The Announcement

For Christmas, this year, Ilene hand-painted some ornaments for my family and her family. These are the ones she made for my family. We delivered her family's before we took photos, but essentially the message is the same.

When lined up, they revealed a hidden code.

The '#14' signifies the number of the expected grandchild for my parents.

If you're still having trouble understanding: Ilene's expecting in August.

Pumpkin Heads

Trampoline Fun, September Flowers

Yesterday I was playing with Toby and decided to get my camera to get pictures of our fun!
I also took pictures of the flowers around the backyard.

Then I took some of the flower pictures and played around with them on PhotoShop. That's a fun program!

I also altered this picture of Toby (above). I lightened it up and added highlights.

Toby had so much fun jumping with the bucket of water, we'll probably do it again today.

As for the potty training, I've dedicated the whole day, each day to getting Toby into underwear. It takes a lot of work (Toby seems to understand what to do, and then he has a colossal accident that takes all of my patience and energy not to give up and put him in a diaper for the rest of the day.

I have to give up my regular workouts, taking Toby to the playgrounds, or going anywhere unless it can be done in a half hour (Toby can hold his bladder longer than that, but I'm afraid of him having an accident, especially if it's poo). Toby seems to like using the big toilet rather than the potty so I ordered a fold-up seat to go on the big toilets at the restrooms in stores, so as soon as that gets to Walmart, we'll be able to go places.

No More Diapers (hopefully) :)

Yesterday we noticed we needed to buy another box of diapers (having only around 10 left) but with Greg out of a job right now, we both did not want to buy them. So we decided it was a good time for Toby to be potty trained. :)

He's been interested in the idea for awhile now. He likes it when I read potty books to him, so we told him that he will wear diapers only for night time and that from now on he'll be wearing underwear and using the potty or toilet.

I've set up a Potty Success Chart where every time he goes potty he gets to stamp off a square and when all the squares are stamped off he gets a special treat (ring pop - he loves those). Also he gets a jelly bean every time he goes.

Yesterday he had 3 or 4 accidents but today he's only had one and a half (he slightly wet his underwear before he made it to the toilet). He seems to like going in the toilet rather than the potty (I think the potty is uncomfortable for him) so I ordered a potty seat that folds up so I can stick it in the diaper bag for church and stuff.

So far it's going well. I hope this will be the end of diapers during the day!

A Short, Funny Video

Here's just a funny thing that happened while we were at Vonnie's house when we evacuated Herriman during the fire. I let Toby take pictures with our camera and here is the result!

He still amazes me

For months we've been casually teaching Toby to read. (He knew all his letters by name and sound before his 2nd birthday). Usually, we put out simple words, generally 3 letters long, and have him sound them out. Something like MAP or CAT that he can associate with an object. He'll point to the letter, say the sound, move to the next letter and sound, etc., until he has said all the sounds, then he puts them together. He'll say the whole word, and then we'll praise him for getting it right, which is generally followed by a minute or two of celebration as he runs around clapping his hands, repeating the word over and over, jumping up and down, and generally making a production of himself. It's incredibly cute to watch, and it's so far ahead of where he should be, developmentally, that it actually scares me.

Today, I tried a different tack. I told Tobs to spell the word JET. He said "Juh, J sound" and found the "J" letter and laid it down. Then he said "Tuh, T sound" and found the "T" and laid it down. With some coaxing we got him to identify the letter associated with the "Eh" sound, and he put it down between the J and T, then sounded out the word, and proceeded to celebrate. I tried again, telling him to spell the word CUP. This time he didn't miss the vowel, and got all the letters in the right order by himself. Repeat celebration. I'm amazed.

Of course, then I had to try something harder and tried to get him to go with DUCK. He got the DUC and after some coaxing for the other "cuh" sound, eventually he got the K. But then he wanted to lay the letters down in reverse order and sound it out backwards. I'm not sure what that's all about, but I'm choosing not to worry about it, considering that he's not even 3 years old yet and he's both reading and spelling simple words.

Greg's Graduation! August 12/13, 2010

Toby, all tired out from all the ceremonies and speeches!

Happy for Greg!

Meeting the president of BYU

Greg kind of looks like a wizard from Hogwarts in this picture!

The Kimball Tower, the building Greg worked and studied in

BYU's past and future (hopefully) walking together

The science building. Isn't it neat?

Yeah! I'm done!

Big Tall Columns

Isn't the BYU campus pretty? Toby's holding up the water bottle we bought him as a souvenir. I (Ilene) got a shirt and bag and earrings, Greg got a tie pin and a hat as souvenirs.

Marlan and Linda came to both days of graduation, and also took us out to dinner. It was so nice!

Congratulations Greg!