her spunkyness

lyla just learned "don't!" it's one of those funny/bummer moments that seem to flow freely with parenthood. on one hand, it is really funny to her her little voice say, "don't!" on the other hand, it's not the most pleasant of words. but along with her spunkyness comes such a fun and sweet side. she is such a gift.

corny fun

our church went to the corn maze in meridian yesterday. it was so much fun! these are some of the kiddos that were there...julia, luke, mary and eli

the moo train...

moo.

lyla and me. she really got into it and walked most of the way.

i've never seen on of these, but it is my new favorite bouncing contraption.

eli LOVED it. this is his, "i'm having tons of fun" face

i can't believe we got both kids to put their heads in those holes...it's really something of a miracle.

family slide...choo choooooo

these two are so cute together

they had a "corn box," which was another huge hit...and a lot less messy than sand.

luke and eli on the peddle cars. they have good fun together.

where does it come from!?!

with still half the stick in the wrapper, lyla was finished with her string cheese. i asked eli if he wanted it, he asked, "did you bite off lyla's bite?" what? seriously? he didn't say "cooties," but he didn't have to. that's exactly what he meant.

apple picking

we went apple picking a few days ago. the kids had a good time, but i'm beginning to think i'm apple picking cursed. last year was a blowout. this year lyla was battling a cold, the kids woke up really early that morning and had been crabby...which makes me crabby. but it ended up going well.

lyla loved what she called an "ap," but it soon became, "ap-ple." i can't believe how much she's talking these days. this evening she handed me a toy hippopotamus and said, "hip-po." i love this age!

lyla saw the boys in action and ran to participate.

papa and eli getting the good ones

my sweet boy

big impressions

my mom and i had a cup of coffee after lunch today. we were at this really fancy restaurant, and when i say "fancy," i mean it had nice play equipment for the kids. anyway, they had those little cups of creamer that have the foil/paper lid that you peel off. eli wanted to drink one so bad, so i let him finish off one that i half used.

he said, "this is my spirit"

i'm thinking, "what? has he been watching some crazy halloween program on tv that i somehow missed?...some witch potion show or something?"

seeing my confusion, my mom mouths to me, "communion!"

the guy was taking communion with a coffee creamer at burger king. how sweet is that?

communion has made a huge impression. he acts it out and talks about it all the time. he believes in Jesus and His death on the cross, as much as a three year old can, so we've decided that we are going to let him partake next time we have it. i really can't wait.

birthday dinner

yesterday was my mom's birthday, so we celebrated with a dinner party at our house. we had a good dinner and apple crumb pie for dessert. i honestly think eli had more fun than my mom...not that she didn't have a good time, but eli just likes birthdays that much.

after we sang "happy birthday," lyla was singing, "happy...happy...happy," it was so cute.
and she had reason to sing, she has a really fantastic grandma. we are blessed to have her in our lives. happy birthday, mom! we love you lots.

and today is my brothers birthday, happy birthday jesse! hope you had a great day...wish we could have celebrated with you:(

give up?

while adam and eli were play fighting...

eli - forgive up!

adam - what???

eli - forgive up or i'll get you!

helper

eli has been really wanting to help us lately. the other night he helped me cut up vegetables for soup. he cut all of the yellow squash with a butter knife. i was very impressed with not only his desire to help, but also his ability to do so. he was excited with his accomplishment.

more dinner conversations

we've all been sick and lyla is tired of the chicken vegetable soup we've been eating for dinner every night. so last night to keep her busy during dinner i gave her some baby puffs i had left over from her babyhood. of course, eli wanted some. he started passing them out to us saying, "forgive in Jesus." it took me a minute, but soon i realized he was giving communion. he continued and said, "you get a forgive in Jesus because you're really nice." i told him that God loves us even when we're not nice. "really!?! WOW!" with a big smile. yes, really.

a few minutes later...

adam - eli, please don't pick you're nose at the table
eli - why?
adam - because it's rude
eli - but it's forgive in Jesus!

bitty baby

we had a doctors appointment today for lyla. it was a "shot" appointment. she did about the same as eli did at that age, which means a lot of crying. as soon as the doctor touched her the wailing began. she cried and trashed through the whole exam and shots, then promptly stopped when a sucker was introduced...for about a minute. then she had time to think of the torture she'd gone through and began again.

she has gained all of 2 oz since her one year appointment, which puts her in the 7% range. weighing in at 19lbs 10oz. she eats a ton , usually more than eli, so she just must have her daddy's metabolism. lucky. she is 31.5 inches tall, 75%.

she is learning new words every day now. she has quite the vocabulary...favorite words being, dada, daddy, dog, horse and hi.

choo choo

waiting...can you feel the anticipation?

all aboard!

monkeys!

a random act of cousinly love

i miss these guys, can't wait until christmas

harvest fest

the harvest fest at far west nursery is becoming a family tradition. they have games, prizes, face painting, a bounce house, pumpkins to color and hay rides (or more like hay races this year). this is eli today and also his first time at the fest when he was one...

lyla really enjoyed coloring her pumpkin...

us on the hay race...

growin' fast

every time we eat somewhere that has chopsticks eli has to try them, mostly because dadam uses them. the sticks always give way to the fork as he eats his mushroom chicken. but tonight he figured out how to use them and was chowing down mushrooms, which normally end up solitary on his plate. yippeee for chopsticks!

la brea

we visited the la brea tar pits while we were there. they have a museum with many of the fossils found on site, but more interesting than that are the actual tar pits. right there in the middle of a HUGE city are ponds of tar, just bubbling up out of the ground.

i'm not sure why, but seeing tar come straight out of the ground is really cool. they have many large tar pits on the grounds that you can look at but are fenced off. this must have been new because there was nothing around it, well, except us.

i love this picture, it reminds me of a happy childhood

super star

we were able to see shane play in a soccer game while we were in la. it was very entertaining in a few ways. one was to watch the "daisy pickers," as my brother calls them. they are the ones who are looking down at the flowers/bugs/grass, while the others are trying to get the ball. but on the other side, you have kids like shane. he scored all the points for his team and was red faced and panting the whole time. he definitely has a healthy spirit of competition.

jesse giving the kids some wise soccerly advice

our la trip

i asked eli what his favorite part of our trip was, after we went through the "playing with shane" bit again, the beach was his answer.

eli "shooting" random stuff