Crazy Hair Day

Yesterday was crazy hair day at the school.  Jake doesn't have much to work with, so we just used orange spray paint.  He was happy with it.

Allie had this cute look.  I saw the idea a few years ago and wanted her to do it, but her hair wasn't long enough.  Then when it was, she wouldn't do it.  She was afraid that she'd get in trouble for having balloons at school.  So, last year she went boring.  Then she came home from school and said that another girl had balloons and then suddenly it was okay.  She has wanted me to let her cut her hair for a long time now, but we were waiting till after crazy hair day and Halloween, just so she could do this (and for her Hermione costume).

It didn't work out exactly as planned because our balloons are small and didn't hold much helium, but they are still great.  I love it.

The Birthday Boy

Jason had a great birthday.  I hoped he'd have a good day.  I know it sounds silly to say that, but some days are better with Jason and luckily, this was a good one.  He woke up with a smile on his face and ready to shout out "two!" whenever you asked him how old he was.
We were all out of milk, so instead of the birthday cereal that Grandma gave to him, we had to have eggs for breakfast.

 He's trying to show me that he's 2!

I still think it's pretty gross that these kids eat their eggs with ketchup on them...

After Jake and Allie went to school, I took the boys to the dollar store to pick out a few balloons and decorations for the party.  I tried to keep Jason happy there (usually going to a store is a scream fest because he has to be contained in the cart rather than allowed to run free).  So, I let him and Nate just run around rather than ride in the cart.  Since he was holding a balloon, it was always easy to find him when he'd get out of my sight.

We got back home and he ate his favorite peanut butter and honey sandwich for lunch.  Then he had a great nap.  Yay!

I asked him a few times what kind of cake he wanted.  I gave him the option of a spider, ball, or pumpkin cake.  When I said spider, he said "pider!  Yiiikes!"  So it was between ball and pumpkin.  He said pumpkin, so that's what it was.  I loved hearing his sweet little voice say "pu-kin cake".

 Nate helped with the cake and only lifted the spinning beaters out once.  I guess that's a lesson for all of us.

 I made the frosting a bit too runny, so it turned out to be a pretty ugly cake, but Jason was thrilled.

His favorite dinner is still grilled cheese and tomato soup, so that's what we had.  Everyone is always happy with that.
Then he got some fun gifts.

He picked out all his own things with me the week before, but was totally excited to open them up anyway.  Nate was pretty sad that Jason was picking out toys, so I let him pick out a Dusty Fire and Rescue plane ("with red pontoons, Mom.")  You've never seen a kid more excited for it to be time for his brother to open gifts...because that meant he got his gift too.

Jason got a cool monster truck that drives and makes all sorts of awesome (and annoying) noises.  He got a Dusty Crophopper like Nate (but with orange pontoons).  He also got a little stuffed animal that says "ewww, yuck.  That tastes terrible".  It makes him giggle the cutest little laugh.  He got a search and find Dusty book from his aunt and uncle and I was surprised at how good he is at picking Dusty out of the pictures on the book.  He was completely happy with his stash and still plays with everything.  I guess that's what happens when you let a kid pick out his own stuff.
It was a great birthday and I am so happy we got to celebrate 2 years with our Jason Kay.

More of Grandma's House

As we were packing up and getting ready to go to Grandma's house, Jake said to Allie, "Hey...tomorrow morning, we are going to be eating Marshmallow Maties!"  It's funny how you do something a few times and it's suddenly tradition and expected.  So even though Grandma made "gooky rolls" they had to have some Marshmallow Maties to go along with it.  Lucky ducks.

 Speaking of ducks...we went down to the pond while Jason was sleeping and had fun checking out all the ducks.  I think there are over a hundred ducks there now.  It's crazy.

The kids always have fun seeing how close they can get to the ducks.

We also picked acorns.

Allie ran out of pocket space for her acorns and started filling mine too.

Jake spent a few minutes just watching the ducks.  I thought it was cute.

Years ago, my niece named a big white duck Bob.  It had a fluffy feather thing on its head, so they could always pick it out from the others.  This time, there was a girl duck with a fluffy feathered head, so the kids were calling her Bob's girlfriend.  This isn't the original Bob, but he can still be Bob to the kids if they want.

There's Grandma checking us out from the porch.  I used to think it was pretty lame that they tore down all the trees and messed up the swamp that I grew up with to make this park.
Now that my kids can walk out the door of Grandma's house to a cool park with a cleaned up pond instead of a swamp, I think it's pretty cool.  I can still remember the fear I felt when I walked down to the water's edge of the creepy swamp when I was a kid.  The area was so full of trees that it was dark and always pretty stinky.  Now it's a beautiful place.  Lucky ducks.  :)

Orem Pumpkin Patch

We went down to Orem Conference weekend and had a great time with my mom.  On Saturday, my sister Lori met us at the pumpkin patch with her two girls.  We went there last year and it was a fun place for the kids.

They have a corn maze.  A great place to lose children if you are so inclined.

And painted cut outs...cheese!

They also have  few blow up slides that kept everyone happy for as long as we would let them stay.

Jake is always so good to help the little brothers have fun.

There's our pile of kids!

After all of that, we let them wander around and pick out a little pumpkin.  We couldn't get a big one because we didn't have room for it in the car, but they were happy with some cute little gourds.

They had a weird mask that everyone had to try on.  I thought Jake looked pretty funny.

When we got to Grandma's, they set up a huge fort and played in it for hours.

I took some sleeping pictures.  They were all in such funny positions.

I wish there was a picture of me sleeping like that, but I'm afraid I didn't get much sleep that night.  My friend Jason woke up ready to party at midnight and then didn't fall back to sleep until almost 4.  I was ready to go insane.  The upside is that he wasn't crying, so I guess I can be grateful for that.
Anyway, it was a good trip down to Orem.  We haven't done that in a while and it was good to go.  We call my mom's house the Bed and Breakfast of Laguna Vista Drive because there are always so many people staying over as they pass through to various events. She's a great hostess.  Thanks mom!

Yiiikes!

The neighbors got their Halloween decorations put up a few weeks ago and the boys didn't waste any time waiting around to go check it out.  Nate's favorite (and mine) is this thing...

It says "Hey! What are you doing?", "gotcha! He, He, He!", and "Tag! You're It!" each time you push the button.  A little spider comes out of his mouth too and gets your finger.  Jason is terrified.

 Nate is not.

 There's also a gigantic spider...

Jason isn't much of a fan of him either.

It must be a good scary though, because he is back there every day.  He stares at them and says "Yiiikes!  Spooky."  It's one of my favorite things that he says, so I try to take him there often.  :)