Shiny New Haircuts

On Saturday, all the boys got haircuts. Ryan had his professionally done and I did Nathan and Aaron's. We bought a haircut kit a couple of weeks ago and it worked great on Nathan's hair. Up to this point, the majority of Nathan's haircuts have been performed by his father and a large pair of regular scissors. Ryab did a good job, but occasionally he looked a little shingled. The new clippers are great and his hair is shorter than ever, which Ryan loves. We're still just snipping Aaron's hair, but I think his next haircut will be with the clippers. We'll see how that goes. Here are a couple of pictures with the boys with their new 'dos.


Nathan is still a bat-swinging, ball-loving, energetic sports enthusiast. He found a new "bat" and "ball" this weekend. (I've come to the conclusion that at some point, nearly everything will be one or the other, or a basket, for him.) I was getting ready and he found my round brush and a cotton ball. Pretty soon he is pitching the cotton ball to himself and hitting it with the brush. Then he wanted me to pitch to him. I have to say - he's pretty good at hitting whatever is the ball with whatever is that bat. It's fun to watch, too. I especially like the action shot with the cotton ball mid-air.

Weekend in Lyman

We went up to Lyman for Mom's birthday on June 21. It was a fun weekend. We went fishing, played at the park, and just had a good time at home. Nathan likes to play ping pong and every once in awhile he'll hit the ball, but he has just as much fun trying and then chasing the balls as if he were a pro at ping pong.

Aaron kept busy crawling all over and waving hi to anyone who walked in the room - several times. He loved to be held and enjoyed crawling underneath the ping pong table.


Nathan helping Grandpa water the flowers and the grass.


We were there on Sunday when Alan, Carmen , Dallin, and Peyton "skyped" Mom and Dad (talked over the computer). Nathan and Aaron enjoyed seeing there cousins. Nathan likes to talk to Dallin on the computer and Aaron liked saying "hi."

Playing at the Park

On Saturday evening we went over the school playground to play. Nathan and Aaron had a great time. Aaron went down the slide with Mom, but his favorite was crawling through the tunnel on the playground equipment. It was a whole new experience for him. He thought it was so fun. He would crawl halfway, sit down, crawl the other way, come back towards me. Then he found the holes in the side and was waving to Dad. Then Nathan started peeking out the holes. Their smiles and giggles were a joy to see and hear.








Nathan loves parks and slides and swings. He can even swing on the big kid swing now. I think his favorite part this night, however, was all of the dandelions (white flowers) that he could play in and blow on. He was so interested in them and had fun blowing all the dried petals away.

Fishing at Bridger Lake

We headed up to Bridger Lake on Saturday morning to go fishing. It was beautiful in the Uinta Mountains and we enjoyed the pretty views on the way up and also at the lake. Nathan was very excited to ride in the canoe and go fishing. He wanted to carry his own pole.

Little Fisherman

This was Nathan's first fishing trip and first time on the canoe. He really enjoyed the canoeing. He was a little nervous as the canoe pushed away from the shore, but he did great and they made it all the way to other side to fish. Grandma and I walked around with Aaron and met the guys on the other side.

Aaron just enjoyed being outside and seeing the pretty water.

Nathan thought fishing was pretty fun at first, but it wasn't quite as action-packed as he likes. He kept himself amused by throwing rocks in the water, climbing up the mountain, and going back and forth between the 4 adults. We didn't have a lot of luck catching fish until Grandma said, "Okay this is the is last cast." What do you know? She got a bite and Nathan helped her reel it in. Then we had a fun picnic lunch in the campground.

Nathan's First Fish

My Cute Boys

I love these pictures of Nathan and me. We were matching that day and so Ryan had to take a picture. He put his arm around me and it made me feel so good. He really is a sweetheart.


We went to Park City last Friday and got to go swimming in the pool. Nathan loves to be in the pool as long as he is floating in his car. Aaron just loves to splash and be held. He loves the water! We had a fun time that day with Grandma & Grandpa Taylor and Brad, Brittany, Kyle, and Luke.

Storytime

We finally put a bookshelf up in Nathan's room where he can see his books better and pull them off to read. He loves it! Aaron likes to climb over and get some books to read, too. Nathan is so cute as he tries to read the books. Sometimes he just starts telling a story as he turns the pages. If it's a book he's really familiar with, he gets it mostly right. If it's one that is newer to him, he just makes up his own story based on the picture.



Nathan also likes to go to the library and get new books. Today he told me that we needed to take the books back and get some new ones. He puts them in the book return himself and picks out books himself- just random ones off the shelf. He doesn't even look at the cover or pictures, he just pulls a few off the shelf and we check them out. There is one common thread - the author's last name usually all begin with the same letter because we don't get too far before our bag is full. Some are good, some are weird, but he has fun picking them out "all by myself." Then he takes off around the library for a minute while I try to pick up the bag while carrying Aaron. He's not too noisy usually and we have a small library, but the check out is always an interesting experience - rounding him up and getting out the door and into the car. Gotta love the (extremely) energetic little guy.


Aaron likes the touchy-feeling books we have. He can find the touchy part on any page and likes to the pages by himself. He likes you to take his finger and point out pictures on the page and tell him what they are. Sometimes he grabs my hand so I can help him point out the pictures while we are reading. He would read the same book 50 times in a row if we let him! He always turns it right back to the beginning to start again.




Aaron loves to get in the shoes - especially Nathan's - and chew on them. They are a special treat for him I guess. We try to keep him away, but alas, he can crawl now and keeps going back for more.

Playing Basketball

Aaron is in on the basketball act now. We have a little basketball hoop where you can put the ball in and it rolls down to the bottom. At first Aaron only liked the balls to throw. Then he figured out putting them down the hole. Of course, when Aaron likes something, Nathan has to be right there. It was cute watching the two of them play basketball together for a little while. The last picture is a cute one of Aaron and you can see a blue ball that Nathan has shot arcing into the basket. I love my little ball players :)!

Crawling

After posting yesterday that Aaron couldn't crawl, he proved me wrong last night. He took a few little crawls and then we tried to get him to do more. The result is this video. Ryan kept pushing the toy out in front of him and he kept going after it. It was pretty amazing. He still scoots on his bottom some, but he crawled some more this morning, so I think he knows he can do it. I apologize for my laughing and commentary. At the end I say "Dad, that's mean" and Ryan says, "just showing his potential." Pretty fun. Nathan was proud of him , too.

Aaron's Check-up & New Summer Resolution

Aaron is now 9 months old and growing up so fast! He can't crawl yet, but he can sure get around and get what he wants. He rolls, sits up, rolls some more, gets on his knees, reaches out, falls down, scoots on his bottom - it's pretty amazing to watch. I think he's going to be a problem-solver. He's getting a little more demanding, but still incredibly pleasant. He's saying "mamamamamama" (I'm calling it good for saying mama), dada, nana (could be Nathan?:), and every time we go outside he says, "uhh." Being his mother, I'm translating that as "outside." He wants to pull himself up on furniture but hasn't quite got that down yet. I can't believe how much he is growing and what he can do.

Aaron especially likes crawling around on the kitchen floor and playing with chairs. He gets himself under, but usually can't figure out how to get back out. Nathan, of course, always wants to be where the action is :). They play peek-a-boo under the kitchen table and both get giggling. Those are precious moments for me.


Aaron has 6 teeth- 4 on top and 2 on bottom and smiles and giggles a lot to show them off. He's got quite a cute smile. I need to get a good picture of it - sometime when he is laughing. That will be on my list of shots to get for this week and next post.

He still seems like a chunker to me - he weighs 19 pounds, 6 ounces and is 27.5 inches long. That puts him in the 30th percentile for both height and weight. I thought he'd be higher on the weight curve, but I think that's because Nathan was so small. He is healthy, happy and all is well, for which I am very grateful. He is still about the 100th percentile for head size, so he's got a big noggin, but it's sure cute!

I haven't been very good recently at taking pictures or posting them on the blog. I am going to try to do better and keep this updated weekly. I feel like I'm too busy to blogging or scrapbooking (haven't done any in about 6 months and I was already 3 or 4 months behind- do the math- yikes!) but I can't figure out where I spend all of my time. As the boys get bigger and the weather gets nicer we do spend a lot of time out of doors, which is fun, but I am going to make a better effort to keep up-to-date. It's important to me and I hope I look back and am grateful I did. I'm not a great journal writer, so this helps me at least keep track of what's going on.

Baseball

Nathan is still loving basketball, but as we head outside more he is enjoying taking his baseball bat and balls to the park to play since the basketball hoops outside are too high. I love having a park so close - we head over there almost every day, sometimes more than once a day. Aaron will sit in his stroller or on the blanket on the grass and just watch. He claps for Nathan and tries to eat grass. He's very pleasant and easy to take. Nathan will hit balls and then pitch some to me and then run off to the slide or the swing. It's fun when both of the boys are in the swings together. They look so cute swinging side by side.

It always takes awhile to actually get to the park, even though it's practically in our (nonexistent) backyard. Nathan likes to stop and look at potato bugs, pick up rocks and look for pretty flowers (dandelions). Here he is throwing rocks into the storm drain. Pretty exciting for a 2 year-old. He spends about 10 minutes doing this before we can move on.

Aaron loves to be outside and just enjoys the ride. He also likes to chew on Nathan's bat or play with the balls when they are not in use.



Batter-up! Nathan is a good at posing and saying "cheese." Even when I'm trying to get candid shots, he notices, stops, and grins.