TALK-ee-toes

We had taquitos for dinner. I loved the way Tate pronounced the word "taquitos". Really, he just put the emphasis in the wrong place, but we laughed pretty hard.

Two kids

This week we've had two kids. Some of our good friends here went to Spain and while fighting back waves of jealousy, we offered to watch their little girl Logan. She's a very talkative, sweet, bouncy little two year old and she and Tate are great friends. We've had a fun week trying to keep them busy and help her have a good time so she didn't miss her mommy and daddy too much. Here's what we've been up to:

- Every morning Tate wakes up and insist "Logan is awake! Logan wants to come out!" When in fact, she usually woke up about half an hour after him and it was torture waiting for her to wake up!

- Realized many differences between little girls and little boys. Seriously, it's amazing how even so young they are all girl or boy. For example, Tate eats a lot, quickly. He's picky about what he eats, but the food he likes are cleared from his plate in minutes and usually it looks like this in the process:

Logan sits there with her food in front of her singing to herself for half an hour and her plate still looks like this:

We played with some chalk outside for a little bit one afternoon. Tate couldn't wait to start coloring. We made shapes and letters and played games.

Logan preferred to just carefully gather all the pieces of chalk up and hug them.

By the end of our chalk time Tate looked like he had taken a bath in a rainbow.

- Glenn and I were referred to as "Tate's Daddy" and "Tate's Mommy" all week long. It was hilarious, "Tate's mommy, I want some ice water." "Tate's Daddy, I spilled my milk." Logan and Tate even started teasing us together. My favorite was the following conversation:

L: Tate's Daddy, I am 2 and you are 48!

Glenn: Oh really?

L: Yeah! Hey Tate, your Daddy is 48!

T: Yeah, he is:

Both giggle for a long time.

- Then there was a trip to the zoo of course. It was the perfect day to go. Great weather, which we've been a little short on this week.

Our group's favorite this time was the reptile house. The littles loved the alligators right behind the glass!

My favorite is this little case full of different colored frogs, blue, gold, orange, and even pink. So cool.

Of course we can't miss the enormous snakes.

And then a little trip to the zoo aquarium on our way out. Sting rays and jellyfish were favorites as usual.
- We had a lot of story time this week. Sometimes it was necessary to help with the post-nap grumps or the missing mom and dad grumps as well. Glenn was always ready to help and snug.

- It was surprising how much longer everything took this week. Getting ready, getting out the door, getting in the car, getting out of the car...you name it. I should have expected it I guess because that's how it felt we added one little person to our lives so of course it's a shock to the internal stop watch when we added another.

Tate is going to be seriously bummed out tomorrow morning when he wakes up and his little friend is not in the next room, ready to play with him. We love you Logs, thanks for coming to play!

MLK Parade

Glenn was away last week in Florida. His grandfather passed away and he went out to help his mother and grandmother. I'm sure he'll post all about it. It was a pretty special experience for him.
He got home Sunday night and when he went in to work Monday morning they told him that there wasn't much to do and they didn't expect him back yet anyway...so he came back home and we went to a parade for Martin Luther King Day downtown. We went with these two ladies, Amy and Kennedy. Good friends from the ward.It was fun to witness a parade here in Houston, especially on Martin Luther King Day. We kept looking around and saying to ourselves, "One of these things is not like the other." And it was us. Because we are white. These cute boys were right next to us the whole time and were very serious about the free stuff being thrown from floats.

Tate's favorites were the marching bands. He loved all the cymbals and drums and trumpets. Although he kept flinching at all the loud noises. He got a little red football and that basically made his morning.Here are a few of our favorites from our first Houston Parade. These pants: Wowsers This group was actually really fun. They were seriously getting down and it was so much fun to watch.
We're not sure what this man was about. His car was just covered with trinkets and signs and junk.

Another interesting car...

And of course a "space shuttle" with an astronaut inside. Tate loved that.
Glenn and I loved taking pictures with my new camera. It's a beauty.
It was a really fun outing and we're so glad that Glenn is home again!

Little Things

We went to visit family in Utah again right after Christmas. We had a wonderful time playing games, talking all night, doing tons of shopping, and going to so many movies (thanks Kenzie for babysitting!).

We had one particularly rousing game of Guesstures.

Mya watched for a while and then decided she wanted to get in on the fun too. She knew just what to do with the cards.

And kept doing the same funny pose. So stinkin' cute.

We went on a long play date with Aubry, Mya, and Kenzie. We went to the aquarium in Salt Lake and then to a fun little Belgian place for dinner and then we walked around Temple Square. It was fun watching the kids discover new things together. The aquarium was really cool. Tons of amazing fish, penguins, a sea turtle, some sharks, sea horses, and snakes. It was awesome.

Mya was serving us cupcakes out of this "window".

Then Tate had to try it too!

Poor Tate had a rough time that night because he was still feeling sick. The whole first part of the week he was pretty grumpy but by the end he was himself again. We met up with Adam and Camarie at the restaurant and Tate wanted Adam to hold him as he sobbed.

Adam asked him, "What's wrong Tate?"

"I cwying."

"Why are you crying Tate?"

"I sad."

"Why are you sad Tate?"

"I sick."

We quoted their conversation all week long.

Later as we sped through the lights on Temple Square because it was late, we stopped at the nativity. It was beautiful. We were all a little tender as we listened to the music and the story. We were tired but so glad we took time to walk around the temple together.

This trip I especially enjoyed watching my little man spend time with my family. Here are some of my favorite moments.

- My dad left on a business trip just a couple days after we arrived so we didn't get to see too much of him. However, the first day we arrived he walked in the door and we told Tate to go see who it was. Tate walked around the corner and said, "Gampa" really soft then ran up and gave him a big hug. It was so sweet.
- Nanna loved all the snuggles of course. He was most snuggly when watching a movie so she would scoop him up and shoo us out of the room so he would snug her longer.

- Watching Aubry having an in-depth conversation on the floor with Tate about his favorite foods.

- Tate and Mya played so nice together all week. Of course, it helped that Tate didn't try to hug/tackle her much this time.

- Tate had one particular afternoon of adoring baby Sadie. He wanted to hold her on his lap and then he practically laid on her on the ground trying to hug her and then kept saying, "I wanna kither" (kiss her). It was sweet to see him adore his little cousin.

- Adam wrestled with little man and I think it was the highlight of his week. He laughed so hard and loved the rough boy play time.

- For some reason Tate loved climbing in this little jumper seat and of course he'd get stuck quite frequently. Once he looked over at Auntie Cami sitting on the couch and just said, "Cami, help!" I thought it was sweet that he not only knew her name, but that she would help him out if he asked her.

- Auntie Mallo snuggling Tate in the mornings and sharing her cereal. She even let him tell her which color of marshmallows he would like next. He's so spoiled.

- Auntie Kenzie is always so great at getting down on his level and playing with him. It was also wonderful to have her help with Tate as we did a LOT of shopping, (sisters had Christmas clothes money to spend) and movie going that week.

Another wonderful trip back home. We miss you guys and thanks for the good times and for being so sweet to my little man.

Tate had a special treat on the way home. We always stop to wave at the pilot at the front of the plane, but this time the pilot saw him and let him explore the cock pit and even sit in the pilot's chair. He had the BIGGEST grin on his face for the first 10 minutes of the flight. It was so sweet.

Glenn took pictures from the window most of the flight. Man, I miss those mountains.

Christmas

This Christmas season was wonderful and the morning certainly exceeded our expectations as well. Tate was feeling yucky but he was still in a pretty good mood. He was thrilled with his toys in his stocking and found no need to continue opening presents when there were so many fun toys around already. We persuaded him to open a few but he soon reached a point where he was simply not interested. In fact he was playing with his cars and jumping them off his other presents. He kept making them talk to each other and telling each other where they were driving.It was so much fun to watch him love his new toys and be excited about playing with them. There is so much more magic involved with Christmas now that we have a little one. It's wonderful.

Glenn and I enjoyed our time opening each other's presents while Tate was completely entertained with his own. Glenn did a great job this year and bought me a new camera. It's a beauty. He did a lot of research and found one that is far too advanced for my needs/abilities right now, but I'm excited to do some studying and hopefully find some fun photography classes as well. So excited! He tricked me and wrapped several boxes inside of boxes and when I finally got to the camera box I looked up and there he was, sitting on the couch, taking pictures of me with my new camera. Little sneak.I'm pretty sure Glenn's excited about our new camera as well. He spent a lot time during the break taking some great pictures.

Glenn got some new sunglasses he's been wanting, some Red Sox Russian nesting dolls (they were a Texas state fair find and are so funny), and some other fun things.

It took all day but Tate eventually got around to all of his presents. Nanna sent some great new Disney movies and cars, Gramma Heather sent some crayons for the bathtub which we put immediately to use.

Tate also received some toy story toys, a book, and the third Toy Story movie. You know those books that have buttons you can push as you read the story? Tate's never had one and was completely enthralled. He liked one button in particular and kept pushing it over and over and dancing an awkward little dance. It was hilarious.

He kept doing it all morning until Glenn eventually took the book away.

We took our time Christmas morning, talked to family and had a yummy breakfast. After Tate's nap we went to a movie at a nearby dollar theater. Tate was still feeling yucky and coughed until he threw up...three times. It was great fun.

I'm still in denial that Christmas season is over. It's by far my favorite time of the year and I just don't want to take the music out of my car and put everything away. We tried something new this year that I think we'll do again. I went to the library and got a bunch of Christmas books, wrapped them, and then we opened and read one every night for Tate's bed time story. It was fun to hear him quote parts of the story and gain a little more understanding about what Christmas is all about.

On Christmas Eve we did our traditional dinner on a blanket (from my family) and talked to Tate about how this is Jesus' birthday and we asked him what he would like to give Jesus for his birthday. He answered without even hesitating, "Cars".

"Oh Tate that is sweet. Is there anything else you would like to give Jesus?"

"Trains."

"That's very nice. I'll bet Jesus would love some toy trains. Is there anything else, Tate?"

"Very very quiet."

"Ah. Well, I'm sure he will appreciate when you're reverent and quiet during prayers and church, huh Tate?" We thought his responses were so funny.

He also really got into Christmas music this year. We'd listen to it as we drove around, cleaned the house, cooked dinner and such and they became our bed time songs as well. He seemed to enjoy the decorations and the whole Christmas feel. It was a wonderful Christmas season. Can't wait for next year!!