triple birthday party

since leah and jack both turn one today and ty turns one on tuesday, we decided to have a triple birthday party...

wow, what a fun party! we had cake, presents and even put all of the kids' hand/footprints on a shirt. leah was a champ at eating cake (not sure if that's a good thing? but i'm SURE she gets it from her mother). the boys didn't really even touch theirs and she went to town.

attendees: maren and leah layton (and maren's sister kelli), rachel and ty mcphie, sarah and jack smith (and sarah's sisters megan and rachel), lindsey and sarah harman, nicole and tori smith, hannah and sophie balderson, katie and armanie anderson, melanie and noah sharp, dyan and nora johnson and becky and trey broadbent.

thanks for coming, everyone!!

12 months

i can NOT believe leah is one year old today! it's been a crazy, wonderful year full of firsts, frustrations and fantastic times. the biggest news of the month is that she got her first tooth! i think the day that will go down in history is valentine's day as we really saw it that morning. it's still not big enough to photograph, but it's there. promise. still no crawling, but aunt kelli has been putting her through some pretty rigorous bootcamp, so we expect that will come soon.

Happy Birthday, Leah!

jelly belly

kelli, leah and i went to fairfield yesterday for a tour of the jelly belly manufacturing plant. it was pretty interesting and smelled so good! (yes, i did have a few...and yes, they do have sugar.) my favorite is their new flavor, pomegranate...but kiwi, pear, very cherry, pink grapefruit and 7up come in as close runners up.

leah was pretty interested in all of the colors, sounds and robots...and even waited to eat (in the car trunk!) until after we were done.

she didn't like the oversized jelly belly much, though. sad as this picture is, it was pretty funny.

bragging rights for maren

as some of you know, ryan and i like to mini golf...and we have a goal to mini golf in every state we visit. we also have a running tally (ryan thinks he is the overall winner, but i have the scorecards to prove him wrong). we went yesterday with my sister kelli and ryan was bragging the entire time that he was totally going to waste us. um, no. kelli won. i came in second. ryan came in LAST. and i even had a child hanging off of my front side that was constantly kicking me, moving my arms and the putter and moving so i sometimes couldn't even see the ball. it's going to take a lot for ryan to dig himself out of this one.

and this is a random picture from super tuesday, otherwise known as a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. leah was teething (for real, it's popping through) and had to be held...only i had a ton of things to do that day and nothing was going as planned. the only time she was happy was when i put her in the laundry basket to play. in fact, she's in it right now.

one year older and wiser too

we had a great time celebrating ryan's birthday last thursday. we made him cookies and brought them to his work, made a masterpiece of a pink cake for him (thanks to all of our utah friends and family for mailing the cake and frosting to us! i will NOT make a mistake like last year), and opened some fun presents. Highlights: the office: season 3, spandex leggings to go along with his spandex shorts (nice), and tickets to see Bon Jovi live in concert in april...he has two tickets, so if you're nice to him, he might just pick you to go with him!! happy birthday, ryan.

older by the second...

Happy birthday to Ryan today! We are so glad to have such a wonderful father and husband in our lives. He works so hard for us all day long...and then comes home and works just as hard to help out around the house. He is definitely Leah's favorite...and mine too. Happy 27!!!

...and yes, that is bird poop on ryan's jacket. i warned him to not lean against the railing. he listens to me now.

...for his birthday, he'd like to know who is reading our blog...and birthday wishes galore...so feel free to leave a comment! :)

mmm...cookies

Too bad i can't eat any right now due to the no sugar pact. no worries, i'll have a cheat day soon enough. i had a ton of fun today frosting cookies with lindsey (and sarah), kristen (and sydney) and whitney (and joel and kadin). ryan drooled as he ate them...and i found out leah likes frosting. who knew?!

my cookies:

rock band: part 2

this is leah and syndey (katz) rocking out at our rock band party as of late. leah taught sydney the fine art and importance of having something in your mouth at all times (below). notice the stylin' hairdos....mohawks for the occasion. Once Leah learns to walk and can keep up with Sydney, i think they'll be great friends!

Hi. My name is Maren and I'm a Rock Band addict.

It's true. I'm an addict. I love this game. For those of you who haven't tried it, you have to. Do whatever you need to do to either purchase the game yourself or find friends who have it. It will be well worth your time.

I'm in no way a video game junkie. In fact, i really don't like video games at all and for that exact reason, never really fit in with my siblings growing up. They all like to play video games and were actually good at them. I, on the other hand, believed my brother when he told my friend to jump down a "special" tube in mario brothers because there was an extra world down there...really, he just wanted her to die so it could be his turn. I'll play an occasional tetris and other than that, i'm solely a watcher. But, I love Rock Band.

I love the guitar, i love the bass (completed a song at 98% accuracy on expert level!) and i love, love, love the drums. I could play them all day. I even like the singing. The game is totally liberating...and i'm convinced we will have a generation of awful garage bands because every person who plays it feels like they are actually good enough to join a band. I spent my saturday with a few other couples playing this game for honestly 6 hours. No worries. We took care of our children as well (they actually got really into it...bobbing their heads and dancing to the music), but it is really that addicting.

p.s. we had a contest of boys vs. girls to see who was better. we played 3 rounds each...and the girls won every time. nice.

'til we meet again

So, I know I'm probably the last person everyone knows to post about President Hinckley. But, I thought I would simply for my own sake and to document it for Leah. We found out about 7:20 pm (CA time) last Sunday because we were talking on Skype with my mom. It was a shock, but I felt very at peace and am so happy that he is with Marjorie again...what a darling couple...and quite the example to look up to. My mom said it was a "President Hinckley day" in Salt Lake the day of his funeral - the sun came out and the snow ceased after days and weeks of nothing but storms. I also heard that people lined the streets after his funeral waving white hankerchiefs and canes! He has touched our hearts and lives for the better and hopefully we have all changed for the better because of him. I am glad to know that when changes like this occur in our church, the process isn't chaotic or something to fear; that although some of our leaders change, there is always a constant leader, Christ, to whom we can look. I'm excited for the new First Presidency. And to President Hinckley, farewell...until we meet again.