Bedtime

Since I bought Elmo at the yardsale, Morgan insists on sleeping with him as well as his old teddy bear. So, whether it be nap or bedtime, this is how Morgan looks when I leave the room. One arm around each stuffed animal. Though, he's not always smiling so brightly. But, having Elmo has made Morgan forget about having a sippy cup when he goes to bed. Yay!

Nelson Family Reunion

Yesterday we went to a big Nelson family reunion. Basically, we didn't know anyone except for Aaron's grandparents. But there was a playground and a river and good food. We left before the main event, an auction, because Morgan was being a handful. It was hard to keep tabs on him, and to keep him out of the way of others. We even tried taking his shoes off of him to dissuade him from running from the covered pavilion, but it didn't work as we had planned.

Morgan loved this tractor, or ATV or whatever it's supposed to be. He called it a car. He would rock back and forth while saying, "Wee, wee, wee, wee!"

A twirly slide. Morgan hasn't had much experience with them. I don't know if he was a fan.

We found a really shallow part of the river, (creek?) and played. We left our shoes on, but took our socks off. Morgan ended up sitting down without warning, so he got his shorts soaked! That's okay though, it was a hot day and they were dry in no time.
Throwing rocks into water is probably Morgan's all time favorite thing to do.

Here we have the water spigot. When we weren't at the playground or the river, Morgan wanted to be here. There was usually a bunch of other kids there too. So, although his pants dried from the river, when we took him home he was soaked from playing in the water here.

The Gardens

I have an Aunt who works in The Gardens at Thanksgiving point. Because of that, she can get people in for half off the admission. We went yesterday. Aaron got off work early because it was Pioneer Day. So, with my cousins Emily and Laura, we went to the Children's Garden.
They have a little pool of water around Noah's ark. The llamas spit water, and occasionally the elephant sprays some. Morgan had lots of fun there.

There was a bear cave. Morgan is riding the bear, but I failed to get the bear in the picture!

A lighthouse. Morgan is climbing to the little room on top.

Here he is in a centipede.

The fish pond. They hang out here by the dock where you can pay 25 cents to feed the fish. We did.

Feeding the fish.

A fountain in the Secret Garden. Morgan liked putting leaves over the jet and watching them fly. My cousin Laura is in the photo. Morgan loves her.

Fuzzy, but Morgan is working on trying to dive into the fountain. Aunt LeeAnn rushed to the rescue.

Part of the nations 2nd largest man made waterfall. Used to be the first largest, but now New York out does it.

Chair, or hat?

How about both. Morgan's Spiderman chair, which he calls man, is great for him to sit in while watching movies or reading a book. But Morgan has also discovered that it is great for wearing on his head.

So, Morgan gets the chair on it's side, then bends over it and props his head in there. Then he slowly stands up and....

Voila!

Then he usually runs around ululating. Maybe he is wearing as an indian headdress or something.

He usually runs down the hall to the door and back. Sometimes he runs into things.

Just like Daddy

When we get home from church one of the first things that Aaron does is take his tie off. Sunday he did just that and draped it over the couch. Then Morgan found it and dragged it around for awhile, so I suggested that he wear it.

Aaron helps his son tie a tie for the first time. :)

Our handsome grown-up boy. Notice the tail of the tie sticking out the bottom of his shirt?

Just so happy.

Carnival

For date night on Friday Aaron and I decided that we would go try the pasta at Pizza Hut. While driving there we passed a park that had carnival rides and stuff. Yay! The Pizza Hut ended up being only an express kind, no dining room, so we didn't even eat there. After dinner at Arby's we went to the carnival, spent $10 on tickets and sent Morgan on 5 rides. He absolutely loved it! It was fun to see him too. I wish we would have known about it though because I didn't have my camera. I had to make due with my the camera on my phone and it didn't work out to well. But here are the tiny picures nonetheless.

We had just arrived and were looking aroud at the rides. Morgan was mesmorized.

The first ride we put Morgan on. He's in the front driving the duck.

The second ride was this jeep. You can't really tell though, with the picture. I think Morgan liked this the best.

Next was the flying saucer. They went up high. Another mother of a child on the ride told me in nicer words that I was being an irresponsible mother to let my little child ride this ride alone. What, was I supposed to go with him? He didn't fall out.

You can't really tell, but Morgan is up in a flying saucer on this one.

He's on a motorcycle deal hear. Around and around and around.

The merry-go-round. I even got to ride. :)

Yard Sale!

Today was a first for me. Today was the first time that I went out looking for a yard sale with intent to buy! I take that back. Today was the first day that I FOUND a yard sale after going out looking for one with the intent to buy. Last week I tried too. But after getting run off the road buy at least 100 loud motorcycles I wasn't in a happy mood and ended my search early. I never have found the whole yard sale thing appealing, and I don't know why. I just went to one and spent all the money I had for it.

When Aaron turned 2 years old his parents got him an easel. He liked it and always wanted Morgan to have one. I found this one at the yard sale for $4. The other side is a dry erase marker board. Morgan already loves it.

I also found and Elmo doll. It was only a buck and since Morgan loves Elmo I bought it. He was very excited when I brought it home. It's not very cuddly, as there is a large battery pack inside it. I don't even know if it would work with fresh batteries.

I also got 8 books for Morgan and the game Catch Phrase. In all I spent $11. I'm a yard sale convert.

Haircut

On Monday I decided to give Morgan a haircut. I put a chair in the bathroom, sat Morgan in it, propped up a little mirror so Morgan could watch, (the bathroom mirror was too high for Morgan to see it) and set to work. Aaron was still at work, so I had no other adult help. Before we had used a beard trimmer to cut the back and sides of Morgan's hair. I got it out but when I tried to turn it on nothing happened. Great. Dead. I failed to realize that I needed only to plug it in. I didn't know there was a plug. I just knew the battery had died. So now my only resources were a comb and regular household scissors. Now Morgan has unbecoming steps in his hair. Ugh. But it's shorter and he doesn't wake up with tangles and snarls.

I took this picture the next day. I spiked his hair. I think it's cute. I don't know why Morgan is crying in these pictures, but I really wanted to get a photo of his hair cut, so I took them anyway.

I think that as Morgan ages he gets more hyper. He loves to jump and play on our bed. What he's doing here is lifting his legs way up and then slamming them down. (Probably a great lower ab workout!) He plays this game at bedtime when I put a blanket on him. That sure makes it difficult. Sometimes he lays on the couch next to me and plays this game. Not fun for Mommy! Especially when he has shoes on. That's the best way to get Mommy angry real quick.

R.O.U.S.'s

R.O.U.S.'s: the things nightmares are made of. All of you Princess Bride fans out there (and who ISN'T a Princess Bride fan?) already know that the acronym stands for Rodents of Unusual Size.
Last night Aaron, Morgan and I watched that movie. Morgan always watches movies with us and can stay pretty well entertained. I haven't worried much about the content of the movies being viewed by such young eyes yet because I thought he was TOO young to notice things or care.
So we were watching the movie. Westley and Buttercup are in the Fire Swamp and have just emerged from the lightening sand. Cue R.O.U.S! Westley is tackled by a man in a giant rodent costume and wrestling commences. Aaron and I joke at how absurdly fake this creature looks. Westley is bitten in the arm by the rodent and yells in pain and fear. Then Morgan squeals in terror and points at the t.v. while jabbering in a panic. I rush to his aide and gather him in my arms. He clings to me, but twists and turns until his teary eyes can see the action on the screen. We should have just blipped through the rest of the terror scene, but we didn't. I sit Morgan on my lap and try to distract him and keep him focused on me. Now Morgan points to the screen and switches his gaze from it to me while talking animatedly. He seems happy enough now, almost as if he was embarrassed about his fear and was trying to joke it off. I'm pretty sure I picked out the word "bad" as he sized up the rat.
The scene ends with a now crispy giant rodent and Westley returns to his princess. I hold Morgan and try to tell him it wasn't real, just a game. He whimpers and cuddles.
Last night I put Morgan to bed like normal. He's been sleeping through the night for a long time now. Last night he woke up around midnight and called for "Mimi." Mommy. Aaron went in first and lied him down, gave him his sippy cup and left. But a little later he was calling for me again. I found him sitting up in his crib and whimpering. I held him and he cuddled. I sang to him and soothed him and got him to go to sleep. There was no further incident.
My poor boy! He must have had nightmares from the movie. I'd never seen Morgan effected by a movie like he was last night, and we've watched some scary movies with him! So I bought a night light today. Hopefully that helps.

Food!

Ah, food. We all eat it. Morgan eats it. I've considered myself lucky that Morgan isn't a very picky eater and more often than not finishes everything on his plate. Now I'm beginning to worry though. Am I feeding him too much? How much is too much? If I continue at this rate will Morgan get unhealthily over weight?
For breakfast Morgan usually has a bowl of cereal. His bowl is filled nearly as much as mine and he eats every morsel. For lunch he might have chicken nuggets. He eats six of them because that is how many I give him. If I gave him seven he would probably eat them all. Morgan can and does eat a whole can of Spaghettios all by himself! For dinner I'll fill his plate with whatever we're having, (barring broccoli, he won't eat that) and he polishes it off most of the time. A whole baked potato, a HUGE serving of spaghetti, (I think it's probably his favorite food). He even eats healthy servings of green salad.
So, all of you experienced parents out there, should I cut down on the serving sizes? Morgan isn't fat, he doesn't have the fat rolls or anything, but he isn't a little skinny twig. He's very sturdy. So what should I do?

Impossible Puzzle Vanquished!

Remember that black and white striped puzzle? Yeah, me too. I finally finished it! It only took me two weeks, but it's done. I decided to try a new strategy yesterday and I was surpirsed at how well it actually worked. I separated all the pieces of a like kind into piles. There are 6 different kinds of pieces. I call them: standard, alien head, bubble end, triplet, arrow, and person. Then I would find a place on the puzzle that had at least 2 sides surrounding it and then would try all the pieces that would conceivable go there. This would be 3 different types at any given time. This method of elimination worked much better than looking at all the pieces at one time, trying to find one that would fit anywhere. Anyway, I'm done! Aaron even helped some. He suggested I glue it to a board and mount it like a trophy, but instead I un-did it and stuck it in the box. Now I can start a new puzzle.

Sidewalk Chalk

On impulse, while at a dollar store, I bought some sidewalk chalk. I thought Morgan would really enjoy it. I was right. He can even identify the purple, and calls everything else yellow.
Notice, Morgan can even spell his name! In block letters, no less. :)

Morgan's new vocabulary

Morgan talks a lot. One word he's recently picked up is Truck. He has also found a new love in the movie Shrek and requests it by name. These two words sound virtually identical coming from him. On both word he emits the R, and replaces the beginning letter with F. It seems when he says these words he shouts, and repeats them over and over. Perhaps he repeats most of what he says and we only notice it more when it sounds like he's cursing like a sailor.
He says something else too, that I haven't identified a meaning for. It sounds like the S word.
Aaron and I don't swear. I haven't heard Aaron cuss, nor has he heard me cuss, cause we don't. But it might appear to an outsider that we use very colorful language in front of our perceptive toddler. Oy.

Impossible Puzzle

I love doing jigsaw puzzles. It's therapeutic to me. I can sit down and work on a puzzle for hours at a time and am always surprised at how quickly the time flies. I recently got one of those boxes that have 10 puzzles in them. I have done them all but one. The one I saved for last seemed like it would be most difficult. I underestimated. This is by far the hardest puzzle I have ever attempted and it's only 500 pieces. I have a card table that I do puzzles on and the 500 piece ones will stay on the table for 2 days at the most.

This picture represents HOURS of work. I took this picture several days after I started the puzzle. The picture was taken on July 1. The puzzle is STILL on my card table with several more hours of work put into it and it doesn't look much closer to being finished than you see here. This puzzle isn't so therapeutic. Aaron doesn't believe that I will finish it, but indeed I will!


Take a look at those pieces, will you? ALL OF THEM ARE THE SAME! Black and white with varying shades of gray. No ground, no sky, just countless zebras ruining my zeal for jigsaws. *Sigh*

The Camping Chronicles: Random

Here are some random photos that I swiped from family.

My favorite part of camping has got to be circling the campfire at night and just yakking, roasting marshmallows, or whatever. Here we are doing that. We all seem to have pleasant expressions on our faces, so I think we are all enjoying it.

Dad and Mom brought this convenient folding picnic table. It sure was nice for the kids! They didn't fit well at the large one.

Oh, he's just cute!

See all the little white dots on the mountain side? They are sheep. Every morning there would be tons of sheep pouring over the mountain, making lots of noise. But the sheep dogs and shepherds kept them out of our camps.

We have to wonder what Aaron is thinking here.

We were all sitting on the hill next to our camp because the shade was there before it was on the level ground.

The Camping Chronicles: Mud Face

Chris and Christine brought their young lab camping with us. After several hours of driving in the car, Sadie seemed thrilled to be out of the car. She dashed around the campsite and released her energy. And she jumped on Morgan sending him mouth first into the dirt. My poor boy! He did not like the taste of mud, so that is reassuring. Oh how I love him!