Beckham's Birthday

Beckham turned 3 mid December. He was so embarrassed anytime we sang to him. The picture of him sitting in the garage is when we were singing and he hid behind my legs. We pretty much celebrated the whole week just about everyday he got another present or we had our birthday dinner. We did not do that on purpose that is just how it worked out. Beckham is really into "Star Wars" and wanted a green lightsaber for his birthday so of course he got that. Chet and I thought it was time that he had a bike of his own so that was his main present. He loved it, although I don't think it beat the lightsaber.

We are so thankful that Beckham is in our family. He brings a smile to our faces everyday. He is so willing to help out and eager to please. We love him very much.

Trick or Treat

Well I know that I am nearly one month late with this post but here it is. The boys were so excited to be super heros! Cooper was batman and Beckham was spiderman. We bought their costumes two weeks or so before and they wanted to wear them regularly. Needless to say many days we watched tv or colored or whatever with our two super heros.

We had so much fun trick or treating. It first started Thursday (29th) with our ward Trunk or Treat; Friday our community had a trick or treat at the park with businesses from our area handing out candy; lastly trick or treating around the neighborhood. The boys made out like bandits.

Tournament of Kings

While Alisha (my oldest sister) and her family were visiting we to the "Tournament of Kings" We all had such a great time, especially all the boys (cousin Easton) along with my boys. They were staring at the tournament totally awe-struck. I had Beckham on my lap so I would just put food up to his mouth and he would eat it. I could have given him vinager and he would not have even noticed. Chet said Cooper was the same. It has been a couple of weeks since we saw the Tournament and the boys keep asking when we can go back. The other day the boys and I went to Michaels and they found foam swords and shields that they were fighting with while we were there.

Disneyland

Saturday, Oct 17th we went to the Happiest Place on Earth. DISNEYLAND!! We had so much fun. As we walked to the entrance I told Chet that we are now an official family since this was our first real vacation without either of our families. We went at our own pace and rode as many rides possible. The lines were not too bad 15-20 minutes. Some of the favorite rides were DUMBO, Star Wars (for Cooper, Beckham was too short), Autopia (where they get drivers licences and get to drive a car), Rocket (inside CA adventures, which we rode like 5 times in a row) and of course the Tea Cups. Chet and Beckham thought that the Farres Wheel was fun, Cooper and I thought we were going to die. I had like a death grip on Cooper at some point. For lunch we ate the most giant turkey leg I have ever seen. Cooper and Beckham had worked hard to save some money for a souvenir. Beckham knew right away that he wanted to buy a light saber. After much searching Cooper too choose a light saber. Again, we had such a great time and are looking forward to returning to Disneyland sometime.

Laguna Beach

A couple of weekends (October 16th) the boys and I went to Laguna Beach while Chet was at a lunch meeting. The boys had so much fun playing in the sand and getting washed away with the water. Cooper said his favorite part was when he fell in the water and the surfer dude helped him up. Beckham mostly liked playing in the sand. We could have spent the whole day there. After Chet's luncheon we checked into the hotel to get ready for our big day at Disneyland.

Lake Las Vegas

October 2nd (Friday) we checked into Loews Hotel at Lake Las Vegas (which is like 45 min South/East of where we live). We had a great time on our over-nighter. Shortly after checking in we were taking a walk around the hotel and the boys were looking a the little water fountains and Beckham took a dive into that freezing water. Of course my camera was not with me and I really wish it was because it was really funny. The boys were so excited to go to the beach so naturally that was our first stop. Some other fun things we did while there were went down the water slide, took a ride on the paddle boat, built sandcastles, watched a movie in the hotel room. It was so much fun we should make it a tradition.

Cooper and Bikes

Yesterday we went to a friends house and Cooper decided that he wanted to ride Macee's bike (that does not have training wheels). He asked if I would stay by him. Off we went. I could not believe it, he rode for a couple minutes all by himself. He never fell and he was even able to use the brakes. Chet is going to take Cooper's training wheels off so he can practice more. I can not believe it Cooper is getting so big!!
After one day of riding Cooper has already decided that he should be popping a wheelie. Crazy Boy! He has now been riding without training wheels for a couple of weeks and knock on wood but has not taken too big of a tumble. The first couple times when he stopped he did not know he had to put his feet down so he did tip over. But like a champ he was right back up.

First Day of Preschool

Okay so Cooper has now been in school for a month. He is having a great time. He goes three days a week for 3 hours in the afternoon. On his first day he was a little nervous because his friends from last year would not be there with him. After a month he is loving it.
When we dropped Cooper off the first day Beckham did not want to leave him. The second day Beckham and I went to a friends house after Cooper was at school and Beckham thought he was going to school too. He even got his backpack ready with a sharing time toy and all.
We are car pooling with two other kids. I love it! I love that carpooling saves me like 30-60 minutes each school day and I love hearing the kids talk about the day as I drive them home.

Labor Day Weekend

We went to St. George over Labor Day for weekend of fun with the Glover Family. Yvette (Chet's sister) organized activities for the whole weekend. We hiked around Zions on Saturday, it was awesome! We were hiking for about 2 hours, after about 1 1/2 Beckham fell asleep on my back.


Sunday we had a BBQ in Pine Valley. Again I have not been there for who knows how long. There was a corn eating contest. Darlene (grandma)showed us how fast corn can be eaten off the cob. Her prize...Floss!


Monday, Brock (Chet's brother-in-law)organized a great scavenger hunt in the hills of Pioneer Park. I have only driven by there. It was beautiful you could see the whole valley. The kids carried a plastic sack to help clean up the environment while we hiked.

Fun With Paints

We bought some kids paint the other day and decided to use them when Chandler came to play.

Fortunately, we had a few boxes we could put toward our cause.

The boys had a blast! Needless to say they all went straight to the tub after they were done painting.

Camping...

We wanted to go camping with our good friends Todd, Stephanie and Chandler Creer. Stephanie drove up to Mt Charleston Friday morning to reserve a spot for us, unfortunatly they were full. So we made our own campground. Friday we had a BBQ at the Creer's. After dinner we made smores over their firepit.



Saturday we went about our day as normal, in the evening we went to watch a movie in the park. Beckham was so cute and excited to see the stars as he tried to count them. I think that must have been his first time seeing them. When we got home we set up camp out back. The boys slept on the tramp and Chet and I attempted to sleep on a mattress under the stars. However by 1130 we were done with our camping trip and brought the boys inside and we all slept in our own beds. Now that is my type of camping. Cooper however was not too happy about the change He woke up about 1:30 am to use the bathroom and was so confused as to why we were not sleeping outside anymore. I guess he was too tired to fight it because he went right back to sleep. We had a great time and look forward to more camping trips.

Tribute to the Boys.

I thought that I would give a little post about each of the boys. While they are both busy boys they have different qualities that I think get overlooked by how much they run around together.

Let's start with Cooper. He is a little sponge. Even when we think that he is not paying attention he hears and soaks up what was said. He uses big words or phrases that surprise us every time. For example: today I had a glass of ice and Cooper started telling Chet that "he can put the glass in the sun and it melts and then he can then put it in the freezer and it will make ice. And that is called a reversible change". Really, a reversible change, what 4 year old knows that. How many adults can recall that bit of 5th grade science. His primary teachers have told us recently how impressed they are by the answers he gives during sharing time, and that he is always volunteering to be a helper. He loves climbing, he has learned to climb the back gate. So now the lock that we put on the gate will only keep out burglars but not keep him in. Cooper remembers the words to about every song that we sing. Sis. Chamberlin (the primary chorister) told me today that sometimes he will be the only kid singing, and you can always hear him. Cooper knows what he wants and does whatever he can to get it. While this is sometimes frustrating for us, we hope that he always has the desire to go after the good and worthy things.

While Beckham loves to follow Cooper around and do what big brother does he does have a different personality. He is a little more reserved. He will stay behind my leg when strangers are around. He loves to be a helper and loves the at-a-boy that he gets from helping. Beckham loves to sing. Last night we were going to sleep and he was singing to us, he started out with one song and threw in lines from 3 others. It was so funny and cute. He is a little mama's boy and loves to snuggle. Beckham is a little protecter. He will tell me, "if the bad man comes to get my brother I will chase him and kick him" and he says it with such force. Beckham is our early riser. We can always count on him coming into our room between 6-630 and getting in our faces saying something funny to get us out of bed. Something else that I think is funny about Beckham, he has two favorite colors. One is he will almost always pick out a green shirt to wear luckily he has 5 or 6 green shirts. The second is that he usually will choose pink out of whatever, his bowls,jelly bellies, or a blanket at the store. PINK!! Yep he is all boy!

New Sites

I have been intoduced to a couple of websites recently that I love to look at. Because I still do not know how to share those sites in a cool way on the blog I thought I would share them in a post. All of them are sites where you can get super big deals, two of which are for biking/outdoor stuff. Anyway thought that you would be interested in checking them out. www.onesaleaday.com www.bonktown.com backcountryoutlet.com
Hope you find some good deals.

JULY

July 2009

July has flown by. On the Fourth of July we were so excited to stay home since we had been gone the previous 3 weekends. We bought fireworks and lit them in the street. The boys loved them and since then they take our lighter out back to do fireworks. Luckily the lighter is childproof.

The next week I took the boys to Layton to see Grandma and Grandpa Hamilton. The boys played outside pretty much all day. They helped drive the tractor and the lawn mower. They rode the horses and played with Aunt Cari's dog Dudley.

We went to the Clearfield Aquatic center and had a great time going down the slide and Cooper was brave and wanted to jump off the diving board. FYI the diving board is probably 3 feet above the water and then he had to swim to the side. The lifegaurds were on full alert when it was his turn. He loved it and jumped 3 times. Needless to say I was a very proud mom. Thank you Las Vegas Swimg Academy for teaching him to swim.

When Chet flew up we went to Lagoon and had a great time on all the rides.

The four of us were there for about 6 hours then we took the boys to Grandma and Grandpa's so Chet and I could ride the big rides.

Chet and I love rollercoasters so we were super excited that the boys also liked the rollercoasters. Only about 12 more inches until they can go on the big rides with us.

Lastly, we were so close to bringing home a piano that has been being restored but last minute we could not becuase our car does not have the wiring for the tow hitch. We were so bumbed. The piano is beautiful and we cannot wait for it to make it to our home for the boys to pound on. My sister Cari is coming down in August so we are hopeful that she will be able to bring it with her.

That is our July in a flash.

Sleepy Boys

Beckham had a little fever on Sunday that really wiped him out. He slept through most of church (which made it easier for us to listen) and then when we came home he fell asleep on the kitchen floor.

About 2 weeks ago, Cooper was having a tantrum and would not come up the stairs by himself. So I left him down there. After a few minutes, when all was quite, this is what I found.
Shh. We must savor these moments.

San Diego

The last weekend in June we went on a vacation with my family. We had a great time we went to the Zoo, Sea World, and the Animal Park. Sea World was by far our favorite. We have never seen the boys sit so still as they did during the Whale show and Dolphin show. They loved holding the star fish, seeing the fish aquariums and they got to ride on their first rollercoaster. My dad had borrowed my cousins motorhome so we drove around San Diego with them and the boys thought it was great to be driving around and not buckled into thier seats. On the way back to Vegas, we were luckily in our own car because the AC in the motorhome went out. It was 113 in Baker. What a bummer for my family. We had an excellent and much needed vacation. It was great to see our family especially those from Texas that we rarely see.

Grandpa Gordon

Last weekend (June 13) we made a trip up to Spanish Fork to see Chet's Grandpa, who has been in a care center for the last 2 years. He has Alzheimers and has been in the last stages of it for a few weeks now. So we wanted to see him and say goodbye before he passed away. We went to see him Friday and he was sleeping, we could not get him to wake up. Luckily we tried again on Sunday. Grandpa was alert and wanted us to stay. While he could not talk much he did like and responded when Cooper would give him kisses. We were glad that we made the trip because Wednesday morning we were informed that he passed away in his sleep. As Chet said, sometimes we make good decisions and going to see grandpa was one of them. Cooper will have good memories of visiting him and singing him some church hymns. We know that Grandpa is in a much happier place and has been reunited with Grandma. We love you Grandpa.

Red Rock

Saturday was such a beautiful day that we decided to go for our first family hike. We went to Red Rock Canyon and took a trail that leads to a waterfall (that is only active during the spring). The boys had a great time climbing on all the rocks. Beckham was such a gentleman and would help me down off the rocks. I had to be sure I was ready to take his hand because the second we connected he pulled on me. What a helper. The boys also thought it was fun to use my camera to take pictures. Cooper also thought that we should stick our tounges out in every picture. As said before that was our first family hike, the boys cannot wait to go hiking again.

So Proud

I read somewhere that you should brag about your kids in front of them so that they gain more confidence and realize when they have made good decisions. So occationally I try to do that. Today Cooper chased a plastic garbage bag down and wanted to throw it away so it would not be littering. I later told Chet about that in the so proud mommy voice. What I think is so funny is that whenever I tell Chet about these types of things the second I am done Cooper will tell the same story in his So Proud voice.

Bottlecap Truck

We went to the library one day and parked next to this Truck. This person took a lot of time collecting and creating this thing. His theme covers every inch of the truck. Also there were numerous stuffed animals on the dash. Awesome!!

Fun Photos

Here are a few photos that Chet has taken on his phone over the last little while.

First, here are the boys asleep. Cooper decided to take make a bed and take a nap on my cedar chest at the foot of my bed. Love the arms.

Beckham's Binki bowl (which we no longer need) has become a hat!

Cooper sitting on a rock outside of the Lamborghini store. He asked Dad to take a picture of him on the rock. Our little model.

Cooper in front of Chet's new car.