It's a . . .

Well we had our ultrasound this morning at 8:30 a.m.  Yes, we all made it there on time, and even had time for oatmeal and cereal for the kids.  How come we can't do that on Sunday mornings?  Seth woke both the kids up and Canon was bouncing off the walls.   I don't know if he was truly excited to go look at the baby or what.  But he never eats that early and is never that awake in the morning.  We got to the hospital and he went right up to the front desk and said "we came to look inside Mom's tummy at the baby."  He is defiantly not afraid to take matters into his own hands.  They told us which way to go and we were on our way.  The hardest part for Canon was obviously waiting until they called us in.  We went in and he said "Wow, this place has a lot of computers and TVs!"  The tech asked him how old he was and he said "9" for some reason.  Then she asked him if he was in preschool and he said "no".  Both wrong of course.  I think he was just more interested in his environment and not really interested in really listening and answering questions.  Savana just kind of floated along.  She was a little concerned when they put gel on my stomach, but got over it quickly.  I don't know if she understands or not.  Anyway - we did the ultrasound, everything looks great and we are having a girl!  Seth was right on this one.  I think I was just telling myself it was a boy so I wouldn't be disappointed either way.  I'm still kind of surprised though, but maybe I shouldn't be because my cravings have been more like they were with Savana than with Canon.  Anyway - we are excited!

Christmas Update

So I guess I had better do a Christmas post since my blog wasn't looking very Christmasy.  I don't have a lot to report on, but we are getting excited for Christmas.  Canon has watched Polar Express almost every day for the past two weeks.  The rest of the day he likes to pretend he is Santa Claus and puts new presents (random items from the house) under the tree.  Yesterday was the first day he asked where the presents were for under our tree.  I got away from answering, but I'm sure the question will come again.  I just haven't put anything out because I'm afraid it will get unwrapped and I'm hoping to pack it all up and take it to Utah.  Yes, we are driving to Utah.  I'm all ready dreading the drive - but oh well.  Pray for us and wish us luck.

The thing I am most excited about this month happens tomorrow.  We find out if we are having a girl or boy baby in May!  It will truly be better than Christmas for me.  We are taking both the kids, so I'm kind of excited to see how they react as well.

That is all I have to report on right now - Merry Christmas Everyone!

Savoring Fall

So here we are at what is almost the end of October!  Fall goes way too fast.  We have been up to our usual fall activities in Michigan.  We found some new apple orchards this year and they just keep getting better.   On Friday we went to a cute place called Three Cedars.  It is a little country farm where you can buy pumpkins, go on hay rides, eat donuts and apple cider and shop in a little country store.  They also have the cutest animal displays that they have set up like familiar nursery rhymes and stories.  But for some reason both my kids always love the wooden trains.  We have been to several apple orchards with wooden trains and that is always were we spend the majority of the time.  They climb all over them choo chooing and whoo whooing.  There are so many cute things to play on including slides out of barns, hay bales to climb on and big "sandboxes" filled with corn, but they just like "riding" the train.

Friday night was our ward Trunk or Treat.  Canon on Savana went as a bug catcher and a butterfly.  In the picture with all of us, we were all butterflies for Canon to catch at a MOMS Club Halloween Party we went to.  Do you like Seth's little purple wings and make-shift antenna?  Cute huh!

The weather has been fantastic.  This time of year you feel like you have to make the best of every warm day because you can feel the cold weather just waiting to blast in.  I guess that makes going to the apple orchards even better because you savor each sunny minute.

Happy Halloween Everyone!

Our Two Hours of Heaven

Seth with Canon & Savana and our friends Izzabelle & Lydia

Every year many people from the ward here head to the western side of Michigan and camp on Lake Michigan in Muskegon.  Every year they have amazing weather and spend 5 days playing in the sand and sitting on the beach.  This year we tried to join the fun, but it was nothing but rainy or windy.  We had about two hours of nice breezy weather.  These two hours were amazing and enough to make us want to come back next year.  The one bonus of the crazy weather were the huge waves that Seth and Canon got to play in.  Seth loved it because it was ocean like waves without the salt and seaweed.  Canon just loved the water.  Come to think of it, it probably was his first experience with waves - and it showed.  He started out feeling the waves a little with his hands, but in about 5 minutes he was soaking wet and rolling around in them.

Testing the Water

Loving the Waves

Butterflies, Nets and Cars

Canon is on a bug catch mission.  I don't think a day has gone by this month without a backyard safari.  It was only intensified after I checked out a DVD from the library that featured a backyard bug hunt.  I actually highly recommend the DVD.  Smithsonian Kids Critter Quest.  Anyway, he was given a butterfly net, which thankfully he hasn't been successful with even though we have a ton of butterflies, and has a plenty of jars full of leaves and rocks to aid in his quest for bugs.  Mostly he catches ants and pill bugs (potato bugs, rolly pollies - whatever you like to call them.)  He asked almost every day if we can go on a walk around the neighborhood (an adventure, as he calls it) to find more bugs.  So this past week we went on a walk and Savana happened to be wearing her little butterfly wings.  It was just such a cute little pair - Canon and his butterfly net and Savana and her wings, I couldn't help but want to take a picture.  Well, if anyone has kids as cooperative as mine when it comes to taking pictures, you know how it is.  I got what I did after bribing with cookies.  Still not what I wanted, but still captured the memories - right?

 Our other fun outing of the week was when a co-worker of Seth's begged him to let her use his Cube in exchange for her Infinity G37 convertible.  After about .5 seconds of thinking about it he called me and had me bring to Cube to work for the trade.  That night we took a little drive and went for ice cream.  The kids loved it!  What's not to love - ice cream, a convertible and a warm summer night

August Fun

Wow - I haven't updated in almost two months. That is horrible! I'll let myself off the hook a little because we were gone for all of July. But now we are back, so I need to get back at it. This week was a super fun week. It started Monday morning when we got to get up and go watch the elephants set up the circus tent. That night we went to the circus. It was actually a really good show. It is amazing what people make their living doing. It brought to life what it means to join the circus. I thought about those poor people traveling 9 months of the year, a different city every day. Then I thought about the moms of those circus performing girls. I loved the show, but hope my kids are never part of one.

Anyway - Tuesday and Wednesday we went to a couple of lakes around here. I think the kids could spend all day in the lakes if I would let them. They will have that chance at the end of August when we go spend Labor Day weekend at one of the Great Lakes.

Thursday we went on a MOMS club activity to a lollipop store. "Oh My Lolli" is a cute little store in Brighton that makes lollipops and hard candy. They did a batch right in front of us and then the kids got to eat a lollipop from that batch. Then we headed over to a park right next door. The store hides tokens at the part for lollipops everyday. We didn't find any - I think they were all found by the time we got there - but had fun at the park anyway.

Friday we had an appointment for Savana's two year check-up (yes, a little late). I was getting ready and could hear Canon out side yelling. He is always outside making a lot of noise, so I didn't really think anything of it. I went out to get in the car, and he had a water stand set up in the drive way. He had brought his little table from the back yard, a picture of water and some cups from the kitchen. He was outside yelling in his best salesman voice "Water - 55 cents." It was hilarious. I had to turn around and come inside to giggle for a minute. The kids in our neighborhood have been doing lemonade stands a lot lately. It's certainly been hot enough! I thought it was too cute!

Well, that is our week. We miss all you guys in Utah. But we are doing our best to enjoy every last minute of summer while it lasts.

Happy Birthday Savana!

Yes, her birthday was actually a week ago, but we finally celebrated this week. I wanted to get her a cradle for her doll, but couldn't find one I liked, so I had to order it. We waited for it to come, and then celebrated. I'm thinking now that maybe the doll cradle was premature for her, since all she wants to do is "ride" in it. So we sang lullabies and Canon rocked her doll while I rocked her. She really liked that and kept asking for "more." I guess she isn't ready to give up being the baby yet :) But she did love her cake. She was so good at posing for pictures and knew that she needed to blow the candle out! On her birthday we went to a new splash pad they have at one of our favorite parks. I'm sure if she could have picked our dinner for the celebration, she might have picked PB & J. That seems to be a new favorite of hers. She also loves shoes and balls, which is where the inspiration for the cake came from. This month her favorite pair of shoes are pink sparky Mary Jane style Converses. She will even wear them without socks, which is saying a lot, because she won't wear sandals. What else can I say about our baby girl. She is so fun and growing too fast. She is talking a lot more and is becoming a little copy cat. We Love You Savana!

Happy 25th Birthday Mommy!

Hey, if I'm doing the writing, I can be whatever age I want to be right?? Seth pulled through and made it a great birthday. He had a co-worker make me a cake - A Utah cake if you can't tell, complete with a lake, mountains and a little beehive on it. Pretty funny. Canon saw the cake and wanted to know who stole a piece of the cake from the corner. He also got me a gift card to a day spa. My feet are so excited to get a pedicure!

In the back you can catch a glimpse of our new kitchen color (our Memorial Day project) and the bouquet of flowers I picked from our back yard. They are big huge peonies. They bloom and fall right over because they are so big. So I thought I might as well enjoy them standing up in a vase. Since I haven't been here in this house during the summer yet, it has been fun to see what treasures our yard is producing.

The Swagger Wagon Update

I guess the link to that last post didn't come through if you get this by e-mail. Just click here and you can see the video that I was talking about.

The Swagger Wagon

I don't know if I'm allowed to post this, since we are a Nissan family :), but since Brent and Kayte, and Kelli and Paul are Sienna Families, I wanted to share it with you guys. Hey I can see Brent rapping like this. Or maybe we should have a rap off between Brent and Kayte and Kelli and Paul. We'll plan on that for June 2011. Start practicing!

Busy May

Wow, it's been almost a month since I updated our blog. This has been a busy May. Since the weather has been mostly great, we've kept busy. Which is good because Seth has been working A LOT. He leaves at 6:00 a.m. and gets home around 8:00 p.m. or 9:00 p.m. Hopefully this schedule won't last :(

At the beginning of May we went to Real Life Farm in Canton MI. This is our third trip there, we love it. I included pictures of Canon and Savana riding the horse and pony. I thought it was funny that Savana wanted to ride the big huge horse and Canon wanted to ride the little pony. They also got to feed the baby goats & lambs with bottles, hold bunnies, milk a cow and go on a hay ride.

Canon has also spent a lot of time in our new sandbox. It is a great little sandbox with a canopy and a mesh cover. Canon sometimes gets a little impatient with having to come and get someone to help take the cover off and plays in the sandbox anyway. Hey, whatever works. Seth has also hung the biggest swing ever in our HUGE tree in the back yard. He climbed about 30 feet up the tree. The kids LOVE the swing. Who wouldn't. I wish I could fit in it. Savana wakes up in the morning and asks for her shoes so she can go "wee".

The first picture is the beginnings of our little garden this year. We just planted pumpkins and watermelons this year. We'll see how that goes and then expand from there. We'll keep you updated on how our little garden is coming along. Wish us luck!

The Detroit Zoo

Nana and Grandpa came to visit us last week. They were here for 3 short days, but we did a lot and wore ourselves out. We picked them up from Holland MI, the half way point between here and Chicago where they were visiting LuAnn and her family. We planned to go to a park in Holland where they have a windmill, tulips and other Hollandish stuff. But when we got there it was cold, raining and because we forgot to take into account the time difference between Chicago and Michigan, we really didn't have enough time to see everything anyway. So we just ate at the nearest Bob Evans restaurant. We really tried hard to find something a bit more adventurous, but the "Wooden Shoe" restaurant, the most adventurous we could find, was closed. Oh well.

Anyway, while Mom and Dad were here we did yard work, went to the zoo and then finished the yard work. Really, could we have Mom here and not take advantage of her green thumb? But the trip to the Zoo was exhausting enough to make us want to stay home. The Zoo just sucked us in, and we couldn't get out without seeing a lot of animals. I think we ended up there for 5 hours. One of my favorites was butterfly house. Two butterflies landed on Savana. She must smell like a flower or something. Another favorite of mine is the Arctic exhibit where we saw the polar bears and seals. They have a really cool tunnel that takes you through the water where the animals like to swim. It makes you feel like you are underwater with them.

I had already started scrapbooking some of the pictures from the zoo, so I posted those pages and added some more of my favorite pictures I haven't worked on yet.

Happy Birthday Canon!

Yes, two posts in one day. But I'm just getting caught up :) Canon turned 4 this week! As he says every time he eats, "Mom, I'm growing up!" Then I sometimes respond "No, Canon, stop growing!" When I don't say that, he reminds me that is what I'm supposed to say and prompts me, "Mom, say 'stop growing'". Pretty predictable dialog at or house during meal time. But he is just so excited to get bigger and grow up. He asks every day if he is big enough to go to school yet. For his birthday he got some new trucks and a parachuter to throw off the landing in our house. It was so cute after he opened his presents - I heard him in his room introducing his new trucks to his other ones. He calls his trucks "his kids". He is very imaginative. Never know what he is going to be for the day. Lately it is a snake. He builds snake holes with the pillows off the couch and crawls through them. He definitely keeps life interesting! We love you Canon!

Easter Update

It's a little late, but here is the Easter update. I have to admit, I wasn't the best Easter Bunny, but with all the easter egg hunts that were available for us to attend, it didn't seem necessary. Instead I did get my kids some new religious DVD's to help make our long Sunday afternoons a little more Sundayish, since we are done with church by noon. But Monday we did go to an Easter Egg hunt at a care center. Canon did a great job helping pass out cookies to the residents, and Savana was great at picking up Easter Eggs. Canon got a basket full too. We had such a great time, we are going back next month. Next month we are helping with their Bingo games. It was so much fun to see Canon being so helpful. And you could tell he loved being so useful.

Figuring It All Out

I always wish I could get inside kids' heads, and see what they are really thinking. Canon has been just randomly saying things lately, and I can tell he is trying to figure this world out. The first topic that he has been asking a lot of questions about is Heaven, Jesus and Heavenly Father. It's kind of a difficult thing to explain to a 4 year old. Here are blips of some of our conversations:

Topic #1: As we were saying prayers the other day, Canon asked who Jesus was.
Me: He made the earth and helped make us
Canon: Does he have a wand? Does he have power? Can he fly? Does he have wings? Is he a fairy?

Topic #2: We were standing in line a CVS pharmacy this past week and he randomly asked about prayer.
Canon: Mom, does Heavenly Father and Jesus have a phone? They don't have a phone do they. Do they need a phone? I can give them a phone . . . I can give them a Handy Manny or Disney phone.

Topic #3: This was this morning while laying in bed telling Canon that Savana was still asleep because she is sick. We keep telling Canon to keep his fingers out of his mouth so he won't get sick. So naturally he started to ask how Savana got sick.
Canon: Mom, what is a germ? Me: It's like a little tiny tiny bug. Canon: Is it green? Did it crawl inside baby sister? I can get it out. Maybe a rope or clapper tool can help.

"Caged" Canon

Did I mention that Canon is into "caging" and his rope. He couldn't free himself from this one. At least that is what he said. I wonder how long it would have kept him in there. If I had known what he was up to, right behind me, I wouldn't have offered him his chicken nuggets and left him in there :) But you know how that is, things are too quiet and you just wonder what is going on!

The "Caged" Frog

I was doing something on the computer last night, probably checking e-mail or Facebook :) when Canon brought me his "caged" frog. "I just like caging my frog" he said. Wow, that frog is going NO WHERE! It was so sad to see that sweet little, soft floppy frog shackled by those wrenches. And then the rope job that tied those wrenches to the barn! Only a picture could even begin to show his work of art. I asked him to put it on the kitchen table so I could take a picture. Seth wasn't home, and I didn't want him to miss this, in case it was disassembled by the time he got home. As soon as he had him put it on the table he proceeded to tie what was left of the rope to the table. Poor Froggy. Not sure what he did to earn this treatment. But he was obviously forgiven by this morning, because he was loosed and put in the back pack for our morning errands. Canon is so funny with that rope. It is one of his favorite toys. It is everything from his fishing pole to a tow rope to his "caging" tool as illustrated above. I hope this isn't a sign of things to come for Savana. Speaking of Savana, she is finally walking!! She finally took steps to me during the Super Bowl and has been practicing here and there all week. She can walk for as long as she wants without falling usually, but we are still working on getting her in the habit of walking. We are so happy that she will at least walk, as long as you make it more of a game than something we want her to do. I'm going to try and upload video of her walking if I can figure it out.

Stars & Independence

We have some independent thinkers, but that's good right? That's what we want them to be! Savana has figured out that she has an opinion and is ready to express it. Canon has been expressing his since he was born. Savana has decided that she likes pajamas and would rather not be changed out of them. Yesterday morning she was so mad that I changed her that she was trying to put her pajamas back on after she was dressed. So I put the sleeves back on, and she was happy. Then I tried to put her shoes on, and she wanted her boots. She even chose her purple hair clip and tried to put it in. That morning Canon decided that he was going to have dry Grape-Nuts for breakfast. He also wouldn't open his eyes for a picture. I did catch one eye peeking to see if I had taken the picture. They must have met in the night and decided to declare Independence Day. Hey, what ever - as long as he will eat and she has clothes on!

Savana has a fun new game too. Obviously sticker and stars. It is nice that there is something that will keep her entertained, we just have a lot of little stickers all over the house. She also loves to put them on anyone who will sit close enough. Star also became one of her few words. She now says ball, star, shoe, dada, mama, more, and ready set go! The ready set go is a game Seth started. He says: "Ready, Set" and then she says "Go!" and he tosses her on the couch or bed. So now if you are holding her she says "Ready, Set, Go" and wants to be tossed.