Going for a walk

At a yard sale this week I found one of child harnesses shaped liked animals. We have been contemplating getting one for Brodi because we know she would like to get out of the stroller more and walk around but she will often wander off on her own. There just seems something wrong with putting your child on a leash. We got Sam a harness last summer when we went to Yellowstone last summer so that he wouldn't fall into a geyser or something and every time we put it on him he wouldn't walk he would just lay on the ground for the sheer indignity of the whole thing and we ended up carrying him the whole time. I ended up returning it because it had really never been used. I think that's what has kept me from attempting one with Brodi, however, she was the one that discovered it at the yard sale and she loves it. She gets a little irritated when she can't walk away as far as she would like but really doesn't seem to mind it. It is really nice to know that we can let her have a little more freedom, but still keep her safe from getting lost, or stolen, or hit by a car, or whatever else we parents worry about. She knows that someone is suppose to hold the tail of the harness so she is giving her self a little walk around the house in this picture. She did cry when we made her take it off to go to bed, poor baby.

Preschool Day at the Zoo.

This week Sam's preschool class went on a field trip to the Zoo. Sam was so excited to go to the Zoo with Miss Janelle and his school friends. I knew that he liked Miss Janelle, his teacher, but until the zoo trip I didn't realize how much he loved her. He wanted to sit by her on the train instead of me. I'm not sure how I feel about him having this other "woman" in his life. :) He also loves our mother's helper Miranda and most of the time BJ and I come home he says, "No Miranda stay, you go." I guess it sure does beat him crying every time I had to leave. Brodi will still cling to me when I go so at least I get a healthy amount of guilt for leaving from that. We were thinking about finding a preschool that is a little closer next year, but after seeing how much he loves his teacher I think we are going to stick with where we are.

Sam with all of his school friends. Most of his class is made up of girls.

You can't really see him in this picture but behind the zebra that is eating is a baby zebra that had just been born that morning. He was so cute.

What Zoo trip is complete without a train ride.

Sam and Miss Janelle.

What in the heck are these used for? (Heaven knows not for the purpose intended)

Potty training Sam has been a very long, long, long ordeal and still not accomplished. He started being interested in the potty last summer and since he was still pretty young we didn't totally push it yet, then last fall we rocked his world with a new sister and everything went shall we say, down the toilet. We are starting to get closer to accomplishing this feat once again so his underwear has been pretty accessible. Brodi has been fascinated by it, although she can't quite figure out what it is used for.

Are they shirts?

Are they bracelets?

Are they socks?

We'll figure it out someday.
(For all those who may be concerned the underwear shown in these pictures are clean, and quite frankly have probably never even been worn.)

San Antonio Trip

For Spring Break we decided to go on our first road trip with 2 kids. We were pretty anxious about it because we were going to visit my sister Kelli in San Antonio which is a 2 day car ride from us. The kids did so much better than we expected and we had a great time visiting cousins that we don't get to see very often.

Here is Brodi all ready to go.

Sam too is ready to drive 15 hours as evidenced by twisting his hair and sucking his thumb. He's going into his happy place.

We usually don't eat fast food too much except on trips, so here are Sam and Brodi at one of our many fast food stops.



We broke our trip up into 2 days. We stayed in Las Cruses the first night. Sam and Brodi were so glad to get out of the car.

One of the reasons that we kept Sam happy was promising him that at our hotel that night we could go swimming because in the hotel description it said that there was a pool. What we didn't know was that they pool was outside and had been drained for the winter. Sorry kids.

Ok you have too look really closely right under the tree in this picture. There is faint S a m. This is the first time I've ever seen Sam actually write his name. He knew that he could type his name because he loves to use my Blackberry memo app to write his name, but I was quite impressed that he could actually write the letters as well. Smart kid.

Two cute kids on the front porch of Cracker Barrel.

The San Antonio zoo has a really great train that goes around Breckenridge Park. He is in his element. In the words of one of his favorite books, "Trains, trains, trains, I love trains."

Naps are so tough for kids on trips. Believe it or not Brodi will be dead asleep within 5 minutes of when this picture was taken. All it took was the gentle rocking of the train.

This is how Sam took most of his naps during our trip. The poor kid missed the Zoo, the Alamo, and Kalin's baptism.

Here we are on our boat tour of the Boardwalk. Sam was pretty impressed by the boat ride, but not nearly as much as the train ride the day before.

At my sister Kelli's house Brodi found a really cool fort. She and her cousin Adria had a wonderful time shutting each other up in the dog kennel.

We found one of the best ways to entertain Brodi during the driving on the road trip was to hand her a sticker every few minutes. She would then decorate her legs with them.

One of our last fast food stops.

For sometime now I have come to realize that all of the commercials for products to reduce fine lines and wrinkles are geared towards me. How in the heck did I arrive in my mid thirties. Try to ignore my crows feet in this picture (if you can) and look at cute Sam.

Block Party

When BJ and I moved to our house nearly 5 and 1/2 years ago we didn't know that we were lucky enough to move onto one of the best streets in Mesa. We have the friendliest neighbors and every year we have an annual block party. We have our street barricaded off and have an afternoon of not worrying about the kids running into the streets. We set up bouncers and just enjoy getting to know each other. This was Brodi's first year at the block party. She had so much fun. For one thing the twelve year old girls took charge of her and she got to be dolled all afternoon by the big girls.


Here is Brodi's new friend Rachel. One of the mom's did all of the girls hair. I think that Brodi should have gotten an award for the craziest hair style.

Here's our motorcycle babe drinking her sippy cup.

Yummy, yummy cupcake ice cream cones.

Here is Sam with his friend Boston. She is also in his Nursery class.

Sam's Birthday Party

We had originally planned on having a family party for Sam the day after of his birthday, but due to rain storm we postponed it until the next Saturday.

Our little train obsessed boy got a train cake for his birthday. The whole time I was making it I just kept thinking, I only have to impress a 3 year old and he is impressed when we cut sandwiches to kind of resemble a train. He loved the cake and spent a lot of time just staring at it. Three year old don't care that there are crumbs in the frosting.

Sam with Nana and Grandma Kerilyn.

Here are Sam and Brodi with all 4 of their Grandmas in the Valley. We love Grandmas. Who can have too many, really? Grandma Hansen, Grandma Shine, Nana, and Grandma Roth.

I love this. Apparently Sam doesn't like Ding Dongs. He took a bite and put it back on the train.

Broccoli

We had stir fry the other night. I asked my vegetable hating boy if he would like a piece of broccoli. To my surprise he did. To eat it, never, but to carry around for 4 hours until bed time you bet. It looks like a tree you see. During this 4 hours he came with me to Costco and held on to his piece of Broccoli the whole time.

You can absolutely play with cars and hold broccoli at the same time, as proven by this picture.

My little girl

Here are just a couple of pictures of Brodi and I playing in the back yard. She is at that age were she doesn't like to look at the camera so most of our pictures are of the side of her head, but what a cute side of the head.

Brodi sitting next to our rabbit/Brodi proof fence around our garden. Mommy ruined all the fun of such a fantastic sandbox.

Sam turns 3!!!!

Wow can you beleive it! Sam is 3 years old. We can't say enought wonderful stuff about this little boy that we have been blessed with by being his parents. He is such a good natured little boy. I look at him lying down on the grown playing with his toys and think how did my little baby become a little boy. Happy Birthday Sam!!! We are so honored to have you in our family.

BJ, Sam and I are all about to ride the train at the Scottsdale train park. I must add I look particularly fabulous because I met them there from running in the Ragnar race.

BJ and Sam looking at the train engine.

The Scottsdale train park has a little train museum. Here are BJ and Sam in one of the trains.

Sam is checking out some of his new birthday presents. Are you noticing a theme here. Trains, trains, trains, Sam loves trains!(Taken out of a book we read every night.)

Ragnar Del Sol

My sister Mary asked me if I would like to run in the Ragnar Race with her Feb 26-27. For those of you who have never heard of it, it is a 202 mile relay race. It is run by a team of 12 people who run anywhere between 3-8 miles per leg and we each had 3 legs. I have been training for it hard since December. It was so much fun. I ran my 7.2 mile leg about 2-3 a.m. thinking this is crazy that I am having the time of my life. Right after Mary, our last runner from Van 1, finished her leg at 3:30 am we found out that there had been an accident during the race. A teenage boy who was in another team was struck by a car and tragically died a couple of days later. From that point the atmosphere of the race had changed a lot because no one really knew what had happened. They decided to cut out the part of the race that the accident had occurred, meaning that 6 legs of our race would be cut out, so instead of running 3 legs each 6 members of our team would run 2 legs and 6 would run 3 legs. They also flipped the order of the vans. I was suppose to be finished running mid morning on Saturday which happened to be Sam's birthday, but since everything got switched I wasn't going to be running until later that afternoon meaning I would miss most of Sam's birthday. I decided to leave early since I had already run 2 legs and be with Sam and BJ. (Brodi was staying the weekend with her grandparents since I was gone that weekend) Seeing the pictures of the end of the race I feel bad that I didn't stay with the team until the end, however, I would have felt worse about missing Sam's birthday. I would totally do this again. Now that I have caught up on sleep I feel somehow unfulfilled about not being there until the end so anyone up for next year, I'm totally in. Here are some of the pictures.

Van 1 on our way to Prescott.

Here is our team "Just for the Run of it." Alisha, Rachel, Mary, Misty, Allison, me, Stephaine, Katie, Elisha, Laree, and Jessica. I just realized Amanda isn't in the picture she is probably trying to sleep in the car, mind you she had a night shift the night before the race. Jessica the one bending down in front is 6 months pregnant.

Here we are at the starting line.

Mary and I in the van with our awesome headbands.

I'm getting ready for my first run. I apparently have something in my teeth. Thank goodness for sisters because heaven forbid I run with something in my teeth.

Allison passing off to me.

...and I'm off.

I really had a gorgeous run.

Now me passing off to Mary.

Van 1 before our night run.

4:30 am we are finally done with our night runs and at our hotel for a few hours. Can you say TIRED!!