Moving

This time it's not me! Woo Hoo!
I'm taking J. and going to Detroit tomorrow to help James' Grandpa C. move.  He has lived at his house for 12 years so it's going to be a big move.  I'm excited and terrified all at the same time.

Terrified:
of being alone with James on a plane for nearly 4 hours
of not being able to handle the luggage, the stroller, and the toddler
of freaking out because my toddler is so energetic and friendly (I sometimes wish he'd just be shy and stay by my side instead of just taking off!)
of not getting everything done in the one week that I'll be out there
of J. trying to be too clingy when I need to get things done
of messing up J.'s sleeping schedule
of failing to get J's ears to pop and dealing with screaming the whole way
of going to colder weather
of getting shot at by gangsta's

Excited:
to see Robert
to get out of Utah
that it's not me moving
to maybe get out a little bit while I'm there
for J. to meet Paul's family

I guess I have a lot of fears, but I'm sure we'll be fine and James will be my little trooper. See you in a week!

Some Randoms

Some things I'm loving right now:

Went for a walk the other day and saw hope in the trees! Little buds of life everywhere! I can't wait for Spring!

My boys make me so happy!

The parking spot closest to the apartment. I really hate having to park so far away and have to haul in groceries and my little boy all the way through the parking lot.

"oh man!" from my little man :)

Not being sick (which is going to be changing very soon for me. A week after we kicked the stomach flu's butt, Paul has a cold!).

I can't wait for these:

Some projects I'm contemplating:

You may think I'm crazy, but I've begun preparing for Christmas. This year I want to give each of my family members something homemade. I have a lot of family members and projects take a lot of time. I have planned  what I will make for each person and have to complete 1-2 projects a month to be done by December. This way I can take advantage of the monthly Joann coupons, too! The thing that sort of stinks is that I won't be able to share these projects with you until after Christmas! I can share this with you though: 
I am going to make a few of these for my cute little nieces! My sister is due in April so I'll have 4 pretty girls to make these dolls for. I'm really excited!

Another thing I'm super excited for is the celebration of the boys!  A few bloggers have gotten together and are making strictly boy things!  It's so refreshing to see so many little boy things being created. It seems like there are cute little girl projects everywhere, but boy stuff is hard to come by!

Valentine's Day

I didn't have much time to plan Valentine's Day this year seeing how we were sick the week before.

I woke up to a card from my boys (James picked it out...he loves Mickey). Paul had left it before he went to work at 5:30. James was a good boy and let me sleep in until 8:00 before fussing.

James and I did a little craft for Daddy. He colored a bunch of paper and I cut the little hearts. I held his hand to write the letters (which he gets a kick out of). Isn't it so cute?  Then we strung some hearts up on ribbons. He had such a blast. I let James pick out a balloon (he calls in Ribb, like ribbit).

I dipped strawberries for dessert.

Paul got out of class earlier than expected so we went and picked up some Macaroni Grill to go and brought it back home. We spent the evening watching Secretariat and even got to go on a walk.  We also introduced James to shadow puppets. He had such a blast making little animals with his fingers on the wall. He literally laughed himself to sleep :)

I can't believe it's been 4 years since Paul and I first got together. Sometimes it seems shorter, sometimes it seems we've never been apart.  We have been through a lot but we are better, stronger people for it.

I am so thankful that I get to spend the rest of forever with my sweetheart!

Not Much to Report

I realize it's been forever since I blogged.  Sadly, as I look back on January the only thing that really happened was all of us catching a nasty cold and being holed up in the apartment due to freezing weather. I am very pleased that it's over.

UPDATE: just after I finished typing this James started throwing up. This went on for 10 hours. It was horrible to say the least. 5 loads of laundry, one blessing and  a roll of paper towels later, he's back to his old self. He even managed to scribble on every wall in the apartment while I was in the bathroom this morning. Thank goodness for washable crayons!

James is growing up so fast!  He finally got his glasses and is just so cute!  He is pretty good about wearing them. After an hour or so he'll usually need a break since they are pretty snug (they have to be that way to stay on). 

His language skills have just exploded over the past few weeks. He always has something to say and no matter what you say back to him, he'll always ask you why.

Going for a ride in his wagon.

Just lounging.

The picture above inspired us to get him this chair. He loves it!

VERY excited for dinner at In-N-Out

Sorcerer's Apprentice

Christmas!

We held our 4th annual cookie day with my sisters this year!  As usual, Reanna made some pretty scary cookies. James got to decorate his first cookie!  There was a lot of frosting and half-eaten candies, but he had a lot of fun.

Decorating his cookie.

After years of failed cheater houses, we decided to make our own. Martha Stewart provided the recipes and inspiration. They actually turned out amazing. Sadly, this is my first successful gingerbread house EVER.

On Christmas Eve we headed up to Salt Lake for the day. We walked around temple square for most of the day. We took James to the visitor's centers and the Beehive house. He had a lot of fun running around the Joseph Smith Memorial building and looking at the pretty trees and fountains.  We probably should have started a little later than we did because by the time the lights were turned on James was ready for bed! 

I made orange rolls after James went to bed and we unloaded the closets full of hidden presents.  I'm so grateful to all the people that knew of our situation this year and thought of him. I'm pretty sure he had the best Christmas ever!  THANK YOU THANK YOU to all my amazing friends!!  We are truly blessed. 

We have spent December studying the New Testament and reading about Christ to James. In the December Friend there was a tree with lots of little ornaments. Each ornament has a scripture that answers a question about Christ's birth. We would read one every night at dinner and let James put the ornament on the tree (with help).  He really loved this. We got this great book for Christmas about making Christ the center of the holiday in our home. We got some great ideas for next year and will be starting a wonderful new tradition next year!

At the PIE in Salt Lake City.

Christmas morning was awesome. I think I woke up first...pretty sure I did :) James ran out into the living room and just stood there with wide eyes whispering "wow" over and over again. It was so cute. He ran over to the powerwheels, hopped on and said "bye" and waved, like he knew he could drive it away! He's so funny. He's having so much fun playing with all of his toys.  He only had baby toys before and was very bored with them. I wish I had taken more pictures, but we have it all on video.

I hope that you all had a wonderful Christmas!  We're excited to start a new year and make new goals for our family.

Christmas Festivities

We have been so busy with Christmas festivities that I almost forgot I had a blog!
Here are some highlights of what we've been up to.

• Made Christmas cards for the elderly with my sister.
• Collected tons of clothing for poor children in El Salvador. Paul started the drive last week and sent the clothes home with one of his International employees.  With only 5 days we managed to collect more clothing then she could take with her!
• Made candy: caramels, chocolate covered cherries, orange truffles, mint truffles, fudge and divinity. whew! Thank goodness that's over with.
• Watched a million Christmas movies.
• James learned to say "ho, ho, ho!"  It's absolutely hilarious. Any time he sees anything remotely Christmas related he shouts it as loud as he can. It's awesome.
• Attended our Family Christmas Party.  It was our first year with the new tradition and it was a lot of fun. Yay for new traditions!
• Wrapped James' presents--Finally!

Now we're getting ready for Paul's work party tonight. We have our annual Sister's Cookie Day coming up and then we're spending Christmas Eve in Salt Lake (hopefully it's not freezing cold).  I have been really bad and haven't taken pictures of anything this year. I need to charge the camera battery and get on that probably.  Have a great Christmas everyone!