Fall fun

Every year since we moved here, we've taken the kids to Cottonwood Farm for some fall fun and cute pictures.

I love this place. They have animals and little wagons that kids love to pull and sit in. They have a straw maze for kids and a corn maze for older ones, they've got super old steam engines and horse rides. It's just the perfect place to spend a morning with the kids.

Joshua was 10 months old the first time we went. He wasn't walking and could barely stand. We still managed to take a picture of him standing by the height chart board. It is the 3rd year we're here now. I can't believe how much he's grown!

William was 3 or 4 months when we went last year, so we didn't get to take a picture of him by the height chart but I got one this year.

Josh at 10 months, 22months and 34 months (almost 3)

William, 15 months

Josh, Will the pumpkin and Elsie

Afraid of the big cow

very excited about the sheep

posing in the straw maze

William and Evan

Sadly the fun ended in a drama (major Mommy-freak-out-embarrassment in the parking lot when Josh hit me IN THE FACE!, and screamed after I stopped him from running in front of a car). I hate it when he's so excited, he gets completely out of control.

Playing "tak, do it"

Man, I love listening to Joshua talk. I keep telling myself I'll have to write down the funny things he says... and of course I don't write them down and I forget them.

I videotaped him a few days ago talking about our trip to Waterworld (2 months ago but he still remembers lots of details!) but I can't figure how to upload the video, so this will have to wait a little.

He mixes up French words into his sentences pretty often and the result is always very funny. I always thought it would be convenient to have him learn French first so that nobody would understand the awkward/not so politically correct conversations we have (like our arguments about who has a penis, a vagina, or wheels). However I haven't been so lucky as to avoid these awkward public discussions. Although today he fell on the ground and came to me saying "Mom, kiss ma fesse", which sounded really sweet (Mom kiss my face) but he really meant "Mom, kiss my bum".

I also love how he mispronounces certain words. Yesterday he started playing "tak, do it" with William and me. After a few minutes I explained to him that he was supposed to say "Tag, you're it". He hesitated a few seconds and agreed maybe I was right about "Tag" but it was definitely "Tag, do it".

Today he started holding an Hawaian necklace he'd found in the toy box in front of his mouth, and told me he was playing the "trunket". The trumpet I asked? No, the trunket... The same trunket-Hawaian-necklace was transformed into a tail a little later (that's the magic of a kid's imagination).

I'll have to add to the list of funny things Joshua says later but I can't ignore the little munchkin who's licking my feet to get my attention any longer.

pictures and their stories

The last few weeks have been pretty uneventful, if you omit the numerous potty accidents, the skateboarding accident (no pictures it was ugly), the kids breakdowns and such...

However we took some pretty cute pictures of the kids so here's a little slideshow of our last few weeks:

Russell took that first picture of Joshua in the rocks at the playground with his iPhone and I loved it so much I tried to imitate the setting with William (although it took me several attempts-having to lay in the gravel myself-to get this shot). Mine is darker but I guess I could edit it. I love my kiddos and their cute little smiles.

Here's William being his usual self (i.e., silly, smiley, overly active). He was jumping the little step and feeling very proud and powerful : )

 Josh playing in the toy car with Jackson and Bethany

Every Wednesday for the last 3 weeks, Josh has been going to a "preschool co-op" with some of our friends. We take turns teaching and hosting our little group of 4. This week was my turn to teach so I took a picture before the kids arrived.

Joshua's "homework": He obviously didn't listen to my instructions and started coloring over all the Os (his favorite letter), then followed my instructions for a few seconds and eventually decided it was more fun just to scribble the page...

On Tuesday I almost completely lost it after Joshua pooped and peed his paints AGAIN. I was so mad I had to go lock myself in the bedroom and stuff my head in a pillow! When I came back down, I found out Josh had colored the entire length of the apartment with crayons. Good thing I had just taken a zen break, I didn't strangle him, but I had him rub the floor until the marks were all gone (ok I helped him). And yes... he is half naked (remember the poop incident).

Today was a lot more peaceful. No toilet accident (although we ALMOST had one). We enjoyed a very inspiring conference from the comfort of our apartment. I just love Conference week-ends. On Saturday we set up a play tent in the living room and told the kids the story of King Benjamin teaching his people in their tents. Then we watched conference on our computer sitting in the tent (or the couch).

rolling in the leaves after conference

listening to the prophet "in our tent"

Oh and Josh started a new... "game": identifying if people (or lately things) have a penis or a vagina. It's very embarrassing when he does it out loud at the playground. Yesterday he made us crack up when he said: "Cars not have vaginas, cars have wheels".

The Real life

Since I started this blog, I often receive comments like: This is the life! You seem to be having lots of fun! etc... I'm not here to say it's not true (or that I don't appreciate these comments), we are indeed very happy. We love the place we live in, we have great friends, the kids (and I) spend our days outside. In a sense it is the life. But I don't think my blog really shows it as we live it daily.

Since I want this to be an accurate record of our life, this post will be different from the usual fun and activity summary. So here's an authentic Friday in the Parks family:

. 5am- William wakes up. He refuses to drink his bottle... one cuddle and back to bed, he screams and gets up in his bed, a second cuddle, back to bed and I leave. I hear him scream and get back up. (After that I don't remember but I fell back asleep so he must have too).

. 7:30am- Josh shows up in our bedroom completely naked. I tell him to go put undies on and I push Russell, it's time to get up.

. 8am- William and Josh are having a fiesta in their bedroom, we ... are still in bed, but now it's really time to get up.

. 8:30am- Russ and Josh hurry to school

From 8:30 to 12:30-

Breakfast with William (cereal and banana spread on the floor)

Quick shower.

I take William with me on a prelim (inventory of an apartment) in the Family Housing. William grabs my pen and refuses to give it back, so I have to take it from his hands, which throws him in a major fury... in an empty apartment, i.e. super loud!

Visit to the family housing office

Email, FB, Craft blogs and Pinterest while William redecorates the living room and climbs on top of the kitchen table.

William starts fussing so I put him down for a morning nap (unusual but I know he'll fall asleep when I need to go pick up Josh otherwise)

I finish the decorated ping-pong paddles, which will serve as a trophy for the ping-pong tournament I'm helping organize tomorrow.

I start a load of laundry.

I feel a little blue, I turn on Skype but Mom and Dad are not online... oh well.

William wakes up. I show him a baby Einstein video and take advantage of the situation to cuddle and kiss him while he's still warm from his nap. The blues are gone.

William eats lunch: mushroom omelet on the floor, cheese quesadilla ripped in pieces but in the stomach.

. 12:20- We go pick up Joshua in his class. He is still wearing the same pair of pants, Yeah!!! no accidents.

On the way home, the wind blows a foul smell... hopefully it's William.

While I put the stroller in, I tell Josh to go use the bathroom. 20seconds later, I find him standing on top of the potty, surrounded by a puddle, trying to reach for his cars on one of the bookshelves. I take away 4 of his favorite cars and make a deal with him: he will get them back if he uses the potty and his undies stay dry all day.

Mini tantrum. I have him take off his wet pants and undies while I take William away from the disaster area. The foul smell gets worse as Jo gets undressed... surprise! There was more than only pee in Joshua's pants. We climb up to the bathroom, rinse him off with soap while William climbs on top of the toilet to try to reach our toothbrushes.

Downstairs it's clean-up time. Second load of laundry. We leave the apartment to take the first load to the driers (in a different building) and walk to another residence across the street to get some ribbons to finish the ping-pong paddles.

Back home, Josh gets one of his cars back because his undies are still dry and starts watching his movie Cars while I put William down for a nap and finish the paddles. Second email break (work), blog, Pinterest. Josh improvises an obstacle course, or maybe a racing track on top of the couch, pillows and ottoman. Of course I have to be one of the obstacles.

William is not sleeping... Darn morning nap!

. 3:20pm- The second load of laundry is over, the DVD is over and William is still moaning in his bed, it's time to go out, hang-up the laundry, take the trash out and the kids to the playground. Josh is waiting for me on his bike in the doorway. I change William's diaper, take the trash and the stroller and turn around... Josh is gone. We look around the courtyard twice and end-up finding him by the dumpsters. After all I had told him we'd stop there before going to the playground, so I'm not too mad, but I still had a little fright.

The weather is still nice enough that we can go to the playground every afternoon. I always take a book or a crochet/knitting project with me, although I'm lucky when I get to read 2 pages (the same two over and over, because I can never remember what I read/where I stopped). The boys are little terrorists, not at all the kind of children I was expecting to raise. They have KILLER instincts. Josh is getting better in this matter (at least with his friends-with William he's still a brute) William is getting worse. He stands up to Josh and practices attacking his friends. Most of their games involve running after each other, pushing, climbing on top of each other and making tiger and racing cars noises.

Two hours later, we've played well, terrorized well, now it's time to go prepare dinner. Josh is not very enthusiastic to leave so I have to bribe him he can help me cook to get him to come home. As a result, I have to prepare dinner with one child licking the tomatoes before putting them in the bowl and the other child climbing on top of the table. (It's funny now, but I had to use a lot of self-control then).

. 6pm- Russell comes home. We eat dinner. Taco salad on the floor for William, but Josh can not get enough. It's not a complete failure after all.

. 6:40pm- Dinner is over but it's still too early to put the kids to bed so we go out to Panera for a dessert. The air is cool and the sunset on the terrace appeasing, we've said it and we'll say it again: this place is beautiful.

. 7:30pm- After helping Russ put the kids in their PJs and brush their teeth, I let him put them to bed while I run to do a check-in in the building next door (checking-in new residents and signing inventories is part of my job).

. 8:20- Arghh!! Another one of these residents who has me inspect the apartment with a magnifying glass. I had forgotten Russ was meeting a friend to play music tonight. He leaves the minute I get home.

After 8:30pm, I clean dishes, clean-up the mess, William cries, email, Pinterest, blog, William cries, blog, William cries...

It's going to be a long night but the session of self analysis has been therapeutic:

I AM ZEN!

Waterworld with Joshua

When we moved here, little did we know there were so many cool things to do around here.

Waterworld is one of them. I've only been to a couple of water parks in my life (one of them was in France) so my opinion isn't worth much but I'll still brag that this one is the best in the world! It is huge and very family friendly. Although Josh isn't 3, there were plenty of cool rides to do with him.

I think his favorite ride was the voyage to the center of the Earth; a giant tube ride with fake Dinosaurs, and freaky sounds and lights. He was really quiet during the ride and I was afraid he was going to come out of it terrified, but instead he jumped out of the tube and said "Dinosaurs, so much fun! Do it again!". And he called the tubes "boats" the whole time we were there.

It was a little difficult for him to wait in line so long (up to 40min for a ride!) but he did amazingly well and we managed to do 5 rides in one afternoon and let him play almost an hour at the toddler area (which he loved too).

Our friend Heidi watched William while we were there and even made us dinner when we came home! How lucky we are to have such wonderful friends!

Preschool and Summer catch-up

After a week or so of diligent attempts (or not), I had to admit to myself that #3 on my list will not go on. Yes I'm a chocolate addict, but I haven't reached the repenting stage yet.

I'm still working on the rest of the list though.

So, the summer is over... basically. Josh goes to preschool two mornings a week and he's ecstatic (so am I). We're slowly getting used to our new schedule but it still kind of feels like summer with the extreme heat, the afternoons at the playground and the dinners outside.

Monday was Joshua's first day in Preschool. He was exceedingly proud and excited. This is him on our door-step with Russell before school.

He was there for almost 4 hours. He had breakfast and lunch there, and he told me he played with an airplane and cars. I also noticed he started singing a song I didn't know that day, and he picked up a new phrase that he loves to use: "understand?" It's only funny if you imagine him saying it with a very stern, almost angry voice. It shocked me at first (because we've never used that exact phrase with him... at least not in English) but knowing my child I am not surprised he had to be disciplined and I'm glad for once I didn't have to do it.

We did some pretty cool things these past few months that I haven't had time to document, so I'm going to throw it all in here.

Skateboarding with Daddy on our way back from the library

(notice the big grin AND the strong grip)

Anne U. White trail with our Friends the Fergusons.

Have I already said we live in the most beautiful place on Earth?

Ready for a 3-mile hike, Josh insisted on leading the way the whole time (he always does)

 I'm a fan of the hands on the backpack.
A tired/bored William

 The much anticipated cascade (a little dirty in my opinion). Happy at last.

The way back: on Daddy's shoulders of course

Aren't they cute!

Soccer Club!

One of Joshua's favorite things is playing with balls so I had to take him there.

It took him a few times to get used to the rules (can you guess he wasn't very interested in taking turns and playing games rather than shooting the ball in the goal?)

Practicing knocking down/straightening the cone using only his feet,
Really tempted to take the ball and start running around... but he managed to wait
The tail game
Chasing the biggest kids around
Cute William messing with the soccer club equipment

William's 1st birthday!

July 16th. We didn't plan anything special. Our friends the Jacksons had watched our kids the week before so we could go to the temple so we watched theirs, and William had two big buddies to play with on his birthday (one of them named William as well).

It started raining a little bit so we picnicked inside.
 

Strawberry shortcake, presents and Grand-Maman's card

Colorado Springs

We took a couple of days off to go visit this amazing city only 2 hours away from where we live. We were mesmerized by its beauty.

Seven Falls

We took an elevator (inside the mountain) up to a platform where we had a stunning view of the falls.

 

Josh admiring the view

Then we climbed up the stairs along the mountain and the cascade to get even closer.

Don't look down William!

and then back to the cabin where we stayed one night:

they had a pool, which got both William and Josh really excited
William having his own kind of fun

Still in Colorado Springs: The garden of the Gods

Notice the excitement of being hooked to a trailer loaded with 2 kids.

I didn't make it very far and then Russell kindly offered to switch bikes and rode a woman's bike for the rest of the visit.

Amazing view

I said I wanted to work out...

Le Kiss hat

Je ne sais pas trop d'où me vient l'obsession mais je suis complètement accro au crochet depuis quelques mois. Une de mes voisines m'a donné le patron d'une robe adorable qu'elle avait fait pour sa fille l'année dernière et depuis je suis mordue.

Et même si je n'étais pas complètement obsédée par le crochet, je ne pourrais pas m'empêcher de fondre pour ce petit bonnet inspiré par les populaires chocolats "Kisses".

J'ai trouvé les instructions dans un livre emprunté à la bibliothèque "Too cute crochet" de Cynthia Preston.

Depuis j'en ai fait 3 (un pour chaque babyshower à laquelle j'ai assisté ce mois-ci). Tout le monde l'adore et j'ai hâte de le voir sur la tête d'un de ces petits bébés.

J'ai aussi fait des mini bottes (style Uggs) pour une amie mais j'ai oublié de prendre des photos. Elles était un peu comme celles que j'avais faite pour William il y a quelques mois, mais encore plus mignonnes.

Summer burnout and new goals

Why is it that for the last 2-3 weeks I've been feeling like throwing a pity party every single day?

I could write down a hundred reasons for it. Actually I have...

But after spending more than an hour, adding to the list, crossing off things, editing, reformulating, I've realized it wasn't helping a bit.

So I decided to take my mind off of it and start a new list. A list of things I want to do. So here it is:



1. Read a book in German

2. Make a quilt

3. limit snacks to 2 pieces of chocolate/day (haha)

4. Teach Joshua to poop in the potty

5. Be in bed by eleven, be up by 7am

6. Read scriptures before getting up.

7. Make a shopping list and stick to it

8. Get a zumba DVD from the library (or buy one), and try it a least 3 times before giving up...

9. Memorize my social security number

10. Write a blog (working on that right now, yeah!)

11. Read a scientific magazine

12. Exercise for at least 10min. every day

13. Learn to saw

14. Take my hubby to Morocco

15. Teach William to go down the slide by himself

16. Teach Joshua to swing by himself

17. Try at least one of the hundreds of recipes I have bookmarked

...



Ahh! I feel so much better already. Now let's hope I can cross a few things off the list before my kids have left home (especially #4) and before I add a hundred more.



Now I don't want to seem ungrateful because we've add a pretty awesome summer.

Our trip to France was fabulous (I gained 5 lbs!), the kids reached some really cool milestones (William is walking, Joshua is "almost" potty trained), Russell is basically done with his thesis... Ikea opened in Denver (exciting right?!)!!!



We took Joshua on a canoe a week ago (he'd been begging to "row the boat" for weeks after seeing a group of kids kayaking on the creek). He had so much fun. He threw a bad tantrum when we returned the canoe. We can't wait to do it again.

Last Friday our friends the Jacksons watched Josh and William while Russell and I went on a date. We went to a Moroccan restaurant on 28th street. The owner speaks French and he was super friendly. They had an awesome belly dancer and really good food. Only warning, the bill is salty as we say in French (it's pretty expensive).

Best Boulder Blast

Memorial Day Week-End is my favorite holiday in Boulder. We discovered the Creek Festival last year and had a lot of fun getting our free samples from all the booths and admiring local art. This year was even better with Joshua being a little bit older. He enjoyed the little train and tried the bounce house this year, he begged us to let him try kayaking on the pool but I thought he was too young for it so he had a complete melt-down. It still didn't ruin the awesomeness of the day.

Then on Sunday we tried avoiding the crowd and went on a walk along the creek, but in the opposite direction. It was still crowded but not as bad.

Try convincing me we don't live in the most beautiful place on earth!

Oh, and the best is still to come: Bolder Boulder is tomorrow morning and the rubber duck race in the afternoon!

A busy week

We are going to Fraaaaaaaaaance!!!!! I am so excited I feel like a 5 year-old on Christmas eve. It's been two years since I last saw my family in France. It will be the first time William meets his Grand-Papa and Grand-Maman. We are leaving on Wednesday and we will be there for 3 weeks.

I'm really lucky I have great co-workers who are so nice they will back-up for me during 3 whole weeks. I totally owe them. Since I'm going to be gone during almost the entire month of June, I wanted to work on a few things before I left. So I had the idea of making photobooth cutouts for the children's Festival that will be held at the end of June. Again my awesome co-workers helped and made some really cute accessories and cutouts for the photo station. They still need some work but I think the result is very cute.

From Little Monkey to Homo Erectus

I can't believe how fast our little Williboo is growing. He's already starting to balance and stand by himself. Sadly, I think we can attribute his strength and stability to the roughness of his brother. This little guy is tough.

This is him showing off his new skill this afternoon:

waiting for the summer

I think we've had the worst month of May in decades this year. We had to spend more time inside than we have in the entire winter. The rain poured for weeks and weeks, we had wind, storms, hail, thunder and lighting up until last week. At last it seems it's over now and we're going to enter summer without having a chance of tasting spring. Oh well...

I had a fright last week when I opened my door after a storm and discovered 3" of water on the courtyard, only a few feet away from 2 of my close neighbors' doors. This made the possibility of a flood so much more real to me. I must admit when I heard my manager talk to us about flood prevention during training this year and last year, I didn't take the threat very seriously (although the creek path was flooded for a few days last week). Well now I do, and I don't think I'm the only one.

On a good note, we definetely made good use of our rain boots and had tons of fun jumping in the puddles.

The end of a semester

Last week marked the end of a semester but especially the graduation of Russell with his Master's degree in Communication. The weeks that preceeded were stressful... very stressful. I'm so glad it's over now. As we were all in survival mode (meaning trying really hard not to murder each others) I didn't really feel in the mood to post anything.

However the kids have reached some pretty cool milestones these last few weeks. First thing William finally started crawling... ok now I realize he wasn't that late (8months and 1/2), but with the whole slow-weight-gain story (that's another thing that was stressing me out beyond mesure), the constant waking up at night, being toothless until 9months old, I was starting to worry that my baby was behind. And suddenly, after months of trying all the bottles and sippy cups on the market, we finally got him to drink from a bottle, and within a month to be completely weened. Since then he's gained 1 and 1/2 lbs in one month and... well, now he's refusing to eat with a spoon. Stubborn?

He also started pulling himself up on furniture and he's sleeping much better.

Joshua keeps learning new things. Things I don't even try to teach him, like fishing (with a baseball bat as a pole)? He can "read" his name, Mommy, Daddy and Cody and sing the entire alphabet song. He's a fun two year old, with good days and awfully bad days.

Here are a few pictures of things we've done recently:

"Fishing" in the bathtub (he's wearing a swimsuit because we were pretending to be in the creek), A fort under the table.

Random 104F fiever that made my day.
Water coloring

"Driving" the police car!
With Brian the Easter Bunny.

Posing by the police car during the FH Easter Egg Hunt

A hike to Red rocks up Settlers Park.

The Family Housing Family week : visit to the Butterfly pavilion

Fun times with neighbors and friends (eating with Sean and Kaden, riding the toy car with Lars, William and Ossam, and our Indian neighbor).

A Football game with Lars, a wagon ride with Katie at the good bye party for the Franke-Philips family, and Sammy’s birthday party.