Will's Birthday Pictures - Finally

I decided I better hurry and get Will's birthday all blogged before it is Savannah's birthday in a couple of weeks.


We went to Robby's sister's baby blessing on the Sunday before Will's birthday and Robby's parents got Will an awesome, and huge, chocolate cake with a basketball on it and a candle that played the birthday song. He was so excited! It was really tasty too.





Plus he got an awesome new Star Wars plane which was a huge hit. He loves it!




The next day was Will's birthday and also happened to be President's Day so there was no school and Savannah got to stay home and celebrate with us. We started out at 7:00 opening presents. Will got a treasure chest that he has been eyeing at Hobby Lobby for months.

And a bow and arrow that he has been wanting since we bought one for his cousin Tyler in December. He was very excited.

Later in the day Grandma Aird and Heather and Ali came to have lunch with us and play for awhile. Grandma and Heather brought more Star Wars stuff and of course two planes are better than one.

The kids had a great time playing together and the adults had fun hanging out and talking for a couple of hours.

Will requested chocolate cupcakes instead of a cake so we had cake and ice cream and sang again that night.

A couple of days later Robby helped Will stain his new treasure box.

I think it turned out pretty good but Will keeps talking about wanting to paint it brown. I think he just wants to paint so we'll see how that one turns out.

Dentist?

Does anyone know of a good dentist in or around Layton? We REALLY need to go and I was hoping to find a good one instead of just picking a name off of a list. Any suggestions?

Digital Conversion Part 2

Problems With Your Digital Conversion?

Tribute to Will

I have been searching for pictures of Will to remember the past 5 years by and I have been surprised to see how grown up he is suddenly. The time goes by so quickly. It has been fun to look back on the past few years.

Here is my newborn boy. He didn't open his eyes for the first few days. I think it was too bright for him.

This is when he was about a month old in his new Easter outfit.



Some of you may remember that Will had to wear a helmet from about 6 months old until just after he turned 1 to reshape his head because it was flat on one side. You can kind of see it in this picture but he is wearing a ball cap on top of the helmet so it is kind of hard to tell.

Will was one of the messiest kids I have ever known. I couldn't believe how he could make a mess out of absolutely anything. Luckily his plate doesn't look like that anymore, although he is still good at making messes.

Will had no hair until he was one and then he grew these beautiful blonde curls. I loved his curly hair.

Will has always been happy and fun to be around. He is always making us laugh and he loves to be the center of attention telling jokes and trying to be funny.

Will loves to be outside and he loves to play in the dirt. He likes to go fishing with his dad and he loves it when we can go camping or hiking.

This is Will when he was 2. He wanted to be big like his sister and do everything that she was able to do.

He is 3 here and this is shortly after we moved to Layton. He decided to color himself red to be Spiderman. He has always been very creative and has a great imagination.

Will loves everything cowboy. He has had cowboy boots since he turned 3 and he wears them till they wear out. He loves horses and cowboy hats and ropes and all that stuff.

This is Will on his birthday last year. He has an infectious laugh and he loves a good party, especially if his Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles and Cousins can come.

He loves to play, especially with his brother and sister. They have a lot of fun together and he is happiest when they are all together being silly.

It has been a great adventure having Will in our family for the past 5 years. We love him so much and it definitely wouldn't be the same without him. I can't wait to see what the next 5 years bring for him. Happy Birthday Will, we love you!

Time for a Change

So, a lot of you know that I went a little crazy back in November and bleached my hair until it was whitish-orange and then again so it was just white. Not exactly the look I was going for. I called my neighbor who does hair and she was nice enough to come over and look at it. She didn't even laugh at me too much, and she told me I should use a toner on it to make it a more normal blonde color. Luckily this worked great and I was happily blonde for a few weeks after that. Unfortunately I am not naturally blonde anymore (I really did used to be) so my roots have been growing out and getting more and more noticeable so on Saturday I decided to go dark. I have never been brown before and it was a little scary, but I think it turned out pretty good. I don't know how long I will stick with this color, but it was nice to have a change. It was also really nice to get away from kids and potty training and life and be pampered for a couple of hours. This was my Valentine's present from Robby and it was so great! Thanks Robby, I really needed that. So, tell me if you like blonde or brown better.

The new me. Sorry it's a little blurry.

Classic Fun Center

This year we asked Will if he wanted to have a few friends over for a birthday party or if he wanted to go to Classic Fun Center with our family instead. Much to my delight he chose a family party and I was spared having to entertain a bunch of 5-year-olds for a few hours this year. (Just so you know, I would have done that if that's what he wanted, but I was relieved that he didn't)
So on Saturday we piled in the car and went to the fun center. It really is a pretty good deal too. We got two-hours of heaven for the kids for only $17. Not too shabby. They have a bounce center where the kids started out and another play area they call Pirate's Cove with slides and stuff to climb on in addition to the skating and the arcade games. We opted not to skate and the kids didn't really seem to notice since they were so busy playing in the other areas.


All three kids bouncing


I noticed later that this one was supposed to be for 8 years and up. . . oops


Giant slides galore

The kids called this one the mushroom

Will on the slide

Savannah falling off-and loving it

The birthday boy

Isaac even braved the big slide. He was terrified the first time, but then he couldn't get enough

We did the bounce for awhile and then the Pirates' Cove. Will wanted to do everything at once, he was so excited to be there. We finished by playing the arcade games and winning a bunch of tickets that earned us some crappy toys to take home. What more could you ask for?

Potty Training

I'm Back! It has been a long time since I have posted anything and that is mostly because I decided to torture myself last week and try to potty train Isaac in addition to having preschool at my house, going to a baby blessing on Sunday for my newest nephew and celebrating Valentine's Day and Will's birthday which was yesterday. I know, not the best timing for potty training. Believe me, I really really regret it. I honestly didn't think it would take more than a day. I know, crazy. But it took less than a day with Will and I fully expected it to be just as easy with Isaac. I had such a hard time potty training Savannah and it took about a year before I could say she was really potty trained. When it was Will's turn my sister had just used the method from the book "Potty Training in Less than a Day" and it had worked really well for her son so I decided to try it too. She was gracious enough to take my other two kids for me and Will and I spent the morning potty training and he was done. He had a few accidents (and regressed a few times here and there) but overall he was really trained in one morning. I thought since I was using the same method as before with Isaac that it would be just that easy again. Not even close! It has been one of the worst weeks of my life. I was literally sitting on the bathroom floor crying by about 1:30 last Tuesday afternoon when I trained him and he was crying too and then he asked me if he could take a nap to get away from me and from training. You know it's bad when they want to go to bed! We had started at 9:30 am and by lunch time he had had five accidents and had not gone in the potty once. I wasn't sure if I should bag the whole thing and put him back in his diaper for lunch and his nap or if I should just keep trying. We were both hungry and exhausted and by the time he went down for his nap I didn't really care anymore if he peed everywhere as long as he was in his room and I could have a break. Well, during lunch he FINALLY went in the potty once and then he had two more accidents before he gave up and asked if he could take a nap. Anyway, this is way more detail than I was planning on giving so I will spare you the rest and just tell you that now (a whole week later) he is doing much better and I have a little bit of hope that we may be able to leave the house again without packing 10 pairs of underwear and pants with us. He actually made it through church at the baby blessing on Sunday and for part of the time at my in-laws house for dinner afterwards. It was about as good as I could have hoped for. I guess this will have to be an ongoing thing with him and I'm hoping that it will gradually get better and better. Each kid really is different.


Issac just before we started the training-notice how happy he is completely unaware of how hard his life is about to be


Potty training supplies

Isaac drinking one of his three drinks near the beginning of training

Potty training is the worst!