CA trip

We had a FABULOUS trip to CA last week to see my fam. Leese and Sophie went with us (and my mom was with us on the drive down... MUCH EASIER with her in the van and two toddlers than the drive back!).

We made it and had a blast.

Here are some fun memories.

Grandpa and his two grandkids reading books.

Sam imitating Gpa's funny face... and Sophie laughing.

Sam and Soph spent HOURS playing outside. Sam preferred the tractor and Soph the pink car most of the time.


Playing with Jake and Lindz... and practicing sticking out their tongues.

Leese. (Who will probably shoot me for posting this pic... heh heh)


Now... what started out innocent as THIS...

Turned into this...

And finally THIS. ("Sure Soph. I'll dump water on my head like you. I do everything you do anyway!")


These two sure had fun playing in the water together. They LOVE being together with only the occasional sharing mishap. It's fun to watch them be such good friends and laugh together.

Cookie Making Adventure Part 2

One of the benefits of being here rather than there are Matt's hours. They are SO MUCH BETTER. There's not a chance there that Matt would have arrived home in time to do something fun as a family like make chocolate chip cookies. We love it.

So, we decided to do just that the other night. With Sam's "help", we had quite the mess to clean up afterwards, including when he turned the mixer on high speed after we added all the dry ingredients. Yep. They went everywhere. (see prior post...). Peanut was covered too. But it was so fun.

Helping to scoop out the cookies. (Sam also discovered the joy of cookie dough. He kept asking Matt for a "piece".)

Showing off the finished product.

Taste testing...

Sam thought he and Matt were really funny...


Sam just wanted to do just what Matt did all night long. Including resting his head on his hands and stretching out his back on the floor just like daddy.


(Note Sam trying so hard not to laugh or look at the camera...)

Cookie Making Adventure

I've been terribly bad at posting (thanks for pointing that out, Ev), so here's a teaser. (And an added bonus. You get to see just how gigantically preggo I am.)

More on this later...

Do You Ever Feel Like This????

courtesy of the new baby giraffe at Hogle Zoo.

Hogle Zoo and more face masks...

First of all, THANKS TO BEL, one of Sam's fabulous aunts, for playing along with Sam and Soph on Sunday and once again donning the face masks. I believe that Sam kept his on for about an hour and kept trying to get Bel and Sophie to put theirs back on. :)



Leese and I took Sophie and Sam to Hogle Zoo last week. They had a great time! Sophie always wants to hold Sam's hand (which is so adorable). Those two cousins just love being together. Sam asked me this morning, "Leeesa? Boooohpie? Bwiiiiiiice?" Yep. He misses you. Ptown is too far away...

IKEA "dressups"

When Leese and I were at the IKEA here (yes, a dangerously short 20 minutes drive doorstep to Ikea's doorstep), I bought Sam a few "dressups" to have in his toy room. Sam tried them all on one by one and insisted that I take his picture each time. Yes... he was "posing" in these pics.







He LOVES them and wants to wear them all the time. He'll keep them on for hours if we let him! Bel came up over the weekend to watch Sam for us so we could go on a DATE and just hang out for a while. Sam LOVES bel. Especially after she played with all the facemasks with Sam and they made some of his funny faces...

Sam the monkey

Sam is pretty hilarious these days... and loves pulling new faces. He was posing for the camera yesterday and I think I captured his funny personality in some of these.



Sam saying "hi" to the camera. Then he would insist on seeing this pic on the little screen on the camera and saying "hi" back to himself.

Sam's monkey face, thanks to Tricia who taught him this. Usually he'll grab both his ears, but he would only grab ONE yesterday!

When I started taking pics, this is how I found Sam. Yep. He managed to put on my boots and was walking around as best he could (aka VERY slowly).

Sweet Sam.


This is what I get when I try to pose Sam.
"Sam, show me your truck."

"Sam, say CHEESE!"



Anyone who knows Sam knows that he LOVES LOVES LOVES to line up cars. So... enter our new toy room with these AWESOME built-in bookshelves and cabinets. The best part for Sam? The ledge above the cabinets where he can line up all his cars and trucks.

Some Moving Pics

Ahhhh, how we miss Boston already! Here's our last full day there. (MANY thanks to the Russes, Chases, etc for all the help, meals, babysitting, taking our food, etc. We MISS YOU GUYS!!!)

Here are all our boxes...




And, Sam thought it was funny to wear my hat while Matt and I were packing. Yep. He wore it for about 2 hours straight. He thought he was soooo funny.

Sorry... no pics yet.

Yes... I hear you! I need to post pics of our new house! And yet... I can't quite seem to make myself take pics of the unfinished rooms, undecorated walls, spaces I don't know what to do with yet, walls I want to repaint, etc. We're getting closer, but be patient! Pics to come...

We've ARRIVED

More later, but we made it to SLC! One thing I will absolutely not miss... the 5+ hour flights with a toddler on a regular basis to see family. Phfew.

We move into our new house on Monday and closed today. Can't believe that 100 signatures and an hour later, we have a substantial loan and are homeowners. Seems a bit too easy... are we old enough for this yet???

More once life resumes some sense of normalcy and we have uploaded some new pics. LOVE being closer to family here!!!