Working with Daddy in the garden

Two years ago Clayton built this raised bed garden. Unfortunately, our garden was not a success. We had squash vine boars ravage our zucchini and the rabbits pretty much ate the rest. Last year I think we were still too disappointed to try again. I think Clayton and Oliver are thinking about trying it again as they cleaned out all the weeds. We'll see.

Oliver's dirty hands to prove he was helping, not just playing

Random Silliness

These two love to ham it up for the camera. I was taking a picture because I thought the two of them looked so cute in their white t-shirts together, and a lets be silly contest ensued!

Oliver is still fascinated with garbage trucks. Here is his garbage truck song sung while running full speed in a circle several times. No wonder this kid is so thin! :)

This video is of Oliver's fancy feet dancing; obviously I loved it! :)

And finally, I can never resist taking these sleeping pictures of Oliver. I just love it when I go into his room to get him from his nap and he is still out just like this!

The Many Faces of OLIVER

I think I'll begin and end with my favorites...

My favorite smiley face

sweet face

just wanna grab you and kiss you face

numerous silly faces

Can I call this the "Going Postal" face?

the I'm so silly, I make myself laugh face

then he moved onto poses, this is his yoga mailman pose

his Olympian mailman pose

not sure what kind of pose this one was, but a pose nonetheless

his very mean, mean mailman pose

given the hand gesture, I'm going to say gangsta mailman

oh wait, this might be the gangsta mailman

and last, but not least, here is my sweet, smiley, happy mailman

My Little Mail Carrier

As I have written before, Oliver has a huge fascination with all things transportation. Lately his play has been consumed with trains and pretending to be a postal worker. It took me a while to decide what I wanted to get him for Valentine's Day, and I didn't order the gift until Wednesday afternoon, so I already had a substitute gift ready in case it didn't arrive in time. Needless to say, I was ecstatic when the package arrived in the mail on Saturday as I knew he would absolutely love it!

check out that smile!

this is his all business smile. :)

We ended up having a great Valentine's Day together as a family. We went to church in the morning, unfortunately we were ready with no time to spare, so I didn't get a picture of us all dressed up together in our Valentine's Day duds, but we did look good; I promise! :) Then, we went to lunch at the Texas Roadhouse in McKinney and it was so good! Oliver loved throwing the peanut shells on the wood floors and then walking on them. We hope you had a great Valentine's Day too!

On a totally unrelated note, Oliver did receive another gift that same morning. It took him two weeks to earn it, but he made it! He went three consecutive days without timeouts and earned some new tracks for his GeoTrax set. We are so proud of him and he is so proud of himself too! Great job Oliver!

This is a video of him right after receiving his new tracks

Project Day

While Oliver and I stayed in Utah last month, Clayton came home to a big mess. We had known our hot water heater was coming to an end of its life, but had hoped for it to at least keep going while we were in Utah, but we had no such luck. The water heater was gushing water into the garage when Clayton arrived home. At least we are fortunate to have it in the garage and not in our house! Our best guess is the water tank had broken a few days before and kept filling and spraying water for a while, because with the freezing temperatures, there was a few inches of ice in our garage and down the driveway. Clayton came back to Texas to return to work, so replacing the tank, replacing insulation and drying the rest, as well as replacing Sheetrock in the garage turned out to be a long drawn out task. Every time I would call, if he wasn't working, it would seem as if he was working on something to do with the water tank. Honestly, I was just thankful I didn't have to be there to deal with it and didn't care how long it was taking! Little did I know, my sweet husband was not just replacing the water tank, etc., he was also installing a shelving system in my utility room and a cabinet over the toilet in my bathroom. I was so surprised and happy when I came home to it last month!

We decided that it would be a good idea to have the same cabinet in our hall bathroom as well, so Saturday, Clayton and Oliver went to work. Oliver loved helping Clayton put together the cabinet.

and here is the finished product in my bathroom.

Thanks Clayton and Oliver! Now I just have to decide what to place in them! :)

Put some muscle into it...

Pretty much every place in Dallas was closed the Friday after it snowed, including Spanish School, so we took advantage of the extra time and had some more play time in the snow. We took a walk around our neighborhood and dug snow along the way. The way Oliver digs snow totally cracks me up: It is like he is winding up for it. He puts his shovel arm way back behind him, pauses for a while and then really puts some speed behind his digging. This video shows Oliver digging the snow and also illustrates why we didn't end up making any snowmen or snow angels at our house...the snow is just too cold and Oliver didn't like it when it touched his skin.

They were so good!

Oliver and I had this fantastic idea that we were going to make cupcakes to take to his friends at Spanish School on Friday. The snow however, had other plans in mind, and ended up keeping us home on Friday so Oliver didn't get to share his yummy creations. That left 22 cupcakes in our possession, and unfortunately I ate way more than my share and we ended up throwing some away after having them in our house for four days. Fortunately I used a Sneaky Chef recipe, so they were not as bad for us as they could have been. Here is the little decorator:

decorating the ones to keep

He couldn't wait, he had to dig right in!

The things we do for our kids...

I have been reading the weather forecasts for days and dreading the impending snow storm. I grew up in Salt Lake, therefore you might think I would enjoy the snow a bit more. And I didn't necessarily mind it when I lived there. I remember walking around in skirts without tights in the winter plenty of times and not thinking anything of it. But now, now that I have moved to Dallas, a place that is NOT supposed to be very cold, a place that is NOT supposed to get much snow, I have become weak. When we were in Utah last month I was literally freezing the entire time there and I spent as little time outdoors as possible. It may very well be that I just don't have the cold weather clothes any longer to make myself comfortable.

But today, today I spent two hours outdoors in the snow all to make my little guy happy. Believe it or not, it actually took some convincing on my end. I think I have a big influence on the little guy and when I say I don't like the snow, he internalizes it and thinks he shouldn't like the snow either. So today, I bit my tongue and said I wanted to go play out in the snow. After some protesting declaring that the snow would be far too cold, he finally agreed to go out. In all honesty, it may have something to do with him not wanting to be left inside alone whilst I went out to have all the fun...I may have mentioned something like that to him. So we put on our layers, and headed outside.

Oliver played just outside the garage for a while, running his tractors through the snow.

I suggested we go in the back yard and make a snowman, but he quickly found the patio while I attempted the snowman. He didn't want to walk in the snow. Who could blame him with rain boots instead of snow boots? Poor kid.

He was content to play on the porch, but the snow wasn't sticky enough for the snowman, so I decided to use our shovel to make a track for him to walk in so he could walk around the yard.

He really ended up liking the track and worked with me the entire time I was digging it. He kept insisting that we were not playing, we were working...which he very much likes to do. Before I knew it, we had been outside for two hours and had missed lunch and surprisingly, I think I may have had just as much fun as he did!

Just before we went inside for lunch, we walked down our driveway to see the park behind our house.

There is the park on the left from our alley.

Even though I don't especially like being in it, I'll admit, snow really is beautiful.

We ended up having a great time and fortunately were able to stay mostly dry under our outer layers, despite our lack of snow apparel. We warmed up nicely with some Sneaky Chef Tomato Soup. Yumm.

Could I really be half-way already?

I had my 20-week sonogram today and Clayton and Oliver came along to see the new baby, and Oliver was an absolute angel! The sonographer confirmed for us (if there was any doubt from the 12-week sonogram) that it was in fact a boy and found that all his measurements were exactly perfect for his age: 20 weeks and 3 days. She estimated that he weighs 12 oz., again perfect for his gestational age. I was happy to see him moving all over, however unfortunately his position didn't really cooperate for good sonogram pictures...but I will still attach them below. After the sonogram, I had my regular appointment with my doctor and I just love her! She makes me feel so good about everything! Thanks Dr. Walsh! It looks like we will be having another sonogram in four weeks with the perinatologist to check the growth of a cyst I have in my uterus. No worries, my doctor just says it can cause pre-term labor if it gets really big. So maybe this baby will be like his big brother after all and have a ton of prenatal pictures too! :)

The sonographer said he looked like he was smiling in this one, it's kind of weird if you ask me.

Mommy, I can still wear it!

Oliver wanted to try on this baby hat he wore when he was seven weeks old. Look at how sweet he is on the left, and how mischievous he is on the right. This picture actually makes me baby hungry for his little brother.

How we enjoy 50 degree afternoons

It was a beautiful afternoon, so after nap today, we headed outside with Oliver's big boy scooter for the first time.

As soon as we walked out the door, Oliver headed straight for his baby scooter.

It took A LOT of coercion to get him to try out his big boy scooter

Here is a video of him on the big boy scooter for like three seconds

He headed straight back toward his baby scooter...I guess it is even difficult for three year olds to say goodbye to the past.

We were getting a bit cold as the sun began setting, so we grabbed Oliver's cozy mittens and hats and that made it a ton warmer for him. Does that smile look just a bit mischievous to you?

There's that smile that I love!

We even walked over to the park and giggled on the swings for a bit. I think this one is adorable; I'm definitely framing it!