It's the middle of the night on Friday, five days before CJ's birthday and the night before his party. He came into our room no less than five times. At 4:30 a.m. he woke me up (again) to ask in a very loud whisper, "WHY are there no decorations or presents downstairs for me?" Because your birthday is not tomorrow!

Needless to say, he was so excited for his party and the Indiana Jones cake.  He saw it three weeks ago when we ordered Trey's cake and when we came back to order it for his birthday, it had been discontinued. Many phone calls and trips to different stores and we tracked one down. He requested chocolate with cherry filling.

It was so fun watching him having so much fun with his friends and just enjoying himself to the fullest. Trey had fun too, mostly because the gym had two vacuums, his obsession.

Trey celebrated his third birthday this week. We kept it low-key, asking him what he wanted to eat and what he wanted to do. I am so thankful to have such a big, healthy, happy boy, especially what he went through after he was born. He is a total homebody, just happy to hang out with me and watch Caillou and Curious George. It's cliche, but I can't believe he's already three. I feel like as a mother the days sometime seem so long, but the months and years fly by.

A little late, but wanted to publish a little ditty about New Years Eve.


Just the four of us
With sparkling cider
And Fondu
Lots of Legos
While watching movies
And popping popcorn in my new "old school" popcorn popper (thanks mom!)
It was perfect.

DECEMBER
Gingerbread houses
Football in the snow with Mac
CJ was awarded Student of the Month, he was so excited!
Decorating Sugar Cookies
Watching movies under their "new" quilts that I started two years ago and finally finished...

Christmas Eve at Grandpa and Grammy's house with all the cousins. Sledding and a fun gift-exchange. So fun to see what they pick out for each other.
Guess how many new recycle gifts our boys got?
Christmas night at my parents' house. Trey could have cared less about presents, he just wanted to pick up all the wrapping paper and trash.

Christmas morning at my inlaws. They live up the canyon with tons of snow so it was fun to really have a white Christmas. Note CJ's awesome Sasquatch pajamas. He loves anything with Sasquatch on it. Santa brought him his requested Monopoly Junior and Lego sets, Trey got his requested drum set and new toy vacuum (because we only have four).
Trey and the new kitchen. All the kid wants to do is laundry, vacuum and take out the trash. I looked everywhere and finally found a kitchen with a toy washer and dryer that make the sounds. He loves it and it keeps him from asking me to do our laundry every five seconds. I actually had to put a locking door on our laundry room to keep him out because if I don't get to the washer in time, he takes everything out and dries it for 80 minutes which doesn't work when Chad and I have to hang almost everything we wear so it doesn't shrink. He's ruined a lot of clothes, bless his heart. He knows exactly what buttons to push, how to clean out the lint and do the dryer sheets.
Anyways, this and CJ's new bike were waiting for them in our living room when we got home from Utah since Santa knew they wouldn't fit in our car. Such a fun time of year, and now onto the saddest time of the year. We put our decorations away today and it's all gloomy outside. I want to rewind and relive December again - it went by too fast. Except I never want to make another quilt as long as I live so I don't want to relive that.

And kind of funny... Last night CJ was begging us to put together a huge Lego set for him and we kept saying "just a minute" so all of the sudden he goes, "I really love BYU!" I dropped the sour cream and Chad said, "You love BYU?" And CJ said, "I don't, but I'm going to keep saying that until you put my Lego set together. I know if I keep saying BYU over and over you'll do what I want so I'll stop." Sad, but true.

Another birthday down in the books... I was given the same gift as last year - a night to myself in a hotel and plenty of time to finish Christmas shopping by myself. The break was nice, but the best part was coming home and watching two Christmas movies in a row with the boys. I just love that they are still little and love to snuggle with me. They didn't want to leave to do birthday cake so Chad brought it upstairs and they blew out the candles without getting up. Too funny.

I love this picture of CJ at my brother's wedding. He was in such a hurry to get back to taking the gifts to the gift table that he tucked his shirt into his belt and then went back to work. He loved the job of taking presents from the guests and delivering them upstairs. He had the worst blisters but wouldn't stop working!

So the three week break that CJ's year-round school handed us started out really great. I decided to take my boys somewhere new each day that would help us get to know our fun city better.


One day we went downtown. We literally walked around all afternoon and they LOVED it. Even the parking garage was a hit.
But not as awesome as the alleys in between the downtown streets that are full of garbage. Seriously, we spent 45 minutes right here. I sat on a crate and watched them marvel at the beautiful dumpsters.
One day we went to a barbershop for their haircuts and then to the cupcake store.
And one day we spent getting the tip of Trey's finger stitched back together after he slammed it in the door, causing the pad of his finger to almost fall right off. Of course Chad was out of town and CJ was screaming at me that he was going to faint because of the blood and I believed him. The ride to the ER was something like this, "Trey, it's going to be okay, don't take the washcloth off your finger, CJ, roll your window down and keep breathing..." You should have seen the look of relief CJ gave me as the nurse asked him if he'd rather watch iCarly in the waiting room. Poor Trey had to get three separate injections because the finger wouldn't numb and he kept yelling at the doctor, "Go away lady, go away!"
But 24 hours later he was happy again.
Because he's Trey. And he's always happy.
Time in the NICU at birth, a broken leg and hospitalization for infection, staples in his head and now this.

Tonight we had a Trunk-or-Treat at the church. CJ wore the costume he made me order back in September - a Zombie Prisoner.  Trey was supposed to wear whatever costume CJ had worn at his age, but Trey is taller and the lion costume wouldn't zip up without choking him. So, with minutes to spare, we threw together a garbage man costume and he couldn't have been happier. A costume parade, trunk-or-treating and then homemade scones and cider finished it off. CJ said he had "BEYOND a blast." I don't think all the little toddlers that cried because CJ was too scary felt the same but, according to him, "that's the idea."

This kid just kills me. He's turned into such a funny BOY. Where did the toddler years go? Last week in church they were learning about families being together forever and that when they get married they will have their own family and he said, "Not to be rude mom, but I was looking around the room thinking to myself, 'I don't want to get married to ANY of the girls in this class, I want someone hot!'"

So then he got fixated on needing a robe. He said he wasn't saving his money for Legos anymore, he was saving for a robe.  So his sweet dad took him to Target after his soccer game on Saturday and he picked out this robe. He has been wearing ever since. He even told me that "Fall happened right in time for me to get my cozy robe!" I love it.

This is a bit late, but last week was Chad's birthday which was very low-key, but fun, especially with the boys being so excited. I took the boys to the party store to get balloons and CJ picked out a big red, black and white bouquet in honor of the Utes. I love him so much!!

Eric brought the kids from Utah to Oregon to the game so they stopped at our house on the way there and on the way back. Seeing the boys have so much fun with their cousins always makes me sad that we live far from all of them and it doesnt' help that Trey keeps asking where they went and crying that they left.

CJ made us all breakfast the other day. Coco Puffs, yogurt, toast with {lots} of raspberry jam, and chocolate milk. He woke up and told me not to come downstairs. It took him a while but he was so proud to show me what he had done.
He's so big and helpful that he now warms up Trey's milk sippies for him in the microwave. I came in from the office the other day to see these to chillin' with their chocolate milk, watching Caillou.
But he's not big enough to figure out how his dad and I have such an easy time finding him at Hide-and-Seek... (Hint, we follow Mac. CJ's head is that big lump under his arm. It never fails, where the dog is, CJ is also.)

"Mom, is 'Fire burnin' fire burnin' on the dance floor a DJ song?"
"I'm pretty sure it is, why?"
"Then I want to wear my DJ shirt to school today."


And then Trey sees the backpack and starts bawling.

"No kee cool, no kee cool!" (No CJ school) Trey cried the entire way there, then on the way home without his "kee" in the car and didn't stop until I laid him down for a nap. It was traumatic for all of us.
As exhibited by this picture of CJ at his table when I was leaving (he didn't see me taking this picture through the glass door). Me, with huge sunglasses on, bawled to. I have a hard time with milestones and even little things (like when you cover them up with their favorite blanket and suddenly their feet stick out because they are too big for it now). Cheesy, I know, but it's just me. It hits you at times like this how fast they grow up and it's hard!! CJ's been in preschool for over two years so it's not the fact that he's going to school now, it's just that we're only a year away from him being gone all day and I miss him when he's not at home.

After school I got there early and he was frantically looking for me the second he stepped out of the classroom and as soon as he saw me he looked so relieved that I was there, ran over, hugged me and asked if he got to go again tomorrow because he "LOVED IT!"