Funny Andrew, Serious James

I just need to write about some of the funny things my boys have done lately.

First of all, today was "performance day" at swimming lessons. This is when the parents are allowed to come and watch the last day of swimming lessons. It was so interesting to watch how different James and Andrew are. They are basically on the same level and are doing all of the same things such as jumping off the diving board, floating and such, except that Andrew can not touch the bottom of the pool yet. Their teacher Gin, usually has James show all the kids what they are going to be doing next. For example, James shows the class how to do a "soldier float." When he's done, Gin says, "who wants to be next for the soldier float?" Andrew jumps up and down, "Me, me, I want to do the soldier float!!!!!" He was so funny to watch. He was jumping all over the place, smiling, waving at me and telling all of his fellow swimmers "that's my mom" as he pointed to me. James just stood there, concentrating, following all the instructions and working hard at doing everything perfectly.

Today when I was helping Andrew go potty, he was sitting on the potty, and I was squatting down right in front of him (I'm there mostly to help him so he doesn't fall in!). We were sitting there face to face, so I said, "I love you, Andrew." He starts laughing and says, "I love yours eyes, mom....I love yours hair....(hehehe).....I love yours toes......(more laughing), then he creatively moved on to-I'm going to marry yours teeth......I'm going to marry yours knees......etc......What a silly boy he is. He is still quite the singer. He still sings Star Wars, and Harry Potter, but he is also into making up his own tunes. It is quite hilarious.

Some funny things about James-he calls hand sanitizer-"hanitizer." Pretty clever, huh? The past little while I have been reading the "Anne of Green Gables", books. So I got the movies at the library to watch. Since Mark has had sooo many church meetings lately, James has been my little buddy at night and he has watched ALL of the "Anne" movies with me. Generally, when movies get a little too intense at parts for James, he will stand up and say "oh no, oh no," and then go hide in the other room. You wouldn't think there would be any intense moments in "Anne of Green Gables", but to him, there were. When Emmaline and Anne open up the curtains and start to play on Emmaline's Grandmother's piano, James knew that this was not good and so he said the "oh no's" and left the room. When he came back, he turned to me and said, "I hate that grandma." I kept telling him that the grandma was really nice, she just wanted the attention of her family. So funny.

I never imagined myself being a mom to all boys, but I have to say that it is a lot of fun. I can't wait to see Caleb's little personality blossom. So far, he cries a lot more than James and Andrew did, however, I think that is because I can't get to him as fast because I have a lot more going on in my life than when I just had James and Andrew. Poor kid, I hope it won't effect him negatively later in life.

What we've been doing

This summer is going by way too quickly. I have already been to girls camp, and Youth Conference is coming up next week. Mark has had a ton of meetings for it, and I think everyone involved will be happy when it is finally over. Mark leaves for Youth Conference next Thursday, he gets back on Saturday, but then he leaves again for a scout camp on Monday and is gone all week. What a bummer. I'm so spoiled to have my hubby around a lot (he doesn't usually work on Friday's), and I just hate it when he's gone.

The last week of June we went Camping with our friends/cousins, Craig and Heidi Carlston and their girls. Heidi is my good friend from HS, and she is also Mark's cousin. Craig is Mark's good friend from HS. They have been our friends for along time and we love hanging out with them. They have three adorable little girls, almost exactly the same ages as our boys, but no, they will never date seeing as they are 2nd cousins! I took a few really cute pic's of our trip with them, but alas, our camera stopped working the day we came home. We camped up Blacksmith Fork Canyon, ate yummy foil dinners, played in a little creek, made s'mores, and we actually got some sleep. Both of our babies (ages 2 and 5 months at the time) did fabulously well and we didn't hear a peep from either of them until 8am! It was so fun that we have decided we need to do it again before this summer is over.

The 4th of July was great! My parents and my little sis, Melissa came up for our fireworks on the 3rd. We also had some of Mark's family over for dinner and some fun. Our neighbors always rent a giant bouncy castle for all the kids in the neighborhood each year, and the kids had fun doing that and playing in the hot tub. I also need to mention a little something about my sis, Melissa (I hope she won't mind). She is 19 and she has been dating this guy who lives in Florida since they were both 16 (they met through a mutual friend). Anyhoo, a few weeks ago, this boy (his name is Jared) got his call to serve a mission. And where did Jared get called to??? That's right, the Salt Lake City, UT mission! The exact mission my sister (his girlfriend) lives in! Poor Melissa. Neither of them are too thrilled about the idea. They are great kids. We'll see what the future holds for them.

Last week, the Carlston's took us boating and our boys LOVED IT! Neither of them wanted to get off the tube! Oh, and James and Andrew have started swimming lesson's and I can't believe it, they are doing awesome. These are the same two boys that wouldn't even get in a swimming pool, let alone put their faces in the water just 2 weeks ago! Hooray for Gin Manning! She is a miracle worker! I was so excited, Mark and I took our boys to the Aquatice Center yesterday, and it was so fun to watch them have fun and just enjoy being in water. James was practicing his underwater swim, and he actually does it really well! Caleb is just as cute as ever. He is still a little chunk and growing like a weed! I'm sure he is up to 15lbs already and he's not even 4 months old yet!

In need of a new camera

Our camera broke a few weeks ago. Dang it! We have been shopping around for a new one, but I'm not sold on one yet. We've been looking at Sony's, and the Cybershot looks nice. I would love to hear from all of my blogger buddies and hear about your camera and what you like and don't like about your's. Oh, our old camera was a Fuji. I liked it okay, but one day it just stopped working. We are going to look into getting it fixed, but we are still going to buy a new one. So let's hear about your cameras!