Big brother Joseph

These pictures were taken before we left for the doctor. Joseph was trying to be helpful and take Samuel's temperature for me. He is so helpful and sweet. I love both of my boys so much!

Real Salt Lake Game

Last Wednesday we went to a Real Salt Lake Game. It was a CONCACAF Champions game against Aribe Unido. The weather was great (aside from the thunderstorm earlier in the day) and it was cool and breezy. In the distance you could see the lightning, but we stayed nice and dry and enjoyed (for the most part) the game.


The sunset. It was a beautiful night to be at a soccer game.

The start of the game. Who knew it would be a frustrating event when the players first came on the field. It was funny to see them zooming the cameras around the crowd. People were doing the truffle shuffle and the chicken dance. I am just glad the camera never came our direction.

Real Salt Lake scores a goal and ties up the game. The other team had "injuries" most of the game. They had one player red carded and another that was ejected. In the end, we won 2-1, but it wasn't fun to watch the other team randomly fall down and fake their injuries. There was 8 minutes of stoppage time added to the end of the 2nd half.

Daddy and Joseph. Samuel got to stay home with grandpa. All in all, it was a fun night. I especially loved the pecans that I ate. :)

Sick Samuel

Samuel taking his own temperature. He is becoming a pro at it because he still has a fever.

Since Monday, Samuel has had a fever. It was in the low 100's, but last night was at a 102. This morning it went from 102 to 103 in a matter of minutes, so I decided (against my better judgement) to take him to the doctor. I am afraid that he will have a febrile seizure like Joseph did, so I wanted to be safe. Of course, I know the time period for fevers (if it is longer than 4-5 days and his only started on Monday), but part of me hoped it was a simple ear infection that would require an antibiotic. Yet again, the doctor told me to watch him and if it hasn't passed by Friday to go back in. I should know better by now. It is a waste of a copay each time I get told the same thing. It would be a virus and not a bacterial infection, so there is nothing to do but let it pass. Viruses are so not conducive to a worried mother.

I wish I was Samuel...for reals

Since Samuel is smaller, he gets a lot of attention from everyone. People often come around and they will go crazy over Samuel and Joseph is kind of left on the fringes. I feel bad for my little guy. After they go crazy over Samuel, they often say, "hi Joseph" as an afterthought. Joseph usually waits for someone to pay attention to him (mommy doesn't count). He usually says, "I wish I was Samuel...for reals." When I ask him why, he says "Because." He has expressed this sentiment often and each time I express that we love him. It breaks my heart. Sometimes he tries to do what Samuel does for attention...not always the best thing, but it makes him feel more noticed.

I have been trying to spend more time with him. The other day he asked us what the biggest number was and we explained infinity to him. He thought about if for a couple of days and asked why there couldn't be an end to numbers. My little thinker (as he named his wolf from Build-a-Bear). :)

Questions, questions, too many questions...

Joseph asks a lot of questions about anything and everything. He asks me what will help him grow and what will not be good for him. Some of his most recent questions:

"Will french fries help me grow?" (me: "No they don't help you grow")
"I wonder why I like them so much?"
"Mommy, do cookies help me grow?" (me: "No, but they do taste good and are okay sometimes.")
"I wonder why I like them so much?"
"Mommy, does ice cream help me grow?" (do you sense a trend?)
"Does chocolate help me grow?"

Statement

Joseph: "I wonder why they call them cowboys because they don't ride cows."

Samuel is also talking a lot more. When I ask him to, he says "up peaz" and gets a huge goofy grin on his face. He is fascinated with rocks lately and loves to collect them just like Joseph did. His personality shines through often. Samuel still has his temper tantrums, but he is a lot easier to get to bed than Joseph. I sing him some songs and rock him and then lay him down. He usually goes down without fussing too much. Usually. :) Another favorite thing for him right now are french fries. When we drive by In-N-Out, he usually will try and get our attention and then signs eat. Silly boy. He also loves pudding and popcorn. Don't worry...that isn't all he eats. He is a fairly good eater. Put peas, corn, pasta, carrots, rice, and many other yummy foods in front of him and he eats like crazy.

Joseph has also mastered going to the toilet all by himself without his seat!! Yay!!!! He has also gotten very good at procrastinating going pee in the toilet, so on some occasions, well, you can guess what happens. He is also sounding out very basic words and starting to ask what words mean. Some of his new favorite words are distracted and annoying. My little teenager. ;) The other day he asked how to spell rat. We sounded it out and he was able to determine what letters were making the sounds and spelled it. I need to work on it more so he will start to read by himself. Joseph has also discovered a deep interest in rescue heroes.

We watched a Bill Nye on gravity and he and Samuel were laughing a ton when he was throwing things off a building to demonstrate that everything falls. Now Joseph says when we are walking up hill that it is hard because we are fighting gravity and it is easier going down hill because gravity helps us.

Minus the toilet seat

So today we are starting to work on Joseph going poops without his toilet seat. He came to let me know he needed to go poop, so I took him to the bathroom. I have been warning him the past couple of days of our plans for today. He got very upset and started to cry. He earned a nap for that action. I then told him that he had 2 options: I would help him get on the toilet without his seat or he could get the seat himself and climb on if he wanted to use it. I left him in the bathroom thinking about it. I just went back to the bathroom and asked what he had decided.

Mommy: "Joseph what did you decide to do?"
Joseph: "Option 3."
Mommy: "There is no option 3."
Joseph: "Yes there is. You put me on the toilet with my seat."

I can tell this is going to be exciting. :P

New words...

"bread", "apple juice", "peaz (please)"

Joe's latest project

Looking for gnomes in all the wrong places...

My parents went with my brothers to Washington before he leaves for Iraq. They left on Thursday evening. I decided to take the girls to the Dinosaur museum at Thanksgiving Point. We decided to look for the 13 gnomes that are hidden throughout the museum. We only found 8 of the 13, but that is an improvement over the previous time.


They have changed the activity center. The kids loved it. We spent a good amount of time in there.

They almost didn't charge me for the girls. I have to bring up the fact that they are not on our family pass. It would have saved me $8, but I wanted to be honest. There have been a few other times that they didn't charge me for the kids and I have had to let them know.

The kids on our favorite picture taking spot...the protoceratops.

One of the gnomes hidden on the giant sea turtle. I guess they move the figurines on occasion. The paintings will always be there and I think that we found all of them.

Samuel likes the large dinosaur puzzle slots. He gets angry if you try to pull him away, especially when you try to take one from his hand.

Company party

This year Joe's company had their company party at the Hogle Zoo instead of Lagoon. It was closer and a lot of fun. Joe won a prize.


Do not feed the animals. Joseph and his hippo smile.


Joseph at the giraffe area. It was warm outside, so it was nice to get in a shaded area.


Samuel in his stroller. He seemed to have a good time, but he wanted out to walk.


Us on the carousel. Spinning makes Joe sick, so I went on with the boys. Neither of them wanted to get on an actual animal that went up and down.


We got to see lots of animals and the boys enjoyed themselves, Joseph probably more so than Samuel.

I am glad that Joe's company opted out of having it at Lagoon. We got to ride the train, eat some fajitas.

New words

"how are you?" (sounds more like howru)
"bite"

Pics

We had a big box for packing and the boys loved playing inside of it. I can't remember how long they were inside, but they played and played.

The cousins sharing some blueberries. Joseph's cheeks are stuffed to the brim with blueberries. At least he shared. :)

Nathan decided that Samuel needed some helping stuffing berries in his mouth, so he was happy to oblige.

All the Rankin male grandkids together for a family photo. We couldn't let them do it on their own, so here are the tired mommies doing some crowd control.

Our cute little nephew Christopher. It was great to meet him before he leaves for London.

More new words

Hi, papa (grandpa), nana (banana)

Strange coincidence...or a sign

So last night I woke up from a nightmare where someone hurt Samuel badly. I woke up and almost started to cry. I prayed and went back to sleep. The place where he got hurt was Riley Street. We are looking at houses and I woke up telling myself that we wouldn't buy a house on Riley Street. Of course, we weren't looking at any houses on a Riley Street, so no big deal. Right? Right. Well, we went to look at houses in Springville. One of the houses we went to look at (where the realtor had put the wrong address on the MLS, so we drove around to all possible coordinates with the same numbers) was an older home. As we walked up to the door, on the sidewalk written in chalk over and over again, was the name Riley. Doo, doo, doo, doo,doo, doo, doo, doo... Coincidence or sign?