Family Pictures

11 months!

Wilson turned 11 months on the 8th! I can't believe that we're just a few weeks away from his first birthday. Time has passed too quickly. He is such a fun little guy. He is full of smiles and just brightens the day. He has been taking steps here and there for a few weeks now and in the past week has gotten pretty good at walking between furniture in the house. He still prefers crawling because it's faster, but he is getting steadier everyday. He LOVES to eat--not that you can tell from his size. He's still pretty little and wears mostly 6-9 month clothing. He puts everything in his mouth (which is still toothless--Whitney says we need to get him some teeth--maybe for Christmas). He is "talking" quite a bit, not really using specific words yet, but he's starting to use Dad pretty well. We're still not sleeping through the night, but we have had a few longer stretches in the last couple of weeks, but we've had some terrible nights in the last couple of weeks too, so no progress yet. He loves to look at books and be read to; he will crawl over to the book box and sit quietly turning pages all by himself. Maybe he'll be a bookworm...on the other hand, he crawls up into his sister's little chair and stands on one foot on the arm so that he can see out the window...maybe he's daring enough to be a rider. :)

Tiny Dancer

I've been teaching tap classes again this year. When we started the year, I had two three-year-olds in my K-2 class and it just wasn't working, so crazy me...I started a preschool tap class. AND, I decided to put Whitney in the class. I have 6 two & three-year-olds! It's a little crazy, but we had our recital last week and they did amazingly well. Whitney is so shy around new people, and she won't usually dance with me during class (she prefers to just sit in the corner for about half of the class, I think it's because I'm the teacher) and I was just sure that she wouldn't do anything on stage, but she surprised everyone and danced most of the dance. They were so sweet and the audience cheered so loudly for them. One of the other moms and I made their tutus--they were just precious. I also had the opportunity to perform again which was so fun. I am teaching an adult tap class this year and one of the ladies in the class performed with me in the recital and then all of the teachers got together to perform a jazz dance. Apparently Wilson has a future in dance as well, he went crazy when I was on stage staring at me first and then moving his arms all around. Everyone said it was super cute!

SliPpeRy sItuAtiOn

I took the shortest shower and didn't even put full makeup on one day last week and came out to THIS! I came out of the bathroom and couldn't see the kids in the living room...

Me: Where are you?
Whitney: In the kitchen
Me: Where's your brother?
Whitney: Right here eating the butter.

She was standing on the counter with butter on her dress, he was on the floor eating it. I put him in the tub with no water so that he couldn't get it anywhere else. Then scrubbed the floor--twice. Changed his clothes and tried to get the butter out of her dress. This was just the start. They also got into the shredded paper under the shredder and I think got out every toy in the house. Oh what a DAY!

Thanksgiving

Whitney's Thanksgiving dress made by Grandma K.

Wilson's matching tie

I think he ate the most out of EVERYONE--Mike even unbuttoned Wilson's pants--it was so funny!

Beautiful table setting

My mom hosted everyone at her house for Thanksgiving. She had the table decorated beautifully! Geraldine, Shawnee, Erik, Sandy, Bekah, Sariah, Mike, Me, Whitney, Wilson, Mom and Kirk enjoyed a wonderful meal! We had so much food and were all stuffed. After we ate, Sandy and I enjoyed browsing the ads planning our black Friday shopping, while Mike and Erik went out and worked on our house. The girls had lots of fun playing. On Friday, Mom and I left Lovell at 3:30am to make it to Billings when Target opened. We had so much fun shopping with all of the crazies. We got a few good deals, but went mostly for the fun.

A couple of weeks before Thanksgiving, I was asked to speak in Church on the topic of Thanksgiving. I found some wonderful talks and quotes. There was a wonderful talk from Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin about living in Thanksgiving daily. He said we need to do three things: 1) Open our eyes, 2) Open our hearts and 3) Open our arms. He said that if we haven't been particularly grateful, “Don’t wait to start. Open your eyes, open your hearts, and open your arms. I promise that as you do, you will feel greater joy and happiness. Your life will have a new level of meaning. You will forge relationships that will transcend this life and endure through the eternities.”

Another quote that I read that I loved came from President James E. Faust, "

“The thankful heart opens our eyes to a multitude of blessings that continually surround us. President J. Reuben Clark, formerly a counselor in the First Presidency said: Hold fast to the blessings which God has provided for you. Yours is not the task to gain them, they are here; yours is the part of cherishing them. At this season, I hope that we may cultivate grateful hearts so that we may cherish the multitude of blessings that God has so graciously bestowed. May we openly express such gratitude to our Father in Heaven and our fellowmen.”

I am truly thankful for all of my blessings. I am thankful for a loving husband who works so hard for our family. I am thankful for two beautiful children who challenge me and brighten my life. I am thankful for loving parents who put so much effort into helping me become the person I am today. I am thankful for a little brother who loves me even when I get a little too "big sistery". I am especially grateful for a loving Father in Heaven who gave us the gift of our Savior so that we can all return to live with Him again.

What you said?

Big girl!

Reading to Brother

First haircut

Playing in the sand at the new house

Whitney is seriously growing up too fast! Her vocabulary is growing so rapidly. She is constantly amazing us (and cracking us up) with new phrases. Here are some of the highlights:

"What you said?"--we hear this several hundred times a day. She says this pretty much every time you say anything to her. If she doesn't say "What you said?", she will say, "HUH?" with quite the confused look on her face. You would think she really didn't get what we said, but she gets everything. Lately I've been asking her to repeat back what I've said and she repeats word for word.

A couple of weeks ago, I was getting after her and attempting to send her to the mat; she decided to go into Grandma H's room, then came out a few seconds later saying, "I feel much better now."

Today as we were driving to Church, Whit noticed that Mike didn't have his seat belt on and asked, "Dad, can you put your seat belt on, so we can be safe?"

We are really struggling with getting Wilson to sleep during the night. Last night was really rough, but at one point, I heard Whitney tell him, "I'll go get Mom." Then she came to me and said, "Mom, brother needs you." What a great sister!

When we got to Church Mike asked Whitney whose house it was and she quickly answered, "Jesus." Then she said, "Jesus built it."

We started working on memorizing the First Article of Faith a couple of weeks ago. It says, "We believe in God, the Eternal Father, and in His Son, Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost." Last night we were trying to get her to repeat it and she told us no, and then said the whole thing by herself!

We are also FINALLY potty trained!!!! We started trying to potty train Whitney at the end of March. It has been an off and on operation since then. About a month ago I decided to really try again and she had a great week. Then the next week it was like we had never even tried. Then finally two Sundays ago, she was in the tub and said suddenly, "I need to go poopy" so I pulled her out of the tub and she went! That was the first time she EVER told me she needed to go. She did great in panties after that. Then on Wednesday after that she just went in and went potty on her own without even saying anything!! She has had a couple of poopy accidents, but no pee accidents for two weeks! She has even been sleeping in panties for about a week and a half!! We have one happy Mommy! And one big girl! YAY!!!

Going Up!

the floor

Walls going up!

The final truss

Mike has been working so hard on our new house! We have been so blessed with beautiful weather even this far into November! He has been spending every extra minute out working. It is amazing how fast a house can go up. He has pretty much sheeted the entire house (I need to get out there and get new pictures). We've selected windows and have them sitting in the garage here at Geraldine's. We also had our garage door and shingles delivered last week. It is so exciting, but overwhelming to make all of the decisions. I am so blessed to have such a talented husband. I'm so grateful for his hard work for our family.

Happy Halloween

Whitney has been scared of everything Halloween since the Halloween aisle was set up in the stores. It may have something to do with us (Dad, Mom & Grandma K) taking her to see the things that talk and seeing her get scared and us cracking up...maybe. But anytime we've gone to WalMart, the first thing she says is, "I don't want to go to the Halloween aisle." She did go once with her dad and decided that she liked the Tinkerbell costume, so Dad told her that Mom would make her one. She came home and asked me if I would make her Tinker dress--so I did! Then I decided that if she was going to be Tink, we needed a cute little Peter Pan to go with it. I'm so happy with how their costumes turned out. They were so cute! Whitney loved getting her candy when we went Trick or Treating, but she absolutely refused to say "trick or treat" at any door--including Grandma's house. It was such a beautiful night and we walked several blocks, got lots of candy, yummy kettle corn from our old neighbors, warm cinnamon apple cider from our old bishop and visited and walked with friends who were also out.

Nine Months!

Mr. Wilson is NINE months old today! I can't believe it!
Here are some of the 9 month highlights:

• Started Crawling on September 30th
• Once he started crawling, he quickly figured out how to stop and sit up on his own (October 1st )
  
• Started pulling himself to standing on October 6th!
• He's even trying to climb up on things and got on top of a box at Grandma K's work yesterday.
  
• He LOVES to eat! His favorite thing to eat is the little puff snacks (though he will eat anything you give him or anything he can find which often includes pieces of paper and plant leaves)
• He loves to smile and laugh
• He does not sleep well at all--like only 2 hours at a time...sometimes only 1 hour
• He loves to watch his sister
• He does not like to ride in his carseat, he's now in a big boy carseat
  
• He has just barely started wearing 6-9 month clothing. He can still fit into all of his 3-6 month onesies and shorts. He is long, but not very round! He still fits in size 2 diapers, but we just switched to size 3 because he fills up the size 2s too easily!
• Still no teeth! Great for nursing! Although he still likes to bite and starts laughing when I scold him for doing it!
  
• He is quite the Mama's boy--he will start crying if I walk past him without picking him up.
• He is starting to say Mama--sounds like "uh-ma"
• He is starting to sign Milk--but uses it for anything he wants.
• He LOVES to watch Barney. As soon as the opening song comes on, he starts dancing and bouncing and making noise. It is so cute! He usually starts bouncing and dancing when any music starts.
  

We sure LOVE him!

Amazing Giveaway

Like a warm cup of coffee is doing a DownEast Basics giveaway! If you haven't purchased from there before, you should! I love there Wonder Tees--it's a long cap sleeve tee that is perfect for layering or for wearing under sleeveless tops and camis! Click here to see the the giveaway!

Have your cake and eat it too...

Can you see the tiny fingerprints???

Yum!

Wedding

The girls!

Randa--official Wilson Holder :)

Me and Dad

I had the opportunity to go to Washington last weekend to my friend's wedding. Wilson and I flew out on Thursday night and came home Sunday afternoon. It was a quick trip, but I had a such a great time. On Friday I went and got my nails and toes done while my dad watched Wilson. Then the three of us went to the fair. We ate all the good fair food--krusty pup corn dogs, elephant ears, roasted corn, lemonade and scones! On Saturday Wilson and I went and cruised the mall--I had to go since it was so close :) Then Dad, Wilson and I went to the wedding that evening. I have known Erica since first grade when we started girl scouts and it was fun for all of us girls to be together again. We had so much fun dancing. Thank you Randa for being the official Wilson holder! It was a great weekend!

Bath Time

The kids really love to be in the bath. Wilson is getting to be such a big boy! He loves to sit up in the bath, but he's still a little unsteady and slides around. His most favorite toy is the small rubber duckie--he puts the head in his mouth and chews on it everytime!

Fun with Grandpa

Grandpa was even able to get in some fun while he was here! He sure loves these two!