The week so far

I talked to my Grandpa on Sunday and it totally made my day. I am slowly recording his life history and he was talking about the depression and WWII. He said he remembered where he was when the bombing on Pearl Harbor was announced. He was in the house, the radio was on and his mom was sweeping the kitchen floor. Then I thought about how I know where I was when I heard about 9/11. We are in a recession, but so far it is not as bad as it was during the depression. My grandparents have lead a rough life and they are great examples to me. We are so blessed!

On Monday Matthew really wanted to make a snowman so we did it that morning before the snow melted. He named the snowman "Carrot."


Here he is later the same day going for a bike ride. I did have to take his jacket off after the picture because it was so hot.


We went to Sunflower Market and the florist was getting rid of some of the "old" flowers. She gave them to me free of charge. I love daisies!


This was a couple of days ago, Brian was out practicing his cast and Matthew needed to practice too.

Matthew recently told me my chin was broken and we needed to go to the chin store to get it fixed.

He did great at storytime today! Normally I have to sit right behind him on the rug and he just watches the other kids. Today he walked right in, sat in the middle of the rug and participated (it was a little, but it was something!).

Any tips on dealing with a toddler who constantly changes his mind? For example today, we are heading home from the park and I ask Matthew if he wants to ride the swings on our way. He says no, he just wants to get home. He points the direction he wants to go and we walk for a few minutes. Then we have a break down about how he wants to ride on the swings. How do I get him to stop this? It seriously drives me crazy!

I did come to the realization that I don't think I respect Matthew enough. I have been viewing him as my charge and he should follow instructions. But he is his own person with likes and dislikes, desires and opinions. I need to step out of the way and do a better job at guiding him instead of ordering him around. He is so fun and I love him to pieces!

Birthday thanks

I have a love/hate relationship with birthdays. I don't want to be forgotten, but I don't want to be embarrassed or feel guilty (if someone does something too nice). Yesterday was just the right balance! Brian got me a book light and the drums for Rock Band. It was a nice and relaxing day (which means I have a mountain of laundry to fold today, but that's okay). I got to talk to most of my family yesterday. On Tuesday I had a movie night with Melissa and Leah (our birthdays are two days apart). I'm going to have dinner with most of Brian's family this weekend and lunch with some friends today.

I also had so many friends take the time to remember me and it seriously brought me to tears. So here's a special shout out to all of the wonderful women in my life! I am always uplifted and strengthened when I spend time with you. You are great examples to me. I feel supported and loved here. Thank you so much for all you do for me!

Easter festivities

I bought the nursery manual a couple of weeks ago to have some lessons at home. We did the Easter lesson this week and it was so cute to see Matthew learning about the real reason for Easter. There was a page to color and cut out Jesus, a rock and a tomb. We reviewed it a few times during the week and Matthew would say "Jesus is alive, yay!" So cute!

Yesterday we went to the Easter egg hunt put on by our primary. I was surprised at how many people came; there were eggs everywhere!

Later that night we colored eggs. Matthew had fun dropping the colors in and mixing them up. He wanted to color a lot more eggs than I had hard boiled.

You can tell he's concentrating because his mouth is open :)

The Easter bunny comes to our house the day before Easter and we had a couple of obligations this morning so our hunt was fairly early. Here is Matthew showing his loot. He thought it was milk in this carton instead of chocolate eggs.

Soufokoto - aka South Dakota

We went to South Dakota last weekend to visit Brian's sister and her family. The weather cooperated while we were driving. On Saturday it snowed all day and there were travel advisories all over the state.

It's kind of hard to tell from the picture, but the snow level was up to the windowsill.

Making a cake.

The boys in their typical fashion-silly.

We can't go to a state with a Cabela's and not pay them a visit :)

Looking at the aquarium. They were very intrigued by the catfish.

I love this picture! They are playing in one of the display tents.

And here's a little video (mostly for Rob and Mary's enjoyment).