Cole is growing up

Yesterday Cole started eating solid foods for the first time. I can't believe he's actually old enough. I gave him sweet potatoes. He loooooooved the food. He grabbed spoon and my hands after the first bite and pulled it back towards his mouth. I never knew kids actually eat baby food. Grant never did. He loves playing with toys now and to lay on the floor while Grant plays.

President's Day weekend in Las Vegas

We took the opportunity of the President's Day three day weekend to go to Las Vegas and visit the Wadleys. Mike Wadley is Chad's best friend from growing up. We headed out of town on Friday evening after Chad was done with work and arrived in Las Vegas at about midnight. On Saturday, we went and did some brief, unsuccessful shopping at H&M. Grant and the Wadley boys, Bryce and Mitchel, were the only ones that truly benefited from the outing. They got to play on the giant outdoor playland at the shopping center.

(Grant and Bryce in the playland)

After the shopping excursion, we headed to the strip to eat lunch/dinner at the delicious Planet Hollywood buffet. It is one of the best on the strip. We all ate way too much. We were one of the few in the restaurant that had children and it was chaotic. Vegas with children was a first for us this trip and it will probably be the last for awhile.

(KaySea, Bryce, Grant and Mitchel enjoying dessert at the Planet Hollywood buffet)

Saturday was Valentine's Day so KaySea and I let Chad and Mike go out on a date together for the evening. They headed down to the strip for several hours and did who knows what. KaySea and I stayed home, put the kids to bed early and watched a movie. Chad didn't forget me on Valentine's Day though. I learned on Saturday that Chad really loves me because for Valentine's Day he gave me a $20 bill and a Black Jack cheat sheet card. I love Black Jack but am terrible at remembering how I'm supposed to play the various hands. They sell these little cards that tell you how to play each of the different hands. I had forgotten mind this trip so he bought me one and gave me money to play. Sadly though, given we had the kids with us there was never an opportunity for me to play.

On Sunday, we relaxed most of the day and then in the evening headed down to the strip to see some of the kid friendly signts. We parked at the Bellagio Hotel to first watch the fountains then walked down to Treasure Island to see the pirate show. That show was disappointing. It used to be a kid friendly show. Now it is very sexual and not very entertaining. We also had to wait about 30 minutes for the show to start and waiting is a difficult thing for a 2 year old. Once the show was over we went to The Mirage to see the new volcano show. It scared Grant quite a bit. He did not like the fire and explosions. We tried to see the white tigers but they were sleeping so we couldn't see them. It was a long but fun night. It was cold though so we had the kids bundled up.

(Cole relaxing on the couch)

(Chad and Grant in the Bellagio Hotel)

(Lindsay, Chad, Cole and Grant in front of The Mirage)

(Grant bundled up for the walk down the strip)

(The Bellagio fountains in front of the Paris Hotel)

(KaySea, Klara and Bryce waiting for the Treasure Island show to start)

(Lindsay and Grant waiting for the Treasure Island show to start)

Monday morning we headed out of the Wadleys for a breakfast buffet at the Sahara. Boy was that disappointing. It was not good to say the least and on the verge of disgusting to be perfectly honest. The less than satisfying breakfast was topped off but a bigger than life tantrum from a little boy all because we needed him to go potty before we started our long drive. I took him into the bathroom against his will. Everytime I said he had to go he said no and when I would say fine I'm done you don't have to go he would scream that he had to go. I managed to get his pants down in the stall and on the potty. I had him on the toilet and was holding his penis in the potty when he screams, "Mom, don't hold my penis!" at the top of his lungs. I finally got his pants pulled up and out of the bathroom with no peepeeing actually taking place and we try to head out of the casino. Grant is still screaming at the top of his lungs. We had to strap him in the stroller to leave. It took both of us to do it. The entire way through the casino he was screaming, "I need to go potty." He made us sound like parents who refused to let him go potty. It was awful and awfully hilarious at the same time. He did not go potty until we go to a truck stop outside of Kingman.

(The construction of the new bridge to bypass Hoover Dam...Will it ever be done?)

Snow in Tucson !?!?!?!?!

On February 10, 2009, we woke up to snow on the ground here in Tucson, Arizona. It was quite a shock because this makes the second time since living here that we have had snow here. Grant loved it. He immediately had to have his winter coat, hat and gloves on to go outside. It wasn't really that cold out but he insisted on having the whole get up on. He loved eating the snow off the patio chairs and throwing snowballs at me and the dogs.

Grant the ham

Playing trains is one of Grant's favorite activities. Every morning he asks me first thing to set ups his trains. They are always out.

Grant had another Little Critters zoo class a week or so ago. The topic was conservation so the kids each made "Zooperhero" capes from brown paper bags. Grant loves this cape and even now puts it on and runs around the house. I had to sneak to take this picture though because Grant kept refusing to let me take one.

These are two hilarious pictures that I recently took of Grant. It was shear luck getting these.

These pictures of Grant with his Cars...his most prize possessions.

Little of this...Little of that

This weekend David and Shelli are visiting. We always love to have them stay with us. It gives mom a break and Grant loves to have new playmates. David came Friday about 12:30 and we headed to Costco. I learned early on that shopping is always more successful when the men have full stomachs so we started with hotdogs and churros for Grant and David then did the shopping. Shelli joined us today at the movies. We took Grant to see Bolt at the cheap theater. He was hilarious because he got bored only a short way into it and was playing around, lying on the floor, squeaking the seat and otherwise fidgeting around for most of the movie. In between popcorn munching of course. Shelli, David and I enjoyed the movie though. Grant has had a great time wrestling and playing diggers in the backyard with Shelli and David.

Tonight, we finally BBQed a rack of ribs I have had in my freezer for almost a year. It did not turn out as well as we had hoped. We cooked them nice and slow as instructed by my wise, BBQ expert father but they did not cook evenly and the ribs turned out to be fatty. It was a good first try and they did look good though.


Grant's new favorite activity is to build block houses for his Cars. The other day we built a giant block slide for Luigi, aka Guido (For some reason, he has it in his head that Guido is Luigi and Luigi is Guido and he cannot be convinced otherwise. He and Nicholas even get into arguments over it. Sadly, it is my boy that is in the wrong.) He now always want to have me build a slide.

Chad has been working with Cole for the last couple of months to hold his own bottle and he's getting pretty good at it. The other night, he was holding his bottle by putting one hand on the bottom and the other on the side. He's starting to get really fancy. (Chad looks a little strange because he was trying to keep his eyes open. His eyes are always closed in pictures because he blinks with the flash.)

Here is a picture Chad took of me reading to the boys. Just thought I'd throw it in this post because there are so few pictures of me taken. I'm really not annoyed the picture is being taken. I'm not sure why I look like I am. Also, don't you think it's cute how Cole is looking at Grant. He does that a lot. He loves to just watch Grant and everything Grant does.

I have now entered the backpack phase of child rearing again. When I have to get things done, like cook dinner or clean house, I put Cole in the backpack and get to work. I did the same thing with Grant and it worked like a charm. On Wednesday, I cleaned 2 bathrooms with him on my back. I had him in the backpack tonight while helping cook the rib dinner. He fell asleep for a little while. I have a picture of Grant in this very same pose at this very same age but I can't post it because of a crashed computer a year or so ago. It's a long story but just know that you would think it was really cute if you could see the duplicate pictures.

Cute moment to remember

Yesterday, I hosted my first plagroup at my house. I guess I am now a full fledged stay at home mom. Four of my friends and their kids came over to play. They all arrived at approximately 11 AM. The first friend left at about 1, the next left at about 3:30, then one left at 4 and the final friend left at 6:30 after dinner because her husband and mine were both working late. It was a marathon playgroup to say the least. Grant missed his nap and went to bed at 7:30 PM. He slept until 7:30 this morning.

Now the cute moment. During the playgroup the kids were all outside playing and suddenly Grant started crying. I went to the door to see what was the matter and he was rubbing his head. I never did figure out what happened but I asked if he wanted to come in and sit with me for a minute until he felt better. Through his tears he said he did not want to come inside and then said, "Will you kiss it?" Of course, I said, "Of course." I kissed it and then he was fine and went back to his playing. He was so cute and so vulnerable when he asked for the kiss. It was the cutest thing he's done in a long time.

List #49 - Don't eat sweets for a month

I gave this one a try for the month of January. I actually did better than I thought I would but not as well as I would have liked. I significantly reduced the amount of baking I normally do in a week and month but I was not perfect. I had a donut after cleaning the church. I had some ice cream for family home evening, I still had chocolate chips in my waffles in the morning and I did have to bake a few times (I have not self control when I bake). I need to work on this some more so I'm not counting this one accomplished yet. I am going to revise it though. I am going to severely limit my baking. I am going to stop having waffles with chocolate chips for breakfast and I am going to limit eating sweets to Saturday and Sunday, if at all. I've got to do better. I really want to kick the sweets craving thing I have. I hate it and it makes me feel yucky so I'm going to give it another month. Plus, it's February so it's only 28 days instead of 31 like January. I should have started with February in the first place.

Exploring Tubac

Yesterday, we took a little day road trip south on I-19 to Tubac, Arizona. It is an art type community that we had always wanted to see. Our original plan was to go to the Biosphere but we discovered that they were only talking about finding and killing Buffalo grass. Not exactly something we wanted to pay $20/person to learn about. Tubac is about 20 minutes from Nogales and looks like a slightly higher class Nogales. Chad told me that in reading up on it he learned that from the time it was started it was a booming city, then a ghost town, then a booming city again, then a ghost town again and now a booming city. Tubac was the first english settlement in Arizona and published the first newspaper in Arizona. Now it is an expensive place to live but far away from anything and everything. There are several small streets of shops and art galleries containing everything from high end art and pottery and art work from Mexico to birdhouses made out of old boots and license plates. It was a nice day to walk the shops and explore the merchandise.

This is a picture of me and Cole. The weird thing behind me is part of a $5,000 statue on display at Galleria Tubac.

Of course, Chad had to have his picture taken with this giant skull made of cement and pottery pieces. He read about it on line and had to find it. Apparently, it is a notable part of the Tubac experience.

This is a Hornet. It is the same kind of car as Doc Hudson from the movie, Cars. Grant was quite excited about it when I pointed it out to him. Grant is on the verge of obsession with Cars right now. He presently owns two Lightning McQueens, Doc, Sheriff, Guido, Luigi, Mack, Chick Hicks, The King, Snot Rod and Boost. He earns them for doing jobs that he's not great at like staying in bed when put to bed, helping get dressed and going potty by himself. He has to earn a certain number of stickers for each job to get the cars. He just earned Boost yesterday for earning enough potty stickers and got Snot Rod this morning for finally earning 5 stay in bed stickers (it took about 2 weeks to accomplish this feat).

Below is Grant climbing around a fountain outside of Galleria Tubac. Grant had a great time finding and looking at all of the neat and creative fountains throughout Tubac. There were many. This particular fountain was surrounded by large river rocks and I told Grant several times not to climb up the rocks for fear he would fall into the fountain. The series of pictures below show just what a good listener our little boy truly is.