Happy Halloween!

No Halloween is complete without a pumpkin and we had to show off Lance's amazing creation.

Shark Attack!

Here we are at our ward Halloween party, and I must say, Mikey stole the show as our little shark. For those of you not quite getting it, he's the shark that attacked us two surfers (with the help of a few of his friends--see Lance's arm and the back of my shirt.) Though you can't adequately see it, we also have numerous bloody and scabby shark bites on arms and legs that really just ended up on EVERYTHING! Car seats, diaper bag, Mikey's costume, unknowing kids who got too close....

Mikey before food....

Mikey after food....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lPJobwIb_A (that kid MUST be a Moss)

Looks like the shark got too close to our boards. (By the way, Lance's is the cool flaming one. Mine's the less cool and less creative stripey one. I guess we know who the artistic one in the family is. See pumpkin above for further proof...)

A rare picture with the hood on and NOT crying...

...or distracted with candy.

One couple in the ward came up to us and said they didn't know who we were until they saw Mikey around us.

Yummy surf boards....

Do you know what a shark says? Well Mikey does! (Okay, I know they say nothing because they're under water, but we've taught him what we think they would say.) This video also features one of our favorite girls in the ward and one of Mikey's biggest fan. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmn4N_kwP7o

Trunk or Treat!

Another amazing creation of Lance's.

Mikey loves Abigail

When Brad and Sarah first arrived Mikey was so excited to see Abigail. He just wanted to hold her and hug her...... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOS9QvyZKL4

Disney World!

We started our day in MGM....then Epcot, then Magic Kingdom. Yes, as a pregant person, I was about dead by the end.

Lance and I on the streets of New York. Doesn't it look real? Yeah, I didn't think so either.

What a difference 6 months makes. When we were here in April Mikey wasn't scared at all of giant cartoon characters. As you can see, that has changed. Could this be seen as a form a torture that I forced him this close to Chip when he clearly was terrified?
Abigail, on the other hand, at 9 months has no problems with Chip.

All dressed up and ready for some time in Morocco! Okay, that thing on my head is just part of this whole belly dancing outfit. I would have modeled the rest, but I had nowhere to change. Sorry, you missed out.

Hanging in Morocco. Epcot's great, we now don't have to travel the world. We saw it all in a few hours!

Lance dancing in Germany.

Our wedding pose in China.

And proof that we were in all three parks in one day (though we were only in Magic Kingdom for like 2 hours.)

Fruit punch at the beach

Mikey always wants nothing more than to drink from giant cups that spill all down the front of him. And even better when it is dad's fountain drink of fruit punch. He gets so mad because he can never just have his fun with it.

Well he finally got his wish at the beach. He found dad's drink and started drinking, spilling, flicking it all over with the straw... everything he always wants to do, but isn't allowed.
And by this final product, you can see why he's never allowed. :)

Busch with Brad and Sarah

Look at all that meat Brad and Sarah got! What pigs! Lance and I ordered salads only....okay, I'm lying. We ate the same meat, and man was it good!

Of course, most kids love animals and Mikey is no different. But I really think birds might be his favorite right now. He was in absolute heaven here in the birdcages at Busch where the birds love to hop all over you.

He had NO fear of the birds walking all over them and asked for more whenever they left. Then he ran around chasing them.


Such a big boy riding the dragon with dad.



And he'll always love fishies. We just left him there while we went to ride rides. Okay, just kidding, but I think we could have!

WOW

You just have to see this video.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P36zR6O4u8Y

There's no denying, this kid LOVES his doggies

Okay, I know in the first picture it doesn't look like he's enjoying this, but on this particular day, he insisted the dogs join him on top of his little slide. There is not quite enough room so they didn't love it and kept sliding off. Then he'd get mad and want them back up...yada, yada, yada. all very entertaining.

After what could have been 5 minutes or an hour outside (both produce the same sweaty-headed kid during a Florida summer), he needed some cuddle time with Emmie.

And again, another activity where he insisted that a dog join him. Emmie didn't really love it. Luckily she loves him unconditionally :)

Eating "yo" and making messes

"Yo," (aka yogurt) is one of Mikey's favorite foods. It's also the one food where he still makes a gigantic mess on his face when eating. Other, more solid foods don't make nearly the mess. So it's quite entertaining. He's getting quite skilled with the spoon, though, so this may not last much longer.
Luckily, he's quite skilled at making other kinds of messes. He loves to go in a room and shut the door behind him, playing by himself (or yelling at us until we come and open the door). On this particular occasion I didn't realize he had taken an entire bag of fishies in with him...and dumped the whole thing out. It was some time before I went in to check on him and found the mess. As you can see by the grin, he thought it was quite funny.

Climbing the ladder

One day dad was outside getting on the roof for something. Mikey and I went out to say hi and Mikey ran straight for the ladder. Though Lance was standing right behind him the whole time, he really did climb all the way to the top by himself. He's our little monkey!

Dressing ourself

Every child gets to the point when they want to dress themself. From the picture below, you may have guessed that we have arrived at that point. It's not an every morning, as we're getting dressed, kind of thing. More like, he wanders into his room at random times of the day and pulls things out of his drawer and pushes them on us until we give in. This was a particularly nice day when he wanted to go with the green, camouflage pj-pants with the collared polo. Luckily, only our neighbors behind us could see this wonderful display of style and color coordination.

Walking the Dogs

One day, while taking the dogs for a walk, as we do from time to time, suddenly Mikey decided he wanted to hold the leashes. Now he insists on holding them everytime...
...even when hitching a ride on dad's shoulders.
It's so cute!

Here's a video...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zypwdYJFJFY

Last night in Utah :(

On our last night in Utah, we had Lance's birthday dinner at Brennan and Natalie's new house that they hadn't even slept in yet! It was so nice of them and so much fun.

Baby Benjamin, getting so big!

Almost all the grandkids. We learned on this trip that Mikey doesn't pose for group pictures--yes, he is the one who ruins them :) And he was probably off distracting Amanda when this was taken. Abigail-7 1/2 months, Benjamin-4 months, Caroline-2 1/2 months, and Kate-almost 5. It looks like Ben takes after his cousin Mikey. He's just about as big as Abigail who has 3 1/2 months on him and almost twice the size of Caroline, only 6 weeks younger than him!

Amanda's hitching a ride on Mikey's stroller. Mikey thought this was the funniest thing ever at first. After a minute, though, he wanted his space back.

Natalie made this yummy peach pie just for Lance.

Amanda's too busy enjoying pure whipped cream to smile at the camera

Baby Caroline.

Amanda Jane. What a cutie!!

Mikey and Amanda are such big kids sitting all by themselves on their stools!

( After 5 or 10 minutes of them wiggling around on them and making us nervous, though, we put them on the floor to finish their food)