Children at work

Last Thursday, Patrick's firm had a bring your children to work day. Unfortunately (for me), our children were too young to attend! We decided to go to downtown Chicago and visit Patrick at work anyway!

We went to the Shedd Aquarium first and had a great time! We love the aquarium and Katelyn even knows many of the animals by name.

We then went to visit Patrick at the end of his work day and talked him into taking us to dinner. It was so fun to see his new office (What a view!) and meet many of the people he works with.

Despite a little 5 o'clock traffic stress while both kids were screaming, we had a wonderful trip and a great day.

I love Chicago and now I know that I can manage taking the kids by myself!

Katelyn is THREE!

I sincerely cannot believe that my little princess is three years old! April 20th was the long awaited day. Where does time go? Katelyn was SO excited about being three because all of her friends are already three.

Because her birthday was on Sunday, we had her little birthday party on Saturday morning. That, of course means that I was up until after midnight on Friday night trying to create some sort of castle cake mess. I have never professed to being a cake decorator and from here on out will probably be a birthday cake purchaser, but Katelyn wanted a castle and this was my best effort!
I used my cousin Melanie's recipes (her amazing cooking blog is my only motivation for cooking) and the frosting was a marshmallow frosting. It tasted wonderful, but was either not the right frosting to make a non-leaning castle or it was way above my skill level. (I venture to guess it was the latter!) Oh well, Katelyn thought it was amazing!

She wanted to have a Cinderella party so we had a Cinderella explosion! She was a beautiful, sweet little princess in her new Cinderella dress.
The girls dressed up, painted their nails, and decorated magic wands so they could go to the royal ball. Patrick was designated the part of the handsome prince. He was a good sport in helping paint nails, dance, and minimize princess drama!

So let's be honest, when you have a birthday party for your three-year-old it is as much for the mom (I admit, that's me) as the girl! I became a disneyoutlet.com addict and found little Cinderella dolls and matching Cinderella t-shirts for all the girls. They looked so cute!
From what I understand, three is the new two so we'll enter the three-year-old phase with caution! We sure love our little Katelyn and have loved every minute of her first three years. She is truly our source of entertainment, joy, and drama!

Idaho Adventure

Katelyn, Jake, and I returned last week from our first fly-with-2-kids adventure. I was a little nervous to be in the air with 2 kids by myself, but they were amazing! We had a flawless experience traveling. I was a walking advertisement for the Joovy stroller! If you haven't ever seen one, check it out!!!






One of the highlights of the trip for me was that we were able to spend some time with my grandparents. Grandpa and Grandma Walker are always so sweet to visit with and Katelyn and Jake loved them. Living so far away from family has taught me to cherish the times we get to be together, especially with my aging grandparents.



Katelyn was completely spoiled with love and attention. We had a little birthday party for her since her birthday was only a week away and she thought she was the princess of the place. Aunt Stacey and Uncle Travis made her day by giving her 2 little dancing outfits. I'm sure they don't realize that now every morning I have to be the mean mother by telling her she can't actually wear them in public!

We had a wonderful weekend with Travis, Stacey, Kurt, Michelle, Kevin, and Katie all coming to Rexburg for the weekend to see us. Thanks guys!



AND - we dug out all the scrapbook albums that we needed to determine that our little Jake is an almost identical look-a-like to his Uncle Kyle.



Seeing uncle Kevin with hair was a new experience for us! Katelyn tried very carefully to tell Kevin "I like your new haircut, but I kind of don't really like your curlers." How's that for trying to be tactful?

Thanks Grandma Laurie and Grandpa Brad for letting us crash your house! We can't wait to come back!

Daddy Day

This morning when Katelyn woke up she asked me the same question she asks me every morning. "Mom, where can be my dad?" When I answered her back that her dad was downstairs in the kitchen instead of "daddy's at work today", her entire face lit up and she said, "I can't believe I didn't even remember that today is Daddy Day."

Katelyn wants Daddy to wash her hair, Daddy to help her get dressed, Daddy to help her with her newly potty trained bathroom issues, Daddy to pretend to be the handsome prince (as opposed to Mom pretending to be the mean stepmother), and Daddy to take her to the park. That being said, I don't know who loves Daddy Day more - Katelyn or Mommy!

Encore Anyone?

This post is specifically dedicated to encouraging family members and anyone else who needs a good laugh. Katelyn has never been in a dance class and she certainly doesn't get her skills from her mother, but somewhere she has picked up a real flare for the dramatics!

Enjoy!

Dancing Queen

A Whole New Song

And finally. . .The Pout

Katelyn says. . .

For those of you who know Katelyn, you know that she is VERY verbal. It has been really fun to hear how much her vocabulary has progressed especially during the past year. One of my favorite things is to hear how she interprets even common words and makes them her own language.Here are a couple of my favorites:

Emalade = Lemonade
High Mu School = High School Musical (we LOVE it)
Mommadad = Mom & Dad (somehow we magically merge into one person when we are in the same room together
Mmmm, alicious = Mmmm, Delicious (usually said after she has convinced me to share my diet soda)
Lasterday = Yesterday or any measurement of time that isn't the present
Sirfy = Thirsty (again often used when convincing me to share my diet soda)

A couple more funnies -

On Easter, Katelyn was eating a big chocolate egg and I suggested she share with her mother. She looked back and forth between me and the egg for a while and finally said, "Mom, would you like to share my chocolate"? Before I could even answer she whispered, "say no thank you mom" and quickly inserted the entire egg into her mouth. I guess sharing wasn't as appealing to her as I thought it would be.

Because we really love drama in our house, when Katelyn gets too tired, too sassy, or just simply doesn't get her way I get told - "You've ruined my life". I seriously thought we had until she was a teenager for her to realize that our mission in life was to ruin her life.

Mother of the Year

Today has been one of those days so I thought that now that I'm a blogger I can vent on my blog!

I had big plans to take the kids to the city to see their dad at his new office, go the aquarium, go to dinner, etc. You see, today is the first day in a long time that the sun is shining, the wind isn't blowing, and it might actually hit 50 degrees. Not only am I dressed in something other than sweat pants - I'm even wearing a necklace!

We didn't quite make it out the door. Katelyn was more than tired and did nothing but temper tantrum the entire morning.

SO - as I'm sitting here feeling sorry for myself that I didn't get to go out and enjoy the decent weather I thought I would post a couple more pictures of our last week.

The other night while fixing dinner I found out that Katelyn could climb into my washing machine. I wanted to be upset and tell her how dangerous it was, but she looked so cute that I had to run and get the camera.

Jake also managed to get his first head wound this week. I have no idea how his little fingernails caused so much damage, but the poor kid looks abused.

I'm certain that these two pictures are enough evidence to convince you that I should be nominated as the next Mother of the Year!

Here's to eating out tonight, Diet Coke, Cadbury mini eggs, and a quiet afternoon with both kids napping!

Babies Don't Keep

Yesterday was Jake's 4 week birthday. I can't believe how fast 4 weeks flew by. I decided that it was about time to get off my rump and start cleaning up the 4 weeks of accumulated clutter in our house. WELL, wouldn't you know that my calm, content, and sleepy baby decided to only be calm, content, and sleepy if he was being held. At first I was a little frustrated because my day wasn't going the way I had planned it to, but I remembered a little poem that my mom used to have hanging in our house and I decided to relax!



Cleaning and scrubbing
can wait 'til tomorrow

For babies grow up
I've learned to my sorrow

So quiet down cobwebs
Dust go to sleep

I'm rocking my baby
Cause babies don't keep







So I spent the day with no shower, in my comfy clothes, and without getting as much done in my house as I had wanted to, but I enjoyed every second I spent with my little guy and my little girl in my rocking chair - cause babies don't keep!

Future American Idol

Please forgive the fact that a technically challenged mother was behind the camera (I keep forgetting that I can't take vertical movies) and enjoy the entertainment that fills my home!

Easter Celebrations

We had a wonderful Easter. We celebrated the "bunny" events on Saturday with a treasure hunt to find Easter baskets. It was so much fun and every egg that Katelyn found was exciting.


We also blessed our sweet little boy. It was a nice blessing and we were so grateful to have so many good friends in our ward who have become like family help us with the blessing.

Katelyn looked so pretty in her new Easter dress which (if I can brag a little) I found on sale for $7!


















After church, we colored our Easter eggs and had our friends Shane & Meredith Jacobs over for a fun Easter dinner. As you can tell in the picture, Katelyn had had enough fun and excitement by the time we got to dinner time!

The only thing that could have made Easter better would have been to see the temperature get out of the 30s!