February 2015

Matt's parent came to visit the first couple of weeks in February and to attend the Roots Conference. The kids loved having them here. A day or two after they came I had been trying to figure out how to go about getting rid of binkies or "kiki's" as Olivia called them and had bought a toy as a reward thinking I would use that. Olivia found the Minnie Mouse toy in Matt's closet and really wanted it so I told her that if she wanted it she needed to throw her binky away in the garbage. In total shock I watched as Olivia walked over to the garbage can and threw away her binki. I knew it was in the moment for her to get the toy and she probably figured she could find another one around the house later but I knew if I gave her the toy we had to stick with it. Over the next week she would ask for her"kiki" especially when going to bed and we would tell her remember you threw it away in the garbage. It seemed to work really well because she knew she had done that and couldn't really throw a big fit about it knowing she did it. Then it became a joke when putting her to bed to jokingly ask for a "kiki" to see our reaction and she would laugh about it. Now if only potty training could be that easy! :)

Olivia loves to paint at my aunts house after Sunday dinner. She has painted a couple different bird houses to put outside. I love the tongue out concentration she has here.

February 1, 2015

It's always fun to capture her personality. I really wanted to remember her kissing face because she loves to pucker her lips to give kisses.

February 5, 2015

Over the weekend we headed up to the cabin with my parents, sister and Matt's parents because his parents hadn't seen the cabin since the beginning of last summer when we bought it. There was still enough snow that the roads were closed but it wasn't a hard hike since most of the main roads weren't completely covered.

February 7, 2015

We couldn't believe how warm it was once the sun came out. Olivia had fun throwing snowballs at everyone until her hands were too cold and she wanted them warmed up.

She liked throwing them at daddy the most.

The boys didn't want to go sledding so they stayed inside to play games while a couple of us headed out to sled.

The side roads still had snow on them since they aren't in the full sun so we headed off to our new favorite hill. Olivia and I rode together and we were soaked after. It was really slushy snow and we were going so fast I would have to drag my feet in front of us to slow down which kicked snow at us and filled up or sled. We even hit a patch of the crushed asphalt and a piece of it shot down my throat. It was fun but one run was enough for us.

We had lunch and played games and left late in the afternoon to head home.

We don't have church until 1pm and so after Olivia's bath in the morning I put these foam curlers in her hair to see how they would work. You just roll up the hair and twist the ends so it went pretty quick.

February 8, 2015

Kaleb's suit that he had been wearing for a couple of years ($12 from Goodwill) was too small for him and  instead of telling us it didn't fit we had to figure it out when in sacrament meeting his jacket was off and we noticed the button on the pants undone. When I asked why they weren't done up he said because they're too small. You forget how fast kids grow! Ashton had also been wanting a suit for months and so we were able to get a good deal on 2 suits for the boys. They looked so handsome for church. And the curlers in Olivia's hair worked really well. I didn't even realize Matt took this picture of them but I'm glad he did.

Olivia's nursery teacher sent me this picture of her with her Valentine's hat on.

Olivia likes to use stools or chairs to play in any sink with the soap and water. She'll even turn on the bath water if we aren't in the bathroom fast enough to do it for her. But a cold bath isn't very much fun so she climbs right out. She loves water and baths!

February 9, 2015

Matt had a couple days off when his parents were here and so one of the days his mom came with me to the apartment to work on some crafts and Olivia stayed with the boys. Matt sent me this picture with the message "Guess who didn't take a nap....ME!"

February 10, 2015

The boys gave out microwave popcorn for their school Valentine's with this tag on it.

My sister is always nice and offers to watch the kids for us while we go out for Valentine's and Matt's parents were nice enough to let us go up to the cabin after dinner to spend the night. We had dinner at Cafe Madrid (my brother and sister-in-law had given us a gift card) and it was really good. When making the reservations they didn't tell us it was a special menu and Matt was really wanting to try their paella so he was a little bummed we couldn't order it but the food was really good. We hiked up to the cabin in the dark and had stopped on the way to grab ice cream and it was fun just to hang out and have a quick overnight date. The next morning as we were leaving we called Matt's parents and learned Ashton had woken up early to the sound of Olivia throwing up so he went to get grandma. I felt horrible she had to deal with her throwing up all morning until we got home. I stayed home from church with her and we figure it was either something she ate or some bug because she was fine the rest of the day. She just wanted to watch the fishy movie, Little Mermaid.

February 15, 2015

Matt's parents left the next day and since it was Martin Luther King Jr. Day Matt and I both had it off so we went over to help Logan and Liz put all the bead board and trim up in the nursery. It took longer than we all thought but at least we were able to finish it that day.

February 16, 2015

We came up from the basement to go to bed and Olivia had fallen asleep in our bed. I'm just happy she didn't fall off since our bed is really tall.

February 19, 2015

The boys love playing Monopoly. They're pretty competitive and play to win!

February 24, 2015

This girl is always posing and wanting me to take her picture. I don't mind one bit!

February 25, 2015

Awhile ago I read on THIS blog post about doing sock curls. So I decided to try it on Olivia. I only used 3 socks the first time and this is her the next morning. They loosened up a little but she has such thin hair and not very much of it I expected it to fall out a little.

February 26, 2015

Olivia wouldn't hold still so this is the best after picture I have. For only taking a couple of minutes the night before I was happy with the results. And it was only the first time so I've improved since then.

This is the next day and you can see it still left some wavy curl to her hair which I was surprised by. When I curl her hair with a curling iron the next day all of the curl is gone so I was happy to see even the slightest curl left. I now use 5 socks but still love how easy it is to do and the socks don't bother Olivia at all.

February 27, 2015

Olivia had fun wearing my sewing scrap basket as a hat. She was laughing hysterically thinking it was the funniest thing ever.

Ashton finally lost his first tooth. The boys must have my teeth because I was always behind in losing and getting teeth. I just had a baby wisdom tooth come in last year that I had to get pulled out. It looked like a baby molar with a really big root. I wasn't expecting at 30 to still have teeth come in! He actually just lost his 2nd tooth too a couple weeks ago. He has really tight teeth unlike Kaleb who has plenty of room in his mouth so I'm sure Olivia and him will eventually need braces.

February 27, 2015