Fun lately

The weather has been too beautiful lately and James always has too much energy than we know what to do with, so we have been taking longer and longer bike rides around the neighborhood. One morning we found a sidewalk we haven't explored that goes by a really large retention pond. James loved being able to ride without having to constantly look for cars and once we got to the water he would constantly stop to climb off and look at the water for turtles.

We found baby turtles on a log!

 I told him to run back to his bike and race towards me as fast as he can. He always thinks he is going "super fast!"

 James saw a lizard on a mailbox, so he jumped off and he actually grabbed it! I can't believe how he has no fear of those types of things: lizards, bugs, toads. The lizard was able to get away, but I told James how impressed I was that he was able to catch it. He told me that he got it because of his "poky fingers":

 He puts his poky fingers out and tries to sneak up on the lizards:

James got invited to a birthday of a little boy we met at storytime at the library. They had it at the Little Gym and James had a blast! He loved running around on all of the equipment and he especially loved the blue cupcakes. He licked all the icing off and didn't want anymore :)

The night of the lunar eclipse, I was going to bed and saw that the eclipse was going to be visible at 3am. I chuckled to myself and told Anthony, "No way am I waking up for that!". Well, as it happened James woke up at 2:30am screaming. When I went to check on him, he had gone #2 in his nighttime diaper, which had created a bad rash that was hurting him. He hurt too much to let me wipe him with wipes, so I had to put him in the bathtub to get him completely clean. Rett woke up and fussed for a little bit too, so after everyone was finally tucked back into to bed, I was sufficiently awake to go outside and see the eclipse. Silver lining :)

 This is a picture of our stray momma cat. She loves to come out for food, but she will also come out just for some petting.

 Pushing at my hand for more petting:

The kittens are growing and getting cuter and cuter by the day. They have their eyes open now, but they still aren't very mobile. I can't wait for them to start exploring so we can play with them more often!

We had a long rainy day last week and James spent a lot of the day watching TV. I knew he needed to get outside, so I decided to take him out to splash in puddles. He put his rain boots on and we started walking. At first he was confused when I told him that it was OK to jump in the puddle, but he caught on really quick! He had such a good time! When he would find a really large puddle on the side of the road, he would look at me and ask, "Is it too big, Mommy?". When I would tell him it was okay, his face would light up like I just gave him the best present. It was priceless :) On the way home he found a big stick and would poke around and explore the mud. Now he asks all the time to go outside and splash in the puddles. He gets so disappointed when I tell him that the weather has been too good :) 

On another bike ride James decided to ride with "no hands" like curious george! He did have them farther up in the air, but by the time I got my camera out he told me that he had to keep them on the handles so he wouldn't fall. He also likes to steer his bike from left to right and back again. He calls it "doing tricks".

General Conference

This year I wanted to do something fun for James to help him get excited about conference and start to learn to recognize the prophet and the apostles. I found this packet online that had a printable page for different topics and pictures of the first presidency and the twelve apostles. The idea is to find the picture of the speaker and when you figure out what their topic(s) is, put their picture up on the right page. There are three pictures for each person so that their picture can go on multiple topics.

It also had a topic page for you to print out and tape candy to so that they can pull off a piece whenever they mention the different topics. The predetermined topics didn't match up very well with what was talked about (next year I think I will pick my own topics), so we ended up just doing one piece of candy per speaker. James got so excited every time there was a new speaker! He would ask if it is was time for his "prophet candy" :)

 Anthony went fishing in the morning, so I took the boys out into the yard to play in the water before it started. I really wanted James to get as much energy out as possible before having to sit relatively still for so long.

Watching the hose fill up the pool:

Rett observing:

 We came inside and got cleaned up and I got all our lunch and snacks ready, along with blowing up the air mattress for lounging. It turned into a bouncy house for James, but either way it kept him in the room.

 Popcorn, snacks, and a mountain of laundry for me!

 Rett loved the "bouncy house" too! :)

 My boys:

 Giving Rett a hug and a kiss:

 At the beginning of the second session I got a picture of everyone looking at the TV, Rett included. Amazing!

 We had a great conference weekend. Anthony and his parents went shrimping late Saturday night so they slept over and joined us for Sunday's session. It was so wonderful to relax and listen to the speakers! I loved to watch James get excited to see the prophet, even if it was mostly for the candy :) A few days ago we were getting in the car and he said, "Mommy, can we watch conference at home?". I said, "Sure honey! We can watch conference any time!". He replied, "And eat prophet candy??" :)

Spring is here!

It is officially spring, we had our first real beach day of the year! We have gone a few times just to walk around and for James to run in the waves, but this was our first time of the year with everyone in bathing suits, sunscreen, beach toys, etc... It was a beautiful day! We went with our friend Summer and her little boy Layton. Anthony and her husband were roommates in Gainesville before we got married and we all got married around the same time and now we are in the same stake!

The boys were two peas in a pod, running around, chasing waves, and borrowing other kids' unattended beach toys :) Seriously, I don't even know why we bring our own toys, they always want to play with someone else's.

I love that we live so close to the beach! It is so easy and convenient to just pick up and go whenever we want to. When I see all the tourists at the beach it reminds me how cool it is that we live where people vacation!

Another fun sign of spring showed up in our backyard. Anthony was weed-eating around our shed and he saw a stray cat bolt out from underneath it. We have seen this cat around a lot and I assumed that it belonged to our next door neighbors. She likes to hang out under our cars and she has even let us pet her a few times. Anthony turned off the weed eater and he could hear a lot of meowing coming from under the shed. He peeked in and saw kittens!

They are the cutest things ever!! So tiny! Their eyes weren't even open, which means that they were less than 8 days old. Just that day I got some free dog food with coupons so that I could donate it to the humane society, so I decided to just drive over there with it and ask their opinion about the kittens. They said that since they don't have enough people to foster kittens that young if we were to bring them into the shelter now, the best thing to do would be to let them stay with their mom and nurse on her while we make sure to play with them and socialize them. Then when they are about 6 weeks old and wean from their mom we can bring them into the shelter and they assured me that they would get adopted. Anthony is already hinting that he wants to keep the mom cat, but I am dead set against it. No more animals! Taking care of two kids is hard enough! :)

So far the mom cat hasn't let us get near the kittens, which I guess is a good thing because it means she is taking care of them. I lured her out with a can of tuna yesterday and she loved getting petted. I did that a few different times during the day and she always came out to see me. One time I tried to see if I could distract her and grab a kitten, but she caught on to what I was doing and nipped my hand a little bit. She definitely doesn't like it when you get close to her babies! We are going to keep getting her to come out and get petted, that way when the kittens are older and can walk around more they will just follow her out. I've read online that they will just follow what the mom does, so as long as she is comfortable around people, they will be too. It is so hard to wait, I just want to get my hands on those fluffy balls of fur!

This isn't really spring related, but I have to add some cute pictures of my smoosh. Man I love this kid!

Cute Baby Alert!

I cannot get enough of this cute little face! I want to squeeze his cheeks and all of his juicy bits pretty much 24/7! This past week he has started sitting up much better by himself. He still throws himself over sometimes so I keep the pillow around him, but he will sit for the longest time as long as he has a toy and someone to entertain him :)

I love to watch him observe and discover things. He gets such a thoughtful look on his face, and his eyebrows go up and down. It is like I can see him thinking, "Ooooohhh, innnnnteresting". James is so sweet with him and loves to demonstrate how his toys work. However, now that Rett actually grabs and holds things we have started to have the "share with your brother" reminders. During bathtime tonight, James even took all of his bath toys and pushed them over the edge of the tub onto the floor so "Rett doesn't get them". So James would rather not play with his toys than risk the chance of Rett touching them. Ahhh, sibling love :)

I got a video of Rett playing with a toy while we were sitting in the backyard. Usually towards the end of the day we move out there and try to get James to run around for awhile :) 

I need to get a video of the other trick Rett can do. He can reach down, grab his pacifier and bring it back to his mouth! Seriously, it is the best thing ever!! As long as he can reach his pacifier, I don't have to worry about giving it to him because he can get it himself. So cool!

Jaxton's Pirate Birthday Party

James got invited to his friend Jaxton's 3rd birthday party a few weeks ago. His mom is my friend who had her baby shower with me. They moved out of our ward right after Rett was born, so we don't get to see them as often and it was so great to get together! All of the kids had a blast! It was a Jake and the Neverland Pirates themed party, so of course James was excited :) When we got the invitation, I asked James what we should get for Jaxton for his birthday and he immediately said, "A Bucky!" (that is the name of the pirate ship in the show). He got one for Christmas and he absolutely loves it. Plus, since he got all pirate themed toys for his birthday, he now thinks that all birthday presents for everyone must be pirate ships.

During the party, all of the kids got to go on a treasure hunt around the park, following clues and playing games along the way. At the very end was a large X on the ground and all of the kids started digging with their hands until they found a buried treasure chest! It was full of goody bags for all the kids. So cool! All the boys got red bandannas (like Jake) and the girls got fairy wings (like Tinkerbell). James wore his for about half of the time, but my easygoing Rett kept his on the whole time. Man this kid spoils me with his easygoing personality!

The cake and food were so neat! Carolyn handmade this treasure chest cake and they had pineapples cut like a crocodile. Happy, you would have loved it! ;)

 They had little cups of blue jello with gummy fish in them. James thought it was hilarious to eat it with his hook hand!

Here is the birthday boy blowing out his candles and opening his Bucky! He loved it, now we just need to get the boys together one of these days so that they can battle their pirate ships :)