44 month photo shoot

Oliver and I like to have our own little monthly photo shoots. Today Oliver gave me different emotions and I thought these were too cute not to share. The object of the photo shoot is to get one great picture to put on my monthly magnet for my refrigerator. I'm thinking of using one of the emotions this month instead of the typical smile. This first one is my favorite.

Lincoln Logs

Oliver received these Lincoln Logs for his third birthday. For sometime now he has been building things with our direction, like the big building behind him in the picture below. This afternoon we were getting ready to go outside and while I was putting on sunscreen he built this small building all by himself. Talk about a proud moment!

Any excuse for chocolate cake

While we were shopping this weekend, Oliver asked for a piece of chocolate cake. When I asked him whose birthday it was, he quickly came up with his beloved stuffed animals names: Bunny & Piggy. Who am I to deny Bunny & Piggy a proper birthday celebration? We didn't have hats or gifts, but we did have cake.

Here we are singing to them shortly after breakfast this morning

This is the best shot I could get of Oliver with Bunny & Piggy

All the others turned out something like this. This is Oliver's idea of a happy face. I think he looks like he is in pain. I hope he outgrows this stage soon. I miss his un-posed completely adorable smiles in pictures!

Oliver's Top 5 favorite things about our trip

I asked Oliver what his favorite things were about the trip, and lucky for me he listed five. Here they are in random order (only because I can't remember the order in which he said them):

1. Counting Shrimp Tails with Gramps
2. Digging in the dirt with his cousins at Grammy's & Aunt Shell's houses
3. Talking with Grammy
4. Seeing turquoise tractors
5. Eating at Cafe Rio

I'm so glad Oliver and Clayton love going to Salt Lake just as much as I do! See below for pictures of our last day:

I'm actually surprised he didn't list this as one of his favorites as he did this all three days. Clayton and Oliver would stack up all the hotel pillows and Oliver would count and then jump. He loved it. This video starts after the count down has begun, so let me start: one, two...

after a jump

look at that cutie pie!

We had a very yummy lunch at Cafe Rio with Uncle Jerone, Aunt Debbie & Preston. Thanks so much for suggesting it!

So cute of Preston and Debbie!

And here is one tired little guy. Our flight was a late one to begin with, but after a delayed take off, we didn't land until about 12:30 AM. Considering Oliver had skipped his normal two hour nap three days in a row, and had some seriously hard nights sleeping in the same bed with me, Oliver did exceptionally well on the plane. I could tell from the beginning of the flight he was very tired. I tried to do everything I could to encourage sleep. Finally when there was about 45 minutes left, he told me he wanted to be in his crib to go to sleep. He then wanted to be held. I held him for about 10 minutes and he was falling asleep and then the flight attendant made me put him in his own seat. The fact that I could hold him until he was two, and then once he was three I couldn't anymore will never make sense to me; Seems like it should be my choice. Anyway, he was tired enough that I just held him tight to my side and before long, he was fast asleep. I was truly amazed that this little guy stayed asleep through the remainder of the flight, continued to sleep while we waited at baggage claim and on the shuttle bus to the Parking Spot and even slept through the transfer from me to his Daddy so I could install the car seat. He finally woke briefly as we tried to put him in his car seat and then quickly went back to sleep and slept through all the hubbub of coming home, getting in PJ's and being placed in his bed. He didn't wake up until 10:30 the next morning. I absolutely loved holding him while he slept and I'm so happy Clayton captured this for me to always remember! :)

That was my last trip to SLC before the baby arrives in June. Thanks to all our family for helping make this a great trip!

Not much has changed...

Not much has changed between these two over the past 3 1/2 years. Of course now Gramps isn't the only one telling stories! :)

The minute I saw these two playing like this, I was reminded of the picture above from when Oliver was only 24 days old. I'm so glad my camera was nearby so Clayton could capture the memory.

Happy Mother's Day!

After spending the morning with my Mom, we headed out for a yummy lunch at Mi Ranchito and then for a drive up Little Cottonwood Canyon with the sole purpose of Oliver taking a nap (ya right). It was a beautiful drive, but no nap was had. We went back to my parents later in the afternoon where we were able to see my sister's family and my brother's family and then have dinner with my parents. It was a great Mother's Day!

I think Oliver's face in this picture looks as if he was surprised to reach down and find my 33 week pregnant belly. Of course he isn't, but nine months really is a long time to wait for a 3 year old. He asked me recently if we missed June. It must seem like I have been pregnant forever to him! :)

I was really surprised to see skiers at Alta on this beautiful Mother's Day. But they obviously still have the snow for it. It was absolutely gorgeous up there but a little too cold for short sleeves and a skirt.

As we were driving back down the canyon, Oliver wanted to stop and get some rocks. We pulled off the road at a trail head and walked in a little bit for some rocks and some pictures.

Me and my two boys

So cute of Daddy & Oliver

Somehow I'm betting that all children who are the owners of parents with digital cameras get tired of smiling for pictures. This is on about the 30th picture. He didn't have any smiles left! :)

And this is the Oliver fake smile we got for our family picture that we took at the end. Maybe we should aim to do a family one first next time.

Thank goodness for Photoshop. I am by no means very adept at using Photoshop, and as a result I won't be blowing it up because it is not perfect, but it looks okay at this size. :)

A little further up the trail Daddy & Oliver found a stream. We tried to get Oliver to touch it to see how cold it was but he was not at all interested.

This is part one of a two part video of Oliver and Gramps counting Gramps shrimp tails. Oliver is at that stage where he loves to replay things. This video is actually the third time they went through this together and Oliver took a lot longer to get to the end this time, so I had to break the video in two. Anyway, if you want to watch I thought this was a cute video of Oliver and Gramps at dinner.

part two of the video above

And finally, here is Oliver's first ice cream from an Ice Cream Truck. And my lil' chocolate monster LOVED it! :)

Happy Mother's Day to my Mom!

I feel so fortunate to be able to spend Mother's Day with my Mom! I had planned to go the weekend before, but I came down with a chest cold just a couple of days before I was supposed to go and unfortunately had to cancel my flight. But going this weekend was even better because not only was I able to spend Mother's Day with my Mom, I was able to bring my family with me.

My mom had been sick since I went to see her a few weeks ago. She unfortunately had a set back with a blood clot in her lung and then pneumonia on top of that. Her stay in hospital along with an inability to hold food down for a while left her in a very weakened state. But she finally was able to go home and that along with receiving fluid nutrients, working on eating more, and also working with a physical therapist has made her feel much better. Being in the hospital is not a fun experience for anyone! She had been home from the hospital for a week when this was taken and I think she looks so good! Some other good news is her Oncologist says the chemotherapy has continued to shrink her tumors even since they last checked a couple of months ago, so after she regained her strength, she was able to start up her treatments again this past Tuesday. Our entire family is so grateful for the miracle granted to us to have the Chemotherapy actually work!

My mom said she had a wonderful Mother's Day. She was able to see and spend time with each of her four children and twelve (almost lucky thirteen) grandchildren. Happy Mother's Day Mom! I love you and feel so grateful to have you as my mother! Thanks for being a great example of motherhood!

I loved this video of Oliver wishing my mom Happy Mother's Day!

Oliver was a very willing participant in helping Grammy with her Mother's Day gift. I thought this picture was so cute of him looking at a picture of himself. :)

Grammy was so nice to let Oliver actually open her gift...he loved showing her everything!

Three generations

And finally, I'll leave you with some of Oliver's photos for the day. He actually did quite well on the photo of my me and my Dad.

Couldn't make a better combo for Oliver

Any ideas why this little guy is so excited? It's not because it is Mother's Day and he is so excited to spend the day with me and tell me how much he loves me....although I am quite certain he does.

It is because of this...

...a turquoise tractor. Oliver loves tractors and his absolute favorite color in the whole world right now is turquoise and he was SOOO excited when he saw this tractor on the way to Grammy & Gramps house on Mother's Day. Seriously, there couldn't be a better combo for him. I really should have let him get out and stand by it, but it was by the side of the road and I didn't want him to get his cute outfit dirty, so this is the best we get. Fortunately with all the construction going on, these tractors were all over the place. Oliver was in turquoise tractor heaven all weekend! :)

Oliver LOVES flying

One thing I hardly have to worry about is Oliver's behavior on an airplane. This kid absolutely loves flying and was so excited to go to the airport today to fly to Utah for a quick Mother's Day trip. He was an absolute angel on the flight and several people around us even commented on how great he is at flying. The only thing disappointing to him about our flight was that we flew Delta. This little guy is such and American Airlines little guy; I'm really not quite certain why??

Here he is playing with Daddy at the airport. These two have so much fun together!

And here he is with my Mom, the reason for our trip. We are so excited to spend some time with Grammy over the next couple of days. We are staying in a nearby hotel, so we will be sure to be back for lots of visits!

Water

Oliver, like most children, is drawn to water. If he doesn't have to put his head under it, then he LOVES it! He especially loves helping water Daddy's trees.

Daddy taught him how to squirt the water out of the hose recently and now he loves doing it. Surprisingly he hasn't soaked himself or me yet...I'm sure that is coming!

I thought this picture of him relaxing in my chair was so cute! This is seriously the only type of chair that is comfortable for me right now. Sitting in this hammock type of chair removes any pressure on my joints and feels heavenly; never mind how difficult it is to get out of the chair! :) I think if I could sleep in a hammock all my sleeping aches and pains would be gone. Oh well, less than six weeks to go! :)

My Big Boy, Oliver

This cute little guy asked me to take his picture today, seriously, how could I resist???

And besides, it gives me an opportunity to post about something that I have been meaning to write about for a while. Normally I don't like to post without pictures, and Clayton has refused to let me take any pictures of Oliver going to the bathroom, so these pictures will have to do. I can't say enough how happy I am that we waited until Oliver was ready to do any SERIOUS potty training.

As I have previously posted, Oliver came to us on the day he turned three and told us that he needed to go poopy, that he wanted to do it on the big boy potty, and that he wanted to wear underwear since he was now a big boy. I can't deny that there was A LOT of preparation for this moment: I purchased his first potty when he was 18 months old. We sat on the potty for a long time clothed and then finally he would actually sit on it bare bummed before bath for at least a year before he wanted to do it during the day. The first time we tried going without diapers during the day was because of a diaper rash. He was NOT ready, I think we had six accidents in just a few hours. The only other time we tried, he was willing to sit down on the potty every 30 minutes, but that seemed like way too much work since he never told me he needed to go and then he had an accident 2 minutes after he got off the potty. He was still NOT ready. His birthday was a couple of months away and we had a vacation coming up, so we decided we would try again after his birthday. During those two months we would often talk about it and he would tell me that he was going to be a big boy when he turned three and wear underwear. He turned three, and boy was I surprised that day when Clayton told me what had happened. The wonderful thing is that Oliver has never looked back! I could maybe count his day time accidents on one hand and those have all been because he was too busy playing and didn't want to use the potty. I do have to remind him to go often, so we are still working on that! :)

For a few months he still wore diapers to nap and bed, and this was mainly because of me. He was/is still in a crib, and I didn't want to have to interrupt his sleep for bathroom breaks. When we returned from Salt Lake in January, I thought it might be time to try no diapers at nap time. We got off to a wet start within twenty minutes of the first nap time, but we persevered and in four months, Oliver has only had two accidents at nap time.

For a couple of months we were having a severe problem with his diapers leaking in the middle of the night. I tried a bigger size, a different brand, and finally the only thing that kind of worked was limiting his fluids after dinner. Oliver often complained of comfort issues with his diaper, and once even told me that his diaper was "driving him cashews" -- which was HILARIOUS, and actually gave me a good laugh during a time when I really needed one. He wanted to wear underwear to bed really bad, but I kept telling him that as soon as he woke with dry diapers for a few nights in a row, he could wear underwear to bed. Not too long after limiting his fluids after dinner, it all started. I can still remember how excited he was the first morning he woke up dry; we all were. Well, we waited five days and despite my own hesitation, the first night went off without a hitch. In fact, we went another five days before he had an accident in the middle of the night. But since then, he may have only had two or three accidents and he has been in underwear 24 hours a day since the 25th of March. Oliver doesn't sleep in as long any more (which being pregnant I really miss!). He used to go to bed at 10 and sleep until 9 or 10. Now he wakes up right around 7, which means we have had to start pushing his bed time up earlier. But I certainly don't miss leaky diapers, and I now I can say I was without diapers for a few months before the baby arrived! :) And besides, an earlier wake-up time will help with preschool in the fall.

So it took three years and almost six months, but I wouldn't have had it any other way. Way to do it yourself Oliver! I am seriously one proud momma! I would be happy if Oliver's little brother's potty training progresses in much the same manner.

And finally, we tried to take an impromptu family picture outside this past weekend and this was the best we got: Clayton squinting, and my hair covering half of Oliver's cute little Elvis face he is pulling. Oh well, better luck next time!

Outdoor Exercise

Go ahead, laugh. I do every time I see Clayton wear it. This is Clayton's bee keeper/running hat. He asked for it for his birthday a couple of years ago and I just had to take his picture in this ridiculous looking, albeit very smart, hat. It is great for protecting the skin on his back and neck while he runs in the full sun. Our neighbors walked by the alley while he had on his hat and they got a good laugh. After that, he said although he really likes his hat, he appreciates the level of anonymity it provides at the track because no one can see his face! :) Oliver had to try it out too!

like father, like son

My favorite part of this post is this video. Grandma and Grandpa Royal bought Oliver his first two-wheeler bike for Christmas last year. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to capture Clayton teaching him how to ride on my digital camera because the batteries were dead so I have never posted any pictures of him riding (don't worry, I have that memory on my actual video camera! ). He has really only rode it a few times because he doesn't like wearing the helmet (and I insist), and the seat has been too low and the pedal wasn't rotating properly so his foot was pushed off the pedal every time he went around. Well anyway, Clayton fixed those things today and here he is riding and loving it! Look at my big boy!