Hogle Zoo

The last Wednesday of the month during the winter months admission is free at the Hogle Zoo. Since February is the last month they offer it and it was going to be a half decent day I decided to attempt the impossible. I'm happy to report that I did it! I didn't lose either children or my mind by taking them both to the Zoo by myself! Usually Wal-Mart is more than I can handle with both of them but I threatened them with their life if they ran away from me and they did so great! I didn't even have to buckle either of them in the stroller! They would get off, look at the animals and hop back on! They did so great and my confidence at taking them places was given a huge boost!

I personally love watching the monkeys so we spent a long time watching them run around, pick each others fleas and eat their veggies!

If you don't know, Jack has a major aversion to monkeys. He is scared to death that there are monkeys at my Mom's house. Now she has about a million cats but definitely no monkeys. One day he swore he saw some running up the wood pile while we were at her house and was seriously almost hyperventilating about it! I was so surprised that he wasn't scared of the monkeys at the zoo and spent a long time looking at them. He was a little concerned when one of them came right up to his face by the glass but luckily no freak outs!

It was a real feeling of accomplishment when we left the zoo with no one screaming and me not wanting to pull my hair out! I know that may not sound like much of an accomplishment if you haven't attempted taking the both of them out in public and needing them to behave like humans and not monkeys! I am hoping this is a sign of them growing up and that we can have many more fun adventures like this during the summer!

Tonsillectomy

We returned to visit the ENT and his tonsils had grown since the last visit and we felt like it was time to do something about it. I finally felt good about it and felt like it was time so we scheduled the Tonsillectomy. After much worry and sleepless nights on my part I am happy to report that it went smoothly and we are on day 5 of recovery now! He has done so well and has been so brave. I finally asked Ryan yesterday to look in his mouth and verify that they did do the surgery because he has done way way better than expected and maybe they forgot to even do it! Luckily for us they did get the surgery done and our boy is just a trooper! The only problems we have had are trying to get him to take his medicine without a huge fight and trying to deal with the cabin fever of us all being cooped up for so long! This one has been hard on all of us because we are not home bodies and like to be on the go!

He was such a brave boy and didn't get scared of anything that happened pre-surgery and wasn't scared of any of the doctors. I did pre-warn him that he would have to put on a hospital "shirt" because I thought he would put up a fight about having to put on what looked like a dress! Luckily he loved his hospital "shirt" and was eager to put it on! They also removed his adenoids while they were in there and we were told they were huge also. The doctor reported that he was probably blocked from receiving about 15-20% of his air flow because of the tonsils! He has no snoring now and is the quietest sleeper ever. I now have to feel his back to make sure he is still breathing whereas before I could hear him breathing from the hallway with his bedroom door SHUT!

This one is out of order but he loved getting to ride in the wagon when we were all done. The nurse mentioned getting the wagon to take him to the car and then got sidetracked so she was taking a long time. Ryan said to Jack "I will just carry you buddy" and Jack quickly insisted that he had said he wanted to ride in the wagon! Just then the nurse showed up with his chariot and he quickly dove in. Probably his favorite part of the entire day... although he doesn't look too happy about it!
This was just shortly after coming out of his anesthesia and he LOVED that there was a movable TV less than a foot away from his face. He had a great morning sipping unlimited icees and watching cartoons to his hearts content!It was so cute when they were ready to roll him back to the operating room they put up the sides of the bed and told Jack it was a race car and he thought it was so cool he had a race car bed! He didn't even get concerned at all when they took him away from us because he was so excited about his race car bed!

He had the sweetest nurse who just loved him and was so nice to him. She made the experience really great and he actually cried when we told him it was time to go home. He exclaimed "But they haven't even taken my tonsils out yet!" He really was having a great time being spoiled rotten by everyone!


Recovery has gone well and we are hoping it continues on that path. He gets really annoyed at us when we have to wake him up to give him pain medicine but I have promised him that when this is all done we can go to the jump house AND Chuck E. Cheese's! I most certainly will have to hold true to those promises because he reminds me everday and asks about every ten minutes if he is better enough so he can go there!

He is already back to pestering his sister so I hope that's a sign that we are close to being back to normal!

NO MORE SNOW!!

I was NOT a happy camper when I awoke to a neighbor shoveling snow at 6am this morning! And then when I did look out the window and found this.... I am so ready for winter to be over!!

Chuck E. Cheese

So I bought a gift certificate to Chuck E. Cheese awhile ago for half price on City Deals ( I love City Deals by the way) and we decided to use it a few nights ago and the kids had SOOOOO much fun. Seriously I don't think I have seen them happier and more excited. Before we left I made us all squeeze into the photo booth to get a souvenier and I think it came out priceless...

It was definitely a night we will remember for a long time and Jack keeps BEGGING to go back! Luckily for him City Deals was still running the deal so I stocked up so we can head back for another night of fun!

Awwww.....

My little Mickey Mouse fanatics doing what they do best!! (Pax is not a Mickey fan and tries to bite the tv everytime it comes on but he is always less than six feet from wherever the kids are!)

Nothing better....

I think there is nothing better than clean, fresh smelling warm little bodies. They are on the verge of being too old for bathtub pictures but I needed to capture a few more of their beautiful wet eyelashes and pruney fingers!

LoVe, LoVe, LoVe these two!

Happy Valentines Day

Happy Valentines Day to the LOVES of my life!!

XOXOXOXOXO!

Take a picture Mom....

*** TONS OF NEW POSTS SO KEEP SCROLLING DOWN! (I feel so productive today... I may still be in my pajamas but the blog is updated!!***

On the rare occasion these two aren't fist fighting each other Jack always tells me " Ahh, Mom you should take a picture!" And so I do- because I am a sucker like that!

He likes to lock her in the bedroom and make her play school for hours on end. I'm not sure what they do when they play school but as long as she isn't screaming I say go for it!

Valentines Cookies

Before we made cookies we were able to go watch Emma-Kate play with her kindergarten basketball team. Oh my, it made for a good laugh and I can't wait until Jack and Ella can play sports. Isn't she just too cute with her little freckles?? I love watching her grow up! Ryan and I spent part of our fourth date at the hospital waiting for her to be born so it's a great reminder of how long we have been together!!

This last weekend we went to Aunt Mandy's and made Valentines cookies. Jack and Ella love playing with their cousins and it's so fun to get them all together.

Little Princess

She got this crown for Christmas and loves wearing it all around. And can I just say that this little Missy has quite the attitude. I think the terrible two's with her aren't going to be all that fun!

Eventful Weekend....

So two weekends ago we decided once again to head to the cabin. We invited Ryan's sister and her husband to join us. They would have to leave a little later than us so we gave them directions and said if they didn't show up by a certain time we would come look for them. Well they didn't show up and we did go look for them.....

Read the whole story here...

http://www.nateandjennywilcox.blogspot.com/2011/01/yost.html

Needless to say they had quite the adventure! So after we finally found them and we decided we were all ready for bed (which was close to midnight) we went outside to head to the new cabin to sleep. I opened the door and took a step out and Pax was right by my side. He immediately started barking and took off after something. I didn't want him to wake the kids so I yelled at him to stop and he did. We walked to the other side of the cabin and that's when the smell hit us.... he had been sprayed by a skunk! Oh man, I have NEVER smelt anything that bad! A skunk dead on the side of the road smells like a rose compared to the actually spray of a skunk. It smelled so bad! With no running water and freezing temperatures we didn't have many options. We had him roll in the snow drift several times but it did nothing for the smell. We were forced to sleep in the cabin with him reeking like a skunk! Luckily, after two days of running around outside the smell had kind of gone away by the time it was time to ride home in the car with him! When we got home we googled up some miracle recipe that is supposed to take the smell away but despite our best efforts he still has a slight stench to him. Although I must admit the peroxide/soda shower we gave him did wonders for his hair and he is looking mighty white and his hair is extremely soft! We may have to do it again just for how nice it made his fur! (Only kidding.... he hated his shower almost as bad as we hated having to give it to him!)

Overall it was a great weekend and we had a fantastic time. We went to the hot springs without kids and had so much fun laughing.

I can't wait to do it again!

BTW, my camera's battery died and this is the one and only picture I got of the entire weekend and I was bummed!

New Years 2011

It was so cold but she wanted to stay outside so I let her and watched her through the window!!
Everyone gathered around the heater trying to get warmed up!

This would be the can that exploded. Literally exploded EVERYWHERE!

Some evidence that I really did do some work!

And the evidence that I really didn't do that much work!

Never too young to make them start working!

We would sled for a few minutes then our bodies would be numb and we would have to go warm up! It was so cold.... have I mentioned how FREEZING COLD it was??!!???

My cute and hardworking husband.

A shot of the masterpiece we are working on!

Ryan was great and pulled the kids around everywhere on their sled! It gets heavy with both of them on there!

Pretty sure she was contemplating eating the snow!

My sweet little Missy!

Jack sporting the hat Grandpa Keldon bought him for Christmas from Canada.

We had to wear our snowclothes the entire time even when inside so we didn't freeze!

So lets just rewind a bit....

We spent New Years at Yost working on the cabin and FREEZING our buns off. If you recall it was so freezing cold and let me tell you it was literally FREEZING in the mountains. It got so cold that I had accidently left a soda in the cup holder from our drive there and it froze and exploded EVERYWHERE! I had heard that could happen but seriously never believed it could really happen like that. Soda was everywhere throughout the entire van but luckily it never warmed up so I was able to just pick the ice chunks of soda off the seats and throw it out!

We had to really bundle up but it didn't stop us from sledding and playing in the snow! The boys did a lot of work framing the cabin and I did a little work but mostly just played with the kids! We had a great time and we love getting away for the weekends! We can't wait until our cabin is done! We may just decide to move there! :)

Baking With Boppy

So now that Grandpa Lee (BOPPY) is semi retired it was great on our last visit because he got to spend the ENTIRE time with us! (he may have not thought it was so great!) He mentioned that he wanted to make some cookies and the kids of course were all over that idea. It was probably the messiest and longest cooking experience he had ever had but the kids had SO MUCH FUN and loved making and especially eating the cookies with their Boppy. It was so funny when it came time to crack the eggs Jack insisted that Grandma Nette let him do it himself so Boppy had to let him do it himself too! Luckily he does surprisingly well at it for a three year old!