Hey, quick update!

I feel like a loser!  I really need to keep up with our family blog!!!  One reason, but no legit excuse is that our other laptop is broken as of the last couple months.  There have been things that I have wanted to post but I wanted to add the pictures with them... but seeing as our other laptop is according to todays terms ancient, I havent loaded the pics onto the computer we have been using lately.  Don't worry though (if you even were), we should be getting it fixed soon!
  We went to Silverwood for the first time with Elizabeth today.  It was a blast!  She LOVED the little toddler rollercoaster, and no kidding you, i rode that thing with her about 10 times.  Everytime it would stop, she would exclaim "more".  So we would get out, get back in the non existent line and get back on again.  It was actually so much fun watching her smile and say "weeeee" as we rode the rollercoster.  We will get to go often this summer because my sister Hannah has a gold pass which gets 2 people in for free each time, plus Elizabeth is free.  I know she is going to LOVE the water park when it opens. 
  Lately she has been saying all kinds of words... I really don't think I could write them all.  A new one that she has started saying is "salsa", she asked for some salsa the other day when I was eating it and I gave her some thinking she would get mad and hate it... well she surprised me and ate ALL of it and asked for more.  LOL!  She never ceases to surprise me.  Eric and I went on a date last Friday to Hot Rod Cafe in Post Falls.  I was our first time going and we (Especially my burger loving Eric) really enjoyed it.  I got a medeteranian salad and thought it was pretty good considering it was at a burger joint.  Nothing like my White house grill salads though! 
  Elizabeth has been doing a lot better at the day care at the gym, which has been really nice.  I don't get called down halfway into my workout.  I am glad that she is warming up to it.  I think it is good for her to get the social interaction with other children.  She is doing especially good in nursery at church which is a huge deal.  It makes our sundays so much more organized and peacefull.  The women in the nursery are awesome too so that makes it really good as well. 
  I'll be keeping up with this more often, not having pictures is a bad excuse to not keep up to date on everything!

Snow, more snow, and some sunshine :)

So, I was hoping that we would be done with snow, but it happened again.  It also got super cold.  We took Elizabeth out in it and Eric pulled her in her sled to the mail box.  We thought she was not liking it at all because of how cold it was so we were just going to go back inside.  Well, Elizabeth didn't like that idea at all! She kept trying to sign "more" which was hard to understand since she had mittens on.  I tried to bear the cold a little bit longer by pulling her around in the sled some more until the driveway was shoveled.

Yeah, it was cold.  Her poor little cheeks were so pink because of the cold, but she insisted.  Don't worry though, we really didn't stay out all that long.  I'm her mother, and if you know me at all, you know I don't tolerate the cold very well.   About a week ago Elizabeth discovered frozen berries.  It all started when I was making our morning green smoothie and gave her a piece of a frozen raspberry to try.  She went crazy on them after that and kept demanding "more".  Here are a couple of cute pictures from one of her berry binges:

I love her face in the second one.  She has become quite the poser for pictures, she knows that when a camera is out that it is time to up the cute factor.  I wonder where she gets that from? lol!  (Random fact about me:  When I was little I was not camera shy like I am now, in fact, I used to be a camera hog.... So, yes, she gets it from me.)

   Elizabeth has also been enjoying vacuuming quite often as well, which makes me wonder why they don't make these children's vacuum's actually clean a little.  She was vacuuming the other night for like 15 minutes.  Every time I get the vacuum out I get hers out so that she can vacuum with me :)  She likes it for a little while, but prefers to do the vacuuming on her own schedule.

We also got a little potty for Elizabeth from one of Eric's coworkers.  Its quite the contraption! It has a spot for wipes and a toilet paper roll.  What a lucky girl.  As of now she hasn't really gotten the idea of what she is supposed to do in her potty, but when she is ready and understands I think she will make it known.  At least that is what I'm hoping.  Sometimes I just catch her in the bathroom decorating her potty with toilet paper. 

She is so funny! 

Eric and I last Thursday night got to go to the play at Post Falls High School.  It was 7 brides for 7 brothers.  If you have not seen the movie it is hilarious, go rent it, or buy it (it is worth owning.)  The play was great and they did such an amazing job.   Hannah watched Elizabeth for us at our house and did such a great job.  It is really nice to have family close by that can help out or just be there if I need dinner with more people besides Elizabeth and myself. 
Eric and I have been working on doing a "no spend month".  That means that we aren't buying anything besides necessities for the next month. (not including money that we still have from Christmas and valentines day to spend :)  When we go to classes at the gym it costs $1.75 each class, so we decided that we would skip those for the next month.  I said that the membership is a need though.  I really have to have that time to work up a sweat.  It is my stress relief.  Lately I have been doing a workout system similar to body for life in that I do one day of legs, a day of cardio, day of arms, day of cardio, etc...  It has actually been going really well.  I'm finding I push myself harder when I am not in the classes.  I have come to love the stationary bike too, which is something I never EVER thought would happen.  Which has led me to the conclusion that once Eric and I have a little financial reserve, I really would like to get spinning certified.  I also decided something else.  I really want to go back to school!  It is funny how when I was in school I never wanted to read and study, but now that I have found a passion (thanks to Elizabeth) that I love spending time reading about.  I would love to get a degree in holistic health and nutrition.  I feel like there is so much interesting stuff out there that can solve so many of our society's diseases, simply by changing a persons diet.  However, I have found that sometimes family and friends might not want my new found passion wisdom.  I want to help people enjoy long, healthy, vibrant lives.  I think it would be best for me to do this and have people who want my advice come to me for help, rather than me try to help anyone who tells me about their health woe's just to complain or vent, and then feel like that is them asking for help.  I do however need to find someone who has a similar passion as me so that I can talk about all these interesting things with someone I won't bore to death. 
   I have been reading a book recently called "Eat to Live", it is so amazing and I am super excited to continue learning this approach that this doctor takes in healing people of diabetes, high blood pressure and cholesterol.  I read an article from the Ensign today with Eric called "The Best is Yet to be." by Elder Jefferey R. Holland.  It is a great article about looking ahead in life and realizing that faith always points us to the future.  It is always important to remember that the past is in the past.  I have a hard time with that sometimes.  But it makes sense that when we look forward and focus on our goals and what we want out of our lives today and tomorrow, that we will be happier and more on the path that we really ultimately want to be on. 
  I found out about a cafe in Spokane called "One World Cafe" It has a great business system.  They use organic produce and even have their own garden that they use to make food.  It is run by donation, so, you pick your portion size, you decide how much you will pay, and then enjoy your meal.  You can even volunteer in the kitchen for one hour and receive a meal voucher to eat for free.  It is a really cool system and it was started by a place in Salt Lake City actually.  I would really like to go there with Eric sometime soon.  They have a Groupon today for $14 and you only pay $7.  Utah friends, look up the "one world everybody eats" cafe.  It is a really awesome thing! 
Anyway, that's all that is new with us lately!  Have a great week!!!
Love the Foutz family!

Goals!

So, I plan on trying to keep up with this blog by posting at least once a week.  I am really going to make an effort :)  This is way better than facebook anyday too.  Elizabeth is 18 months old already and I can't believe it!  She is the sweetiest thing ever.  For a quick recap of things she is doing now:

• Today when we got home from being over at grandma Johnsons she kept saying "homm"  I could'nt figure out at first what she was trying to say, but then I realized she was saying "home".  So cute!!!
• She has been in nursery now at church for the last 3 weeks, although this last week she really wasnt in it at all.  She started crying even before Eric could get her into the nursery room.  She woke up really early though and church is at 11 (right around nap time, yay) so that didnt go so well.  The first two weeks were great though, so we think she will be alright next week.
• She has started getting VERY picky about the foods she eats, as of now, all she will eat is avacados, apples, clementines, whole wheat noodles with spaghetti sauce, eggs, Cheerios, and Chia seed cereal.  On the few occasions we have had Salmon she scarfs it up though so that is good.  I know that she would probably love eating white bread, processed chicken nuggets, mac and cheese, and hot dogs, but I just don't want her to get accustomed to those foods.  Oh, and once in a while, she will have some green smoothie with us in the mornings.
• Her eye teeth have been trying ever so slowely to make their way out of her gums, thus making sleeping not the best as of late.  She never has really slept all that great but with the teeth bothering her I can expect to be up at least twice a night.  I remind myself often that this wont last forever, I am also hoping that I will be blessed with a good sleeper in my next baby.  I have come to believe its not because we cosleep as I have a friend who also cosleeps and her little one sleeps through the night like crazy. 
• She is still learning signs for words and is now learning how to incorporate the sign for "please" accompanied by her cute little voice saying "peze".  I may have taught her the sign for poop, she is almost to the age of potty training so I figured it was worth a shot, and it sure is funny when she does the sign.  She says banana "nanana", eye "eyyyeee", nose "nows", ear "eah", mouth "mouh", cheek "chee", toe "toooee".  She says more but those are the ones she really does good with.
• She takes her shoes and socks off everywhere we go.  In the car thats one of the first things she does.  She will be one of those barefoot kids.  I brought in a huge pile of her socks from my car the other day.

Our Valentines weekend was really great!  Eric and I got to go to a mystery lunch that was so awesome!  It was funny cause I was trying so hard to figure out who did it and both of us got it wrong.  I was wanting to get it right super bad because they enter you into a drawing for an awesome basket full of free stuff.  Eric and I love free stuff! 

I had to get a mask cause, well, I wanted one :).  But we had a really good time.  The lunch, although not to my healthy standards was delicious!  It was a crossant chicken sandwich, with a side salad, red velvet cake (the death of my diet), and little scones as a snack as we were trying to figure out the darned mystery.  The whole thing was written by some local girls, and all the proceeds went to the Christian Church that the girls attended as well as my sister Hannahs softball team.  The story had a great message about forgiveness too which I though was great. 

Those are a few late pictures from Christmas
Here is a picture of Church the next day in her pretty Christmas dress

She wasnt exactly thrilled that I had put pig tails in her hair... Still cute though!

 Still loves bath time!!!

 She loves to terrorize Nacho!  We don't feel bad for him though because if he wanted to he could run away, but he doesnt... we think he just whines for attention because really I think he likes it!

 One of the fabulous days that Elizabeth was thrilled about green smoothies.   Love the green ring around her whole face!

 Her hair doesnt look crazy becuase she is laying down, it looked just like that when she was sitting up.  It was a serious case of after nap bed head.

 This was an afternoon in the park.  I cant believe she is big enough to go down the big slide all by herself!  She is a big climber too, we will have to watch her soooo carefully!

 Look how big she is just walking and holding my hand on the way home, with a beautiful sunset behind us!  We are so lucky!

 She decided she wanted to play in this box that was probably 3 sizes to small for her.  She kept asking Eric to pull her around in it.  When he would stop she would start whining until he would do it more.

I love this little mischevious face!
This last sunday I got to attend Women at the Well at the stake center.  It was sooo beautiful and of course I cried almost the whole time.  It made me wonder why I don't just listen to more uplifting music all the time.  Eric has been playing basketball on Thursday nights and kicking some major church ball bootay!  I tell him that he might need to be a little more humble, but really I'm proud of him and cant wait to go to his game this Thursday!  I am currently reading a bunch of books here are just a couple that I am working on:
The Biography of Thomas S. Monson (amazing book so far)
The five love languages of children
the Body Ecology Diet
all good books! 
I am really enjoying renegadehealth.com and greensmoothiegirl.com for some good nutritional and exercise motivation and information and recomend them to almost everyone!  Well, thats all from me for now.  Sorry its such a long post but I had to get in a lot of info :)
I'll update next week!  Until then, have an awesome week and we love you all!

Merry Christmas!!!

We are so exited for this christmas!  I decided that Eric and Elizabeth and I need to get more in the christmas giving spirit.  So today and tomorrow I will be baking up some goodies for us to take to friends and family.  It might be a little too slippery to doorbell ditch... but we will see.  I love doing doorbell ditching so hopefully its not too icy out.  We went to our ward christmas party on Saturday and Elizabeth met Santa for the first time...

Clearly she wasnt too thrilled about it.  But it was cute!  I took that picture as fast as I could.

We got our family pictures taken recently, however I didnt have time to make christmas cards.  I believe I will be sending it out in an email though, so post your email so I can send you one if you would like one!

Today we went to the White House grill for lunch... AMAZING, like always.  Here is a pic of when we went for my birthday!

I love how Elizabeth has her eyes closed, lol!  We had so much fun!  However, $25 for lunch is a little pricy... So, while we were there today I looked and payed special attention to what was in my favorite dish so that I can replicate at home.  I want to start doing some themed dinners as a tradition in our family.  I think it would be awesome to incorporate traditions of other cultures in our dinners... Like, dancing!  I am going to look for a vegan whole wheat pita recipe so I can replicate the vegetarian gyro from White House.  Their green beans are to die for, and looking at it closely I realized that it was simply sauteed garlic steamed green beans, EVOO, and basalmic vinegar... Easy enough!  Eric got a nice Factory farmed Turkey from costco for christmas so we will be having our my family over for dinner Christmas eve, as well as play games.  We are so excited!  To all of our friends and family we don't get to share Chistmas with this year, we love and miss you all dearly and are excited to see you soon!  We think of you all the time! We send our wishes of a beautiful Christmas season full of happiness and joy in the knowlege of our wonderful Savior Jesus Christ who came to earth and showed us the way back to our Father in Heaven.

Love the Foutz family!

Well... we all have our days...

   Thought I would share this slightly funny, slightly embarrassing, family story of the day.  Yesterday while playing basketball with the missionary's Eric got kneed right in his thigh muscle.  At first he was groaning about how much it hurt and I thought he would get over it soon enough.  Well, not so.  My poor guys muscle tightened up so much that he cant even really bend his leg.  It hurts him to do just about anything right now (I'm sure it will get better soon though.)  Well, me trying to lift his spirits a little today before he went to work decided I would whip him up some blendtec ice cream for him to take with him and enjoy while on his way.  Well, I'm still new at the whole liquid/ice ratio etc... was running the blendtec and needed to stir it down towards the blade a little more.  I removed the lid and stuck my fork down into it scraping the ice from the sides down to the center.  Well... the blade had not stopped spinning.  I accumulated a stupidity injury on my hand from when the end of the fork jammed into my hand (Its not bad, hurt my hand a little, hurt my pride a little more.)  Besides that it also caused a bunch of the stuff to fly out of the blender, on our cupboards, counter etc.  Eric was standing right there when it happened too, so, more embarrassing.  But anyway, I sucked it up, fixed the ice cream and put some in a cup for Eric.  I felt good about it and it tasted great and I was sure Eric was going to like it.  While in the hustle of trying to get all his things (phone, wallet, keys) he stuck the ice cream on the top of his car.   We said our goodbyes and I love yous for the day, and he was on his way.  Proceed to 3 minutes later.  I get a phone call from Eric.  I thought he was going to tell me how wonderful I was at making blendtec ice cream and how amazing I was and how glad he was to have me for his wife.  Although I'm sure he would agree with those things, the phone call went a little differently.   He said "Renee, I'm really sorry (in my mind "oh no, what else could have happened?") I had put my ice cream on the top of my car, and well, I forgot to get it off and I drove with it on the top of my car.  I now have ice cream down the back of my rear windshield and the cup fell off and shattered on the road a few blocks away from our house."  I started laughing because I thought of all that effort for the stupid ice cream that 1. hurt my hand, 2. made a huge mess, 3. hurt my pride, 4. broke one of our nice glasses, 5. went to waste down the back of a windshield.
   You know, I guess the memory of that will always be something we laugh about.  And hopefully, maybe Eric's leg will feel better after having a good laugh. 

I got a new calling!

I have a new calling in church now!  I am the new Primary Secretary!  I know that this is one of those callings where its intended that I grow... as I'm not the most organized person.  I'm excited though!
Eric has been serving as the Sunday school teacher for the 12-14 year olds and loves it. 
We just got a blendtec last week and we love it.  We are making all kinds of green smoothies, soups, desserts, etc with the thing!  Its awesome!  It seems that Elizabeth will eat anything that has been made in the Blendtec too, which is awesome.  Speaking of which, she just woke up from her nap.  She is sooooo cute when she wakes up.  She does this little yell/cry thing knowing that I'll come in quickly and then she just likes to crawl around on the bed for a while smiling and giving me kisses!  Its great!  She is currently watching sesamestreet.org while I finish writing this.  Besides the blendtec we have been doing really well.   Eric, Elizabeth and I went to the White House for my birthday dinner (obviously not the DC version :) it was amazing!!!  I got the Vegetarian Gurro, lots of Hummus, garlic, veggies, YUM!  Elizabeth got her very first childrens menu item, spagetti with garlic bread (special occasion)  We had a wonderful time, although we were dissapointed we missed the belly dancer that comes every thursday night at 7.  We got there at 5:30 and staying until after 7 would have just been too much for E.   On my birthday I got to watch letters to Juliet which was an amazing chick flick that I loved and would like to someday own :)  Elizabeth is now saying "hi" to everyone that she sees.  Infact, at White House Grill she took a liking to the people sitting next to us and kept looking at them and waving and saying "hi" to them.  It was so cute.  Anyway, thats whats new with us! Till next time!
Love,
the Foutz Family!