Andrew

Now that the older boys are in school, it's just Andrew and daddy some mornings. Mornings where they can get errands done, like getting a haircut!


It started out ok....

But turned very sad....

Isn't that the saddest little face? And look at the car he is clutching in his hand that they gave him. It worked for like, a second.  But he's all trimmed now and cute.

A trip to the park afterward helped cheer up this 20-month-old.

Andrew is really so sweet, despite one good habit that's become a bad habit shall we say.

He loves to read. Loves to be read to. Loves books. Loves them so much he'll throw an all-out crying fit if you don't drop what you are doing and put him on your lap and read his favorite book to him.

"Eed?  EEEEDDDD???"

Last week, Saggy Baggy Elephant. This week, Cars.

But we try to remember he won't be this age long, and it will be hard to put a college student on our laps to read to him, right?

Benny's first day

My Benny boy is now in the 4 year old preschool class.  He's been waiting for his school to start for a while.  Yesterday morning, JB says he just marched right in! No fear, no nervousness. 

I picked him up at noon and he bounced right over -- "Mommy, Mommy!" He'll go three days this year and I think he's going to love it. He found Legos there the first day.  And he's already bonding with his teacher.

In his prayers last night he said, "Thank you I could go to preschool today. Please bless Miss Jamie with all the hard work she has to do...."

Except he says "fank" for "thank" and "pwees bwess" instead of please bless. I like how he is still my little boy learning to talk, instead of growing up too fast. 

Farewell, summer

August saw the end of baseball.

A tour of the Sweets candy factory with aunt Suzanne (it's a tasty tour).

A few trips to Lagoon with cousins -- look at that proud grandmother.

Look at this proud daddy, taking Max on Wicked.  Max thought it was so-so -- the bar hurt his tummy as they plummeted down, down, down.

And here's me after coming down a water slide!

Andrew knows exactly where to get warm after Lagoon-A Beach.

It sure seems like we did a lot.  But most of the summer we hid inside. It was hot! Man, it was hot inside that  U fieldhouse for baseball, too.  But the boys loved it, and improved so much over the weeks. And I'm so glad we were able to go to Lagoon a lot.  Thank you, thank you John Robert!

Dirty Jobs...

...With JB!

JB helped roof a house last Saturday. Look how white his teeth look under all that dirt! Such a stud. The boys hosed him off in the backyard before he came in for a shower.

JB's birthday

For JB's birthday, I found him a bike jersey from the Tour of Utah. It's just slightly too small! Apparently they are made in Italy and they run small. Those Italians.

I also gave him this new tall, comfy camp chair from Costco.  (They had a BYU one, too, honey....)

Then his parents took us out to eat at their favorite restaurant in SLC, the Rio Grande Cafe.  I love these pictures JB took of Pauline and John.

Benny, waiting for some rice and beans goodness.

Andrew the ham.

Um, why so serious?

These two always make each other laugh.

Afterwards, outside, JB was teasing his parents about taking a picture with them each kissing his cheek.  His dad said, "I don't want it showing up on Mary's blog!"  So, I picked this one. For you, Feller.

JB got his boys to do a kissing pose too.

I'm pretty sure they also launched into a chant of "We love daddy! We love daddy!"  Chants have been big in our house since we watched the Olympics for every minute of those two weeks.  Even Andrew joined in with some "USA! USA!" action.

Max's birthday (oh, and mine too)

We had a few days of celebrating Max's birthday in July. First with family on Pioneer Day. There was definitely a Lego theme.  Pinterest helped me make his cake.

 

 For weeks before hand, Max dreamed of, talked about, and begged for a Lego fire truck. I mean he would mention it 10 times a day. But then he found out about the $30 set....and the $71 set.  He would sigh, talk wistfully about the bigger sets, but then insist all he wanted was the $10.67 fire truck.  Oh we sure tricked him!

Papa and Nona pitched in for the $71 dollar set.  Max was almost overcome. 

That same night I got a surprise for my birthday -- Toms flats!  I wear them a lot cuz I am in love with them.

 

Then on Max's actual birthday we took him for a cheeseburger. The boy loves cheeseburgers. He also daydreams about those.  On my birthday we had fried chicken.  I daydream about it.

 

Then the next Monday, we had a Groupon to Planet Play and took along some neighbors and cousins.

 

Yeah, it was fun!  Oh, see the turquoise strap over my arm?  A birthday present from JB of a fabulous purse that I love. A lot.

Second grade looks great

Someone is very excited about starting second grade.

Those younger brothers are showing off what they look like on this first day of school, too.

Benny's preschool starts in a couple weeks.  Andrew is fascinated by buckles and loves bike helmets. He's not starting school for years, thank goodness.  

Well hello!  

Max talked our ears off about the first day.  Miss Gerri made pancakes as per tradition apparently. Excellent tradition.  And he wants us to come see his locker decoration. 

For K and 1st grade I would always talk about how he was the youngest and tallest in his class. He was listening. I heard him say something yesterday about checking birthdays to see if he was still the youngest, and I think he was eyeing the other kids to see who was taller.  It's starting to even out now, I think.