Recently

Some cute pics of the kids:

He loves getting his hair done by dad these days. He's so grown up.

Our little Ruthie Bear gave her first talk a few weeks ago. She did a fabulous job, even though we only had it prepared two days in advance. The topic was "Jesus Christ teaches me to choose the right." We found pictures of Jesus' life and then she would say, "Jesus teaches me to choose the right and to get baptised" or whatever the picture was of. She had it all memorized so I just had to show her the picture, to remind her what came next, before holding it up for the rest of the primary to see.

 ultrasound pic at 35 weeks, lovin' the cheeks!

I've been having tons of contractions in the evenings, for three days now. I remember that being the case with Ruth. I was madly timing contractions and always disappointed they only lasted 30 seconds. So far these are lasting up to about 10 and only a few minutes apart, but once I go to bed they slow down. Also, baby dropped the other night. It was the first time I had actually experienced the baby dropping...like I literally felt her working her way down and out of my ribs, it was super uncomfortable but cool. I'm feeling like there's no way I'm making it to our due date of May 31st, but we'll see.

Easter

So the Easter Bunny is real, in case anyone out there was wondering. Brad's been working tons so we were going to do our Easter on Tuesday, but Sunday morning we woke up to find eggs all over our front lawn! We were all super surprised. Will couldn't wait to dig in!

While I'm Thinking About it

I wanted to record personality traits about Ruth and Will while I was thinking about it.

At 3 1/2 Ruth is more outgoing than ever. She loves to talk to people at the grocery store, at the pool, ANYWHERE. She loves to dance and comes up with little routines and tricks. She has an amazing memory. She can tell us the name of songs that come on after like 2 seconds of it turning on. She is daring and loves to try new things especially physical tasks like monkey bars or touching animals at the zoo. She is very uninhibited in her personality and physicality. People are often telling me how well she speaks and how intelligent she seems. I too am often blown away by things she says, like the other day she said, "What if I don't want to grow up to be a mommy. It might be scary!" I just told her that some times it is scary and gave her a hug. Today Brad told her that she and Will had to eat their breakfast at the table instead of at the TV because Will makes a mess with cereal. She came back a few minutes later and said that Will agreed to not make a mess so they could eat their breakfast while watching shows!

At one month shy of 2 years old, Will has become a funny man. He loves to point out things that are: silly, funny, and wacky. He loves making jokes and often laughs at himself. He is very capable physically and likes to practice kicking, throwing and climbing, although he is more reserved than Ruth. He is very cautious in new situations and likes to stay very close to parents and observe what normal behavior is before jumping into new tasks. (examples are at the pool, petting zoo and hop-to-it, he is very upset for several minutes unless being held, then slowly acclimates to his surroundings.) Through all the mimicking of Ruth that he does, he has learned to count most of the way to 10 and is working on his colors. One of his new favorites is coloring. His love for rhythm has also increased to the point that he now is making drum sticks out of anything he can find.

I know we're not supposed to compare our kids, but I love that they are different. Ruth is free-flowing and care-free and Will loves the preciseness of drums and is cautious about his surroundings. I love my kids and can't wait to see what kind of a personality #3 has.

Las Vegas Trip

We went back to Las Vegas so Brad could go to the Wyndham Global Conference, thanks to his company for paying for the hotel room and gas! Brad had a great time at all his meetings, received a Chairman's Award, and got to meet all the big-wigs associated with Wyndham hotels. He came away really motivated and with lots of ideas to better himself and his hotel. And he got to meet Captain America and Thor.

The kids and I had a fun time swimming in the Luxor pool, visiting the zoo, eating their first Happy Meals, playing at a park, eating lots of frozen yogurt (there was a self serve place right outside the elevators we used in our hotel) and relaxing in our hotel room.

One of the funniest things that happened on this trip was Ruth's reaction to palm trees. The first one she encountered she ran right up to, turned around and started bouncing up and down trying to scratch her back. Then she stepped away and said, "Ow that hurts!" Can you tell she was watching Jungle Book on the way down to LV?

One of the kids' favorite things was riding on escalators, elevators and the monorail that goes between Mandalay Bay, Luxor and Excalibur. Tuesday was a bit of a grumpy day for the me and the kids. I took them to see the sharks at Mandalay Bay which they hated and the only thing that made them happy until dad showed up were the escalators and monorail. Later that day we went to Circus Circus and watched a fun circus show and played lots of kid games.

As a family we had fun eating at the Rain Forest Cafe (service sucked, food was ok...the refillable ICEES was exciting...decor was AMAZING and we got to sit right by the gorillas),

seeing the M&M movie, seeing Tournament of the Kings and generally seeing the sights and lights of LV. Tournament of Kings was the last thing we did Wednesday night and it was the perfect way to wrap up the trip. We got to watch a fun show with knights, horses, fire, dancing princesses and dragons, all the while eating chicken and roasted potatoes with our hands and making as much noise as possible...it was the perfect kid event that Brad and I loved too. Also a great b-day present for me!