Snow Day(s)!

We had a few snow storms this past week!  Better late than never!  One of them was pretty big and kept getting worse throughout the day so Brooke's school became optional.  It was optional because everyone had already gotten in in the morning, but by afternoon they didn't want to make kids come in.  Brooke chose the high road and stayed home from school.  I think that's her first snow day ever!  All that said, the roads still weren't great in the morning.  Monica had to take Winry to the eye doctor, and the trip was much longer than usual.  Anyway, we didn't really get a good chance to go out until Saturday, and then I took all the kids out to play.  Good thing our back yard is mostly in the shade of our house, cause the front yard was cleared.  Grayson was a bit hesitant at first, but once he got going he loved it!

Grayson and I were busy playing on the floor on Monday.  There were some blankets out, and he would run over to them and bury his face in them, so I started to join him.  I was smart and put my hood on so he didn't pull my hair to get my head up, and we had a great time.

Grayson has learned a new direction lately, and it's backwards.  He crawls backwards, he walks backwards, but he doesn't look backwards...  Fortunately he's not gotten hurt yet (that I know of), and it's pretty fun to watch because he usually gets pretty excited.

Brooke continues to love reading, and loves to read to Grayson!  I love that the girls love to take care of Grayson so much, and love to play with him too.  Also, Grayson didn't like stories and reading very much even a few months ago, but he LOVES books now.  If he sees one he almost always brings it over to hand to someone so they can read it to him.

I had to go into work on Thursday so my computer could be updated.  They needed me on site for the update for some reason, and it was a long one.  It took about 3 and a half hours in total to get it done, and that whole time they were using and rebooting my computer, so I couldn't use it.  I was going to bring my laptop so I'd have something to do while I waited, but managed to forget it.  Well, the dock in the radiation drop-in desk is a USB C dock, so I figured I'd give my phone a try and it worked!  My phone has a "desk top" mode for when it's plugged into an external display, and the mouse and keyboard worked too.  Not exactly the setup I was going for, but at least I was able to get some stuff done on my phone while I waited.

Back to Saturday and we're out in the snow.  It snowed at least twice this past week.  Grayson isn't exactly at a stage where he can play on his own or be left alone in the snow.  He doesn't move great in his snow clothes, so if he tipped over face down... .well that would be bad.  So I had to keep close to him.  The girls still had a fun time, and when I couldn't, they pulled each other around in the sleds.  Also, it was cold enough and powdery enough that we couldn't make snow balls or snow men.  The girls had fun sledding and making snow angels.

I took Grayson over to the snow table to see if he'd like it as much frozen as thawed.  Good news, he did!  Specifically he really liked rocking one of these waterfall toys back and forth.  Eventually we started to get cold and came in for hot chocolate.  I was really glad to see that Grayson still felt warm everywhere, even his hands which were in the snow in what I thought were rather thin mittens.

Saturday afternoon I finished a golf platform I've been working on.  My Optishot is great, but it just sits on the ground which makes me worried about hitting it really hard.  Now I've got a platform the same height that it sinks into, so it's much less nerve racking to use!  I've also been working on some custom software for it, but I'll talk about it more later.  Anyway, last night I got my golf setup together to give it a try, and Monica even joined me.  We had a great time, and Monica really enjoyed getting back to the links!  We didn't have a lot of time, so we'll have to play some more this upcoming week.

Today at church when the sacrament came I tried to quickly grab a piece of bread for Grayson so he didn't stick his hand in to get one.  It wasn't that I wasn't fast enough, more that he just didn't care.  He ended up going for his own, and pulled the biggest piece out!  I know it was the biggest piece because it was about 4 inches long!  I couldn't believe it when he lifted it out, and I couldn't help laughing either!

Alright, that's all my cool news for now.  Till next week!

Winry's Birthday Party

We finally made it!  After a COVID scare turned false, and an over weekend trip to San Diego we were finally all home and healthy and ready for Winry's birthday party!  Saturday was yesterday (that's right, I'm writing this on time finally) so there's obviously other stuff to talk about, but not much.  Monica's and my phones had really important stuff to do in our pockets, so we didn't get many pictures this past week, but that's okay because we got pictures of Winry's party!  Here's almost everyone together!  Zoey (from our ward) and Aurelia (from next door) were feeling shy and didn't want to come in.  Thanks to everyone who made it, and I hope your kids had a great time!

Monica has been taking walks with the kids, and Grayson has been loving his blue car!  The girls really love to push him in it too.  Brooke will push him along for a whole walk, and yesterday Winry was pushing him back and forth in front of our house.

In other news for the past week, Monica got a yarn fuzzy ball (pom pom) maker from a gift swap on her San Diego trip, and so we've been making them all week.  However, Grayson got to them, and... well... let's just say he's not allowed to have them any more.  Fortunately he didn't actually swallow any of the yarn, just pulled it apart.  Grayson also caught the beat one morning and started dancing.  He was SO concentrated.  Stomping a foot is hard work.  Lastly, while technically after Winry's party, this just seems like a good place to drop my final video without a picture.  Jelly and I were playing together through her cat tower.  Jelly loves to play like this, and while I'm working if I get up to go to the bathroom she'll run to the opposite side of the basement so we can play.  I just poke my head around a corner so she can see me, and then if I stay hidden too long she'll come charging to get me!

On Saturday we started off the party with some coloring pages while we were waiting for everyone to arrive.  Once everyone was here we played a game where Monica wrapped a present a lot of times, and then while music was playing they passed the present around.  If you were holding it when the music stopped you got to open a layer, and eventually they got to the middle where there was a Pokemon card for everyone!  After that we had lunch, and a bit more coloring happened.

Then the kids got to play Pokemon Snap!  One at a time they'd sit in Grayson's little blue car, and I'd slowly push them around the room and they'd take pictures of Pokemon.  The girls had colored a bunch of Pokemon pictures, but the real game was that I had attached pictures to motors and the Pokemon would randomly pop out from behind things.  It was a big hit!

I gave the kids my actual camera to take pictures with, and the results were varied.  There are some pictures that look like they're kind of supposed to be of people in the room, some are blurry cause the camera was moving too much, and of course, a full set of finger tip pictures!  The important thing is they all had fun.

After Pokemon Snap, we opened presents.  Everyone was very excited to see what Winry was getting.  I especially like this picture because you can see how most everyone is watching what's going on, but Iris is behind Winry checking out the piano she just opened!

After presents, we all sang Happy Birthday to Winry.  Pikachu was singing along with us as well, though you can't hear it.

After we sugared all the kids up, it was time to shake and wiggle!  I think we did at least 4 different freeze dances.  The kids were having a blast and just kept dancing until it was time to head home.  It seemed like everyone had a great time!

To round out the day I went on a run, and the kids played in the front yard with the neighbors for basically the rest of the day.  Brooke lasted longest in the cold, and when I went out to check on her she was just chatting with Julia, Aurelia's mom, who was out working on her garden.  I think that rounds out our week!  Hope you have a great one coming up!
 

Winry Turns 4!!!!

Whoa! Where has the time gone!  Winry is already 4 years old!  She had a GREAT birthday this past week (pretend I wrote this on time).  Here we all are with her birthday banner!  She wanted a Pokemon themed birthday, and the girls even colored a bunch of pictures to help the theme.  We still need to reschedule her party, hopefully for sometime soon!  This was the best picture of all of us, Grayson was being a bit distracting, so when I got him to look, one of the girls was always distracted.  Better to have the birthday girl!

We opened presents first thing on Winry's birthday.  She was SO excited!  Just look how excited she is to get new underwear!  She loved her presents, though I did confuse her as she opened a whisk from me.  The real present is that I am going to take her to do a cooking class together, but she's really clung to that whisk and often asks if she can use her whisk to help with cooking.

During the day, Winry basically just played with her new TOTS toys.  I even asked if she wanted to go on my run with me because she loves to ride along in the stroller, but she said no, she wanted to play with TOTS.  As I thought about it, it made me happy.  Being her birthday we tried to let her do something special, and in the end she mostly did what she does every day, which made me realize that Winry is living her best life every day!

Winry really wanted to go ice skating for her birthday, so we had dinner on the early side so we could get to the library right when the rink opened.  Monica took one for the team and sat out with Grayson, but they had a great time together.  Grayson loved to watch the fires.

More than that, Grayson loved to MOVE!  He kept walking back and forth along the side of the rink and was very happy every time I came by.

The girls had a great time skating.  Most of the time I was helping Winry to skate around, but there were a few times she tried it on her own!  We all had a lot of fun skating, and even stayed later than we were supposed to.

We hustled home for some cake and ice cream!  Of course we sang happy birthday, and we even had to relight the candles and sing it a second time because Winry forgot to make a wish!  She remembered the second time, so we didn't have to keep singing.  After some cake and ice cream it was off to bed.

Monica left for a girls weekend on Thursday, and I needed the stroller to make picking up Brooke easier.  Unfortunately, Monica left me with a little present...  No wonder the wheel was flat!  I was able to patch it and it worked great for us as we went to pick up Brooke.

That afternoon we went to the park.  The girls had a great time on the playground, and I followed Grayson as he walked around.  The plan was to stay until dinner, but Winry had to go to the bathroom so we had to leave like 10 minutes early.  It ended up being a great time to leave as things took a little longer when we got home.

On Friday, Brooke actually had a remote learning day, which means she did school at home.  She had a few worksheets she brought home, so I printed a few for Winry to do as well.  They had a great time doing their homework together.

Grayson continues to be a great feeder/eater.  On Friday he noticed that the food he drops or spits out typically falls into his bib.  He noticed this once he ran out of food, and went in for seconds!

Friday afternoon we picked up my sister, Jerusha, from the airport!  The rest of the day was mostly excitement about Jerusha's arrival.  On Saturday morning we headed out to go bowling!  It's been quite a while, but the girls had a great time again.  Brooke took a stab at throwing the ball by herself, and the first throw didn't go great... but the second attempt made it down the lane!  Winry used a ball... pusher ramp (Brooke did too most of the time).

Grayson did NOT want to be set down, so I had to hold him the whole time we were there.  It was not my finest bowling, but to be fair it was like I was holding three bowling balls as I approached to to make my throw.

And we don't want to forget Jerusha, who was smashing up the lanes!  Not an impressive throw, but...

She did win.  It was a pretty close game, and almost everyone got a strike too!  Most importantly, I got a strike!... I mean, we all had fun!

The girls love to play in the arcade after bowling, and this time they played Mario Kart together!  They had a lot of fun.  They spent most of the race in the back swapping back and forth between who was 5th and who was 6th.

But then in the home stretch Brooke took off and took first!  Winry also did some good catching up and ended up in third, which overall means their team won!

Meanwhile, Monica was at the beach, not even understanding how much fun we were having!  Monica headed to San Diego with her friends that she does a writers group with.  She had a great time, though she stayed up too late every night (she agrees with me).  Anyway, I'll let her add any details of her trip she wants to here: We walked in the sand and ocean, saw tide pools, went to the temple, ate delicious food, laughed, relaxed, and had a great time!

On Sunday we had to do our Nailed It projects for my family call.  We were supposed to make a snowman, so we got out the ol' ice shaver and made some snow!  After having so many bowling pictures I figured I'd combine all the snowman pictures.  I didn't put my picture of me with my snowman cause you couldn't tell how big it's nose was in that picture!  If you use a snow cone maker to get snow for your snow man, there's really only one fitting end for the snow man...  That's right, we snowconed them!  Also, the eyes were chocolate chips, so that was delicious too!

Monica got home just before the girls fell asleep on Sunday night and came to say goodnight to them.  Everyone's having a great time, and I'm glad Monica made it back safely!  Have a great week ahead.

Farewell Niki!

Well, we had a wonderful time while Niki was here, but of course, all visits end eventually.  Niki had to leave on Monday, and fortunately Brooke didn't have school, so she got to go with to take Niki to the airport.  Winry and Grayson went as well.  Brooke was really sad to see Niki go, but they got to wear matching shirts, and Brooke had her unicorn to hug on the ride home.

Winry put on Monica's coat this past week.  I don't' know when this happened, but I thought it was really cute.

Grayson has come back to food again, which is nice.  He still loves to feed himself, so we try to let him get his food off his plate himself.  Spaghetti was a bit messy...

I've been working on things for Winry's birthday, and she wants it Pokemon Snap themed.  I've printed some Pokemon for it, and Grayson loves them.  So I gave him some of the trial prints, and he carried them all around for days!  I brought him the stuffed Pikachu, and he really liked that too.

Winry's birthday party was going to be on Saturday, but got postponed for unforeseeable reasons.  Anyway, Winry was pretty upset, and since the postponement was last minute, we still did some party things that day.  We played switch games and ate cupcakes.  A fourth of Winry's fell on the table, so she ate it straight off.

During the day I changed Grayson's diaper and forgot to button his onesie before putting on his pants, so I just buttoned them over his pants instead...  Sadly, none of the pictures were great, but it looked awesome.

Our next door neighbor felt sorry about Winry's party getting canceled, and so they dropped off her present.  Winry got to open it a little before bed.  She was acting really weird the whole time, but she got some elephant Woodzeez and a furniture/house playset to go with it.  She has LOVED it and they've been playing with it non-stop since.

That's everything I've got for this week.  It was a bit of a slow week, but things are going well.  Hope everyone has a great week!

Happy New Year!!

Welcome 2022!  And welcome surprise visitor/guest Niki!  Niki came out to visit us over the New Year weekend, and we had a great time.  We let the girls stay up until a little after 8 pm, and did our own countdown with poppers before they went to bed.  We didn't tell the girls what the poppers would do and let it be a surprise.  Brooke thought there was going to be a little toy inside, so they were surprised by the pop!  I didn't want to say there would be a pop because I didn't want them to be worried about the noise.  They really liked them, though Winry couldn't pull her string and Niki had to help her.

On Monday Brooke was feeling sick and threw up and had a fever.  She was feeling a little better later in the day, so Monica took her for a COVID test just in case.  They waited in the line for I believe 90 minutes, and Monica captured the line of people waiting for testing as they were heading back home.  The line was rather crazy... so that's... exciting?

Brooke got a science kit for Christmas and she's been really excited to give it a try.  Monica helped her get through some experiments this past week, and she loved it!

One night this week we had fish tacos, and Winry put hers together.  At first I thought it was only going to be cucumber and sour cream, but she did add some fish in the end.  She was very happy with her taco.

It's been a struggle to get Grayson to eat lately.  He was getting a new tooth, and that's probably what started it all.  He'd put things in his mouth and spit them out, and then basically just wouldn't put anything in his mouth. And he'd scream and scream at us anytime we tried to feed him, even foods he liked. The blender was rather active and he ate many a pouch for a day or two.  His mouth doesn't seem to be hurting anymore, and he'll eat a bit more.  It helps the most to let him take charge.  Sometimes that's picking the food off his plate himself, sometimes its getting into his food on the floor.  This has only happened once, and it does seem like it helped.

My oh my... Winry was curled up in her shirt while getting ready for bed one night.  She needed chapstick and naturally went out the neck hole to take care of that.  The shirt was already a little big before, but it might be stretched enough to wear it the rest of her life now.

We took out our Christmas tree Wednesday night to get it out for trash day.  We lost LOTS of pine needles (I accidentally put the tree all the way down, so it couldn't suck up water...).  Good news, Grayson loved the crunching sound!  The mess was already there, so I guess whatever to the stomping, and the plus side is that the house smelled nice and piney for a bit after.

Here are all the girls on the last day of 2021!  This was close to bed time.

The new year brought with it the first real snow fall of the winter.  The high on the 1st was somewhere around 9 degrees F, and we bundled up for the backyard shortly after breakfast!

We had a lot of fun in the backyard, and it didn't feel as cold as I thought it would.  We did all the great winter activities, like snow ball fights.

And Niki pulled the kids around the back yard loop on the sled.

And I ran the kids around on the disc sled.  In addition to that, we had a competition for the best somersault to snow angel, and I tried a few headstands.  We had a great time playing out there, but eventually we started getting cold and headed in for hot chocolate.

After warming up inside a bit, it was just too good a first snow day to not keep taking advantage.  Monica ran to the store to grab a few more sleds (I might have broken one in the backyard in the morning...) and then we headed to a close by park to sled down the hill!  When we got there I put Grayson in the sled to pull him along to the hill.  He liked it for a few seconds, but in the end was carried over, which was probably for the best.

Brooke and Winry both helped get the sleds over to the hill, and then it was time for sledding fun!  Everyone enjoyed the sledding! Here's a video of Monica  taking Grayson down.

Here's Niki and Grayson hanging out at the top of the hill.  Grayson really took to Niki when she got here, which was great!  When we went to Utah for his birthday, he shied away from everyone for several days, but Niki was his best bud right away!  After a bit, Grayson had to head back for a nap, and Brooke went along to warm up her feet in the car.  Winry and I sledded together for a little until Niki and Brooke got back and we continued to all sled together.  Unfortunately I have no videos of Niki sledding.  I really hope she got to go down.  If not I'm super sorry you didn't get a turn Niki!  We may have handed her too many babies and cameras...

That night after the kids were in bed we played some Skyjo and had a great time.

On Sunday, the girls both got the same hair style for church, so of course Niki didn't have any other choice!

Winry brought her Wikki Stix she got for Christmas with her to church.  These were a really good activity cause she was super quiet doing them the whole time.  She made the logo from the container all by herself!  It turned out looking the exact same!

After church we headed up to Tyson and Tina's house so that Niki could see everyone while she was out.  She also had to take Matthew his Christmas present.  We got there early enough that we got to see Andrew before he had to leave to the airport to head back to school too!  Of course Grayson found a chair to stand on.  Later he found a little rocking chair and stood up on that.  I didn't have time to take a picture of that one, but I did grab him before he fell over. Speaking of grabbing Grayson, earlier this week, Grayson threw himself off the couch. So Monica dove across the couch and was just barely able to grab his ankle and keep his head about an inch from hitting the hardwood. The unfortunate part, she dislocated her shoulder while doing so. Luckily it went back into place and other than still being really sore, seems like it's ok. Sounds like we're going to have many a Grayson save in the next little while.

Matthew and Winry played together the whole afternoon.  Brooke alternated between playing with them and Megan.  It's awesome how great all the kids get along, and they just had a super wonderful time together all day.

And that brings us to the end of the week.  Niki is leaving Monday night, and then life will be back to normal.  Winry has preschool tomorrow, but Brooke still has one more day of Christmas break before she heads back, so it'll be good for everyone to get to play together for one more day. 

I'm feeling pretty excited for the new year, but nothing specific really comes to mind as to why.  I still need to work out all my resolutions, but I want to work on speed reading which I already started into a few weeks ago, and I want to start using training plans for running again.  Speed reading has been going well and I've enjoyed it a lot.  It's also keeping me motivated to read more, and I spend some time each day reading a book.  I already finished one last month in fact!  As for running, it's just felt a bit unstructured (because it has been) and because of that I haven't had a way to track progress or improvement.  While I've enjoyed going on runs, they've just felt harder than normal lately, so I'm hoping getting back into some structure will help get things moving again.  Hopefully I'll get the rest of my goals figured out this week, and if I remember can talk a bit about them at the end of next weeks blog as well.  Have a great week!