So I don't forget

Last Monday we went over to our friends house to make apple print wreaths. The boys had a great time and they turned out so cute! While we were waiting for the paint to dry, we were playing outside. Tommy was riding the little powerwheel four wheeler. He went across the sidewalk and right off the curb and face planted on the street with the four wheeler flipping over him. He was hurt, but more upset that I was trying to clean him off when he wanted to get back on...which he did.




This was lunch after Tommy's accident...notice the big bump on his forehead.

This was a day or two after the accident...sorry about the food in the mouth. His battle wounds are almost healed. Poor kid was running in the library on Thursday and fell, scraping his scabs off and bleeding like crazy.


On Tuesday night Barrett and I went to vote. I had explained to Damon what voting meant and what we were going to do. When we got there, the helper guy lowered it and let Damon come in to help me...I told him what buttons to push. We got stopped by a reporter (no cameras) asking us questions on who we voted for and why. We ended up being in some article online...I have no idea where...but sounded pretty unintelligent. I told Barrett the next time we're stopped by a reporter and we have the kids with us...we say we can't talk. I told him the rule, kids are a free out anytime anywhere!! After voting, we went to DQ to share a blizzard...yum!

Wednesday Damon and I were making Scotcheroos for our dessert that night (we were having the missionaries over for dinner). I always let him lick the spoon/beaters/spatula when I'm done using it. He had a taste of the chocolate and said something like, "yum, this is good. (another lick) yum! this is super good, (another lick) this is amazingly good." Those aren't the exact words but I cannot remember what he actually said. He just kept using different adjectives to describe his tasting! It made me laugh...until he put the licked spatula on the finished product for more tastiness! He also kept calling the treat, "buckaroos."

Thursday we were able to pick out a lot of books at the library and even made homemade butter during storytime. The boys loved it, until Tommy scraped his scabs off when he fell.

On Saturday, I went with some ladies from church to the temple for our Stake Relief Society temple trip. It was pretty fun to see old friends and learn more about new ones. As always, being in the temple is wonderful! It was neat to be there with so many familiar faces. Before I left that morning, Damon was changing out of his pajamas. He still wears a diaper at night. He broke the 2 week streak and did number 2 in his diaper. He was afraid he'd get in trouble, so he hid his diaper behind his door, sat on the floor to put his undies on, then noticed the floor was messy and used a shirt, a BYU shirt, to try and clean it up, but that didn't work, so he just covered it up. I left the mess for Barrett to clean up. Good thing we have a carpet cleaner!!! Barrett did a great job watching the kids and it was good for both of us to be in each other's shoes for a bit.

So, here's a random picture I took this week of the kids watching basically everyone in our neighborhood getting ice cream from the Ice Cream Truck right in front of our house. Poor kids, just staring out the window.

Tommy is the cutest during prayer time. He squeezes his eyes shut tight and fold his arms. Every time I try to take a picture of him, he smiles. This time he was just opening his eyes and had a little scowl on his face. In church on Sunday he just sat on the end of the pew munching away on fishies. I would whisper that we were having a prayer and he'd squeeze his eyes shut and keep munching away. So cute!

Happy Times

This last week I started teaching early morning (6:00 am) seminary to the high school kids at our church. It was pretty exhausting!! I can't remember when I have EVER had to wake up at 5:00 in the morning!! The boys have been waking up early too. One or both of them is awake before 6:00. What's worse is that by Saturday and Sunday morning they were already into a new routine...early hours at our house...boo. We have all been so tired this week and weekend. I'm trying to remember the really postive happy things of the week:)
1. The boys were playing football with daddy downstairs. Damon ran upstairs to dig through my cupboards for a "helmet." He found his snow boots for cleats (I guess?) and put a towel underneath his helmet for protection. I was busy doing things and came back into the kitchen to see Tommy digging in the cupboard pulling out a bowl for his helmet. So cute:)
2. Damon has done his "business" on the toilet for a whole week now!!!!!!!!!! He tried it before church last week and kept doing it every time. I told him if he kept it up everyday, then on Friday we'd go to the store and let him pick out a new motorcycle toy. It worked! He spent a long time choosing this pretty awesome guy.
3. Apple tree crafts make me happy. We colored coffee filters green then the boys dropped water on them to watch the colors bleed and smear. After they dried, we used our fingers and paint to make the apples. We colored popsicle sticks for the tree trunks. We colored grass and drew baskets with apples in them. Damon even drew mulch around the trunks and a tumbleweed...I have no idea how he knows about them. Then Damon wrote the words for our project. Tommy's is on the left, then Damon's in the middle, and mine is on the right. I originally got the idea from No Time for Flashcards, but changed it up a bit.
4. Silly Tommy. Friday night Tommy brought Barrett a shirt and wanted him to put it on. Then he brought another one, then another...he had 7 or 8 on!! We were crying we were laughing so hard. Damon thought is was hilarious and at one point he was looking at a tag on a shirt and said, "I'm trying to see what "T" it is." Meaning the size...2T, 3T, 4T... Tommy was so upset when we tried to take his shirts off and leave only one! (Pause the playlist at the right first)



5. Beach time! Saturday afternoon we went to the beach for maybe the last time this season. It was such a pleasant day. It wasn't too hot and the water was warm. The beaches weren't very crowded. We played in the sand and just chilled. It was perfect! Satuday night we cut the boys hair then gave them baths. When Tommy got in the tub Damon said, "Tommy's hairy. He looks like Daddy."
6. We tried having Tommy say a prayer...repeating after us. It was so cute. I had him bless each person in the family, "bless Daddy...mommy...Damon...Tommy" When we got to Tommy he pointed to himself instead of saying his name:)

Another Long Update

I've been trying to complete this post for a few days now! It is pretty long and probably pretty boring for most people:) So, you're warned.
So I took a few pictures in the last few days but nothing really exciting has been happening. Last Saturday we went down to the Washington DC Temple. It was probably our best trip since Tommy's been born. We all made it back in one piece and with peace:)Here are some pictures of the boys drinking their CapriSuns...it was pretty hot out!
We needed to clean the church, so stopped by on our way home from the temple. The parking lot had a lot of cars in it, so I sent Barrett in to see what was going on and when things would be done. He came back and said we didn't have to clean...yay, but I felt a little guilty too. While we were getting ready to leave, we saw one of our favorite families from our old ward drive up. We went over to talk to them and the boys played in the grass. The next morning I was getting Damon dressed for church and noticed his legs were covered in bug bites. I counted at least 37 on one leg! Tommy only had a few. Monday I had to buy anti-itch cream for bug bites...it totally helped! I caught Damon with my camera one morning snapping away. I deleted them all except this one of Tommy watching tv...it was just cute. Tommy has been talking up a storm lately. Sometimes when he's napping he yells, "mama wharr--youu, dah dah wharr-youu" I finally go up there and he says,"mama, pooht". Yep, he now tells me (not all the time) when he poops. We were at the mall and he found a little Elmo doll. He picked it up and so excitedly said, "Ehmo! Hap-pee! Ehmo! Tyoot!" It was the cutest thing...we couldn't tell if he was telling us Elmo was happy or HE was happy for seeing Elmo. He has really gotten more interested in books lately and loves to look at them by himself and have them read to him. He says, "boohts" for books. On our way to the Temple we told Tommy to look out the window at the cows. He yelled to Daddy for 10 minutes about the cows..."dah dah...ta-ows...(jibber jabber) Dah dah...ta-ows bhoo" He would not stop...he loves cows! Barrett was getting Tommy ready for bed one night and I tossed his jammies to them. Tommy said, "day doo mama." Tommy head butted me one day accidentally and I said "ow!" Tommy said, "saw ree mama." Barrett and Tommy were playing hide and seek one day and Barrett started counting out loud "one..." Tommy then said, "two..." One day we asked him to say the word, "cougars" and he would say, "rah rah rah!" Gotta love the fight song! We love how he says "shoes." I had to video it...it is sooo cute (probably only to us). Pause the playlist on the right first.
Tommy is also entering the "terrible twos." I took his toothbrush from him to put it away and go get him a snack downstairs. He screamed for awhile until I found the snack he wanted. Then he cried because I wouldn't let him take it out of the package. I went back upstairs while he finished his tantrum. He finally made his way back up and reached for his toothbrush to then put it away himself! He stopped crying until we went back downstairs and got the snack back out...the tantrum returned. I let him choose his cracker out of the package and he sat down at the little table happy as can be and munched away. I'm not ready for this...I feel like Damon is still in the "terrible two" stage...I can't have 2 boys there!!

Damon is getting taller and turning more into a boy. I looked at him one day and realized his clothes were getting pretty small. He loves getting new books at the library. Story times have been cancelled for the last 2 weeks, so we didn't end up checking out books one week. We went on Monday and checked out more books than we ever have. He gets home from the library and has to pull out all the books and look through each one a few times then I'll read them all to him. He then gets a couple favorites and hoards them. Speaking of hoarding...Damon has this stash in the kitchen of all his "favorites." A couple containers full of rocks of various sizes, sea shells of various sizes and designs, a manilla envelope full of maps and menus and magazines, a big ziplock full of "coupons" he's cut out of grocery ads, a container (which gets changed every few days) holding his money, and a few special toys that he doesn't want Tommy to get. It is crazy and taking up too much space. I've been feeling like he needs more structure, so I've started our little "school" which lasts a few minutes. We talked about scissor safety yesterday and he was really cute answering questions and demonstating how to correctly carry scissors to and from the drawer. I have been loving www.notimeforflashcards.com. We got this idea from them. Right now we do school while Tommy's napping, but I'm hoping to change it to the morning so Tommy can get some exposure. On Sunday Damon gave a talk in Primary. He had the hiccups and stage freight, but did better than the last couple times...so, progress. I had him say his talk for me one day to video it.