Happy Birthday Mason!

I can't believe it has been a year already! Mason has added so much to our family. His little personality keeps getting bigger and bigger. He makes us all smile and keeps us moving.

For his birthday we invited our friends over for cake and ice cream. Mason really had no idea what was going on, but he loved all the people over.

And I HAD to have MY fun and make him a much bigger cake than we needed. But, hey, you're only one once, right?

The monkey reminds me most of Mason, partly because the monkey on Madegascar is named Mason, but mostly because he is our little monkey. He is ALWAYS climbing on things. He gets SOO frustrated when he can't quite reach.

The top tier on this cake is a removable smash cake for Mason to dig into...and he DID.

Some of his friends even helped him open some presents. Notice the gift we gave him was some baby shampoo. MacKelle dumped the other one we had out in the tub because she wanted the bottle. Poor Mason.

Trouble

Mason recently found the Kleenex box. Here is how I found him. He has been into ALL kinds of things since he started walking. He has also discovered toilet paper rolls...goody!

Just the Boys

Here is the picture of Trace and Justin at the Montana Grizz game a while back. Justin said that Trace was the only kid around, and that he handled the cold pretty good. They had a really good time. I think it will be one of those trips Trace will always remember. Don't they look cute in their matching beanies?

Cookies and Crayons

Do you ever have to bribe your children to be civilized for church? My bribe today was cookies. I brought some Oreos and some chocolate chip cookies (along with Jelly Bellies and fruit snacks-Nothing like a little sugar to CALM? the Kiddies-What was I thinking???). The Oreos were for Trace and MacKelle because, well, if Mason eats an oreo he ends up looking like he's been playing in the mud. He somehow found the bag with the oreos in it and just HAD to have some (probably because he wasn't supposed to). When we realized what had happened it was too late. We did a switch-a-roo with the Jelly Bellies and cleaned him up as best as we could.

Meanwhile. . . . MacKelle had been coloring and SOMEHOW the entire box of crayons was dumped out through the crack in the seat of the pew. I've been to other wards that don't have the dreaded crack. It is about an inch gap between the seat and the backrest of the bench. I'm sure it keeps the seats cleaner, but is a pain when you have kids with little toys and snacks that fall through it.

Back to Mason. . . He finds the bag of oreos again and figured out how to open it, in the process, flinging one under the bench to the row behind us. Next thing I see is his foot disappear under our seat. He crawled back to the cookie and was making MORE slobbery chocolaty mess. . . .All the while Trace is telling me he wants to go home and that he and MacKelle are thirsty and Mase is playing peek-a-boo with the poor family that will I'm sure never sit behind us again after the crayons and the cookies. Did I mention that it is ward conference? Justin said we must look like investigators who's kids had never been to church before.

I love church. . . It keeps life exciting. But I'll try a different bribe next time.

Starting Early

I was a little surprised when I found Mason like this. My first instinct was to send MacKelle to her room for writing on him (she has been known to write on herself-and other things too). Then I saw the pen in his little fist. I'm not sure what he was doing, but he managed to get himself pretty good.
The worst part is that he was buckled in his booster seat, so I must have left the pen within his reach. But in my defense, I think that babies have go-go-gadget arms.

The Cousin Party

After Christmas we went to Montana to visit my family. My kids had a blast playing with my sister's kids. Here they all are having a "party". They started planning a "Christmas party", but my mom talked them into a cousin party since Christmas was over. They each decorated a little cake and they danced to Bert and Ernie classics like "Rubber Ducky" and "Dance myself to sleep".

Trace and Diego really had fun together, and MacKelle and Ali were adorable playing together. Makes me wish cousins weren't quite so far away.
I didn't get any super great pics of it, but Grandma was getting her groove on too. Ü