Taj started a game about a month ago, and I'm really trying not to read too much into it. It's called "Fat Dog" and involves only me and him. He squishes my tummy and yells, "HONK!" He asks me what I ate to get so fat and tells me he ate a whole chocolate cake. He's totally innocent and thinks it's a funny and completely fabricated story, but someone has to remind herself of that :)
I was teaching Eden what butterfly kisses are and later she starts trying to touch my eyes. I was a little confused until she said "touch butterfly."

Taj is more social than ever. Between church, preschool, and play dates he's a very busy guy. After a play date with Bennett I asked him if he had a best friend. He kind of smiled. I started naming his friends and he tells me it's Eden.

The kids are super excited about Halloween, which is normal. A lot of people around here really get into it and decorate their yards. I use the "let's go look for decorations." excuse often as a motivation for them to get into the stroller for my runs. I do not like the creepy Halloween decorations, and Taj does. So far my saying "it's pretend just to try to scare us" is working, but really inside I'm thinking I should leave a note asking these people to put the creepy stuff where young kids can't see it. Some of the houses really are taking it too far.

We just got back Preschool pictures 2009-2010. It might come as no surprise that this little guy is found with his nose in the books all the time. Eden takes him books and asks for him to read to her. He basically just turns the pages and asks her questions about the stories they both have memorized and point at the pictures. I can't believe that it really wont be long until he's reading for real.

Rewind...

We went to California last week and had a great time. It wasn't exactly eye opening, but there were a few things reconfirmed for me during the trip. -I LOVE the beach. Ashley Moffat explained it well when she said it's one of the most satisfying things to see your kids love something you love. On one of our plan free days in California we took the kids to the beach with the Moffats instead of Disneyland and don't regret it for a second. Happiest place on earth by far :) Thanks again Moffats. Lets do it again soon o.k. -Reconfirmed that Velzy and Ivy are cool little people. They taught Taj to body surf and make "drip castles". I don't know where Velzy learned her wrestling moves, but she has earned the Smith family's respect.

-Utah is a bubble. I was surprised by all the, um, colorful people out there. By colorful I'm not referring to non Anglo, while that is also true. You don't come across much variety here in Happy Valley, but we sure met some interesting characters there. It was refreshing, but also helped me realize what a unique place Utah is. There is a lot of junk out there in the world. The bums were very sweet. They often said how blessed we are to have such a beautiful family. I really do feel blessed.

-Water in California is cold, but not too cold after playing football on the beach, chasing seagulls, or when the waves look funner than the waves in Utah Lake.-Steve and Taffy (my in-laws) are a couple of the kindest, most patient and generous and thoughtful people I've met in my life. Let's just say traveling with little ones can wear a Mom down and put her in less than the best of moods. They were unwavering. I was met with constant smiles, love and willingness to help. Basically, they are superhuman. My heroes.

-The produce world IS worldwide. Duh, right? I buy grapes from Chile, and avocado's from Mexico. My onions from Washington, and on and on. Because Micah works with his Dad brokering produce in our basement I never thought about the magnitude of the business they are involved in, until we went to the Produce Convention in Anaheim. It was ginormous. We got all kinds of free stuff: food cooked by Tyler of the Food Network, pictures with the Ocean Spray guy, totes a plenty, stress ball potatoes and pineapples, pens, chap stick, avocado/lilikoi Popsicles (yum), and much more. It was huge and impressive and fun. If I could, I'd be a produce convention roadie. I loved it.

-I love free stuff :)

-It's always nice to be home after a long trip.

Thank Heavens For Little Girls!

Our little princess is 2 years old.It's been a busy 2 years. I hardly had time to stop and realize I don't have a baby anymore. Instead, I have these cute little monkeys. The skirt and cowboy boots are an example of her strong personal expression. I stayed up one night making skirts for her after she insisted on wearing one. Not a dress, or even pink leggings. It had to be a skirt. I'm proud of her stubbornness sometimes. I like a girl to be tough enough to stand up for what they want (in the right moments that can be one of the most important things for a girl to do).
While the pictures don't show her smiling, I assure you Eden LOVES to dance. She isn't smiling because she gets so involved and into her own dancer world. It's darling to watch, and I'm smiling for the both of us. She loves to put on her dancing skirts, do tippy toes and does better than most of the 3 year olds in the class. I'm glad we're finding things she loves. As I get to know her better I can look back and see her all along in the pictures.

For our little princess we had to have a princess party. She had specific plans for her birthday and has been telling us about them since Taj's birthday. She had to have a birthday hat and the birthday song.

We let the kids decorate their own crowns and cupcakes.

She loved her cake. My Mom offered a little candy off of it to her she said no. "Eat it after birthday song." There she is standing up for what she thinks is important again-what other kid would turn that candy down?

We are so proud of our Eden girl. As much of a princess as she is, she is sweet. Anytime she hears someone tell her sorry she says sorry right back to them. When Eden is doing something naughty she wrinkles her nose and smiles as if it's a little joke. She brings a soft and loving spirit to our family that we didn't know we needed. Happy birthday Eden. We love you!

My Mothering Dilemma

About a year ago I tried feeding the kids some fish sticks. They rejected the food as soon as the word fish was mentioned. A few days ago I told them I had a surprise for lunch. I cooked the fish sticks and said they were nuggets, like chicken nuggets. They ate every morsel.

I felt a little sneaky and did a little self-evaluating. I'm realizing I use this trick/method a lot to get the kids to eat things I think they wouldn't otherwise. For instance, Quiche is Egg Pie and I slip some spinach in there. Smoothies frozen then partially thawed are slushies, and always have veggies in there too. Zucchini muffins are zucchini cup cakes.

Should I feel bad about this? Down the road are the kids going to refuse to try anything that doesn't fall under the cake or pie or nugget category? This is my mothering dilemma of the moment- there are so many.

Family Fun

We've been living in Utah for 3 and a half years now and every time

a holiday comes along I still instinctively picture packing up food

and the family and spending

the day at the beach. This labor day we got as

close to that as you can in

Utah. We packed up and went to the lake,

and you know there was surf! Ha. It was a great day ending with the night at Zermatt. We ate at the best Mexican restaurant "Tarahumara", we've found in Utah-suggestions welcome. The kids LOVE room service and the pool, and don't forget the merry-go-round. If it weren't for the money thing, I'd do this every holiday.

Notice Micah's handywork on what used to be our poopy brown surf board. I love it and want to use it much much more.

Totally Worth It

My little boy turned 4 years old yesterday. I'm still in shock. After all those moments of daydreaming of having older kids and how nice that would be, I have a four year old.
We had a transformers themed birthday party where the kids had to find clues to find the Decepticon (bad guy) and destroy him to save the party. The kids were great. They totally played along while we sharpened our warrior skills doing obstacle courses and target practice.

Bumble bee guarded the Decepticon pinata that we destroyed.They had to complete the obstacle coarse to receive part of the Allspark.

The cake was the hardest part of the party- most time consuming anyway. Once we knew the kind of cake we wanted to make there was no turning back. Micah found some recipes for the fondant and cake, then we went for it. After a few nights, and even one staying up until 3am we made it, and it was totally worth it.

The huge Micah sized Bumble bee was Micah's baby and awesome! I have the most talented husband, and I'm amazed at the determination he has to completing projects well. While I'm ready to say things are good enough, he's coming up with ways to improve it. I hope Taj gets that from his Dad.

We are so proud of Taj. He's always trying to make us laugh and always willing to help us out. He's very obedient and smart. He approaches things very thoughtfully. Lately he's been riding his bike while I run with Eden in the stroller. He's loving the new freedom and Woohoo-ing on his way down every hill. I love it! He's also stepped into his role as big brother more lately. He talks with Eden and "reads" to her. They've been coming up with new Taj and Eden games. He's a sweet heart too, always telling me he loves me. Eden has had her first time outs this last week and Taj snuck over to her to try to help her calm down and feel better. He's amazing. I love being his Mommy.

Captain Planet!

I've noticed a lot of talk about recycling on my kids favorite TV shows: "Little Bill", "Curious George", and "Caillou". I let them watch one after our morning walk early this summer and it instantly became routine. I enjoy it too. Back to the recycling- I noticed it, but until a week ago I didn't think the kids did. Taj started asking me if we could recycle certain items, and always asked when he was throwing things away. I sank a little feeling badly that we don't pay extra for the special recycling bin. Instead of making excuses Taj and I took a couple of boxes and turned them into our recycling center. I am really impressed by his interest in this. He points out the recycling symbol on everything and still asks if he can recycle items going into the trash. Now I can say "Yes" and let him take it to the right spot. I'm so proud. Taj can be such a good influence on our family.

My Worst Nightmare

Maybe "worst nightmare" is a bit of an exaggeration. It was a snake- YUCK!, but it wasn't much bigger than a worm, and I'm alright with worms. And it was just a garden snake. Besides giving me the creeps, they're harmless.

Taj ran in with eyes as big as golf balls and said he saw a snake. I ran for the camera and Micah ran to protect his young. Sure enough, this was the little guy Taj found. It's small and I DO NOT want to see it's Mother. I've seen a few snakes this summer and I never wanted to see one at my house. They've crossed the line this time.