Logan at 16 months

I wanted to get this post out of the way before we go out of town. Logan turns 16 months in 4 days. :) And he'll be almost 17 months by the time we get back! My goodness time flies.

Newest words:
-oreo (thanks to the oreo guards on Wreck it Ralph)
-"na!" snack
-num-num-num (yum)
-shhh
Hmmm I guess it's mostly food-related words this month!! Figures.

My very favorite thing Logan does/says is "uh-huh" or "m-hm"! He gets really high pitched on the second part like "uh-HUH" and I just love it. He does it all the time anytime I ask him a yes or no question. It's so nice that he isn't in the NO stage yet. I'm lovin' the "m-hm" as answer to everything. :) Grace even does it now if she is answering yes to something. haha

Logan gives these looks like he knows EXACTLY what I'm saying but is not going to give in. I wish I could record them exactly! If we tell him he is eating too many things at once, he will stop everything including chewing, lower his head, and shoot us this look like "I feel thoroughly scolded right now". It's too funny! Quite often I will raise my voice to him or tell him NO, and he will give me those looks, which causes me to laugh. So then I can't stay mad. He gets away with a lot around here, it seems!

He finally is learning how to backwards down the stairs on his stomach.  He goes very slowly but he is pretty good about it now! I'm not freaking out like I used to if he ends up going up and down some of our staircase by himself. He is just learning and experimenting. :)

Logan sings about "Dada" quite often.

Logan is a total cuddle-bug before naps and bedtime (he still takes two naps in the day and sleep 11-12 hours at night). I usually grab his blue fuzzy blanket and sit with him in the rocking chair while I sing him a few songs. He loves it! And so do I because I get to have a cuddly boy in my arms 3 times a day. When I finish a song he will tap my chest or back telling me he wants "more".

Sleepy after errands.

Last week my SIL was watching the kids. All 4 were playing playing in their play room. She heard Ava crying and walked in to find Logan laying on top of Ava just staring up at Amanda like "What?" haha He is such a large kid... Poor Ava. I would have been screaming for help too!

He frequently lays down on the ground for no apparent reason...

Logan has had croup for the last few days. :( He woke up two nights ago crying and coughing and I could hear in his breathing that it was pretty labored. I went and woke Ryan up, who listened to his lungs, and told me he would take him to the emergency room. Usually Ryan is all about telling me to relax and has an "it's no big deal" attitude will illness in our family. So when he said he would take him in I knew it must be necessary. They were home about 2 hours later after Logan was given an oral steroid. Ryan said he cried for awhile at first, and would scream if anyone touched him. The last hour he suddenly turned into a giggly, fun, happy little boy and sat with Ryan quietly watching basketball for awhile. He is still coughing a lot, with the barking sound coming and going, but he is doing better.

Happy boy at the ER... I swear he was sick though! haha

Having a snack after midnight once he was home again. Being silly!

When Logan runs around, he is SO fast. I mean he didn't learn to walk all that long ago and he was off and "running" really quickly after that. Having Grace as a sister who thinks running from one wall to the other wall, back and forth, is a fun game every day probably helped give him a push. Just like baby antelope have to learn how to run right after taking their first steps just so they can survive! ;)

Play dough! He thinks it's fun to sit up with Grace while she plays but still tries to eat it. Hence the binky.

Logan now has four teeth and top and 4 and bottom, and is cutting all four of his molars. Ouch!

I can't believe he will be in nursery in a couple of months! I can't picture it... He still is my baby! I don't remember feeling like that with Grace, but maybe I did. They just seem so little still. I'm hoping he does well but he is such a mama's boy that it could go either way. At least his cousin is still in there and his bestest bud/cousin Ava will follow him in a month later.

He got his first haircut a couple days ago! And boy was it traumatizing. He wouldn't sit still after a couple minutes and he was super mad that we were holding his head still. It was really overgrown over his ears and the back of his head, and I think it looks pretty good for a quick buzz session in the tub with Dad. haha I know it's not even or perfect but oh well. :)

Before

 During

 Lots of hair!

 After (I know there isn't much difference)

He is still getting tons of bruises on his forehead. :( Every few days he gets a new one. This one must have been from a really sharp corner or something because it was a very small bump but got really raised and puffy in the small area. Poor guy. I swear we don't beat him and he is usually in my sight at all times!

Speaking of that, I still try every few days to let the kids play in the backyard by themselves for a few minutes at a time. I'll try and finish some dishes or start dinner or something while they play... but if I'm not out there yelling NO at him, then he will end up digging around in the dirt in our garden. So annoying. Plus he can't climb over the short retaining wall around our paver patio without my help.

He loves putting balls in the basketball hoop! (we sure love hand-me-downs)

Logan knows where his toes, fingers, head, and nose are. He LOVES when we sing songs together like Itsy Bitsy Spider, Wheels on the Bus, Snowman, etc.

LOVE YOU, LOGAN!! Don't grow up too fast.

Recently...

I'm trying to get my blog totally updated before we leave town in a few days because I may not get a chance to do it from Utah. So this will be a lot of random things and photos. :)

Once spring was in full swing, our back and front yards grew a CRAZY dandelion forest. This photo only shows a teeny tiny area but I promise it was much much worse. I texted Ryan a picture of how bad it was in the day time (since he rarely sees our house in day time, ha ha) and he said "Have Grace pick them". Very funny, Ryan... but it gave me a good idea of something to keep her busy! So I sent her out with a bucket and she got quite a few before giving up. I don't blame her.

 -Our preschool lesson a few weeks ago was about spring time. I'm having a hard time remembering all that we did because it feels like it was forever ago, but here are a few photos.
They did fruit loop activities including stringing them on a piece of spaghetti stuck into a ball of play dough. Super easy to put together and the kids liked it. If I felt they had the patience for it, I would have tried to have them make a pattern.

 They also sorted the fruit loops into colors and glued them into a rainbow.

 In the background of this one you can see the rainbow we made with paper... I sent them on a scavenger hunt finding all the colors of the rainbow in order, and by using hand-drawn pictures of items around my house they would recognize. They did awesome!! Scavenger hunts are the best.

 They balanced plastic eggs on wooden spoons and walked around, and then we had a race. They were too cute.
We also did a nature walk outside with pictures of things to find, another sheet of words that had to do with springtime and they used Bananagram letters to match letters inside the boxes, read some books... I'm sure there were other things but I can't remember. It was fun!
I was supposed to teach last week for the final class but Grace and I both woke up with sore throats and she was coughing a lot, so we cancelled. :(

 Logan experienced his first sucker! We were in the car and went through the bank drive-thru. He was being a total whiner and had already finished his snack, so I handed him a little sucker. He was SO HAPPY! It was super messy and he was really angry when I had to throw away the soggy stick with a little sucker left on it.

 This is a bad pic, but we enjoyed a quick walk around the block as a family one afternoon and I wanted to remember it. It was beautiful outside, the kids were happy in their wagon, and I had my man with me. Perfect.

 Speaking of Ryan, I should update on how he is doing. Last month/track his rotation was in neurology, and this track (which just started a couple days ago) is ED (emergency department). It's at Doctors Hospital instead of Nationwide Childrens, so he is treating adults 95% of the time... which he hates. He saw one kid the other day but the attending got after him a little bit and insisted that he just focuses on adult medicine this month. It's upsetting for Ryan because he feels it's pointless, and quite frankly the other attendings agree... Adult medicine and pediatrics is VERY different, and he just wants to continue to focus on peds instead of wasting his time feeling out of his element. He will come through it just fine though. :) Plus this month he has an 8-day vacation away from it, AND he still does his continuity clinic (which he loves) plus tomorrow he gets to do a "ride-along" day with the local fire department. Isn't that AWESOME!? I'm a little jealous.

Owen and Grace had a little picnic on the patio on a beautiful spring day and Amanda and I (and the babies) enjoyed our Chipotle burritos inside without the crazies. ;)

 We went to Costco as a family and Daddy was nice enough to buy as a churro! Yum.

 Look at my handsome boys!! I thought they were dressed so similar that day I had to get a pic. I have the best-looking men in my family. :)

 We have LOTS of beautiful days! I am beyond in love with this place in the spring. It's so beautiful. The weather is perfect right now. It even SMELLS good, like freshly cut grass and clean air and garden flowers. :) Nevada always smelled like ... dust and garbage and hot sidewalk. haha

 Matching cousins in their Old Navy shirts!

 Ben and Amanda have the coolest back yard by far. :)

 Naked toes! I love this picture.

 We went to the park last weekend and lots of other families were there. It was hard to find an open swing. Ava and the little chub somehow squeezed into this one to share.

 For the last month, our young women group has been running a fundraiser to help them earn their money for YW camp. We have a large group (20 girls) and it costs $50 each, with some families having multiple girls to pay for. We had brainstormed some ideas and ultimately decided to offer chocolate dipped strawberries and caramel/chocolate dipped pretzel rods to the ward members, and they would in turn order some from us and "donate" to the camp fund. We can't "sell". Confused? haha. Anyway the ward was so generous and we had way more orders than we expected at first! We also had 2 of our 4 leaders find out last minute that they couldn't be there to help and all the YW do this project with us... so it was A.L.O.T. of work between me and the president. Lots of lessons were learned and we know now that we bit off more than we could chew. I think ultimately I personally put 20+ hours into this project and who knows how many my president put in. :/
We ended up selling roughly 288 strawberries and 217 pretzel rods. We had 5 different "packages" you could order so we had to find different types of bags and boxes to package those orders up based on the size of the product, etc. Plus the strawberries we found ended up being monstrous, which was good because we wanted it to be worth the money people were spending. All the girls who were participating (all but a couple) met on saturday morning from 9am-noon and we got to work. Miraculously everything was mostly hardened enough to package up for pick-up at 1pm that day. Whew.
In the end we earned enough money for each girl to have about $25 to go towards their fee. I call that successful!

Last thursday was our 7th Wedding Anniversary! We knew Ryan would get off work around 5, which doesn't happen very often, so we found a babysitter for the evening. Ryan and I went to dinner at City Barbecue and ordered their City Sampler. Oh MY! It was so delicious. They had spare ribs (my favorite), part of a roast chicken, beef tenderloin, and pulled pork, plus some sides, and their french fries are amazing. We left there smelling strongly of campfire but it was well worth it, especially without the kids. :) Then we went on a little drive (because we were semi-lost and went the wrong way at first) and found our way to Target where we walked around. It was a perfect, easy-going date.
As a gift to Ryan I made him a black and grey quilt (just two pieces: a top and a bottom) with a lot of help from a ward friend, and then tied it with black and grey yarn. It looks great, I think! just simple and masculine, and just the right size to watch a movie with or for extra warmth on his side of the bed. I have a yellow one that I've had since graduating high school which he steals from me. So I thought it would be a nice labor of love for his anniversary gift. :)

 Yesterday was Mother's Day. Ryan's shift was from 1-11pm that day, which meant he could actually come to church with us! It turned out the Grace was coughing way too much to let her go to sunbeams, and I was teaching the YW lesson, so after sacrament meeting Ryan took the kids home. After my lesson I rushed home so he could leave right away for his shift. He had already fed the kids lunch and as it was 12:30pm by then I pretty much put them right down for naps as soon as I got there. It was so wonderful, to be honest. Ryan didn't think anything of it, I'm sure, and the house was still a complete disaster after our crazy busy weekend, but just having one less meal to make and feed them was such a huge gift to me. That was the best Mother's Day gift, in my book. :) I also received these gorgeous roses "from the kids" the day before. Very sweet.

Even though this was how the rest of the Mother's Day evening went (while Ryan was working), I still LOVE being a mama. I have crappy days sometimes where I am convinced that I hate this residency life and I just need a break from it all. But on the other days I feel fulfilled and happy and completely love being able to have these two sweet spirits in my home. They make me want to be better, more than anyone else in this world. They remind me of what's important more than anyone else does. They deserve the best of me, and I hope to give that to them more fully. I still wish I could learn patience, forgiveness, joy in the moment, and that I can control my anger better... but every day is a new chance to try harder. I love them, and I love that they made me a mother! 

Things Around Town

A few weeks ago we were able to go with some friends to the Franklin Conservatory. I have been wanting to see what it was all about since moving here but it's expensive, so it was so great getting in for free with my friend's pass. The Conservatory has a whole indoor "garden" with a butterfly exhibit, other rooms with some different kinds of habitats and plants, activities for kids, a mini train track with characters from fairy tales, and a gorgeous outdoor garden! This place is seriously beautiful and they rent out some of the spaces to all kinds of weddings and events.

These butterflies were all either in their cocoons or had just barely come out of them and were letting their wings dry. Some of them were so huge! What a neat exhibit.

 Inside the butterfly habitat, they just fly around right next to you and go wherever they want. Kids try to chase them down. It was very neat!

 You can see the Three Little Pigs and a royal castle.

 Grace, Claire, and Berkley

We also visited the zoo again recently and we had lots of fun, as always! This time we went in a larger group: the Parsons, Goates, Anne Lange and 2 kiddos from the ward, and us. The gorillas were especially fun to watch and this one just sat and stared at the kids. So funny!

 And of course we had to spend lots of time watching the Bonobos and their silly babies playing the way they do. They were even going down the slide and wrestling with each other. Adorable!

 My favorite part was seeing this elephant wading in the water. She was HUGE and so close to us. She was blowing bubbles in the water with her trunk and then showering herself off. The kids were loving it!

It was on the way from this trip to the zoo that Grace saw the word "zoo" in a book and said "Mom! This is where we went. 2 O's and 1 Z." Smarty pants.

Grace at 3 1/2 Years

Grace turned 3 1/2 a few days ago (on our 7th Anniversary) and I thought it would be a perfect time to spotlight her and all she is doing these days. She is such a little busy body, very smart and observant, and carries her own little attitude around. Here are some things about her:

weight: 32.5 lbs 

wears size 4T in mostly everything but still fits in some 3T shorts from last year

wears size 8 shoes

I love those beautiful eyes. I catch myself telling Grace how beautiful she is just about every day.

-Her hair is so sweet. I honestly adore her curls and how easily they go from crazy frizz to sweet ringlets and waves just with a little water and scrunching it up. Living out in the humidity has done wonders.

-Grace is a really wonderful sister and more often than not shares with Logan and really loves having him around her. She has moments in the day when she pushes him away from whatever she doesn't want him to have, or she bosses him around, but usually she is happy to have him playing with or near her. If she asks to go outside to play, she specifically asks if she can plays outside WITH LOGAN. :) I love that.

Grace usually eats her snacks a whole lot slower than Logan does. When his is all gone, she will typical share the rest of hers with him. So sweet!! It makes me smile when I see her sharing her precious snacks with her brother.

-Her favorite things to eat right now are: ketchup, anything you can dip in ketchup, occasionally likes ranch too, apple slices, grilled cheese sandwich, Chick Fill A for "special occasions", and snacks like pretzel sticks or gold fish. She loves to drink apple juice (which I still water down) and I need to figure out how to get her to drink less juice and more regular water. Usually she gets a sippy-cup or two full everyday and milk the rest of the time.

-Her favorite movie right now is definitely Wreck It Ralph and she laughs right out loud at several parts She especially loves anytime they talk about "duty" (we had to explain to her what that was the first time) and now she giggles when we say "duty" while singing I Love To See the Temple. haha... She's 3 and already has her mind in the gutter. ;) Grace also loves Doc McStuffins!! She earned a doctor bag a couple months ago and gives check-ups to her stuffed animals. She is actually really good at it and impresses Dr. Dad with her doctoring knowledge. 

-She can trace the alphabet letters pretty well, and takes her time doing so. She can free-hand the letters "A", "H", "O", "G", "L", "T". Right now, all day long, I hear "Mom, what starts with  (word) ?" which means "what letter does  (word)  start with? And she can usually get it right when I ask her what she thinks the answer is. A week ago (i think) we went to the zoo. On the way home she was looking at the book "Big Dog Little Dog" where it has a picture of a sign with different ways to go. She saw one of the words and said "Mom, this says one Z and two O's. That's where we went!" I am so impressed with her!

-Lately she is saying some really funny things. Here are some examples:

We came to a stop sign in the car and my little side-seat driver said "Hey, you didn't stop!" 

I may have rolled through it just a little bit... :/

After finishing up using the toilet, she said "I have toilet on my hands - I need to wash them." 

Ryan was really tired one afternoon, so I said "Come in the kitchen and get a Dr. Pepper." Grace said "Is Daddy sick?!"

After her baths lately she will warn be that she is about to toot while I'm putting lotion on her... She'll say "You better move! I'm gonna toot!"

I was interviewing her for a little card we sent to the Grandmas. One fill-in-the-blank said "Grandma/Nana laughs when_______". She said "when I giggle". I thought that was so cute... and true!

-Grace likes to remind us multiple times a day that RED is her favorite color. I hear it alllllll the time, haha, as if she thinks I forgot. I'm glad she knows her mind. :) She also knows everybody else's favorite color and reminds us what they are.

 -I would say Grace is pretty independent most of the time. She does really great having quiet time in the afternoons and it's fun to walk in on her toy creations and toy car scenes when I go in to get her. During regular awake hours, she is pretty good about finding toys to play with. She and Logan usually play 75% of the time with their Disney cars, but we lost a few of them recently. :( It still makes me sad. I think we just need to replace them soon because now they only have a few left between them.

Picture story: Logan was holding tight to her blanket and she was yanking it out of his hands. He laid down and had a tantrum while Grace was triumphant. 

 -Grace is not potty-trained at night yet. We have tried 3 or 4 times in the last year, if I'm remembering right, but she is still peeing while she sleeps without waking up at all. She doesn't realize it's happening. Even if she doesn't drink after 5 pm and she goes pee before bed, she will still be wet either in her bed or in a pull-up. So... we are still going to hold off until she shows signs of understanding how to hold it better and wake up when she needs to. In the day time she is getting better at being able to use the potty all by herself, but struggles with buttons on her pants and turning off the water once she has washed her hands (because they're slippery). She is getting better though! 

Cutie girl in her spring sunday best. :)

 -3 year olds are tough... She is a little ball of attitude and emotions, and I know it's just going to get worse the more hormonal she gets! She cries a lot about ridiculous things. She gets very frustrated if she can't get her sandal on by herself, or if her toys aren't doing/looking just the way she wants. It's not uncommon for her to throw things that are making her upset. She also pouts (pictured below) which is by far one of my biggest pet peeves. I should ignore it, but all I want to do is say "Stop pouting!" and make a big deal. I am still learning how to respond better so she will learn not to do it. Also when we tell Grace not to do something or she doesn't like what we say to her, she growls and/or stomps her feet. It happens MANY times throughout the day. Now Logan has picked up the growling and he does it when I tell him "no". Ugh.

-Today the primary went up and sang for Mother's Day. Grace actually went up with them!! She has previously had the opportunity to join them for Easter and she didn't want to. She clams up anytime I ask if she wants to tell someone happy birthday, or give someone a hug, or perform in any way. She used to be the opposite just a year ago, but has gotten a lot more shy when she is in the spotlight or expected to do something. I was so proud of her today for going up there (with the help of some nudging from another mom in the ward who she must trust).

 -Grace loves playing outside in our backyard, being pulled around in the wagon, playing with Owen and Ava, going to sunbeams, watching shows/movies in the morning while I shower and occasional in the evening, playing with play dough, playing games, running errands with a full snack cup. :)

We love Grace so so much. She keeps us learning and guessing and experiencing new things. She MAKES me relax and come down from my mommy high-horse so that I can play and be silly with her. All too often I get so caught up in surviving from day to day that I forget to ENJOY it and enjoy the two littles. She reminds me more than anyone else in this world of what is important. I'm so grateful for her.