Vanner turns 2!

Our big two year old!  Vanner talks really well (better than either of the other kids at this age), loves to ask "why", says "oh" in the cutest voice when you answer, loves BYU basketball, dogs and helicopter's and wants to be with big brother and sister whenever he can.  His favorite color is orange (which Jeremy thinks is so fun because it is unique and not your typical boy "blue") and he stays says, "Mommy, I carry you" when he wants me to carry him somewhere (which happens quite often). He definitely is honery from time to time, is a biter and a hitter (luckily, or unluckily only to family members) and will scream and throw a huge tantrum if you don't let him push a button he wanted to push or don't carry him down the stairs and he wanted you to.  However, all of those moments melt away when he snuggles with you, sings you a song (he is a great singer) and tells you he loves you.

His birthday started out at the University Place mall.  I had heard that Build-A-Bear had started a new "pay your age" program for birthday's.  Figured it was best to try it out with the two year old to see exactly what you get for "your age" and what you have to pay extra for.  We got our bear, stuffed him, "washed" him, named him and off we went.  

When we got home and found the outfit we brought Vanner home from the hospital in and put it on his bear.  It was pretty cute and fun/sad to remember how tiny he once was.  Also, for some reason, just on his birthday, anytime we said "cheese" he would close his eyes shut and smile.  Not sure where that came from but hence the multiple pictures with eyes closed.

We opened presents and had cake and ice cream with some family.  He loved the airplane, cars, bubble machine and robotic car that he got.

His dog's name is Harry and it moves, barks and sings.

Liza made the cutest little dog house for Harry to live in as a birthday present for Vanner.  She filled it with different candy treats.

The frosting for the doggy cake was left over's from other things and ended up being a little softer than I anticipated.  But it got the job done.

Lots of helpful kids around when it was time to blow out candles.

I often call Vanner the man child because he is so big.  He wears 3T shirts already and 2T pants.  When I took Vanner in for his 2 year old doctor's appointment the man child title was confirmed.  He isn't even on the chart for height (he is above all the lines) and is about 88% for weight.  I predict that he is going to be a big boy.  Funny to think that just a year ago at his one year old appointment he wasn't putting any weight on his legs and didn't do any standing or walking.  Now he talks, walks and acts like a three year old.  What a difference a year makes.  

Happy Un-birthday to us!

The first Saturday of November I threw a happy un-birthday party.  Often I feel like women spend hours planning parties and activities for their children's birthdays but hardly recognize their own.  So I figured it was time to celebrate ourselves.  A few of us met in the late afternoon and went hiking to Stewart Falls.

Afterwards we went back to the house house for dinner (soup and bread).  A few ladies weren't able to go hiking but came that night for dinner.  We did a gift exchange with the theme "accessories" and everyone brought something $10 or less.  We started with January and went through the birthday's month by month.  When it was your time to open a present you choose whichever one you wanted and they had to tell what you were like as a teenager.  It was fun to hear everyone describe themselves.  To finish off the night we sang happy birthday and all blew out the candle in our cupcakes.  Super fun night.

Bicycle mayhem

The end of October I received a text from my sister, Cherie, that her husband, Jared, was in a bicycle accident in St. George.  He went to the hospital, had things checked out and was released with some broken ribs.  The following week he went back in for a check up and ended up being admitted to the hospital.  He had a mass in his lung (they weren't sure whether it was an infection or blood) and during his stay ended up needing a chest tube for a collapsed lung.  So, the boys and I packed up and went to help out at Cherie's house while she was staying at the hospital.  On Friday while everyone else was at school we went to the Treehouse museum for some fun.  They loved playing at all the exhibits and learning new things.

Friday afternoon we took Jude and Eli back to our house to have a sleep over for the weekend.  Jared was home from the hospital by then but he and Cherie both needed a little time to relax after a long week.  Everyone loves playing with cousins and since Liza wasn't able to go to Bountiful with us she was happy we brought the party back to our house.

From the mouth of Max

A recent lunch conversation with Max:

"Mom, you know that story about the man on the side of the road?  (aka - the good samaritan)  That is kind of like a shark and a fish because the fish is on the side and then the shark comes and eats it."

Hmmm...maybe we need to revisit this story.

October is over

Rainbows always make the world feel better.

Our garbage disposal has had a slow leak for months now and we have had a bowl under it collecting disgusting water.  Jeremy finally investigated and the verdict was we needed to pull out the only and insert the new.  It was an all day project complete with pulling out the car jacks so we could tighten it sufficiently but it is in now and working great.

There was a little party to celebrate the fire fighters who worked on putting out the fires in Woodland Hills.  Not many people but lots of free pizza and treats so we were cool with that.

Max saved up his money from his birthday and also money he has earned and bought himself this Batman set.  He loves it and has played with it almost every day since getting it.

Jeremy reconnected with an old college buddy and they went to cheer on the Cougars at the football game.  He said they kept getting in trouble for various things like talking too much and standing up too long.  I guess the people sitting next to them must have been hard core fans.

What is up with Liza's "smile" these days?  Who knows.  But this hand me down dress from Hathaway is absolutely adorable and I love it.

Liza's top front tooth has been wiggly for weeks.  We keep thinking it is going to fall out every day but it doesn't.  Still hanging on.  However, I wanted to make sure I had a picture of her smily with all her teeth so I took these before bed.

Jeremy got back from TechConnect just in time for the Chemistry magic shows.  Usually we go and watch him perform the show but this time he sat with us in the audience.  It was a nice change.

Liza continues to like crafts and made some fun stuff at school for Halloween.

Jammie days

Everyday when I pick Liza up from school she wants me to come see the new tricks she learned on the bars.  Although this sounds nice, it requires me to find a parking spot, get both boys out of the car and walk to her play ground.  And to top it off I'm often in my pajama's and/or slippers when I go to pick her up.  So often the answer to her question is no.  The other day when I picked her up she asked if I would come watch her.  I said no, I was wearing pajama bottoms and ballet slippers and didn't want to walk out in public like that.  She got really upset and starting yelling at me, "Mom, why don't you ever get dressed?  You are just always in your pajamas?  Why can't you just get dressed?"  My response was a bit of a laugh followed by, "I was dressed yesterday because I took you to the library and anyway, if I'm just at home why do I need clothes on?"  However, it did make me think that if my 6 year old is telling me I wear pajamas too often maybe I need to reconsider my clothing choices.

The art of creation

We decided the beginning of September what we were going to be for Halloween and as soon as we decided the kids kept asking everyday if I had worked on their costume or not.  I kept assuring them we had two months and plenty of time but they insisted that they needed them now.  So I started them about a month and a half early figuring I would have plenty of time to work on them.  Little did I know that multiple things would go wrong and I would be working on the finishing touches up until the last hours before our ward party.

Liza wanted a shirt that was sparkly.  I couldn't find one that I was willing to pay for so reluctantly I decided to make her one.  I don't have great sewing skills and wasn't sure about a shirt but figured if I kept things simple I could probably manage it.  We found some fabric I was willing to pay for and I made her this sparkly shirt and stain skirt.  The fabric of the skirt was a bit of a nightmare because it frayed everywhere but it wasn't that bag.  However, our shirt fabric was not a good choice.  It had NO give and so was really hard to take on and off.  Whenever she would put it on the seams would rip on the side.  I thought the solution would be to just serge the seams to hold them tighter.  Thinking that was all I needed to do I waited until two days before the party to go to my friends house and use her serger.  After using the serger she put it on and it still ripped.  Especially since she would need to wear it all day at school the following week I knew we needed to come up with a new solution.

So we headed to the store to look for a sparkly shirt I could just add the super girl symbol to.  Sadly we didn't find anything that was sparkly - or even a very good blue color for that matter.  So one day before the party we went full force into plan B mode and improvised.  I cut up the original shirt into triangles and sewed them onto a plain blue shirt.  It actually turned out pretty cool looking and I really liked the end product, just wish I hadn't started from the beginning the day before because those darn triangles took longer than they should have to sew on.

And, of course, after I sewed them all on it was bunched in the center where I was planning to iron the super girl symbol on.  So I had to iron the super girl symbol on another shiny piece of fabric and then sew it all on.  Loved the end result.  Didn't love the time it took to make two shirts.

After Jeremy decided to be Robin the kids and I found this one-piece Robin suit at DI for $4.  Jeremy tried it on and couldn't even get the back closed because it was to tight and the lower part of the suit was...an interesting fit.

After scrapping that idea he happened upon a Lego Robin costume and he did a great job creating his new suit from a card board box.

And finally, I thought I had the perfect concept for my Wonder Woman outfit.  But the first skirt I made was a total bust and I had to remake it.  Then I ironed on my WW symbol too low and it looked really awkward with how it was placed on my chest.  So I cut the top seam, cut off the sleeves, lifted the front of the shirt about two inches and then sewed everything back together.  It wasn't a perfect fix but it worked well enough for Halloween.

Max and Vanner's costumes were time consuming but no major catastrophes.  Even though it always takes more time and money then I think it should I do enjoy making costumes.   My sewing skills improve each time and I learn new things about my machine that I never knew before.  And I'll be honest, it makes me feel good when Max wants to wear his Batman costume over and over even after Halloween.

A "Super" Halloween

Halloween was good this year.  Another year of talking the family into themed costumes.  Sometime soon that isn't going to work but I'm going to run with it as long as I can.

The week before Halloween we had our ward party.  Jeremy was out of town but the kids and I had a great time eating dinner and doing lots of fun activities that the youth at church organized.  The highlight of the night was the "fishing" game where the kids pulled up little beanie boo stuffed animals that they got to keep.  They were elated and couldn't wait to sleep with them that night.

Halloween day the boys and I went to Jeremy's class on campus to hand out candy.  They all thought the boys were so cute and would ohh and ahh over everything they did.  My costume was Wonder Woman and at one point Jeremy said, "And she really is a wonder woman."  The entire class went "AHHH" it made me laugh because they are all 18 and so ready to find love and have everything in life be so romantic.  

In the late afternoon I took all the kids back to campus.  We did a little photo shoot.  But it was pretty cold so no one was super interested in being outside for long.

After the photo shoot we went inside to enjoy a fun Halloween celebration that BYUSA put on for the families of BYU faculty.  I had my doubts about going but it was actually really fun.  They had lots of activities for the kids, free pizza for dinner, it wasn't very crowded (surprisingly) and Cosmo showed up so it was definitely a win all around.

After the BYU party we headed home for some trick or treating in the neighborhood.  Of course everyone got way more candy than they needed, but that is the whole point, right?  Let the season of gluttony begin!