undies and cowboy boots :)

Lance has boots that he just keeps the spurs on, and only wears them when he is on a horse. So obviously they usually stay with his saddle and stuff. But he came inside still wearing them after riding one day, and Layton thought they were the coolest. He wore them around forever. Of course while wearing his big boy undies :)

He would say "YAHOO" and raise up his hand like that as soon as I would take a picture. In the past, when he is in his cowboy frame of mind, he will lift his hat up and say it. But no hat this time, so I guess he just made do :) If I say it with him or after him he says "You not a cowboy mommy, only Yateon (Layton) a cowboy"

Clean-Up, Clean-Up

Last night Lance gave Parker a roll and let him walk around with it (which is actually a big no no, but that's another issue :) When I came in the room Parker was on the rug tearing his roll up into little pieces.
After he was done, he got up and walked over to the chair Lance was in and pointed at Lance and then at the kitchen, I told Lance that he couldn't give Parker another roll.
But Parker kept at it and finally pulled Lance into the kitchen, where he pointed at a towel. Lance got it for him and this is what Parker did with it...

How funny is that? He knew he had made a mess and was so persistent trying to get it cleaned up. Funny Boy, he is getting such a sweet little personality.

A Cowboy... Really?

I don't know how I got so delusional, but I honestly thought that I could have my boys enjoy the farm and horses, without becoming a full on cowboy. I didn't decorate their rooms with a stitch of anything cowboy related, and yet... here we are.
Layton has choices of tons of very cool prizes to pick from after he gets 5 stickers on his potty chart, and still, he picks a horse ride every time. And then gets super upset because he lost his cowboy hat branding cows, and his boots are too little. So he has to wear "regular" (horrifying, I know) clothes on the horse.
Don't worry everyone, new hats and boots are on their way :)

He will not let anyone ride with him, we all went on a little ride and I rode with Parker and Layton rode with Lance, and it was barely tolerated by Layton, and Parker too really. They both love it so much.

Oh, and in the middle of his ride Layton told us he needed to go potty, so we got him down and he went and got back on and continued on his way. BIG BOY!

We are for sure in the market for a tiny little (very well broke) pony. He really rides this horse just fine but I know it is only a matter of time until he falls off and I would prefer it to be a shorter trip to the ground :) Let us know if you hear of anything.

{disclaimer}

I am not going to pack around my huge camera all the time. I know I am a photographer but do not judge these pictures. They are with a regular camera, that up until I bought my big camera were completely acceptable to me. Now I feel super pressured to take awesome pictures of everything. So bear with me, and if you want to see my professional pictures go to my photography blog (www.sweetlysimplephotography.blogspot.com) now I feel better :)

Potty Training (round 2)!

This time it is for real :)

We got Layton started with potty training back in November, and he was doing really really well. Lance ended up having to work out of town for about 6 weeks and I decided that I didn't want to do potty training all by myself.

Which of course I have regretted because Layton really was doing so well. I am sure it wouldn't have been any big deal, but you know me. Easy way out :)

Anyway, wehave been just solid with diapers until we just started again. I have been doing the 3 day potty training (http://www.3daypottytraining.com/) and I am so excited about how it is going. Layton is so excited about it and doing great! I totally recommend this way to anyone looking.

This is Layton's potty chart. he gets a sticker every time he goes potty, and when he gets 5 stickers gets earns a special prize. The prizes are a choice of pictures of things he likes to do - painting, horse ride, trampoline, make cookies, etc...

Oh also, this picture is taken after his second night in a row of staying dry!

I bet you can't guess what he has chosen almost every time (pictures of horse rides, coming up :)

Popsicles!

Parker was napping and Layton told me that he wanted a popsicle, so we got one (actually no sugar, frozen fruit, but he doesn't know a difference :) and then went out side and for awhile he was being so sweet... sitting in the chair with with his little feet dangling off of the edge, licking his popsicle, laughing and smiling, and telling me funny things. I thought, "darn, I wish I would have brought my camera out"

Then, the kitties wouldn't come over to us (because they know better by now) so he decided to go and get one. They live in our garden shed in our backyard, which is also one of Layton favorite places to play. So when he stayed in to play for awhile I didn't give it a second thought.

After a bit Layton came walking out, looking like this...

I laughed and laughed, and decided that this was worth a trip inside to get my camera. Upon closer inspection...

It was even funnier because he didn't realize that he had gotten popsicle all over himself.

while I was taking this, I said "Layton, look at your arms" and he looked at them and said "wow, that's AMAZING!" I almost didn't get this picture, because I was laughing so hard.

p.s. the very light khaki shorts are still soaking in stain remover, hopefully we will be able to get all the raspberry out

(serves me right for eating natural stuff, I bet an otter pop wouldn't have made this massive stain :)

The great flood of 09'

I promised Lance that for family night we would get the garden planted, I needed to go grocery shopping so he stayed home with the kids to get started and I ran to the store. While checking out, the power went out, so I had to just hang out in the grocery store (in the dark) for half an hour.

So of course I was running late when I got home and hurried to get dinner made and the groceries unloaded and cleaned up. After dinner I asked Lance to take a few things down to the freezer for me. He came back upstairs and said "we have a problem"

I went down to look and the entire storage room had a few inches of water in it.

So frustrating, about a week ago we had a minor little flood in that room so we took the stuff out, dried it up, and just about two days ago I reorganized the room and got things back to normal.

(this is my laundry room, again piled with storage containers)

This one was much worse, so we hauled the stuff out(again), my brother called his friend to come up with his awesome shop vac.

(Layton and Isaac loved using our little shop vac to suck up water themselves)

So... we sucked up the water and this time had to take the carpet all out.

which was super heavy because it was full of water.

Seriously, I know it wasn't THAT bad. and the room wasn't even finished but still... it is taking up time that we don't have.

Diagnosis, our "freeze free" faucet froze and broke, and leaked water into the basement all day long yesterday while I had the hose going for the boys to play in.

AWESOME!!!

Anyway, sorry to be a dower. Just frustrated. Lance is fixing the faucet today, maybe we will get the garden planted tonight :)