I saved us over $50 a month on diapers.

Yep, I finally bit the bullet and potty trained Brinley. I had been making excuses forever why I couldn't do it. I was pregnant and tired, I had a new baby and couldn't deal with it, we were going to to Utah and I wanted to wait till we got back, blah blah blah...excuses.

Then 3 weeks ago, she woke up one morning with a dry pull up. I sat her on the potty and she went. That's when I knew it was time and I couldn't put it off any longer. Teya potty trained in less than a week (She poop trained herself before we even started so we really only had to teach her to do #1) So yeah, I was a little bummed when a week went by and Brinley was still having accidents. Guess I got a little spoiled with Teya. I kept at it though, my philosophy is, once you've put underwear on them there's no going back. So no matter how many accidents she had I never put her back in her pull ups. Even when we went out in public, we just brought extra pairs of pants and underwear.

She finally started catching on and by week two she had gone the whole week without any number 1 accidents, including at night, but she refused to do # 2 in the pot. She would hold it in for 2 days straight and then make a massive "deposit" in her underwear (sorry, TMI but it is a potty training post after all.) It was the most frustrating thing ever. Finally I turned to my Facebook friends for advice. (What would we do without Facebook?) And I got a lot of great suggestions such as have her go commando, offer her a bigger reward for #2, and watch for the poop face and when she starts making it, run her into the bathroom. I did all three and it worked!! She has finally started doing her 2's in the potty. She even told Taber when we were out somewhere and did it in a public restroom. HUGE breakthrough!

I still try and remind her go potty every 2 hours, and I still watch for the poop face because I don't trust her on that one quite yet, but she's doing great. 10 straight days with no #1 accidents and 5 for #2. Her potty chart is full of stickers, she earned her pony toy, and best of all, no more buying expensive pull-ups. I think I'll take that extra $50 a month we're saving and call it my potty training bonus. Pretty sure I earned it!

Teya's creation station

I don't know if it's a first child thing or what, but Teya has never been very good at entertaining herself. Brinley will go and play with toys and flip through books and just do her own thing but Teya always wants me to do that stuff with her. I try to play with my kids quite a bit but it gets to a point where you need to get other things done and sometimes I need them to play on their own. Other than the TV, I have struggled to find something that will hold Teya's attention without my help, but recently we've had a little break through.

I call it "Teya's creation station." It's really just our craft table that's been where it's always been, but for some reason Teya has finally figured out that she can do projects on her own without any help. She knows where all the stuff is and now she just goes and gets it and starts creating away. It's so cute to see her go in there after breakfast and start stamping, painting, coloring and molding.

These are some of her latest masterpieces. She spent a long time rolling out the playdough, cutting out each of the turtles, and then using her markers to decorate them. (There were probably 8 more but she put them in a special bag up in her room) She also made that snow man but it kept falling apart so she asked me if I would hot glue it together. I was happy to oblige. I know these probably look like scrappy little knick knacks but to me they are so sweet because they came from Teya's little hands and she saw the project through from beginning to end without my help.

It can be a little messy, especially when she starts cutting things out our playing with moon sand, (which is the devil, but my kids love it) but she's learning to clean it up and it's definitely worth the mess to see her doing her own thing in her happy creating place.

Fan of the Game

Last night we took Cam to his first Celtics game. Walking through the stadium it felt like we were with a celebrity. Everyone would stop and point and "ooo and aaaah" like they'd never seen a baby before.

When we sat down in our seats everyone's attention turned from the game to the little Celtics baby. A guy sitting near us asked if we wanted him to take our picture. We said, great!

Cam was actually pretty tired since the game started at 8, so not much of his usual smiling but he was super mellow and chill the whole time, loud noise and everything.

His 15 seconds of fame came during one of the time outs when the camera saw him and couldn't take it's lens off him. He was seriously on the Jumbo Tron FOREVER! People were cheering and going nuts and then a screen popped up that said he was one of 3 fans nomintated for the Fan of the game!

If we thought he was a celebrity before the Jumbo Tron, you should've seen him after! I took him out in the concourse area and I'm not kidding you, dozens of people kept stopping me and saying things like, "Oh my gosh!! It's the baby from the Jumbo tron!" "You guys are the people from t.v.!" Or "Hey look, it's the fan of the game!" Another person asked if we wanted them to take our picture again. Sure! (Cam had a nice drool patch going under his double chins at this point, I think he was drooling over Taber's popcorn)

Of course being famous can be pretty exhausting and before the 3rd quarter was finished our little guy was passed out. Loud cheering, blasting music, crazy fans, nothing could faze him, he was out cold. He had done his job and put a smile on thousands of peoples faces, and now it was time for some well earned sleep : )

Thumbsucker: Blessing or a curse?

After 2 big time binky babies I am a little shocked and somewhat fearful to have a major thumbsucker on my hands. Right now it's kind of adorable but I'm scared for what it means come "weaning time." I thought it was mortifying that Teya sucked a binky till she was over 3 years old, but thumbsuckers go longer than that! A certain unnamed thumbsucker I know who may or may not be myself, sucked her thumb till she was in 4th grade! Much more mortifying than a 3 year old with a binky. Also expensive when the thumb sucking led to buck teeth that could only be tamed by braces. What are we going to do?!

On the other hand it's so sweet that the little guy can self soothe at night. He's been sleeping through the night (8-9 hours) for the last few weeks and I credit that to the fact that when he wakes up he pops that cute little thumb in his mouth and sucks himself back to sleep. (The binky babies didn't sleep though the night till 6 and 9 months)

Is it worth the convenience of self soothing right now to battle breaking the habit later on? Or should we cover those little hands and force the binky on him?

It's going to be hard to stop him, just look at that face, he's looking at me all guarded like, "Don't even think about it mom, this is what takes me to my happy place!" I guess for now I'll enjoy the blessing of self soothing before we tackle the curse of making him stop.

Camden's baby blessing

We blessed our sweet Camden Taber Kekoa Rigg in Utah, where many of our family and close friends could be a part of his special day. It was amazing to see my first born son encircled by his father, uncles, grandfathers, cousins and closest family friends, all righteous priesthood holders and all men who love him and I hope he will look up to and strive to be like as he grows older. There was such a beautiful feeling in the room as Taber blessed our little boy. I felt overwhelmed with gratitude to have the gospel in my life, to be married to such a good man, to be surrounded by loving friends and family, and to have 3 beautiful and healthy children.

Walking into the room and seeing faces we haven't seen in a long time was an amazing feeling. Every person in the room was someone dear to me and it was hard not to get choked up seeing their faces again. It made me feel grateful for the knowledge that families can be together forever. As I looked around with a full heart, I thought this must be how we'll feel after we pass on to the other side. I'm sure we'll see many faces of people we love and the reunion will be very sweet.

Following the blessing we had a luncheon with an delicious spread of Hawaiian food, all made by my mother. She is amazing. We also had homemade Texas sheet cake for dessert, thanks to my awesome sister Rachel (who somehow managed to escape all the pictures).

Thank you so much to everyone who came and made this experience so special! We love you all so much!

Some pictures with the Fairbanks Family, Matagi Family and Taber and Brett

Our good friends the Draschils and their sweet little girls.

Ioane's, Beardsley's and Tresners.

Peter, Angela, Eric and Ashley, Justin, Taber and Tau.

Riggs, Murdocks, and Udas.

And just for fun here are some pictures of me and Taber with each of our children on their blessing day. Looking at them makes me think of when my dad used to look at all us kids and say, "I am a rich, rich man." Now I know what he was talking about. : )

Living Legends Reunion

One of the highlights of our college years was performing with the Living Legends at BYU. Taber did it for 2 years and I did it with him my senior year. When we found out they were having a huge 40 year reunion we knew we had to find a way to get out there and revisit our glory days.

And speaking of the Glory days, here's a little sampling of us back when we were young, skinny and tan. (I have to say, looking at these old pictures REALLY motivated me to start burning off the baby weight. Nothing like pictures to give you that extra motivation ; )

So yes, we decided to bless Cam out in Utah so we felt a little more justified about flying our whole family out for the reunion. It worked out beautifully and even though it was an extremely packed trip, I'm glad we made it out there to be part of the Living Legends reunion.

One of the events we attended was the current Living Legends group performing at the DeJong Concert hall. My brother is in the group for his 4th and final year so I'm really glad I got to see him perform one last time. After the show they had a reception for all the alumni who came to the show.

One of Taber's old dancing pics totally made it on a poster. Look at the intensity on his face, he still gots his mojo ; )

And Cam looks pretty interested in following in his Daddy's footsteps.

It was awesome running into so many old friends who we spent many many hours practicing, traveling, and performing with.

And it's always awesome to see Janielle, the Living Legends director and Ed who coordinates all the tours and travel.

Later in the week we ran into Dusty and Chauma at the Wilk during the pow wow. Chauma and Taber were head man and woman at the 2003 Pow wow so it was fun to meet up there again 8 years later!

One of the best parts of the whole reunion was the Alumni showcase performance. They had alumni doing numbers from all 40 years of Living Legends and Taber got to dance in the native segment showcasing 2000-2005. (Someone took this picture of him practicing, pretty cool!)

The show was the same morning as Camden's blessing so it was a little stressful trying to get all the kids bathed and ready and down to provo to watch Taber dance. I was on the verge of a breakdown and at one point seriously thought we were going to miss it. Thankfully miracles do happen and we made it just as the 2000-2005 section was getting on stage. (which meant I also got to see my sister and her husband dance and they were awesome!)

Taber's dad made it down for the show too which is amazing considering everything that was going on that day. He's always been supportive like that and when we were in the group he would even fly in from Alaska to see our shows.

Taber did a great job and it was the perfect way to cap off a wonderful reunion. Here's a little video I took of him dancing with my phone. He's the really hot guy on the far left wearing white. ; ) (oh and at about 57 seconds in you can hear Teya say, "He's even wearing a dress!" kids: )

Random Favorites

So like I mentioned earlier, I took over 400 pics while I was in Utah and even though I have two more posts to do (Living Legends Reunion and Baby blessing) I had a few extra pics that didn't fit in anywhere but I wanted to have for my blog book, so here they are in this random post.

Cam wins the super baby flier award. He handled the 5 1/2 hour flights like a champ and received many compliments from the people around him for being so sweet and mellow. Probably helped that Daddy has such a comfy shoulder to sleep on.

I know I've posted pics like this before but I seriously love our stroller! and this is the first time Cam was in a stroller pic so I had to put it in ; )

And while I'm showing the many merits of our sit and stand stroller, It also nicely accommodates Brinley's car seat (with Sleeping Teya inside), which turned out to be very convenient on a late night at the airport.

Trip Highlights:

My thoughtful little brother Jake and his adorable wife made a special effort to take the girls out on a date with their Auntie and Uncle. The girls haven't had a lot of interaction with Jake and Scar so it was really sweet to see them run up and hug them like they've lived next door all their lives. Family bonds are neat like that. : )

It was also neat seeing our nephew Eric who recently returned from a mission and just got engaged to the beautiful Ashley (soon to be) Rigg.

BYU made it to the sweet 16 and they were showing the game on the jumbo Tron at the Marriott Center. Taber went with Brett and his family to support our Cougars from afar.

Bread sticks at the Pizza Factory. A really happy moment for all the little Rigg kids

Eating at In-N-Out with Sarah. A really happy moment for the big Rigg kid (and Sarah)

I thought this was funny because we actually bought McDonalds for the kids and smuggled it into In-N-Out. (they're too young to appreciate In-N-Out's awesomness) So here they are posing with their In-N-Out hats and McDonald's Happy Meal toys. Awesome.

Love this pic of Noa and Brinley, he's totally doing like a prom picture pose. Such cute cousins.

And speaking of Cousins, Teya was beyond giddy to be able to spend so much time with two of her favorites. Skyla (Taber's brother's daughter) and Maile (my sister's daughter) The three of them were pretty inseparable and Teya already misses them like crazy.

Love this one of Taber and our kids his Parents and Grandma. So glad they were able to make the drive out from Colorado to be there.

And I'll end with Grandma Uda and her 3 littlest Grandsons. Cam all squished up against her just makes me smile. Yay for Utah and random picture posts :)

Cam Meets the Fam

One of the best parts about being in Utah was introducing Cam to our families for the first time. He was a very popular little guy and I think he got held pretty much the whole time we were there. Here are some pictures of Cam with his fan club.

Cam with: Top row: Aunt Sarah, Aunt Erin, Grandma Louise, Grandma Karen and Grandpa Rigg. Bottom Row: Grandma Uda, Grandpa Uda, Aunt Rachel, Cousin Skyla.

It was also really cool to get Cam together with his all his little boy cousins.

Here he is with my sister Sarah's boys, Noa and Micah. Watch out ladies, these boys are gonna be heartbreakers.

Cam and his cousin Micah, the two newest grandkids on the Uda side and just 6 months apart.

And here are the two newest grandkids on the Rigg side,

Cam and Rockwell Rigg, just 3 months apart.

Look at those faces, they're just babies yet they already exude cool confidence. Total Rigg boys.

And here's Cam with his 1st cousin once removed, handsome little Trey who is just 11 days older than him. My Cousin Ashley and I were due just one day apart!

What a lucky little boy to have so many cousins his same age and so many relatives who love him so much. I just wish we lived closer to everyone! *Sigh* maybe someday : )