She's Ready To Pop

I love throwing showers and planning parties for friends and family members! This weekend I was able to throw a baby shower for my friend Kayla, with the help of my sister-in-law Natalie! It was a lot of fun and turned out really cute! I got the idea from my sister's baby shower that was thrown by one of her friends. I love how it turned out! A lot of people showed up and showered Kayla with tons of fun things for her baby girl! The theme of the shower was "She's Ready To Pop".




The shower was complete with Pop art...


The treats included Cake Pops...

Poppyseed muffins...

White Chocolate Popcorn, Butter Popcorn and Caramel Popcorn...


And Soda Pop...


We also played some fun games like guessing the size of Kayla's belly...


And of course, Kayla got a lot of fun gifts...

It was a great time!

6 months!

Today is our sweet baby McKinley's half birthday! I can't believe how big she's getting! She's sitting up all by herself now for 5 to 10 minutes at a time! She rolls over like crazy! We'll lay her in her crib and never know how we'll find her in the morning! A lot of mornings we'll take her out of her sleep sack and discover somehow she has kicked out of her jammies and unbuttoned them all the way up to her belly! No idea how, but she is a strong girl and when she wants to do something, she usually finds a way to do it! She's sleeping really well! She now falls asleep on her own at night, wakes up once usually around 4am and I feed her, then goes back to sleep until 7am! It's SO nice to get a full nights rest again! I've forgotten what it feels like, and I'm almost able to sleep through the night myself again :) She's also falling asleep on her own for naps, which is a relief for me and gives me more down time! It's so nice to have a little more "me" time with McKinley sleeping so well! We go to her 6 month check up in a week, so after that I'll post about her 6 month stats then! We love our little girl more than we ever thought we could!!

New Years Resolutions

I know it's already 19 days into the New Year, but I'd still like to make some resolutions for myself in 2011! I already know its going to be a big year with lots of change for our family! I'm looking forward to it and I'm excited about what's in store for us!

The first thing I'd like to accomplish in 2011 is getting back to running regularly! Since I've had McKinley, I've yet to get back into a regular work out routine! Travis, McKinley and I went for a long walk today, and it felt so good! I thought, this is what I need to be doing every day! My sister, Mandy, told me about a Couch to 5k program that she did after she had her baby girl. She's awesome and followed through with it and ran in her first 5k! I'd love to be able to run in another 5k! That's one of my resolutions for this year!

The next thing I'd like to do in 2011 is try and be more friendly and outgoing! With a move planned for us this year, either for a job or grad school... which ever works out for us, I'd like to make a resolution to meet people who live in the area where we move to. I have a tendency to keep to myself, especially when I don't know anyone, but I'd like to resolve to put myself out there and try and meet people and make friends. Having McKinley makes this a little easier, because it automatically gives me something in common with people who also have little kids and something to strike up a conversation about. This is just another reason I've enjoyed having McKinley around!

Another resolution I have for myself in 2011, is to spend more time reading than I do watching TV or on the computer. I recently started reading The Hunger Games series and I've sped through the first two books in the series and am currently reading the third and final book. It's made me realize how much I enjoy reading! There's so many more books I'd love to read. Travis has also gotten into reading with me, so it's been nice to have a reading buddy. We've been frequenting the local libraries and look forward to many more visits!

My final resolution, that I can think of for now, is to be a better at praying and reading my scriptures daily! Some days I just fall short, and I need the extra spiritual lift everyday, not just some days! I can always feel the difference between the days I do and the days I don't!

I know I can do it and stick with all of these resolutions, as I've done and stuck with them all, before, just gotten out of the habit at one point or another. I feel that putting them in here will hopefully help me to feel more accountable and determined :) Any encouragement and advice is appreciated!

Lastly, I'd like to leave you with a cute picture of my little girl, since she makes me smile!

Happy Girl!

McKinley has been such a happy girl these days! She smiles these big opened mouth smiles that are just so cute! She is getting to be so much fun and responsive. This is my favorite age so far! What a fun, cute, happy little girl we have :)



She is also starting to laugh! She loves to laugh with her Daddy! She loves it when he blows on her belly or her legs. It's one of the cutest sounds in the world :)

Cereal... yummy! yummy!

At McKinley's 4 month appointment, her pediatrician recommended we started feeding her rice cereal once a day. She wasn't too sure what to think about it, but we got some cute pictures of her eating "real food" for the first time :)

The first bite

What is this stuff?

I'm not so sure about this!

You're really giving me more?!?!

She's gotten better about it since then and is starting to like it a little more. She's still not too sure about it though!

Merry Christmas & A Happy New Year

We had a wonderful Christmas and New Years this year! We were able to see almost all of both of our families! What a great way to spend the holidays! We spent Christmas Eve eating our traditional finger foods, reenacting the Christmas story from Luke 2, and doing a few Christmas trivia games!

Travis and I were Mary and Joseph, Melia was baby Jesus,
and Oliver and Gabriella were shepherds

The shepherds coming to see Baby Jesus

We carried on another tradition of wearing matching Christmas jammies. The sisters all wore matching ones, and the cousins did too!

Emily had matching pants too, but hadn't gotten back from her honeymoon yet!

What cute cousins!

Me and baby girl in our Christmas jammies

Daddy with his little girl!

Having fun on Christmas Eve!

Ready for Santa to come!

We had Christmas morning with my whole family there! Emily and Bossy got in at 2am from their honeymoon in Jamaica! We were so glad we got to spend Christmas morning with everyone!

McKinley excited about her first Christmas :)

Opening presents for McKinley

A new basketball for Travis

Some new boots for McKinley

Happy that Santa brought her some new toys in her stocking!

All the sisters together on Christmas! Here we are in our matching Christmas Bucees shirts

All the girls and our families, minus Melia who was napping at the time

We had a wonderful Christmas! We got a fun new Flip camera from my parents which we've used to take a bunch of cute videos of McKinley! Expect to see those on here soon :) We then got to spend a few more days in Texas with everyone! Which was of course a lot of fun! Travis got to go golfing with my dad and Bossy! Something most people don't usually do in December! I had fun with the girls doing our hair and getting pedicure and of course shopping!

We then headed up to St. Louis to meet up with Travis's family. All of his family was there minus one of his brother. It was so fun to see everyone and hang out in another full house! We got to go see Tron while we were there, McKinley's first movie. She did really well during it! She slept for the first hour, then ate and watched the movie the second! She did so good, so we were actually able to enjoy the movie :) We of course watched a lot of movies in St. Louis, played some games, went shopping some more and played traditional Bingo. We always play Bingo on New Year's Eve, a Hulse tradition. So it was fun to be there for that! We had a wonderful time with our families. It's so fun to show McKinley off to everyone and to have lots of people who want to hold her! It was nice to get a little break :)

The Graduate!

I'm so proud of my cute husband! December 17th was the last day of his undergraduate education! He graduated from the University of Utah College of Architecture + Planning with a Bachelor of Science in Urban Planning. I'm so proud of him and all the hard work he put into his education. He excelled and made the Dean's List many semesters! Now he's applying for jobs and graduate school, so we'll see what the future holds for us! I know he'll do great things and he'll be a wonderful Urban Planner. He has so many great ideas and plans! I'm so excited to see what the future holds for him!