Ian might be trying to send a message.

A few days ago, around 5:15am, Ian woke up asking for a bottle. Well, if he has a bottle, then he thinks the day has begun so I tried giving him his pacifier and hoping he would go back to sleep. All was quiet for a few minutes and I was thankful since I wanted to get some more sleep. My slumber was soon interupted again by his talking/whining about a bottle. Knowing that giving it to him would give me at least a little more sleep, I went to give it to him and found him with his pj bottoms pulled down, diaper off and pee soaked into all his clothes and blankets. Not what anyone would want at 5:30 in the morning, right? Alright, I give him a bottle, change him, and because I am still half asleep, I move him to a dry part of the bed with a dry blanket instead of changing the bedding right then. Bad mom, I know. Whatever. All of that bought me about two hours more sleep. Not bad expect that when I woke to his talking this time he was saying that he pooped, and indeed he had. Too bad he had taken his diaper off AGAIN before doing it. Gross!

Does this mean he is ready for potty training? What if I'm not ready? Does anyone want to do it for me? My wonderful mother-in-law got the ball rolling with Maddie's potty training after my pitiful attempts at it left us both too frustrated to make any progress. Any amazing potty training secrets I should know?

Arizona Living

In case anyone missed it, we moved to Mesa, Arizona early in August so that Spencer can pursue an MBA at Arizona State University. I am pleased to say that I no longer have to manage an apartment building. It was wonderful while it lasted, but I am happy to be past it now. We are living with my parents and I am loving being in a house! I have lived in one apartment or another since I went away to school in 1997, except one summer living with my grandma. I would have to say my favorite thing about being in a house is having a washer and dryer. And having a back yard is a really close second. When we first got here I was so in love with being able do my laundry without hiking down the hall with six or more loads to wash after scrounging for enough quarters to wash it all. I was pretty sure I could happily do 3 loads of wash a night. Evidently that was the honeymoon phase of the relationship. I still love that I can do it here so easily, but I don't really love the folding and putting away aspect. Madeleine started ballet last month and I think she is one of the cutest ballerinas ever! She loves being in her ballet clothing most of all. Last time I saw her in class she was not actually dancing so I don't know if she likes the dancing part as much, but she is crazy about the clothes. Last week, the night before ballet she very carefully laid out her clothes so they would be all ready for her in the morning. She didn't want to be late.

Madeleine also goes to preschool 4 days a week. She has a really great teacher and lots of nice kids in her class too. She only goes from 12:15-3 in the afternoons, but they eat lunch and have a snack while they are there. Doesn't that seem like a lot of eating? Don't get me wrong, that's right up my alley since I love to eat, I just think it seems like a lot.
Ian is in a shoe phase right now. He's in Maddie's boots in this picture and some of her other shoes in the next one. The shoe phase is a long one, isn't it? Seems like he's been really into trying on our shoes for awhile now. Anyway, he loves playing in the backyard! He's gotten really good at climbing up one side of the jungle gym and down the other. The kids love having a back yard to go play in. I love it too! Being able to let them take their craziness outside now and then is wonderful! And as you can see, we are so lucky to have grass in our yard. Which is quite a luxury for living in the desert. We're on an irrigation system where we flood the yard every couple weeks to water it and one major side effect is tons of mosquitos. I mean TONS! I was out one night for about 15 minutes and got over 70 bites on my legs in that time. Disgusting! I looked diseased. And I guess I could have contracted West Nile virus or something, but I don't think I did. Maybe I should check the symptoms of that. Anyway, I think the city recently fumigated or something and that seems to have helped.
Madeleine is practicing gymnastics. She has also learned how to swing by herself. Also, we have been swimming at my sister's house a couple times a week and Maddie is quite the little fish! She is so great in the water! It's awesome. Oh yeah, and 'awesome' is Maddie's new favorite word. Everything is AWESOME!
Here's our little pretty boy. He probably will go through a time in his life when he won't like that we not only took this picture, but then showed it to everyone we know, but it's just so funny! He is such a boy in every way, but he plays around the house in girl shoes quite often. Such a funny kid.

I have been super lazy with taking pictures lately, so sorry for having only these boring ones to post. I am charging my camera battery right now and I am resolving to do better. I'll try to not neglect my blog like I have been.

We are missing all of our SoCal friends tons! Our new ward seems really nice and there are quite a lot of young families here so hopefully we can find some friends here to fill the void of moving away from so many great people. Miss you all!

Yosemite, July 2008

Just before moving, we had the chance to spend a few days in Yosemite for a Rands Family reunion. It was awesome! The Rands posterity is staggering. I think Spencer's grandparents have around 70 grandkids and great grandkids (Paul, please correct me if I'm wrong on that) and there will be plenty more to come. So this was perhaps the final extended family reunion since the families are becoming too big and spread out to get together. Anyway, lucky for us we were able to attend. I had been to Yosemite as a kid when my family lived in Fresno, but I had no memories of it and how amazing it is. Here are some pics from the trip.We spent quite a bit of time playing down by this bridge because it was really close to our cabins so it was the closest spot to cool down. You see how Ian is fighting being in my arms? He couldn't wait to get down and play. Shortly after this was taken he totally charged straight into the water with all his clothes on. I don't know what he was thinking because after he did it we could tell he wasn't happy about it.Little Madeleine and her super model poses. You can see that it was a bit hazy while we were there due to fires in the area.Ian was enjoying his new favorite pastime---throwing rocks. Unfortunately he was not able to discern the small rocks, which were okay to throw and the boulders that might actually hurt someone. That and he didn't seem to grasp the whole not-throwing-directly-at-people concept.It was so great to see Holly and meet her little guy, Noah! We hadn't seen Holly since her wedding in December of 2006, so it was an extra special treat for us that she and Noah were able to come. Of course we missed Mark, who couldn't be there since he just started medical school.
One morning, Spencer and I, along with Holly and Drew embarked on a hike to Vernal Falls. That's one of the shortest hikes on the way to Half Dome. I would love to hike Half Dome someday, but this trip was too short for me to feel good about abandoning the kids and everyone else for an entire day. Anyway, the hike up to Vernal Falls wasn't too long, but it was intense. Can you tell in this picture how steep these steps are? Spencer and Drew continued on to Nevada Falls after we reached Vernal, while Holly and I headed back to our kids. The way down was about as crazy as the way up. The day after we hiked Vernal, most of our group decided to go part way up with all the kids. I remembered it was paved up to the footbridge so we could push a stroller and it wouldn't be too terrible. Plus, we thought the kids would like it. We thought Madeleine could walk since it was less than a mile. Well, sure it was paved, but it was so steep! How could I have forgotten? It was less than 24 hours after I first did it! Let's just say Madeleine is not really into hiking. Or walking for more than about 5 minutes, period. If that. Spencer had to carry her in our child carrier backpack and Ian rode in the stroller. Once we reached the bridge the kids played around, ate snacks and reluctantly posed for a picture or two.

The whole trip was so great! It was a wonderful last hurrah for us to be with all of Spencer's family before we moved further away from most of them. Our kids always love seeing Grandpa Paul and Grandma Sandi as well as their cousins and aunts and uncles. Here's hoping we don't have to wait too long to do it again!