Obessed Much?!

It is no secret that Mason has some obsessive tendencies. Every once in a while something catches his interest and becomes the center of his life. Need I mention our fleet of garbage trucks? Lately, Mason's garbage trucks have had a little bit of competition for his love and attention. I just wanted to share about Mason's new loves.

• The Red Helicopter.

I'm not positive when or where his love for helicopters began. It could stem from watching the Life Flight helicopter fly over our house several times a day since our house seems to be along its route between hospitals. Or it could be from the Balloon Fest on the 4th of July when we looked at the Life Flight helicopter across the street the whole time instead of the balloons. Regardless of how it started, Mason has a fascination with helicopters, particularly "The Red Helicopter" (Life Flight). Last month I took him up to Discovery Gateway Children's Museum where they have a real Life Flight helicopter for kids to play in. We spent nearly the entire time playing in the helicopter. Mason was just overflowing with excitement and still talks about it. We now go on field trips down to the hospital to look at the helicopter as a reward for Mason. All he wants for Christmas is a "Big Red Helicopter". They happen to have some really cool big BLUE helicopters at Costco so we told him Santa is only making blue Helicopters this year. Now if you ask him what he wants Santa to bring him he will tell you a "Big Blue Helicopter". I can't wait to see his face on Christmas morning. We framed this picture for Mason after he carried it around with him for several days and got upset when it was bent. He keeps it on his dresser next to his bed so he can see it when he's going to sleep. We occassionally find it in bed with him when he's sleeping. So sweet. Mason is really a good little artist for a 2-year-old. He constantly asks us to draw helicopters for him and then he tries to draw one himself. A couple weeks ago he drew this helicopter 100% by himself. When scott got home he thought I had drawn it. That not only tells you what a good job Mason did, but also what a horrible artist I am :)

• Trains

Last Christmas, Mason liked "choo choos" a lot. We kind of did a train themed Christmas for him including a train table and train sheets for his new big boy bed. He has continued to enjoy trains since then, but in September when he was introduced to the new show Dinosaur Train, he became obsessed. For those unfamiliar with Dinosaur Train it's a new show on PBS that is actually pretty cute. Mason likes the dinosaurs, but it's the train that truely captivates him. He has to have his trains in hand while watching the show so he can pull it around whenever they are riding on the train. We can often hear him singing "Dinosaur Train, Dinosaur Train, We all ride ride ride.....the Dinosaur Train" which is part of the theme song. He also likes to find tunnels for his train to go through so he can announce "time tunnel approaching!" like the conducter does. It is so stinkin' cute. Although he doesn't really know who Thomas the Tank Engine is, he has one Thomas train (thanks Stacie) that is his favorite. He calls it his "front blue face train".

I love how passionate Mason is about things. I hope this passion carries over to all areas of his life as he gets older.

A Season to Remember

Tonight Scott officially retired his golf clubs for the 2009 season, and what a season it was. This year Scott played some of the best golf he's ever played. He broke 80 three times (77, 78,79) and averaged in the low 80's the rest of the time. It's a good thing, too, because he had to prove to me it was worth the money he spent on new irons, wedges, and a putter earlier this year. :) In the past Scott has mostly played golf with his Dad and brothers, but this year he had a group of friends at work that he really enjoyed going out with. He also had a lot of fun going out quite a bit with my Dad and was able to keep up with him better than he ever has before. I'm glad Scott has a hobby that lets him have fun and relax and even more glad he's had so many opportunites to do it for free this year. Here's to Scott's 2009 golf season...it'll be one to remember. Here's a little trip down memory lane. These are pictures of us golfing at Wolf Creek in St. George when we were engaged. We look so YOUNG.

Guinea Pig

This picture makes me look like a horrible mother who donated my child to science when really I just had Brynn participate in a simple infant development study at BYU this week. They are studying an infant's ability to interpret audio and visual stimulation at different ages. It looks pretty intense from this picture (sorry it's so crappy, their printer was almost out of ink) but in reality she didn't mind wearing this helmet for 5 minutes while sitting on my lap in a dark room and watching a 3 minute video of short and long yellow caterpillars with corresponding beeps. No big deal. When they called and asked if we would participate I said yes because I am always interested in the results of this type of study and thought it would be fun to be a part of one. The funniest part was when Mason became best friends with the lab assistent who played with him while we did the study and invited her to come play at our house after his nap. Such a social child.

Speaking of infant development, Brynn had a big week of milestones last week when she started sitting on her own and eating rice cereal. Pretty big stuff for my little girl.

We Did It!!!!

He's Potty Trained!!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks for all the advice a while back. I put away the undies and decided to wait until he was older, then low and behold a month later he woke up one morning and asked to wear underwear and did a pretty good job of keeping it dry. It made all the difference once he wanted to do it. I'm so happy I could do a little dance.

A little piece of Heaven

Do you ever wonder what Heaven will be like? Will everyone be dressed in white? What will we do for fun? Most importantly, will there be food? Sometimes I find myself thinking about this. I remember when I was younger and thought Heaven would be the same as it is depicted in the movie Saturday's Warrior ... fog machine going, girls dancing and singing in pretty dresses (oh how I hoped mine would be pink), people being teleported to and from earth. And while I'm certain it will be nothing like that, I still don't know exactly what it will be like. All I know is that a month ago I was spending the morning playing on my bed with Mason and Brynn. The sun was shining through the window and reflecting so perfectly off the white comforter that laid underneath their bare bellies. Brynn was giggling at Mason as he lay beside her playing peek-a-boo. I was in Heaven. I knew then that it doesn't matter to me what's in Heaven, only who's there with me. I am so grateful to be sealed to my family for all eternity so that even after we're gone from this earth we can laugh together in the clouds. And we all know it wouldn't be Heaven to Mason unless a garbage can was there :).

Happy Halloween

Well, here they are, the costumes of 2009. Scott and I dressed up as Swine Flu. These costumes won us the best couples costume at the Bell Halloween Party as well as 3rd place at the Nu Skin Costume Contest. It was also kind of ironic because I spent my Halloween at work taking care of patients with Swine Flu (and no I didn't wear my costume to work). We have offically hit the point where Mason wants to pick out his own costume. I had a costume in mind for Mason, but he informed me he only wanted to be a Dinosaur. He was introduced to a new show, Dinosaur Train, by our neighbor and loves it. Now Dinosaurs and Trains are his favorite thing in the world. So here is Mason our fierce T-rex. If Brynn would have had a say I'm sure she would have opted out of dressing up, but we dressed her up as a pumpkin anyway. Pretty darn cute if you ask me. The costume did have some perks for her, like a nice place to rest.. Our Halloween festivities started off early in the week at a darling Halloween party my mom did for the grandkids. It had everything from witches brew at dinner to spider webs (yarn) all over the house for the kids to follow to their Halloween prizes. Here's Grandma with all the Utah grandkids, unfortunately Rachel Faye had to join the party via skype from Arizona.We had a lot of fun carving pumpkins this year. Scott of course was the artist and carver. Mason was really into it this year and turned to us while cleaning out his pumpkin and said, "this sure is fun, Mom." Here are Scott and Mason showing off Mason's T-rex pumpkin.

Here are Brynn and mom showing off Brynn's baby pumpkin. Brynn apparently loved it, too. Here are all the pumpkins we did this year. Scott's says Go Phillies for obvious reasons. Scott took Mason trick-or-treating and besides a couple episodes of stage fright, he really got the whole concept.I told Scott only to go around one neighborhood because Mason doesn't know any better yet and I really didn't want tons of candy around our house. So this was Mason's loot and look how happy he was with it. Hope everyone else had a great Halloween, too.