Grace is ONE (part one)

This is her birthday picture - I took it after my doctor appointment in Redding. She got to go with us...the boys stayed home.

She loves her baby

Love this dress (a hand-me-down from a friend) and took some pictures of her

after church...she posed (kind of) for a few & then that was it and she was "out of here"

as Nathaniel would say :)

Here are just a few pictures of Grace's first birthday...I have to resize some more and then I can upload them. We celebrated on Sunday the 19th since I had to go to Redding to the doctor on her actual birthday, plus Joshua had a soccer game AND Cub Scouts that night. She didn't care a bit. She loved her cake :) and, thanks to big brother Nathaniel having his birthday just 3 weeks before, she knew exactly what to do when it came to presents :)

Nathaniel turned FOUR!!

I decided I'd better get the pictures posted from Nathaniel's birthday ASAP since this weekend we celebrate Grace's first birthday. Having your birthday right by the first days of school makes things interesting!

Nathaniel actually started celebrating his birthday on the 26th. He got to take cookies (he picked Chips Ahoy) to preschool on his very first day! Due to lots of reasons, you can no longer take home baked treats to school for birthdays or parties any more :( But they enjoyed the Chips Ahoys.

I did remember to take pictures of him on his birthday like I do every year. We did our photo shoot in the backyard and here are a few favorites.

On his actual birthday he opened just a couple of presents in the evening...late in the evening. We had an ice cream social at church that night (good planning Activities Committee person! Oh wait, that's me!) and every one sang Happy Birthday to him...he liked that. When we finally got cleaned up and came home and got everyone in pajamas, he got to open up two presents. One from Mommy, Daddy, Joshua & Grace and one from Grandma and Grandpa. He was very excited about both of them.

He had seen this knight, dragon and castle at Walmart months ago and wanted to buy it. I happened to remember it on his birthday and Daddy was able to pick it up on his way home from school that afternoon - it was the only thing he'd wanted and he told us when he opened it: "You remembered it's what I've been wanting forever! You're a genius!"

Grandma & Grandpa got him his own remote control truck...Joshua has one that he got for Christmas...now they can drive them together.

Lots of things were going on Saturday, so we celebrated with cake & homemade ice cream on Sunday...with Great-Grandma Darlene. Her birthday was later in the week so we combined them.

The birthday boy & girl
Grandma with all three kids

Nathaniel got a bunch of new clothes for school & some pajamas. He also got a Leapster and a couple of games that are helping him learn his letter sounds and math.

His cake was interesting...I'd asked him a few weeks before what he wanted and he told me he wanted a cake with his family on it hugging and kissing. I thought that was an interesting request from a four year old. Well, as the weeks went by I'd ask him again and he'd tell me "I already told you - you and daddy and me and joshua and grace hugging and kissing!" And he'd give me this look like, "Get it through your head, woman, how many time do I have to tell you this?!"So this is what I came up with...I used Nilla wafers for the faces and frosting and sprinkles and cookie crumbs for faces & hair. Not professional, but he loved it (I turned the T shirt cake pan into a tree (family tree) and added grandmas & grandpas up on top.).

When he blew out the candle we told him to make a wish. He gave me hug and said "I got my wish, Mommy, because you made me the cake I always wanted with us hugging and kissing!" So I guess we're doing something right and he knows he is well loved!
> It is so incredible to me to see how fast he has grown up! He celebrated his 2nd birthday just a week or so after we moved up here. He is just such an amazing kid. He is our sunshine boy and loves everyone. He loves to hug all of his favorite people - and there's quite a list of them at church that he must hug each week...and people look forward to their greeting from Nathaniel! He can get pouty & grumpy, but it's not long before the sunshine of his smile peaks out from gloomy mood. WE LOVE YOU NATHANIEL!!!!!!!!!!!!!

a boy & his bike

Hard to believe that just 3 years ago Joshua headed off for the first day of kindergarten. Now he gets himself to and from school (true we live a lot closer to the school here than we did in Winters, and there's no traffic to speak of here and a better walking, etc. environment here than there). Brian was a little hesitant for him to walk by himself last year - but I was sure he'd be fine...I mean, I'd walked to and from school the exact same way throughout my elementary school years...same streets, same sidewalks. And he's done just fine.


His big desire has been to ride his bike to school. He's finally conquered his bike and is a good rider. He pays attention to what he's doing and he knows all the hand signals (which is better than me!) Back in August, before school started, I let him ride his bike downtown to the library or the store or something by himself (he'd ridden down once or twice with supervision). So when school started up, we told him that he could ride to school on some days - but he has to be ready by 8 and he doesn't ride on Cub Scout days. Oh the joy in his face!


I always wanted to ride my bike to school, but was never allowed to...there were lots of reason and none of which I can remember now. But I wanted to Joshua to be able to do that...for a boy especially that bit of independence is so important. True, he's had some boys give him a bad time...wanting to borrow his bike, telling him that the chain was falling off, trying to get the combination of his bike lock, etc. But he's being assertive and telling them no - and I told him their main problem is all of them are bus riders who live out of town and can't ride their bikes to school, so their probably a little jealous. He's so excited to get to take off on his own and get to school in this "cool" way.


One morning I took the camera out and watched him leave and took a couple of pictures. He keeps both hands on the handlebars, doesn't look back to see me, though he did yell "bye" one more time because he knew I was standing there. He's keeping his eyes on the road. Before too long it'll be a car he's hopping into and taking off for school and not looking back because he's focused on where he's going, but he'll know we're standing there watching him and making sure he's safe and he'll yell, "bye" but keep going.

How quickly the years go...

Generation Gap?

This MormonAd (from the New Era, the LDS Church's youth magazine) hangs in the dining room under the phone hook up (eons ago when I was a kid a phone actually hung there - I think it was rotary). I guess Carrie hung these up when she was in Young Women's. Anyway, the other day, Nathaniel asked me what that was. I explained to him it was a phone...he thought that was funny because he's never seen a phone that looked like this one. Then I read what was underneath - "With Prayer you'll never get a busy signal." I opened my mouth to tell him that, and realized he didn't know what a busy signal was - he doesn't make many phone calls at four. So I told him it was about praying to Heavenly Father and that you can pray and He'll always hear you. He was fine with that...he just had wanted to know what the funny thing in the picture was. Later, I was thinking about it and realized that Joshua, at 8, and still not making many phone calls, probably didn't really know what a busy signal was...you rarely get a busy signal anymore with call waiting and voice mail and everything. I told Brian, "Our kids aren't even going to know what a busy signal is!" I thought it was kind of funny. So today, when I was thinking about this and checked out the New Era website where they have all the MormonAds since the beginning (early 1980s...I remember most of the ones from the 80s and early 90s), I found this one:

It's the version for the new millenium...says with prayer you have unlimited minutes, no roaming charges, no busy signal and you can use it anywhere.

I guess phones may change, but prayer never goes out of style :)

Eleven months already!

Last Saturday Grace hit the 11 month mark...how fast her first year has gone! I took these pictures last Saturday evening after getting back from Medford. But with school starting and Nathaniel's birthday, I just hadn't gotten a chance to load them onto the blog. She's getting quite vocal on her opinions of things...and is always happy to share it with us. She has taken several steps...but hasn't started full out walking yet. She likes to stand and dance :) We all love our cute little Grace Olivia.

Nathaniel's First Day of Preschool

The big kid preschooler

Both boys, ready for school

Doing one of his favorite things - PLAYDOUGH!!!
He was so excited to get in to class...hustled through the door (leaving Grace & I way behind) calling out, "Hi, Teacher!" No fear, no qualms, no hesitation...hugging the teacher, friends from church and storytime and getting down to business (ie playdough).
He did come and hug Grace and I good-bye.

Little Miss Grace upon returning home and finding neither of her big playthings (Joshua and Nathaniel) are around.

Our Third Grader

Joshua started third grade today. He was pretty excited to start up again...so was I! Nathaniel wanted to start today as well, but he's got to wait one more loooooooooooooooong day. He's asked so many times if it wasn't time for J to be home or not. Still 2 1/2 hours to go, bud!