Ladybugs

We have had so much fun with our garden. Saturday we got the water lines in and got a few things planted. So far we have basil, thyme, chives, parsley, tomatoes, four different peppers, and onions. I'm so excited. Tonight we got ladybugs to put in our garden.

Hailee was so thrilled to buy some lady bugs. She wanted to keep some in her room as pets. 

I went to the store to buy a few lady bugs for each plant, but they only came in a container full of them. 

There were hundreds and hundreds of them. We had plenty for our plants and some to share. I hope the little lady bugs like our little garden.

Can I Get an Allowance for That?

 Here are some of my favorite conversations with Hailee lately...


N: Hailee, can you get some more hangers from your closet?
H: I can't find anymore.
N: Uh-oh.  What should we do?
H: Maybe we should just stop washing our clothes.

After walking into Hailee's closet
N: Oh- I just love seeing your nice clean closet
H: Can I get an allowance for that?
N: (laughing) I'm the one that hung up all the clothes!
H: Mom, what's an allowance?


She recently did a science fair experiment for school. She was telling me about the other science fair projects from her class.

N: What other science experiments did you see?
H: Martin did an experiment. He wanted to know if the shower used more water or the bath used more water. He thought that the shower used more water. But the bath uses more water.
T: Why do you think the shower uses less water. 
H: It just goes down the drain and back around again. And that's why showers use less water.
T: That really would save water...

Hailee is always the best little girl. Friday I was really busy getting ready for a "Favorite Things" party. One of the things I was taking were "brown paper packages tied up with string." I had gotten them half way put together when it was time to get James down for a nap. While I was getting him down Hailee decided to finish them up for me. I am constantly impressed by how sweet and helpful she is. Without being asked she just helped out. She is such an amazing little girl and we are all so lucky to have her in our family. 

Our Garden

Shopping for garden supplies. 

Intel decided to start a community garden program. As soon as Todd saw he signed up for a plot. Luckily we got one spot and we are so excited to start a little garden. It is 4' by 20' and we're having a hard time deciding what to plant. We even found Hailee a princess garden shovel, rake and bucket. She is so excited to start helping.

We've only gotten out there two times, but so far the kids have had such a good time. Here are a few pictures of them enjoying the garden area. The weather has gotten so warm, but when we've been out it's been a little windy so I had the kids all bundled up.

James LOVED the drill. He is so helpful at the garden. Hopefully once things get going I'll be more of a help instead of just chasing James around keeping him out of trouble.

Hailee and James both love helping at the garden. We've finished up the border, now we just lack the irrigation and then it's time to plant. I can already taste the fresh tomatoes, peppers, basil, onions, garlic, thyme, chives, etc.... it's going to be hard to narrow it down.

Monkey in the Window

So the other day when I went into the kitchen to look for a recipe James decided that it was the perfect time to do some exploring. He climbed up Hailee's chair, onto her table and into the window. At this time Hailee thought it necessary to inform me what James was doing. I remember her calling me and I figured it wasn't anything. That is until I heard crying. James had walked down the window sill then decided to turn around. It was then that he lost his balance and fell face first onto the floor. I'm still not sure what he landed on but it left quite a nice mark on his face. Do you think a swollen and bleeding face could stop my little boy. Nope, not at all. He kept trying to climb into the window. How to I childproof my house with this little boy? He still has quite a mark, but lukily the bruising never got too dark and no one called child services on me.

One of those days....

A few years ago one of Todd's cousin's told me that she was a perfect mother before her second child was born. At the time I remember thinking it was funny thing to say because I knew she was still a fantastic mom. I have to say the last couple of weeks I'm understanding a little more of what she was trying to say. Not that I claim to be a perfect mom, but like her my first child was a very obedient little girl, that would never even think about doing anything wrong. And like her again my second is a little boy who seems to have a mind of his own. I've been trying to remember what or if I did anything different with Hailee than I'm doing with James and I've come to the conclusion...they are just different kids. Some of our fun the last little while.

Spencer and James

A little while ago we were babysitting one of James' little friends. For the most part James and Spencer played well together even though they are almost a year apart. Spencer is such a great little guy and so obedient. James was in to everything and Spencer just thought he was crazy for being so disobedient. We're hoping he rubs off on James and that James doesn't rub off on him. It seemed like every time I turned around today he was into something. He learned how to climb to the top of the step-stool, played in the dishwasher, climbed on Hailee's doll house, and figured out how to climb in the toy chest while we were waiting for Hailee at ballet.

James climbing in the toy box at ballet.

While we were at ballet he decided, while I was distracted for 5 seconds giving Hailee's teacher a check for the month, that he would take a little stroll outside. Somehow he got out of the building on his own and walked down the sidewalk in the rain. Luckily one of the other mom's brought him back in to me. Thankfully he didn't make it to the street. From now on he'll be carried during that time. That is something I never had to worry about with Hailee, even today she always stays right by me. James on the other hand likes to explore.

An embarrassing moment also happened with James this week. Lately he's been thinking that the phone is the best new thing. To avoid him searching the internet for hours on end I decided to put it in text message mode. It worked for a while and he even got to send some cute messages to people.

Then I left him alone for a little bit too long. If you push the middle button on my phone 3 times it sends your message to the first person in the alphabetical list of contacts. I discovered this after James had sent "Aaron" 3 texts. "Aaron" is the father of one of Hailee's little friends that I had just met not too long ago. Lovely. Now Todd is listed in my phone as "AAATodd" and he enjoys getting messages from James periodically throughout the day. 

James also had his one year old doctors visit. He is doing well. He's up in the 90th percentile for height and in the 22nd percentile for weight (21.1 pounds). I'm curious if he'll end up more like Hailee. She was always 90th for height and 5th for weight. Even at the 22nd percentile for weight he seems so much heavier than Hailee. The doctor was happy with all of his numbers and said he is doing just fine developmentally. Then he had to get 4 shots. Poor little guy. He was pretty good during the whole visit.

Happy Easter

I always love it when Easter Sunday falls on the same Sunday as General Conference. There is nothing more I love more than sitting with my family and listening to the words of the church leaders, bearing testimony of the risen Christ. It's eve n sweeter now that Hailee is really listening as well. It is so sweet to see her testimony growing.

We are still working out our Easter traditions as a family. We did get to color eggs together and the kids were visiting by the Easter bunny. Hailee was thrilled and James was just excited to eat candy for breakfast.

Starry Night by Todd

Day and Night by Hailee

Orange on White by James

"H" with shiny accents by Hailee

We had such a nice Easter weekend spending time together as a family. I guess that is the best tradition as all being together. It doesn't really matter what we do, as long as it's done together.

C is for Cookie

We decided that James would love to a cookie monster cake. He doesn't watch TV much so he doesn't really have a favorite character, but he does love cookies and music. He always get a laugh when Cookie Monster sings.

I was so sure that James would love eating his birthday cake. He didn't really like everyone watching him. He wanted everyone to join right in. Here are some of our favorite pictures. This post is really for the grandparents :)

James blowing kisses.  He always loves blowing kisses.

Above: James decided to feed cookie monster a cookie.

Time to clean-up.

I can't believe my baby is one. None of us can imagine our life without him. He is such a sweet part of our family.