Happy St. Patrick's Day!

We had a very festive St. Patrick's Day.  I spent the whole day reminiscing about what I was doing at that time last year: my water broke, we were in the hospital, Steve was watching Jimmer play BYU basketball WITH my doctor while I laid in bed dealing with contractions - that sort of thing. :)  The leprechauns invaded us leaving green everywhere they went!  

Green eggs and "ham", pancakes, and green grape juice!

Ross LOVES eggs...here are his green ones.

This face pretty much shows how the rest of the eggs went down...on the floor!  I didn't think color would be such a big deal to him - boy was I wrong.

Even our chocolate chip cookies were green!

Our little leprechaun peeking around the house.

Hilarious story about this picture.  Steve is hiding behind him holding him so he doesn't fall.  He was repositioning himself to pose WITH Ross and let go of him for a total of .333 seconds which of courses ended with Ross toppling forward into the mulch and mud.  Amazingly he didn't cry and wondered what we were all fussing about. :)

I would definitely try to catch this one!

I was in the festive spirit - and especially since I can't celebrate in a classroom anymore - I get more ambitious at home.  I made Ross and Steve St. Patrick's day ties - they actually turned out pretty well.  They wore them the next day to church - for Ross's birthday! :)

Ross has been re-visiting his fascination of his hands again seeing all the things he can do with them including this little pose. :)

 So happy St. Patrick's Day!!

I just have to say...

We have the cutest boy in the world!  I can't believe a year ago tomorrow I went into labor with our almost-St.-Patrick's-Day little boy.  He is SO much fun with lots of smiles and laughs.  He really is the happiest little guy.  We love him more than he'll ever know.

  

Merry Spring?

The snowflakes were massive!  Proper Christmas flakes.

Well this is what we woke up to this morning - a stark contrast to my festive spring wreath I have posted on my door. (Yes I'm mentioning my wreath again - I seem to have an obsession with it.  Sometimes I open my door for no reason other than to admire it for the umpteenth time...it's like when you've just deep cleaned and organized a room and you find yourself wandering back there just to look at it and feel satisfied all over again.) We got some fun pictures of it though before Steve headed off to school.  

Let me out!

Whenever the action is behind him he refuses to look at the camera.

Catching the snowflakes

My favorite pic of the lot.

Steve has been working on Ross's "fear" of boingy door stops with him.  Some days Ross thinks it's hilarious, and other days he comes whimpering for safety.  If we laugh when he does it - he seems to be fine.  He's quite the character.

Handsome profile

Dad showing the safeness of door stop boing-ing

Ross trying it

Liking it...

Awkward family pic :)

Funny scrunchy face

Attempting to eat dad's toe

I'm finding Ross is quite the stubborn little boy.  He is not interested in mimicking anything you do like waving or clapping hands; however, he finds it quite amusing when you mimic him.  He LOVES playing with magnets on the fridge and walking along all the cupboards in the kitchen.  He also ADORES his daddy.  He gets so excited when he gets home and cries if Steve puts him down. 

I just noticed today that Ross has figured out how to push himself up to a sitting position from his belly.  This is going to make things much easier for him.  He's even crawled a few paces on his knees but still resorts to the my-legs-have-gone-lame army crawl.  Very humorous.  I still can't believe that little boy is turning 1 on Sunday.  I've started weaning him which is so strange since I thought this day would never come with all the insanity that came with nursing, and now it's here.  My little Baby Ross isn't going to be a baby for much longer and that hurts my heart.  He's growing up too fast - but he gets more and more fun every day. 

I decided to reread The Hunger Games in preparation for the movie - which may turn out to be a giant mistake.  I forgot how gory that book can get.  I hope the movie doesn't over do it.  Anyway - life is great and we are just about ready to celebrate Christmas instead of Easter with this crazy weather!    

Beautiful Days and Smoothies

Is this not the cutest little face who loves the sun?!

So we have had some GORGEOUS days lately.  Yesterday was the best one yet - but I'm thinking today might give that one a run for its money.  The sun has been out the last four or five days, but it has been pretty cold despite the inviting visual display.  Did we Oregonians care though?  Heavens no!   I even ditched my jacket a few days to confirm to myself that it was the middle of summer though I would still come back shivering.  Ross and I have been regular swingers at the park next to our apartment.  He's liking the swing more and more though he still can't decide if he wants to lean forward or backward while he swings.  We've been regular walkers everywhere too.  I'm sure soon enough I will be complaining about the atrocious heat and how I miss the days of sleeping with a blanket, but right now I'm enjoying the sunshine every chance it presents itself.

Enjoying some grass

Not quite sure what he thinks about it.

Trying to come to terms with the feel of green soft yet prickly stuff.  Note the one sock wonder - this kid was never born to wear socks - OR shoes.

Realizing you can break off the blades

Investigation complete - he can officially crawl on the grass.

 I had my book club meeting last night that I had just started.  It was a pretty good turn out with about 10-11 people there.  I was quite pleased everyone liked the book I chose - The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton - with the exception of one who couldn't get into the jumping around of time periods.  I won't judge her though. ;)  I had kicked Steve and Ross out of the house since I was hosting it.  They were good sports about it and went to a fellow abandoned husband and son's house whose wife came to our meeting.  We all thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and some even lingered hoping their kids were put completely to bed by their husbands.  As much as I love reading, I have only been in one other book club that flopped when I was a summer camp counselor at Aspen Grove.  We read The Phantom of the Opera and had a super boring conversation about it and then were going to read The Hiding Place but never organized it.  I think maybe being -ahem - older now - I  am much more interested in other ideas and comparing them to my own.  Anyway - I hope this little club keeps up.  We're going to read The Book Thief this time which I am really excited about.  
 
So back to the beautiful weather - I've decided smoothies are another way of pretending it's already the middle of summer.  I got this smoothie recipe from an old roommate of mine, and I must say - it is very tasty.  You'll have to try it.  You get 4 servings of fruit, almost 2 servings of vegetables, and just over a serving of dairy.  Yum!

 

1/2 cup nonfat vanilla Greek yogurt

1 cup frozen mixed berries

1 banana

1/2 cup fresh strawberries

1-1 1/2 cup spinach

small amount of skim milk

ice

He wanted some too.

Yummy green smoothies!

Ross's First Cookie...

We have a serious sugar addict on our hands.  This is what happened when Ross was presented with a cookie - with no coaxing of our own...

Before...

About half a second later...

He seemed to turn into some sugar crazed addict after that...

Ross's critique...complete satisfaction.

Yes...

Well...

Of course!

Can I have another?

 Of course right after this we suffered the after math.  The sugar was coursing through his little body - he almost didn't know what to do with himself.  I think the sugar intake will be at a very minimum in the future...

So it snowed again this morning...

Ross does his best contemplating by the window when this happens.  Note: Ross is NOT wearing his red pajamas in this picture.

Then we had sunshine by lunch time.

We went swinging with some neighbor friends.  Wes REALLY loves swinging - I mean he really gets into it with his legs kicking and laughing the whole time - Ross was quite fascinated by this.

My cute boy

After about 10 minutes of swinging the clouds decided to come back so we bundled a little bit before we ended.

I just think this picture of Ross is hilarious - look at those cheeks!

Sweetest boy ever. :)