Christmas 2009

It was a quiet Christmas with just Scott, Peter, and I, but we really enjoyed relaxing. In fact, we had frozen pizza on Christmas Eve and spaghetti and bread sticks on Christmas day. I am thinking that easy meals are going to be a Christmas tradition for us since I am not very passionate about cooking. Maybe we will institute a traditional dessert on Christmas Eve next year.

We all began the morning by sleeping in until almost 10 a.m. (Peter is the best sleeper :)! As we wandered downstairs, Peter took one look at the presents under the tree and his tent, turned around, and ran to the computer. He then turned it on and started talking about "bu bu's" (buttons) and "CC's" (CD's). We had to coax him back into the other room by telling him the lights on the tree needed to be plugged into the outlet. Finally, he became interested in the presents when we showed him how to rip the paper off; he enjoys and is good at destruction. He really liked the toys, but the treats are really what got his attention. Every two seconds during unwrapping, he was begging for treats. Here are the pictures:

Most of my Christmas present was getting a budget to buy some things to hang on the walls. Here are my boys on Christmas Eve posing beneath the first official picture hung in the house. It is about time after living here for six months.

Thank you my sweet hubby for staying up late on Christmas Eve to hang things up!

This is what it looked like after Santa stopped by.

Peter's favorite toys, so far, include an electronic alphabet book/game, his tent, and a battery operated toy drill and flashlight. Here is my cute little handyman in training.

I guess this little handyman needs a lot more training. Drilling into his ear is probably not the greatest idea.

Scott was so enamored with the flash and zoom lens he got for the camera that he did not notice Peter trying to play with a CC while he documented it with a picture.
Our stockings look just like a Santa hat we have, so Peter just assumed it was a hat as well.

I decided to document my growing belly.
Eight weeks until Rigby's ETA!
Knock on wood before I type this next part. I am feeling really good about this pregnancy compared to my pregnancy with Peter. I have gained less weight, hardly any water retention so far, and minimal acne. Hopefully it continues to go so well.

I love this picture of my boys and their power tools. It is so cute to watch Peter go around the house with his drill and flashlight imitating what he has seen Scott do.

Happy New Year everyone!

Our First Christmas Tree

We purchased our first official Christmas tree this year. For the past four years we have been using this little thing that I bought years ago:


This is the first year we are spending Christmas without family, so we decided a larger and more festive Christmas tree was in order:


I really had my heart set on a formally decorated tree, but I have decided that a "hodge-podge tree" (as I call it) has more character and will be more meaningful and fun for our family throughout the years. We have not collected many ornaments yet, so we just purchased some candy canes and glittery snowflakes to fill the tree out.

Peter is absolutely in love with the tree. I told him the candy canes were to stay on the tree and they were just plastic and not treats. However, he saw through my ridiculous bluff and keeps sneaking treats; the candy canes are now on the upper half of the tree. Although, what is even more exciting for him are the lights. No matter how many times he gets in trouble-spanking, time out, lecture-he CANNOT stop plugging and unplugging the lights. I am not even going to attempt putting gifts under the tree because I know it will just be another battle with my curious little boy. Seeing his fascination with plugs, outlets, buttons, electronics, etc. makes me curious to see what he will choose as a future career.

Peter's new favorite activity:

I love it when he sits still and snuggles with me.

Snow in Houston

Yep! You read correctly. This past week we had snow in Houston that actually stuck!!! It melted by the next day, but people here were quite enamored. Schools shut down early, police were directing traffic all over the place, social functions were canceled, and Scott even came home from work early. The main concern was having icy road conditions because people here are not accustomed to driving on ice. Being from a state that gets plenty of snow and ice, I was very amused by people's reactions.

But, since it is so rare, I decided that Peter and I could not pass up an opportunity to go play in the snow and document it with pictures:

Isn't he cute in his little winter gear? Well, as much winter gear as someone in Houston owns.

Here he is throwing a tantrum because I would not let him press buttons on the camera.
Life is tough.

Here are some recent miscellaneous pictures of Peter:

Peter's attempt at applying mascara.

Peter wearing Daddy's sweat shirt.

These cute pictures were taken by Debra at Thanksgiving. Thank you Debra!

Thanksgiving

I know this post is a little late but Peter decided to bring home a nasty bug from nursery and share it with Scott and I right before Thanksgiving. So, we have all been groggy and lazy for the past couple of weeks. Well, better late than never-right?!

We were able to spend Thanksgiving with Seth, Debra, and Sofie who traveled up from the Rio Grande Valley (south Texas near the border with Mexico). Seth and I are childhood friends. We were glad they could come visit because it was much more fun than just the three of us. Also, cooking is not my passion nor my forte, so I appreciated the help.

This is me looking disheveled while cooking the pumpkin chiffon pie. I thought I would put this picture up, not because I wanted to show my lovely 7 month pregnancy physique, but because I wanted to show my poison oak arms for future remembrance.

I promise it looked worse in person. Every time I see this picture I start to itch and have a renewed desire to avoid poison oak at ALL COSTS.

Our table of yummy food-minus the pie, cranberry sauce, and gravy. I felt like we had prepared a million dishes, but this picture shows a rather slim selection. Oh well, it was the first official Thanksgiving without any other family for all of us, and I think we did a decent job.

Peter enjoying the feast. He made a royal mess!

Do you think he could open up his mouth any wider?

Seth feeding cute little Sofie pumpkin chiffon pie.

Sorry no pictures of our photographers, Scott and Debra. I really wish we could have had a group picture taken, but things were really crazy. By the way, I really, really, really appreciate my family's hard work from previous Thanksgivings. This meal wiped me out for days! I think I am done cooking for the rest of the year-sorry my poor boys.

Family Update

I had to put up some of these cute pictures of Peter and Austin playing at the park.




___________________________________________________
Peter's new interests include choo choo trains and airplanes. We are near railroad tracks, so every time he hears a train whistle he instantly freezes and with a lot of excitement and wide eyes whispers, "choo, choo." We are also near a small airport, so every time he hears or sees a plane he says, "anue." How he came up with that for airplane, I have no idea.

Some unfortunate interests include throwing EVERYTHING into the garbage can and pulling EVERYTHING out of drawers and off the counter tops. We believe that half of Mr. Potato-Head's parts are probably in a landfill by now, and some of our shoes almost followed suit. He has also figured out how to scoot chairs/boxes around to reach into drawers and on top of the counters. My plastic wrap is continually under attach, and he also managed to grab the butter off the counter the other day. He proceeded to place it into his little pan so he could cook a tennis ball. I often find his little pan (filled with toys) on the stove top. He has also started trying to turn the knobs. Someday I will appreciate his determination and resourcefulness, but for now all I can do is laugh AFTER the fact.
__________________________________________________
Scott and I have been doing some yard work lately (in November!). Gotta love the fabulous Houston winters. I am so proud of my pruning and weeded flowerbeds. The only bad thing about all of this is that we discovered poison oak in the process. I hope the itching stops soon!!!

We have also managed to damage our van a lot lately. We have had it for three months and listen to the list of damages we have done by ourselves:

1) I ran over a piece of metal and completely flattened an almost new tire. It could not be patched, so we bought a new tire.
2) We left the door opened all night and ran down the battery. Thankfully it charged and works now.
3) I forgot to pull the van into the garage one night and Scott ran into the van and scraped a large section of paint off both vehicles. In his defense, he was in a hurry and our driveway is a tight squeeze.
4) Peter pushed the garage door button in the Geo while the van was in the garage with the trunk opened. The garage door did not stop. More paint gone and a slight bend in the trunk.

Wow, this list does not inspire confidence in our intelligence does it. Hopefully we are reaching the end of our van abuse. On the bright side, these are all small accidents. I am so thankful they were not worse. I just had to document this so we could look back and laugh some day.
___________________________________________________
Oh (so I don't leave Rigby out :), three more months until we get to meet our little baby boy!!! I cannot wait to see all three of my boys together.

The Children's Museum

This last Friday was one of Scott's days off, so we decided to go to the Children's Museum in Houston. It has been recently remodeled, and we were all very impressed--especially Peter. The kid thought he was in heaven. There were plenty of buttons to push, levers to pull, knobs to turn, etc. What was even better was that Mommy and Daddy did not get mad, and they even encouraged him! He tired himself out so much that when we headed home at 2:30 pm, he could not finish chewing his PB & J sandwich without falling asleep (he had not eaten since 9 am!). To get him to finish chewing and swallow, I had to feed him a cookie which instantly brought him back to life. When we got home, he even tried to refuse taking a nap by playing in his crib for at least 30 minutes before falling asleep. Where does his energy supply come from?

Oh, by the way, he even started pulling plug covers off the outlets at the museum. Honestly, we travel 25 miles, pay $7 per person and parking, and one of the main attractions is still no different than at home--THE OUTLETS! We have tried every kind of outlet cover and all types of punishments for this, but the kid still has an amazing skill and an incurable curiosity for plugging things into outlets. Ahhhhhh! It is a good thing he has such beautiful blue eyes and a contagious smile that melt my heart.

One of Peter's favorite activities--pushing buttons
(or "bu bu(s)" as he calls them).

This is why my house is always such a disaster.
Here is our little destroyer at work:

Our encouragement during this video is probably not going to help the disaster situation at home.
Oh well, it was sure fun to watch.

I love this picture! If you cannot tell, it is a mock police car for the "Kidtropolis Police Department." I guess Peter was arrested for plug cover thievery. They also have a mock grocery store, veterinary, art studio, restaurant, bank, ATM machine, etc.

This next play area is called "The Tot Spot." While we were there, most of the kids could sit for a couple of minutes and play with one thing. Peter just ran from one thing to the next. I am beginning to think that he has been blessed with way too much energy or he has ADHD--probably both. I felt a little better after I saw one other kid that was just a little bit worse than Peter. I still would not trade my cute little energetic boy for a calmer one though. My exercise plan is always in place thanks to him.

Halloween and Too Much Candy

Here are some pictures of our Halloween festivities. We really are not very enthusiastic Halloween people, so Peter is the only member of the family that dressed up.

Peter and Scott posing before pumpkin carving.

At first Peter tried eating the seeds. Then, he discovered the joy of throwing them all over the kitchen floor. Later when Scott and I were carving the pumpkins, he grabbed the garbage can and dumped it onto the tile-pumpkin guts and all of our regular trash. Lovely.

The finished products!

Peter and I at the ward carnival/trunk-or-treat activity. Every time he got a piece of candy from someone, he got mad that I made him put it in his bag. He just wanted to stuff his mouth at every stop.

Have you ever tried capturing an almost 2 year old pirate for pictures? Be ready for a challenge! This pirate was only interested in helping me press every button on the camera.
This is a common sight at our house. Peter loves to put blankets, pants-really any piece of clothing-on his head and walk around giggling. He thinks he is quite the comedian.
What a goof ball.
My sweet little 'Peter Pumpkin Eater' in his festive shirt.

Scott and I did learn an important Halloween lesson this year-the HARD WAY! We let Peter overindulge at the ward party which was the night before Halloween. As I went to cover him up last night, I smelled his room and thought, "yuck, that kid has bad gas tonight; he is definitely his father's son." (a lot of the men in Scott's family have a notorious reputation for this unfortunately) Then this morning, Scott grabbed Peter from his crib and discovered brown crusties all over Peter's sheets, blankets, and pajamas. We finally decided that he had exploded out of his diaper sometime in the early morning and slept in his gunk for about two or so hours. YUCK!!! This was not just a spot of poop; it covered a good third to half of his crib mattress. I cannot believe that he did not wake up and cry for us when it happened. Of course the diaper almost looked spotless. I am still trying to figure out how kids can have explosive diapers with little or no evidence left inside the diaper, but plenty of evidence outside. Needless to say, he did not have one bit of candy today; just plenty of bread and bananas. Okay, I admit that he did sneak a couple of pieces while the trick-or-treaters were distracting us. I think we will be rationing sweets just a bit better in the future. Better luck next year!

The Star of our Family

Peter is definitely the best entertainment we have ever had! He keeps us on our toes and keeps us laughing (or screaming sometimes).

A quick story before the pics: The other night I brought out some cords to organize. As soon as he saw what they were, he screamed and smiled with complete happiness; if I did not know better, I would have thought it was Christmas morning. He grabbed an unplugged power strip and proceeded to plug cords into it, and he also managed to correctly plug a USB cable into the computer. I guess the only thing I need to get him for Christmas is a stocking full of cords!

Well, here is the star:

Peter lounging on my cute bench-a big no, no!

A winter hat I bought at Wal-Mart. He will probably never need it here, but I couldn't resist!

Peter eating chocolate cake batter. Mmmmm! No wonder the kid is so picky about food when we give him stuff like this.

He is obsessed with dipping things in any type of sauce! This particular day, he had chicken nuggets that he would dip, lick clean, and then dip again. He finally finished his nuggets and decided he couldn't waste the sauce, so he started to eat it with his fingers while I was not watching. What a mess!

Peter loves helping us with anything and everything! We try not to discourage this desire, but it can be kind of annoying sometimes. Here he is helping me move food storage items into the kitchen cupboards.

We have recently been painting. Here is Peter getting in on the action with a Peter-sized roller.

Peter all dressed up in an apron. I love the expression on his face.

Houston Zoo

Peter and Austin in front of the Albino Alligator.

Peter and I were able to go to the Houston zoo this last week with our friends Julie and Austin. The highlights for Peter were anything but the animals.

Peter struggling to run away. Flamingos are boring I guess.
The warthogs were not much better. He would rather eat his crackers.

Peter enjoyed the snacks (and trying to feed Austin his granola bar), . . .

pulling the wagon he and Austin were SUPPOSE
to be riding in, . . .

playing with the buckles in the wagon and pushing the seat backs up and down obsessively, . . .

the water, . . .

and drinking as much fruit punch as he could possibly get his hands on! (as evidenced by his permanent, red mustache in every picture)

We were finally able to find the Children's Zoo area that was geared more towards kids his age. While we were there, he fell off a bench and banged the back of his head on the cement. It was the kind of sound that made everybody turn towards him in horror. I was almost sure blood would start gushing from it; but he pulled through this incident with no concusion or blood, some crying and mommy snuggling, and 2 free coins (usually $2.50) for him and Austin to ride the merry-go-round! The merry-go-round was probably the highlight of the trip for both kidos. Way to get a freebie Peter!

Peter and I on the merry-go-round:

Julie and Austin on the merry-go-round:

We wrapped the day up at the petting zoo. I tried to get Peter to groom the goat with the little brushes they provided, but he was more interested in showing me where the goats eyes and nose were.

I was exhausted by the end of the day, but Peter-the energizer bunny-spent an hour playing in his crib before he finally decided to take a nap.