Halloween 2012

Ezra's second Halloween was much more eventful than his first. I only mention this because I was filling out his baby book the other day and for each of his first major holidays it asks questions like "How we celebrated...", "Who was there...".  The Halloween page has two lines written in saying that we dressed Ezra as a skeleton and we celebrated by taking him to Grandma's Minster's work to show everyone his costume.  It was a good enough Halloween for me, but it just sounds so dull when you have to describe it in writing.

This year not only did we dress Ezra up, but we actually celebrated as well.

We went to St. Luke's Pumpkin Patch a couple of times....

We also went to the Trunk or Treat at our church.

Ezra got a fair amount of candy from all the ward members, none of which he got to eat.

He also got his face painted and enjoyed crawling around on the dead grass.  I shouldn't have let him crawl on that grass, though, because now his lion fur is matted with prickly stickers, most of which I don't think I will ever be able to get out.  At least he enjoyed himself. 

And the best part is we got to hang out with friends.  Jack's parents were much more festive and dressed up as Swamp People to go along with Jack's alligator costume.  I had a couple short lived ideas for Marc and I to dress up as the Scarecrow and Dorothy or, even easier,  zoo keepers.  But it was just so much simpler to not dress up at all!

Number Two

I have a problem with typos.  Not so much in writing letters or papers, but whenever I am making a sign or something for presentation where I'm focusing on how it looks a little more than what is says, I have a habit of leaving out a letter or making some other mistake.

In high school, I stayed late one night to make a big 10 foot sign for student council to advertise the musical chairs lunch time activity later that week.  I was very satisfied with how it turned out when I hung it up at the front entrance of the school that night.  It wasn't until the next morning in Mr. Downs class that I was brought to the realization of my mistake as he informed the class of the stupidity of whoever made the sign advertising "Musical Chars."  I was lucky Mr. Downs didn't tear the sign down, which he usually does when he finds any spelling or grammatical mistakes that are displayed in public.

So this brings me to my latest mistake on the shirt I made for Ezra...

And just like the "musical chars" sign, I didn't realize my mistake until after I made the shirt, and after I took a million photos of Ezra wearing the shirt, after I used the photos to design announcements online to send to our family, and after I even put on the announcements "Baby Number Two: due May 1, 2012."  No, it wasn't until later that night after I had ordered the announcements to be printed and shipped that I realized lying in bed that I had put my due date as May 1, 2012.  And only then, did it even occur to me that I had also put the wrong year on the shirt!  Codi said it is probably just my "pregnancy brain," but I know it really is just my brain.

So yes, all of this is just unimportant intro to the more important news that we are expecting our second baby in the beginning of May--May 2013!

Our Big Boy

Life is so much fun with Ezra.  He is constantly keeping me entertained and surprising me with what he can do and understand.  Lately his favorite song is "Book of Mormon Stories."  He requests it quite frequently by holding his hands up in the shape of a book.  He especially gets excited when Marc and I sing it together and he has even started doing all the actions.

He is still just a crawler, but I really think he could walk if he wanted to.  He can stand on his own very well, but not for too long because he doesn't want to fall.  He does really well  walking with us holding one hand and he also likes using his new bike as a walker.  He'll walk the whole length of the hall with it while ringing the bell--thank you Codi for the great birthday gift!

He loves to play by the window when the sun is shining onto the carpet.  Sometimes he'll just lounge over there in the corner until I come looking for him.

Last month we experimented with finger painting at his friend Emma's house.  Niether of them quite knew what to do with, but they did have fun getting messy!  We'll have to try it again when Ezra's a little older.

Now my biggest dilemma is figuring out a Halloween costume.  I've been thinking about it for a couple of months, but the problem is I'm so indecisive, and realistically I'm past the point of making anything myself.  So I really just need to find something online soon.  Yeah, I'm a boring mom, like that.  Hopefully Ezra won't be scarred for life by wearing a store bought costume, because as much I'd like to think I'm a crafty and creative person, I have a feeling we'll almost certainly go the store bought route many more times in the future. :)

9.16.12 Ezra turns 1!

Our little Ezra celebrated his first birthday yesterday.  And he is not our little Ezra anymore.  He's a big boy with his own personality and likes and dislikes.  He has his favorite games and he loves to make his mommy and daddy laugh.  Not walking yet, but he's just started testing out standing on his own without any support.  And his first tooth came in just a couple of days before his birthday too!

Since my mom is Kathy, I had to make a sign and do some decorating for my little boy's birthday...

Marc and I decided early on that we wanted to give our children only one gift for birthdays and Christmas.  I modified this plan later on to giving one gift and one book. We were hoping that this would help keep our kids from becoming spoiled or entitled.  However, we forgot about all of Ezra's grandparents, aunts, and uncles (and there are a lot of them) who would send presents too.  Ezra was definitely spoiled on his birthday, but he didn't seem to mind and neither did we. :)

One of the first things he went for was the crinkly paper bow on top of his gift from the Asay's....

He was very careful when tearing off the wrapping paper, which surprised me because he can sure tear a piece of paper to shreds when he it's something he's not supposed to get into.

He got a dump truck from mom and dad.  Hasn't figured out how to move it around much, but he loves putting the legos in the truck and taking them out again.

We were able to video chat online with all his grandparents and most of his aunts and uncles throughout the day.  They got to watch him open presents and make a mess of his birthday cake.  It's amazing that even though we live so far away, it still felt like our family was here with us to celebrate.

Ezra was fascinated by the candle, but of course, didn't grasp the idea of blowing it out, and instead tried to grab it out of the cake.

Surprisingly, Ezra started out by being very delicate with his cake, picking off the sprinkles first...

...but it didn't take long for him to start digging in!

 And he had a whole audience to cheer him on back in Utah!

I was pretty relieved that he ate as little as he did, and stopped of his own accord.  I don't think I've ever seen Ezra refuse any food or stop eating because he was satisfied or full.  This gave me hope that he does, in fact, have a limit!

Happy, Happy Birthday Ezra, dear! 

We love you!

July in Utah

Our trip to Utah this summer was so nice.  My very favorite thing (other than seeing family of course) was being able to hang out on the grass.  Not only is it usually too hot in Midland to just be outside , but there is also no decent grass to enjoy.  It's either dead or infested with fire ants.  A green lawn is definitely what I miss the most about Utah.

I also loved being on the farm in Mona.

Ezra loved his very first 4-Wheeler ride!

And despite Marc's guarantee that I would crash, I drove a motorcycle for the first time.  I may have ended up in the weeds on my first try, but I did not crash!

Ezra loved the trampoline. He's lucky enough to have one in Mona and another in Orem to play on.

It was fun to see Ezra play with so many of his cousins too.  He got so used to all the people and attention that when we came home he acted a little bored with me.

Ezra and Gemma were fun to see together.  Ezra was in awe of Gemma's walking and babbling.

It was good to get home to our own place and normal routine, but we still miss family and the beautiful  Utah outdoors in the summer.

I've been horrible about taking photos of Ezra since we got back, but I will do better and post some more recent photos soon.  He is getting so big, and on Sunday he turns 1!  I can't believe how fast this year has gone!

7.14.12 Ute Stampede

The Ute Stampede Rodeo is a summer tradition, and living in Texas is no excuse to skip out on this tradition (zombie walks are also no excuse, Jeremy Stubbs!).  We didn't come to Utah for the sole intent of going to the Stampede.  However, when planning the dates we would be visiting family, the dates of the Stampede were a big part of the equation.

As always, the day starts out with the Lion's Club breakfast...Ezra was happy to sit with his Grandpa Gordon because he was much more generous with his food than Daddy usually is.

We also stopped in at Matilda's to see Grandma Holly...

...who had a very cute cowboy hat for Ezra.  Too bad his head was a bit too big for it to fit properly :).

We also spent some time with cousins at Adam and Andie's house...

Ezra loved being able to roam free on the grass and play with all the all the animals there.

Grandma was kind enough to babysite Ezra for the night so Marc and I could go to the Rodeo with the usual crowd. 

As always, they featured the bathing beauty winners at the beginning of the parade.  One day I will enter that competition!

Half way through the rodeo it started raining hard.  We were fortunate enough to be under the grandstand, so we stayed pretty dry...at least until the wind started picking up.  Trevor, Amanda, Travis, and Allison all had blankets to help keep them pretty dry.

I pulled my jacket up over my head and hunched over my purse to keep it dry.  

My back was soaking wet, but my purse made it out okay!

And Marc had no blanket nor jacket, so he pretty much got soaked.

And through it all, the rodeo kept going, 

because afterall, "It's the bulls and blood, it's the dust and mud!"