!

We then set off on our incredibly long, what seemed never ending journey across country. Our first stop was in Erie, CO with Ryan's Uncle Jared and his wife Natalie. They actually have two kids that are the same ages as ours. Very fun. Here are some pictures of the cuties!

Sarah and Brayden Climbing the stairs, naughty! Reagan and Abigail

The next day we traveled about twelve hours to Des Moines, Iowa to stay with my good friend Lisa Nance and her family. I felt bad we didn't get in until close to midnight. We were thinking we'd make if for dinner, but the estimate that google maps gave us was about two hours off and we visited a little bit before we left Colorado. Oh well, we were too tired to think and so I didn't get any cute pictures while I was there. Lisa and Zach have two adorable girls, Ashlyn and Oakley (who sadly left for day camp before we got up) and Beckham who is just about Sarah's age and they had so much fun chasing each other around that morning.

It was another very long day on the road because we decided to make the last fifteen hour stretch all at once. So we took lots of pit-stops along the way. Here are some pictures of Sarah.

Sarah face planted it in the dirt and had an awesome dirt goatee! We thought it was pretty funny. The other picture is right before we entered Pennsylvania. Since we decided to just drive the rest of the way we ended up driving through the night while the girls slept. This picture was taken at about four in the morning and the sun was coming up through the hills. It was beautiful! It was also a misty, foggy morning and so it made it feel extremely surreal that we were finally in PA!

We finally made it to our house early on Thursday morning, August 6th!

1007 Flemmington Street, Pittsbrugh, PA!

Take that down, you are all invited to come and visit.

We'd love to show everyone this beautiful city.

We absolutely love our new home. For those of you who don't know this is actually my sister's house and we are renting it from her. My sister and her husband lived in Pittsburgh for seven years while her husband did the MD, PhD program at Pitt, so it is really ironic that Ryan and I are going to the same school for Ryan to get his MD.

Our house is located in the township of Greenfield. A cozy neighborhood of Pittsburgh. We live just down the road from the rec center and are looking forward to taking full advantage of the swimming pool next summer (there is not a chance that anyone is getting me in a swimsuit right after having a baby, HA!)

Our furniture didn't arrive until Monday the 1oth so we were with out furniture the entire weekend. We were exhausted to say the least. these are a couple of pictures of our sleeping arrangements.

On August 9th was the big White Coat Ceremony! Ryan was really excited and nervous to be there. The girls barely made it through the ceremony alive but it was great to be there and watch Ryan get his infamous white coat and take the hippocratic oath. We are so proud of him!

I just want to share a couple of fun stories from our first week here and some pictures and then this forever long post will be complete.

After our stuff arrived and we were beginning to get settled in I was trying to put Sarah down for a nap. I was holding Abby in my room and Sarah was of course supposed to be laying down in her room. She kept trying to sneak past me and down the stairs and I kept having to ask her to go and lay backdown. The next thing I know I see an upside down garbage can with Sarah's legs poking out the bottom. (Don't worry, it was a clean, empty can that we had just bought). She tip-toed past me and crept down the stairs. She had been so cleaver that I let her think that she had gotten away with it.

In another attempt to get Sarah to take a nap I decided to close the child gate at the top of the stairs. I was trying to get things done downstairs and realized I needed the tool box that we left in one of the rooms up stairs. I started up the stairs to find Sarah standing by the child gate with a small screwdriver in hand trying to take apart the gate so she could come downstairs. What a smart little cookie we have!

We have been trying to get Sarah off of her "plug" and the floors were pretty dirty so I didn't want her carrying her white blankie around getting it all dirty so we kept asking her to leave her blankie and her plug up on her "bed." This is how I found her bed one morning.

She tucked in her "Ali Gator" and everything. Very cute!

Okay, here is the fun part. Just some pictures for everyone to look at. I hope you enjoy!