What We've Been Up To

Anyone who knows Mason knows his love for trains. Thomas in particular. He brought home a pretty decent haul from Christmas in Idaho. He has a lot of fun driving the train around the tracks but not before having Mom and Dad "help" set up the tracks for him.

Travis works from home when he can so as to avoid wasting time walking back and forth to the library. Quite often Mason wants to go back to daddy's little workspace in the bedroom. I pulled out the gates and have used them a couple of times to keep him out in the living room so Travis can work but Mason lets us know how unhappy this makes him. Travis thought he would make a quick little fort in the couch to keep Mason happy one day and it worked better than I thought it would.

BEHOLD THE BLIZZARD OF 2011

We started hearing last Friday or Saturday about this blizzard we were going to get. Apparently it was quite the storm spanning over 2,000 miles. Chicago received 20.2 inches while we ended up with 18.7 inches. I saw reports of snow drifts that were 3 to 4 feet high. That's a lot of digging out.

So here's how we handled this paralyzing storm. As soon as it stopped snowing and blowing we went out and made sure we could get to our cars. Getting to our cars proved to be pretty easy. Digging out the cars on the other hand... we'll see.

We wanted to take Mason sledding and we had thought about this before the storm blew in but never made it out to buy a sled for him. This was our solution. We put a pillow in a laundry basket and used one of Travis's old belts to pull it. It was quite a success and Mason loved it. That is, until he saw and wanted to go to the park. The snow was too deep and the "sled" kept tipping over. We gave up there and decided to just walk around. Mason didn't agree with that decision and we ended up going home with the promise of watching Cars (one of Mason's favorite movies). Three times we went out and three times Mason was promised a movie or rather bribed with one so he would come inside quietly.

We will have had Travis home most of the week. He worked Monday and Tuesday. Places starting closing early on Tuesday due to the storm, and Wednesday and Thursday were snow days. Sometimes it's weird to have him home this much and I have to keep telling him to get back to work. Hopefully next week will be business and usual and we can all get back into our normal routines.

Christmas Vacation 2010

With Christmas Vacation 2010 came a few more firsts for Mason. He saw Grandma Smith and Aunt Tara shoveling snow one morning and decided he better help. Grandma and Grandpa Turner got a little 4-wheeler for the grandkids to share and Mason loved riding it. If you look closely you can tell he is a lot like his mommy because he wore his slippers while he rode. Not the greatest picture as far as showing what is happening here. Christmas morning Mason's cousin got a sled and we all went sledding while Grandma stayed home and got Christmas dinner ready. Mason loved going down the hill with Aunt Tara. I wasn't wearing proper shoes for sledding and the one time I went down one of my shoes fell off. It was still fun. Cold, but fun. The first half of Christmas Eve was spent with the Turner side. Mason loves playing with his cousins. He wasn't very interested in having his picture taken so this is about as good as it gets. Maybe an aunt or uncle got a better one with their camera. Best buds. Being dressed alike was not planned. I think they were watching a movie or they probably would have both been looking at the camera. We got home from church the first week in Idaho and there was some good snowman snow so I told Travis he should go make a snowman for Mason. Travis' dad got there about the same time and helped build it. Then Mason went out and helped put the face and buttons on. They made him facing the house so Mason could look out the window and see his snowman. Another first and he loved it.

Christmas Tree Take 2

This is the first Christmas tree in our 6 1/2 years of marriage and it didn't even last 24 hours [Travis here with a correction: We had a Christmas tree in Boston. It was about 18 inches tall and had the fiber optic twinkling and color-changing lights. I guess it wasn't very memorable for my wife]. The sweet little boy in the picture (aka Mason) tipped it over twice and I took it down instead of waiting for him to do it again. I get tired of those games a lot sooner than Mason does.

This is our second tree. Made entirely out of paper and tape, it doesn't tip over or take up any room which is great because we don't have a lot of free space for a tree at the moment.

Mason had a lot of fun helping me decorate it. I'm not sure if he liked the candy canes on the tree though because he kept taking them off.
I think my favorite ornament is the gingerbread man holding the candy cane. That wasn't the original plan. They were going to be separate ornaments but I think I liked them better as one.

Thanksgiving

We were forutnate enough to spend Thanksgiving in Idaho with the family again this year. It was a blast, of course. Any time spent with family is time well spent as far as I'm concerned. Thanksgiving day was great. Good food was eaten, paper turkeys were made, young cousins played, and naps were taken (but only by adults).

The best part was being able to watch the kids play with each other.

Mason loved riding his cousin's 4-wheeler.

The making of turkeys and a napper in the background

The end result

I wish I had taken more pictures but I was busy having fun and enjoying good food and company. It doesn't get much better then that.

Stalling Tactics

So lately Mason has been trying anything he can think of to get out of going to bed (and sometimes going down for naps). We decided to compile a list of all of the things he has tried in order to stay up later. Here they are.

The top 10 things Mason does to put off going to bed.


10. Eats dinner very slowly

9. Requests a snack at the last minute

8. Requests another drink after one sat in front of him at the table untouched for the duration of dinner. He is suddenly thirsty at bedtime.

7. Brushes teeth very slowly or simply refuses to brush them

6. Asks for another song

5. Asks for anther book

4. Refuses a diaper change

3. Insists he pooped and needs another diaper change after refusing the first one. He has yet to actually be poopy after such a claim.

2. Insists on another family prayer

1. Puts himself in time out. He plops down on the time out stool and says "two minutes" or "don't move"



My favorite ones are the time out and asking for more prayer.

Cheese Trains and Wet Socks

So, this post will be pretty random. I try not to do random posts but I didn't feel like doing 4 to 6 posts tonight.

We could not get Mason to eat anything tonight, and it was getting closer to bedtime. As many of you know, he is obsessed with trains. I suggested a cheese train. He liked the idea. Travis cut the cheese into a train. It's funny to watch (or listen to) Mason while someone is doing some type of train art. He gets pretty excited and does this delightful squeal/giggle/laugh.

I was getting Mason ready for a bath Saturday night and totally forgot to take his socks off. He was so concerned that he still had his socks on and that they were wet.I should have taken a picture of the whole park. It was closed off all summer. They finally finished it in September so we put our jackets on and went to play at the park for home evening one night. If you look at Mason's nose he has a car "sticker" (band aid) on. I don't really remember how he got the sore but he loved wearing the stickers.Travis hates when I post stuff like this but this is the work of Mason. He likes to put us down for naps. He goes to his room and get a blanket and usually a few other things. He makes sure you have a pillow and will not let you get up until he is satisfied that you have taken a decent nap.We are finally to the Halloween pictures. We decorated cupcakes tonight.I was surprised when Mason put the skull and pumpkin on the cupcake instead of in his mouth. He did eat one of each and was a little upset when we said no to more. These are the cupcakes that Mason decorated.

Here are all of them that we did.

We went to a primary Halloween activity Wednesday night and Mason was a little soldier. (Thanks Grandma and Grandpa for the outfit.) He had a lot of fun playing the games and seeing the other children in their costumes.

The Missing Tortillas

Mason and I went grocery shopping this morning and got home just in time for lunch. Travis was getting stuff out for a quesadilla for Mason and told him to give the tortillas to Mommy (or he thought he did). Meanwhile, I was in the bedroom changing into something more comfortable (I love wearing lounge pants around the apartment). I came back out to the kitchen and Travis was looking for the tortillas. He asked me if Mason gave them to me. He hadn't. We looked everywhere. We asked Mason to take us to the tortillas. We looked in the cabinets and drawers, the garbage, and under pillows and blankets in the living room. I ended up making Mason cheesy bread for lunch instead of the intended quesadilla.

About 1:00 Travis went back to work and I was left with Mason and lunch cleanup. As I was putting the cheese back in the bottom drawer in the fridge I saw something that didn't belong there. The tortillas were in the back of the drawer under some other cheese. I think Travis intended to give the tortillas to Mason to give to me but put them in the drawer where the cheese was. We know that Mason didn't put them there because Travis said he was in the fridge still getting things out when Mason walked away and what would posess a 2 year old to bury the tortillas as far down and back in the fridge as he could get? We had a good laugh and apologies were made to Mason for blaming him for the missing tortillas.