Happy 24th of July?!

Did you know that the 24th of July is a major holiday? Here in Utah it's as big of a deal as the 4th. It is a celebration of when the Mormon pioneers first came to the Utah valley. There are lots of festivities during the weekend and lots of businesses take the holiday off. We decided to join in the fun and we headed to Liberty Park for the Days of '47 parade. Unlike many of the other locals who slept in tents at the park overnight, we showed up about 5 minutes before the parade passed by the park. It was hot and pretty exciting. People were really into it and cheering and clapping for the bands, floats and VIP's. We saw senators, congressmen, the president of the LDS church and even royalty from Tonga. Addy loved the horses and the music and she was clapping right along with everyone else. It was interesting to learn a bit more about the mormon culture and the things they value. Here's a slideshow of the day.

First Visitors

Addy was very excited to wake up from her nap 1 1/2 weeks ago to find Grandma & Grandpa Bursch in her room. She had so much to show them, tell them, and do with them. Mom and Dad stayed for a week and we were able to go on walks, hikes in the mountains, to swim lessons, church and out to eat a few times. It was great to share our new home with visitors. :) While it's still not 'decorated' it does feel more like home now. Here is a slideshow of their visit. (The random scenery shot in the middle is a moose! See if you can find the rack. Meghann would say our day was blessed, and it was. )

While Mom & Dad were here, Addy stood up by herself for the first time! It was the night before Mom & Dad left and she just all of a sudden pushed herself up on her toy basket and stood there looking around. We all saw it (except Brad!). By the next day, Addy had figured out how to stand up in her playpen but not yet how to get down. That was not a fun playpen time so we spent the rest of that afternoon practicing sitting back down. Now Addy is up and down all the time on whatever she can get her hands on. It's amazing how fast she changes.

Here is a fun video that shows a bit of Addy's personality. She's so much fun. Watch for her fabulous giggle in the second half (right before she's had enough!).

Big day for Addy!

Addy has had a big couple of days! Yesterday morning during breakfast she said 'hi' while waving her hand. Wow! This was not just accidental syllables together sounding like a word (like Mama was!). This was for real!

Then this morning she said 'hi dad' while eating breakfast! Brad and I just looked at each other in shock! She really did say it! Here is Addy saying 'hi' to her reflection in the storm door. I only caught the tail end of it.

During lunch outside today she decided she could use her 4 point stance to do a silly scoot toward her toys. I got some of it on video.

I think my life is about to change. . .

5 year anniversary!

Last Friday was our 5 year anniversary. Since it was a holiday weekend, we decided to celebrate on Monday when Brad would have the day off and we didn't have any plans. We decided to start a new tradition for ourselves to celebrate our anniversaries with. We decided to choose several new recipes (from Cook's Illustrated, of course!) to create a fancy dinner and dessert. We love to cook together and we really love to eat so we figured we could do this for our anniversaries for years to come.

Brad started early, though and made us a fancy breakfast to start off the day! He made Cook's Illustrated French Toast and Denver Omelets! Whoa! It was so good and I didn't have to do a thing but eat! :)

When Addy took her morning nap, we got started on the cooking. If you've never done a Cook's Illustrated recipe, they are complicated and they take forever but they taste amazing! I never make them by myself because I can't follow such long and involved directions! I lose focus and get overwhelmed. Brad, on the other hand, does great and he loves the chaos!

We decided to go with Thai food because I love it and we hate spending so much money eating out whenever I get a Thai craving. :) We made pot stickers, Thai Chicken Soup and Thai Green Curry. We also made chocolate mousse for dessert and that was actually pretty easy but it was as good as any restaurant mousse! Wow! Mostly I just was the sou chef and helped to organize the ingredients (while trying to clean up after the master chef as he went!). It took all day! We took a break in the middle of the day when Addy woke up but we cooked until 7pm when we finally got to eat!

Here's a slide show of the process!

Happy 3rd of July!

Here in Utah, if a holiday falls on a Sunday, it gets rescheduled. This was the case with the 4th of July this year. And let me tell you, the 4th of July is a big deal here but we all celebrated on the 3rd!

We woke up early (as Addy has been waking up early lately!) and got decked out in our patriotic gear. At 8am we headed down the street to the local Ward (Mormon church) for a neighborhood pancake breakfast for all of Highland Park (about a 20 blocks). We had breakfast with our next door neighbors and their 4 kids and we enjoyed getting to know them a little better.

After breakfast we plopped down on the grass along one of the streets and prepared for the neighborhood parade. Starting with a gun fire, kids on bikes and in strollers, horses and riders, a man with a handcart, a fire truck, an old John Dear tractor, funny cars & lots of dogs strolled down the street throwing candy and waving at everyone. It was so cute and it seemed straight out of the 50's! (Have you seen the Sandlot?) After the parade we headed down to Alden St. (it goes Alden, Beverly, Chadwick, Dearborn. . . A, B, C, D. . .) for the carnival. We got to pet the horses, go on the fire truck and partake in cotton candy, ring toss, bubble blowing contests, snow cones and everything else you could think of for FREE! It was really fun and Addy loved it!

We took a little siesta through the middle of the day in preparation for the big night ahead. Around dinner time we headed down to a neighbor's house (who happen to be the parents-in-law of the pastor of the church we have been attending) for a 4th (3rd!) of July celebration. We ate fabulous food, got to know some couples from our church and Addy got to see lots of little kids running around.

After all the food, we put Addy to bed in their house and headed for their front lawn to watch the fireworks display being set off at the park nearby. The fireworks were fabulous and it was so neat to live so close to the greatest display in Salt Lake! We got to meet more of our neighbors as they ventured out to see the display. It was quite a celebration even if it was a day early!