Introducing the Newest Member of our Family...

Baby Owen

 Technically, this is really baby Emma, the doll that D gave me when he was not quite ready for a REAL baby back in 2006 or 2007.  But P's best friend has a baby brother named Owen, so P wants his own baby...but this Owen is a girl.  And P wants to take her everywhere.  She is currently buckled into the front seat of my car.   

Whatever makes him happy, right?

Life Lately, According to my I-Phone

Conference Success!

During the last General Conference (in October) we thought it would be a great time to work on potty training P.  Epic fail.  We spent the whole time cleaning up messes and in general having a miserable time.  For April General Conference, P was potty trained (yippee!), and I thought it would be a great time to try to explain what General Conference is and why we participate.  We started off the day with our tradition crepe breakfast...

 and then before Conference started, I explained to P how we listen to the prophet and apostle, and I showed him all of the activities (and snacks) we would be doing (and eating).  

Most of the activities kept his attention for about 5 minutes max...but building the Lego temple lasted a good hour.  (Yes, that is Harry Potter going to the temple...).

 But then the temple caught on fire (somehow) and the firemen had to come and put out the fire.

It wasn't a perfect day, but P understands that we listen to the prophet and apostles, he knows who several of them are now, and he knows why we watch Conference.  Maybe next time we will work on listening for specific words...maybe.

Happy Easter!

 Hunting for eggs at the speed of light...

 Hoarding eggs...

In case you can't understand him, he is saying "Here's an egg!" over and over and over again.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

We began our St. Patty's Day celebration the day before with a green breakfast...green eggs, green ham, green milk, and green pancakes.

And this is what P thought about his green breakfast:

Less than successful.  But the next day, when P woke up, a Leprechaun had left gold in his shoes!  He was a little freaked out at first...but then he realized that he is a Leprechaun...

 And a Leprechaun needs to hide his pot of gold...and where is the best place to hide it?  At the end of the rainbow, of course. 

At the Zoo

The weather has been so beautiful the past few days with record breaking highs, so we had to celebrate Mommy and P day at the zoo.  Despite the massive construction (that caused the train to shut down and won't be completed until 2014), we had a great time.  The new Rocky Shores exhibit was awesome...the polar bears get so close to the glass while swimming, and P was mesmerized.  And maybe the animals were equally excited about the warm weather, because they were all out and about, doing fun things.  The trip ended with a tragic skinning of the knee (which has caused P to limp around our house all night and scoot around on his bum because his knee is "super hurt"...), but it was still as successful trip to the zoo.   

Mommy and P Days

Fridays are Mommy and P days.  Every Friday we get to spend the entire day together just the two of us, so it is a special day.  We always try to do something special that we don't do every day, whether it is going to the Dinosaur Museum, playing at the mall, building a snowman, visiting one of P's friends, going to the library, making a craft together, or whatever.  Today, P and I went to breakfast...and I let him wear his new fireman outfit.  Several people commented on his outfit, and he was so proud to be a fireman.  

Fire Station Field Trip

 We have been looking in to Preschools for this coming school year, and I visited one this week to check it out.  While I was there, they invited us to come on their field trip to the Fire Station, and since P's current "character" has been rotating between fire man and garbage man, I figured he would love to go.  I kept it a secret until we got there...I told him I had a special surprise for him.  I almost had to drag him out of the house kicking and screaming because he was very involved with his Lego fire station and fire truck and did not want to stop playing.  But he knows exactly where the fire station is (we drive past it several times a week), so when I pulled into the parking lot he started to get noticeably excited.  We watched a fire safety video (which was super educational...when we got home, P showed me how to stop, drop, and roll, he practiced crawling around under the "smoke", he found all the smoke alarms in the house, he somehow found our matches, and we discussed our fire evacuation plan), and took a tour of the fire station (we were both a little disappointed that there was no fire pole...).  P did not want anything to do with the other kids, but he LOVED the fire station.  Glad we went...except that he has already asked me if we can go back tomorrow...