The Prophet Said to Plant a Garden!

"The prophet said to plant a garden so that's what we'll do

For God has given rich brown soil, the rain and sunshine too.
And if we plant the seed just right and tend them carefully,
Before we know good things will grow to feed our family."

"We plant the seeds to fill our needs, then plant a few to spare,
And show we love our neighbors with the harvest that we share.
Oh won't you plant a garden too, and share the many joys
A garden brings in health and love to happy girls and boys. "

(LDS Children's Songbook p237)

We have had a blast with our garden this year. I am sure there will be more pictures before the summer is over. So far we have peas, carrots, cherry tomatoes, basil, mint, and sunflowers. We have tons of big tomatoes that we are waiting to turn red. And we have softball sized watermelon, so hopfully those will grow well also.

ADVENTURES IN POTTY TRAINING!!!!

WOW! The house is so quiet when I am the only one awake! I have a lot that I should be doing, but I thought instead I could update our adventures in potty training....here we go again! This is a warning that this post contains information from the trenches of motherhood, and if you have no interest in potty training, you should move on without reading this. I decided to write this mostly so that when Levi is older, I can embarrass him with it.

Last December Levi was getting upset when he would go #2 in his diaper, so we got him some underwear. That didn't last too long. Then, in March had a serious attempt at it, which was working until mom was sick in bed for a week. Since that time he wears underwear occasionally. We had a pretty busy last few months of company, so I wasn't going to push it on him then, but now that the company is gone, we are potty training for the last time.

Levi's problem is not that he is scared of the toilet. When he sits on the toilet he empties his bladder just fine. The problem is that he is so focused when he is playing he will not leave his toys for the three minutes to use the restroom. So after many failed attempts we have resorted to the sticker chart. Now, you can call it a reward system, but lets face it. I am bribing my child to be potty trained. I tell him I will give him a sticker (2 stickers for #2) and then when his chart fills up he gets a toy. I have also been a really over excited mom when he goes potty in the toilet so that he knows how happy it makes me. After a week, he has earned a new train (Gordon). And we are working on chart #2 that has twice the number of spaces. This is a picture of him at target when he bought his train with his chart. He was too excited to take time to get a good picture.


So he was going #1 on the toilet rather well, but just wasn't attempting the #2's. I was pretty sick of cleaning up the #2 when they fell out of his underwear onto the floor so once I had Levi do all of the dirty work. We go in the bathroom, he takes off his underwear, which spills all the little pebbles onto the floor. Then he empties the rest of the pebbles into the toilet, which gets more pebbles on the floor. Then, he takes toilet paper and picks up all the pebbles he has put on the floor and puts them in the toilet. So he has now learned that Levi puts his own pebbles into the toilet, whether he does it the easy was or the hard way.

As for mom and dad, potty training has given us lessons in sanitation, insanity, patience, patience, patience, and patience. He is doing such a great job and we are so proud of him for being diligent and loving his sticker chart!

Happy Birthday Daddy and other randomness!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO A WONDERFUL DADDY!!
Yesterday was Noah's birthday. He took the day of work and slept in. We got up and took the kids to Grams house and then Noah and I went to lunch and went....golfing! It was nice to be together with no kids for 7 hours. We can't even remember the last time that we spent that much time together. Our golf games were less than average, we lost about 20 balls (oops), but we had a blast being together. After golf we got a Buzz Lightyear cake from the DQ and had cake with the kids and Noah's parents. The kids both fell asleep in the car on the way home so we put them in bed and cuddled and watched the Olympics. Then today he got to take Levi to see Star Wars Clone Wars, which was fun for the two of them.

Noah works so hard so that I can stay home with the kids. We miss seeing him, and love him so much. He is a great dad. Thanks for everything that you do honey, I love you!


We have had a great month, and it is hard to believe that it is only half over. Chances are the rest of the month will seem pretty boring. In other news. I got another calling (assignment) at church. I am teaching Relief Society (the women's organization) once a month. I have never taught adults in church since my mission, so I am pretty excited for that. I am teaching on the fourth Sunday, which are lessons from recent talks give by the Prophet and Apostles, so that is special to be able to study what they have said and share it with others. My first lesson is a week from Sunday.

Daddy also gave Ruby a whole oreo cooking. Actually I think that Ruby ripped it out of his hands. After a while, she had to be naked in her high chair because she was such a mess, and we didn't have the heart to take it away from her because it was making her so happy. We got the first peas from our garen and they were soooooo yummy.

I also found the most beautiful dishwasher that I have ever seen!

Grandpa Lyon, Grandma Inna, and LaLa

The day that ReeRee left, Grandpa Lyon, Grandma Inna, and Aunt Leslie (aka LaLa) came to visit. We had such a great time. We went to the Red Rocks Ampitheater, and to a Colorado Rockies game (Major League Baseball). We also had fun just staying home and playing. We also celebrated Grandma Inna's birthday before they left on Sunday. LaLa stayed a few extra days so we took the kids to the park, and watched the Olympics. Here is Grandpa with Ruby shortly after arriving at our house. It was fun to show our cute house to my daddy. Ruby loves eating...I mean reading books!This is Granpa helping Ruby walk a little. Ruby is now walking along our furniture. She has made a lot of milestones since we last saw my dad in March.Here is Grandma Inna holding Ruby after a long day. She didn't quite make it through the whole baseball game.

This is LaLa and Ruby playing in the river at the park. Ruby is such a water baby. She loves to splash!This is Levi showing his superman muscles after doing some super cool tricks on the playground at the park.This is one of my absolute favorite pictures of Levi ever. He is wrapped in a towel after playing in the water at the park. He is so adorable.

Thanks for coming Grandpa, Grandma and LaLa. We had a blast. And thanks for our goodies we love them! We miss you already!

Visit from Ree Ree

We are so lucky to have had so many visitors the past month. They are all now gone, and lofe is getting back to normal (aside from the piles of laundry that I will attempt to conquer tomorrow!!! Shortly after Erin left my sister Marie (Aunt Ree Ree to my kids) came to visit for a few days. We had a lot of fun. We went to the zoo, and the park, and sewed pajamas and skirts. It was a blast. Levi loved seeing her and playing with her. Here are a few pics.

We went to the Cheyenne mountain zoo in Colorado Springs. It is smaller than the Denver Zoo, but it was the perfect size for Levi and it is on the side of a mountain. It was beautiful. You can buy giraffe crackers and the giraffes come right up to you to eat them. Levi was a little scared, but here is a picture of Ruby, she did just fine. I even got to pet the giraffe's nose!These are at the community park. We had fun playing on the slide. Levi brough his Donald Duck to the park, for some reason he was extra attached to it that day. He wouldn't go down the slide with Donald Duck, he would throw Donald down first and then go after him.Ree Ree could always make Ruby happy by playing with her LeapFrog table. It is a toy that Ruby didn't show much interest in before ReeRee came, and doesn't show interest for after ReeRee left.

Thank you for coming to visit us ReeRee! We miss you already and love you to pieces!

Hello Baby Max!

Congratulations to Janette and Nate who had their first baby boy on July 11 th!His name is Maxwell Pez Childs. He is named Pez becuase his dad has an insane collection of Pez dispensers. Here are a feww pictures from their blog. Love you guys!

They also have 2 adorable girls, Hannah (3) and Julia (1.5). Three kids younger than Levi! Janette is an awesome mom. We are so sad that we can't be there to hold him.

Goodbye Hobbs! We miss you!

On July 25, Noah's dog Hobbs was put to sleep. I am doing this from memory, so my apologies if I get anything wrong. When Noah was about 13(?) he got Hobbs for Christmas. Well, I think that he got a video camera, which broke, and so they returned it and then he used that money to buy Hobbs. He was named Hobbs after the comic strip Calvin and Hobbs (hence the comic strip). Although Hobbs has lived with Noah's parents for the last 9 years while Noah has been at school and on a LDS mission, Hobbs has always had a special love for Noah. When we moved in with Noah's parent in May of 2007, Grams and Yampa said that Levi brought new life to Hobbs. Levi LOVED him playing with Hobbs. He would step on him all the time, and every night Levi would feed Hobbs his cheese, which was how he took his medicine. The week that Hobbs went to Heaven Noah's parent and sister slept on the couch by HObbs because he wouldn't move. Then the next night Noah and Levi went to say good-bye to Hobbs. They were able to take him for one last walk and when they told Levi to say good-bye to Hobbs Levi said, "bye Hobbs" with a smile. I don't know that Levi realizes what death is, but he is still telling us a few weeks later that Hobbs died. So goodbye Hobbs we sure love you!