In The Mountains!

On Thursday evening when Dan got home from work, we packed up and headed to grandpa and grandma's cabin for the weekend. We had a great time! We went for walks, made a couple of camp fires and just hung out. In the bottom picture, we made lunch by roasting hot dogs and smores. Quite yummy and fun indeed!

Stuck!!

Have I not said before that I have seen this one coming? Given that Elton's favorite things are: hanging out with Bingo, trying any door he can find, and his love for playing in the sunroom. A couple of days ago he discovered he could put the toys out they dog door and so has since decided that if they make it through, so might he. His test subjects made it as you can see, so the time came for him to try. He got stuck. However, he didn't seem phased by it in which he attempted again about 15 minutes after I pulled him out and got stuck again. But you know what they say - try and try again - and so try he did and had success on the 3rd test and made it through. He is a determined little guy!!

Feeling Yucky!

Elton started with a snotty nose on Monday and then on Tuesday when I went to bed I thought I felt a cold starting. Elton has done well. Me, on the other hand, not so well. The last 2 days have been miserable. Caleb has been good and put himself to bed for his naps when I have told him (which I can't believe). Today I am wondering if it is turning into a sinus infection as I have been very dizzy and my head feels like it is splitting in two. It seems like over the past 2 years, that anytime I get a cold it turns into a sinus infection. What is up with that? I had only had one sinus infection in my life before that.

On a brighter note, it seems like we have successfully gotten rid of Elton's bedtime bottle as he has been without for 5 nights now. This means no more bottles!! It has actually gone quite well. I had Dan put him down the first 2 nights as I thought it might help break the routine him and I have. Seems like it worked!

Mother's Day

The flower baskets in the pictures were my Mother's Day gift from Dan and the boys. They took me to Lowe's and I got to pick them out. I don't know what kind of flower they are, but I think they are so pretty and I love the colors. Dan also took me out for Sushi last night. It was so good!!! We hadn't been out for Sushi since Valentine's day. Even today I couldn't stop thinking about how wonderful it tasted! Caleb also made me a picture and planted a flower in a cup for me at Classy Castle. I made sure he knew how beautiful they were and how much I loved it! I'm not sure he quite understood what the big deal was though. I guess if I had to look at it from his perspective I would be thinking "What's the big deal about this Mother Day thing? She's my mother every day!". I did explain to him though that it was him and Elton that made it a special day for me, because without them I wouldn't be a mommy.

Walking?

With Caleb it was always hard to figure out definitive "firsts". With Elton on the hand, it has always been easy. That is except when it comes to walking. He has been doing 2 or 3 steps between people for a couple of months, but while we were up in Canada you could see him getting closer and closer to walking. Honestly I thought from how he has been doing things that he would have been walking over a month ago. When I set him down he stands on his own. I just set him down on his feet by the couch and witnessed him turn around and take 5-6 steps on his own before his own. I think I am going to have to consider this his first time "walking" although there have been a few times in the past week he has done similarily.

The Adventures Of Puppy & Baby

I know I have said it before and I will probably say it many more times, but it is so funny to watch Bingo and Elton. It is like they explore together. Elton is definitely my little adventurer. He is our little doorman as a door of any sort interests him (cuboards, room doors, doggie doors, sliding doors, etc). This weekend he has mastered going from the house out the sliding door to the sunroom and into the back yard. You can see from the one picture of him and Bingo at the dog door it was like they were trying to decide who should go first.

Peep Monologues & Tractor Rides!

While on vacation at Papa Jack's farm there were many rides and some baby chicks. A friend of my dad's works at the local hatchery. He brought over some baby chicks which were named the "Peeps" by Caleb (I'm assuming because of their direct resemblance to the yummy sugary Peeps received on Easter). The boys loved the Peeps. They were very gentle with them and Caleb always asked before holding one. Elton loved to peep right along with them and would have loved to get right in the box with them had we allowed. It was fun to watch the excitement in his eyes. However, Caleb loved to have one sided conversations with them. He we tell them to eat and take naps. The one I loved the most was when listening to them he said "Peeps you stop arguing". The Peeps were check on frequently by the boys and it was amazing how much they grew in just one week. Upon us returning to Idaho Caleb passed the Peeps on to his cousin Ty at their farm.

The other big activity that became a ritual after naps on the sunny days with Papa Jack was tractor and 4-wheeler rides. Of course one ride was not enough and every tractor had to be tried every ride. I think that Papa Jack got thorough enjoyment out of this as much as the boys. By the end of the trip he said his tractors had put more distance on them in the past week than the past year. On the day the cousins came over it was quite rainy and cool, but Caleb insisted that him and Ty go check the tractors. Papa Jack took them out and I guess they went and checked every tractor and building out. When they got back Caleb pronounced wholeheartedly "We had a Wonderful time!!".

New Camera

So wouldn't you know it, our camera started to act up on us on our trip. We thought at one point we had lost all of our pictures from our trip and weren't going to be able to take anymore. While we had kind of been talking about getting a new camera with better zoom and features, we weren't really serious yet. We started looking around and on our last day of vacation, we purchased a Sony Cybershot DSC-H2. It has a 12x optical zoom and is 6 megapixels. There are lots of features on the camera and I just started playing with it today. These are some pics I took.

For Christmas this past year, Dan gave me a computer program to organize my pictures for scrapbooking - Creative Memories Memory Manager. I haven't had time to start using it, so now seems like the time as I learn the new camera too. So far I think I am going to be very happy with both. Wish me luck!!

First Day In Canada

When the boys woke up their first morning in a strange house (Nana & Papa Jack's) the did great considering they had fallen asleep in the car. We went to Great Grandma Edgar's house after breakfast for coffee so she could meet Elton as soon as possible. This was one of the big reasons for our trip. Actually my parents were the only family of mine that had met Elton before this. Elton loved checking out all of her cuboards and VCR.

The first picture is our four generations picture with Great Grandma, Papa Jack, myself, Caleb and Elton.

Arrival In Canada

We arrived in Winnipeg, Manitoba just before 9pm on April 24th (the time is 1 hour ahead of our time in Idaho). We flew out of Boise into Minneapolis. It was there we got to ride the "train" tram (as Caleb referred to it) to go to the terminal for our next flight. We then flew from Minneapolis to Winnipeg. In Winnipeg we went through customs and the customs agent (upon reviewing all of our documents) asked me if I was aware of my kids having the choice of dual citizenship due to me being a Canadian citizen/US resident. This I will have to investigate into further as it would allow them many options later on as far as school.

My parents and brother (who flew in to visit from Calgary) met us at the airport. We then made a late stop at Perkins for a meal as we hadn't eaten since our 11am stop at McDonald's. There, Dan tried the "poutine" (fried with cheese and brown gravy". I am now going to attempt to make it here as I have been into making homeade baked fries at home as they are a lot healthier.

We then started our drive to Manitou (where my parents live and I grew up). I changed the boys into their jammies before we left Perkins. Caleb was a little disoriented as he wanted to know where our Jeep was and where Canada was. The boys fell asleep on the drive to Manitou and all went straight to bed shortly after midnight at my parents.

The boys did excellent flying and we couldn't have asked for better little travellers. Our last plane was quite loud and we were at the back, but Elton just shook his head back and forth as we were landing as though he wasn't just too sure what was going on in his head.