February

Christian LOVES his "Pizza Shark" shirt that my mom gave him for Valentine's Day. He asks to wear it every single day. I just love how he posed here when I asked him to smile for me. 

Kent and I were talking just a few days ago about how easy this child is. He's agreeable, often responding to our directions or commands with "Okay!" and obeying right away. He doesn't throw tantrums or fits, he just accepts when we tell him things need to be a certain way. He's always always happy, waking up ready to giggle and play. 

We adore him.

February has been the end of winter and the beginning of Spring. Oh I cannot even say how happy this makes me! We've had several afternoons in the 50's, and we've texted all our neighbors, set up a blanket in the front yard, and let all the kids run and play in the yard together. The sunshine just feels SO good and I feel like I've come back to life. I love this neighborhood and this weather. For a few days in January, I started to feel pretty depressed and discouraged about the cold and snow, but now? Life is good again.

Ellie asked me for months leading up to Valentine's Day if they were going to get a special breakfast table set for them. I started this tradition right before Christian was born because I felt hugely pregnant and so tired and it was my attempt at feeling like I was still a "good mom." But it's turned into our family's Valentine's tradition, and I'm loving it. I didn't have time this year to write love notes to them, and Ellie missed having those, so I'll have to make sure I do that next year.

Our Valentine's Dinner was Thai food take-out for Kent and I (getting ready for our trip, I guess,) and then I set up a "fancy" dinner for the kids with heart-shaped fruit, pink milk, and an attempt at heart-shaped grilled cheese. Candles, a little Josh Groban in the background, and the kids felt so special. 

Another tradition that I love: making these photo Valentine's cards to send to our cousins and grandparents and give out to our friends. Taking the photos is always an adventure--this year included multiple bribes with chocolate kisses as well as maybe a few threats, but we finally got what we needed on the one day that had enough sunshine between storms. 

 Our poor Ellie has been sleeping in this toddler bed for years now. We just haven't prioritized getting her a real bed because it seemed to be working still, even though she had to curl up on her side in order to fit in it at this point.....
But lately she hasn't been sleeping well at all, and after multiple wakings one night last week where she insisted she couldn't sleep, I finally decided it was time to get her something other than the toddler bed to sleep on. So we moved the bed out, and Ellie and Christian had a fantastic afternoon "washing" it with wet rags. 
Ellie is now sleeping on a double-high twin air mattress until we find a good deal on a real twin bed for her.
If we're being honest, though, it's likely she'll be sleeping on that air mattress for quite a while. At least it's not a toddler bed anymore, right? 

 Ellie had a field trip on Friday morning, and since Christian naps in the afternoon, it was just the two of us running errands that morning. He's so gosh darn cute, and I just love when I get a chance to spend some time with just him. It was windy and chilly in Spanish Fork, and when we'd get out of the car he'd tell me to "Faster! Faster! Cars!" hurry so the cars and wind wouldn't get us. He giggled when I ran and made silly noises. He's so fun to talk to as we go about our shopping, I just love his little responses and "okay!" answers. He sat in the cart and made up little songs, helped me lift the "heafy" things out of the cart, and was quite content to play with the boxes of berries. 

 I made dinner on Monday night for a family in our ward, so naturally my bread loaf came out a hard lump. It actually thudded onto the bread board when I slid it out of the pan. Then Kent poked a hole in the top with his finger when he was trying to test it. So. I made biscuits to take to them. 

 The biggest apples we've ever seen were at the grocery store last week. I didn't even need apples, but I had to buy one because it was just so huge! This picture was after I spent fifteen minutes trying to wrestle Christian into the Ergo carrier on my back. 
The grocery store clerk was chatting with us as she rang up our items at the end, and she asked Ellie's name, then said, about Christian, "You probably call him Fiesty, huh?"
I said, "No, actually we most often call him 'Uh oh.'" 
She looked puzzled, so I explained that he likes to put golf balls in heater vents, legos in toilets, color on the fireplace, and fill up the bathtub until it overflows. 
He's a curious trouble-maker, but at least he's always happy about it!

 We went up to Logan last weekend to give the kids a chance to get used to being there, and while we were there I gave Christian a much-needed haircut. His little curls in the back were pretty adorable, but the rest was just getting too out of control. 

 He wanted to watch Shopkins while we cut. Definitely NOT my favorite show in the world, but the way he says "Shawkins!" is pretty cute.

I wanted to get a picture of how handsome his hair looked the next day, and this is the pose he gave me:

When we were driving to go to Old Navy and get dinner a few weeks ago the sunset reflecting off the snowy mountains was incredible.

Old Navy was ridiculous, though---our kids were very unhappy that we weren't buying anything for them, just shirts for Dad. 

 A week or so was spent getting ready for our friend's Valentine's Dinner party--it was a lot of work, but I just love this sort of thing, and I was pretty proud of how it turned out.

A few Saturday's ago, the Ludwigs asked us if we wanted to do a babysitting swap. They went skiing in the morning and the kids all played at our house, and then in the afternoon we took our kids to their house and Kent and I got to go on a real date--the day was awesome. These adorable kids all get together so well and I feel like we hit the neighborhood jackpot here, really we just are so happy here.

 We got on the waiting list to get a table at Black Sheep, and while we waited we got ice cream, of course.

 German chocolate cake and strawberry basil ice cream. 

 And how is everything at Black Sheep just so delicious??


 All the way back at the beginning of the month, I did something like I used to do all the time with the kids--we painted. These kinds of activities and crafts are my favorite way to "play" with the kids. And then Kent brought home Chinese food and we ate it picnic style on the kitchen floor. (after we got over Nick's crying fit about how rude we were to try and feed him something that "wasn't American!") 
Oh this life. It's the best.