You Think Halloween is Scary? Read This!!

So we live in sleepy, safe ole Cedar City. We have had a few interesting little encounters at our apartment due to the fact that we live near a bar. But we have never had anything really bad or scary happen to us. Until last night. It was so scary. I had gone to bed about 9 because I had to get up early, but Erik stayed up and I told him not to stay up late. At 1am I had to go potty and I woke up and Erik was still awake. I got up and got grouchy with him about staying up so late and made him come to bed. He got ready for bed, I got a drink and we turned off the living room lights (including bright Halloween decoration lights we had up in the windows) that were still on. We walked into the bedroom and I got into my side of our bed. Before Erik could even walk around the bed to his side, all of a sudden we heard a banging at our windows! We looked out and there was a silhouette of a person outside our bedroom windows, and he was trying to open them! It was so scary.
Erik ran out and pushed the panic button on the alarm and then called 911 and got his gun. I ran to Noelle's room and turned on her lights to make sure no one else was in there and grabbed her and ran to the living room. I guess all the lights and commotion scared the man away. But we are blessed and live very close to the police station (I will never complain about hearing sirens late at night again) and they were there in no time. They caught the man as he was trying to get away. Our apartment is the only one in a long row of old buildings that are all connected together and are full of offices and business. We suppose the man was just trying to find an easy window into an office and try to get what he could get. When he saw that people lived there it must have surprised him (even though if he had had any sense he would have looked around and seen our lights on only seconds before he tried to get in). The police were there for about two hours and we finally fell asleep at 4am.
We thought that was the end of it. Not so! We found out this morning that there was likely an accomplice who was apparently not apprehended, and that one of them had a gun! It was found thrown on the ground in a doorway of a business a few doors down as the employees showed up for work this morning. The night was scary, but finding this out has given me chills all day. I am so grateful that 1) the man did not try to get in Noelle's bedroom windows, which are right by ours, 2) the man was not able to get in at all, 3) that he just ran away instead of doing something awful, and 4) that we had such a quick police response. It was very scary, but we are all just fine. And now more anxious to graduate and move out of sleepy old Cedar City.
p.s. As we were waiting for the police to come up and talk to us Erik says "I bet you're glad I stayed up late tonight, huh?" Yes, I was very, very glad :)

Random Fun

She loves her daddy. Really.

Have I mentioned my child is gorgeous? Yes, I'm bragging.

Noelley's hair is just so pretty!

Stylin' ladies,

Gangsta lady,

Loving-all-her-bows lady.

You Won't Wanna Miss This!

Us girls being silly at dinner time! You can hear my friend Anee and me laughing at her, she cracks us up! Be sure to listen for Noelle's little fart right after I ask her to blow a kiss ;)



Finally video of her walking!!! She is doing so well, I'm sure that she will have the confidence to do it by herself in no time! How we love this sweet little girl. She brings the sun to our lives :)

The Thundering Waters!

More popularly known as Niagara Falls!!! The falls are only a half hour away from our house, so of course we had to visit! We had such a fun time! We only stayed on the American side, but there is a state park there and a lot of things to do. We went to the aquarium, Noelle loved seeing all the fishies in the tanks. We rode the Maid of the Mist boat all the way up to the base of the Horseshoe Falls. Noelle loved being on the boat and I was grateful for those lovely blue ponchos. Then we watched a movie about the history of the falls, and walked on a boardwalk called the Cave of the Winds up to the base of the American Falls. Again, I was thankful for ponchos (yellow this time) and the nice foam sandals they give you so your shoes don't get soaked (which they did on the boat). It was such a wonderful and nice day, everyone was happy and enjoying themselves. We had a great time!
The Cave of the Winds boardwalk. And lovely yellow ponchos :)

Wow we are so pretty :{

Canada on the right, American falls on the left!

On the Maid of the Mist boat.

That's the American falls in the background

The captain of the boat took this lovely family picture for us :)

The funniest thing happened at the aquarium! I had walked by this tank before Noelle and Erik and had seen all the big fish swimming all around in it. When I came back, Noelle was standing at the glass looking at the fish, and they were all on the other side of the glass looking at her! You can only see three of them in this pic, but there were about 7 of these monster fishes all piled on the other side of the glass staring at her. It cracked me up!

Riding the trolley.

Independence Day!!!

What a fun weekend we had for the 4th of July!!

On Sunday after church we had a company BBQ with all of the APX people we are working with this summer. Since we all live in a couple different places it was fun to have everyone together to talk and play and have fun. The BBQ was at a beach, but sadly the beach and water were so gross and smelly that we could not go swimming!!! And it was sooooo hot and sticky, but we managed and had a good time. (I don't have nay pics of the bbq :( but might tomorrow)

After it cooled off a bit we picked one of the many free fireworks shows offered around the area, and I'm pretty sure we picked the best one! It was the best and most fun show I have been to in a long time, they did great! We went with our friends Zach and Anee, and Tristan and Sasha. Noelley did a great job staying up late and she loved the big pretty fireworks. It is so much fun to have her to celebrate holidays with!
Laughing at daddy :)

Eating Michealangelo. He was delicious!

Just waiting for it to get dark...

Walking down the big fun hill. Noelle is getting very good at walking but still doesn't quite have the courage to do it by herself :(

The fireworks show was at the University of Buffalo campus and as we were walking back to the car we saw this big bronze statue of a buffalo. We just couldn't resist going for a ride :D

On Monday morning our ward had a breakfast that wasn't quite early enough to beat the heat (that week ended up being the hottest Buffalo has seen for a while) but was still fun. There was a flag ceremony and free food, and you know we can't turn down free food!

Winner Winner Chicken Dinner!!

Yes my friends, we have a winner for the First Word contest!!
Noelle's first real word was: (drumroll please).........
EAR!!!!!!
Yes, that's right, she can say ear :) It's so cute she has to work so hard to get the "r" on the end but she does it and she knows exactly what an ear is.

A couple people guessed ear, but the first one was my friend Katy Wilbur!! She will receive a very special prize from me! Thanks everyone for voting, this was fun :D

First Word

So Noelle has said her first REAL word that is not baby talk and actually relates only to the object that the word is and is not randomly babbled out for fun. It is an actual word with an actual meaning and it means the same thing to her as it does to the rest of the English-speaking world!!! Any guesses what the word is?????
Whoever guesses the right word will receive a wonderful prize specially from/made by me :)

Hint: It starts with "E"