Books!

This past week Lucas has wanted to read a book 24/7.  The other night I wanted to sit down and turn on the t.v for five minutes, but Lucas had other plans, he turned off the t.v looked at me and said, "read book".  What do you say to that?  Lucas and I read the book, and have been reading books nonstop since then.  This is not a bad thing, I just feel guilty that I can't read to him 24/7.  Right now we're obsessed with a book call, "The Doghouse."  We went to the library today so hopefully we can branch out a little bit!  Side note, we were able to find another Dora DVD, thank heavens, I have basically memorized the previous Dora Halloween episode.

Caramel Apples

On Monday for FHE we had our friends over (the James Family) for Caramel Apples.  I have never made caramel apples it just sounded and looked good, and it is the season!  Honestly can you go wrong with apples dipped in caramel then smothered in a topping of your choice and drizzled with chocolate (white and milk)?  By the end we were wondering where the apple was!  This was very successful, almost too successful!  Lucas seemed to like it, he basically licked his apple clean.

Pumpkin Picking!

Saturday afternoon we went pumpkin picking!  There was a fun festival going on at a fruit farm that we go to.  We took a wagon ride out to the pumpkin patch and picked a pumpkin.  That is what we planned on doing, honestly, but really Craig picked the pumpkin while Lucas and I were busy stepping in a huge pile of pumpkin goo!  Yuck!  It smelled awful, thus we smelled pretty bad until we got home to wash our shoes! (I think Craig was relieved that I was so willing to leave so quickly, he thinks I take to long picking the pumpkin, but it takes time to pick the perfect pumpkin for our dinner.) So not our funnest trip to the pumpkin patch, but the most memorable trip so far!  And we did end up with a beautiful pumpkin for our traditional dinner in a pumpkin!  Thanks to Craig!  Lucas also rode on this train car ride.  I thought he wouldn't like it, because he had to go all by himself and during part of it we wouldn't be in view.  This was not a problem at all he liked it so much I think he would have gone again!  Instead of riding it again we went and saw the bunnies, which Lucas seemed to enjoy!  He spent most the time trying to pick one up, much to the dismay of the people running the bunny petting booth (Lucas has not learned the concept of being gentle yet.)

 

Football!

Friday night we went to a Penns Valley High Football game.  A young man in our ward is the quarter back, defensive end, and the long snapper.  Basically he is the team!  (He also is also a starting forward on the Basketball team and plays P/1B/SS on the baseball team.)  It was way fun!  The weather was wonderful!  Unfortunately they lost, but our wardie did awesome!  We went with our friends which made it way more fun!  Lucas seemed to enjoy it!  He left the game on a sugar high, at one point he was carrying around a bag of pretzel M&M's.  Yeah that's responsible parenting for ya.  Oh well, isn't that one of the reasons to go to sporting events; to eat junk food!

Penns Valley is the Blue and White

A newspaper shot of Sam

Dora

Lately Sesame Street just hasn't been holding Lucas' attention and he gets bored easily with it, not that this is a bad thing.  We started checking out the old Disney movies, "Robin Hood", "The Jungle Book," etc...  We let him watch them in the evening while were making dinner.  He has really been enjoying them.  Last week when we went to the library, Lucas picked Dora the Explorer.  We haven't ever really watched Dora before, but WOW!  Lucas is a Dora addict.  He loves it, he is so captivated by it.  He has watched the same Dora DVD over a dozen times this past week.  He is even to the point where he starts to interact and respond to her questions.  We have also heard him saying, "oh man," at random times, or when he drops something (A phrase said by one of the characters on the show).  I have also heard him said, "oh man", "Swiper, no swiping".  As a matter of fact while I am typing this he is watching Dora.

The begining of potty training

A couple of weeks ago I decided I wasn't going to push Lucas into potty training until he was ready.  I have not been looking forward to this milestone and I didn't want it to be completely miserable for the both of us.  However, we have been trying to teach him the concept by putting him on the toilet in the mornings and at night.  This was less than successful, after a few seconds he would look at us, and say, "mommie broken, it's broken."  To say I was surprised Monday morning when Lucas said, "mommie potty" is an understatement.  I will admit I did not want to put him on the potty, it was early and I had not even put my glasses on yet.  In the end I figured I better, because what if he actually went.  Sure enough he went, and we praised him a lot.  I have never been so excited, which is pretty sad, and goes to show that our world revolves around Lucas and his small successes.  That night Craig put him on the potty and sure enough he went pee and poop.  At this point I figured we should probably follow through and make an effort to potty train Lucas.  So it began, and we are still working on it.  Lucas will go in the morning and at night, when we put him on the potty, but during the day is hit or miss.  If I put him on the potty he will usually go, however, he has yet to tell us he needs to go, which is evident by the pile of wet underwear and jeans on the dyer.  To give Lucas some credit, we have been kind of busy, and though we have been doing the best we can at the moment, we just haven't been able to hunker down at home and get it done.  Will see how it goes.  We are proud though that doesn't seem to have a problem with going poop and pee in the potty, though I worry that he thinks every time he goes potty he has to go poop.  (Editor's Note:  Katie actually took pictures of this momentous occasion, which shows how sad our lives can be sometimes.  Unfortunately the pictures are not rated for public distribution.)

Punxsutawney!

My friend Alyssa and I decided that though we have thought about it and even attempted once to go experience the groundhog festivities, we finally realized that it is not worth it, to wake up at the crack of dawn, trek up a hill, and stand in the cold with our children for hours (it is really cold in February), just to find out that there will be six more weeks of winter!  However, Punxstawney was still something we wanted to see. So on Monday we packed up the kids and headed to Punxstawney.  Other than Groundhog Phil and Gobbler's Knob there is not much to see in Punxstawney, so this was a quick day trip!  It was fun and the weather was pretty good!  We went to Groundhog Phil's burrow and saw him sleeping, he did briefly wake up to eat and Lucas was able to see him.  We drove up to Gobbler's knob took pictures and called it good!  They did have several of these Groundhog statutes around town, they were pretty cute.  Lucas seemed to enjoy it!