"I clean it up"

I am a little embarrassed to post yet another entry about my mistakes as a mother but this must be remembered so here we go.

Owen has this problem. He always has to poop right around nap time and most days lately he is forgoing the nap altogether. So today since he played hard this morning and then went poop right before his nap I knew we were in the clear for him to have a good nap. Well, after he had been in bed for about 2 minutes he came out and said he needed to go potty. I told him no, that he just went and he didn't need to go and told him to go get back in bed. He did as he was told and was quiet for about 5 minutes when my phone started to ring so I answered it and snuck out to the van to talk so I wouldn't wake him up. After talking to Scott for a couple minutes I opened the door to listen for Owen and didn't hear anything so I decided to call and talk to my mom. 30 minutes later I paid for it.

I came in from the garage and as I was about halfway up the stairs I noticed Owen's door was open and just then the smell hit me. I found Owen with his pants off, poop everywhere and poop smeared wads of toilet paper all over the floor. Owen just looked up and me and said, "I clean it up."

The poor kid had smeared the mess all over himself, the rugs, the toilet and the floor. I wiped him off with wipes and then put him in the bath so I could clean up the mess. As he sat there watching me work he looked at me and said, "I tell you I need to go potty and you say NO!" Yep, this one is on me. I just wonder how long he was in there "cleaning it up."

Sunday Best

I love these handsome little boys. They look so cute all dressed up for church. Owens hair doesn't stay looking nice past sacrament meeting but at least we got one picture with handsome hair. It never gets old to me to see them dressed up like this for church.

We absolutely love our ward here in Kansas. When we moved away from Utah we had many people say things about being prepared to be Relief Society President or in the Bishopric as if we would be so needed in the struggling wards outside of Utah. This couldn't be further from the truth. There are so many amazing people in our ward. So many families that we look at and think "we want our family to be more like the so and so's or what are they doing to raise such awesome strong youth." I am convinced that Scott and I need to be here to learn from them.

Scott works with the young men which he loves. I think he is just glad to be around people who are willing to beat box with him.

I am in the Primary which is so great! I secretly wanted to be for a long time and although I am going to miss the awesome RS lessons each week I love being in primary with Spencer. I love knowing what songs he is learning and being able to talk to him about the lessons he had each week.

Basically we love our ward. We miss Utah and being close to family but we really love our Red Bridge Family.

New Toys!

One of the wonderful post Christmas perks is the kids play for hours with their new toys. Hours of happy, playing kids equals happy kids and a happy mom. Here are some pictures of the fun.

I could never get a picture of the cars going around...they move too fast.

This is also a favorite of Scott and I.

When Owen concentrates out comes the tongue...just like his dad.

Thanks to Grandma Miller Spencer got his first Lego set. He has spent hours with this firetruck. Usually repairing the damage done by his brother.

Other 2011 fav's include new trucks, guns, movies and games. I can't even tell you how many games of Guess Who I have played in the last two weeks.

Christmas Eve in Kansas

This year Christmas was much different for our little family. We made the hard decision to stay here in Kansas and spend our first Christmas away from the rest of our family in Utah. It was different but not bad. We had a great time relaxing and hanging out with out the normal hustle and bustle. Christmas Eve day since we knew there wouldn't be snow for Christmas we made our own snowflakes for a white Christmas. Then we did tradition holidayish things like playing football

and eating cheese balls.

Then we joined a family party via webcam and enjoyed watching gifts that we sent be opened and also opening presents from family far away.

Next on the list is getting ready for Santa's arrival. I love how basically the pictures below tell so much about the personalities of each of these Miller boys.

Sweet-

Silly-

Crazy-

We were so grateful to be invited to a party that night with many great families from our ward. They really are our family away from family and what a treat it was to spend the evening laughing and eating and enjoying each others company. I am sure that helped keep the homesickness at bay. Then home we went to get ready for the big events to come.

We had so much fun with the magical feeling of Christmas. Each year it gets more and more fun with these little guys.

The house is ready...time for bed.

The Minivan Express

The night before Christmas Eve we surprised the kids with a ticket to ride the Minivan Express. As Scott got the kids ready for bed and did the normal routine I put tickets on their pillows and then went out to the van to wait for my passengers. We had just finished watching The Polar Express and as soon as they saw the tickets the fun began. They put their robes and slippers on and Scott led them out to the van. We don't really go out much at night after dark so the kids hadn't seen many Christmas lights. The Minivan Express took us to a neighborhood that is WAY decked out with lights and while we drove they had hot chocolate and ate popcorn. The kids loved it! I loved it! So simple but it was a hit. In fact when we got home Owen insisted on sleeping with his ticket and the next morning when they woke up the first thing they did was play Polar Express with the kitchen chairs all in a row and taking turns wearing the Engineers hat. We might have to do this again next year!

Like father like son...seriously alike

Scott and I were looking through some old boxes the other night and found these of him at about Owens age. If Owens hair were longer they would be identical.

Seriously, are my genes involved at all? Actually, it's fine because the are both so cute.

Just because he's cute

Potty Trained

I should have posted this a couple of months ago but I can't pass up on giving props to my Owen Jack. I was convinced that he was going to be difficult to potty train and well he basically rocked it. When we started he was scared to even sit on the toilet. So, I did the same thing I did with Spencer. We went to the library and checked out "Go Potty Go" and I brainwashed him. After watching it about 5 times in a row he wanted to sit on the potty. We stocked up on reward treats and we were fully committed. The boy is a genius. He regularly pooped about twice a day before potty training but once there were reward suckers the kid was eeking out little nuggets all day long and basically had a sucker in his mouth all day everyday for a week. A week later he was trained and now a couple of months later he even sleeps in underwear. I'm so proud of him!

It's about time they pull some weight...

With two little boys using our toilets they need to be cleaned frequently. They now clean the toilets.

I know it won't last forever but they actually enjoy doing little jobs around the house.

It's a beautiful thing.