Thank You

It is now cold enough that the boys got to wear the sweaters that my aunt Pam made for them. They must have been a ton of work. The boys were excited to put them on, but very hard to get to sit still for a picture (notice Evan has Kyle in a death grip). Thanks for making them both. They are very cute and Evan loves to go over who made them every time he sees them.

Evaluation Time

I found this on a friend's blog and her son's answers were so cute, so I decided to try it out on Evan last night. Here is what he thinks of me.

1) What is something mom always says to you? Yes
2) What makes mom happy? Cleaning up your toys
3) What makes mom sad? Not kissing her
4) What does you mom do to make you laugh? tickle me
5) How old is your mom? 47
6) What was your mom like as a child? she liked baby toys
7) How tall is your mom? 47 inches
8) What is your mom's favorite thing to do? go to singing class (primary at church)
9) What does your mom do when your not around? find me
10) If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for? she'll see a tiger
11) What is your mom really good at? playing playdoh
12) What is your mom not so good at? pouting
13) What does your mom do for her job? takes care of me
14) What is your mom's favorite food? chicken noodle soup
15) What makes you proud of your mom? when she's happy and playing
16) If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be? Spongebob
17) What do you and your mom do together? play toys
18) How are you and your mom the same? we both have blonde hair
19) How are you and your mom different? she's a girl and I'm a boy
20) How do you know your mom loves you? cause I love you too

Last Week of Summer

Here's what we've been up to this past week.

Kyle tried chasing the remote control cars and was pretty close when he bit it in the driveway. I got out the camera to document and he looked up and said "cheese." Maybe not that amazing to you, but he'd never said it before, and prior to this past week hadn't really said much but "ma-ma." He has started saying a lot more words this week, including ball, balloon, bye-bye, bear, shoe, sock, and banana. None of them are super consistent as to when he will say them yet, but we're excited for a few words.

Last Saturday we decided to go and do the walk at Tumwater Falls. Evan loved the waterfalls, but walking on the grates above the falls proved to be too noisy.
Sunday we walked Capitol Lake with my parents. You'd think I would have taken a picture of some of the pretty stuff we saw, but no, I waited til we were back in the parking lot.Wednesday we met Grandpa Stucki and Rachel for a trip to the zoo. Rachel and Evan ran most of the zoo and loved spotting all of the animals. It is fun to see the two of them becoming better friends as they are getting bigger.

Being eaten by the shark. Even Kyle figured out you were supposed to yell.
The touch tanks. They were very brave and touched just about everything I think.
Just a cute picture of Kyle and Papa getting ready to see the sharks.The only time the 4 year olds weren't running. This was near the end and their little legs were getting tired. They took a quick rest and then managed to run through the rest of the zoo. All in all a very fun week. I'm glad we enjoyed the great outdoors, because it looks like the rainy season may be settling in.

Happy Birthday Evan!!!

Sept 10th 2004
My cute baby boy

Crazy walking one year old (with what seemed like a lot of toys)

Getting so big playing with Gramps just before he turned 2

One year ago...still a little bit of a baby look at 3 years old

My baby is gone. He turned into a big boy and wants to play with remote control cars. He told me this morning he is four now and doesn't need to sleep with his big dog in his bed anymore (the one he has slept with almost every night for 3 years). When you are four you don't need the dog to keep you safe anymore because you are big apparently. I miss my baby, but the big boy thing is fun too. He is learning so much now and can do so much. He wrote out the entire alphabet the other day and if he has his way he will be reading and riding a bike without training wheels in the not too distant future. I'm excited to see what the next year will bring.

Doin' The Puyallup

Monday when my dad got off work, we headed to the Puyallup Fair. My dad gets free admission tickets from work and we lucked out and went on dollar day for the rides. That is two fairs this year we have had $1 rides. Evan has loved the rides. Since they were only a buck, he got to do 11 this time. Kyle was still too small, but next year they will have to share.

The swings were a hit. It amazes me he is willing to do all of this all by himself.

We looked at all the animals, except the horses who were off doing a show. This is a sheep butt from the petting zoo. Evan was brave and petted everything there was to pet this time.

This was the first ride he went on. We couldn't get a smile out of him because he was too busy aiming his gun at the kid in front of him and they were shooting at eachother. Those guns made the loudest most obnoxious buzzing sound when they were being fired. Thank goodness I'm not a carnie because that ride would drive me crazy.

Kyle in his element...pounding on things and making a lot of noise.

My new favorite photo. Kyle is finally starting to smile for the camera consistently, so we might actually get more good photos now.

One of many driving rides. They wouldn't let you go as a single rider, so he had to ride with a little girl in front of us. Her mom asked if she wanted to ride with him and she yelled no, but after some coaxing was talked into it. After the rides Evan made Aunt Camille proud and demanded an elephant ear. Look what you taught him. He started asking for it when he heard we were going to the fair, and he wasn't leaving without it.

Evan's Party

Believe it or not Evan turns 4 tomorrow. Sunday we had a party with grandparents and some cousins and he had a blast. This is the cake he designed. When we asked what he wanted he said "a rectangle with green frosting." He then picked out a number four candle and the batmobile monster truck for the top. It was just what he wanted. We cleared the oreo dirt idea with him before we added it, and luckily it was okayed.

The spoiled boy got a Leapster 2 from Grandma and Pimpa Warning, and another game to go with it from Grandma and Papa Stucki. He loves that thing, and he has been very quiet on car rides since we got it, so I love it too!

Lots of trusty assistants to help out when called upon. They were good about letting him do it, and then helping him read the boxes to tell him what he got. Then they all helped him try out all of his toys when we were done. He was so glad his cousins got to come.

Modeling his coveted Batman costume. At first it was only to wear around the house (at his demand) but we may have talked him into being Batman for Halloween too.

Breakfast Adventures

Kyle refuses to be fed, he insists on feeding himself.
This morning I let him try yogurt while I worked on paying bills.
Apparently being able to use a fork pretty well does not carry over to using a spoon.
At least it looks like he had fun.

Buckle up...For safety

A quick update on a few happenings around here. Monday we ventured out to Ikea. My mom decided to join us, and by the time we got home I think she'd decided never to shop with us again. We weren't thinking and didn't strap Kyle into the stroller. He sat quietly in his seat and looked at things until we hit the kids department. One second he was sitting, the next he had managed to stand up and abandon ship. There is no scarier sound than hearing your babies head hit the cement floor with a very loud thud. He wasn't bleeding, but instantly he was very tired and looked glazed over. Brandon carried him as we continued on, and then he puked...all over himself, Brandon, and the floor. We finally managed to get out of the store, throw out Kyle's clothes, and get moving. The on-call doctor said it was a concussion, and to keep an eye on him (luckily he was acting normal in an hour or so). We stopped by the mall on the way home to buy Brandon a new shirt and throw his out because the smell was making us all sick, but we survived. Luckily Kyle recovered quickly and by that night nobody would have guessed that we had been neglectful parents earlier in the day.

Now the Evan update. He is doing great. He ran a fever for a few days, so to get him to drink more we bought him Batman tattoos. One tattoo for every big drink until he was wearing all 10. He thought they were awesome and was mad when we made him scrub them off for church on Sunday. We compromised and he got to keep the leg ones on a few more days because he was wearing long pants to church.

We moved his bed into our room last week while he was recovering. You'd think he'd want to sleep in it, but apparently the pile of pillows next to the bed were much too tempting. It was so easy having in our room now, because he sleeps quietly. No snoring, no sleep apnea, no tossing around. The only downfall to this great sleep is that he doesn't need as much, so I'm having to wake up earlier.

In other news, a few funny comments from my boy.

Getting ready this morning "Mom I need to get dressed so I can go to school. I need to learn something." I wish I knew what the something was. We did cover that it isn't nice to hit people, and he is not the boss of Kyle. I hope that was the something he wanted to learn.

Tonight as Kyle was hitting the wall and ready for bed "Kyle, what is your deal tonight." I guess I've said that one to many times.

Translation

Tonight, a special post just for Dan.

I busted out the German-English dictionary, and viel spas 

(pronounced "feel shposs" with a short "o") means....
it's a lot of fun, or have fun.

D'oh! (graffic)

This post is probably PG-13

Tonight we visited Mom Stucki, who had a pretty rough day. She goes to work early in the morning to unlock the office and turn on the lights. She said her prayers which allowed her to get to work safely, but it was her office that was the danger. She doesn't know quite how it happened but when she unlocked the door and went inside, she was turning on the light when she took a hard fall and caught herself with her nose. When she picked herself up off the floor, her nose was gushing copious amounts of blood. She resourcfully grabbed a garbage can and carried it beneath her face while she got ice for what assuredly was a broken nose. She layed on the couch while she iced her nose and called Dad to come get her. She spent several hours in the ER with dad getting Xrays and a CT of her head to check for fractures. At some point shortly after the fall, she realized her left elbow hurt, which also turned out to be fractured. Thankfully, there were no fractures to her skull and no major bleeding. Her nose has an incomplete fracture on the left side. As you can see in the picture, she's pretty swollen and she's got two shiners. But, she's in good spirits and her pain meds are helping to keep her more comfortable. We'll keep her in our prayers and hope the recovery is speedy. As a side note, oddly enough, the tally for broken bones in the Stucki family is, Girls: 3 Boys: 0