Dear Sawyer,

You are one!

Frogs, snails, puppy dog tails that's what little boys are made of.  Well, not really.  But that's the theme I went with for your first birthday!

We celebrated your day with cousins, aunts and uncles, granny and papa.

We went on a hayride!

 

All of a sudden you have turned into such a little man. 

I'm pretty sure eating cake was your favorite part!

You dove in...

You giggled...

You started slinging cake everywhere!  You had an audience and we giggled with you!

This group of kiddos loves you so much and will always protect you!

This is your cousin Alistair.  You are only two months older than him.  I bet you will be great friends.  And guess who else loves you?  Your Papa!  His grandchildren are so important to him.  I love how he makes his rounds and makes each of you feel special.

You know who else is special.  Your daddy!  Do you know how much I love him.   You will one day.  Do you know that I thought our family was complete with Laurel, Savannah, and Landon.  I had no idea that I would be able to have another baby.  Do you know that your daddy felt like we should have another baby and we did!  We had you! 

Do you know who loves you most of all?  That's right, me!  You see their is a special bond between a mother and a child.  I am so in love with you.  I can't even imagine our family without you.  You are such a funny boy.  You are SO loud.  You express yourself with lots of grunts and screams.  You laugh so much.  You are very determined.  You mock our sounds and expressions. You walk up to me and put those sweet arms around my legs and look into my eyes with your gorgeous brown eyes and say, "mama, mama!"  That is the best sound ever to me.  I am blessed to be your mommy!

Happy Birthday Sawyer.
I love you,
Mom

Entertainment from the deck

Sawyer waiting.....

to see....

his daddy fly by on the dirtbike!

Little guy stayed right there for a very long time entertained by the sound of a dirtbike.

Do you know what I heard Seth say the other night!?  "Landon if you go poo-poo on the potty, we will get you a dirtbike!"

HAHAHAHA!

Let me just tell you, I will help pick it out!  Seriously, how do you get a three year old to poop on the potty? 
He says he wants an orange one just like his daddy's.

Photographer~Laurel

I was playing with Sawyer one afternoon, and Laurel picked up the camera and said, "now that's a pretty picture!"

I love how she loves taking pictures.

I think she knows if she prefaces everything with, "now that's a pretty picture" she won't get in trouble for picking up my camera!  Maybe she will get her own for Christmas:)

Turning a bad day into a good day

Boy, oh boy it has been a day with my Landon!  Poor guy got in trouble all.day.long!  He would not mind me at all.  Everything was NO!  I try to only blog about the happy moments in our life.  I mean really, who wants to look back and read about our not so happy days.  So I refuse to go to bed having bad, worn out, am I making a difference in Landon's life feelings.

Some funny things did happen with him this week, so we will just concentrate on those and hope that he and I forget the yelling that went on today.

I love walking through the trails that Seth has worked so hard to create.  I feel so blessed that I can walk out our front door and go all through the woods on nature walks with the children.  Yesterday I took Landon and Sawyer for a walk.  Landon knows the woods so well and would live in them if I was brave enough to leave him.  We got to this ditch where Seth has put a board down for you to cross over. 
I said, "Landon, I don't think the stroller is going to fit across the boards."
He said, "just twy mommy!" 
I tried.  It didn't work.
I said, "It won't work."
That little rascal, turned and looked at me and said, "well bye, bye!"  and crossed over the ditch and was running off into the deep woods. 

Another funny story:

This box has provided so much entertainment for Landon.  It has been on the deck for weeks.  The other day I lost Landon.  He was on the deck and I went to the back of the house and came back and Landon was gone.  I figured he had gone down the steps and I was going to have to search all over for him.  He is so quick!
I went out onto the deck and looked over the rail and started yelling, "Landon!  Landon!"  and I would get a little more animated in my yelling, "Laaaaandoooooooonnnnnnnnnn! where are you?"
All of a sudden,

He pops out of the box right behind me.  The box I had walked right past.  And said, "Here I am, mommy!"  I jumped and let out a scream!  Then he started giggling and said, "mommy, you said, Laaaaaaaannnnndoooooonnnnn where are you!?"  He thought that was the funniest thing ever that he had pulled one over on me.
He wanted us to reenact the whole thing.
So for the next few minutes, he would hide in the box and I would walk right past it and yell, Laaaaaandooooooonnnn!  And he would pop out and I would scream!

He can be the sweetest boy.
He comes up to me out of the blue and says, "I love you so much mommy!"
Or he will say, "I like you mommy!"
He will look at me and say, "you pwetty, mommy."
He will say, "you happy mommy?"
He says, "I weally want daddy to buy me a b-bike,  mommy!"
He has started asking about Santa Clause.
"Whew does Santa Clause live mommy?"
"Is he nice?"

I say, "Landon, why won't you go poopy on the potty?"
He says, "there monstas in that potty, mommy!"
He will say, "I want some more bapple juice mommy, and that's it!"
When he is watching Little Bear, Curious George and Dora, he will say, "I sure wish little bear could jump out of that t.v. and play with me."

I love this boy, tantrums and all!

Warrior Dash 2012

Back in January, I said that I had always wanted to run a half marathon.  Then I ran my first 5K a few months later and I decided I'm good with running just a 5K.  I might do a 10K.  But I don't really think I have a desire to do a half marathon anymore.  I love jogging.  I just don't think I love it enough to keep going that many miles.

At the beginning of this year, a group of us girls signed up to do the Warrior Dash.  The Warrior Dash is a 5K race with obstacle courses throughout the race.  I really didn't know what I was getting myself into, and at the time, I was still so overweight from being pregnant.  I had just started working out and I was very out of shape.  But I knew that I had several months to get myself into shape and this would be  a good goal to work towards.

If you look at the Warrior Dash website, you will see that it is a crazy fun race.  People dress up!  Well, when we saw that people dress up, we started brainstorming about what we could do.  Sariah, who is a theater major, put together this crazy ensemble!

  And yes, I was a little out of my comfort zone!

Red

Hot Warrior Mamas was our theme! 

Here we are right after we all got into costume.  We had so much fun laughing at each other.  Seriously, my hair has not been this big since the 80's!

Now, we are at the race and the adrenaline is kicking in!

After the race!  We are wet, muddy and cold!  But what an accomplishment!

Highlights from the race:

Lots of muddy trails through the woods where we just slid down hills on our bums!

Pulling myself up a mud hill with a rope and losing my grip at top and sliding all the way back down, screaming, "No! That did not just happen!"

Swimming through a green, slimy pond where I almost had a panic attack.

Jumping over fire at the end of the race.  We split up four and four.  We were all holding hands and were going to jump over the burning tires together.  As we were running toward the fire, I let go of my fellow hot warrior mama's hand.  You see, I didn't want to bring anyone down into the flames and I didn't want to be brought down.

Coming home and seeing my children's face when they saw my frizzed out pigtails.

Landon, for days, kept asking, "mommy, what happened to your hair?"  "You jumped over fire?"

This race was so much fun and we all want to do it again next year!

Friend/Foe

Laurel gets in the car one afternoon all upset.
"Ashley isn't my friend anymore.  I accidently hit her eye when I was putting on my jacket."
"She will not even talk to me.  She said I gave her a black eye and that she can't even see me because now she is blind!"

"Wow, Laurel, this Ashley chick sounds a little dramatic!"
"Mom, we have been friends since last year and now she won't even talk to me!"

"Did you apologize?"
"Yes."
"Well, that is all you can do.  She will be back to herself tomorrow."

That night, I was packing Laurel's backpack and found this letter.  I just had to take a picture.  First of all, the blue painter's tape over last year's Christmas candy cane and the plastic doll made me laugh so hard.  I love how she wrote, "God bless you" 

Well, bless Laurel's heart, this story doesn't have a happy ending.
She gets in the car the next day and throws the letter in the front seat and says, "Ashley read my letter and threw it back at me and said that she did not like candy canes!"
"She told me that she needs a break from me!"

Seriously, third grade.
So Laurel and I had a discussion about how important it is to choose good friends.  We talked about how you never know what is going on with someone at home.  I told her to be polite to little miss Ashley but we were not to lose anymore sleep over her!

It's so funny how Laurel, weeks later, says, "I'm not giving up on Ashley!"
This girl has a heart of gold!

All in a day

Our days are filled with~

 

 

Painting!

 

 

Helping little brother walk!

 

 

Making messes!

 

 

Clapping!

 

 

Pulling bowls out of the cabinet and....

 

 

playing peek-a-boo!