Happenings

I taught Joy School again this week. It went a lot better this time. Maybe the kids are getting more used to the schedule, or maybe I just got better and knew what to expect. Either way I really enjoyed it this time. The kids seemed to have fun and I know Dylan loves it!

We have just been hanging out around here. We've been going outside everyday since we have been having such nice weather. It has been in the 60's and 70's lately. Very unusual for November, but no complains here! Dylan loves riding his bike and his scooter. Lauren loves to ride in her wagon, so it works out great for everyone.

Lauren still isn't walking yet. She shows all the signs that she should, but something isn't clicking for her. The doctor suggested we have First Steps evaluate her, so I hope everything is ok. She'll be 16 months old next week. Crazy how the time flies. Oh yeah, I have her 15 month stats:

Weight: 22 lbs. 2 oz. (25th percentile)
Height: 32 1/4 in. (90th percentile)
Head Circumference: 46.8 cm. (50th percentile)
She is getting bigger by the day and we love having her around. She is talking like crazy! I only wish we knew what she was saying. Some of her words are very clear, while others are just gibberish. I think it's cute! Her newest obsession is with shoes. She loves them. Any shoe works great. They go on her hands as she is crawling or she will sit and try to put them on her feet. Silly girl! She gets them on every once and a while. She thinks she is pretty funny!
Her hair is getting so long! I had to trim her bangs the other day because they were in her eyes! I put her hair up in a little pony tail and she absolutely hated it! She cried the whole time, but I think it looked cute! We'll have to try it again soon!
We went to the park the other day with my mom and her friend. The kids were really cute and we had a wonderful time. Here are the best shots I got!Lauren was so cute playing peek-a-boo around this tree!

Happy Halloween!

For Halloween this year, I thought it would be fun to make pumpkin pancakes for breakfast. The kids loved them and I think they turned out really cute! One of my friends suggest them, so thanks for the idea! I'll have to start getting more creative for the holidays! We decided to stay home and trick-or-treat with our neighbor friends. Dylan and Chloe, their daughter, are really good friends and had a blast together. We walked around with them last year, too. It was really nice to just hang out around home and then pass out candy. There were a TON of kids walking around our neighborhood. I guess we lucked out and got a great family friendly area! I tried to get a few shots of the kids before we left. Lauren would not look at the camera at all! Dylan, on the other hand, was cheesing it up!

Here are Dylan and Chloe walking away from a house. It was really cold outside, so we were very glad the kids had fleece costumes! Lauren thought it was fun to take a piece of candy out of the basket and drop it into her basket. It was too cute! She actually said Thank you by the end of the night, too! This morning, I had to get a picture of the kids with all of their loot. Dylan was throwing a fit until I gave him a piece of candy before breakfast! He was happy after that! I love how they are smiling as they look at all of the candy! Lauren didn't know what to do with all of that candy! She started throwing it behind her after I took the picture. At least she is looking at the camera!

Dylan with his goofy grin. It's amazing what candy will do for a 3 year old!This is one of the traditions that I started when Dylan was a baby. Overall, we had a wonderful day and enjoyed spending time with our friends.

Pumpkin patch

Yesterday, we went to the Pumpkin Patch about 15 minutes away from our house. It is really cute and had a ton of fun activities for the kids to enjoy! We started out by going to see the animals in the petting zoo. Dylan was really excited to feed them.

Then we rode around on these little buggy type things. Dylan had a blast with daddy and then Lauren got a turn with me.

We then headed over to the pumpkins to pick one out. We let Dylan pick it out this year. He did a great job and thought they were all really neat. Lauren was just excited to be sitting next to them. She would not look at me for anything!

We had to get a family shot before we left. I think it turned out great and we really enjoyed being there together as a family!Hopefully we can make this another one of our traditions to get there as a family each year!

Surprising news!

Yes, it's true! I am 18 weeks pregnant and having a boy! We had the ultrasound on Thursday! We were a little surprised by this pregnancy, so we waited a while to tell everyone. The baby is due March 24th, right after Dylan turns 4! I can't believe I am going to have 3 kids 4 and under! I guess we just needed to have another little Tater-tot running around her faster than we expected. We are getting excited and looking forward to seeing this little guy!
The doctor's office made it very convenient for blogging, because they give you a cd with all of your pictures on it instead of a vhs! Yeah for technology!

Ups and downs

We had an interesting past couple of weeks, to say the least. Last week started out fun. We visited grandma and grandpa. Dylan got to wear this amazing outfit that my great-grandma made for my grandpa. It is so neat that we have 4 generations wearing this outfit and it's still going strong! The legs were a little short, but other than that it was great! What a handsome little guy! Ricky was gone all week, so I thought it would be a long week. We did fine until Thursday. I started to get a cold, so I didn't feel so great. It didn't seem that bad until Friday morning really early when I woke up with the chills and then got sick. I called my mother-in-law (who is a nurse), and she suggested that I got to the doctor. Luckily, we have a great ward and someone came over to pick up the kids for me. (Thanks again Kelly!) I went to the doctor and couldn't even sit up long enough to get the results of the test. I ended up having the Swine flu. Yuck. I didn't get a really high fever, so I must have caught it early. They gave me a prescription for Tamiflu, which only shortens the length of the symptoms for a day or two. Ricky came home that evening and kept the kids away from me, so they wouldn't get sick, too! I guess we got lucky that it was only me that got sick this time and Ricky took a week of vacation before we knew I was going to get sick. It was not fun and a very long week. I missed the primary program, which I was bummed about. I guess you can't control everything. Since we have been entertaining ourselves at home, the kids have been having a blast. Dylan's newest funtime is building forts out of the couch pillows. I love having a play couch! He even does a great job of sharing with his little sis!

We tried to get outside to enjoy the beautiful weather we had this week. Too bad I was sick and couldn't go much farther than the backyard. The kids still had fun! I enjoyed snapping a few shots of them playing.

And then the rain came! I got this umbrella at a garage sale for 50 cents, and Dylan loves it! He wants to take it everywhere, so I let him go play in the rain! Too funny!

So, I think things are starting to get back to normal around here. I am feeling a ton better and Ricky has a couple more days off of work! Yeah! Hopefully things will stay good around here for a while!