Zoo Trip 2013

Last weekend we went on our annual zoo trip. Werty vowed that next year he is taking a day off work and we will go on a weekday instead of the last Saturday before the school year starts...it was so crowded that we missed meeting up with Werty's brothers and their kids. We being the only ones without a cell...they found each other just fine. We did find each other in time for lunch and the bird show. Then we split up because they had already seen the things we hadn't.

 Here is our zoo's baby elephant - she just turned 4, same age as Bear.

 Last year, the snow leopard had 3 baby cubs about the same age as Little Miss, the zoo still has mother and one cub, this one. I love the baby animals...

 Here is a new baby giraffe!

 Bear at the bird show. He loved the birds flying right at and over his head.

 Bear and Werty on the carousel. He wanted to sit in the peacock seats because he didn't want an animal that went up and down.

Bear is almost as big as a female adult orangutan. 

 They had a special lego theme exhibit going on, although some of the lego animals had been removed due to heat damage...but here is the polar bear, make completely of little legos. And the kids spent about 20 mins playing with these big legos before we left.

 Even Little Miss tried doing some legos.

 After the zoo, it was about 5pm, so we stopped by to visit my grandparents before leaving Salt Lake.

Conquering Stairs

My kids continue to grow in different ways. Little Miss has been climbing up the stairs for weeks now, but still couldn't climb down. Last week, she got it. She has conquered the stairs! Every day she tries out new sounds and new words. Yesterday, the word was 'cheese' (because she didn't like any of the other options I offered to her for her snack). Meanwhile, Bear is becoming a 4 year old. This morning he found a fortune cookie in the kitchen, and declared that he was going to help me with cleaning up his room and the family room, that he was old enough for chores, and as a reward when he was done, could he have the fortune cookie? Sure! So, he cleaned up the toys throughout the house - his room, the living room, the family room. Then we had lunch, and after lunch, he ate the fortune cookie. It's so nice when there are opportunities for positive reinforcement!

 (I would like to point out that Little Miss is eating a roma tomato from our garden in this photo. She was eating raspberries, but they ran out before she wanted them to. Werty gave her a tomato to cheer her up, and a few minutes later she started eating the tomato quite happily.)

This is the newest dress I made for her.

PS Mom, do you like any of these pics for your book?

15 Month Stats - Little Miss

Poor Little Miss had a tummy virus, and spent Wednesday and Thursday with a high fever (103 is high in my book - and it got to 103.9 Thursday night). Today she is finally back to eating real food, and very happy about it. Here are her stats from her 15 month check-up on Friday. I will have to take her back in next week to get her shots now that her fever is gone.

Weight:  22 lbs.  40%  (I think she probably lost a pound being sick this week.)
Height:  33 inches  95%  (She might not be as tall as Jack-Jack, but 95% is still tall in my book.)
Head:  19 inches  95%

First Step

So, Little Miss 1 is pulling herself up and wanting to stand. She still isn't sure how to get back down again. She took her first step from the piano bench to the couch, while we were having a google hangout call with Werty's family on Sunday. Not that the computer was aimed at her feet, so all anyone saw was her head. I cleared off the camera today so that we have it ready for when she takes her first independent steps. She continues to pull herself up on stuff, even toys in the middle of the room, so I think she will start walking very soon. Meanwhile, she continues to climb on everything she can reach, including the stairs. Here's the photographic evidence:

 And here are both kids, playing together, in case you think we only take pics of Little Miss.

Idaho and Back

We attended the funeral for Werty's great Aunt yesterday. We had a nice visit. We saw Cherney's cute little new house. When we got home Little Miss was hugging everything, so happy to be back at her own house and out of the car. The smelly car. This is not the first time that BooBear has thrown up half way to ID. Now that he's a little older and can tell us what happened, we have realized (we're a little thick sometimes, ok?) that he gets car sick. Werty finally told me on this trip that 1. Werty got more car sick than the rest of his siblings when he was a child and 2. what tips and tricks that we can do to keep him from getting car sick. I had learned from past trips to bring extra clothes, which turned out to be a good thing as BooBear went through all three outfits (he sat on pair of short #3 to keep his nice shorts from getting soiled by his yucky car seat.) I was also smart and didn't put him in his church clothes for the acutal car trip, so he still had nice, clean clothes for the funeral/reunion. It was nice to see everyone. Good luck to cousin L and his upcoming trip to Cape Verde. We hope he will be able to bring his fiancee to the US soon, so they can get married in the temple.

Here are some new pics to share:

BooBear said he was making a "sandwich."

Little Miss riding her bike by herself, pushing with her legs, for the first time.

She has reached that age where she does lots of "firsts" and cute random things. I took this pic this morning, when she was sleeping with her bum up in the air.

My Reaction

My son learned a 4 letter word. A word that we don't use in our house because, as parents, we set the example. A word that I have been dreading. A word that I have been preparing for, trying to decide what my reaction should be. He learned the word HATE.

Yesterday, Bear was having a time-out from his sister's ride-on fire truck because he was being too rough with it, using it to bump into his sister, etc. After his time out, I told him his sister was having a turn on it, and he couldn't have it back until after her turn. Perhaps the consequence was more severe than it should have been for the infraction (because in my mind this was strike number3, and in his mind, the last infraction wasn't as bad as the first 2). He threw a fit. When I tried to talk to him, he told me, "Mommy, I hate you." And when all he got was stunned silence, he looked me in the eye and repeated it again, slowly and deliberately.

This is it. The moment I have dreaded/planned for/hoped would never come. What will my reaction be? Do I get angry? Sad? And then...I just laughed. He was surprised and almost laughed himself...but then he remembered that he was mad at me. Frowny face returned.

"I don't believe you." I said in my 'you're silly' voice. "Because I love you so much!" And then I gave him a hug. There were a few more minutes of tantrum after that because he still wasn't getting what he wanted, but I am pleased with my reaction. I was able to laugh it off, diffuse the situation instead of escalating it, and reassure my son that I loved him. And hopefully he will not permanently add "I hate you" to his list of things he does or says when he's mad.

Summerfest Carnival

This year we decided our kids were old enough to take to the Summerfest carnival that our city does every year. The first thing the kiddos did was sit in the back of a real helicopter!

BooBear rode rides appropriate for his age, mostly vehicles that go around in a circle.

I took both kids on the carousel. Little Miss enjoyed it at first, but by the end she was starting to get scared.

BooBear in the boat ride. Little Miss watching her brother and eating fishy crackers.

We grabbed some carnival fare for dinner and headed home right before the parade started - we were almost cut off from being able to walk home. We saw a lot of people we knew going TO the parade, while we walked home. When they are a little older, we'll try to the parade. We spent about two hours total, just right for our little ones.