Our Helper

Just a little video of our little man vacuuming this weekend! As you can imagine, it's very helpful! Ha! The level of cuteness dropped down one notch when I realized that he will no longer let me vacuum. I tried tonight and he fussed until I let him have a turn. :)

Snow Storm?

Picture from our back deck

We did get some snow and icy rain on Saturday, but NOTHING like what they had expected! In fact much of it is already melted! We ran a couple of errands and the stores were dead -- maybe that was our hint to say indoors the rest of the day!



One of our errands took us to Walmart where we bought Mitchell a new truck. It's remote controlled and he LOVES it! It's kinda cute -- he thinks I control it, eventhough Jacob is usually has the remote. When it stops going, he'll pick it up and bring it to me. I'll place it back on the ground and then it'll mysteriously start going again :)

We're ALMOST done painting the kitchen! Pictures to come....

15 Months!

Happy 15 months, Mitchell!

Mommy, no matter how hard you try...I'm not interested in sitting in your chair today!

Let's

Go

Play!

Let's see...what's our 15 month old up to these days.....
His new favorite word seems to be "Truck"...pronounced "Errrr-uck". He loves to point them out while we're driving and calls our Pilot a truck.

Mitchell has learned to say "no" to things he doesn't want to do. Just tonight when I went to put him to bed, I said "Mitchell, it's time to lay in your bed" and he shook his head back and forth saying "no, no". I won that battle, but there are many more to come!

We're just now starting to notice how good his memory is! For example, over Christmas when we were at my mom's we watched birds from her kitchen window. The first night we arrived there this time (3 months later), he was standing in the kitchen and looked up at the window and signed bird! He couldn't see out the window, so I know he didn't see a bird. He just remembered! Also, I have a little purple dog on a shelf at home that he played with a couple of times. Today, he looked the shelf and said "dog?" The dog wasn't there (who knows where it'll turn up!), and he was asking me where it was!

Jacob was sooooo excited to see him tonight! He was dying for some Mitchell time after being gone for 2 weeks!

We're expecting 8-12 inches of snow tonight...we'll see!

Napa Valley

We had a GREAT time in Napa Valley! Our first trip to the Valley together...and hopefully not our last! We wined, dined and slept in for three days straight...couldn't have asked for a better vacation! Here are a few pictures below. If you're interested in seeing more, check out the side panel.


In one of the wine cellars

In front of one of the grapevine fields


Jacob between the rows of vines

Isn't it just beautiful?!?!

Mitchell was a good boy at my Mom's! Although we were only gone 4 days, he literally looked bigger to me upon my return! Jacob stayed in San Fran to work again this week, so it'll be almost a full two weeks without seeing Mitchell. He's dying for some Mitchell time! Mitchell was looking at our pictures and saying "Dada" :)

Cookie Monster

I left Mitchell with my Mom & David yesterday morning and headed out to San Fran. It is a LONG flight! I left there at 10:40am and arrived in San Fran (with one layover) at 5pm. Jacob had spent a few days in Salt Lake City and arranged his flight to San Fran so that we could meet in the airport. We had a nice dinner last night at a restaurant called Santorini, which is the Greek island that we fell in love with on our 2006 vacation. The food was wonderful and it was nice to have an evening together :)

We called to check in on the little man this morning and he's doing just fine, as expected! Here are a few pictures they sent me from this morning. They took a field trip to a local cookie manufacturer...their good friend and neighbor works there.


Our cookie monster

Mitchell has been struggling with sleeping a full night on the trip. I was there two nights with him and the first night, he was up from ~12am to ~4am. I took the 12am to 2am shift and my mom stayed up with him from 2am to 4am. Luckily, the 2nd night he slept straight thru, but apparently last night he was up from ~12am to ~2am again! I think he's struggling to get accustomed to new surroundings/new crib. Hopefully tonight will be better!

I call this his Katie Holmes smile. She always smiles with her tongue between her teeth.


Is that tongue searching for cookie crumbs?

We're headed to Napa Valley this afternoon, hope to have lots of pictures to post :)

Happy St. Patty's Day!

Our little leprechaun

We're headed up to Minnesota/Wisconsin today! We're bound to get lots of "he looks Irish" comments with his red hair!




Kiss me, I'm Irish


"Mmmmmmmmm"

"Pfahhhhh"

His reaction when I said "Mitchell, show Mommy your new shoes!"

We finally used Aunt Katy's christmas gift card for some spring/summer tennis shoes. He loves them!

Animal sounds

We've been working on animal sounds lately...and he's getting a little better! They all still sound pretty much the same, with the exception of the snake's ssssss and the duck's quack (but it sounds more like he's saying duck than quack!)

He's very into 'figuring out how things work'! Tonight he figured out the light switch, up off, down on, off, on, off, on, etc. I wasn't in a hurry for him to get that one down! He's also working hard to figure out his car seat buckle, but luckily he does not have it down yet!

We had some much needed rest this weekend. The past couple of weeks have been unimaginably busy! I've had 2-3 nights of campus events each of the last two weeks, so my Dad and Sherri have been my saviors! Mitchell has definitely learned who they are....and they claim he's saying Grandpa now...but I have yet to hear it :)

We spent the weekend painting our kitchen. We only got the base coat on, but it looks good! We'll have to put the painting on hold for a few weeks because our travels are here! Jacob flew back to San Fran tonight. Mitchell and I are headed to Minneapolis on Tuesday (St. Patty's Day), and then I'll head out to San Fran on Thursday to meet Jacob. We're REALLY excited for our trips!

Refrigerator Reorganizer

We've got a refrigerator reorganizer on our hands! Too bad he didn't wipe it clean in the process!

Oh, no! You caught me! I'm probably not supposed to be in here! I promise, all I'm doing is a little reorganizing!

Oh, yeah! I must've gotten my daddy's power of persuasion because she's going to let me play!

I guess I better follow through with my promise. I'll start with this sticky stuff that you guys put on your pancakes/french toast....but you never let me try :(

There we go, much better placement.

Hmmm...what shall I put away next?

Orange stuff is next.

It's that sweet stuff that you guys mix with tequilla. Yeah, I never get to taste it either, so I might as well put it right next to the syrup.

Perfect! Next up, the carton of eggs! :)

Blowing a kiss

He LOVES blowing kisses these days! It is the cutest! Here's a short video. He does it to everyone....including strangers at the store. Usually followed by lots of "ahhh...."s :)



(push the play button to watch the short video)

The great outdoors

Mitchell LOVES being outdoors! No matter the temperature or what is out there...he just loves to walk around and explore. We had just come in from a trip outside..

Why did you bring me inside? It's so great out there!

Boo..hoo....please take me back out there!

Whimper, pout, whimper pout

Momma, out, momma, out, M-O-M-M-A!

Did you say we could go out again?

Weekend is over already?

How is it already Sunday night? We had a great weekend, but somehow it just went too quickly :(

Both Mitchell and I were excited to spend some time with Jacob! He seemed to enjoy his first week on the San Francisco project (I double checked the spelling this time, Dad!). I'm honestly kind of worried that the travel stress, long busy season hours and time change is going to make him sick. We'll see!



I missed my Daddy :)

Jacob: "I have to leave again today, but I'll be home Friday night!"
Mitchell: "Whatever"

Jacob and I fought over who had to get up with Mitchell at 5:10am on Saturday morning! Jacob won for the first two hours, but he let me take a 7am nap while he made Mitchell's breakfast. I LOVE the inventer of day light's savings time! So what if we lose an hour for one day? His 6:00ish wake time on Sunday morning just seems so much more reasonable!

Bathtime game

Here is a little video of our latest bathtime game. I'd call it "hide and seek", but there is no hiding....only seeking! Mitchell has four or five different types of toys in his bath, and I call them out and see if he will pick out the right ones.



I really didn't know if he could do it when I started....but as usual, he surprised me!



He shows us how he can find a duck and a zebra in this video.



He can also find his frog, elephant and boat. He's out of toys though....I'm going to have to find some more to learn!



It's amazing he can see anything over that tummy! Ha! :)

Spoon tug-o-war

I was just being silly when feeding Mitchell and it quickly turned into a fun game of tug-o-war. He won :)

I'm going to try to get a video, but Mitchell has started "reading" his own books aloud. Obviously, he says very few real words, but he babbles babbles babbles...stops...turns the page, and then babbles some more. So cute :)

Jacob just started a 6-week new project in San Francisco. He will fly out each Sunday night and return on Fridays. We have decided to take advantage of his location and plan two mini-vacations! The first will be an adult only trip to Wine Country! Mitchell will be staying with my Mom & David in Wisconsin for the weekend, while I fly out there to meet Jacob. This is the first time we've vacationed without him. I know I'll be dying to see him by Monday, but we're looking forward to it! A few weeks later, I'm going to fly back for another weekend, but take Mitchell with me. We're going to spend that weekend in downtown San Fran and see some of the surrounding sites (Golden Gate, famous curvy road, Alcatraz, Trolleys, China town, etc). Between those vacations and my trips to Minneapolis for work, it's going to be a busy spring!

Here is a little video of one of Mitchell's new favorite activities. He still enjoys ripping toilet paper off the roll and throwing it on the ground....however he's now decided it's also fun to throw it away, piece by piece, in the trash can! No arguments here!

We had a nice weekend! Mitchell is literally learning new things EVERY SINGLE day! Here are some of my recent favorites...

1. He has been blowing kisses for quite some time, but he will now actually kiss your lips/cheek. He can't pucker his lips, so he just opens his mouth up and if you're lucky, he might even lick your cheek. Ha! I'd say they are the type of slobbery kisses that only parents love...but my Dad and Sherri actually taught him, so I guess they are suitable for grandparents too :)

2. He is a signing machine, sponging up anything he sees me do. Sometimes he uses them out of context...but how is he supposed to know? For example, my Mom and I were singing "Shoo fly shoo" last weekend and he started signing "shoe". I also really encourage him to try to say the words, but usually the signing comes first.

3. We have a DVD player in the Pilot, and often let him watch this baby video that he really likes called "Baby Signing Time". It opens up with a lady singing and signing "Baby Signing Time" to a catchy little tune. When we put Mitchell in the Pilot today to run an errand, he starting trying to sing the song and signing "baby" to tell us that he wanted to watch his DVD!

4. Jacob figured out (good for him!) that Mitchell responds to things better when you explain them to him. (duh! Why didn't I think of this earlier?) For example, rather than literally wrestling him to change his clothes....we get his attention and tell him that it's time to change his clothes and then ask him to help - "put your arm through here", etc. The most shocking part of this is that it seems to work with bedtime & naptime too!!!! "Mitchell, it's time for bed. Let's go upstairs and turn on your music and then I'm going to rock you for a minute and then lay you in your bed. Give me a kiss on the cheek. Good night, buddy!" No fussy, crying....AMAZING!

5. It is just constantly amazing to me how much he can understand now! It's like we no longer speak a foreign language to him :) Today, he ran into the kitchen and signing "banana" I said "Oh, buddy, I know you want a banana, but you've already has two today. How about we have crackers instead?" He ran over to the pantry, opened it up, grabbed the box of crackers and brought it to me! :)