Drawing

A few days ago Tanner discovered that he could make marks on a piece of paper with a pen and now he wants to do it whenever Vance is coloring. He thinks he is so grown up and he is started to be right. I decided today was the last day I give Vance a coloring page, at least one with small pictures. Who cares if he colors in the lines, I sure don't. Well, today he cared and got mad anytime he drew out of the lines, which was often as you can imagine so it ended up being a big source of frustration for him. He wanted me to do all the coloring. Looks like I will be letting him do free drawing from here on out at least for a while.

Partners in Crime

Today as I was trying to watch the new Harry Potter trailer (approximately 2 minutes) I realized that both the boys were behind the couch-not a save place if you are the mother. I watched the whole video and then said "Vance" No response. "Tanner" No response. I go behind the couch and they had my wallet and had dumped everything out of it including all the change I had in there. They had their hands full of credit cards, driver's license, and a bunch of other fun stuff. I immediately checked Tanner's mouth and found a quarter in it! Great, I know. I quickly gathered up the change and the rest of the stuff and told them both to leave mommy's wallet alone. When I told Stephen about it he first asked if I'd taken a picture of it. No, sorry I was more worried about getting money out of our baby's mouth than taking a picture. No thiefing picture this time, but I hope you enjoy the ones I did take today.

It's okay

Today we drove past the urgent care place that we took Vance to when he hurt his leg and when he got stitches put in last month. As we drove by Vance saw it and starting saying, "It's okay." over and over. I guess we've told him that plenty when he has been injured. He will say that anytime he gets hurt, scared, or if he sees someone get hurt, or the cutest is when Tanner is upset and he pats his head and says it. Today he curled up on the couch with his quilt for a few minutes so I took a couple of pictures while it lasted.

Backyard

We finally got around to doing something with our tiny backyard. It was a garden of weeds. In a way I wish I would have taken a picture so I could just show how bad it was. It was pretty embarrassing. Good thing it is fenced in and no one had to look at it. We decided to put indoor/outdoor playmats outside. That way when we move (whenever that is) we will be able to take them with us. We can't really take grass with us. I wish we'd taken a picture right after we laid them down when they were clean and shiny. Oh well. I am not wishing we had done everything that isn't concrete that way so there would be less dirt everywhere. Here's a couple of pictures. The boys are enjoying it.

Jinxed

Yesterday I was telling one of Stephen's sisters how glad I was that Tanner hadn't figured out that he can pull himself up in his crib. Yep, I jinxed myself. Today I laid him down for a nap and he wasn't having it so I went upstairs to see what was going on and he had pulled himself up and was jumping on the mattress (that little monkey)! Well, naturally I got Stephen to lower the mattress down, I make him do all the dirty work, you see. Tanner did not want to nap between realizing how fun it was to jump on the bed and adjusting to having his mattress lower so he is a picture of the tired kid on hanging out with his dad. I like having the mattress higher because I have a bad back, but oh well. Safety first. Next time I better knock on wood...

Couple of pictures

Here are a couple of pictures I took of Tanner on Sunday. Vance stepped into my shot with the bubbles, darn. I'll have to see what I can do to fix that.

Happy Birthday Luke!

It is our nephew, Luke's first birthday. (He is my sister-in-law, Mandy's son). He is pictured here on the left with Tanner. We were so excited to have you join our family Luke. We have enjoyed watching you grow your first year and look forward to watching you grow in years to come. We are so glad our boys have a cousin to play with. You are a fun little boy. Happy Birthday!

Cute Problem

I took this video about a week ago, but I thought it was still worth posting. When Tanner was a newborn people would ask how Vance was handling thing or how he got along with Tanner and whatever else along those lines. Basically Vance ignored Tanner's existence for the most part. Sometimes he would tell me to put Tanner down or get mad if I tried to take a picture of them together, but mainly he ignored him. The older they both get though the more interested Vance is in Tanner and the more he likes him. In the past three months or so you could even say that they've become playmates. Recently Vance has taken it to a whole new level. He thinks he needs to be the one to fee Tanner solid foods. If I start getting food ready for Tanner, Vance will hop in the chair and grab the spoon and expect me to hand it over so he can feed Tanner. I've caught Vance a few times offering his snacks to Tanner. I try to explain to Vance that Tanner can't eat everything that he can yet because he doesn't have enough teeth, but that hasn't sunk in yet. As you can see this is our new, but cute and sweet problem. Tanner isn't a big fan of Vance feeding him, in case you were wondering. He thinks it is funny at first but mainly he is hungry and doesn't want to mess around with Vance, who's feeding skills...well, let's just say they aren't as good as Mom's.

Ten Months Old

Tanner is ten months old as of today. He is growing and learning new things everyday.
He loves to jabbber and make noise.
He loves to play with Vance.
He can pull himself to a standing position on furtniture and walk along it.
He still smiles at everyone, but will immediately hide his face.
He's a momma's boy.
He likes to eat cheerios, kix, but his favorite cereal is chex.
He loves to get into everything.
He tries to be a big boy like his brother.
He is still as cute as ever!

Pool and Outside pictures

Tanner got in the pool this time around, but only for a short time. He had more fun hanging out on his towel watching Vance. My mom got Cars and Finding Nemo towels before she knew that is what the boys swimming suits were. Boy, she's good. Yes, I did take a picture of Tanner's feet. They are cute. I can't help it.

Peek-A-Boo

You have plenty of dumb/silly/irritating/painful things happen, sometimes all in the same week, but then you have moments like this where none of that stuff matters and you just enjoy the present. :)

Gonna Mail Myself To You

I wouldn't necessarily say that today was a bad day, but we sure kept having dumb and at times painful things happen to us. This morning Vance decided to put my mascara on so that was all over his face and hands. He did try and put it on his eyelashes, but failed getting it all around his eyes. You have to love waterproof mascara at times like that. Then he touched my hot hair straightener with his finger and burned it (not bad thankfully). Later today Tanner was crawling around and knocked our big and heavy footstool onto himself. He cried for about a minute. I think he got over it before I did. When I was trying to put one of the gates up I couldn't get it to latch and so I put all force I could muster into it and pinched my fingers in the process. Still in pain from that. I was working on a project for Vance that was taking way longer than I expected it too (why can't my children just sit and play on the floor with a toy while I work on projects...ha) Anyway, during that time I didn't realize that Vance had gotten a hold of our stamps (100 roll) and hid them. I didn't realize this until later when he pulled a stamp off of himself. That sent me looking all over the place for them. I finally found them and was glad to see only two had been taken off and I knew where one of the two was. I found the other stuck on Vance's shirt. You may be wondering what the picture of Vance is above. It is him pointing to his stamp. I think he decided that home was lame and he was going to mail himself back to grandma's where it was fun. Our day rubbed off on Stephen too. He knocked over a metal shelf in our upstairs hallway on the way to get Vance ready for bed. That knocked a container of thumbtacks to the floor and they spilled all over the place. To top that off Tanner had already been put in his crib for the night and he is still awake crying. :) I'm looking forward to going to bed. Maybe Tanner will cry so hard that he will sleep well tonight...

More Pictures

Here are the last pictures I'm posting here from our trip. I did however put like 70 pictures on my facebook page today so if you are interested in seeing more and have a facebook account you can go and look at my two summer albums. We did a lot of different things. We went to three parks, we went to Tri-Cities for a day, we went miniature golfing, went to the parade, firework show, Stephen saw "Kung Fu Panda", and we just hung out. Glen was at EFY and then Scout Camp so we didn't see much of him. Rose had girls camp so we saw just a little more of her, but not a lot. Eric was home in the evenings after work. My dad took two days off of work so we got to see him a little. Mainly we just got to hang out with my mom though. I am sure she enjoyed having the grandkids to herself. We had a great time and are glad my family put up with us as much as they did. Can I just tell you that I love my parents spare room too. It's purple and it has an awesome bed. What could be better? Oh, and Vance got everyones names down pretty good by the end of the week. He was even saying Eric which has been a hard name for him to learn. At the beginning of the week he just called him Rose. I don't blame him, that name is much easier to say. :)

Memory Game

1. As a comment on my blog, leave one memory that you and I had together. It doesn't matter if you knew me a little or a lot, anything you remember!

2. Next, re-post these instructions on your blog and see how many people leave a memory about you. It's actually pretty funny to see the responses. If you leave a memory about me, I'll assume you're playing the game and I'll come to your blog and leave one about you. Enjoy!

Home

We made it home from Washington. We took a TON of pictures while we were there. I have just started to skim the surface of what we took, but I'll try to get some pictures posted of what we did throughout our vacation. Here are some.

When in Washington

Copying what I saw on Holly's blog

When in Washington one must...

Pledge Alligience to the Flag (whatever that means...)Watch a parade in the rain
See some small town fireworksEat yummy cakeTry on Grandpa's work hat

Play games with Uncle Eric
Play in the Turtle sandbox with Aunt RoseTake time to stop and smell the flowers.

Tarzan and Jane

I want to get this story written down before it is long forgotten. This morning Vance was looking through a book full of different Disney stories. Tarzan happened to be one of them. There was a picture (not this particular one) of Tarzan and Jane. He pointed to Tarzan and said, "Dad". Then he pointed to Jane and said, "Mom". He did that a few different times. Well Vance, your parents might like to be that in shape... I think his dad being Tarzan is a bit of a stretch. He doesn't have long hair and he hangs out fully dressed. Oh, well. The things kids come up with. It gave me a good laugh.

Bopping

Here is my attempt at getting Tanner bopping to some music. He enjoys a good music. He is in a phase now whenever he sees the camera he goes after it so I have to try and hide what I am doing, makes it harder to catch things.

We are headed to Washington tomorrow sometime. I may or may not have time to post before we go and I don't know how much I will get around to while we are there. We'll see. Happy 4th to everyone if I miss that!