The Sharpies

February Already?

2012-02-05T21:32:00.010-05:00

February is off to a good start here in Indiana. Get ready to see some pictures.
A. is pretty excited about being a 'Big Boy.' Even though he sits in a booster at the table with us, he occasionally likes to climb into his old high chair to eat. He learned to pull the tray off and you've gotta be a 'Big Boy' to do something like that!

Time to shave already?

Daddy was shaving, why shouldn't Andrew? (cover on the blade)

I put A. down for his nap the other day. It was a day that he decided to just read and play in his crib instead of actually sleeping. I heard him saying all sorts of things. He was calling out to me saying 'Mommy! I can climb out of my crib because I'm a big boy. I can climb out Mommy, come into my room!' I then heard his feet moving around on the crib mattress. I texted Nate to tell him about it and pointed out that he must not be able to actually climb out because he was still in the crib.

I guess he wasn't kidding!

He was climbing out enough so that he was standing on the mattress from the outside before climbing back in. Even though he can climb out and he knows it, he never has. He is pretty dog-gone good at respecting authority in situations like this. He just waits in there until we come get him. Can all our kids be like this?! The other night he woke up a couple hours early and bonked his head on the crib. When I went in there to comfort him he asked if the sun had come up yet (meaning is it time to wake up and play). I told him it was still night time and offered to sing him a couple songs. He suggested a couple, helped me sing them, and then snuggled back into bed with his blankies to sleep some more. Love my little boy!
The other day we tried taking our 4+ loads of laundry to a laudromat instead of using the little complex one that we have here. It was a disaster! It ended up costing more and it took way too long resulting in a late bedtime, late dinner, 4+ loads of still wet clothes, and a scramble to blow dry special blankies in time for bed. We had clothes hanging around every surface of the apartment for days trying to get them to all dry out, I spent so much time trying to get them hung up and situated just right so they could dry. I should have just taken them to the complex dryers, but I'd already made the blunder that made it more expensive and I couldn't bring myself to pay more. On the plus side we were able to create a new game or two because of those hanging blankets. We made a crib fort and both boys were able to join in on the fun:

Check out E's face in this one:

A. did not step on E's head, it just looks like he's going to.
Train launching anyone?

Pajama day! A. loves staying in his jammies all day long if we'll let him. He also isn't as eager to leave the house to go on adventures, he'd just assume stay home and play. On days when we do stay home though it's a lot harder to regulate electronics. I let A. watch a short movie about 3-4 times a week (usually about 1/2 hour), we let him play computer games for a little while most days- his favorite is Curious George's Busy Day on pbskids.org and we let him watch Mormon Messages on average 5 days a week, it's where he learned the words to "I Am a Child of God" and since then he's really picked up on tons of primary songs. And then there is skyping with family... but he asks several times a day to watch this or this or this or play that, what kid doesn't like doing those things? It's fewer times of having to say 'not right now' when we do get out of the house! He is pretty good at playing these days though. He loves pretending all sorts of things like climbing mountains, or jumping in puddles, or cooking/eating. His current favorite toy is the train set he got for Christmas. And, he still loves reading stories with us. I've found that I have to hold it and ask if he wants to read a story though if it's not our conventional reading times or he won't want to read.

Brotherly lovin'

E. put his arm 'around' A. and A. thought it was absolutely hilarious

Gotta love the warm weather we've had this week. Nate came home early a couple of the days and we took the boys to the park. A. absolutely loved it. He's much braver than he was a few months ago. He goes down all of the slides and doesn't run away from other kids who are thinking of following him down the slide or up a set of stairs.

E. is looking pretty big these days (I weighed him the other day and he's already 13 pounds), and pretty grown-up too...

All this playing tuckers us out in time for bed!

Happy February

When Grandma Comes to Visit

2012-02-05T20:08:00.004-05:00

We were so excited to have my mom come visit for a week and a half in January. It was nice to have a fun visitor this time of year when we're stuck inside most days (although this year has been surprisingly warm!). My mom was a huge help- we were able to get lots of things done. She gave Nate and I the opportunity to go on a few dates, which I am SO grateful for. We all got to play some games and have fun just visiting.

One of the perks of being a grandma is spoiling the grandkids they say. A. sure didn't mind getting a treat or two like some fruit snacks! It's amazing how exciting something small like fruit snacks can be to a two year old.

She had to go home before baby E. was born (10 days past my due date) so she could be home in time for my younger brother to return home from his mission (He served a 2 year mission for our church: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in North Carolina) so it was lots of fun to introduce her to her newest grandson.

We got some baby footprints and handprints- kinda tricky!

A. loved playing with his grandma. She had lots of fun ideas, like eating number soup:

Just look how happy he is to be playing with Grandma!

We were able to have some pictures of all 4 of us together (pretty rare...)

Thanks Dad for sending Mom and thanks for coming Mom/Grandma, we miss you!

Alive and Well

2012-01-29T21:44:00.003-05:00

Life here is good. We're healthy. We're together. We have been blessed with SO much. I get to spend my days with these little guys:

(he only sleeps on his tummy during naps when I can watch him)

We're getting excited for Valentine's Day. (the thing on the wall started out saying i 'heart' you, but it was too much fun to play with) Here's A's "smile" these days.

And, I get to watch these two play together.

Yep, life is very very good.

Tricky moves

2012-01-15T21:14:00.004-05:00

The other day when I went in to get A. from his nap/quiet time I found him like this:
He looked over at me and said 'Hey Mom! Look at this.' He was pretty proud of himself. Then he heard Nate say sometime out in the other room (he didn't know Nate had come home) and A. added 'This is tricky Da-da!" He's been practicing his latest move. He's never climbed out of his crib, I don't think that the possibility has even crossed his mind. He loves his crib, why try to escape it? In fact, he usually wants to hang out in there while we read him stories after he wakes up and we come in to get him. He's stayed in there for as long as 45 minutes after we went in there. We're in no hurry to rock the boat and put him in a toddler bed.

He calls this the monkey bars:

(his legs are off the ground)
Check out this mound on the measuring spoon:

And how bout this face:

And he just makes me happy:

Two legs... two boys!

One Month Old

2012-01-15T20:52:00.003-05:00

E. is now 1 month old. We love our little man. He's generally a happy baby. Most nights he only wakes up to eat during the night and then quickly falls back asleep. He has started smiling. He loves having his diaper changed, and is most likely to give us his smiles when we're changing it.

Doesn't coo a ton, but A. gets really excited every time E. "talks." E. seems to have "no nap days" and "nap days"- some days he basically doesn't nap at all- just quick cat naps and other days he sleeps for hours and hours.
This is his signature face:

Do you think they look like brothers? I do.

More Christmas Break 2011

2012-01-05T21:59:00.004-05:00

It snowed! (technically the 2nd snow of the year, but the first one we were driving through to pick up my mom from the airport and it didn't last).
Check out this handsome little marshmallow man:

We made a little snowman together.

And more importantly, we threw snowballs! He LOVED throwing snowballs and the slushy snow was perfect for him to turn into little balls. He would have stayed out there all day if he could have, too bad it was so dog-on cold!

He's getting so big :)

We found little E. sleeping like this:

That's how you sleep too, right? Conducting in his sleep.
Extra Daddy-time means some fun games! A's train ride went from:

To:

To:

Good times.

E. got his first non-hospital bath. He was a champ.

We took a trip down to Indy so we thought we'd stop by the free art museum, gotta love free! A's favorite thing to see/do were the escalators, sometimes we're a little more cultured than others :)

Merry Merry Christmas

2012-01-05T21:31:00.004-05:00

Christmas morning with a 2 year old is a pretty exciting thing. We all put on Christmas hats, walked through Christmas streamers to find presents under the tree, and... a train set running around it. A. has been loving the train sets of other little boys for a while so we were pretty excited to give him his own (which he's been loving everyday so far, thankfully).

We had a breakfast of waffles (the yummier, less healthy kind compared to our normal whole wheat ones) with homemade strawberry syrup and whipped cream. Then we spent the next couple hours very slowly opening presents. Who wants to keep opening things when there is something exciting to play with!

A. was pretty excited to get some candy in his stocking

The handsome 2 week old:

The guys building construction vehicles together, A. gets pretty excited to use the screwdriver to help:

Later in the day we went to church and got to talk to some family members on skype, including Nate's younger brother Aaron who is serving a 2 year mission in Arizona for our church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It was a busy, fun day.

This is an advent calendar that I made for Nate leading up to Christmas, mostly with things that I love about him. I would have 'done' more things for him like making homemade treats that he really likes, but having a baby in the middle of the month (and not knowing when for the first half of the month) kinda threw that off, but it was still a fun, inexpensive, thoughtful gift I thought.

Here's the tree that I spent a ridiculous amount of time on, only to have it end up in the trash at the end of the season (this picture was taken right before it died... it had kinda already been beat up). We don't have our own tree and I was going to have a tree one way or another (we didn't really want to buy a cheap, silly looking one when we already don't have a lot of extra space in our apt). We ended up having a friend let us borrow one, and another friend gave us one that their friend no longer wanted... so we had three trees- so much for being tree-less :)

Settling in

2011-12-23T22:41:00.004-05:00

We can't get enough of our new little man over here:

It's been just the 4 of us for the last week now. Nate has been working half days and helping take care of the boys/housework the other half. I've been amazed at how generous friends and my ward have been with providing dinners for us. There was one night when 2 friends brought us dinner and we didn't know anyone was going to. Everything has been delicious and it's been so nice to not need to worry about dinner- plus variety from the usual dinners is always a plus too!
We've been trying to soak in a little of the Christmas season. We went to a live nativity put on by a local church where they acted out different scenes from the bible, especially about Christ's birth and life. We bundled up and walked around the 16 different scenes. A. loved the fire and he thought the animals were cool too. Here's a picture of the reception afterwards with hot chocolate and cookies:

A. got a special Christmas mug that he got to color. Then we drank hot chocolate together. Nate has showed A. the art of dipping toast in his hot chocolate- makes a yummy messy treat.

Nate doesn't have hot chocolate on his face, just a 5 o'clock shadow :) He's pretty good at getting it all in his mouth.
We like our stories over here. Lately we like finding exciting places to read them. Like the ottoman!

Or the big bed! He arranged the pillows himself :)

A. ended up getting a cold- which has unfortunately been caught by little E. It's pretty sad seeing his little eyes all goopy and hearing him have trouble breathing. Hopefully he'll be better tomorrow! Here are some pictures for your viewing pleasure!

This seeing business is a little tricky. Sometimes the hard work makes him go cross-eyed

Our little football player. Mostly this picture just makes me laugh.

We mostly keep him bundled up to stay warm, but there is just something about baby arms, legs, feet and hands!

The Birth Details

2011-12-23T21:15:00.004-05:00

Here's the timeline of events leading up to baby E. being born:

Friday Dec. 9
6:15ish (pm) I start having contractions every 10/15 minutes while we're at Nate's work Christmas party, no big deal ,but def. noticeable. We go home, get A. to bed and watch a movie. Contractions keep coming, stronger and closer together
11:00 (pm) contractions every 5 minutes. I was still pretty excited thinking 'this could finally be it! 8 days past due...' We're sitting around trying to figure out when to go to the hospital. Not the best time to think about the friends who live close by who had their babies in the car because they couldn't get to the hospital quick enough (it's about 30 minutes away). I was hesitating going because I went too early when A. was born and I think that's a big reason why I ended up having a C-section.
Saturday Dec. 10
12:00 (am) I try to go to bed, but then the contractions are about 2 minutes apart and I kinda freak out thinking maybe we did wait too long! so we grab our stuff and head out the door. I have my midwife paged so I can give her an update. As I told the switch-board lady my number my teeth were chattering because it was cold and nerves. It had been several minutes and the midwife still hadn't called me back. As we got close to the hospital we decided to go into a Walmart that was just 5 minutes away so that we can walk around and decide what to do. I finally get a call from my midwife and she says that she's tried calling me 3 times, left me messages etc and that she's on her way to the hospital. Oh man! I didn't want her to actually go yet! I was just joking with Nate that I could still sing through a contraction- probably not serious labor quite yet, but then again- they were less than 5 minutes apart still... We walk around the store for another 30 minutes and then head to the hospital. But, they were seeming to slow down so we hang out in the car for 40 minutes or so and tried to stay warm. Just not serious enough to stay so we decide to leave. I direct Nate back to Walmart and we walk around... some more. They pick up again so we head back to the hospital. After all the midwife was there waiting, and the hospital was 1/2 hour away. So we sit in the parking lot till 4 (it was less than 10 minutes before) because I figure they charge you hourly in Labor and Delivery.
4 a.m. We check in. I walked in right after another girl in labor, she looked like she was about to die- not at all how I was feeling. Not a good sign! I went and sat down waiting for my turn. After a while they asked "You're with her right?" I said no and that I was there to check in too. I get settled in checked. All that work and I'm a whopping 3.5 cm. Seriously? So we stay through the night trying to do anything to speed up labor- walking etc. I get a little sleep, maybe an hour? The contractions were slowing down again. Then I was checked again and... 3.5 cm. still. So we headed home and just told A. that we wanted to see him again before the baby came.
Contractions continued throughout the day. I got a nap for maybe an hour. The contractions keep getting harder.
7pm The contractions were getting to be longer than 60 seconds, and less than 5 minutes apart. They told me to come back to the hospital when they were that way for over an hour. After an hour and a half, I called the midwife for ways to stop the contractions if this wasn't the real deal because I didn't want to be sent home again. I tried everything and they just got more intense, so after they been long and frequent for over 2 hours we left for the hospital again. They were the same people checking me in- embarrassing! This time I was more like the other girl. Not smiling and just sitting there waiting for my turn. We get upstairs again, to my old room no less and.... I'm a whopping 5 cm. Only half way! I was bummed. So we waited, and breathed through lots more contractions. Then 7cm. Then 8 cm.
2:00am (ish) finally 8.5 cm. That's pretty close to 10! I was getting so tired after not really sleeping for two days that I couldn't stay awake between contractions unless I was walking or in the shower. Sitting on a chair, laying down, sitting on those big balls- I couldn't stay awake if I wanted t0- unless those intense contractions were visiting! When I'd sleep though, the contractions would slow down- not good for progress. I was getting pretty discouraged, wondering if I'd ever get there.
8:00am (ish) they try breaking my water to see if that will speed things up. It does, it sure made things more intense! I was thinking that I'd love an epidural if we weren't all afraid of it stopping labor completely meaning- C section for sure. I kept thinking that I MUST be a 10 by now only to hear every time that he was in a plus 3 station- super super low, but that I was still 8.5cm.
10:00am I was becoming a basket-case. If the stinking contractions weren't going to help me get to a 10 then I couldn't take them any more. I felt so stuck. I didn't think I would ever get to 10, but I'd made it this far, I couldn't just have a C section now. I could have had one of those weeks before, scheduled. I was praying so hard for help because I knew I just couldn't do it anymore. The midwife suggested that I try pushing through a contraction. She tried to manually help me dialate. That was the most painful thing ever. Then another contraction- so much pain. But then
she said the magic words. "You're a 10! You can start pushing!" At last. My mom and sister had super short pushing times and I figured I would too. Not so. At least I wasn't in a ton of pain now... Just pretty tired, but hearing that there was an end in sight gave me the energy I needed.
12:11pm EKS makes his debut. The umbilical cord was around his neck twice and his little head was blue. My midwife acted really quick and cut him free. He was born the rest of the way and quickly started crying and regained color. They handed him straight up to me which was such a difference than when A. was born. There he hung out for the next couple hours. After finishing up with me (I tore in a few places, just 1st degree thankfully, but I still needed stitches) they left me, Nate, and the baby together while they all got lunch and whatever else they do.

I was so thankful that I was able to have my healthy little boy in my arms. Thankful it was a successful VBac, which I'd been trying to prepare for for months, thankful for midwives who were so patient with me. I wouldn't have been able to have the VBac without them, seriously, doctors would never have been that patient! I had originally hoped the other of the 2 midwives would be the one to deliver my baby, but it worked out so much better that it was Sharon because of the way she went about things- good thing the Lord is in control! It was also pretty satisfying to know that I did it all without pain medicine! The Lord was watching out for me and my family and I am so grateful.

New Baby!

2011-12-16T16:02:00.007-05:00

Baby E. made his grand entrance into the world on Dec 11- finally! It was pretty rough getting him here (42 hours of consistent contractions- a couple trips into the hospital, a couple hours of pushing...) BUT, he made it, he's healthy, and I was able to successfully have a VBAC (normal delivery after a previous c-section). I was even able to do it without an epidural or other pain medicine.

Nate was a great support and we are so grateful for his mom who came and helped with A. (thanks to my mom too who came to help the week before- when E. was due to come!)

He was 7 lbs 7 oz, 20in long.
A. has been absolutely thrilled to be a big brother. He's always wanting to know where the baby is. As of today he loves when E. gives him kisses and for whatever reason he says 'hold tight!' right before we bring E. in for the kiss.

Hopefully the sound comes through!

1 day

2 days

3 days

5 days

Our internet has been down for DAYS, we finally came to the library so even could see our newest addition!

He's Had a Birthday

2011-11-06T20:29:00.004-05:00

There is a little guy over here who turned 2! It was a great day, he woke up happy and had a blast all day. He was thrilled to walk into the main room and see over a dozen balloons hanging from the ceiling and scattered over the floor. There were even a few balloon animals- a dog that mommy made and a bear that daddy made (gotta love the internet, and the bear was WAY harder). He chose pancakes for breakfast and as he finished up instead of just exclaiming 'play time!' he said 'play time means balloon time!!' We skyped with grandparents to open presents- A understood this one much better than last year. A. also figured out that we let him chose what activities we were going to do, even the ones that we usually limit to 1 or 2 times per week like watching a movie- you could tell that by the end of the day he sensed his extra power. Nate took the day off except for his one class that was during A.'s naptime mostly anyway which was fun. We played with balloons, new toys, watched a movie, played ladder golf outside, went for a wagon ride, got an ice cream treat, made/ate birthday cake etc. The day just went by too fast!
The Birthday Boy himself!

Had some balloon hats to add to our balloon fun.

Reading a story with daddy and 'George the Monkey,' A's new friend that he loves to play with and sends him into a fit of giggles pretty frequently.

A. had been talking about how he was going to have a birthday cake on his birthday for weeks. Whenever we mentioned his birthday he would tell us that he was going to have a cake. The funny thing is we were pretty darn sure he wouldn't be willing to put any into his mouth once he got the much anticipated cake so we tried to have it be something that could still be fun for him. He helped make it (he loves to help bake, especially when he gets to crack the egg).

And he helped spread the frosting- he thinks it's pretty cool when he gets to use a butter knife...

He helped decorate it.

And even added the candles- after that he was pretty much done with the cake, the lit candles kinda scared him and he turned his nose up at the idea of actually eating it (which is why we took him to Wendy's earlier and got him a frosty so he could still have an exciting treat)

Happy Birthday Sweet A. Boy, we sure love you!

Pumpkin Patch

2011-11-03T14:03:00.003-04:00

We went to the pumpkin patch for Moms and Tots again this year- this pumpkin patch grows the pumpkins for research and then gives them away for free! We were able to get little pumpkins and some fun gourds to put on our table etc. and a bigger one to carve. Andrew was so excited to be able to go, and loved talking about it for days. He especially liked that we got to ride a wagon pulled by a huge green tractor!

Check out these cool white pumpkins!

We were coated in mud after this... I literally spent at least an hour trying to get the mud off of our shoes! but, it was worth it!

Family Pictures

2011-11-03T13:53:00.003-04:00

We decided to take advantage of the beautiful fall colors and take some family pictures. We swapped taking the pictures with another family- You can tell we aren't professionals by any means, but I still think we were able to get some cute ones!

The 3, almost 4 musketeers!

To nap or not...

2011-10-13T14:56:00.003-04:00

A. makes me laugh. Sometimes he falls asleep within a couple minutes. Sometimes it takes him a while to fall asleep, like today- an hour and a half until he finally drifted into dream land. Sometimes he doesn't end up falling asleep for his nap at all. What is a little boy to do when he's in a crib with a few stuffed animals and blankets for a long time? Talk of course! A lot. Some funny things I've heard him say:
-"I'm a Nut!"
-"pumpkin 'match' "(he was talking about how we are going to visit the pumpkin patch soon)
-"Give me 5!"
-"Hurray! I clapping cow, baby doll, baby doll" (we had recently seen the chick-fil-a cow and given it a high 5)
-"super-docious, atrocious" (from the song Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious)
-"high 5 cow! high 5 blankies!"
-"Throw the football! 2 points!"
-"A, I, O, G, Andrew Boy!" (He was trying to spell his name)
-"I go a picnic"
-"I got it mommy!"
-'Ahhh-weee-ahhh-wum- away'- from 'The Lion Sleeps Tonight'
-"mommy, I play with Davy again!"
-"I make a pancake. It's all done cooking! flip!"
-"I saw a tractor cut the grass. take a break"
-"Grandpa, hi Grandma. I talking a Grandma. Bye Grandma!"
-"I go a school! I go see Daddy."
-fake cry. "I not crying"
-spit- "bless you!"
-"Where did Mommy go? potty? I read Arthur's Sleepover"
-"I touch a tree- the sleepover. Next page. Pillowfight!" (all things from the book 'Arthur's Sleepover')
-"I don't see it, baby doll"
-"I a digger, I dump dirt. Yeah!"
-"Mommy get a vitamin a baby doll"
~singing 'I am a Child of God'
~singing 'Twinkle Twinkle Little Star'
~talking about a picture of Jesus
~saying several lines from a book about a moose that we had checked out from the library and have since returned

Yet another reason to legitimately take longer to fall asleep... I've been trying to teach him how to take a shirt off lately. I suppose I should work on how to put one on himself, not just the bears, as well...

He says all sorts of things, I'm amazed that he can entertain himself pretty much just by talking for up to an hour and a half! At least on the days that he doesn't sleep we all get a little "quiet time"- even if it isn't very quiet.

Also on talking, lately he has very specific things that he'll try to tell us. It's amazing to hear the things that are going on in his little head. He pretty much always knows what we are talking about, even if we're trying to be sneaky and avoid using certain words (like computer, movie, candy, etc.) He helps me read several books, even books that we have for just a little while from the library. Lately he has also started trying to sing a lot more. He helps us sing 'I am a Child of God,' 'Once there was a snowman,' 'Twinkle Twinkle Little Star,' 'This Land is Your Land,' 'The Itsy Bitsy Spider,' 'I Like to look for Rainbows,' and 'The Lion Sleeps Tonight.' It is fun to have someone to talk to all day even though I'm a stay at home mom- who wouldn't want to talk about tractors cutting the grass or taking a little break in the garage and toy trucks driving to Chicago with such a cute boy?

Trip to Columbus Ohio for Columbus Day (weekend)

2011-10-12T13:22:00.002-04:00

Nate gets a couple days off of school for October break. Because he had a midterm last week, his afternoon class on Friday was cancelled so we took the chance to take a road trip to Columbus Ohio to visit our friends the Bradshaws and my cousin Brad and his wife Jessica, and to go to the temple. A. was thrilled with the idea of going to Ohio and kept asking me where it was and excitedly told me that we were on our way! He did a great job with the 3.5/4 hour drive both ways. It was so fun to visit and really nice to be able to attend the temple with Nate (when we go to the slightly closer temple-Chicago- we take turns). We were able to do lots of fun things even though we were only there for a little over 24 hours. We all went out to dinner (both families we visited are actually good friends with each other living in the same apt. complex- small world!), and got together for a delicious breakfast. Nate and I went to the temple and we went to the Columbus Zoo with the Bradshaws- thank you Columbus Day for 1/2 price tickets to the zoo (the Columbus Zoo...) and we were grateful to be able to utilize A's under 2 age one last time for free entry! The zoo was really cool, they had tons of fun animals. Our favorite things were the polar bears (they were very active and jumped into the water, then climbed out and shook off the water- A. was so impressed he started clapping for them) and an animal show that they put on where dogs, cats, pigs, birds, a groundhog, a porcupine, a kangaroo, a llama, ducks, etc. did tricks for everyone- A. loved that they had pretty much all of his favorite animals (basically the ones that have been characters in his stories). It was entertaining and a great way to see lots of animals.

At the aquarium part of the zoo looking at fish, sting rays, turtles, and a manatee.

The Crocodile:

See, we all had a lot of fun:

29 Weeks

2011-09-20T15:26:00.005-04:00

Yep, I'm still pregnant! 29 weeks (until Thursday that is...) No big complaints. We have started reading Christmas stories over here in an effort to bring the holidays more quickly though :) And... A. requests to read them over and over again, he sure loves to laugh like Santa.
Here are my handsome men for your viewing pleasure:

The Little Things

2011-09-15T21:50:00.003-04:00

:) He said 'fair dinkam' and 'g'day mates' for his Australian koala impression. Some things in life just make me happy.
This week I keep finding myself reaching for the camera as fast as I can to try to catch memories. I LOVE looking through family pictures/videos, I always have. With a toddler learning to do and say funny/cute things and his amazing daddy I'm worried that I'll forget all the little things that make life so great for me right now. A lot of times it's just silly games that we make up using things around the house that are winner-activities. A few highlights from this week:
My firemen, off to rescue the people-until someone sees the camera.

Firetrucks have been very exciting around here lately. We had a playgroup with church that I set up to be a tour of the firestation this week. As we climbed out of the car and got ready to walk over to the station we were able to see the firetrucks turn on their lights and race away. Duty called I suppose- we'll have to try again. A. has been very animated when telling me for the past few days that 'fire engines gone! Sirens on! Help people!' for whatever reason he opens up his mouth really wide to tell me about this experience- cracks me up.
Here's a little boy who loves being a big help- while I went to get the milk for our breakfast, he climbed on up and helped me pour my cereal :)

We love to read a good book and so we cuddle together on the couch for some story time.

Who doesn't love a little puddle jumping?

This stage has led to lots of fun imaginative play, funny conversations etc. but it's come with some challenges too. Getting dressed has become a battle most days and I can't figure out why. He claims the clothes are too big and by too big he means too small but we just shifted to a bigger size and we've tried offering to let him have some say, no go. He also has started losing it when we tell him that it's time to come upstairs to our apartment after playing outside. Meals have become tricky too- I guess he's embracing the fact that he's a toddler and someone let him in on the fact that they are allowed to pick at their food like birds would? A few toys have needed to disappear, like the dominoes, because they end in tantrums every time. Although certain times are frustrating, most of the day is a fun adventure with him. Let the good times roll.

Labor Day

2011-09-06T14:18:00.004-04:00

Who doesn't love a day off?
We took advantage and headed over to the local zoo- which we LOVE! The one tough thing is convincing A. to get past the playground just outside to see all the fun animals.

The zoo is free, and has the perfect selection of animals for kids A's age. There is interactive stuff to do like:

crawl through tunnels and peek through the ground with the prairie-dogs. Although- that's no easy feat when you are 6 months pregnant...
He was able to jump with the wallabies (we called them kangaroos because really, what's the difference?)

We pet some goats at the petting zoo portion- they were just little little babies the last time we went a month or so ago. A. would burst into a fit of giggles after touching one and wanted nothing to do with the big ones...

Get nice and close with the otters-

And our favorite for this visit- the 'dancing porcupine'

We did forget jackets which was a bit of a bummer because we had to cut our time short there to warm the little man up- especially after he started playing in the water. Who would have thought that the temp would drop about 30 degrees within a couple days?

In the evening we were able to celebrate his friend's birthday- these two boys are really close, we're neighbors and A. loves getting to see them.

We're glad that Nate was able to take the day to play with us!

A little of this, a little of that.

2011-09-06T14:00:00.004-04:00

Someone wanted to do a little work with his daddy...

Eating a little snack while waiting at the bus stop. We got to see all sorts of things while we waited for the bus, trucks, bikes, mixers, buses, and diggers.

He insisted on having a few spectators while he colored for a few days- cracks me up. Little kids can be so funny :) I think he was drawing a piano here.

My guys were thrilled that college football started this past weekend. They had a lot of fun watching the BYU game together. A. would say 'throw the ball!' over and over again, he'd repeat what Nate would say- things like 'come on' and 'yeah!' and he was thrilled when a team would score and say 'two points!'. He enjoyed throwing a little football with Nate during the commercials as well. Here's a picture of them watching together (they really did have more fun than it looks like they are having...):

This little guy has gotten very into climbing on things and anything that we deem as 'tricky' must be done several times.

A. has been loving getting to 'paint' with water lately. First he would actually paint with it, now he's moved on to flinging water onto the paper... and table, but hey, it's just water and it keeps the little man happy!

Summer Lovin'

2011-08-11T15:56:00.007-04:00

We have been loving summer over here (especially lately because it's started to feel nice outside again). Nate has had a flexible schedule and has been able to spend even more time than usual with us- we are going to miss a few things about living the student life. We can't believe that summer will be ending for Nate as he starts another semester in a little over a week.
We've been having fun with silly faces lately:

One of my cousins moved to Indiana and we were able to see his family a couple weeks ago, they have two boys so it was fun for everyone! A. got his original shirt dirty so we got a matching shirt picture with his 2nd cousin.

Here is our marble run. Since taking this picture we've added to our creation, but you get the idea. There are now a few extra tubes that we also lined up on the ground below that we try to get the ball to land in. If we miss A. makes sure to let us know that we should 'try again!'. I'll also put up a video of his saying 'try again' but I love it, what a good attitude when you miss or make a mistake! A. seems even more excited about getting to try again anyway.

Here's 'try again' in action:

End of summer clearance warranted this fun addition to our house. Nevermind the fact that it took me at least 15 minutes to figure out how to get it into the car with both A. and myself so we could get it home or that I'm not sure where we are going to keep it in our apartment, but we have one little boy who love love loves our new wagon. We've gone for at least three rides since we assembled it yesterday afternoon.

Nate came home early from work yesterday (which worked out great for me because some little boy around here decided to skip out on his nap). We went to the small local water park yesterday evening.

A. probably had the most fun playing in the sandy area with water:

My guys relaxing by the side of the pool:

We were just about to go home, but A. wanted to splash in the water a little bit more. We took off his suit because it was covered in sand (and I put my t-shirt back on)

We had to take advantage of the nice weather some more by playing outside this morning. This little guy learned how to climb the ladder:

Dropping rocks from heights is almost as fun for a little boy as dropping them into water:

Tire Swing! the perfect swing for a young toddler if you ask me.

This is 'The Blanket Game' as A. calls it. He would do it all day if we let him.

Yep, Life is good.

The Little Chef Man

2011-08-07T22:22:00.003-04:00

Tonight Nate and I were talking about making something for dessert; A. was busy coloring. I was looking through a cookbook for an idea and found something that looked good. I was naming off some of the ingredients in the recipe like flour, baking powder, oats, butter, etc. Suddenly A. stopped coloring, turned around, and triumphantly yelled out 'ingredients!' with a huge smile on his face- he knew what the plan was and he is a little boy who loves to help cook! He was pleased as punch to help me put the ingredients in the bowl and stir. I have learned a few things about cooking with a toddler:
1. keep certain items out of their reach: the egg carton
2. get out as many of the ingredients as possible and have them within reach so you don't have to leave the toddler alone with the bowl to get creative
3. have a good idea of the order of things (he wants the next ingredient as soon as he's done with one)
4. make things that have a little room for error-a bit gets stirred out over the edge or sometimes some salt misses the bowl.
5. plan on cleaning up a mess

The first time I tried baking with A. while Nate was at work I thought to myself 'never again, that was a disaster' but A. and I have figured out how to make it work and we love making things together. I sometimes feel a little bad making something when he's asleep because I think 'man, he'd love helping with this.'
Here's a video from when we made bread together the other day:

He wanted to wear my necklace. Posing for the camera:

Got the real smile :)

Daddy Time

2011-07-28T21:34:00.004-04:00

We have a little boy who wants to be like his daddy, and who can blame him? Nate is amazing and does such a great job with A.

They are pointing out the cows that they see in the distance:

Some baseball lessons. I love this little video.

Nate pretends that he's sleeping by snoring and A. touches his nose to wake him up. A. probably thinks that's how you are supposed to wake a sleeping person up :)

Nothing like a little story time

Nauvoo

2011-07-28T21:10:00.003-04:00

We were excited to visit Nauvoo while living this close to it. Nauvoo is a historic site for our church (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints). We were impressed by all the stories about the people, many of whom were extremely poor, who worked together to build up a beautiful city from a swamp in a short period of time. The people were all very hard working, charitable, and faithful and they were able to amazing things. We were able to learn lots of interesting details about what it was like to live in the 'West' in the 1840s. We both have ancestors who lived in the city and we were able to tour the house of Nate's Great-great-something Grandfather (Wilford Woodruff) and learn more details about his life. We met up with my brother and his family and had a great time even though it is such a hot time of year to make the trip!
Some pictures to remember the adventure:

After a little practice A. was awesome on these stilts and could walk pretty far with Nate's help.

This video makes it to the blog by request of little A.- he asks to watch the movie of him on stilts every time he sees this picture (he enjoys scrolling through the blog looking at pictures of our adventures).

Churning a little imaginary butter:

We helped make a rope that was great for playing tug-of-war

A. would have sat on this wagon all day if we let him.

We were a little sad to see this trip come to an end because we don't know when our next big adventure will be (the baby will be getting here too soon for a Thanksgiving trip and too recently to go anywhere for Christmas).

P.S. I'm Pregnant :)

2011-07-16T21:23:00.003-04:00

Oh, and by the way, I'm going to have a baby. Another one, my first is just growing up too fast and he needs another little someone to be his full time buddy. I'm due sometime around Dec. 1st which means that I'm half-way there. We found out on Wednesday that it is going to be another boy- just what I was hoping for!

My favorite thing about the ultrasound this time was number 1: seeing his little beating heart. The detail is awesome, you could see all 4 chambers and you could see the little valves opening and shutting as he was working hard to pump that blood around. I'm always amazed at how miraculous our bodies are. number 2: A. saying 'baby, baby!' the whole time and declaring that he was 'noisy' when we listened to the baby's heartbeat. Here is a profile shot with his little hand fisted under his chin.

He wanted to wave hello:

Colorado Adventures 2011

2011-07-15T13:20:00.007-04:00

After spending a week in Utah visiting Nate's family, A. and I went to Colorado to see part of my family. My parents live there and my sister was visiting from Texas with her two boys for most of the week. Our trip also overlapped with my Aunt Julie's stay for a day as well. We got there on the 4th and my mom held down the fort with the boys sleeping peacefully in their beds while the rest of us went to see the firework show. I've always loved the fireworks show in our city, they do such a good job and you can get right underneath the fireworks. Some were so bright that I had trouble keeping my eyes open though and you could feel the vibrations from the explosions. There was a little pool set up on the deck, but A. mostly just wanted it to water my mom's little porch garden.

Z. loved doing puzzles, and getting a round of applause for every piece he put in place (note his hands placed together as a hint that we should be clapping). He helped A. get out of a grumpy mood by paying him special attention.

These three had a lot of fun playing together. They're all within about 2 years of each other in age. A. loved running around the circle (entry-way, through the living room, through the kitchen, and past the family room) chasing Z. Even if Z. wasn't running A. would run chanting 'chase Z. chase Z." and laughing. I think he said it even when Z. was in another room playing because A. couldn't usually see Z. anyway because Z. is more than a year older, quite a bit taller, and therefore much faster at running. Good times.

My dad with all his grandsons at the park.

This was a water fountain that the boys had the most fun playing in after it went off so they could jump in the puddles. C. was the most willing to get wet in the cold water. A. likes to hang around on the outside and watch till the main water goes off, then he gets down to business.

My Aunt Julie was in Colorado for part of our trip so we were able to play with her too.

Stairs were a novelty to these two.

We went to the Denver Children's museum and the boys had fun, especially the older two who could actually do the activities. They had a lot of things that were right along A's interests. The rocket-launching was both of our favorites I think.

Chair rides were fun-

Reading stories with grandpa, this only ever lasted for a couple minutes, there was just too many other fun things to do.

A little music practice

We headed to the local pool. A. was even brave enough to go down the big slide with me a couple times. He does get pretty overwhelmed in general at crowded loud places like that though.

We went to a Wildlife Sanctuary where they had animals like tigers, lions, bears, wolves, leopards, etc. We picked a good day to go because the animals, especially the tigers were super active because they were about to be fed. They are only fed every three days because that's how often they eat in the wild.

There was a HUGE puddle at this viewing deck. The little boys tramped back and forth having a ball!

Z. was even willing to share a couple animals with A.- that's saying something for a little boy who has a special place in his heart for his animals!

C. was a good sport to let A. give him a ride on the toy car.

We went on a walk around the lake and A. was able to throw rocks into the water, one of his very favorite activities. The other day after we got home I told him we were going on a walk and he assumed we were going here...

We sure love getting to spend time with family. We had a lot of fun and made some great memories. A. and I were excited to see Nate after our trip though. A. was pretty excited seeing our apartment too and wanted to try to do every activity he has fun doing (for example setting up a table against the couch for a slide, sweeping, jumping onto our beanbag...) just as soon as we got home. Nate cleaned the ENTIRE house for me as a welcome home present, I loved it- he even cleaned the hard-water spots off the faucets that were here when we moved in over a year ago that were bugging me... I love my man.

Utah Adventures 2011

2011-07-13T20:26:00.006-04:00

Nate's family flew us out to Utah for a week-long visit. A. recognized everyone and was happy to see family. He even got to watch a movie in Grandma Sharp's car- so he took every chance he could to run errands with Grandma. He loved having new places to explore and fun activities to do. We sure were spoiled by all the yummy food, the help with A., and the fun activities! Here they are singing a song and doing the actions, A. was helping with the actions.

Nate had been planning for weeks what he'd be able to build with the lego collection his family built up over the years.

Playing with Aunt Amber.

A. loved all the attention he got. He was happy as a clam to play with everyone's phone, sometimes two at one time!

He wanted to read with Amber several times :)

My brother Jason, his wife Cassie, and their little girl- E. came over to the house to visit. We set up a pool for A. and E. to swim in. They are really close in age and it was fun to see them running around together.

A. was funny with Tonto- the family dog. He was scared for the first few days to be near him, but loved being able to see Tonto. He'd often request to see Tonto just as soon as he'd wake up. After a few days he was willing to go up to Tonto to pet him or give him one of his toys, but he'd still get scared if Tonto came anywhere near him. Even after he was willing to go up to Tonto he'd still randomly be nervous around him, I guess he just had to be in the right mood. He thought that Tonto should always have his duck toy and be sitting on the couch- good luck convincing a dog to comply with demands like that!

We went to the Children's Museum in Salt Lake while we were there. They had tons of hands-on activities for A. to do. He was a bit overwhelmed for part of the time, like he normally is if there are a lot of people and a lot of noise, but we all had fun!

Sitting in the helicopter with mommy!

He had quite the group of adults following him around, ready to help if he needed any!

We got to ride on the new 4-wheelers. One had an attachment to plow snow and so A. decided that they must be bulldozers and has spent the past several days talking about his ride on a bulldozer with daddy.

Right before leaving for the airport we helped ourselves to some cut-up watermelon. A. loved poking them with a toothpick, so once he was full he started sharing with his daddy!

It goes without saying that we had a blast!

One Little Monkey

2011-06-12T21:05:00.003-04:00

Lately A. hasn't wanted to get out of his crib after waking up for the day or from his nap. Can't imagine why...

We love getting fun books to read! We just hope they don't lead to any bumped chins... He also just loves hanging out in there while we read him other stories, he looks through books, or plays with toys that he requests.

Until lately A. hasn't been much of a climber, maybe cause he's kinda short and has short little legs, but now he's discovered some mischief to get into if he climbs a little higher.

One Little Monkey- sure is loved though!

Mmmm, strawberries

2011-06-12T21:00:00.003-04:00

I was able to go to a strawberry farm and pick some strawberries this past week. I picked a little less than 7 pounds, but the strawberries were pretty little, it was over 90 degrees, I had a friend watching A. for me (which was a life-saver- it would have been so hard to pick with just the two of us...) and it was about 25 min drive each way- so I counted my almost 7 pounds as good. They were delicious and we've been enjoying them all week. Some found their way into freezer-jam, some into strawberry syrup, and lots and lots to our tummies. Strawberries are one of my very favorite treats!

Seeing the Sights

2011-06-05T16:02:00.006-04:00

On Memorial Day we took my parents to look around campus. They have a big fountain that is fun to play in- but it was turned off. A. was none the wiser and still loved chasing his daddy and grandma around all the cement walls.

We went to a local dairy farm that we've heard a lot about and had a blast! We rode on a bus that was painted to look like a cow and got to see how everything operates- they had thousands of cows. One crazy thing was that everything was powered using methane gas that they produce from the cow manure! We learned a lot about the cows and then about the dairy products. A. thought the pipes they had to show the temperature of milk after leaving the cow and then after they cooled it down was pretty funny- he's a big fan of 'hot' and 'cold' right now.

On the bus he preferred sitting with his grandparents! He's still talking about when he went on his bus ride.

After we watched a cow being born (they apparently have about 80 calves born a day...) we headed outside to play a little. There was a train:

There was a climbing wall that I went up a few times.

A huge inflated bubble to jump on

And the favorite- tractors you can ride on. He would have done it all day if we would have let him, too bad it was tiring trying to bend down to hold the gas pedal and steer while walking alongside it to do it for too long.

They had a 4D movie that was pretty boring but we got a good picture and it was only 10 minutes.

A human-powered carousel was a fun adventure for A. as well.

We also stopped by the cafe to get some fresh milk, grilled cheese sandwiches/quesadillas, and ice cream- very yummy.

Kirtland Ohio

2011-06-02T20:43:00.008-04:00

My parents came to visit! A. was a little unsure about our visitors when he first woke up to find them on Thursday but after a few minutes he started to send smiles their way and within a few hours he was one happy boy to be able to play with them.

We packed up the car and headed to Ohio, that's one more state for us Sharps to add to our list (list of states we've visited). My mom especially wanted to go and see church history sites and we figured we didn't know if any of us would ever be this close again. We broke up the 6+ hour drive for the little man and his pregnant mommy. A. did awesome on the drive though, he especially loved being able to sit next to his grandma- they sure could make each other laugh! They watched for trucks, tractors, and buses for hours. Considering all the farm areas we were driving through we saw a ton!

We saw most of the sites on Friday. First we headed over to the Kirtland temple. It was the first temple built in this time, but is now owned by another church. They hold really nice tours and tell you a lot about the history.

We then headed over to the LDS church history center. We walked through the Newel K. Whitney Store, and several replicas of significant buildings close by. A favorite place to see was the upper room in the Whitney store where the school of the prophets was held.

The little man did really well being taken in and out even though we needed him to stay quiet for all of our tours.

We had lunch at a park that overlooked Lake Erie. It was the first time that my parents have been able to see one of the great lakes.

Back into the car we went to head over to the Johnson farm.

Toward the end of this tour A. had had it and I ended up needing to take him outside.

We then drove 4 hours to get to my Uncle's house- it was about 10pm when we finally got there and little A. had no intention of falling asleep during the drive. If everyone stopped looking at him then he'd start singing 'head shoulders knees and toes' or just give cheesy grins till someone couldn't stand to not look at his cute little face.

We spent most of the day at my Uncle's house until coming back home. For the entire trip I think that A. only cried for about 15 minutes or so- he did great- and so did his fan club that tried their hardest to keep him pleased. The trip was a success and fun memories were made!

The Milk Man

2011-05-18T13:12:00.003-04:00

A. has finally learned that the word 'milk' starts with the letter 'M' and not 'G'- still says it like mulk though...

This was one of those instances that was too funny to not get a picture, but don't worry this will NOT be a normal thing for the little man- we do have some rules around here :)

Porch Garden

2011-05-18T13:00:00.003-04:00

We've been wanting to grow a few vegetables around here in hopes that one day we can have a garden and that we'll have an idea how to actually do it. We only have a porch here so we decided that we'd try growing things in pots. We tried sprouting some seeds inside- killed those though... So for round two we thought we'd try growing them straight in the pot outside. A. has been loving helping us water and the poor things would drown if they got as much water as A. thinks is necessary.

We're sure hoping that we can get something to grow, but if all else fails (it's pretty windy here and that's rough on the little plants) we've had fun trying!

Baby Quilt

2011-05-18T12:52:00.002-04:00

I made a baby quilt for my good friend who is having a baby girl sometime in the next month. It was my first major sewing project and it was a lot of fun to do. My ward has a quilting group that meets once a month and baby quilts was one of the projects a little while back. I got my fabric (most, I was really hoping to use a pattern that my friend and I both had on blankets when we were growing up, but I hadn't had success finding it yet so I got four patterns that I thought would work if I could get my hands on 'THE ONE'). I went to the activity to learn what on earth I was supposed to do. I stood in my area cutting away when I decided that I would walk around and see what other people had chosen for their blankets. Miraculously I spotted THE pattern I needed being used by an older woman in my ward. I raced over and asked where in the world she found the fabric and told her all about how that was the one that I needed and the reason that I was wanting to make a baby blanket in the first place. She said she had it in her scrap box from several years ago and that she was just trying to learn how to make one- so she wasn't actually using any specific fabric and that I could have it! I was SO happy and it makes me so grateful and happy every time I think of it. Here's how the blanket turned out:

Smile!

2011-05-01T22:27:00.002-04:00

When we tell Andrew to 'smile' this is the face we get these days:

Although his version of 'smiling' is cute, the real deal is my favorite.

Easter Fun

2011-04-28T12:49:00.003-04:00

With two practice Easter Egg hunts, this little boy was ready to go for the one we had on Saturday. We hid eggs while he was napping and he even woke up to find one in his crib and a few in his room leading out the door. As soon as he saw them he knew what to do and he was down to business.

He's a little man who loves his candy- mostly starbursts and jellybeans

Happy Easter!

Lovin' Life

2011-04-20T21:45:00.002-04:00

Life is good. How could it not be with these two around?

We are really enjoying the life of a student (well Nate being a student I mean, I graduated this time last year) Nate is flexible in his schedule. We usually sleep in past 7 or 7:30 everyday. Make and eat breakfast together and play a little until we bid Nate 'buh-bye' to go to work. He's also usually able to be home by 5ish and then we spend some good quality time hiding, reading, and coloring- or other similar activities. Tonight while A. was in his crib falling asleep we heard him in there laughing to himself, not sure the joke he was thinking of but we enjoyed it just the same. Some funny things he did today:
-tried to get his stuffed animal bunny to ride his car with him
-helped himself to a bag of dried fruit he could reach when Nate was holding him by our food shelves
-found a new piece of paper and brought it over to his coloring table and went to town making a picture
-when we were telling him to smile for a picture he'd open his mouth really wide (he thought that's how you smile)
-trying to get Nate to tickle him

Cookie Time!

2011-04-14T12:42:00.003-04:00

Nate loved making treats with his Dad and siblings on Sundays growing up and he decided that A. is old enough to start the tradition in our home. A. is really into helping us cook, especially when he gets to measure ingredients and stir so he was extremely excited to get to be a chef with his daddy. They had so much fun together and didn't even make too much of a mess.

He was making the same sound the beaters make as they mixed their ingredients together.

Not that we're complaining, but we couldn't convince Andrew to taste his finished product. At least if he's going to be selective about what he'll eat at meal time he'll be picky about junk food too :)

Conference Weekend

2011-04-02T20:09:00.005-04:00

General Conference for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is being held this weekend. It's one of our favorite times of the year. We get to hear from a Prophet of God and other leaders about a variety of topics. It inspires us to try harder, to be kinder, to be more loving, to be more generous- to be more like our Savior Jesus Christ.

Last October we started the tradition of sleeping in a tent on Friday night before Coference starts with the door of the tent facing a picture of the temple that we have hanging on the wall. The idea came from the Book of Mormon when the people gathered their families in tents and faced their doors toward the temple (see Mosiah 2:5-6) so that they could hear the word of the Lord. A. is still too young to sleep in the tent with us, but he helped set up/take down, and we all spent some good quality time playing in it :)

Since we live in the Eastern time zone we had over 5 hours of time before conference started so we headed outside to fly a kite. This was the first time we've all tried it together and the wind was great for it. (at last the land of the wind that we've moved to has come in handy!)

We've had a really hard time getting pictures of him lately- he stops and runs for the camera... So here I tried to sneak up behind him to catch him gabbering. He's not truly gabbering here but it's still cute. We call him our little motor boat with how frequently he "talks" he knows several words but he just takes off saying nonsense words a mile a minute and he usually has a very serious look on his face. Pretty sure he think he's telling us whats on his mind- too bad we can't understand, but it sure is cute :)

oh, and I love the smile he gives at the end of the video.
and another oh- we switched him to a booster seat and let him join us at the table which has helped a ton with getting him to sit down to eat without a fight. Now the only problem seems to be that he likes to steal my "gork" (fork)- the big tease.

Thoughts

2011-03-27T20:43:00.003-04:00

So, I've been thinking about a few things a lot lately. The first is how can a I be a good mom, specifically to a toddler. He is learning so fast right now and amazes us everyday with the things he can understand. I know that I want to have a little boy who follows the rules and listens to his mommy and daddy. The what is pretty easy, but the how gives me a little trouble. Where is the balance between being compassionate with teething, sickness... and having very set rules to follow and being consistent. It's so easy for me to come up with some reason as to why I should cater to his every whim but then when I do I feel like I'm setting him up to be spoiled or disrespectful/disobedient. I can get caught up on things like how badly I want to teach him to eat healthy food- or even how I can get a veggie or enough protein into him for the day. I have resorted to some kinda desperate ways to get protein into him- like grinding dry beans into flour and baking it into the things he will eat since he is pretty darn choosy as to what he will even let us put on his plate (he removes what he doesn't want and hands it to us- any suggestions here?). Because I loved learning about nutrition in school I feel like it is my job to get all the good stuff into my guys. I think that I've let my focus for parenting get off of what is really important- love, the Savior, the Plan of Happiness, etc. I found this awesome article by chance on LDS.org. It got me to thinking about what should be most important and how we should be setting a good example to our kids while they are young. When our focus is right we can have the Spirit help us know how to handle situations. Children are loved by the Lord even more than we could ever love them and as we seek his assistance we can be guided to know what is best for them. Another thing along those lines seems to be that the best things in life take a lot of work. Having well behaved kids makes for a happy time at home- for everyone! Considering how much time I spend at home, I'm all about a happy one :) Teaching those kids to be well behaved though seems to be no easy task. I guess I better roll up my sleeves and prepare for a little blood, sweat, and tears because it'll be worth it.

The second thing that I've been thinking a lot about lately is being a good steward of our things. I have been blessed with so much in my life. In our culture it can be so easy to feel like our life will be better if we have this and this and this. I am no exception here. Even though A. has plenty of toys- I love to look at them at the store and think "wow, he'd have a lot of fun with this one, and this one, and oh he loves buttons- this one would make him really happy too." I don't buy all of them, or any of them a lot of the time, but I waste time thinking about it. He doesn't need every toy that he's ever enjoyed. It's better for him to have a few and learn to be grateful for what he has and to take care of them. Another trap that I get sucked into is getting stuff because it's a 'good deal' I'm a sucker for low prices, but low priced stuff that I get I usually don't need or it isn't even very good quality (like dollar toys...) and then we just seem to be surrounded by too much that I'm constantly trying to find a place for or put away. That just seems silly to me and yet old habits die hard. My new goals are quality, not quantity and to take good care of the things I do have. Nate told me about this talk (http://lds.org/general-conference/2004/10/more-holiness-give-me?lang=eng) that he really liked. The messages given in general conference by our Prophet and other leaders sure are great. I can't wait till Saturday when we get to hear from them again. Following their counsel really does make me happier.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

2011-03-17T20:16:00.003-04:00

Two out of three of us are sporting our green today. Nate on the other hand decided to celebrate his favorite holiday of the year "Opening day of March Madness" and wore a BYU shirt. To be festive around here we made some Irish Soda Bread- with a little green of course. A. helped me make it. Did a little finger painting with green paint. And we've watched all sorts of college basketball.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Battle of Wills

2011-03-17T19:46:00.005-04:00

Ended in a draw.
We told him he needed to eat one more piece of hot dog before he could have more fruit. He stayed there (upset) until he fell asleep after about 40 minutes.

Being an Example

2011-03-17T19:40:00.003-04:00

Where'd he get the idea to do this? oh wait, he saw me do it. What's funny is I didn't even really think about it- how embarrassing! I was sitting on the floor and that was the quickest way for me to eat my cheerio. Now that our little man is copying everything we do it is so important that I set a good example for him. Maybe I ought to not eat like a doggy or a certain little boy might think that that's an ok way to eat :) At least we had some fun being creative in our eating habits.

Texas

2011-03-10T19:21:00.006-05:00

The little man and I escaped the winter weather for a week to go visit my sister and her family in Texas. Moving away from my sister several months ago was one of the hardest things for me about moving to Indiana so we were pretty excited to get to see her and her boys. As we were traveling there I would periodically name everyone in her family who we were going to go see and he'd get a big smile on his face (he even stopped crying one of the times!) It was crazy trying to get everyone fed, dressed, and rested enough to get out the door. 3 kids two and under is a lot of work! We checked out several parks while we were there:

He put the hat on himself :)

He was being pretty funny in the car on the way home :)

The boys went swimming on the back porch

Then jumped in the tub together to wash up and baby C. joined the fun... or should I say craziness? We tried to skype with my parents so they could see it to, while taking pictures, while trying to keep the boys above water and in the tub, and get them clean.

We went to see a wall of water downtown that pours 11,000 (I think) gallons of water a minute. It's a lot bigger than the picture makes it look. Too bad it was cold and windy and we were all dressed for summer so we stayed long enough to take a few pictures and say 'oooh' and 'ahhh'

We met up with Derrick's brother and sister-in-law and got some lunch.

Playing together at the apartment.

We went downtown to play at a park and meet Derrick for a picnic during his lunch break. Too bad the playground was invaded by 50 5th graders right after we got there. Z. didn't seem to mind and he kept making his rounds up and down the slide like they weren't even there.

We had some sweet dance parties (A. did not fall over here- he's pretty talented.)

Playing in the dry tub while their mommies got ready for the day.

Back to the airport again. We figured out that this was A.'s 13th trip on an airplane. He's a trooper!

Oh, and after 2 and 1/2 months we were able to break A's banana habit that I mentioned in the previous post. One morning I just forgot to bring one with me when I went to get him up. Who needs bananas when there are fun cousins to play with?

Mornings

2011-02-27T22:09:00.004-05:00

We have turned into morning people over here. Kind of. Two at a time at least- since we shifted A. to one nap instead of two he started waking up an hour or more earlier so we take turns getting up with him. Mornings are a little different around here. We have to walk into A.'s room with a banana in view (which was a result of us trying to wean him and we've kinda just kept with it even though it is a bit ridiculous, but hey what better way to start the day then by getting rescued from captivity- aka 'the crib' and given your favorite food?). A. is a breakfast man. Most of the foods he likes are breakfast foods. He is a big fan of the whole process and his favorite thing in the kitchen is our griddle (or maybe the rice cooker, or waffle iron?). We whip up a nice hot breakfast like blueberry pancakes or maybe some french toast if we're feeling adventurous or stick with easier things if it's just too early. After we play/read stories for a bit we go get daddy and then cook some more breakfast for him. A. loves that Nate puts applesauce on his pancakes and so they sit/(stand if you're under two feet tall) at the table and eat his pancakes, with big boy forks of course. I usually sneak off for a nap at this point. This particular morning we turned on a little music and had a dance party. Check out this fancy footwork:

There really was music playing :) the camera just didn't pick it up.
And then we looked out the window for dogs, cats, birds, or geese.

Top O' The Mornin' To Ya!

Oops.

2011-02-27T21:05:00.004-05:00

Sometimes we have a little trouble getting dressed around here :)
-I may or may not have put both his little legs into one pant leg. Forgive the poor picture quality, but I didn't want to make him be stuck for too long. He was kinda confused about why he couldn't walk. What a good sport I have!... p.s. it was an accident but it gave me a good laugh. Oh the little things in life :)

February

2011-02-21T09:53:00.008-05:00

We have felt the extremes weather-wise this month (for a winter month at least) It was absolutely freezing for the first part (for example some days it was a high in the single digits not considering wind and humidity) and then the past week we got up to 50! We loved the warmer weather. It is so nice to be able to get outside and play, spring will be so welcome. A. has been seeming a lot older for the last little while. He is repeating more words than we could count-this morning he said two :) Here he is saying 'Boom' with Nate.

Although he does know how to say more words he doesn't usually try to communicate with us using words. He likes to try to show us what he wants. He definitely has specific things he wants and usually gets pretty upset if we can't figure out what it is the first or second try. He is also really big into testing his boundaries as of about a week ago. He'll intentionally do things he knows he's not supposed to to see what we'll do about it. Yesterday he stood on his little green chair (which he knows he's not allowed to) while we were coloring and looked at me and said 'no'. Which is another thing he learned this week- the word 'no'. It's really cute when he says it, or at least it is if he's not telling us 'no'. The latest defiant act is trying to pull his bib off or fighting us when we're putting it on. Oh toddlerhood.

He does love reading stories and playing games with us. His laugh is one of my favorite sounds in the world.

He has developed a really strong attachment to his blankies. He has 3 favorites that he wants to carry around with him everywhere around home and church, thankfully he doesn't need them when we're running errands. He likes to cover his head and say 'Andwoo' because he's heard all the times I've said 'Where's my Andrew?!' Lately it's been a lot easier to do chores with him awake which has been really nice. He likes trying to help (especially sweeping or vacuuming). He has started holding our hands while walking outside which has been great for directing him to specific locations and I think it's so dog-on cute when he holds my hand. He loves having us write letters and tell him the name of them. He also has learned some actions for a few songs like 'The Wheels on the Bus'- it's fun to watch him cry like the baby, sush like the mom, and read like the dad. :)
We went to a fish shop the other day for 'Moms and Tots'. A. sure loved running around and looking at all those fishies.

Family Fort

2011-02-18T21:32:00.002-05:00

The other night we made a big ol' fort in our living room and had a blast! We used all of our chairs and both of our couches. It was pretty short though which made me miss the chairs that we'd use for fort-building at my house growing up. We'll definitely need to do this again soon!

A Day in the Life...

2011-02-06T15:01:00.004-05:00

Here are some little movies from earlier this week for the Grandmas, Grandpas, and anyone else who wishes they got to see Andrew in his element a little more.
Yep, still loves that camera :)

Cracks me up.

He wanted to read you a story, (sorry about the moving video):

15 Months

2011-01-27T11:35:00.005-05:00

It's true, my little man is officially 15 months or 1 1/4 years old! He's sure fun right now. He's curious, talkative, and just learning so fast. He knows how to say around 20 words- things like 'nana' for banana, up, all done, doggie, momma, daddy, please, hot, bath, out, bye-bye, hi, grandpa, ball, read, uh-oh, eyes... yesterday he found the power of saying 'up please' when he consistently was picked up for saying it- he got really good at saying it really fast. He sure loves to be held so that he can be a part of the action. Right now he still loves dancing to music, pushing buttons, pushing cars around, going outside, cooking, and reading books with mommy. He's very big into routines right now- for instance, he's knows it's his job to turn off the light before bed after I give him his blankie and then I close the closet door before I start singing to him. He is understanding things more and more. He always says 'uh-oh' when he drops something- often on purpose- and then says something that sounds like 'I did it'. It's been harder lately to get pictures of him doing things because he often stops whatever he's doing to get the camera- he was stuck this time though:

This is the first picture that he took all by himself. He was holding the camera and everything.

'You the MOM'... or maybe 'I want the camera!'

He's been big into pushing/riding around in the stroller. And sticking out his little tongue.

He also scowls all the time- when he's mad, happy, doesn't matter the mood. And he loves to eat cold cereal with milk, he was being very careful to scoop up every bit of cereal he could.

Getting bigger every day.

His little cave.

Daddy's Boy

2011-01-25T12:12:00.003-05:00

This little guy wants to be just like his daddy. He loves trying to do whatever Nate is doing. He sure loves his daddy and gets the biggest smile on his face when Nate walks in the door. He's always laughing at the silly things that Nate is doing. (However, he's only a daddy's boy when I'm in the room. He doesn't need me to be giving him attention when Nate's home, but he gets quite put out if I try to leave the room without him being able to follow along.) The little man and I sure love our #1 man!

Dropping Confetti

Eating big boy cereal together

This was right before church this week- his little smile cracks me up!

Grating carrots together at the table for our muffins

Helping his daddy load the dishwasher. He's looking SO big!

Christmas Part 4: Hawaii

2011-01-13T21:43:00.012-05:00

Off to the airport again. All in all we went on 6 flights this trip ranging from 1 hour to about 7 hrs. Needless to say we spent a lot of time traveling to/from airports, at airports, and on airplanes.

We were so blessed to be able to go to Hawaii with Nate's family. We met up with them in Utah and then flew to Hawaii. Unfortunately the day that we flew to Hawaii A. became sick with a 24-hr stomach bug (that involved throwing up for a day and feeling a bit gross for a day or two after that) the morning we flew to Hawaii. Thankfully he did great on the super long plan ride considering. We were so lucky to have a direct flight from Utah because we spent the entire day traveling as it was. A. did get pretty sick as we were driving to the house we stayed at- in the pouring rain. And then later that night I got hit with it too. The next day A was feeling quite a bit better and we were able to head to the beach which was super close to where we stayed. A's favorite thing about Hawaii was probably the beach. He is a little man who loves going outside more than anyone I know and the beach had all sorts of fun things to explore.

We ate a little sand while we were there, but all in all it didn't upset him too much and it didn't happen very many times.

Helping build the sand castle

We spent some good time boggie-boarding

We went to the Polynesian Cultural Center while we were there. I was under the impression that it was similar to a Visitor's Center or a small museum, boy was I wrong! That place is HUGE. Each of the nations of the pacific had a show that portrayed aspects of their culture. We also were able to go to the Luau with authentic Hawaiian food and Nate's dad watched A. so he could sleep while the rest of us went to the play the Cultural Center put on in the evening- it was really cool.

We walked over to BYU Hawaii to see the campus- A. loved every bit of it from the walking there, all the attention from his uncles, grandparents, aunt and parents, to the water fountain, to the cool rock outside.

This was a common sight:

He wanted to be held by his mommy (or his daddy) a ton while we were there.

We were able to go to the temple while we were there. One evening after Andrew was asleep we were able to attend a session with Nate's parents and brother Tyler. It was such a blessing to be able to go with family, to know that A was fine- and not upset that we were gone, and to only need to drive a few minutes-instead of the hours it takes to get to a temple from where we live. Plus we enjoyed being able to see a new temple.

The Sharp Family minus Aaron who is serving a mission.

We were able to go snorkeling at Hanauma Bay. It was gorgeous there and we were able to see a lot of really cool fish. At first when I tried I started to panic because I'm not a very good swimmer and I was terrified of not being able to stand up. It took me a few tries to get going, but I'm glad that I got it because it was a really cool experience and such an accomplishment for me to overcome something that scared me! Amber (and Mckay, Tyler, and Nate's dad) watched him so that Nate and I could go out together.

We visited Pearl Harbor while we were there.

Nate and his brother Tyler got sick with the bug on the flight home, they spent the first day back like this: (this picture wasn't staged)

A. thought their bowls were pretty cool, so his grandma got one for him too.
A. thought his uncle Hunter was hilarious! All trip long he would start laughing when he saw Hunter.

Christmas Part 3: Christmas Day

2011-01-09T14:59:00.006-05:00

After waking up and getting A. some breakfast we started to open presents with everyone. Because there were so many people and the little kids couldn't wait for everyone to take a turn, we all just kinda opened and looked around occasionally. A. opened a few, but was mostly too distracted to stay on task. The adults all got hats to wear and the kids got matching pajamas.

We had the opportunity to talk with my younger brother Garrett on Skype. He is currently serving a mission in North Carolina for our church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Families get to talk with the missionaries on Christmas and Mother's Day and this time they were given permission to skype with their family if possible. It was fun to show him how big the kids were all getting and to actually see him. He's a great example to me.

My parents had a little table and chairs in the basement that A. LOVED. He especially loved eating snacks at the table- and he was pretty pleased to be in just a diaper for a bit. Lately he loves finding little seats that are just his size.

He got some quality cousin time.

My dad, Nate, and I took A. to see some Christmas lights in Broomfield CO. This house had the best display that I have ever seen. It was indescribable. Thousands of people come to see this house each year. A. loved it! He thought he was so big running around all the people to look at lights and trains and...

He doesn't usually want to hold our hands while he's walking, but I love it when he does. I thought it was funny that he was looking up at my dad like 'who are you?'

When we got back it was bath time. A. Loves baths.

He especially loves bubble baths. He especially especially loves bubble baths with his cousin. These two had a ball playing in my parents big tub.

The water was flying ALL over the place.

And then it was time to get the boys ready for bed to dream of Christmas next year.

A. was such a happy boy for Christmas which really made it enjoyable for me and Nate. He loved getting to see all sorts of new things and play at Grandma and Grandpa Jones' house and spend time with his cousins. Until next year...

Christmas 2010 Part 2

2010-12-30T15:10:00.006-05:00

Jen's family and Jason's family were also able to come to Colorado for Christmas. It was a lot of fun to see the kids play together. We were able to play some tennis. All the adults were able to attend the temple- my cousins who live close to the temple watched all the kids- thank you! We had the traditional Christmas party at my Aunt's house. Andrew sure had fun with her steps. We went to Target to get pictures taken, but it ended up as a bit of a disaster. One of the kids tripped on the way in and got a bloody lip, the kids were grumpy and or sick, etc. But we got pictures in the end. We played a lot of games and watched a few movies.
A. was pretty excited about being able to play with Derrick's IPad- not a big surprise there, he loves anything with buttons or a screen.

He found a sweet tub to tote around.

I got to meet my sister's little boy for the first time and I can't wait to see them again.

My dad got a lot of time to show the grandkids stuff, it was really cute.

Andrew learned how to go down the stairs. This video starts out with the boys marching to 'Follow the Prophet' and ends with the stairs. A. originally tried to go down by walking straight off, when that didn't work he tried to start by walking off backwards- still didn't work, so he eventually figured out to start by crawling backwards/sideways in his case. I'm so proud!

The kids and my mom got jammies (the kids all matched and my mom's had sock monkeys on them) and the rest of us got Christmas hats to wear in the morning. We weren't able to get a picture of all the kids dressed together because someone was always asleep, but believe me, they were cute!

Christmas 2010 Part 1

2010-12-30T14:48:00.003-05:00

Where to start with a huge event like Christmas?! This post is our first few days in Colorado. Nate and I were the first ones to get to my parents house (we brought A. of course!) A. LOVED having a new place to explore and all the attention he got. We loved the chance to escape the cold and go outside to play!
We helped grandma make chocolate balls- the best Christmas candy, no competition.

This is his traditional squat- he sits like this all the time to play!

We played some video games with Nate.

And we took a trip to the dog park that is part of a bigger park that we played on.

He found all sorts of buttons to push- he was thrilled that the power button worked on Grandma and Grandpa's printer.

Exploring outside.

We are so grateful that we got to go to Colorado several days before Christmas to play with Grandma and Grandpa Jones!

Fun with Cousins at Christmas

2010-12-26T00:55:00.005-05:00

3 of A's 4 cousins were able to celebrate Christmas at Grandma and Grandpa's house this year (we missed his other cousin and her family- hopefully we can see them soon!). It was so much fun to see the kids play with each other. As they are getting older they are able to do a lot more together.

A. thought his cousin was pretty cool and liked to do what he did (for example, march when people were singing 'Follow the Prophet').

Can you find the boys in all this Christmas fun?!

Excuse A's lack of pants, but just look how cute those legs are! These two were the closest in age and had fun playing with the same toys and climbing the stairs together.

These guys were good buds, they made each other smile/laugh every time they looked at one another even though this was the first time they'd met.

A. with Jason and Cassie's little girl (E.)

A. with Jen and Derrick's little boy (C.)

A. with Jen and Derrick's son (Z.)

We're sure going to miss our cousins!

Snow

2010-12-15T12:47:00.004-05:00

It is SO cold here. I didn't even know that it could be this cold on a regular basis. I thought I was prepared for winter, I grew up in Colorado and spent a few winters in Utah for crying out loud... boy was I wrong. There isn't as much snow, but it is way colder. A. has missed going outside everyday to play and he brings me his shoes and jacket frequently trying to convince me to go 'buh bye' with him. Occasionally it does warm up (to like 30 or 40) so we bundle up and go out to play- and we love it!

He likes to look at airplanes and point to them in the sky

He got some new boots, they help him walk in the snow, but he reminds me of a cowboy who's been in the saddle too long when he tries to walk around inside with them.

He loved getting to walk around in the snow, he'd watch his little feet make tracks in the snow. p.s. this is at the cemetery across the street that we walk through all the time- and he's not walking on any headstones.

My guys

2010-12-15T12:44:00.003-05:00

Sometimes we wake up with messy hair around here,
Sometimes it even matches! Oh how I love my guys with their unruly hair :)

Thanksgiving Vacation

2010-12-03T20:23:00.004-05:00

For Thanksgiving we were blessed with the opportunity to go visit Nate's family in Utah. We stayed at the home Nate's parents finished earlier this year with a lot of Nate's extended family. My parents came to visit their families in Utah and so we got to see them too- and my brother who lives in Provo with his wife and daughter. And my cousin Kelli. And my grandparents. (We were sad that we have enough time to see all of our family and friends who live there.) We got to eat lots of yummy food. I got to make my first cream pies-the filling at least :) - and they actually set up! We survived the blizzard of 2010 that was supposed to be the biggest blizzard in about a decade, but where we were it was kind of a joke. A. is a shy little boy who wanted to be close to his mommy and daddy the entire time. Unfortunately he never figured out that we traveled to Mountain Time Zone, so he was about 2 hours ahead of everyone else. He loved getting to have attention (as long as it was from a distance) and a big house to explore. A. walked around in the snow for the first time- too bad he couldn't walk without help with all his snow gear on :)

He loved getting to play with anything electronic and warmed up to people if they'd share with him. Hunter shared his DS with Andrew and he loved it!

A. with his Great-grandma Curry at the computer

The tunnel. Probably A's favorite place in the world. It was just his size and he loved running into it, playing peak-a-boo, etc. We spent many hours playing in here. He's with his uncle Mckay playing with cell phones. He even found a seat to get a little more comfortable.

Here he is with his grandma Sharp, she was such a good sport to go in there!

p.s. he didn't cry after that sweet wipe-out at the end, he's a tough boy.

A. also loved their dog Tanto. He was constantly chasing after him while pointing at him and saying 'doggie'

Thanks Mom and Dad Sharp for the wonderful vacation! We were so excited for months to be able to go.

Learning

2010-11-17T20:12:00.006-05:00

A. is just learning so fast! He is understanding more and more of what we say and likes to do what we do. He is quite insistent on helping us stir dinner- even dinners that don't need to be stirred :) He loves to play with us and he gets a huge smile on his face when Nate comes home. He runs out of his room in the morning, ready to seize the day!

He was wearing the bowl as a hat. I just couldn't quite catch it on camera.

SO BIG- he loves to be a big boy and eat a sandwich by himself.

Wearing his daddy's jacket

Oops, fell down- and he's stuck, yikes!

I was vacuuming and A. started out in Nate's arms, then he jumped down and grabbed his 'vacuum' to help

Then on to bigger things :)

He loves shaking his head, sometimes he throws himself off balance when he's walking from doing it, silly boy.

Lately he loves looking at the animal book with Nate- A. points to an animal and Nate makes the animal's sound. A. started making the donkey sound. Unfortunately the camera ran out of room after 3 seconds, but we think he makes a very cute donkey :)

Love love love this boy.

For Zachary

2010-11-02T19:52:00.006-04:00

My Nephew Zach loves to watch home movies. Lately he's been pretty excited about his cousin and requests 'more Andwoo' or 'more Nay.' Here are a few videos so my sister has some variety when Zach gets in his Andrew movie mood and... for anyone else interested. :)

Dear Zach,
These are for you. Love you!

He's Had a Birthday...

2010-10-29T10:07:00.003-04:00

SHOUT HURRAY!

A. is officially one year old. wow. I can't believe that that much time has already passed since he joined our family. Just looking at him you can tell he's not a baby anymore...

He loves to help us with anything he can and by 'help' I mean do it too. We gave him a musical instrument set because our little man loves to make noise!

He loved sitting in the box it came in-just his size. A favorite birthday activity was getting pushed around the house in it.

Not a huge fan of cake... maybe we should have given him a banana or a pear if we were going for an ecstatic, funny boy. Oh, I think his tummy is very cute. :)

Loves those buttons... Nate came home in between classes so we could celebrate while Andrew was happiest.

He has figured out ways to tell us what he wants. For example, if he's hungry he runs into his room and lugs this pillow- which is as big as him- to me or Nate. I use the pillow when I nurse him so that's why he associates it with food, but he brings it even when he wants a meal in his high chair. And, he's quite upset if we hide the pillow and he's searching for it...

Now that he's one he tries to climb onto all sorts of things... too bad he's so short and can't really climb onto anything without a boost up.
He LOVE LOVE LOVES his daddy and mommy, the computer- especially laptops, cell phones, and fruit.
We can proudly say that he now consistently sleeps through the night :)

Yum.

2010-10-27T10:55:00.002-04:00

A. has been working on eating all by himself. So big.

Michigan

2010-10-11T16:48:00.008-04:00

Michigan is the 21st state I've been too, the 13th state for Nate and the 6th state for A. We went there for a little family vacation and we loved it! The timing was perfect as we got to see the leaves changing colors- it made for a beautiful drive.
We decided to break up the 4 hour drive by stopping at the beach (Lake Michigan). The water was too cold to play in, but A. loved the sand, chasing seagulls, and looking at the water with his daddy. We were pretty surprised at how many waves there were considering it was a lake.

While we were in Grand Rapids they had an event called ArtPrize going on where they featured over 1200 pieces of art in a 3 square mile radius in the city. We saw several while we were there- we were surrounded by a free art museum- how cool is that?

It was family night at the children's museum so we of course had to go. A. loved the piano, the clear elevator, and pushing a little shopping cart (of course).

We also checked out the Fish Ladder on the Grand River that runs through Grand Rapids. The water was so clear and beautiful.

Next we headed to the Botanical Gardens and Sculpture Park. They had tons of interesting art and some incredible plants too. Our favorite area was the children's area of course :) The highlight of the park was this replica of the Great Lakes with little toy boats for the kids to play with.

The children's area also had this exhibit where the kids could explore plants etc. with their senses. Good times.

A. loved looking up at these "balls" of flowers with Nate. He was laughing and laughing :)

This next picture is for my nephew Zachary:

We sure kept A. busy. He loved pretty much everything from the beach, to the hotel pool and room, to the museum, to the fountains. He fell right to sleep after some of our adventures (sometimes before he could even finish his graham cracker)

It was so fun to get away and just spend time together as a family. We made lots of fun memories and were so grateful that A. did so well sleeping away from home and seeing so many new things. Nate was great taking care of us and showing A. some of the wonders this world holds- I love watching them together. Makes me excited for forever :)

New Conference Tradition

2010-10-02T21:10:00.003-04:00

This year I had the idea to start a new family tradition. The night before conference (last night) we camped out in our living room. We set the door of the tent to face the picture of the temple we have hanging on our wall. We finished up the story where King Benjamin was preaching to the people (who had the door to their tents facing the temple). It also worked out perfect that the most recent edition of the Ensign is all about temples so we read an article out of there this morning- in our tent of course :) A. didn't end up sleeping in the tent- I tried bringing him into it at about 5 am after feeding him, but as soon as I laid him down he woke right up and sat there looking around and wiggling for about 5-10 minutes just looking at the tent so off to his real bed he went- he can join us when he's older. It was also really fun setting the tent up because he was so excited about trying to help the entire time while totally getting in the way and he had a blast playing in the tent before bed (he was slap happy and so much fun). Although we didn't sleep great, it was memorable!

p.s. don't mind A's clothes that totally don't match, in fact I don't know if they could NOT match any more, today was also laundry day :)

Kitchen

2010-09-30T11:27:00.003-04:00

The kitchen is probably the most exciting place in the house to A, even if nothing is going on in there :) This video was taken right after he saw water bubbling in the rice cooker (the white thing on the counter) which he thought was SO funny. He wants so badly to be tall enough to see onto the counter and stove. It also shows him walking and talking at 11 months.

September

2010-09-28T08:59:00.005-04:00

Things have picked up around here as Nate has started school and continues his research. I have gotten more involved in things like Institute and Moms and Tots etc. (I'm going to start referring to our little man as A. on here I think) A. just turned 11 months old yesterday. He's a pro at walking and loves getting in to all sorts of things. Lately he repeats the sounds of a lot of the words we say, even things like gotcha-it's really cute. He thinks it's pretty funny to have us sternly tell him no when he plays with the trash can so he frequents that area and looks at us with a big smile as he swings the door to the trashcan back and forth... we're not really sure what to do about that one... He's becoming very aware of what's going on around him and has definite preferences. We gave him a haircut this past month to keep him looking manly- but it was hard to see the curls by his ears go. He likes climbing into our ottoman just like my nephew did back when we lived in Provo.

He's gotten pretty clingy and wants to be held a lot. When he's really mad he'll even start stomping his little feet. He's barely 11 months old for crying out loud! But just look at that little face...

He wants to be just like his daddy :)

The little man loves making noise/music and he loves pushing buttons so... our keyboard is one of his favorite things to play with. Unfortunately he's just a little too short to be able to push all the buttons he wants to from standing on the floor, but we can't always be sitting there with him while he plays (it's a lot...) One afternoon when I was trying to get dinner ready I discovered a way to keep us both happy:

Just one more reason why we love the LoveSac Nate got for his birthday years and years ago (A. also loves to dive into it, we use it as a barricade, it's good for falling onto after playing a game where you drop at the end...)

Oh, and he has been starting to dance :)

I'm now over a Relief Society weekly activity for moms and their kids. This past week we went to an apple orchard. The weather that day was perfect!

A. has been really into helping us lately. He wants to be a part of everything we do. He especially loves helping in the kitchen- stirring is his favorite. Here we are with our spatulas for flipping pancakes.

He has been very excited to help us feed him. He always has to have a spoon in his hand if we do and he likes to dip the spoon into the bowl, he's even getting better at dipping the spoon and then getting it to his mouth- wahoo! We still hold the bowl though because otherwise it gets turned over very quickly followed by him rubbing it all over the tray as fast as he can.

And that was our September in a nutshell.

The little shopper

2010-09-05T09:37:00.002-04:00

Our little man loves going to the store- he loves having so many new things to look at. We appreciate it because it makes it a fun adventure every time we need to go shopping!

10 months!

2010-08-30T15:43:00.003-04:00

When did he get so big? -it snuck up on me. This little guy makes us laugh EVERY day. He sure makes life better.

Busy Boy

2010-08-23T22:37:00.003-04:00

Andrew is one curious little guy right now- he thinks he needs to be on the move all the time (including when he should be sleeping). His laugh is very contagious, especially when he is walking around jabbering and then busts up laughing like he told a funny joke- gets us every time.

Andrew is one strong boy :) He likes to try to push everything around using his big muscles.

Andrew was feeling kinda sick this day but he still enjoyed going outside. I thought he looked SO big in his jeans and tennis shoes.

Breakfast Day

2010-08-17T20:24:00.002-04:00

Last Saturday we had Breakfast Day. A day of breakfast for every meal! We celebrated by staying in our pj's all day, never leaving the house, and being kinda sick... Regardless we enjoyed it. We had some Whole Wheat Pancakes for breakfast, German Pancakes with Strawberries for lunch, a parfait and a peach for snacks, omelets for dinner(had to work some protein and veggies in somewhere...), and some carrot spice muffins for dessert. Can't wait till breakfast day visits our house again!

Home Movies

2010-08-08T21:40:00.002-04:00

He keeps us laughing, that's for sure!

His walking gets better every day :)

Although getting him to sleep or understand that he's not allowed to play with cords can be hard and frustrating sometimes, he's at such a fun age right now- so playful and curious- we love our Andrew boy.

Visit with Grandma and Grandpa Sharp

2010-08-04T09:08:00.005-04:00

We were so excited to have Nate's parents come to visit! We've sure missed living close and getting to see them pretty much once a week. Andrew took some time warming up to them, but considering how shy he can be, he did really well! Mom and Dad Sharp sure spoiled us while they were here- they took us out to dinner, gave Andrew some cute clothes (see below) and bought a walking toy for Andrew which he loves- and it's helped him get better balance. They watched him during church so we could sit back and listen- it was so nice! We're excited to see them again for Thanksgiving, along with the rest of Nate's family (minus Aaron who is on his mission).

We walked over to the bog because it felt so nice outside compared to the hot weather we've been having all summer. Andrew got sick of being in the stroller so Grandma and Grandpa offered to carry him.

Andrew loves to walk, so he jumped at the chance to get down and use his own little legs.

He wanted to go in the water SO bad!

Andrew had his first taste of ice cream while they were here, Nate's Dad has been waiting for this day for a long time!

We went to the local zoo.

We all got pretty sleepy around here so we took a lot of naps :)

Look Who's...

2010-08-03T22:06:00.003-04:00

Look what Andrew can do:

T minus 16 hours

2010-07-29T09:50:00.001-04:00

In about 16 hours my Prince Charming will come home! He's been gone this week doing research in Florida and man alive do Andrew and I miss him- can't wait to see my man!

Cruisin'

2010-07-29T09:03:00.002-04:00

This is about a month old, but I think it's super cute. Andrew loves to cruise on the furniture- sorry about the sideways shot, I need to remember that when I take the videos!

New Friends

2010-07-29T08:51:00.003-04:00

We met another girl with a little boy about the same age as Andrew in our complex and we get together a few times a week to play or to go on walks. Kristi and I have a lot in common, and it's a blessing to both of us that we met- we were both in serious need of a friend.

Such little boys- someone with a weed-whacker came by and they both HAD to watch

"what you lookin' at?"

9 Months Already?

2010-07-27T10:25:00.007-04:00

We just can't believe how big our little man is getting! He is at a really fun age right now and we count ourselves blessed to have Andrew as part of our lives. He loves to crawl around and look at everything. He uses basically anything to help him stand up. His hair is getting pretty long and starts to curl, especially by his ears. He is a Cheerio loving man and he thinks that whatever mommy is eating is what he's supposed to be eating (I get hungry a ton so I have lots of snacks between my meals... and yet I still feel like I am usually hungry). Andrew is always so excited to have his daddy come home from work... and sad to see him leave in the morning, usually resulting in a few tears.
This is his new face to pull:

So BIG he has Sunday Shoes

Our little helper, helping with the laundry :)

He is very happy to see us in the morning.

He loves the bathroom scale :) Maybe he's watching his weight?

He's our little monkey man, trying to climb on things.

He's practicing standing a lot, especially when we read stories to him, I love it.