Surprise!

When my parents went on vacation, they asked me if I could stop by their house and feed the bird. Quick and easy, I figured. I figured wrong. You might think they would have told me that they were setting their house alarm. They haven't done it in a long time, so it was not expected. When I entered the house, the beeping started. I knew instantly that I had seconds to put in the code or someone would come over the speaker to warn me that the cops were coming.(They actually did come when my sister had a similar experience previously).  But thinking this was a quick in and out, I had left my phone in the car. I raced out to get it to dial my Dad's number. You have to be inside with all the sirens to fix anything though, the sirens which were even louder now that I had missed my window to enter the code. It's so easy to dial and focus under those circumstances! Luckily Dad answered just as the lady came over the speaker asking who I was. I told them my situation and she asked for a password. Dad told me over the phone just in time and any major catastrophe was averted. But really, who expects their parents to booby trap the house for you before inviting you over?! I almost peed my pants, ha.

I might have to avoid Winco for a while...

This is why I dread grocery shopping. And why you shouldn't judge those moms in the store who do anything they can think of to keep their kids passive and riding in the cart...
As with any trip to town, Ty and I had a million errands to run. Groceries of course come last so that the ice cream can make it home without melting. The poor little guy, by that time, was so sick of hours in carts and carseats that I let him run alongside the cart as long as he didn't try to take things off the shelves. And he was doing great. It was evident that he needed to expend some energy though, because he sprinted off down each aisle and came back just long enough for me to point him in a new direction. But he wasn't darting in front of other carts, so I figured it didn't hurt anything. Most people give smiles and knowing looks, but some just don't seem to understand a 2-year-old's need to move sometimes. I got some interesting looks, especially from one woman. Finally I put him in the cart until I got to an aisle that was empty. Bad decision, because as soon as I let him down he picked up a bottle of teriyaki sauce and broke it, saying "uh oh Mommy" as it trickled its contents on the floor. That same disapproving lady of course came into the aisle at about that point and gave me another look. I told him that was why we needed to stay in the cart and he agreed at this point, ha.

After looking for what seemed like FOREVER for an employee, we moved to the next aisle. I reached up to grab a bag of noodles. Apparently there was a huge slash in the bag, because as I swung it down to my cart, noodles went flying--EVERYWHERE. The two people in the aisle with me kinda laughed, one saying "They must have cut it when they shelved them," and the other "yeah, that was totally not your fault."   "Right?!" I said. But of course it wasn't until then, when all you might notice is an aisle covered in noodles and the same ridiculous girl and toddler in the middle of it, that the disapproving lady enters the scene. Just in time to let me know that she noticed. So helpful.

We finally made it to the checkout counter. Ty flirted with the checker and made a fast friend. So she just laughed as he kicked off his shoes and yelled "Mommy, I'm done! I'm done, Mama" the whole time I had to bag my groceries. The funny thing is, I wasn't really rattled by the experience this time. Usually I would have been at the end of my rope by then, but this time I just laughed and tried to finish quickly. I can't blame the poor kid. I was done too.

November get together

So, we have lost our camera. Again. We actually have two, and have no idea where either one is. So the only pictures I have are from other people (below) or from my phone. I was looking through pictures of the time my family was able to get together in November. I think they just say so much about our family.

 

The whole group

I was retaliating to something, I'm sure. Generally Michael deserves the pestering. But this is why I love getting together. I am laughing most of the time.

Uncle Landon loves tickling and wrestling fights

Dog Pile!

Making cars for the drive-in movie. And I'm just being me...

Making pies for the store. Always love the hairnets. T thinks it's a hat, so he will wear it.

Teaching the little guy how to shoot

Awesome hair in this family, right?! Somehow we have the only straight-haired boy.

Family bottle rockets. We had an Astro Blaster and a Green Phantom (Landon and Angie's), and lots of other legit names for awesome rockets. Tami stocked us up with some awesome decorative duct tape so that they were pretty sweet looking.

 

 

We played fly-up with the rockets and tried to catch them after their launch. This was the ready position. Chris is not one for needless movement...he would get his hands out when they were in the air :)



I just want you to notice Michael's hair. This is what happens when he's either nervous, or has too much sitting time...

Feeding the crazy ducks. They swarm, and are ruthless. You have to watch out. Before she realized, Landon kept throwing bread at Tami's feet so they would surround her. It was hilarious.

Grandpa's drums are always a hit with the toddlers.

Like Music to the Ears

It's sad that I have only written recently so that I can document somewhere the funny things my son is doing. I will try and do an update on the whole family soon, but this one is about the little guy. He's the most entertaining anyways, right?!

Lately he is all about singing. This might mean sitting at a piano and playing a few notes while yelling at the top of his lungs, or walking around singing in a rosy voice. But my favorite--he has to be holding a piece of paper to be his "music" (Usually it's my junk mail, but whatever). And then he has to be standing amidst a pile of laundry. While I fold, he will go stand there and start belting random notes. After a few, he stops and says "Song. Song mama." and then goes on singing. This repeats for almost 20 minutes. It cracks me up.

He has an obsession with tall things, or being tall himself. He almost never builds things. He's more of a destroyer. But he will put together legos so that they are "Tall!" Or he stands on the island in the kitchen and insists that Mama and Daddy have to stand up there too so we can all be "Tall!" It brings him a lot of joy, so I can't help but play along.

He does sit-ups and push-ups with Daddy. Since it happened before showers the first time, he now thinks that they are necessary before any shower. But his sit-ups consist of laying on the ground and lifting the legs to a 90 degree angle and back down. His push-ups are great. He gets on hands and feet, and then pushes his little bum up and down, with slightly bent legs. Not bad, I must admit. But also so cute.

Hats are becoming more exciting. I often turn around to find him with his cowboy hat, riding his horsie, or going down his slide with a Viking hat on. Nothing's cuter than a 20-month-old Viking.

He also LOVES his "horsy". It moves its' mouth when it sings and he likes to stick his hand in it and say "ouch" like it's biting him, ha.






His vocabulary has been growing exponentially, it's crazy. I love it when he says "cheese" for the camera, and then that makes him hungry, ha. He mumbles a lot, which I now realize are full sentences that I just couldn't make out before.

                                                                                             

We think it's probably a good sign that he is obsessed with babies lately. Over Christmas, he just loved following his two younger cousins around because he can't get enough of the babies. Now he has to settle for a doll he found at Grandma's until his little sibling comes along, but it is definitely one of his favorite toys.

Lately he will try and read his books to himself out loud. Go Dogs Go! gets especially loud and vibrant. Daddy had not yet experienced this when he decided to give it to him during sacrament meeting to keep his attention...

I'm pretty sure he has mastered all of the animal sounds we can think of. We made sure to teach him a cougar--which he does surprisingly well. He also knows actions for fish and bunnies, since they don't say much, and of course there is the turtle that says "Righteous!"

He is at such a fun age, it's always entertaining!

18 months

Photo by Tami

We just passed a huge milestone in this family...our boy is old enough for nursery! It's true, he's now 18 months. And cuter than ever. Some of his recent past-times include mastering the actions to the itsy-bitsy-spider and other such songs, climbing on EVERYTHING, and dancing to his heart's content. Here are a couple fun things that he's done lately to crack us up!

He has taken to making any small object into a gun as he runs behind you yelling "piew, piew" or "boom boom" to shoot.

Yesterday he figured out how to turn on a tricky lamp, and as he did each time would shout "Ta-dah!"

He loves trying to throw and catch with a mit. He has to hold it with two hands...

We didn't show him any TV or movies until a few weeks ago. He saw himself on Grandma's ipad, and now he constantly wants to watch himself. So if he asks you for a "moo-me" (movie), it's possible that he is referring to a DVD but more likely that he wants to watch one of himself on your phone.

He has learned a new trick at bathtime--soaking the parents. He's still working on the form and skill of it, but he uses his toys to try and dump water on us. Every time he tried to get me, he covered Daddy. He thinks it's hilarious. So if you ever babysit and have to give him a bath--watch out.

He finally caught onto pillow fights and LOVES it. His little giggle the whole time makes me laugh.

His favorite time of day is when "Dada" is home. Just hearing the truck pull up, he runs to the door smiling, which makes me happy too.

 

 Thanks to his cousin, he was Woody for Halloween. Pretty stinkin cute little sherriff.

 

Of course I had to teach him how to properly organize his candy for trading purposes. He doesn't have anyone to trade with, but he'll be ready when siblings come along.

 

He can often be found with his "Be-be" lately. He's become pretty attached.

 

Happy 18 months!

Chillaxin'

So we have had some time lately to catch up on life a little bit. We got to take a few days of vacation at the Rowley's cabin, which was really fun. I got some massive bruises on my arm from archery. I thought it was because I had bad form, but Brent and Kaden also had that problem, and I was hitting the target fine (before I got so scared of it getting me that I couldn't hold my arm still long enough, ha). So now I just think that's not my favorite sport. We tried out the zipline again, as you can see on the left. I jumped off a little early and made my knee into hamburger, but it was still fun. We also rode the 4-wheeler back and forth a lot, which is Ty's new favorite thing. He got spoiled for those few days, and now that we are home, I have to take him on rides around the orchards now and then or he is completely crestfallen. He is learning though. Once you put him on the seat he reaches to move the keys, and then puts his hand on the ignition button. And then he gets the biggest grin and just looks up at you like the world couldn't be happier.

He has also taken lately to talking on the "phone". The phone can be a remote, a play phone, a block, or even the power block for the computer. He will sit and have great conversations, but when you give him a real phone with a real relative on the other end, he freezes. Like a deer in the headlights. We're working on it.

The little guy and I also enjoy our popsicle dates. He runs to the freezer and says "popo" and we sit together on the kitchen floor to eat it. It seems he must be sitting in my lap before he can take a bite, so that's what we do--every day after watering the garden or playing outside.

This last week we went into town to the county fair. I love the fair. The rodeo is my favorite, but the food--though completely unhealthy and overpriced--is delicious. And you would never eat it otherwise. We got a good ol' funnel cake for good measure. Landon's little brother came with us. He wasn't too excited about most of the rides, but we talked him into the Spider with Landon. But he wouldn't let them spin much, ha. Our little guy went on the ferris wheel (which is probably the scariest ride in my opinion), and Goliath's slide. And he was pretty interested in seeing all the animals.

 I got a hole-in-one to enter a golf sweepstakes, just sayin'. And we hit up the buckin' broncos at the rodeo. We were there when one of the rodeo girls fell off her horse and got dragged around the ring because her foot was stuck. It was pretty crazy. Luckily she was ok. Whitney even watched Ty so we could go on the ride that drops you out of the sky. Wooh! I have a video but haven't changed the format, so I can't post it yet. Sorry. Let's just say I might have screamed.

 We finally finished our garage. It's all painted and organized and we can even fit the car and truck! I really was skeptical that huge truck would make it in. We have to really squeeze it in, you know, butter the sides even, but we can fit them both :) And, I painted the front door. Unbeknownst to me, it's really hard to get normal paint to stick on doors. So you may not fully appreciate this task unless you've tried it, but I was pretty proud of myself after putting 4 coats on to get it to look good.

And Ty got to go swimming for the first time. He clung to me pretty tight at first, but once we gave him a ball to chase around, he actually tried to paddle and loved it. Good times. I love summer when we actually have time to take advantage. Now we just have to roast some more mallows and watch a meteor shower and my summer is complete :)

I know these are blurry but it's all we have.  Landon says he was shaking because he was cold ;)

Though I must say. This is the first year where school has started and my life hasn't changed a bit. We have no one in school anymore. WEIRD, but AWESOME!

Sunday duds, as Anita calls them :) He likes to look just like Daddy

Aunt Angie came to visit. It was fun to see her and show her the new house! Thanks for making the drive!!

His new way of looking at the world lately. Not sure why, but he does it all the time.

Someone asked me to make their son's brithday cake a few weeks ago. I was really rushed for time the day I did it because Tyson was really not cooperating, so I'm not sure it was quite what I planned. But I made a big angry birds cake, and then these cupcakes, with the blue bird cupcakes as well. Had to pipe feathers on all of them! I think it turned out looking good, but I am definitely learning a lot. It was my first experience making marshmallow fondant, and it turned out pretty great! And they had a delicious raspberry cream cheese filling.

Our little wrangler says "hope your summer has been fun too!"

Green Thumb

I just wanted to post about our garden because I'm pretty proud of myself :) Our yard may be a wasteland of dirt and new poplars popping up everywhere, but the garden represents some major sweat and hard work, ha. For real though, I even sprained my thumb weeding this week and now I can't really grasp anything with my right hand. 

We moved in a little late for the usual planting season, so we didn't have high expectations. The night we actually had time to do it, we ran into town to get seeds. There was a slight miscommunication with the peppers and we somehow ended up with several full rows of hot habenero or jalapeno peppers. Let me know if you are a salsa maker. Then we came back with a little bit of light left and a storm approaching. Landon and I hoed like crazy and spread some miracle grow in that soil as fast as we could. We were sticking plants in like lightening to avoid any lightening striking Landon, who was holding the shovel. Luckily, we got everything in--partly in the dark--about 20 minutes before the rain started.

When we started the endeavor of this year's garden, I told Landon to keep it small-scale. There are only two of us, and with cherry season, I knew I would have to take care of it by myself. And yet, he is always the one who chooses how much we plant, ha. With our little guy around, I could only weed about a third of it a day, so it took 3 days to finally weed it, and then a few days later I had to start all over again. Kinda disheartening. And then I discovered Preen. It's awesome--weed preventer. I put it in between the rows and this week I weeded the whole garden in like 15 minutes. 

I've also had to watch some youtube videos on how to harvest our crops, since neither Landon nor I know much about any of them. We had no idea when they were ready, or how to harvest them, or how to water. It's been mostly guess and check, but I thought I would consult the experts when figuring out some things. Despite the poplar trees trying to grow in the middle, and the gopher taking half of our lettuce, we are pretty happy with how it's turning out.

This is actually from Grandma and Grandpa Rowley's garden, but I laughed and thought you might like it too. He loves his veggies.