VOTE!

Just wanted to remind anyone who comes across this today to go and get your vote on! :) This election is historical and we all need to get our opinions out there, even if they differ from my own. Just go do it! I did and I don't regret it and wish that God's will be done through this election and that some changes will come to our country. Good luck to all!

explanation

So apparently I can't figure out blogger and my new blog is below the last one, just in case you are confused--so enjoy! :)

sorry!

Okay, so I know it's been over 3 months since my last post. Life is good, Mackenzie's growing and learning so fast that I can barely keep up with her. I promise that tonight when Matt gets home I'll post pics and more stories for ya'll to see! This time I really will do it, too!! :)

FINALLY!!!

Okay, so I said I'd update about a month ago, and I did start updating- I promise and this is the finished product. Pictures are in reverse order coz blogger is weird and I couldn't figure it out. But life here in AZ is going fairly well. Mackenzie is moving around and growing like crazy. I'm sure she'll be walking before she turns 1 in November. She is constantly surprising us and making us laugh. She is such a ham! Just like her daddy because as you all know, I am such a serious person and never do anything fun! ;) But here are pictures, I hope they make you happy!


SEPTEMBER:

I loved my balloon hat Daddy made me, I couldn't stop trying to look at it!
Daddy and I are going to work out in the yard in our "keep the sweat off your forehead and out of your eyes" rags-that's what he calls them

Another one of me in my balloon hat, isn't my daddy talented?
We went to the local fair and Matt held her up to pet all the animals, she was loving it!
Stacy, Sarah and I in Vegas.
Mackenzie loves to play with the dog food and water and take the food and watch it float in the water-so gross!!
Helping her daddy practice for the Wednesday night service at our church where he leads the music.

AUGUST:
A side view of my new haircut.
A goofy front view of the new haircut-don't know what's going on with my face, so don't ask.
Mackenzie in her boat in our pool.
She loves to dance to any music, even just Matt trying to beat box.

JULY:
She loves to hang out in the laundry basket while I fold everything, it's funny.
AAHH!! 3 boats in a 6 foot long pool is a major traffic jam!

Mackenzie and Quinn (her new bestfriend) with his Grammy.


JUNE:
Uncle Adam and Aunt Trina (her godparents) with us at Mackenzie's baptism.
Her new toy that looks like a watering can that she would eat the spout of.
With Auntie Sarah W at Red Robin, they got along great!
Me and Megan at her graduation from EWU. Go Eags!
Mackenzie and Megan in their "stunna shades".
Pretty pretty princess.

MAY:
Smiling for the camera at my (gretchen's) birthday party in May.
Daddy and Derek with Mackenzie and Quinn
Mommy and Julie with Quinn and Mackenzie.
Quinn and Mackenzie advertizing for Margarita Time at Chilli's Restaurant. :)


Well, there are all the pictures for all of you who have been asking. I promise I will try to do better at the updating. I love you all and hope to hear from you soon!!

no voice, happy baby

So I got some crazy allergies here. They are driving me craaazy! I don't have a voice and am full of the wonderful little nasty men you see on tv in the Mucinex commercials. :( Not so much fun. And the baby doesn't know what to do with me. She's gotten used to me blowing my nose every 5 minutes, but the not having a voice thing makes her look at me like "You look like my mommy, but you don't sound like her, so I'm not sure if you are her or not..." which is a totally entertaining look. On another note, my dad was here for almost 2 weeks and it was so much fun! I never realized how much I miss that crazy man until he is here and then gone again :(. But he might be offered a church down here in AZ, so that would be fun (for me at least!). Having family closer than a plane ride away is something I thought I could only dream about....

OOh! baby note! She's been sitting up on her own for almost a month now, it's really fun! She had decided to skip the rolling over part and go straight to sitting up (until Sunday that is-pic to follow) and now that she can, she doesn't want to lean against anything. It's either sit up all the way or be held, and nothing in between. It's funny how she has such a distinct personality already. She is constantly making noises as well. Once she starts talking, I swear she will never stop! I might have to invest in Duct Tape stock!! :) hehe (just kidding...) Also, last night she decided to sleep twelve lovely hours solid. Oh, sweet, sweet sleep. Since the allergies have knocked me on my butt, it was so amazingly wonderful to sleep for 10 hours solid. I hope this is a glimpse of what is to come!! She is also in LOVE with mirrors right now. In our bathroom, there is a wall size mirror with both medicine cabinets being mirrored as well. I will take her in there and she will look back and forth between mirrors and looking at me personally and then switch and look through them all again, it's soo cute. She laughs the whole time too. Oh, she cracks me up! PS I called a bikini a zucchini when I was little.

But here are some more fun pictures to keep you picture people happy! :)

Lookie! I rolled over all on my own--in my sleep in my crib!
Mmmmmm... toes are the best!

A special smile in my Lion King PJ's for my Auntie Megan!
I am so smooth in my sunglasses!!

Yay for my new swing! I heart it!

I'm in my zucchini (right, mom?)

Attn: Naked baby pictures---be warned!!

So when my mom and Grandma visited wow, it's been almost 2 weeks ago now, we went and had some pictures of Mackenzie taken. Here they are:Hawaiian baby

Happy, naked baby :)

Happy baby

This is my version of sitting up

I love to fly!

I think they all turned out fabulous. The one of me and her is my favorite (obviously next to the nakay baby one!!) I think she should be a model, but then again, I am a little biased. But aren't I supposed to be?? Here are some more for good measure :)

mmmm... my high chair tastes sooooo good!

I am AWESOME!! My sunglasses make me cool!

So there you go, hope this is enough for you Jeni and Bianca!! :)

i know, i know

So I am apparently the worst mom at updating a blog that mostly centers around my baby. She is doing great, by the way. On the 12th, we had her 4 month check up and she weighed 16 pounds, beware everyone-Godzilla baby might be coming your way soon! She's so chubby, she has cankles and wrist rolls... it's funny! But I know she'll start moving soon so the fat will disappear and lead way to a lanky baby. But hey, I'm enjoying my "chunk-a-munk" as I call her. She is so much fun. Every day she starts doing something new, starts discovering new things she can do, new sounds she can make, and crazier faces she can make. She's always smiling or laughing, or eating it seems. She's eating at least 6 ounces, more like 8, at almost each feeding on top of rice cereal and pureed fruits. So far we've tried: apples, bananas, pears, and peaches. Peaches weren't too successful but I think that's coz they were kind of tart and she seems to like sweeter foods. She also likes corned beef (Matt fed her some-to suck on- on St Patty's Day) and chocolate (I knew she was a Smith somewhere in there!! :))

I am so excited! My mom and grandma are coming on Friday for a 5 day visit and it will be so fun! Grandma hasn't met Mackenzie or been down here to visit us yet, so that will be really neat. We're also going up to Seattle in June to baptize Mackenzie and go to Megan's graduation from EWU, so if anyone is up in the area from June 6-16, let us know coz we'd LOVE to see you!

Okay, so here are some new pictures of the baby for you!

excitement!!

So I'm super excited right now. Mackenzie slept through the whole night and then is taking a nap right now! Yay for babies who sleep!!! AND I get to see Onca-B and Andy-Dandy-Dandrew this weekend and I miss them so much, so I'm super excited about that!! YAY YAY YAY!!!

The only down side of things right now is that the car's odometer (the new one) was wrong. It was replaced at 32,000 miles, so you have to add that to whatever the odometer says. So the car has 54,000 miles, not 22,000. :( So we are getting $1,000 off what we paid plus brand spanking new super tires for their mishap. Turns out the carfax report said there was 32,000 so they checked it out and this is what we're supposed to do. The dealership got hosed on the trade-in (coz they didn't know that) but hey, not our fault, so we get new tires, detailing of the Saturn before they turn it in for us, and money off the car. Wish it woulda been a better deal, but hey, it still is a pretty good deal for a fancy-pants car.

Oh, and my neck is deciding that it wants to spaz out and be really sore-- any ideas on how to fix it??

SLACKER!!

Sorry I've been such a blog slacker lately. Life has been insane!! Our digital camera broke and I can't figure out how to make the video camera take regular pictures (coz it apparently has that feature) and get them onto the computer.... where, oh where, is my super computer husband when I need him?? Oh yeah, that's right, he's working like a mad man... again. Right now the baby is in her swing watching Veggie Tales while I try to do this and catch up on Christmas Thank You cards... I'm seriously the biggest slacker I know right now.

Ok, so my baby is huge. She is so much bigger than she was even just a month ago. Here's a pic that I took from before the camera decided it didn't like to turn on.
She has the craziest belly ever!! She was busy trying to eat her hands and her wrist rattles when I took this picture, so she was a little confused and a teensy bit upset about being interrupted while she was so busy. It was quite funny actually. Here's one of her smiling at our friends' house. It's their 2 year old's head that is in the way.
I absolutely LOVE her smile. Her whole face lights up and it's a little to the left, so it's a cute crooked smile. AND she's going to have dimples, like me! :) Yay! Finally something from her mom instead of her daddy!!

A few weeks ago, life really came crashing down on the Hecht household. On Sunday and Monday Matt had the flu and was puking every half hour for 13 hours straight. EWWW... poor baby though, I felt horrible for him and couldn't do anything to help. Tuesday Mackenzie got her 2 month shots, that was not fun. 4 shots in her legs and the poor thing didn't know what to do. Luckily I took our friend Karen's advice and gave her some baby tylenol beforehand so it helped with the pain. She was getting Tylenol for every 6 hours for the next 2 days and it seemed to seriously help her and she was just a little cranky rather than the completely inconsolable that our friends' baby was after he got his shots. Then on Wednesday we had to take Hank, our cat, to the vet. He wasn't going to the bathroom, eating, or even drinking for a whole day. I was worried sick about him. Tuesday night he slept in his litter box. I called my friend Sarah, who is studying to be a Vet Tech and has worked in a Vet office for 8 years, and asked her what she thought was going on because it was past closing time for our vets office. She said she was 98% sure that he was having some sort of bladder blockage issue. So I called on Wednesday morning and got him in 2 hours later and it turned out he had bladder crystals. The only way to relieve that is to have surgery (or a procedure, not sure which actually) which the vet said needed to be done immediately. So they toted my baby away (the cat baby, not Mackenzie) and he went into surgery right then and there. $1200 for the surgery and 2 nights in the hospital later, my baby is better. He has to be on special food and a supplement for the rest of his life. They also have him on a form of penicillin for pets for a while too. I bawled my way home after leaving him there. I knew he would be okay, but I was still terrified. She (our vet) wants to check him out every 2 weeks to do a urinalysis and check up and prescribe me his supplement, so that's at least another $100, and Matt's getting upset that he's costing this much. So I'm calling around to see if any other vets are cheaper... let's hope so. Goodness, I really do not want to ever relive that week. It was not fun. And not cheap, either.

This past weekend, we b0ught a new car. Well, new to us. The lease on my Saturn is up in a week or so and so we needed to get a second car. (the local bus system is pretty non-existent and there are errands and groups I belong to that I need to get to while Matt's at work and he has to be able to go anywhere at the drop of a hat, so 2 cars are necessary-dangit!) We went to a few different dealerships in town and didn't see anything and then we went to the Hyundai dealership-they were awesome when we were looking when we moved here, so we thought we'd try there again. Unfortunately, we had the baby with us, so I couldn't test drive anything and sat in the show room while Matt drove around. We found a 2004 Hyundai XG350 (it's their old luxury-ish car) that had 22,000 miles on it--INSANE! and was in fabulous condition. To get us to buy the car on Saturday instead of waiting till Monday (all dealerships and most businesses are closed on Sundays around here) they gave us $3,000 off the Kelley Blue Book price and are paying for the Saturn to be repaired (there is some minor damage on the bumper) and return it to Vegas for us since there is no Saturn dealership closer. So, we got the car. It's a pearl-ish color and has tan leather interior. It's perrrty and I'll post a pic of it later.

This upcoming weekend we are going to San Jose for a wedding, so I want to see YOU, Miss Bianca! If there's any way that you can meet me there, let me know. It'll be fun as I am going to meet more of Matt's crazy family that I haven't yet. Should be a good time. I hope!

Well, it's time to feed lil missy, so I hope to hear from all of you soon and I hope the pictures I posted are sufficient for now! :)