Our Little Getaway

Bry and I celebrated our eight year anniversary last night and finally got to spend our weekend together...alone...together (sounds lovely doesn't it?!) this past weekend. We escaped to Sedona for the weekend and enjoyed doing pretty much nothing. We had a cute little cottage with a kitchen and front room. It was so nice and cozy. We made breakfast at home both mornings and enjoyed a lot of snuggling and TV watching.

Shell kept the boys and Jules had Ming. We visited the "adult hot tub", drove the "loop" which was beautiful, walked the shops and got a Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory apple, drove to Flagstaff to use our free movie passes to see The Big Year (DO NOT go see it...lame), and at Outback.

It was wonderful and relaxing. We stopped off on our way home for a little walk and finally took a couple pictures....I need to be better about taking pictures of the love of my life.

Puppy Love

 

18 Months

This little pretty is eighteen months! She is a crazy girl and lights up our home! She is quite the little stinker in all her busybody-ness, but she is such a snuggler which makes it all okay. Of course Maylee is a picky eater, but I would not expect any less from one of my children. She eats mostly toast, cheese, yogurt, apples, bananas, grapes, fries, chicken fries, pizza, quesadilla, grilled cheese, and cracker things...and of course anything sweet anyone else is eating! She loves cheese....yes, I know. At least I can load her with fruits and spinach in a smoothie!

I have let her "practice" eating with a spoon and it usually ends up something like this! Sticky little stinker!

The child loves bananas...and of course there is no better place to put leftover banana than in your hair!

 We got home from Sedona the afternoon of Maylee's eigtheen month birthday so we HAD to have a cake. The kids were all exhausted, but chocolate frosting makes everything better! :) **Maylee had her first bail and owie while we were gone. She was a champ and it has since healed up quite nicely. It looks worse than it was**

 Maylee is really good at signing "all done" and I love it every time she does it. She holds her hands up and twists her little wrists like she is doing a dance or something. LOVE IT! She is just so dainty and oh so cute!

Maylee says a fair amount of words and understands pretty much everything. She can say sticky, stinky (stk stk), mama, dad, pup pup, ball, num num, Hailee (lllll), up, please (eese), and maybe a couple others. She is not a huge talker, but she knows how to tell ya what she wants. She is walking all over and loves shoes. She tries to run and is a great climber. She likes to eat crayons and pull her brother's hair. She loves books and will never turn down chocolate or a marshmallow. She loves Baby Einstein and hates the garbage man. Mentioning her blanket will make her giggle - give her her blanket and she will lay her head down on your shoulder and suck her thumb (pure heaven). She goes to bed about 7:45ish and sleeps all night until 8:30 or 10:45 or anywhere in between. She takes one nap and goes down like a charm.

Stats:

Height: 29 1/2 inches 5%
Weight: 17 lbs 9 oz <5%
HC: 46 cm 25-50%

Keepin Busy

We are busy. Everyone has their own level of business, but it seems with three little ones things are usually bustling around here. The kids are happier when there are things to do. Busy boys are happy boys.....bored boys make a crazy mommy!

Carter likes to line his cars up...and Drew likes to take them away which makes Carter exceptionally happy!

We made moon sand a while back and the boys loved it. Maylee was napping and they went to town! Who knew flour and baby oil could be so much fun. They dug for treasure and used cookie cutters.

We decided to re purpose our pool noodles. It started with them wanting steering wheels, but my attempt at pulling that off was futile. Instead I cut them in half and they raced balls down them and had a blast!

Carter likes to play with water and ice mingled with a few toys and sponges. This usually happens in the morning while Drew is at school and Maylee is still sleeping and I am trying to squeeze in a little more work time.

We made homemade jack-o-lantern pizzas. The kids had fun making them, but Carter was the only one who enjoyed eating his. Honestly, something went wrong with my sauce because goodness it was SALTY, but still fun to make!

 

 

 

Finally, the Toddler Busy Bag Exchange was a success and I am excited to do another one after the holidays. Here is a sneak peak at one of my kids favorite activities!

Daily Dabble 10/11/11

Missed the gym, but it was worth it to snuggle with you in bed. The boys were up early - no surprise there. Ming was up at 9 and ready to go. We went to see Cars 2 at the dollar theater...on fall break...on $1 Tuesday...it was crazy. We survived with multiple potty breaks and Ming watching Baby Einstein on the touch. SHORT nap for Maylee. Went to the "wood chip park" with Shell and the kids had a blast. Kids were starving since they mostly ate popcorn and all sorts of empty movie type food. All chowed down and are about ready for bed! Maylee still loves her puppy. I asked here where her puppy was and this is her intent looking-for-puppy face!

Balancing Things Out

We were a little uneven in our family....2 girls to 3 boys so we thought we needed to even things out. Welcome Patty Patch to our little Baker family! She is/was my sister's dog and they were ready for her to move onto another family that was home a little more and had little hands to love her all day long. Let me tell you......all six of the little hands in our family love her all day long! She is so sweet and tolerant.  She ADORES Bryan and follows him everywhere when he is home. She even tried to get in the car with him this morning when he left for work. She follows me around during the day and just sleeps where ever I am (until little hands come to give her some "love"). Drew is really good with her and doesn't bother her too much, but of course he was the one nipped on her first day since Carter and him trapped her. Carter is obsessed with her ears and Maylee loves her eyes...to poke at them of course. I love that she has developed a love of walks for my husband. We have gone on a walk everyday as a family since she came on Friday - LOVE it! So far so good. I am adjusting and so is she. It is nice that she is a bit older with a whopping six years behind her so I don't have to do the potty training and she sleeps in her crate at night. I did have to tell Bryan that she could not have my spot next to him on the couch even though she preferred it that way! Hope Patty likes it here and doesn't mind the heat because I don't think the little people in this house are ready for her to go anytime soon!

Daily Dabble 10/10/11

First day of fall break and we are surviving fairly well, but then again it is hard to believe it is only Monday! The kids were off and on this morning. Ming slept until 10:30 so that was nice. She so lovingly shared one of her muffins with Patches...nice. Shell and Hailee came over and we attempted a craft, but it was a bit crazy with all the kids. During Maylee's nap the boys and I finished my craft and did two of their own. Our house is slowly getting "Halloween-ified"! We had fun. Now they are resting and I am going to blog and work. Looking forward to our family walk tonight! Love love love you

Drew wanted to have his picture taken today and I have to say I was loving his posing!

Conference Weekend

I love General Conference, but I know I will love it even more when our little people are not so...well....little! I caught a couple of snippets of talks on Saturday afternoon, but most of the time was spent corralling these little peanuts!


Who know that crinkled brown paper packaging could be SO fun!

Oh but, little boxes are ten times as fun when you get a ride around the house in them! The boys tried to fit too. Drew's broke right away and Carter's was pretty unstable. Maylee sure enjoyed herself though!

 

On Sunday I pulled out all the stops....riiight. I do have to say though during the morning session all children were happily content and fully entertained by a brand new package of popsicle sticks. They all played with them in their own way and were happy campers. For the afternoon session Ming was sleeping so I helped the boys make their very own monster feet! It is a great idea in theory, but alas...glue and tissue paper is hard for any little boy and then we pained and had to wait for them to dry...then they were slippery and hard to walk in. Oh well - it was fun while it lasted!

Conference was wonderful and I did get to listen to more than I have in past years which was so nice. I look forward to reading and rereading the Ensign in the coming months!

Daily Dabble 10/5/11

I am in love with this cooler weather. I have hardly has to use the AC today and it has been SO nice. Carter has been on one today. I am not sure what his problem is, but he has been quite physical and nasty today. Hopefully he will wake up a happier child tomorrow. After we came home from running errands and getting Drew from school Carter walked in the house and said "It's so nice to be home". He is such a funny kid! Now if I could just convince them to keep their heads in there for a little while longer...it seems to muffle their sounds!