Our House

Our house is finally underway! That's right! We decided to build! Sorry for all of the exclamation marks. I'm just a little excited. I'm going to try and keep an updated photo of the progress of our house in the sidebar, so for those of you who are interested keep checking back for the latest!

Week 1

What will be the view from our back porch.

 

 Week 2 

  

Week 3 

  

Week 4 

  

Week 5 

  

Week 6

Week 7

 

Week 8

 

Week 10 (Oops missed a week! Sorry!) 

It's a little hard to see the mountain in this picture because of the clouds.

Christmas fun!

This year for Christmas we went to visit my mom in South Carolina. If you don't know much about my family, I have 4 brothers and 4 sisters, 4 of us are married (including myself), and 3 of us have children. We were ALL home for Christmas this year, and my mom also invited my Grandparents, my aunt, and my cousins. The grand total of people sleeping under one roof was 26! Not only that, but my mom has 5 cats, 3 dogs, and 4 snakes. As you might imagine, it was a bit chaotic at times. Here are some of the highlights:

It is kind of a tradition (well, when my sister and I are home anyway) to build a gingerbread house at Christmas time. Originally, we tried to make it look as professional as possible, but in recent years it has gotten a bit silly. Last time we had King Kong climbing up a castle turret and a man doing a hand stand at the front of the castle. This year... well, here are the pictures.

 View from the side.

View from the back.

 

I designed the water wheel myself (I can't take credit for the decorations on it, I only designed the gingerbread part of it). That would be why it is a little lopsided.

 

 

View from the front.

 

Santa (or someone) lounging under an umbrella, drinking a Piña Coloda on the roof. The umbrella was originally going to be a spaceship, but somewhere along the way it transformed.

 

An alien sitting in a chair on the front porch.

 

Opening his very favorite gift...

 

Thomas the train!!!

 

One of the funniest things was listening to Eli and Natalie sitting in the back seat of the car together. Eli would say something like "Derby Pie" and Natalie would laugh hysterically like it was the funniest joke she had ever heard. Natalie is the cousin that is closest to Eli's age, so he played with her the most. He did make her cry sometimes, but it was usually when all of the adult's back's were turned, so it was hard to tell if he actually did anything wrong. We have some video of them playing together, but I have to wait to get it from my sister before I can post it.

We also went out to the movies to watch "Blind Side." If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it!

All in all we had a great time! Eli is still talking about his cousins and grandma (sorry aunts and uncles, but he hasn't mentioned you).

Once there was a snowman...

The other day in hot, sunny St. George, we woke up to snow on the ground. Eli, of course wanted to play in it, so Cameron and Eli built a snowman.

Trying to help put on his nose.

Here is Eli giving hugs and kisses to his new friend.

 

The splits?

Being St. George, his snowman was completely melted by the end of the day. He still will occasionally look out the window and say "Snowman fall!" and have a sad look on his face. Poor little guy!

Look what I made!

So, over the Thanksgiving break, my wonderfully creative sister-in-law had the idea to make headbands. This is the one that I made. I've never really worn headbands before, but I'm kind of proud of it. I've been finding excuses to wear red just so I can wear my headband. Hmmm... maybe I should start an etsy shop...

Eli-ese

Recently Eli has been putting words together that don't really go and laughing hysterically like he just made the funniest joke in the world! His most recent one is "Echo-bus." Translation: Motorcycle bus. This one he kept saying over and over again for hours laughing uproariously every time. I have to wonder what exactly it is that makes him laugh? Is it the sounds of the two words together? Does he have a funny picture in his head of what a motorcycle bus would be? Maybe a bus with two wheels, or a bus that instead of carrying passengers carries motorcycles?

He also surprises me with words that he knows. Just the other day, he went into my room and said, "Timber!" and fell, backwards, onto a stack of pillows on the bed. I'm assuming that Cameron taught him that one.

Sometimes what he says sounds like something different than what he is actually saying, having a funny result. One of his favorite games is to throw Teddy into a place that he can't reach, and then he says, "Teddy, get it!" But the way he says it sounds exactly like, "Teddy did it!" Already, at such a young age, he has found a scapegoat!

I have been trying to teach him about his little sister so that he isn't too surprised and jealous when she gets here. I told him that I have a baby in my stomach so sometimes he points to my stomach and says, "Baby!" and I'll say, "That's right, Eli! There is a baby in there." I think to myself, "Yes! He get's it!" Then he'll point to other lumps on my body and say, "Baby too!" Ok, so maybe he doesn't get it.

What are some funny things your kids say?

Slacker-Mom

I was a bit of a slacker for Halloween this year. Between moving across the country, looking for a temporary apartment, and looking for houses, I didn't have a lot of time to come up with a Halloween costume for Eli. I suggested to Cameron that Eli could be a puppet and Cameron could be a ventriloquist. We just had to draw lines on Eli's face with eyeliner! Cameron didn't want to hold him the whole time, though.

So, we looked through Eli's closet and found a little jacket with a monkey face on the hood. It is actually one of those towels that can be worn. It came with a swimsuit. Then we rolled up a towel and attached it to his pants as a tail. Costume finished!

To prove that I'm not always a slacker, here are pictures of last year's Halloween costumes. The little boy in the picture used to be our neighbor. We took him to the church Halloween party with us.

The New OBGYN

I went to my new OBGYN here in St. George for the first time yesterday. I felt like it was a very good visit overall and was quite impressed with my doctor. I had heard that some doctors in Utah practically force you to get an epidural (which I don't want) and are very apt to decide a C-section is necessary (which I also don't want). Neither of these things seem to be true of Dr. Chalmers. Apparently he used to work in a practice in Alaska that had 2 doctors and 3 midwives, so he is quite used to delivering babies naturally. Thanks Rachel for the recommendation!

Normally, I wouldn't have taken Eli with me for a doctor's appointment, but since I have been in St. George such a short time, I didn't know a babysitter. Eli was pretty good for the appointment, but the highlight of the visit came when Eli handed Dr. Chalmers a treasure. At first as I was looking at it, I was trying to figure out what it was. When it dawned on me, I was simply hoping I was mistaken. Then, Eli said, very clearly and matter of factly, "Booger!" I was mortified! Dr. Chalmers took it in stride. His reply to this wondrous present was, "Why thank you Eli! That's the best gift I've gotten all day!" I'm sure I was blushing profusely, but at the same time, I couldn't stop laughing.