On a walk. We don't do this a lot anymore because Dylan is a whopping 42 lbs. He is pretty fast on his little balance bike and can keep up with me so that's usually what we do. Actually, truth be told, most times I have to pick up the pace to keep up with him:
We went up to the Rod and Jana Thorley's in Frisco for Nate's Open House farewell. He's pretty stoked about serving his mission in Brazil. Only 17 more years until this mini missionary has his turn to go off into the world:
Don't say good-bye yet, sweet boy. You are still my baby for now:
A tie and cowboy boots for church, just like daddy:
The Tahoe exaggerates, but it kind of felt like 183* that day when it was actually 103*. It has been a relatively mild summer down here. Today it was cloudy and 80* and a lot of my friends didn't want to come to the splash pad today with us because it was 'too cold'. That's Texas for you.
45 Month Update:
*Dylan has now been on all of the huge tunnel slides at Hawaiian Falls and loves them all. His favorite is "the Red Slide". It's a completely dark tunnel with flashing colored lights that plays a song of your choice on the way down. He usually picks "The Mack Song" ('Life is a Highway' from the movie Cars) or "I Like to Move it" (from the movie Madagascar). Now it is really fun for us to go to the water park with him. For a kid that was afraid of some weird things (the play tunnel on his tent, dogs, bounce houses, blow up beds/pools, electric garage doors, electric toy cars...most of these were sound related fears and he has since outgrown all of them), he sure is brave with slides and roller coasters that some adults have a hard time with.
*Dylan will frequently say things like, "Thanks for making me food" or "Thanks for helping me." Sometimes he can be a stinker, but he does have good manners.
*Before he went to Hannah's birthday party he said, "My mission is to go to Hannah's party and make her feel special." He then said it before Calvin's party last week. (It's something Mike the Knight would say. "My mission is to...")
*Dylan spilled his drink and said, "It's ok. It's going to be fine. Don't worry about it." I'm not sure if he was talking to me or himself.
*He loves to build tall 'statues' of himself with his 24 huge Lego blocks.
*I'm still not sure what to make of this: Dylan woke up one day and said, "The flashy lights came in my room and scared me. Can I take my toy gun to be with me to bed?" UFO? Bad dream? The neighbor's headlights? No idea...
*Dylan gets all excited when Colton walks saying, "He took lots of steps, Shilo!" Also, he has taken to calling us Autrey and Shilo instead of mom and dad a lot of the time. Odd, but kind of amusing.
*In his sleep he called out "Shilo! Shilo! I need my flashlight!" We play ABC Hunt in the dark with a flashlight to look for letters I hide in his room in plain sight to help him learn the letter names and sounds. Huge hit as far as games go. I just told him we would play the next day and he rolled over and got quiet again.
*Dylan cracks me up. "Thumbs down means bad and thumbs up means good. That was a bad choice. Thumbs down!"
*Dylan hasn't really enjoyed coloring much, but this week his interest picked up. He did an awesome job coloring a picture of a red flower and insisted it be hung up on the fridge. He used both his right and left hand.
*Dylan also was really struggling with the cutting motion until this week. He mostly used his right hand.
*Since Dylan's motor skills were on a roll this week I had him trace shapes I drew and then glue dry pinto beans to outline them. With as careful as he is lining up his cars, I knew he would love this...as long as he didn't get his fingers in the glue.
15 Month Update:
*Colton got his 2nd tooth (bottom right front tooth) and 3rd tooth (top left front tooth)! It's changed his whole look. I could be wrong since he doesn't have his other bottom tooth yet, but it looks like he's going to have the Miller trait of the bottom two teeth overlapping a bit like I do.
*Colton is taking a lot of steps on his own (10-15) but doesn't do it all the time. Last night was the first time he went from a crawling position to standing without using something to help him up.
*Autrey was talking about turning on the fan and Colton looked up and pointed at it.
*Colton waves "bu-bba" (bye-bye) to people as they are leaving. He also loves to look and wave at "bubbas" (birds or puppies) every time he sees one. "Bubba" also means 'ball' or 'baby'.
*When I ask, "Where are your toes?" he will put his leg up in the air and look at his toes.
*Autrey likes to say that Colton is part monkey because he likes to climb on EVERYTHING.
*Not only can he get on his toy push truck, but now he can make it go forwards and backwards. He also loves to push and steer his push walking toys.
*Colton doesn't prefer green vegetables coming at him on the spoon. He will eat it, I just have to distract him so he doesn't see it coming. A few times he has spit it out. I blame Aunt B for his dislike of the color green in his food. Haha.
*He likes to drink out of open cups. He makes a mess and usually starts coughing when he gets too much, but does it anyway. Including in the bath. Yuck. He also likes to try to use straws and 'drink' from my closed water bottle.
*He is very good at pointing and 'asking' for what he wants. Many times it is whatever anyone else is eating.
*Colton anticipates when to push the tiger roaring sound button when reading the tiger counting book we have.
*He loves to push the button to shut the garage door. Dylan gets to open it and Colton gets to close it. Otherwise Dylan gets upset about not getting a turn.
*When you say, "Give kisses" Colton will open his mouth and go for it. He is pretty cuddly and sometimes gives unsolicited hugs, kisses, and cuddles. He also likes to play with hair.
*Sometimes he will fold his arms when we pray.
P.S.:
*Autrey and I went to our ward temple night for the 1st time with Janson and Meagan Kemp. Yay!
*I started Jillian Michael's 30 Day Shred workout. I love P90X, but 20 minutes is much better than 60-90 minutes each day in my life right now. I'm still on Level 1 out of 3, if that tells you how intense those 20 minutes are.
*We went to Keio Vaenuku's funeral in Euless 2 weeks ago. He was going to play football at the U of U this year and died in a car crash. Autrey was his Young Men's leader when we lived there. Very sad, but you would be hard pressed to find stronger people than Tongans, both physically and spiritually.
*I got LASIK and LOVE it, now that all the pain is gone. I can see 20/15. Thanks, Doug and Mona!
*Autrey and I finally got Smartphones. Now we just have to learn to be smart users. Anyone have a 12 year old you could lend us? Haha. But really...
