A Look at 2012

2012 has treated this Baker family well.  We have experienced a lot of "firsts" in our family this year.  Makaila grew from this...

...to this.

She went from crawling for the first time,

to taking her first steps.

Kaila ate solid food for the first time,

And said her first words.

Trip ran his first obstacle course race (see this post for more) and got to see two of his young men from Malaysia leave to serve missions, which was a first as well.

I also ran my first race ever (more can be seen here), and attended a mission reunion for the first time in 4 years.  We took Makaila camping at Lake Powell for the first time (more about this to come), and we stopped at Zions Canyon on our way home.

Dan was the first out of my brothers to get married, and that made Alyssa (whom we love!) our first Doxey sister-in-law!

Trip and I went river rafting on Provo River for the first time with Dan and Alyssa this summer (unfortunately we don't have any pictures, just fond memories).  Makaila turned 1!  

She went to the aquarium for the first time...

we went to a pumpkin patch.

 We took family pictures for the first...

January 2012

second (click here to see more)...

April 2012

and third time this year!

November 2012

We sent out our first Christmas cards as a family.

Makaila had her first Easter,

Valentine's Day,

St. Patrick's Day,

Fourth of July,

and Halloween.

Our first nieces were born!  

Bean experienced her first snow.

She will also get to see the lights at Temple Square for the first time this year.

This picture is from Scott Sanders

We have been truly blessed and are forever grateful for the unique experiences, gifts, and love that each and every one of our family members and friends brings into our lives.  Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all!!

New Shoes

At the beginning of October, I finally decided to get Makaila some shoes.  She had been walking for a couple of months and like it or not, she was ready to walk around outside and in public places.  I wasn't sure how she would feel about shoes, since we could never keep them on her feet when she was an infant.  I took her shoe shopping and after trying on several pairs to find the right size, she found a pair that she loved!  I didn't have socks on her, but she didn't care.  Once those shoes went on, I couldn't get them off of her!  She even wore them to the checkout counter (the guy was afraid I was buying and empty box at first).

The next morning, the very first thing she did was pull her new shoes out of the box and ask me to put them on her.  Grandy was there and helped her put them on so I could take some pictures and a quick video.  Who would have thought that she would love her shoes so much?!

Thanksgiving 2012

Ever since we got married, Trip and I have tried to cook our own Thanksgiving meal, and then meet up with family for dessert (at least when we are in Utah).  Obviously, when we have stayed with others, and when we were in Malaysia, we did things differently.  This Thanksgiving weekend, we were able to enjoy a delicious meal, visit both sets of Great-grandparents, and get our Christmas decorations up.  It was a fun weekend spent enjoying our time together as a family. 

Anxious to eat

Doing prayer hands

Learning bad begging habits from Captain Jack

Wearing Dad's dog-tags after eating Thanksgiving dinner

Cuddling and singing with Dad at Great-grammy's house

Swinging with Gramps

Helping me untangle the lights

One of Makaila's favorite books is "Pat the Bunny", so this ornament was by far her favorite

The Dirty Dash

At the end of September this year, I ran a 10k called The Dirty Dash.  This is the first race I have ever run, so it was a big deal for me.  Trip was going to run with me, but got hurt his hamstring while training for the Philadelphia marathon, so he had to back out.  Luckily for me, Dan, Alyssa and a bunch of Alyssa's family had signed up to run it with us, so I didn't have to do it alone.  Trip was also able to watch Bean and take some pictures of me.  Unfortunately, he wasn't able to see most of the big obstacles, and I haven't gotten any of the pictures that Mumsie took yet, so you won't really get a lot of the obstacles here.  There were several wall that we scaled, a huge slip and slide, LOTS of mud puddles, and tunnels to crawl through, and plenty of hills to run up and down.  Here are the pictures :)

Me, Alyssa, and Dan just before the race starts

Our group was dressed as "Where's Waldo"

My hands are numb because it was pretty chilly, especially after getting wet

I don't know what I am doing with my arms here...kinda look like a zombie :)

The final mud pit