Happy 4th of July!

Well, I'm a few days late, but better late than never. This was Hudson's first 4th of July spent at home (we were in Montana last year), so we decided to make the most of it.

IMG_4122, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

Everybody loves a parade, right? Woodbridge has a small community parade each year. We've never gone to it but decided to check it out. It wasn't very big - just a few small floats, some cars, and lots of kids getting to ride their bikes all decked out for the 4th of July - but it was actually quite fun. We even scored some candy! (It doesn't hurt to have a cute little guy sitting right next to you).

IMG_4463, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

After the parade, we headed to one of our pools with some friends to cool off. Once Hudson got ahold of this water gun, it was all over! :)

IMG_4178, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

After Hudson's nap, we headed to the church for our stake 4th of July celebration. They have a big barbecue - Teriyaki chicken, Korean Barbecue, steak... very traditional American fare - and then have a few bands (comprised of stake members) who provide the entertainment. It's a lot of fun.

IMG_4166, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

We made the smart choice to sit in the front row (aka, the first row of parking spaces) so that there would be some area in front of us for Hudson to run around. With them expecting around 1,000 people for the event, we didn't want to be tracking him down through the middle of the crowd (parking lot)

It was a good move, although it provided Hudson easy access to check out the band equipment. But wait, it gets better...

IMG_4184, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

Yeah - don't mind him - he's with the band. During one of the bands, Hudson decided that he should get a little closer and take a look at those guitars. The picture doesn't really do this justice - the other person close-up on the right was the person videoing the performances. Other than that, there was a huge open space before the throngs of people. So, you basically have the band on "stage", with this little tiny groupie getting right in their faces during the middle of one of their songs. It was really funny - he was providing a great deal of entertainment just standing there looking up at them. I knew we probably needed to go get him, but I was laughing too hard and didn't want to walk right up there in front of everyone in the middle of the song. During one of the guitar solos, I was finally able to go grab him - much to his chagrin.

IMG_4186, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

Fortunately, Hudson left the band alone, and then just started playing on the grassy area next to the band with some of the other kids. he was having such a great time dancing to the music and running around. For a little bit, he would run down the hill, run up to me, and give me '10', while both of us would go 'Aaaaahhh!!!!'. It was hillarious. We both just laughed so hard. We almost felt bad taking him home at 7:30 to put him to bed - I don't think he has had that much fun somewhere in a while!

IMG_4201, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

Ok, it's a pretty lousy fireworks shot, but it's all we have. We weren't even planning on watching fireworks. With them not starting until around 9:00, there wasn't any way we wanted Hudson to stay up that late to go out and see them. Well, as the community fireworks started, I thought I'd just glance out our window to see if we could see them... and there they were! So Tennyson and I sat down on the floor in our bedroom, and watched them out our sliding window. (The white in the pic is our curtain, and the brown bar is the top of our outside deck railing). I've been annoyed that they cut the trees down outside this window, but it looks like at least one good thing came from it!

Such a fun, long day. Glad we don't do this everyday - but fun to have a packed day like this once in a while!

Look, I'm kinda pretty

Blog makeover!

I'm still not so sure about the stripes down the side, and I think I want to make the text wider, but this will do for now! :)

It's never a good sign...

When you're googling "how to remove vomit from carpet" at 8:30 AM...

Hudson was pretty lethargic this morning when he got up. He wasn't fussy, just wanted to sit, lay down, or be held. He even closed his eyes for a minute while I was holding him. We read a bunch of books and then he just lay down on the floor near his trucks. It didn't take long for the cause of the lethargy to appear - all over the floor. ("uh-oh, uh-oh" - yes, you've got that right Hudson!)

Fortunately it was only once, and he was up dancing around by the time Tennyson got home this evening. Now we've both had our turns this week to clean up some "sickness". Here's to hoping we don't have a tie-breaker anytime soon!

Any good reason?

Is there really any good reason for someone to have a loud screaming argument with another person? In a public parking lot? (say, outside my bedroom window...) At 6:00 AM? Driving away around the corner like a maniac? Leaving the person you were having an argument with there to call the police? Argumentee talking to the police on the phone and in person loudly in the parking lot - but not loudly/clearly enough for inquiring minds who were rudely awakened to find out exactly what was going on?

Really, is there any good reason???

Grrrr.... at least it didn't wake Hudson up.

I'd been meaning to clean it anyway...

IMG_3747, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

Hudson recently decided it is fun to try and wear my shoes. Ok, fine. But yesterday morning, he went to my closet, and when I found him, he had pulled almost ALL of my shoes out onto the floor - along with a few pairs of Tennyson's shoes as well.

Oh well. I'd been meaning to pull out my shoe rack and vacuum underneath it. He must have known...

What is it with pouring?

IMG_3699, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

While we were in Washington D.C., we let Hudson have some water in a cup while another cup was close by. He then proceeded to pour the water from the first cup into the second. He would then pick up the second cup, take a sip, and then pour it back into the first, and then start the cycle all over again. He did pretty well with keeping the water in the cups, but the process was a little messy on the hotel floor. But hey - he was sick and it kept him happy, so we let him do it.

Once we got home, we tried to put a stop to the practice by not letting him have more than one cup at a time on his highchair. It didn't make him too happy at first, but he got over it.

The Sunday after we got back, when I went to pick him up from nursery, the nursery leader told me he had taken two cups and poured water back and forth between them for about 10 minutes. Hmmm, no surprise there. So, that afternoon we let him have two cups and some water out on the patio, and you can see the result.

So now we come to last week. I put Hudson in his highchair with a bowl of oatmeal and a cup of milk. He's been wanting to dring from a "big boy" cup instead of his straw/sippy cup, and is pretty good at it. I didn't think much of it and let him start eating his cereal while I was doing a few other things around the house. He seemed to be eating well - no fussing or anything - until I got closer to check on what he was doing.

IMG_3703, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

IMG_3704, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

IMG_3705, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

In case you can't tell - yes, that is OATMEAL being poured back and forth from his bowl to his cup. Our little mad scientest, hard at work. Really - what is it with pouring?

Uh-Oh

Right after Hudson ate lunch today, I was in cleaning up the dishes in the kitchen and he came in saying 'Uh oh, uh oh'. I proceeded to follow him into the bathroom to find the 'uh oh'. His bunny was on the floor, and I looked into the bathtub to see if something had been thrown in there - but it was just all of his bath toys. I told him it was ok, that the bath toys were ok in the bathtub and then headed back to the kitchen to finish cleaning up.

He kept repeating 'uh oh, uh oh', so I went back in there with him. He then did the following:

IMG_3091, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

Then this:

IMG_3094, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

Now, there is a toilet lock on the toilet, so I hadn't thought to look there. But it seemed like that's what I needed to do.

And so I did.

IMG_3097, originally uploaded by Tennyson and Christy.

I guess when he says 'Uh oh' he means it.

So much for a toilet lock.

Big Boy Haircut!!

Hudson had his first 'big boy' haircut today. His hair has been hanging down in his eyes, and was getting a little crazy. It was starting to get a little long in the back, and I didn't want people to start thinking he was a girl!

So, on the recommendation of a few people, we took him to a 'first cuts' salon. It was right near Tennyson's work, so he was able to join us there during lunch. Hudson did a great job - he just played with the little airplane wheel on the chair and looked up every so often at the cartoons they had playing in front of the chairs. (He gave Sponge Bob a really big smile. Who knew they were friends?)

And now he looks very much like a little boy. Sigh. He's growing up so fast...

Oh what do you do in the summertime...

Well, it was bound to happen... summer is officially here. What that really means, though, is that we now have to find new things to keep us occupied. With this being my first summer to spend at home (and not just at work every day), I've discovered that I have two favorite activities so far - at least for days where the temperature hits the mid-80's or above:

1) Take Hudson to the pool so we can both cool off
2) Come up with any excuse to go somewhere with air conditioning (i.e. don't I need something from Target/Costco/grocery store/mall?)

I suppose my list would be different if we had air conditioning at home... and maybe when Hudson gets a little older we can add 'go to the beach' to the list, but for now, that's probably more effort than it's worth. (Can't say I'd be crazy about beach traffic with a grouchy baby in tow).

There you have it. Now if we could only figure out a way to take the crib somewhere with AC so that our poor baby isn't going to sleep in a 90 degree room... Thank heavens for fans!

So, it's been a while...

For a while now, I've been thinking that we should have a blog. Every time I'd get a new blog link from a friend, I'd think, "hmm... we should do that too." But then I'd never get around to actually making it happen. And then, one day, I remembered that we already had a blog! Voila! So here we are. And now I don't really feel like we are just jumping on the blogging bandwagon, because we've really been "bloggers" for a few years now! :)

Anyway - I don't really think there are many people who will even care much to read it, but I always love being able to keep up with friends and family who aren't close by (even some that are!). The plus for us is that I hope to be able to jot down those little life events that are so easy to forget. (Case in point is the entry I started a few years ago about our trip to Australia/New Zealand. It's too bad I didn't finish the story then, because now the details are all becoming a little fuzzy. At least I'll have the memory of losing our luggage!)

So there you have it. We'll see how good I am at keeping this updated, but it will be a fun adventure in trying! And I guess the best thing to do is just jump right in and pretend I've been posting all along!

(And eventually, maybe we'll be able to get this blog looking a little prettier... but for now, this will have to do!)