5 Things

So my friend, Rebecca tagged me with this. 

Five things I have in my purse

1. Part of a broken key chain

2. 96 cents in change

3. Small bottle of lotion

4. Chapstick-would die without it.

5. Stub from my voting ballot in the November general election

In my Work room (I don't really have one, so the 2nd bdrm)

1. Food storage shelf

2. Dan's work table for Warhammer

3. Safe (nothing valuable, just documents)

4. Art canvas

5. Lamp from our family room (there's no overhead light)

I've always wanted to do

1. Visit London

2. Learn how to sew

3. As of yesterday, visit San Francisco

4. Perform in a musical

5. Go somewhere tropical

I am into right now

1. Raising my baby girl

2. Scrapbooking

3. LOST-I'm so addicted. I'm catching up on the previous seasons.

4. Organizing my house aka sorting through Dan's junk. :)

5. Working out-staying in shape and getting my arms buffer so I can handle carrying around my 16 lb (and growing) daughter

I want to tag

1. Sarah

2. Kathleen

3. Melanee

4. Carina

5. Emily

Poopy Sunday

So I decide to dress Anna in a really cute little Sunday dress. It was one she hadn't worn yet. We get to church and right after the sacrament, we hear her poop-a lot. I always keep diapers in the diaper bag. I was about to take her out to changer her when I had the thought to double check that I actually had diapers. Well, it turns out I didn't have any. I frantically tell Dan this. He's about to go home and get some, when we think of a family that has a girl 2 months older than Anna. I see that they're sitting on the opposite end of the chapel from us. So during someone's talk, I get up, go to the family, briefly sit down next to them and ask them if they have a diaper. Luckily, the mom did and I went back to our place, grabbed Anna and went and changed her. Now, something you need to know about Anna's poopy diapers. They can be REALLY big, and sometimes ooze out of her diaper because they're so big.

I'm changing her diaper and thinking everything is fine, until I notice the poop has gone all the way up her back and a huge amount is on her dress. Luckily, I keep a onesie in the diaper bag for just such occasions, but that was all I had. So I took off her cute little dress, tights, and shoes and put a onesie on her. It's unfortunate because I had a pair of pants in there, that I just took out the other day. But maybe it's all good, becuase the pants were red, and her onesie was pink and that would have just looked funny. :) I ended up just wrapping her blanket around her.

So, lessons to be learned. ALWAYS make sure you have enough diapers in the diaper bag before you go anywhere. Plus, make sure there are enough clothes in there. I'm just glad it turned out fine, it could have been a lot worse.

Anna's First Christmas!

For the last two and a half weeks, Dan and I were in Utah, visiting our families. We had a lot of fun, showing off Anna to our families and friends. She had a blast because there were always people around. She is really a social baby and loves lots of people so she can smile at them and be entertained by them as well. It's so cute.

Anna got spoiled on Christmas by her grandparents (Dan's parents). Grandma bought her a lot of toys. His dad was working on something the whole time before Christmas and wouldn't let us in his shop. So Christmas day he brings out a little rocking horse that he made for her. It is so cute!

The finished product!

I love these pictures because she looks so happy. We also visited my family at my brother Chad's house. They had a baby, Cooper, in March, (or as his older sister says, Coofer), Anna was born in July, and my sister Kathleen had a baby, Kaia, in November. So here they are, all three cousins born in the same year. This is the best shot we could get of three babies at once. :)

Anna's great grandma (my grandma) sent her the cutest little outfit. I love it. Cousin Kaia has the same outfit. I think this picture is one my new favorites.

Her smile is to die for!!!

Also while in Utah, it snowed about every other day, so we took advantage of that and took Anna out for a little tromp in the snow. She loved it! We wanted to have her lie in the snow and make a snow angel, but she would have gotten all wet and probably wouldn't have had much fun. Next year, I guess.

So overall our trip was a lot of fun. We got to spend time with family, plus friends that we never get to see. We also got to eat at our favorite restaurants-PF Changs, Nicolitalia's, Cafe Rio. Place that we never get to eat at, unless we're in Utah. We were glad to be home though, only because it's hard to be away from your own house when you have a little baby. Poor Dan's family. Every time Anna was asleep everyone had to whisper and be super quiet. They weren't used to it, but tried really hard.

Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow!

So we have been dumped with a ton of snow! I woke up this morning to Dan telling me it was snowing. It has not stopped ALL day. Dan just went outside and

 measured the snow on a table and it was 5.5 inches!!! This is very odd, considering we live i

n a desert in Southern California. Below is a picture of Lancaster, where we live. That is a Joshua tree out in the desert covered in snow.

Here are some pictures of our backyard and front yard. In the backyard, a huge branch fell off our tree, due to the weight of the snow. The snow today was really wet, so I guess it weighed more. Pretty crazy, huh. Luckily it didn't fall on our house

I wish Anna was older, so we could go out and play in the snow. I have a feeling we won't get snow like this for a long long time. 

A Thankful Heart

So today during church, there was a musical number that made me reflect on all of my blessings. It was actually a song that I had performed in a choir at BYU. It's a Thanksgiving type song, and the music is really pretty. As I was listening to it, I felt touched by the Spirit and by Heavenly Father's generousity in my life.

I have been blessed with so much. There is nothing that I lack. Heavenly Father has always made sure that I have a roof over my head, food to eat, clothes to wear, and money/job to sustain myself. These things are all I need to survive and yet He blesses me with more than I need. Everything else that I have in my life, is really just little extras. A home, computer, TV, car, cell phone, furniture, extra clothes, life in the United States, money to spend on fun stuff, and other nice things that I have to enjoy. I could go on and on with the things I don't really "need." Heavenly Father has given me so much. Not to mention my wonderful husband and beautiful daughter. I feel so truly grateful for all my blessings. I only hope to be able to stay worthy of the blessings that He still has in store for me.

Isn't she so precious? I'm so thankful for her.

Now a little bit about our Thanksgiving. We stayed home this year and had our own first Thankgiving. We invited another family over and they have two cute little girls. We cooked the turkey, made stuffing and rolls. I have never cooked a turkey in my life, but it actually wasn't that hard. I didn't really enjoy sticking my hand in it to pull out the neck. I looked for the gizzard parts, but they weren't there. I thought that was really weird. However, after the turkey was done, Dan was cutting it, and found them all in a nice little package at the bottom of the turkey. I guess somehow they were put there, and not in the cavity of the turkey with the neck. Good thing they were wrapped up. :) Anyways, it turned out well. As did the stuffing, and the rolls were awesome. We tried a new recipe in this bread book that we really like. They turned out so good! Dan made them. Way to go Dan. It was a lot of work and cooking, but it was good. I have actually never made stuffing or gravy, but it wasn't hard at all.

The only down side to that day was I didn't get any pumpkin pie. The family we ate with bought some pies. We went over to their house that evening to eat pie, and for some reason the pumpkin pie wouldn't cook. When she took it out, it was still soupy. So she put it back in the oven, but it still wouldn't cook. By that point, it was late and Anna was fussy, so we went home without any pumpkin pie. I had some apple, but it made me sad that I didn't get any of the pumpkin pie.

New Anna pics and Bookshelf

I was able to get some really good shots of Anna the other day. I put her on her stomach for some tummy time and she started smiling. It was adorable. I think these are by far the cutest pictures of her that we've been able to get. 

Gotta love that smile

So cute!

Playing on Daddy's tummy!

So a few months ago, Dan bought some bookshelves at a garage sale for $2 a piece. One was painted white, the other one was just wood and not painted. I've been working on sanding the painted one. It's been taking forever though because I can only do it when Anna is sleeping and some days I just don't get around to it. Well, I finally got the wood one sanded, primed, painted black and put up in our living room. It makes me so happy because for the last month and a half, we've had a huge stack of boxes of books, as well as loose books in the corner of our family room. There are still some books, waiting for the second shelf, but it's a lot better than what it originally was. 

Before I started sanding. 

Newly painted bookcase in the family room.

We're going to paint the other one black as well. Not too shabby for only $2. And they're solid wood, not particle board. 

Anna's first Halloween

Anna had her first Halloween on Friday. We dressed her up as a pea in a pod. I thought she looked so adorable!!! Her little chubby cheeks were all squished in her costume. 

A kissy sandwhich!!!

The Phelan's first Halloween with Anna

She didn't like her costume too much though. I think it was because the sleeves were kind of long and her legs were kind of stuck together because there weren't actual legs in it. We didn't do a whole lot for Halloween. We couldn't take her trick-or-treating. We had a grand total of 3 people ring our doorbell for candy. It was okay, because I only bought one bag of candy and really wasn't expecting a lot of visitors. Then we had our friends Katie and Luken come over with their two cute little girls. I'm excited for next year because she'll be able to walk and Halloween will be a little more fun.