Trip to Vegas

We drove to Vegas on Friday night and stayed till early Wednesday morning. We had a blast with Dad, Bev and Ryan. We ate lots of good food, as always. Beverly makes wonderful meals (flank steak, eggs benedict,) they have tons of snacks, and we eat out every now and then.

 Our days are similar to this schedule: Ben and I take turns waking up with the boys in the morning and try to keep them quiet until most everyone is up. We eat breakfast and then head to the clubhouse (which is like having a Gold's Gym in your neighborhood) and play basketball, tennis, or work out. Troy and Liam played in the playroom or threw around balls on the basketball court. We go home and get ready, the boys eat lunch and take a nap, and then we head out for shopping or doing whatever. We come back and eat dinner, play games or watch a movie, and eat ridiculous amounts of treats and soda. The best part is just being with everyone all of the time. It's really fun joking together, talking about political issues, and having fun playing games. It's a fun, family vacation.

The only pictures I have are of "Christmas morning" which we had on Sunday night.

Here is Dad and Bev. Dad is showing off the Nautique hat that Ben and I got him. The Nautique shirt is in the box still. Nautique is a boat brand, for those who don't know, and Ben's dad is a huge boater. Thus, the Nautique gear. Last year we got him a street sign that said "Barefoot Blvd" because his dad is a passionate barefooter.

Here is the rest of the crew. Brayden, Brittany, Alit on top and Ryan is laying down with a flash of Troy in front of him.

Troy loved opening the presents. 

He made sure to help everyone else too. We got Bev a hand blender. 

This was Troy's favorite present. A Lightning McQueen VTech Toy. I didn't get a picture of him with it, but it was for Liam as well. So Liam is sporting it in the next picture.

This is the clubhouse kid's room. Talk about child heaven.

We got McDonald's breakfast on the way home and I just had to post this picture of Liam. 

His first McMuffin :) He ate is just like that too. He only got through about half of it, which is surprising. He eats more than me sometimes. Both of the boys did amazing on the way there and home. Alit and Brittany were troopers and sat in the back, squished together next to Troy. Troy keeps asking if he can sit next to them again, every time we get in the car. Haha.

My Grandparents

About a week ago, I was brave enough to take Troy and Liam, BY MYSELF, and visit two of their grandparents that live here in Provo.

First was Grandma Shirley Andersen, my dad's mom. She is 92, positive, patient, a little forgetful ;), and loves to play with her great grandchildren. I really wanted to get a picture of the boys with her, and so we attempted...

Going....

Going....

Gone.

Grandma just laughed. She had three boys, then 7 girls, and then another 2 boys. She said that the three boys were much more difficult than all of the girls combined. Haha. She probably just said that to make me feel better, but it worked. 

p.s. Troy is her #187 great grandchild, Liam is her #223 great grandchild. Devin said that if she lives a few more years, she will have the largest posterity from one woman. 

Troy and Liam loved her balcony. Liam tried to throw rocks at a dog below and Troy kept going in and out because he was fascinated by the sliding door. I'm not sure why though, we have one.

Grandma made sure they had snacks and a ride on her chair. Troy thought it was really fun. Liam was just scared.

We couldn't stay very long because the boys start to get comfortable after 20 minutes and that's when the trouble starts. Liam had a close call with some glass ornaments on a shelf, but luckily none of them broke. 

Second was Grandpa William Farnsworth. He is my mom's dad. He is 91, sharp in the mind, cheerful, and very loving. My grandma, his wife, passed away last year and it has been a tough change for him, but he is plugging along. Liam was instantly excited about staring at the basketball standard in the backyard, so he couldn't be pulled away for a picture. Troy was ready for a nap...

I love that smile of my Grandpas. And I think I got my thick, dark eyebrows from him.

Again, we didn't stay very long. I was only so brave. But it was good to see my Grandpa. He has been a great help in my life and I love him very much. We are blessed to have our grandparents close by.
p.s. Grandpa informed me that Katelyn will be #111 great grandchild. Crazy!

December!

I'm excited for Christmas and all of the family, friend, and ward gatherings. The decorations and spiritual experiences. The songs and words that remind me of Christ. The lights on the trees and the glow of the snow. The service to render and the softened hearts to give a little more. It's just a beautiful time of year.

I tried to start a tradition with Liam and Troy. We made a Christmas countdown chain while listening to Christmas music and eating popcorn. I had them color pictures on some paper, and that is what we used for the chain. Troy likes to show me each individual drawing before he moves on to the next one. I love it.

Liam actually colored! For about 2 minutes... and then he just ate popcorn. So, his paper is a little crayon and a lot of spots made from the popcorn. He LOVES popcorn, just like his mama.

The finished product.

Troy did the honors of the first cut.

I'm not sure why he made this face, but he was proud of his cutting skills.

I said "tried" to start a tradition because we have not touched the chain since. Troy and I both forgot about it. I guess we will just cut a bunch today if I remember..

On Friday I decided that I was tired of my house being toddlerified, so we went to the mall. I spent most of the time watching Liam open the doors. Troy was a sweet helper and trying to get Liam to come play. "No Liam, come this way to the slide!"

Troy showed a little bit of hope in potty training yesterday. He pooped on the potty after only sitting there a couple of minutes. Crossing my fingers for more progress. He was very excited to get two cars as his reward. But not as excited as I was!

p.s. Liam is very interested in the potty and wants to try and pee before nap time, just like Troy does. He pulls his pants down and stands over the toilet, nothing happens, then he laughs and pulls his pants back up. What a little ball of joy!

Pizza Party with Aunt Sarah and Uncle Devin

Sarah and Devin are SO sweet and had a pizza party for Troy and Liam while Ben and I went to dinner and shopping. I mentioned in my last post the reason for the pizza party, so if you care, go to the previous post.

Here are some adorable pictures from the pizza party that Troy still talks about.

Here is Sarah and Troy rolling out the dough. 

I'm guessing that Troy wanted to be involved in every step. He is a big helper lately. I like his pose, "I am aware that you are taking a picture, so I will hold still... but I'm not going to smile or say cheese." I think he would make a great kid model for serious pictures :)

Liam probably wanted to eat every step... 

So, Devin fed him pears while Troy finished making the pizzas with Sarah.

Mmmmmm. They brought some pizza home and it was delicious!

Thanks again Devin and Sarah! They loved it. After they ate pizza, Troy and Liam played with Jimmer. They love that dog. I hope Liam wasn't too crazy for them. He looks so innocent, but is so sneaky. He got into the sour cream this morning and finger painted on the floor. This happened while Ben was watching the boys because I had a doctor's appt. for Katelyn. It's much funnier when you are not there. :) 

This Week's Activities

Charnae is our neighbor and the sweetest friend. She invited us over to decorate sugar cookies. Troy was VERY excited. I left Liam home with Ben because he came home early. What a nice thing that was. Liam is too busy for sugar cookie decorating. Chayla is about a year younger than Troy. She is the smallest, cutest, little girl.

Troy was extremely proud of himself. He would turn and say, "Mommy I did it!" after every cookie.

I hung out with Giles, 4 months old, in the front room so that Charnae could get things done. My cheeks went cherry red for some reason. My skin is not my friend during pregnancy.

Yesterday morning was preschool. We reviewed all of the letters, did an art craft with markers and coffee filters = snowflakes. Then we watched Polar Express about "friends" for the letter f. It wasn't a scheduled week, so a movie worked well. The three boys, Caden, Troy, and Izek are on the bean bags and Liam is running right in front of the picture. 

The movie got a little long for them, so they started jumping onto the bean bags. 

Liam kept me busy today, as usual. He got into the sugar, which is buckled shut, but he figured that out. I had to laugh when he gave me this huge grin with sugar all over him. 

Tonight is date night for Ben and I. Troy and Liam have been invited to a pizza party by Devin and Sarah! This is THE cutest idea. What a huge present to Ben and me. The story behind the pizza party is that Troy reads a book about Curious George going to a pizza party every night before he goes to bed. He has demanded this for about 5 months now. They are going to make pizzas and eat them. I'm so excited for my boys (and to be with Ben alone!) Thanks Devin and Sarah!!

What a wonderful break!

Thanksgiving break was heavenly. Ben was off of work and we just played, ate, and enjoyed being with family. We spent thanksgiving at Ben's dad's side, Uncle Greg and Aunt Sue's. It was fun to be with the Allsop family. Troy and Liam were two of three little ones that were there, but they are older, so they made sure to let their presence known :) Ben and I tried to feed them before hand, so that we could actually eat with everyone. It mostly worked, except for Liam wandering upstairs away from the movie. I didn't get pictures. Lame. But it was beautiful and yummy. The boys played basketball after and Ben got a pretty bad scrape. His jeans got a huge hole at the knee and it was surrounded with blood. And he didn't stop playing, of course.

 The rest of the weekend was spent at Ben's moms and we just enjoyed hanging out. We played lots of games and ate way more than necessary. Brayden was such a sweetheart and babysat while we went shopping early black friday. Ben and I had so much fun. Troy and Liam love their Uncle Brayden. When we played games, we tried to keep the kids occupied upstairs with a movie. Liam is catching up to Troy in size. Not really, but sometimes when they are sitting, it looks like it.

While everyone was shopping or working on Friday during the day, we wanted to help mom with a few projects. I LOVE working together with Ben. We raked a large amount of leaves in the yard, Ben cleaned out the garage and hung the Christmas lights. Liam was a big helper with the leaves... well, he avoided the piles, which was very helpful :)

Other than Christmas break, my recent pictures are of Halli Ann. We were babysitting and Troy and Liam thought she was so funny in the johnny jumper. I am SO excited for our little girl to come! But until then, I soak up little Halli Ann. She is THE cutest little girl.

Liam and Troy would jump with Halli Ann, but Troy got bored and started to run away.

Liam was very curious about how she was jumping. He was having a hard time keeping up :)

Ben is busy with his calling as Elder's Quorum President. He is constantly texting, e-mailing, calling, stalking...  He also stays very active with basketball and loves it. His work is going really well and he just got an iphone 4s from his work. We have this phone as personal phones, thanks to Christmas last year, and it's fun that now he gets it for work too. I'm pretty sure Ben was an influence on it, because his work is NOT one to spend money on new technology. I think they saw the benefit of having a good camera on your phone, google docs, work e-mail and be able to send it to each other while out in the field. Anyway.. he's doing good.

I am doing great. The last two nights were really fun, we went to the temple with Ben's presidency and the night before, I went to a bridal shower for Dantzel at Rachel's house. SO FUN. I miss all my sweet girlfriends. Katelyn is moving around a lot, especially at the temple session yesterday. Little heartburn every now and then, but I just need to take more tums. I am exhausted by lunch time because of little Liam, but I don't know if that would be different if I was not pregnant... 

One of my piano students was taking pictures with Liam on my phone and I just have to post it because it makes me smile. I'll be cutting down on my teaching, but I love it while I have it. 

Liam is so happy, sweet, and crazy. Within 5 minutes tonight, he threw the remote down a vent (luckily I got it out), unplugged the Christmas tree, stuck a sticker in between the piano keys, knocked down his high chair (very heavy) and poured water all over himself. He's a busy one. He also gets SO excited to see us. He yells out our names and runs to us. If he's really excited, he will put his hand to his mouth and rotate it rapidly while saying, ababababa. What a joy in our lives!

Troy has gone poop in the potty twice! HUGE deal here folks. Although, I'm not getting my hopes up too much. I still feel like we have some time before this is behind us. Troy is growing up and talking about Christmas. I don't think he quite understands everything, but he gets very excited about the concept of Christmas. His favorite song is I am a Child of God and will randomly start singing it in the car. He has the cutest little voice. Troy is a good big brother. He plays with Liam all of the time and makes sure that Liam has a toy if he has one. They still fight and Troy thinks he can push Liam around, but he is pretty sweet. He also tries to keep Liam in line. If Liam hits him, he looks at him and says, "No Liam, we don't hit. Don't hit my head. No." He takes over my job sometimes. He also tries to tell Liam to go potty so that they can both get rewarded. :) I wish.

I told Troy to smile, and he got the eyebrow action, but didn't move the lips. I love this little guy SO much. He is really into hats. I think Ben may be the reason. Troy loves pleasing his dad. At church on Sunday, Ben tried to take Liam out of sacrament meeting and Troy just started crying hysterically. I wasn't surprised, and I even warned Ben what would happen. I took Troy out and we switched children. I always take Liam, and Ben always takes Troy. They have chosen their favorites :)