Life According to Tate

We had a busy weekend, as you can tell by the plethera of pictures. I'll let Tate tell you all about all of our crazy fun.

"The Fishies Place"

"Tate looking at the fishy. I see a fishy and Tate."

"There's Tate and Mommy at the fish place. Tate sad."

"Huh?"

"That's Tate playing the xylophone. He's playing noises. Boom. Boom."

"Tate playing with the blocks. The blocks shake and I turn that on and the blocks shake and fall down. I build a house and it fall down."

"Tate singing songs."

"That's Tate riding the car and drive it. That's the beep, beep."

"Tate putting the ball in and ball going up. I need to go play ball again."

"That's the zoo place. That's the place I go to the zoo."


"That's Tate and that's daddy and the birdies. And the birdies are flying."

"That's Mommy and Tate smiling."

"That's Tori sucking her 'fum'."

"That's the zoo place. Tate smiling by the turtle."

"Tate riding the kangaroo. Tate is sad cuz he don't like the kangaroo. Tate is making the kangaroo sad. I scared the kangaroo and he's sad."

"Whoa. That's the tiger. He's roaring at Tate."

"Mommy and the giraffe. Mommy and Tori and the giraffe. The giraffe is standing on his legs."

"Those are the zebras and Tate and Daddy and the zebras are eating hay."

"That's the lady."

Editor's note: This exhibit is on display in the "Hall of Primates". Yes, that is a human being in there.

"The elephant. That's a big elephant. Wow. It's cool. Or what."

"That's the elephant. It's made out of wood. It peed. Mommy sitting on his nose. He's making sounds. I don't like it. I've got some feelings."

"Dexter monkey. He's on Larry show (Night at the Museum). He's eating his carrots and he's sharing with his brothers monkey."

"That's the birdy place. That's the zoo place. That's the dinosaur place. That's the Rexy place."

"Baby Tori is sleeping."

"I see Rexy. And little Rexies and the big Rexy dinosaur. Roooooaaaar!! I want to make Rexy down the rocks and scare him and get Larry and bite him. Rooooaaaarr! Sniff."

"Tate getting a dinosaur bone. Tate using a paint brush, digging the dinosaur bone."

"Tate and Daddy getting the dirt. Played with plants and little dinosaurs."

"I need to see Bruce (from Finding Nemo). Those are his teeth. He brush his teeth. He's gonna not eat daddy. Stay there. He's gonna hit dad down the ground and bite him and knock him down again."

"Tate playing with the dinosaurs. Little dinosaur says "Rooooaaaaarrr! I'm a dinosaur." That's what he says."

Bald is Beautiful

I love my three baldies! The only one in this picture who is naturally bald happens to be the only girl, Tori. But I thought they all looked pretty cute with their matching hair styles.

Oh, and Happy Father's Day to the best daddy ever! Phil is such a great, hard working, patient, loving, gentle, firm, hands-on, playful dad. It's no wonder that the kids in this house prefer daddy to mommy, hands down.

Fun in the Sun . . . and wind and rain

What's better than a day of family fun? A day of FREE family fun! We decided to head up to Park City to spend a few hours shopping at the outlets. (Just to clarify, the outlets are NOT free) Anyway. Don't tell Phil I told you this, but we got a little lost because we didn't know exactly where the outlets were. We happened to stop at the visitors center to ask for directions and the lady there told us to head up to Olympic Park where the Australian National Ski Team was practicing their free style jumps, making their landings in a pool of water due to the lack of snow. She also told us there was a little museum we could tour and that it was all free. Awesome.

This is Tate and Daddy watching one of the skiers do a cool arial trick. (The skier is pretty much too tiny to be seen in this picture)

You can see this skier got some major air. It was so cool.

Tori was way impressed.

Who makes the best extreme skier face? Phil?

Tate?

Shanon?

The Tate and Daddy bobsled team.

The next day turned out to be really rainy and windy so we decided to spend the day inside and repaint Tate's room. Well, I decided and everyone else went along with it. We painted his room just a few months ago when we moved in, but the colors were just too dark. Too cavelike for a little boy. So we brightened it up with some white and "Deep Space Blue". I think it turned out really cute.

Top 10 Things I've Learned As A Mom

1. Adding a long "e" sound at the end of any word can make it sound almost delightful. Example: Poopies, pukies, etc.


2. The phrase "It's different when it's your own" is totally true. I remember my mother-in-law saying this to me one time when I was dry heaving as my niece blew snot bubbles out of her nose. I thought there was no way I could handle something like wiping a snotty nose. Turns out, when it's your own kid, it's no biggy. In fact, you'd be surprised at the items you'd be willing to wipe your kid's nose on. Example: inside of your own t-shirt, your sock, etc.


3. There is no diaper available on the market today that can contain the explosive, mustardy liquid known as infant poop. It just doesn't exist. Don't waste your time trying every single brand. Just buy yourself the industrial size bottle of Shout and be prepared to treat a lot of stains.


4. You CANNOT force a two-year old to eat his vegetables. Don't try to bribe him. Don't try to coerce him. Don't try to hide peas in his tater tots. He'll just learn to hate tater tots, too.


5. The mind of a mother is runs at 110%, 24 hours a day. A mother's brain is constantly planning meals, making grocery lists, memorizing names of children in the neighborhood, taking inventory of what needs to be cleaned next, choosing outfits for tomorrow, prioritizing errands, worrying about whether that rash is severe enough to warrant the doctor's attention, etc. This constant overworking of the mind leads to occasional forgetfulnes. Such as the time I left for work without one very import piece of my breast pump. I remembered my purse, my lunch, a cooler, ice packs, my bag containing bottles, and most of the parts of the pump, but I left one little part of it in the dishwasher. Luckily, a kind husband rushed it to me before I exploded. (This just happened today)


6. My kids are the cutest. And your kids are the cutest to you. We are each convinced that our own children are the most exquisite of all of God's creations. We can't be talked out of it. And that's okay. But just so you know, my kids really are the cutest.


7. If you have a choice between epidural and no epidural, GO WITH THE EPIDURAL! Childbirth is painful. I don't think I fully appreciated this until my second child was born and it happened so fast that the epidural didn't have time to kick in. Now that it's over, I can say, "Oh, that wasn't so bad." But in the back of my mind I know I'll be asking my OB to give me my epidural a week before my next baby is due, just in case.


8. Children grow at a rate equal to the speed of light. Seriously. Everyone tells you, "Enjoy them. They grow up fast." But I had no idea how fast. Tomorrow morning I'll wake up and my two year old will be seventeen.


9. Playgroup is really for the mommies. Under the pretense that we're filling our children's social needs, we gather each week for a little bit of what moms crave most: adult conversation. After spending days on end at home with your kids, with the largest word you've used in days being "peanutbutter" or "Snuffleupagus", you NEED to chat with other moms. Even if all you do is talk about your kids and how they love peanutbutter and Snuffleupagus, somehow your sanity is saved by playgroup.


10. I never really knew how strong love could be or what true joy was until my children were born. These two little angels sent from heaven can be such a challenge and can try my patience more than I thought possible, but I wouldn't trade them for anything. They make my life so much richer and I love them more than words can say. Thank you, Tate and Tori, for making me a mom. I love it.

Sweet, Sweet Summer

School's out! Yay! And Daddy is home for two months for summer break. We kicked off his vacation by going to the Bees game on Friday night. You might be confused about this first picture. Well, we decided to ride Trax to the game and Tate pointed out this sign in the parking lot. He said, "Look, a potty." I assumed he associated the sign with potties because of the stick figure on a blue background being similar to those that designate Mens and Womens restrooms. But then he said, "That guy is sitting on the potty." Well, by dang if it doesn't look like a guy sitting on the potty. This should be the international symbol for restroom.

Riding the train to the baseball game.

Tate and daddy enjoying the game.

It turns out Tori is a baseball fan, too. As long as she can cuddle up in her blankey and sleep for a few innings.

The game went into extra innings and the Bees ended up winning in the bottom of the eleventh. That's a lot of innings for a little boy to sit through. Luckily, the people in front of us kept him entertained and gave him treats like this big hunk of cotton candy.

Warning: Cotton candy may cause severe stickiness accompanied by the growth of facial hair.

Saturday we headed over to the Stake Family Fun Day. Breakfast was followed by an array of activities, including train rides, face painting, fishing pond, pony rides, dunking machine, tug-o-wars, snow cones, cotton candy, popcorn, etc. Tate loved the train rides.

And, much to my surprise, he agreed to get a Tiger painted on his face. He spent most of the morning growling at everyone.

And, again to my surprise, he enjoyed riding the ponies. It's been a fun couple of days and now we're looking forward to a good, long Sunday to rest and get the sugar out of our systems.