Tuesday, December 20, 2011

2 Teeth Down




It's been a big week at the Tanner household. My birthday, seeing Santa, Avery's last day of school before Christmas, a couple of different Christmas parties and more. But maybe the most exciting thing is that Avery lost her first two teeth.

She has been waiting and asking about losing her teeth for a while now, since some of the older kids in her preschool class started losing teeth. I told her that it might be a while because I didn't lose my first tooth until I was in the 2nd grade...but she must take after Al in the teeth department. Over Thanksgiving my brother's family and my dad took her to see Puss in Boots and she came home from the theater with a very wiggly tooth. She said it was the popcorn that did the trick. But after asking about losing a tooth over these past several months, when the opportunity finally came she wasn't sure it was that great. She asked my older brother to pull it out and I think she wasn't prepared that it would hurt a little...because he gave it a yank and she ran out of the room crying. After that it took a lot of prompting to even let us see the wiggly tooth, let alone try to wiggle it out. Avery would work on it from time to time, but mostly just let it sit. We had noticed at one point though that actually both of the two bottom middle teeth were very wiggly.

On Tuesday Avery and James had asked for some chocolate milk to drink. They walked back into the family room and just a couple of seconds later Avery came running back into the kitchen holding her tooth, almost in tears because she was so excited. It had fallen out all on it's own. She made a few phone calls that day bursting to tell people all about how she lost her tooth.

The next morning Avery was getting ready for school. She was eating breakfast and had just finished when her other bottom tooth fell out on its own. Two teeth in less than 24 hours! Avery was beside herself.

That night we were eating dinner before we went to see Santa and Avery was telling us all about how she went to school and told everybody about her lost teeth. It went a little something like this:

Avery: I told Mr. Hanak (one of the music teachers) that I lost a tooth!
Me and Al: What did he say?
A: He said, 'Yeah, you sure did!' Then I told the cafeteria worker about it.
M & A: And what did she say?
A: She said, 'How exciting!' Then I told the other cafeteria worker about it and she said 'neat!' And Coach Christy said, 'Wow!' And then I told Coach Budd.
M & A: And what did she say?
A: She said, 'yeah, you already told me.'

Then Al and I just laughed and laughed. I'm sure Avery had walked around most of the day telling anybody that would stand still.

Avery's two permanent teeth are already growing in and I can see that we have some orthodontia in our future...hopefully she takes after Al in that department too and not me! It's all kind of bittersweet. Avery is so excited that she's lost teeth now, but it makes me and Al kind of sad. There little faces just change so much when their permanent teeth grow in. Our little Vee Vee is getting older for sure.

Going To See Santa







The night of my birthday we took the kids to see Santa. We had told them that if Al got home at a good time we would go to Bass Pro Shop and see Santa there. It is just down the street from us and they do a really cute Christmas display. Avery and James were super excited and talked about it for the days leading up to the 14th. Al ended up getting home early that night so we were able to go!

We took the kids last year and had to wait in line forever, but this year it wasn't busy at all. I guess we picked the right night to go. We only waited 5 to 10 minutes and then it was our turn. Avery wasn't shy at all and walked right up to Santa. James, who had been talking about it for days excitedly, panicked at the last minute and started to cry. So Al carried him up to see Santa. Avery told Santa she wants a "green nutcracker with a sword and a crown on its head" for Christmas. They have been talking a lot about the Nutcracker ballet at school and Avery loves it. She tells me something new about it every day. I think it's neat that her teacher is teaching them about the ballet, but I'm not sure what Avery is going to do with a nutcracker...James said he wanted "toys." After Al prompted him to say cars Santa asked James if he liked Lightning McQueen and Mater. That melted the ice a lot and James finally went and stood by Santa. He didn't really want to sit on Santa's lap still, so he and Avery just stood in front of Santa for the picture.

Besides seeing Santa there are a lot of other fun stations set up in their winter land. James was most fascinated by the electric trains and it was so fun to watch his little face be so excited as he controlled the trains. Avery spent some time on the trains as well and also sat at the table to write Santa a letter. There were several other things to do but after the trains and the letter Al and the kids took off to go see the boats that were for sale. It was a really fun night.

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Dane at 27 weeks and 3 days




Today I had two ultrasounds. The first one was for my gall bladder. I had to go in fasting, which was rough...they shouldn't do that to a pregnant person. I am still feeling sick from it. Anyway, I had a half hour block for the gall bladder ultrasound. The tech was really talkative and she also had a student with her so she was explaining everything, which is how I found out that I have gall stones. Right before she started the ultrasound the tech explained that she was going to take some images, give them to the radiologist, he would write a report and send it to my OB and then my OB would go over the results with me. But as she was sitting there explaining everything to the student I joined in the conversation. It was interesting! So at one point I said to the tech, "Is that my gall bladder?" and I pointed to a white round marble on the screen. She said, "No, that's a stone." It was funny watching her try to track everything down since the pregnancy has displaced all of the organs. And once we saw a little foot up by my organs :)

After the gall bladder ultrasound I had to go to a different part of the hospital and get a baby anatomy ultrasound. My new doctor just wanted to take a look at things since he wasn't my doctor at the time of my last ultrasound. This was really fun. The tech said that Dane weights 2 lbs. 6 oz. right now and is measuring right on my due date. This ultrasound lasted a half hour as well, and there was another student in on this one, so the tech was talking a lot to both of us. I walked out of there with a ton of pictures! It is so fun to see Dane at this stage. Al met me in the hospital lobby afterwards to see the pictures. He thinks that Dane looks like James :)

Tomorrow is a regular OB appointment, plus the diabetes test. My OB is also going to run some labs on my liver and just see what is going on at this point. I am not having symptoms yet of cholestasis, in the past it shows up for me around 30-32 weeks.

Thursday, November 3, 2011

Two Little Bats









We had two little bats this year for Halloween. Avery had her heart set on being Wonder Woman for the longest time. I'm not even sure how she knows who Wonder Woman is...but about a month or so before Halloween she changed her mind and said she wanted to be a bat and she never wavered on it. I thought it would be cute for James to be a bat too. My mom and grandma sewed the costumes and sent them out to the kids. They loved them! The black parts of the costume are made out of a crushed velvety type of material. And you can't really tell in the pictures, but Avery's purple wings were sparkly. I think my favorite part of the costumes is the ears. I love how those cute pointy ears just stick right up.

Avery and James were crazy about the costumes. They have loved flapping their arms and running around the house...so much so that I finally had to have them take off the costumes because my sanity was at stake :) We were able to get quite a few wears out of the costumes. Avery had a birthday party to go to a couple of days before Halloween that she wore her costume to. Then we had the ward Halloween Trunk or Treat, and then actual Halloween. They don't wear costumes to school here, or even have a Halloween party here. Al and I both thought that was sad! We both remember several of our classroom parties and how fun they were.

Al had Halloween off this year which was so fun! He has worked the last two Halloweens. I know he loved going out trick or treating with us. The kids did really well and James caught on very quickly to what he was supposed to do. After we left every house the kids would call out 'Thank you!' and then James would add, 'Happy 'Ween!' Very cute. James would stop and focus on every Jack o'lantern and ask Al if he could blow out the candle. Avery was more focused on getting to the doors :) James was very possessive of his pumpkin bucket and wouldn't let me or Al help him carry it, and it was heavy! The kids loved coming home and dumping all of their candy into a pile. Then we had fun sorting it all out.

I don't really have pictures from it, but Al and I went to a couple's only Halloween party the weekend before. It was a lot of fun. Our costumes weren't that great...we didn't have money to put into it, and we don't have a collection of Halloween stuff to choose from. And I don't have a sewing machine. Not to mention that neither me or Al is super into dressing up. So we decided to go as Juno and Paulie Bleaker from the movie Juno. But the night before the party I found out that my good friend Kim and her husband were going as Juno and Paulie! So then Al thought it would be great to go as ghosts. Just the super classic, lame, white sheet ghosts. I thought it was kinda funny too. Al 'borrowed' some sheets from the hospital which I was totally against. I don't care that he 'borrowed' them. I cared that they had been used in a hospital!! But Al said that they were from the children's ward (he's on pediatric surgery right now) and that he had gotten them from the fresh laundry and that the hospitals actually throw out the sheets very frequently so they never even get used that much. Whatever. I still wanted to wash and dry them again. Al thought I was crazy. Then as we were cutting up the sheets I noticed a small blood stain on the sheet Al said was mine. Al didn't believe me, but then I showed it to him and he was like, "Um...I'll take that one." In the end the ghosts didn't really turn out how we expected, and I was still freaked out about the sheets, so we didn't use them. We ended up being football players...sort of. Al wore his high school jersey and I wore this football jersey t-shirt that I have. We didn't win any prizes for our costumes, but we did win the pumpkin carving contest! We only had 15 minutes to carve, but we did awesome! Avery had suggested before we left that we go with a super mario theme. So Al carved the Boo ghost on his big pumpkin and I carved a one-up mushroom on the tiny pumpkin. I wish we had pictures of the pumpkins 'cause they really were cute.

Wednesday, October 5, 2011

We are having a...







BOY!!!

We are very excited :)

I took Avery to the ultrasound with me this morning. Yesterday morning she was nearly in tears saying she didn't want another brother, so I was a little worried about how today was going to go.

Avery had a paper she had made that had a box labeled boy and a box labeled girl and she was all prepared with a pen to mark the correct box when the time came. The ultrasound tech was great at explaining everything that she was looking at. They have a big flatscreen on the opposite wall so it was nice to see everything on the big screen instead of craning my neck to look at the little computer. The baby is developing perfectly and measured just 1 day ahead of the estimated due date, so he is growing right on schedule and weighs almost a pound :)

When it came time for the gender reveal Avery was hopping from one foot to the other, barely containing herself. When the tech told us it was a boy Avery started jumping up and down and exclaiming, "It's a boy! It's a boy!" And then she marked the right box on her paper :)

When we left the ultrasound room Avery told everybody in the hallway, "We're having a boy!!" And of course, everybody smiles back and says congratulations. Then Avery said to me, "Mom, I always wanted it to be a boy." Ha ha ha! Well, good! She did say she was upset she wouldn't get to share her room with the baby. I told her she was probably the only person I knew that was upset about not sharing a room!

I texted Al immediately. He had tried to get the day off, but it wasn't in the cards. Right before I went in to the ultrasound he had texted me saying he was in the OR, so I knew I wouldn't be able to call him. I just texted him, "Little DANE looks healthy and perfect, measuring just 1 day ahead of due date." He ended up calling a couple of hours later. He scrubbed out of his surgery because he just couldn't wait any longer and he said that everybody in the OR was so excited too. I didn't get to talk to him for long because he had to go scrub back in, but it was good to hear from him.

We will be naming our little guy DANE WILLIAM TANNER. Al and I both love the name and are so very excited.

Thursday, September 29, 2011

Girl or Boy?



I don't know if it's too soon for this post, but I thought maybe it was time to put our guesses out there for what the gender of baby #3 is going to be :)

Here is some input that may or may not be helpful:

- I really think it is a boy
- I have been wrong with both of our other kids :)
- Al has a 100% track record of guessing
- He used to be confident it was a girl, but now he is only semi-confident
- Avery of course thinks it is a girl
- James thinks it's a girl
- James doesn't understand the question :) Or that a baby is coming...
- We have a great boy's name picked out. I am really excited about it!
- We have a blank slate for a girl's name...
- All of my pregnancy symptoms/morning sickness etc. have been different with each pregnancy, so no use comparing.
- One Chinese calendar I saw said boy, another said girl :)
- If we follow Al's older sister's family pattern it will be a girl :)
- If we follow my older brother's family pattern it will be a boy :)
- It is great having one of each already, because I will be thrilled no matter what! I just want a healthy baby.

My ultrasound is on Wednesday, October 5th, less than a week away! Finally! I will be almost 22 weeks at that point. I'm thinking of taking Avery with me. I hope the next few days pass quickly!!

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Avery's First Week in Pictures






As you can see Avery's first week of Kindergarten was well documented. And she embraced the khaki and navy blue :)

Avery had a great first week, she loved it. The school is grades K-4 only, which is kind of nice. There are two music teachers and so Avery goes to music class twice a week. They have a PE coach too and Avery goes to PE twice a week as well. They also go to the library once a week. Avery was very impressed when I told her that Grandma Louona used to be a school librarian. Avery is starting to get to know the kids in her class and gives us little details on her classmates. It's amusing :) She brings home a folder every day that has a printout for the first six weeks of school that lists daily homework assignments and a daily behavior report I sign off on. And then it also has the handful of papers that Avery worked on that day. This morning Avery asked me when she gets to go back to school. She is hooked already.

As for me, I did much better on Tuesday when I dropped her off. But then Tuesday night I got really sad again thinking that she was going to be gone the whole next day too. Still adjusting I guess. The rest of the week got better with each day. It is nice/weird being on a routine after a long summer. Wednesday was the last morning I got to walk Avery to her classroom. From now on I can just drop her off at the school entrance. The school had a huge sign posted in the lobby on Thursday morning that said, "Hug them, kiss them, then tell them good-bye!" Ha ha ha! So that's what I did. I can see why they have to have a cut-off though. Avery is fine, but I would walk her every day to her class room if they let me :) And there were a few little kids having freakout/meltdowns as their moms left them in the lobby. That was hard to watch and I'm glad that Avery didn't go through that. Gotta make the separation some time I guess.

James is adjusting too. We have cuddled a lot this week. He's always been a cuddler, but I think it's increased since Avery's been gone. He watched Nemo everyday and sometimes he would come and get me and pat the couch next to him so I would sit by him. Then he would lay his head on my lap. I've spent a lot more time playing on the floor than when Avery was home too. I also think he's starting to talk more! Or maybe I am just hoping he is talking more ;) Thursday morning James threw a fit when we had to drop Avery off at the door. I thought it was because he missed Avery and I felt bad for him. Then Friday morning he insisted on taking a book bag on the walk to take Avery to school. Like Thursday, I dropped Avery off at the door and watched to make sure she headed the right direction. I only watched for a few seconds and then I turned around to look at James in the stroller...and he was gone. I started calling, "James! James!" and was starting to panic when a dad said, "Are you looking for a little blonde boy? He went inside." I don't know how I missed it, but he snuck right in the school. He got a good way into the lobby, with his bag over his shoulder. I grabbed him before he got too far and he had another meltdown. I guess he wants to go to school too :)

Monday, August 22, 2011

Avery's First Day of Kindergarten










Avery is home from her first day of Kindergarten! It was a success :)

I had to include the picture of Avery in her 'alien mind blocker hat.' The green leaf is something she fashioned on the front to stand for 'nature aliens.' I guess she's a fan of nature aliens in particular...? She made a symbol for James' hat that is yet to be made. I don't think he's too keen on wearing a piece of foil on his head. But if he were going to wear his hat his symbol is a waterfall. For water aliens. Naturally. I know Al is thrilled beyond words that Avery has a huge interest in the solar system and now aliens. She drew a picture of the solar system yesterday that is so cute. I'll have to put it on the blog.

Anyway, Kindergarten!

Last night I painted Avery's fingernails and toenails in honor of the big day, and in honor of our tradition since the first year of preschool. This year at the store she picked out plum seduction, a very nice purple-y pink color :) After her nails dried Al gave Avery a back to school blessing. He talked about it with her before hand, how she needed to be extra reverent and listen to the words. She asked if I was going to help too, but Al said that only he would be giving the blessing since he had the priesthood. Then she asked what my special job was and Al said it was to paint her nails and help her look cute in her outfits, fix her lunch, etc. :) Al gave Avery a really nice blessing. Avery is so funny, when Al started the blessing and said her full name Avery whispered, "yes?" Ha ha ha! Al was saying some really nice things about Avery and the school year and he said something about her helping the kids that were sad. Then Avery whispered, "And also help me to be friends to the people that don't have any friends." Ha ha ha! So Al included that as well :)

After the blessing it was time to get Avery in bed. I took her upstairs and helped her pick out her outfit for the first day. She picked the hot pink polo. Then I opened her drawer full of shorts and pants and pulled out a pair of navy uniform shorts. Avery looked at them and said, "No! Not those!" Then I pulled out a pair of khaki shorts and she said, "Mom, I don't wear that color." Um...you do now! Welcome to uniforms! So we settled on a pair of denim capris. You are allowed to wear denim as long as it's not embellished at all. I guess we'll have to ease Avery in to the whole concept of uniforms.

Last night after the kids were in bed I had a little bit of an emotional moment. It's just such a big deal that she will be gone every day, all day now. I have never been away from my kids for more than a few hours at a time and so it is hard for me to be away from Avery for so long. Al was sympathetic, but said, "You know you can't do this at the school tomorrow, right?"

We woke up bright and early today. Al had the day off which was so nice! We got the kids all ready and headed down for Avery's requested breakfast of powdered donuts and orange juice. But she was just too excited/nervous to eat much of anything. Then it was off to school.

Avery was so excited. We walked Avery inside and to her classroom. Mrs. T was at the door ready to greet the kids and start the routines with them. Right when we walked in she put a name tag on Avery, then showed Avery where to put her lunch box. Avery excitedly told her, "I have a Littlest Pet Shop lunch box and today there are BBQ chips inside!!" To which Mrs. T replied, "Oh that sounds delicious!" Cute :)

We had a tiny hiccup when Avery went to hang up her back pack. There was another mom there with her child. She was wearing one of those long flowy dress things and Avery tripped on it on the way back to me and Al. She fell flat on the ground. Avery stood up bravely, but I could see her face crumbling as she walked back to us. So sad! I was already having a hard time keeping it together! Avery came and buried her face in my shirt and cried. I reassured her that she was okay, but maybe it just scared her a little bit. To which she replied that well, it did hurt a little too. She quickly pulled it together though and found a seat at one of the tables. Mrs. T had a coloring sheet at every seat for the kids to work on when they got there. At this point Al could tell I was in a fragile state so he told Avery to give me a hug and she did. Then I helped her sit back down and gave her a couple of kisses on the cheek and then...we left. I looked at the other moms all around and they all seemed composed! But as my friend Kim told me later, they were just saving up their tears for when they got back home :) What can I say...I'm super attached/worried/overprotective/emotional etc. And I'm my mother's daughter :)

Throughout the day, every so often, I would think I wonder what Avery is doing now. Did somebody help her with her lunch? Have they even had lunch yet? Is she having fun? And all sorts of other things. We all went and picked her up at 3 outside of the school. She came running up to us and before we could say anything she grabbed James' cheeks in both of her hands and said, "Did you miss me?!" It was cute.

Tuesday, August 9, 2011

The More The Merrier :)




Yeah! A baby is on the way!

I've had two ultrasounds already and will have my 3rd appointment on Wednesday and everything looks great! This ultrasound picture was actually taken a few weeks ago. I love how you can already see the head and arms and legs :)

I am due February 11th...February is a big month for us I guess since Al and Avery already have birthdays in February! Which puts me at just over 13 weeks right now. But the baby will be born at least 1 week before that, and up to 3 to 4 weeks before the 11th if I get sick again. So probably anywhere between the middle of January to the beginning of February.

I will start shots at 16 weeks, once a week, up until I deliver. My OB is setting up a home nursing service that will come to the house to do the shots. I am sure it is something Al can do, but I need to find out more specifics, like if it has to be on the exact same day every time, etc. Al will start to be gone a lot more in the next several months and so maybe it won't work out to have him just do it.

I think I have already felt the baby move :) But I don't know if that's possible at 13 weeks or less...but I swear I have at night when I rest on the couch. Hopefully I'm not just crazy...

I have felt pretty good, very tired, and more sick with this one than the others.

We have told Avery already. She wants to name the baby Amy Avery T. She will not even try to think of a boy's name. She is certain she is getting a sister. When James saw the ultrasound picture the first thing he said was "Baby!" I know he doesn't have a clue about what is going on, but I was shocked he could decipher the ultrasound picture without any help!

My OB is also pregnant right now and will just be finishing her maternity leave right around when I will be having the baby, so we'll see how that works out. And my OB group is switching hospitals in the fall/winter. So I will be at a different hospital than what I thought. I was kind of worried about that, but Al said as long as it wasn't the county hospital I would be fine :) Besides when I was in the hospital last year we saw another resident from our ward, Al kind of knew the anesthesiologist, and he ran into some people he knew when I was in recovery. So maybe it's just as well that I'm at another hospital that's not linked with UT...

I think that's about it for now, but we'll keep you posted!

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Lagoon









On our second to last day in Utah we spent the day at Lagoon with my mom and dad, Derek and his family. I hadn't been to Lagoon since I was probably about 14 or so and didn't remember a ton about it. I have a very low tolerance for rides...I have to take Dramamine at Disneyland and get carsick if I glance down at a map for even a few seconds. So I knew that it was mostly going to be a spectator day for me. My kids have had very little exposure to rides so I wasn't sure what they would think about it, especially since James got freaked out at the bounce house.

We got to Lagoon right when it opened. It was raining lightly outside and it was cold! Luckily we all brought sweatshirts with us. I was pretty surprised when we got inside the park at how nice it was. I definitely don't remember it being that nice, but it had been a while. There was quite a bit of landscaping, fountains, etc. And it was very clean. The kids were on their first ride within about 3 minutes of entering the park. We started small :) It turned out that Bulgy the Whale was a crowd favorite. Especially with James. He ended up riding it several times that day and was even sort of saying 'Bulgy' by the end of the day.

For the first while we stayed in the kiddie area and let the kids go on the rides multiple times each. There were no lines and so the kids could go from ride to ride without a wait. Derek took Alison off to ride the wild rides. After we hit the kid rides pretty heavy we decided to venture out a bit to see what else the kids would want to go on.

It turns out they wanted to go on everything!! I had no idea what Avery's tolerance for rides would be (or James' for that matter!) and I know my dad was nervous too. He said a couple of times that he thought Avery was going to get sick. But she would come running off of each ride with a huge smile on her face and want to run to the next ride. I kept asking her if her tummy hurt, or whatever, and she always said no.

My parents and Derek and Jen were really nice to take my kids on all of the rides with them. James wanted in on the action after a while and he started to go on the rides he was tall enough to go on, which were a surprising number of rides. Avery went on a couple of different roller coasters, the Chinese Dragon (it goes super fast in a circle on direction and then reverses and goes super fast backwards)the dinosaur drop (takes you high up in the air and then drops you), the scrambler, the tilt-a-whirl, the Flying Aces, etc. A lot of these she went on multiple times. James was able to go on one roller coaster (well, he went on Puff in the kiddie section a few times, but then he went on a bigger one several times later) and also did the tilt-a-whirl and the Flying Aces. The Flying Aces goes pretty fast and gets you a fair amount off the ground. As soon as it was over he shouted "Again! Again!"

At one point the little kids and my dad and I sat it out while my mom, Derek and Jen, and Alison went on a ride called the Samurai. It is a crazy ride. I don't know how to explain it except for that the separate arms are spinning in complete flips, while the whole ride itself is rotating. Avery was really disappointed that she wasn't tall enough to ride and kept saying for the rest of the day that she was sure she would be tall enough next year to ride it. I have no doubt she would have ridden it this year if they would have let her on!

We ended up staying at Lagoon until almost closing. It never got crazy busy to where you would have to wait long for rides. It was a lot of fun to see all of the rides lit up when it was dark. Right before we left Jen disappeared and came back with a churro and a few funnel cakes. She was a hero! I think James would have eaten an entire one by himself if the opportunity had presented itself.

It was a great day and I can't wait to go again. Maybe next year! We'll have to see if Avery's grown tall enough for that Samurai ;)

Saturday, July 16, 2011

Temple Square






One day we went downtown to temple square and the conference center. We didn't end up going inside the conference center, but just walked around outside.

Temple square was so pretty. I don't think I've taken Avery before...and definitely not James. It was fun to be that close to the Salt Lake temple again. Avery loved being up close to it and I explained that Al and I were married in there.

There are so many buildings to go in and see, but we only hit a few of them. In one of the visitor's centers there is a cross section of the SLC temple. It was really neat and very detailed. I got to show Avery where Al and I got married. The kids loved all of the fountains outside, the old fashioned looking drinking fountains, and all of the flowers. Avery actually seemed to really enjoy the older buildings, the old tabernacle, etc.

We walked across South Temple to the section that the church is remodeling. What they have done so far is really pretty. Lots of landscaping and fountains. On one of the fountains it had an official dedication date, I think it was in March of 2012. We spent some time in the remodeled Deseret Book store. They have really improved it and given it some personality. Then we had a late lunch at the Blue Lemon, a new restaurant they put in.

After all of this James was ready to call it a day, so we headed back to the conference center, where we parked. I don't know what happened, but somehow we got extremely lost. We remembered one of the numbers where we parked, but we didn't know you were supposed to remember 2 different numbers. And what also complicated it was that we parked on some weird half level...Anyway, after walking around the parking garage for 30 minutes, several trips to the various elevators and talking to a few people we finally found our car. At that point James was asleep and we were all exhausted. We definitely got our exercise that day.

The Grandpas




I love these pictures of the kids with their grandpas. They love them so much and had so much fun with them on this trip.

James was like my dad's little shadow wherever he went. He called him "A" for Dave. He loved watching/helping my dad in the yard. The one picture isn't very good, because it cuts off Avery, but they went shopping with my dad to buy some flowers and then helped plant them. My dad also spoiled him and sang/rocked him to sleep every night. We had to work that one out when we got home...but I didn't mind.

James did really good at calling Grandpa Allen "Bapa." It was so cute to hear him say it. Avery and James both loved going on the ward walk-about with Grandpa, and they also loved sharing food with him :)