Christmas-y Quote of the Day

Me: [trying to explain brothers and sisters and parents to Little Boy, who is clearly not understanding]
 Little Boy, interrupting: "Well...but I'm a reindeer."

That's What Christmas Means to Me, My Love

I just wanted to pop in for a "little minute" (that's a Little Boy term) and share some of what we've been doing.

 
Counting down the days...

 
Decorating Grandma's tree (the bottom of it, anyway)...

 
Decorating our tree...

 
...and sort of meeting Santa. This picture says so very much about Little Boy's personality.

Hope you're all having a wonderful holiday season!

He Went About Doing Good

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"What will you and I give for Christmas this year? Let us in our lives give to our Lord and Savior the gift of gratitude by living His teachings and following in His footsteps. It was said of Him that He 'went about doing good.' As we do likewise, the Christmas spirit will be ours."


-Thomas S. Monson

{image source} “A wise man once said, ‘Music is one of the most forceful instruments for governing the mind.’ Whether it governs in a positive way or a negative way is determined by what it brings onto the stage of your mind. If you can say that a song is spiritually inspiring or that it urges you to see yourself in a more noble perspective, the music is worthwhile. If it merely entertains or lifts your spirits, then it also has a useful place. But if it makes you want to respond in a carnal, sensual way or to consider unrighteous desires, then that music should be avoided. It is not worthy.” -Boyd K. Packer

Quote of the Day: Hot Dogs

{image source}

Andrea: "What is that?"
Isaac: "What do you think it is?"
Andrea: "Is that a hot dog? You grated a hot dog?"
Isaac: "I wanted to see what it would taste like in a quesadilla."

And Then There Were Textbooks

So I finally finished the application process for the Bachelor of General Studies program at BYU. I've been "provisionally" accepted to the program--to be officially accepted, I have to take and pass a Student Development class. ("Provisionally accepted" also means that financial aid doesn't apply. Heh.) So I'm taking the Student Development class right now. I'm learning how to learn again! Whee! But my study time is taking up what used to be my blogging time. That's why my blogging has been so spotty lately--it will probably continue to be, until I figure out how to re-balance my time.

We Would Never Do a Small Thing

"We are God's children, and if we ever got that through our heads thoroughly and completely, we would never do a small thing, we would never say a cross word. We would not use bad language. We would not criticize anybody. We would love everyone the way the Savior loves us." -Marjorie Pay Hinckley {photo source}

Halloween '08

Yeah, I posted these pictures last year. But who wants to go looking through my archives to see them again? That's what I thought.

 So. Last Halloween in review. We put Little Boy in an apron, gave him a handful of Sharpies, and let him have at his pumpkin. He took it very seriously, as you can see--he always sticks out his tongue when he's concentrating.
 

 And here's the two of us (Isaac didn't dress up). I was a pirate--argh!--and Little Boy was a clown. You can see a little bit of his costume at the bottom of the photo. No face paint for him--he hates gooey things.


This Halloween will probably be a lot like the last one. Light on candy, heavy on "scary" movies. Y'know, like "Ghostbusters" or "Casper". The really terrifying ones. Oh, and we'll dress up. We have some...different...costumes planned for this year.

Little Boy's First Halloween

Lately I've been noticing the fact that--duh--Little Boy isn't a baby anymore.

So I was being all nostalgic and looking at pictures from when he was a baby, and I found one from his very first Halloween. He was less than two months old. My mom made him a little orange hat with a green stem on it:

 

The little punkin. Of course, he couldn't be bothered to wake up for the picture.

Little Boy's Uniform

Little Boy has two items of clothing that he wears every single day. One is the little hat from his birthday, which I mentioned here. The other is a pair of Lightning McQueen slippers that I got from a clothing swap at our church. I was going to hide them and save them for Christmas, but he saw me walk in the door with them [he was supposed to be in bed by then. Heh.].


He literally wears them from morning 'til night.


And if we accidentally leave them at Grandma's house, well...I'm sure you can imagine what happens then.

Dancing Zombies

In the spirit of the Halloween season:

Ramalama - SYTYCD Wade robson Uploaded by 8chris8. - Watch original web videos.

You Have Not Failed

{source} "Rear your children in love, in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Take care of your little ones. Welcome them into your homes, and nurture and love them with all of your hearts. They may do, in the years that come, some things you would not want them to do, but be patient, be patient. You have not failed as long as you have tried.” -President Gordon B. Hinckley

These Little Ones

{source} “Never forget that these little ones are the sons and daughters of God and that yours is a custodial relationship to them, that He was a parent before you were parents and that He has not relinquished His parental rights or interest in these His little ones." -Gordon B. Hinckley

Pickin' Punkins

Guess what--these pictures are from yesterday. I know! Usually I'm blogging pictures from at least two weeks ago.

Anyway, Little Boy got to pick out a pumpkin from his grandma's garden yesterday. (Yesterday! Yes!) He had three choices:

 
[But before we pick, we have to stop for a little cheeeeese.]

 
Eenie, meenie, miney...

 
...moe! We have a winner!

 
He picked the one with the cool scars on it. Awesome. This pumpkin will be one scary jack-o-lantern.

Little Boy Quote of the Day

 Little Boy: "I'm gonna purple comb my brown hair!"

Shyness in Candy Land

{source}

[Side note: I remember playing this old-school version of Candy Land at my grandma's house when I was a little girl. Good times.]

Little Boy went to his best friend's [okay, my best friend's daughter's] birthday party today. The party theme: Candy Land. Awesome, right? It was pretty fun. All the kids had a good time.

Little Boy said he had a good time, too, but...he's just so shy. Whenever we're in a social situation, he spends more time with me than with the other kids. I've tried encouraging him to go play; I've tried not encouraging him to go play. I've tried putting him in more social situations, but it hasn't seemed to make a difference.

Here's what really bothers me: the fear that it's my fault. Maybe I'm sheltering him too much, but I don't notice it. Maybe he picks up on my nervousness when I'm around other people [family and best friend's family not included].

And I do get nervous around other people. I can remember being just as shy as Little Boy when I was a little girl. Did I somehow pass that on to him?

I'm definitely better now than when I was a kid, though. That gives me hope.

Quote of the Day: Two Quotes for the Price of One!

Kaylyn: "Rrrrggghh! [pause] ...that was my soul talking."


Isaac: "Hey, crumb cruncher!"
Little Boy*: "I'm not a crumb cruncher! I'm three."


*Translated from toddlerese: "I'm nah a tum tunchah! I'm fuh-lee."

Bigger than Tonka

Our local grocery store hosted a Safety Fair a few days after Little Boy's birthday. There was a fire truck. A biiiiiiiig fire truck.


I thought maybe they'd let us take a few pictures of it.


But they let us go way beyond picture-taking--they let Little Boy get in the fire truck. And sit in the front seat. And look at all the cool gear and lights. I don't know about you, but I've never sat in the front seat of a fire engine. It was probably the best day of Little Boy's life.


They did not let Little Boy go up the ladder. Not that he wanted to--that was Isaac, actually. I got dizzy just looking up at it from the ground. [In fact, I'm getting a little dizzy looking at this picture. Yeesh.]

Frequently Recharged

[click for source] "Our spiritual strengths are like batteries; they need to be charged and frequently recharged.” -Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin

My Grandparents Come to Town

So, the grandparents. I'll introduce you to them. I only have a few pictures of one night--we went out to eat and the food took foreeever, so I amused myself by playing around with my camera. So they're not great photos. But they're better than nothing.

 
Isaac & Grandpa. They're probably talking about golf.

 
Grandma & Mom. They're probably watching Little Boy do something silly...

 
...yup. Definitely silly.

The Year of the Tonka

Sorry about the lack of posting. My grandparents were in town last week, and we were off adventuring.

So anyway, Little Boy had a birthday a few days ago. He's three. [I know, right?]

 

Cupcakes = perfect size for little boys' hands.

 
He got his first balloon ever. He likes to run up and down the hallway with it, looking over his shoulder to watch it float behind him. He hasn't tripped yet.

 
And...there were presents. Including, but not limited to...

 
a little wooden train...

 
and trucks. Lots of trucks. Fire trucks and dump trucks. So many trucks. They're everywhere.

His grandma sent him the little hat he's wearing in that picture--it used to be Isaac's. He wears it all the time now. Pretty stinkin' cute, if you ask me.

Step Up and Be Strong

“Sisters, now more than ever, we need women to step up and be strong. We need women who declare the truth with strength, faith, and boldness. We need women to set an example of righteousness. We need women to be ‘anxiously engaged in a good cause.’ We need to live so that our lives bear witness that we love our Heavenly Father and the Savior Jesus Christ and that we will do what They have asked us to do.” -Barbara Thompson

Like Oak Trees

“Faithful members of the Church should be like oak trees and should extend deep roots into the fertile soil of the fundamental principles of the gospel. We should understand and live by the simple, basic truths and not complicate them." -Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin {click image for source}

Little Boy Quote of the Day

Little Boy, as I walked into the living room: "Mom! I'm gonna duuuuuuuust!"

 

Peace, Joy, and Plenty

“The plan of happiness is available to all of his children. If the world would embrace and live it, peace, joy, and plenty would abound on the earth. Much of the suffering we know today would be eliminated if people throughout the world would understand and live the gospel.” -M. Russell Ballard

"Every woman can be a gospel doctrine instructor in her home, and every sister in the Church needs gospel knowledge as a leader and teacher. If you have not already developed the habit of daily scripture study, start now and keep studying in order to be prepared for your responsibilities in this life and in the eternities.” -Julie B. Beck

Crafting With A Two-Year-Old

Little Boy's latest art project:

 

He loves trains. I mean, L-O-V-E-S them. And he doesn't even know who Thomas the Tank Engine is. Yet.

I'm afraid to expose him to Thomas because he may never eat or sleep again, after that.

 Anyway, all we did was glue down paper rectangles and circles. (The alphabet magnets were his idea.) Two-year-olds are so easy to please.

A Woman And A Mother

“My dear sisters, don’t ever sell yourself short as a woman or as a mother. … Do not let the world define, denigrate, or limit your feelings of lifelong learning and the values of motherhood in the home—both here mortally and in the eternal learning and benefits you give to your children and to your companion." -Elder Robert D. Hales

Crazy Neighbors and Big Trucks

Check out this truck that's outside right now. Little Boy is in love with it:

 
(I had to take this photo from the upstairs window--I didn't want the work crew to see me. Awkward.)

There's a bunch of work going on at the apartment next door. The last tenant who lived there was...mentally unhealthy. Let's just put it that way. Anyway, she decided that she'd like to remodel her apartment--and ended up causing $20,000 of damage. (We did hear a lot of loud noise coming from her apartment when she was "remodeling". We just thought she was weird. It didn't really occur to us that she was violating all sorts of housing laws.)

So that's why there's an enormous truck outside right now--the management finally hired someone to fix the damage. The crew is using that arm thingy on the truck to lift pallets of stuff over the hedge and onto the front porch of the apartment. Little Boy thinks it's pretty cool. Heck, I think it's pretty cool. It's not every day that we can watch big ol' loud trucks from our front porch.

Turn That Frown Upside Down

I'm a little bit grumpy today. But instead of grouching all over the place, I'm just going to post this video that always makes me laugh. Enjoy!

Just Beachy

So, this one time we went to the beach [this was like two months ago. I know, I'm terrible at keeping up.]. And at that beach we had some adventures.

 
We sported our most stylish beach gear, of course.

 
Little Boy ONLY wanted to walk in the water. None of that boring sand stuff.

 

We wondered why this pink starfish was with all the purple ones. Maybe the pink one was lonely, and the purple ones were comforting it--we saw lots of pink ones on other rocks. Or maybe the pink one is their prey, and they're going to eat it. Eventually.

Not pictured: The weird fish that we found on the beach and threw back in the water. Saved! And the beached jellyfish that we did NOT throw back in the water. Ouch.

Blossom-End Rot: D'oh!

I found these in my garden today:

 

except...they were attached to the plant. Anyway, I've got blossom-end rot.

Y'know that heat wave a couple weeks ago? Well...this is the result. Since we weren't at home for most of that week, I didn't water the tomato plant very well. And it got pretty dried out. Apparently that's a no-no.

But on the bright side...our car works again!

"There is nothing that we are enduring that Jesus does not understand, and He waits for us to go to our Heavenly Father in prayer. I testify that if we will be obedient and if we are diligent, our prayers will be answered, our problems will diminish, our fears will dissipate, light will come upon us, the darkness of despair will be dispersed, and we will be close to the Lord and feel of His love and of the comfort of the Holy Ghost." -Robert D. Hales