Snow

F. with his dump truck

S. and F. climbing the mound in front of the house.

A. first sledding experience

F., Mr. Snowie, and S.

boys sledding around the yard (I know it is sideways, sorry)

We've had some snow. We've played in it. We've had fun. We like snow.

Meet Rockstar

or maybe it is Rock Star; I'm not sure. But I know you would like to meet her. The only problem is that I am way behind on pictures, so I'll write this post with all the places for the pictures to be, and maybe, just maybe, I'll come back later and insert them. If not, it will still be a post worth reading. F. is potty training again. (Do you remember my fiasco with training last year?) He has been asking me to wear underwear since before Christmas and I kept putting it off. But in the past few weeks he has started waking up at 4:00 ish to have his diaper changed. (Since I'm still not sleeping through the night--I know, my own fault--it left me cranky and very tired.) So I decided to do the prep-work for a second try. I read Potty Training in One Day, Toilet Training with No Tears, and skimmed a few others. I decided to compile what I liked (modeling with the doll, lots of treats, total focus for one day, try to be stress free) and what I didn't ("Grandma would be sad that you peed your pants", potty training to the clock) and try it out. Since I liked the doll idea, I looked online for something cheap and water proof. Nothing. I headed to Target and picked up a $13 bath doll. But since she only had a diaper, I needed to make some underwear for her so that F. could help her change her underwear and such. I designed a pattern and whipped up three. The boys were concerned that she didn't have pants, or pajamas, or anything else, so I promised them we would outfit her later. Saturday went well. We played downstairs on a fleece blanket all day. The fleece caught the pee and held it so we could go back and clean it up after we had changed underwear, etc. By Saturday night, he was figuring out how to hold it while he ran to the potty. We've had some ups (at a friend's for a birthday on Monday and no accidents) and downs (peeing twice during a movie). I think this time will work. The funniest thing is that A. thinks that Rockstar is his doll. He hugs her and screams for her whenever he sees her. F. also thinks that she is his. Me? I'm working on clothing the poor naked thing.

Family Picture

The latest family picture--taken by R--'s brother in Arizona. It was cold. That is all I will say.

He's 1!

(I can almost reach it.)

(Mmm, tasty.)

"Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday dear A--

Happy birthday to you!"

We had a leisurely birthday party for little A-- this past week. I can hardly believe he is one. It still seems like he should be waking up multiple times a night to eat--wait, he still does. (But then all my boys did at this point, and I'm okay with it, really.) This year has flown by.

A-- really is part baby and part big kid. He loves nursing (though he really only nurses in snatches). He wants to control his own movement and feed himself. He loves his chupete (pacifier). He wants to play with his older brothers, and sometimes they let him. He has started cruising around on the furniture and has taken up to seven steps in a row (this is at least two months earlier than both his older brothers). But he is still "Baby A--" to his older brother F--.

He tried the cake and ice cream, but didn't devour his whole piece like his older brothers did when they were his age. Maybe this means he won't have my sweet-tooth. We love him and are so glad he is part of the family.

Finished

So after long hours quilting around clouds (remind me never to do that again!), A-- has his quilt. He likes it, even if he doesn't look like it here. A few days after I finished it, we took it to Arizona over Thanksgiving. On the ride home, S--got sick from all the snacks he ate on the plane and threw up in the car, right on top of this quilt. So it was promptly washed and put back into circulation.

Happy 3rd Birthday

My parents drove across the country for a retirement vacation and to visit grandchildren. On their return trip, we decided to celebrate F's birthday, so that he could have family there. (My dear husband would be out of town on his birthday.)F-- had requested tigers, Lightning McQueen and ghosts be on his birthday cake, with my mom's help (meaning she did it while I worked on dinner), he got tigers--three of them crawling up his birthday cake.

F-- gave blowing out his candles a noble effort. He got the first two, but couldn't get the third. He blew harder and harder, but all he succeeded in doing was spraying part of the cake with spit. I helped him get his last candle out (and scraped the spitty parts off the cake). And we ate. It was great.

For the next week or so, as we'd drive in the car, F-- would be singing in the back seat.

Happy birthday to you

Happy birthday to you

Happy birthday dear F--

Happy birthday to you.

And then he would blow out his imaginary candles.

On his actual birthday, we invited some friends we met at the library for the Halloween parade over to the house for cupcakes. F-- tried the candles again, same thing happened (though with less spitting).

Now my little guy is 3, though if you ask him, he will tell you he is 6.

Haunting Halloween

With Halloween on a Sunday this year, we debated the level of involvement we were going to have with trick or treating. After all, we are trying to teach our children to honor the Sabbath day; however, we are also trying to instill in them a sense of community. So we decided to participate in the ward's trunk or treat, one of the local trick or treat at businesses, and a very limited trick of treat of our neighborhood (with our neighbors).

The boys had a ball. They picked their own costumes (A-- didn't get much of a choice).

S-- as Peter Pan (The Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson variety, complete with Tink sitting in her next in his hair. Of course, since he hasn't seen what that Peter looked like, him idea of Peter Pan was influenced by Disney.)

F-- as a ghost (he loved shouting "Boo" at people).

A-- as a really cute frog (you might recognize the costume from years past)

Me in my wonderful Nigerian Bride costume that my dear husband brought back from Spain.

All of us trick or treating at the businesses. It was touch and go for a while because F-- couldn't find his shoes (thus the stroller) and S-- was scared silly of the whole thing. He wouldn't walk by the strangers, ask them for candy or say thank you.
Until . . .

Spiderman came along and showed S-- that he didn't need to be scared. From this point on, S-- was on board with the whole trick or treating.