5th Annual Beaird Halloween

It was once again time to have the annual Beaird Halloween party. This year was the 5th year that we have been throwing this party. It has been so fun over the years to think of costumes and party game. We love having are friends and family over and see their creativity too. This year we decided to be a family of zombies. It was really fun dressing up and putting the make up on Sophie. Here are some shots from tonight's party.

Zombie Family

The cutest Zombie baby ever!


Kade and Ciara Gone Fishing

Ryan and Tara - Butch Cassidy and Dark Ninja

Dan and Juli - Dancing with the Stars

Brian, Tiffany and Taylor - Little Halloween Family


Basketball Challenge

Little Listening Ear

This weekend my mom came to visit. We didn't really do much, just hung out and shopped. I think that those are the best visits. I love having nothing that has to be done. On Saturday mom and I were talking and I said, "let me get the brush to do Sophie's hair before we leave." Well, when I said that Sophie was standing right next to me and must have heard what I said. When I came back with supplies in hand, she also came walking back with her own hair brush and brushing her hair. She went into her things and got her brush and came back! I could believe it. It is not like I directed it to Sophie or even repeated myself. I am so blown away every time she does something so unexpected.

Here are some pictures from Gardener Village, a cute crafty shopping area here in Utah.


Playing Peck-a-Boo

Last Month Visit to Vegas

Last month we went to Vegas to see Mike's sister Aimee and there family. It was a really nice trip and we always love visiting with them. While we were there we got to go to Nyan and Weston's flag football games. They did a really great job and even though we spent most of the day there for them games, we wouldn 't have missed it for the world. It was a total blast. Here are a couple shots from the trip.

Grandma Beaird with Sophie and Kendelle

Sophie and Kendelle played catch

Sophie and Grandma Beaird

Sweet Kendelle

Sophie clapping during the game

15 Months

I realize that I won't be able to document something about Sophie every month for the rest of her life, but I figure when I can I will. Since I didn't get around to doing a 14 month post for her, I will add a few things from the previous months to this.
Sophie has been talking for a while now. She loves to jabber and it really sounds like she is saying real words. In fact, we were at Applebee's one night and the hostess asked us, "did she just talk? Like real words?" Even though Sophie has said hi, yea, mama, dada, baby, baba, and other such first words, we have come to the conclusion that Sophie's real first word is "doggy." She says it very clearly and when we see a doggy (other then Bjorn) she will point and say "doggy." I am not sure what she thinks about Bjorn. I think she knows he is a doggy because I was flipping through some pictures and when it was one of Bjorn she said doggy. I know that she loves him and wants to be near/chasing him every chance she gets.

Sophie started saying doggy around 14 months and now she is saying other words. She can say mommy, daddy, what's that?, thank you, okay, and some other various things. We have also been working on a couple sign language signs with her. She can sign please and all done/ finished.

On to the potty training. Potty training is going really well. As to be expected, we are by no means fully potty trained, but Sophie poops and pees on the potty everyday. It is rare that we change a poopy diaper, maybe once to twice a week. A couple weeks ago I said to Sophie, as I had done many times, let's go to the potty. Well this time, she got up and walked from the living room straight to the bathroom. Since then if you tell her it is time to go potty, she knows what you are talking about. I think we are still on track for being potty trained by 18 months, but we will see. If not, I don't mind because I know she gets it so it will come in time.

(Sophie and Tayen)
I don't know how to put all of these random comments together so I will just make a list.
Sophie makes a noise like her horsey
She loves to play in her kitchen drawer
Bath/Shower time is super fun for her
She has started to do a little bit of coloring
She loves to carry around her purses while wearing shoes
She has been putting on our shoes and walking in them
She likes to push in the kitchen chairs
She loves her Carebears and other stuff animals
She will get a book and climb up on my lap to read it
She likes to run around outside
She likes cookies and ice cream
She loves her daddy
When she sees her cousins, especially Mia, she gets every excited
She drinks from a sippy cup, but still takes a bottle
She likes to watch video of herself on the computer
She still takes two naps most days (thanks Sophie!)


(Sophie and Mia)
I am sure there are a million more things, but I think that will do for now. So that is Sophie at 15 months. And yes, Tayen, Mia and Sophie all have matching jammies. We just couldn't get them all in one shot.

How do they even know how to do that?

A few days ago I changed Sophie's diaper in the living room and out of laziness I tossed the diaper on to the coffee table to pick up later. When I tossed the diaper it rolled off the back of the coffee table and went between the wall and the table. Sophie and I then headed down stairs to play and hang out with daddy.
After being downstairs for 15 minutes or so, Sophie and I came back up. As soon as we got up the stairs, Sophie walked right over to where the diaper had landed, picked it up and walked down the hall to the laundry room and threw it away.
It just blows my mind. Not once have Mike or I shown her how to do that or even really talked about it. Since she typically goes on the potty, we hardly ever even use that garbage for diapers.
So today I handed her a diaper to see what she would do and sure enough she marches it straight to that garbage. Sophie, you are AWESOME!

Sophie now likes the rocking horse!

My parents saw this cute rocking horse at Costco that they felt Sophie needed. So when they came to visit last week my mom took Sophie it to go get one. Well Sophie was terrified of it. She didn't want anything to do with it. She wouldn't come within three feet of it. My mom almost didn't buy it because Sophie was so scared. But my mom decided that Sophie would probably get used to it and so they got it.
Well over the next week Sophie still did not want anything to do with it. I sat on the horse and we gave it loves and kisses. We even put stuff animals and Bjorn on it, but she was still freaked out. So we just tucked it in to the corner and hoped that she would come around.
Well today we had a breakthrough. She actually touched it and then she sat on it!!! Check out this video of her riding her horsey

Country Lane

We love living in the country especially because we are only five minute from real shopping. I also love that we live on Country Lane, it really adds to the whole country living thing. This is a picture from our house to the field at the end of the street and the one below is from the field looking back at our house. It almost looks like we have a yard, but really that is just our neighbors grass.
Maybe someday!


As you can see a bit in the first picture, the sun was red that day. It is hard to get a good shot of it, but here is one. It was much more red then what this picture reflects.

We went over to the field to get a better look at the red sun and to visit one of the horses that was near the fence.


Such a cute little family!

Olson Family Labor Day Visit

My parents and both of my brothers came to visit us over Labor Day weekend. It was really fun. My mom got here Wednesday night, my dad and Erik arrived Friday evening and Scott came later that night. We wanted to do something different because we had done most of the usual Salt Lake touristy things. We decided to make the 4 hour drive to Moab. We left Saturday morning and headed out on our road trip to Price. Price is a small town in Central Utah that has the Collage of Eastern Utah's Prehistoric Museum.


After visiting I would use the term "museum" loosely, but it was still pretty cool. There was a little kids play area that we all enjoyed. I mean that Sophie really liked.



After spending some time at the museum, we got lunch and then putted around town a bit before heading to and even smaller town Green River. We got to our hotel and all went swimming. Sophie had a good time and seemed to really like the water, especially the hot tub. After the swim we all cleaned up and when to dinner at one of the only two restaurants in the whole town.

The next morning we headed out early because we still had an hour drive to Arches National Park. We decided to head to the Delicate Arch hike first becasue it was going to be the most challenging of all the arches that we wanted to see. It might only be 1 1/2 miles but it is hot, a high elevation and did I mention hot? While you are hiking it seems like it might not be worth it, but once you reach the arch you know why you did it. We had such a great time at Arches and was so glad that we decided to go there.


The next day was Monday and Mike had to work (Labor Day was his holiday to work) so the rest of us head to Antelope Island. I had only been there once before when Scott visited a year or so ago, but not everything was open when we went before, so we got to see some new stuff this time. Here are some shots from the island. In case you are wondering where there are island in Utah, it is in the Great Salt Lake.




On the island there is a little ranch with the home where the ranch hands lived since the island was modernly inhabited. It was neat to see how they got by on the island with so little modern technologies. I mean what did they do with out the internet? The pictures below are my parents trying to rope "the bulls." I don't think that they would make very good cowboys.