Cocoa the Kitty

A couple of weeks ago Conner and Jayden had been playing outside and when they came in they, of course, “forgot” to close the back door behind them. I changed Jayden’s diaper and afterwards he quickly sat up, pointed, and yelled “kitty!” I turned around and he was right, a black and white kitten had wandered into our living room! The kids were thrilled and played with the kitty nonstop for an hour, with Conner randomly asking “can we keep it!?” The kitty was extremely kid- friendly, it loved all of the attention it was getting and didn’t even mind being mauled by Jayden. Conner fed the cat his leftover chicken nuggets from lunch and got the kitty a bowl of milk. When the kids came in for nap/quiet time the kitty sat right outside the sliding glass door the entire time and I knew we were in trouble! When Daddy got home he squashed the kid’s hopes of keeping the cat but said that the kids could play with it when it came to visit. A fair compromise I suppose….although he did put it out the front door in hopes that it wouldn’t be able to find its way back! It took a couple of days but eventually the kitty found its way back. Since then we have gotten kitty food, treats, and I helped Conner make it a cardboard house which he took great pride in painting, coloring, and covering in a million stickers.  While he was decorating it he ran inside and yelled “I know, I want to name her Cocoa!” The kitty loves her new cardboard palace and hangs out in there whenever it is windy or cold. We aren’t sure if it belongs to someone else but it is at our house 75% of the time just waiting outside for the kids to come play.

Conner usually spends at least an hour of his day outside with the kitty. It has been so cute to see him take care of her. He brushes her, makes sure she has food and water, tries to teach her tricks, and talks to her nonstop. Some of the conversations make me laugh! One day it started raining so Conner came inside to put on his rain coat. When he went back out he said “Cocoa it’s me, I’m just wearing a different coat. I’m still Conner, the boy you love.”

Happy Birthday Jayden!

I can’t believe this little boy is already 2! His birthday was on April 15^th. We met Daddy at Artic Circle for lunch and the kids played on the toys and got an ice cream cone.

That night we had cake with some neighbor friends and let him open a few of his presents.

One of them was this car track. He LOVES it! He is such a car nut that we couldn’t have gotten him anything that he’d enjoy more. He played with it all night and still plays with it every day!

That weekend my parents came into town for a belated party. We had another cake… it was supposed to be a basketball but didn’t turn out because the black frosting was so runny that it ran all over the cake… but at least it was still delicious!

Jayden got to open even more presents....  He got a battery operated train, building blocks, and a piggy bank. My parents didn’t want Conner to feel left out so they brought him a few presents too!

Jayden is such a fun little boy! Lately he has been so lovey… he is always giving us kisses and big hugs. He randomly walks up to me and says “Hi momma” while patting my leg and kisses my leg and walks away.  He also randomly kisses his stuffed octopus, which he has been asking to sleep with every night, and other random objects that he is playing with. He is so stinkin cute that sometimes I just can’t stop hugging him! He is “all boy.” His number one love is his cars. He plays with his matchbox cars every single day. He loves to line them up so there are always rows of cars all over the house. He always has to gather up a basket of them to take up to bed with him and we can hear him on the monitor playing with his cars when he should be sleeping.  I often complain about always picking up a million cars every single day but it is so cute to see him be so obsessed with something! He is an incredibly picky eater. I thought Conner was bad but Jayden is even worse! There are very few things that he likes… and bacon is one of them! When we make bacon we have to cook the whole package otherwise we won’t get any! Jayden can be the most stubborn 2 year old and he seems to always want to do the opposite of what we tell him to do but we love his little firecracker personality and wouldn’t change anything about him. Happy Birthday Jayden Dell!

 

Campfire Cookout!

Back on Black Friday we got a good deal on a firepit and since the weather has been so good lately we decided to get it out to roast some hot dogs and smores. The boys loved it and were sad when it was time to put the fire out. Conner said "I wanted to sit by the fire until it was dark!" I was so nervous the whole time that as the boys were running around the fire that one of them was going to trip and fall into it! Conner now says that the only way he likes hot dogs is cooked over a fire... I have to agree that they taste the best black!

 

I LOVE these two Dorito faces!

Easter 2013!

Over spring break the kids and I went and stayed with Grandma for a week and had a great time! While we were there we dyed Easter eggs. As expected the kids got pretty messy… When the dye wouldn’t come off of Conner’s hands he was so upset that he said “I never want to dye eggs again!” which he immediately took back.

 

 

We also had an egg hunt in the backyard for the four grandkids. Conner sprinted around the backyard while Jayden stopped after his first egg to open it, sit on the grass, and leisurely eat his m&m’s.

Conner has been talking about Easter nonstop for a month and was super excited when the day finally came. On Saturday morning we took the kids to an egg hunt at Lowes. There weren’t too many people there so the kids were able to get a ton of eggs. We got there 15 minutes early and the kids had a hard time waiting because they were so excited. Afterwards Conner didn’t want to leave because he thought there might be some unfound eggs out there and wanted to keep looking. The eggs were even filled with good candy… which I greatly appreciated … :)

The night before Easter the Easter bunny delivered two magic jelly beans with instructions to plant them in a pot of dirt, water them, and wait for morning to see what grows. Conner got really into it and enthusiastically helped me gather dirt, plant the jelly beans, and kept checking the pot to see if it had started growing. In the morning two lollipops magically sprouted from the jelly beans!  I think that this will have to be a new tradition! (Thank you Pinterest!)

 On Easter morning the kids were spoiled by the Easter bunny… they each got a couple of DVD’s and a sports set to share. Conner immediately started gathering eggs and we had to convince him to go check out his easter basket first. While he waited for me to put in my contacts and get the camera he had scooped up a small pile of eggs in his lap. He is so competitive! Haha! But after filling his basket completely to the top he was kind enough to fill Jayden’s basket while Jayden sat and shoveled candy into his mouth…

 Nathan and I made a delicious fried chicken dinner after church and both ate so much that we needed a nap afterwards. Apparently Conner had not been satisfied with the number of egg hunts that he had been able to participate in because he begged us to hide all of the empty eggs all over our backyard… and then he hid them all over the house numerous times for Nathan and I to run around gathering. After he went to sleep the eggs went back to “Easter egg land” aka the tote in the garage labeled “Easter.”

Conner Quotes

Lately Conner has been saying some pretty funny things. Little kids are always so honest… sometimes a little too honest! A little while ago, I got home from church earlier than Nathan because he had to stay to do tithing. I was hungry so I ate a bowl of cereal. When Nathan got home he made himself something to eat and asked if I wanted some too, I rarely turn down food, so he got me a bowl of some.
Conner asked “Whose food is that?”
Nathan said “Mommy’s.”
Conner looked confused “But Mommy already ate dinner.”
Nathan trying to defend me “The first time mommy was feeding herself and this time she is feeding the baby.”
Conner “Ohhhh, is that why she always eats so much food!?”

 Recently while driving in the car, out of nowhere Conner says: “Mom, Daddy knows more than you."

Me: “He knows more about what?”

Conner: Thinking… he shrugs and says “Just more about the earth.”

We recently went to the temple and we told Conner “A babysitter is going to come over because Mommy and Daddy are going to the temple tonight.”

 He said “Yeah! A babysitter gets to come over while you guys go to the temple…(pause) to get a little more married?”

We were going to do sealings so I guess he was kind of right!

Conner is 4!

Conner turned 4 on February 20th! I know I'm a bit late posting but it is better late than never! Trying to decide on what cake to make, I let Conner look through my Pinterest “party ideas” and he chose a John Deere tractor cake, that was way above my skill level, but we went with the tractor theme anyway! I made these invites for Conner’s little friends and his party was all that he could talk about!

 
Unfortunately, on the morning of his party he threw up while we were hanging decorations. The first words out of his mouth were “Mom, I still want to have my party.” But the flu had been going around and we didn’t want to share germs so we had to cancel. I felt so bad because he had been so excited to have his friends over. But I still made him a cake and we had a little family party instead.

We let Conner open most of the presents that we got for him. It was so cute how grateful he was for the gifts. He kept saying "Thanks so much Mom and Dad!" after each one that he opened. It was so sweet!

That weekend my family came into town for another party for Conner. We were able to play all of the games that we had planned for his "friend party" with his cousins. The kids loved the piñata… what’s not to love…getting to break things and have candy fly all over the room? And we had a treasure hunt, which was Conner’s favorite part, and he has been obsessed with creating treasure hunts all over the house since…. (for a future post) We had a baked potato bar for dinner a.k.a. “Farm-Grown Idaho Spuds” to go with the theme.

 

After we sang “Happy Birthday” to Conner, all of his cousins wanted to help blow out his candles but were held back. So we sang a second time and let all of the kids help him blow out the candles!

As usual, Conner got spoiled with lots of gifts. I’m blogging about this last but we actually opened presents first, immediately after everyone got to our house, because Conner was super excited! A couple of weeks ago, my Mom bought Conner “Peter Pan” and he has been obsessed with it and has been quite into pirates. So for his birthday my Mom got him a treasure chest and pirate ensemble, which has been quite the hit.

We love our sweet 4 year old and can’t believe that he is growing up so fast! He is so smart and amazes me with the questions he asks and the things that he catches onto!