In other news....

We are moving! After years of wanting to move to the East, we are moving to PA. Joe is going to grad school there and we are closing on our house either this week or next week. Once we close we drive out there. I know...shocker. We have sold all of our big furniture other than a few pieces that we felt would be good to have. We are mostly packed. Mostly. On Wednesday the big moving freight arrives and we will pack it up. So much to do so little time. It is crazy over here. In other news news,Samuel has broken the potty training barrier. He no longer needs diapers or help going to the potty. He goes on his own. Of course he likes gumballs for going potty and he no longer naps, but not having to buy diapers is awesome. We promised the boys that we would take them to Goblin Valley, so the weekend before this past weekend we went. It was a fun and very spontaneous trip. We visited Goblin Valley State Park, camped in Hanksville (and gotten eaten alive by mosquitoes), visited Natural Bridges National Monument, visited Monument Valley, visited Four Corners (and had two tired sleepy boys that were cranky about being there and ate some Fry bread), went to Mesa Verde and camped there, hiked to Spruce Tree House at Mesa Verde and drove some of the loops, drove to Arches and did a couple of hikes there and then drove home. Pictures and more details will come later...

Crazy Days

To say life is busy would be an understatement. We are finishing the final preparations on our house. Tomorrow the carpet guy comes to measure and hopefully give us a good quote. Last Friday my family was sealed to Jessica, Robert, Destiny, and Kayla. It was amazing to see Kayla so grown up with her siblings. They are really beautiful children (now teenagers and pre-teens). Joseph and Samuel are getting bigger. Joseph has another loose tooth. He also did a second Great Brain project on the weathering and erosion of Goblin Valley. I will post pics later. He was excited because he got a genius rating again. He is finishing up kindergarten which is crazy. Joseph is a smart little boy. He is doing first grade math and first grade reading. I like to see him reading. One of his favorite things to do is to play video games.

Our stubborn little stinker

Samuel is quite the little talker. He is quite conversational and will talk your ear off given the chance (as long as he knows you and is comfortable with you). We have been trying to potty train him. Peeing he has down, pooping has been a challenge. We have tried all sorts of bribery, encouragement, withholding, candy, toys, and the list goes on. We were desperate. We told him that if he pooped once in the toilet we would give him a Trash Pack Garbage Truck. He did it and we gave it to him, but then he decided not to go poop in the toilet again for days. Well, last week we went to Salt Lake to pick up a chair for our house. He hadn't gone poop at all on the previous day despite sitting on the toilet for hours (with breaks). I knew he needed to go, but he was being stubborn and wouldn't go. Well, I was running lots of errands and was worried about an accident in the car. I decided to put a pull up on him to prevent an accident. My bad. Within 5 minutes of having the pull up on he pooped. We were on our way to Gymboree because he needed new sandals. There is a nice little splash area for kids to play. I told Joseph that after we left Gymboree we would go and he could run in the water. Samuel wanted to run too, but I told him that it was only for big boys who pooped in the potty. I felt so bad for not letting him go and play, but I think it triggered something for him. The next day we were going to the library and I told him he needed to poop before we left. He did. Not that it has been smooth sailing since then. He likes to carry around a toy wagon filled with little people. I had to take it away from him when he refused to poop in the toilet. The day after the first successful non crying poop, he came downstairs after dinner (he had refused to poop at all during the day). I heard him yell from downstairs, "you can keep the green car tonight mommy." I knew that he planned on pooping in his underwear. I ran downstairs and up to his toilet. It was too late. Little stinker. The past couple of days he has done a little better. I told Samuel that if he started pooping in the toilet he wouldn't need naps anymore because he is a big boy. I put him down for a nap yesterday and came downstairs to look at some stuff that I needed to get done on the computer. I hear a yell from upstairs saying "I went poop." I jumped out of my seat and ran upstairs to see if I needed to clean the accident I was sure had happened. Instead, I found him in the dark bathroom standing over his toilet with a large poop in the toilet. Wow. He had gotten out of bed and gone to the bathroom by himself. He then stated that he didn't need a nap because he went poop in the toilet. He was tired the rest of the day, but he didn't nap. I was so excited. We will see what happens today. I told him if he pooped today we would go to the little splash park today. He also names his poops when he sees them. He has told us he has done: Christmas tree poop Ice cream cone poop Monster poop City man poop Broken snake poop Banana poop Mountain poop Brown pee poop Island poop Sneaky Caterpillar poop Mushroom poop Big poop Teenie tiny poop We have started to keep track for blackmail in the future.... Also, this is how you will see Samuel if he thinks things are going to be scary or are too loud. Yesterday we went to the Art City Days in Springville with a friend and her kids. It was a lot of fun and yesterday they had lots of craft stations. If kids completed 5 crafts they got a prize. We were at the tinfoil art station and it was next to the balloon art station. Lots of popping balloons meant Samuel stayed like this for a long time. It took a lot of convincing to get him to let his arms down.