Don't blink...

'Cause if you do, you might miss something. I feel like our house has been full of changes lately. Carter is a pro at sitting up and (I wouldn't say it's a crawl yet) he can scoot himself all around the house. He is also very good at eating his snacks (cheerio's, biter biscuits, bananas, bread, etc.). And although I just gave him a hair cut a few weeks ago, it's already time for another one. Any tricks on cutting a 7-months old hair (i.e., keeping him from turning his head toward the scissors)?
Olivia loves to be outside. She also started her "dance" class (actually called "magical movements") today and she loved it. We are so glad that she's involved in an extracurricular activity. Olivia is also getting very good at reciting The Pledge of Allegience. We did find out that she still won't attend nursery by herself though. Hmmm?
Aaron only has 2 1/2 weeks of school left and he is definitely on the daily countdown.
I spend any extra time thinking about what I want to do to the house we are planning to buy. My long list has it's priorities, but Aaron and I are excited to start building equity...and to have a basement!

Carter's first biter biscuit.

Olivia's first PB&J outdoor lunch of the year.

We plan to close on or around April 24th.

Of course, that isn't our furniture (it's not a FUTON!). I took these pictures off the listing website.

"I looked out the window and what did I see?"

"Popcorn Popping on the apricot tree!"

Well, we aren't quite to the popcorn on the trees yet...but the weather, in our neck of the woods, has been beautiful this week! I absolutely love the changing of seasons!

Beautiful weather outside includes sidewalk chalk for Olivia - and a bath!

Looking so handsome!

And cute!

Olivia is getting better at peddling her bike, but the steering still needs work. Watch out for the house!

Carter tries to eat every old leaf he can get his hands on.

Beautiful weather outside means I can go for walks again! I was pleasantly surprised to see that both my kiddies fell asleep while I strolled the neighborhood.

Aren't baseball caps the cutest thing on little boys? Especially when their ears get pushed out!

Unfortunately the good weather wasn't hear to stay. We are hearing reports of snow flurries for the weekend. Oh well!

It's taken over my life!

I just realized that I haven't posted in over two weeks and then I went to see what pictures I could post...I only had two. And well, the two pictures that I had were of a house that Aaron and I were thinking of buying. So...that is why this blog entry is titled the way it is.
Aaron and I have been busy house hunting the past couple of weeks. Nothing is final, but I think we are coming to an end of it. That means we'll have some down time before we close and then it will get crazy again. The one picture I'm posting this week is taken at a home that Aaron and I thought we would be buying. We ended up not settling on a price with the seller and so we have moved on to a new home. Maybe it's for the best...these mirrors were a bit over the top. The mirrors were on the walls and ceiling as you walked down a portion of the stairs into the basement. It would have been a huge mess to try and get those things off the walls (and ceiling) without them breaking all over!
What were they thinking when they put those up?

Valentine Celebrations & a date!

We hope you all had a great Valentine's Day! Since we had some bad weather and were stuck home all day, I decided to make it a fun holiday for Olivia too.
I don't know why everything I'm writing is underlined. I can't figure it out...oh well.
Lots of pictures to enjoy this week!
People have mentioned to me that they can't leave comments...I hope that blogger has that problem fixed because I don't think it's a problem on my end of the line.

When I was a little girl, Valentine's Day was always a big to do! I was surprised to find out (just this year) that the traditions that I grew up with weren't a tradition with most of my friends too. I guess it's because they didn't grow up in the UT! I used to take all my Valentine's for my friends to their house, put it on the door step, and then "doorbell ditch" them. I loved to get Valentine's the same way from friends, my cousins, my grandma & even my mom. So...this year, Olivia's mommy left her a Valentine at her doorstep. Maybe some of you can make this a fun little "tradition" for Valentine's Day with your kids (next year of course).

I'm glad she was excited to get some skittles and a Valentine note.

The power was out at Aaron's office on Valentine's Day and so he got to come home and spend most of the day with us. He even brought us Valentine gifts home. Olivia got a rose and a balloon. I think Carter has enjoyed that balloon even more than Olivia has though.

Since Aaron isn't a big chocolate fan, he got a new wallet for Valentine's Day. It's called an "all-ett." His old wallet was so fat that it was ruining his pants. His new wallet (the thin thing on top) only holds the necessities and so it's also better on one's back!

This day of love wore Carter out. I took this picture because I was so surprised that he fell asleep in his swing. He doesn't like his swing much anymore. After I took the picture, I noticed that his face was stained orange from his lunch of carrots.

Olivia and I made a Valentine Cake for our dessert. It's a sour cream pound cake. We ended up sharing with our neighbors because we had too much for our little family.

Here is our candle light Valentine Dinner.

The day after Valentine's, Olivia had her first dentist visit. She did great. They cleaned her teeth and counted them. Then she got to bring home a bag of toys and other goodies (no, not candy goodies). I forgot my camera and so the dental assistant took this picture for me and it didn't turn out very good.

This is one of those precious moments. I caught Olivia helping Carter get a drink of water from my water bottle.

This is one of the best pictures of the ice we could get without getting all bundled up to go outside. I know the ice is hard on the trees, but it was so pretty! When the sunlight hit it, it sparkled all over. Ice covered every branch, power line and isicles were hanging off every street sign. I guess I can say it was pretty, because we weren't one of the thousands of people that didn't have power. Very grateful for that!!!

We got more snow yesterday and so Olivia and I headed out to play in it.

Carter can't wait until he's old enough to play outside when it's only 20 degrees.

Until then, he'll enjoy watching us through the sliding glass door.

Olivia wishing she had a hill to slide down.

We had so many isicles hanging on our house. One in particular got very long! It was fun to see it get longer and longer every day this past week. We finally decided to break them all off so that they didn't fall off and hurt Olivia while she played outside.

It was almost to my chin when we broke it off. So, I'm guessing it was almost 5 feet in length!

Well, Aaron and I got to have a little date on Saturday night. We haven't had one since Carter was born last August. Our friends, Karen & Ken, watched the kiddies. Olivia got to help Karen make a cake. She loved it!

Frosting a cake takes great concentration.

So does putting sprinkles on it!
But it takes the most concentration to eat it! Yummy funfetti cake!

"So This Is Love?"

We have had so much cold weather that our household has been quite uneventful. Today was the first time it's gotten above freezing in a few weeks. But it will be back down tonight because another winter storm is coming through. It's so pretty after the snow has fallen! Just too cold to play in. No seriously, I don't consider myself too much of a wimp with the cold, but when it's in the teens (without the windchill factor), it's too cold for a child to play in.
I took Olivia and Carter to get check-ups last week. It was there that the doctor pointed out to me (his mother) that he had two teeth. Where have I been? Well, I actually didn't think it would happen for awhile. I think Olivia was closer to 10 months old. Maybe this will mean that Carter will sleep through the night sooner than Olivia did too? I sure hope so!!!

Olivia has finally found her Prince, and just in time for Valentine's Day.
She sang the Cinderella song "So this is love...hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm," while they danced.
Well, actually, she only got to sing the word, "So" before her Prince Jordan took off running in the other direction.

Along with the cold weather comes STATIC CLING!

All of that from just taking her coat off.

Since it's too cold for cereal, Olivia got to try GRITS for the first time.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Wintery Weather in Cinti

Not much new - we do have new pictures though!

Olivia wanted to blow out the candles on her cake again. This was actually on her birthday. We had cake and ice cream for almost four nights in a row. Olivia was in heaven. And who am I kidding? I was too:)

His first baseball cap finally fits!
(Does this look like a "Blue Steel" pose to anyone else?)

Last Sunday (21st), church got cancelled from a snow storm we had. So, Olivia & Aaron made the best of it! I didn't even make it out to snap a few pictures...it was too, too cold for Carter!

When Olivia was done playing in the snow, she enjoyed her first cup of hot chocolate with marshmallows.

And enjoyed it, she did!

I can hardly believe that Carter will be 6 months old this week. He is getting pretty good at sitting up. He didn't even want to relax in his rocker while he watched his favorite movie - Baby Einstein!

What a pose! Olivia loves her Valentine dress!
It seems she grew a few inches over night because, all of the sudden, her fall and winter dresses no longer fit!