Birthdays and Arizona!

     April is one of my favorite months because not only is it my birthday, but it's John's too!!  For my birthday John and I are going to go see the musical Wicked... in July.  So since I don't get my big present till then my requests for my birthday were Waffles and a Love Letter from John.  What can I say I'm a romantic ;)  We also went to dinner at Wingers while John's sister watched Deja.  OH and I almost forgot. John surprised me with some of my favorite treats like Cadbury Eggs, Doritoes, Ice cream, etc. that he hid around the kitchen before he left for school!  It was like a junk-food scavenger hunt of sorts and it was beautiful haha.  It was also fun to have some special treats for conference weekend!
     A couple weeks ago John realized that he got a short spring break from school and it just so happened to be the same weekend as his birthday.  So we got to thinking, why not really take advantage of this time off to do something fun.  We joked about going on a cruise, but then we decided that it might be fun to go down to Arizona to visit my sister Meri and her family!!  So with less than a week of planning we made it happen :)

     So we drove, that's right Drove nearly 12 hours to Mesa and 12 hours back.  We took our time and spent the night in Vegas for both the way there and the way back.  Deja did pretty well in the car considering her age and the circumstances.  The worst day was definitely the first one because I was feeling awful with some sort of stomach bug, but that was the worst of it and luckily John and Deja didn't catch whatever it was I had.  

     While we were in AZ some of the highlights included playing games, going to the park, watching movies, watching golf, eating Meri's delicious home cooked meals, shopping, and just hanging out.  We didn't really have anything specific we wanted to do while we were down there except hang out with the fam and see Meri and Shane's beautiful brand new home, so it was a successful trip ;)  

     Deja had so much fun playing with her cousin, Molly.  Molly was a great helper and always made sure there were plenty of toys on hand to play with.  One night I caught Molly scratching Deja's back with the back scratcher.  It was super cute and funny.  

     For John's birthday the main event was definitely bowling!!!  It was so fun and I wish I would have taken a picture :(  We all bowled 2 games together, and then John bowled another 3 by himself because we were paying by the hour.  His top score was 199!!  That a boy John :)  For dinner Shane grilled up some delicious ribs and Meri made special birthday cookies!!  We were so spoiled by our hosts.

   
     John's main birthday present was the 8 season collection of the TV show Monk.  I also got him some of his favorite treats for the car ride down and surprised him with a new razor and his favorite girl scout cookies while we were there!  Sounds pretty boring now that I'm writing this out, but hopefully he enjoyed them, haha.

This is my favorite sweater on her right now, but the camera never does it justice!

Updates on Deja include:

• She loves squishing people's skin with her little, tiny fingers.  Aka pinching.  I try to stop her from doing it, but she obviously doesn't realize it hurts us.
• She has pretty much mastered sitting up and can usually stop herself from falling over with her hands.  
• For a while her favorite thing to do was shake her head back and forth like she was saying "no."  My visiting teacher was convinced Deja was communicating, but I knew it was just a phase.
• She hasn't started crawling yet, but can pretty much roll to where she wants to go.
• She can transfer a toy from one hand to another with ease :)

We start 'em young around here

We love her to pieces!