Guess who's 3?

Yep, this brown eyed boy turned 3 this year.


This was the first year he really understood what a birthday is all about... PRESENTS!! He completely understood about getting presents, but when you told him "Happy Birthday" he would say "Happy Birthday" back, we laughed every time.

I don't have any "cake" pictures because frankly, James doesn't like to eat cake or cupcakes or really any dessert except cookies. So we had cookies for his birthday.

 
Uncle Andrew brought home some toy bikes from Afghanistan. They also came with riders as well.

Oh! are we ever into Rescuebots at our house. They get played with daily and the cartoon has had to have a limit put on it of once a day or it would be on all day long.  This is Heatwave in case you were all wondering.


A little before James' birthday we got looking around his bedroom and realized his side of the room was a little bare. Ethan has his "All about ME" posters from school up on his side and James didn't have anything so he got this Cars 2 poster and an Avengers poster that are now hanging on his side of the room.



Grandma Fritsch has an amazing talent of crocheing. She makes all the grandchildren blankets that are personalized to them. They get one when they are born, which is put away until they are old enough not to ruin it, so about the time they get married. But they get another that gets to go on their bed and used every day.
This is James' blanket. His favorite color is Yellow. If ever he has a choice in colors he will always choose yellow (remember the ball throwing at Blast Off?).


This is a "Balance" bike. I wish we would have had this for Ethan. They are by far the best bikes for kids to start out on. It helps them figure out the balancing part of riding a bike. Most kids go straight from one of these to a bike withOUT training wheels.
Since it is snowy and cold outside James gets to ride this around the house. It took all of 1 week for James to be able to go from the family room to his bedroom with his feet up on the bar. I have a feeling Adam will be on it by mid-summer and James will be riding a normal bike. And speaking of Adam....

This is what happens when you let the 1 yr old, that doesn't understand birthdays and presents, sit on the bike and then make him get off...



Isn't that the best tantrum - I didn't get my way faces ever? It makes me laugh every time I look at it.

Winter Sports

The whole family got to go up to Targhee this year to see Ethan race down for winter sports. It was cold, but I'm glad we went.
 

Some fun in the snow

Some Blast Off Fun

Last Monday while in Idaho Falls Grandma E, the boys and I had some time to kill while waiting to meet up with Uncle Bubba in Lava. So we headed over to Blast Off.

We had the whole place to ourselves, it was great.  James was running everywhere and Adam was surrounded by balls so he was in heaven.
It is the best place to kill some time and wear out the children.


I didn't notice while we were there, Bill actually pointed it out, that James would only throw the Yellow balls. Yellow is his favorite color if you didn't know.
Every time James came back up out of the balls I keep saying to myself "Bazzinga".

Now this was funny. Adam was yelling so loud at the balls because he couldn't get them out.

it was a fun time.

DIY project

The boys have been in dire need of some book shelves for their room.

I really haven't found anything that I liked so we have been stacking them on the floor, which ends up in a big mess.

I found a DIY idea project on pinterest and went for it.

These are my rain gutters turned into book shelves...


What do ya'll think??

3D is cool

For Valentines Grandma F sent up some books for the boys and Ethans happen to be a 3D Dinosaur book. So of course we all had to give it a try. The best was James. He was trying to grab the dinosaurs from the page it was funny.

Tis' the season

This year there were a lot of Santa's helpers showing up all around the valley, which was nice and allowed us to choose where we took the boys to see "Santa". Lucky for us one of our favorite places to eat, The Brakeman Grill on Main Street, was one of those places. So we got together with a couple families and planned it out to have an awesome lunch and then see Santa. It was a great lunch and a great Santa. Enjoy..

Adam turns 1!

Adam turned 1 on the 8th.

I still have a hard time grasping it.

1 year.

Looking back on the challenges of the year and of course the challenges before he came into this world, it brings me speechless.

1 year ago, we were preparing for one of the hardest and most emotional days we could imagine. Here are some of the memories that keep swimming around in my head: Bub met us up at the hospital for a blessing. It was wonderful. I remember sitting in the chapel on the Labor and Delivery floor so nervous and not being able to put a complete sentence together. Then Bill and Bub put their hands on my head and Bill gave me such a blessing. I still hold parts of it close to my heart.

Adam was really "quiet" that morning. The labor wasn't bad and it seemed like he was saving his energy to fight the battle to come.

The blue partition. If you haven't had a c-section before, then you really wouldn't understand the frustration and annoyance which is the partition. I know there are some out there that are happy it is there, but I'm not one of those. With James Dr. Huggins didn't even put it up. It was so great. I was relaxed, so relaxed they didn't strap my arms down.
Oh, strapping my arms down. Not for the claustrophobic. a big blue partition and you cant move.

They kept putting the mask on and saying my blood pressure was dropping too low. I would look at Bill and roll my eyes. Then he would say something to the effect of "you need oxygen to breath so it has to be on." Then he would hold my hand tighter.

Holding my breath. Actually, I think it was more of I didn't think to breathe.

Knowing he should be out and making noises, seeing scrubs moving fast around my head and seeing the look on Bill's face. I'm sure it was a mirror of what mine looked like.

Knowing he was out and still not hearing anything except the nurse telling me I have to keep breathing.

The tiny cry as they were passing him through the window to the NICU and the tears that followed.

A really annoying alarm that kept going off and more reminders to breathe.

Fading in and out until I recognized the voices of those wonderful people in my recovery room.

More alarms, more nurses telling me to breathe and being shaken when I didn't respond. One of the clearest memories I have is laying there on the bed thinking to myself "this is cool. I don't need to breath. I don't even want to. Wow. I wish they would turn off that noise, its annoying."

Not breathing to panic attacks because no one was telling me what was going on with Adam and Bill.

Mindi coming in and letting me know he was okay, Bill was with him and they were giving him oxygen. 

Seeing his IV in his head and holding the tears back, willing myself to stay strong.

4 hours of skin-to-skin in the NICU. Watching his SATS go from constant concerned monitoring and high oxygen, to being completely free of everything all in 4 hours.

His first feeding, 16 hours after birth.

Waking up in a panic because he wasn't in my room and then biting on my tongue so I didn't cry.

Visitors!! All the visitors were a more welcome sight then you'll ever know.

Nancy and Kristen, all the way down from Idaho with a butterfinger shake and so much love.

Cookies!!! Big, soft, loaded with frosting, flower shaped sugar cookies. All I have to do is think about them and I crave.. CRAVE!! them. I did share one of the 4 cookies with my nurse. I think Bill may have had a pedal or two. Thank you Laura!!

Hours and hours rocking, feeding and talking to Adam in my little curtain covered corner of the intermediate nursery.

The overflowing feeling of gratitude when we were told he would be discharged with me.

 If ever we need a reminder of the miracles and grace of our Heavenly Father, all we have to do is look at Adam.
 

My favorite time of year!

Yes, for most people this is Christmas but not for me.  My favorite time of year is HALLOWEEN baby!!

Seriously, most people have Christmas traditions; we have Halloween traditions. Don't worry, we have a few Christmas traditions as well.

This year was even grander than years past. What can I say, I was trying to make up for not being home and not being able to hold these traditions last year.  Blah, blah, blah.. on to the traditions you say?

*October 1st:
October 1st is a day set aside for putting every Halloween decoration I own around the house. It usually takes most of the day due to the spider webs that take forever sometime to get right.

It is also the first day of carving pumpkins. I see it as a great kick start to the season, we get our family carving done, so we know the kids have carved a pumpkin (yes when I say kids I only mean Ethan) and its a great Family night activity for the week.

*Mondays: (and I do mean every Monday)
At the beginning of the month we put together a list of families we would like to have over to carve pumpkins. We brake it down and separate everyone into a Monday. We hand out invitations, or text when it gets too close, and bring the 8 ft table upstairs.
It was a couple Mondays with a crazy house full of kids, food and plenty of fun carving up the pumpkins. We ended up with some great and original jack-o-lanterns.  Enjoy!


Monday the 8th we had the Rogers, Jenkins, Pattersons, Johnsons and Bagleys


Monday the 15th we had the Crows, Godfreys, and Hawkins's


Monday the 22nd we had the Thomas's, Marcums, Georges, Colsons, and Stevens's
 We weren't able to get a picture of all the pumpkins since some families had to leave a little early.

This year October 1st landed on a Monday so that worked out well. I wish I would have taken photos of our carving, but for some reason I can't remember I didn't take any. So close your eyes and imagine a Storm trooper, a rebel emblem, and a fence, cat, moon scenery.  Awesome right??

*The Decor:
Every season I get to add one more decoration to the decor. I am exceptionally proud of this years pick.

Isn't that just AWESOME??
What makes it even better is the fact that I made it myself... alright, with the help of Terry and his mad wood cutting skills.
Terry cut all the wood to my specs and i put it all together.
I screwed it all together
Painted it to the right shades
Made the stencil
Painted the lettering and characters
Printed the countdown numbers
and put it in the entryway

I love the way it turned out. The original that i based my sign from said "its all about the candy" and had candy corn all over it. For me, I could care less about the candy. Its all about the costumes, its the one day a year I get to dress up and no one thinks I'm strange. Well stranger than they already do.

*The Costumes:
Oh the costumes!! this year Bill and I had the opportunity to go to Disneyland and to Mickey's Halloween Party. When we go again, it will be during the Halloween season. I saw more elaborate and original costumes at the party than I have ever seen. It was spectacular!! (more about this in another post).
Ethan finally (and I say that rolling my eyes) decided on Batman. Unfortunately for me it was decided as I was 3/4 done with his bat costume. You would think I could just switch it over, but nope, didn't look right at all. Luckily he spent a few days at Grandma Ellett's and she whipped him up a costume suitable for Batman. Ethan drew up the mask and I cut it out. He loved it, so I couldn't change it.
James was Ironman. He has been obsessed with Iron Man since Avengers came out. It ended up being cheaper for me to buy the costume than to make it, so that's what happen. I did make him "Ironman hands" back in September, which worked out great as an addition to his costume.
Adam got to be Yoda. All the boys have now been Yoda at one Halloween or another. It was great and he kept the hat on the whole time.
I, of course, was my normal witch. I'm still missing a hat, but I'm particular about what it looks like so I will continue to be hat-less until I find it.
Bill put on his Jedi cloak and pulled out his certified replica lightsaber, which got more attention the darker it got.


*Trick-or-Treating:
Apparently last year the trick-or-treating was crazy in our neighborhood. Makes sense, we are one of 3 neighborhoods in a 10 mile radius. So I thought I was doing good getting 11 bags of candy.
Boy was I wrong!
This year is the first year our ward did not hold a trunk-or-treat, thank heaven! I'm not a fan of trunk-or-treat. I see the advantages to those who live a bit out of the town, but what would end up happening is this; Our ward would park our cars and hand out candy while everyone in the valley (and I do mean the ENTIRE valley) would come drop their kids off and then pick them up when they were done. Then you get the ones that keep going around and around like they are tied to a horse pull. Anyway I'll get off my box and continue with the night.
Needless to say it was CRAZY! the amount of people made me grin.  Most everyone parked by the entrance and the mailbox building, so the only through traffic was those that live in the hollow. It was incredible. Bill and I split the hollow in half and I took Ethan and James out first. We were able to walk down the middle of the street without worrying about a car. There were kids of all ages and costumes running everywhere with parents dressed up walking and talking with everyone. It was nostalgic. It was the first Halloween we have had up here that was truly how Halloween is supposed to be.
Oh! did I mention the headless horseman that was riding around the hollow?

*Updated picture. Thank you Ashley for the awesome picture* The picture isn't that great(I'm trying to see if anyone else got a good picture). Yup, that's right. Bet ya can't say you saw a headless horseman while trick-or-treating.

The only down side was the candy. I didn't plan for the amount of people that came! I even dumped out James's bag and passed it out. By 7:15 we were out of candy. There was one cool parent who came up with his kids and had a big bag of candy in his hands. He grabbed a handful and dumped it back into my cauldron  I thought that was really neat that he would think to do that. So all in all we passed out 12 bags of candy and there were still people going close to 9.

Next year I will be looking for candy donations. if you don't have my address i'll be happy to correct the problem!

This Halloween was one of the best I can remember. I can't wait to see what next year brings!

A little late but still great

I got looking at my camera the other night and realized there are SOOOO many pictures I haven't blogged yet. Not just pictures, but important pictures. Like, Ethans Birthday!! Seriously I feel like a bad parent. As it states in the title "A little late but still great", here is Ethans birthday post.

 

Ethan had some of his friends over for a couple hours to celebrate his birthday. It was a wonderful tornado of boys.