If only he weren't so serious all the time...

Will does such random things during the day. He sure knows how to drive me crazy...but then every once in a while he does something so hilarious that it just cracks me up. His favorite form of contraband is Q-tips. Whenever I forget to shut the door he sneaks into my bathroom, finds the box of Q-tips, and takes off to hide. Of course, he hides in the same place every time-- behind the rocking chair in his room.

Will is getting to the point where he has to do everything himself- except for the small problem that he is too small to do most things for himself. All day long I hear "Will do it! Will do it!" He had to pick out his own clothes the other day and out of all the clean clothes I had just folded and put in his laundry basket he chose the wife-beater (I don't know what else to call it...sleeveless tee?) that says "I'm the star" and came free with a pack of onesies that he outgrew a long time ago. He spent about 1/2 an hour trying to put it on before I gave in and helped him and he wore it all day...with no pants. That is high-class right there.

Yesterday I took a quick shower and when I got out I could hear Will coming up the stairs. He walked into my room and I discovered that he had taken it upon himself to get dressed for the day. He managed to get a pair of shorts on...however they were on backward, both legs were through 1 leg hole, and they still had the price tag hanging down. He was obviously very pleased with himself which made it that much more amusing. I told him we were going to take a picture to show Daddy and he said "Smile. Cheese!" and gave this lovely pose.

This morning I put Will in his high chair and gave him some cereal and grapes for breakfast and left the room for a minute or two. When I walked back in Will had his head down and his arms folded and said "Father ... Father...AMEN!!" Apparently I walked in on him in the middle of a little prayer. He says "AMEN" very jubilantly...especially at the end of talks and prayers in Sacrament Meeting at church. He usually turns a few heads.

In other news, we have a yard!! Thanks to the miracle of sod our yard that started out as dirt this morning is now grass! Unfortunately we aren't sure if they didn't deliver enough or if we (well, I had nothing to do with it...but I'm sure I wouldn't have done it better either) just under-estimated how much we needed because we have about two-thirds of a backyard at the moment. A real life reason to pay attention in geometry class kids--it is kind of tricky to figure out the square footage of a yard with a lot of curves and diagonal edges! I took a before picture and tomorrow I'll take an after picture and eventually I'll post them.

Baby #2 is scheduled to arrive 8 weeks from yesterday. It is crazy to think we'll have two little boys around here in 8 weeks or less! And it is frightening to think that the Bar Exam is only about 6 weeks away!!

My birthday was on Friday and we had some friends and neighbors over for cake in the evening. All day long I tried to get Will to tell me "Happy Birthday Mommy!" because he likes to say Happy Birthday...but all he would say was "Happy Birthday Potty!" over and over....not sure what that says about me there. Oh well.

Will's Big Day Out

Will saw an ad in the paper the other day for the Big Day out with Thomas on the Heber Valley Railroad and suddenly he was the world's biggest Thomas fan. He has seen the show on tv a few times and he likes trains in general, but he suddenly decided that he LOVES Thomas the Tank Engine. Sooo we gave in and paid the exorbitant prices for Will to go ride Thomas. Actually we didn't have to pay for Will at all since he is still under 2, but Mom and Day had to pay $20 each for the pleasure of taking him. Even though Mom and Dad felt it was kind of a rip off I think that Will had about as much fun as an almost-2-year-old can have.

We prepared for the excitement by taking some Thomas books out of the library...which Mom is wishing she hadn't done because she has read them each about 50 times and is afraid Will is going to be traumatized when they have to go back to the library.

We spent the morning shopping at the outlets in Park City and Will got a bunch of new clothes thanks to the sales at the Children's Place Outlet. The new baby also benefitted from a few new things to enjoy in addition to Will's hand-me-downs.

Will fell asleep in the car when we drove down to Heber and we woke him up in time to see Thomas pulling back into the station. He was pretty excited when the train got closer and he realized that it was "Thomas!"...he says this in a high-pitched voice that gets even higher on the last syllable. The other activities proved to be on the lame side, but Will still had fun looking at a few animals, playing with a train set (when the bigger kids weren't pushing him out of the way), getting a balloon monkey, and getting temporary tattoos of Harold the Helicopter and Thomas on his arms. He had to sleep with his pajama sleeves rolled up last night so that he could see Thomas and the helicopter...which for some reason he calls "Chuck".

Finally it was time for the big Thomas ride. Will had a pretty serious look on his face the whole time. I think he was having a hard time taking everything in. Thus, the pictures aren't very smiley, but I think he really was having fun because every once in a while he'd laugh and let out a squeal.

After the train ride we drove home and went over to a neighbors for a barbeque and Will had fun playing with the other kids. By the time we got home it was late and I tried to get Will to sleep, but he was way too excited. He wouldn't stop talking about "Thomas--helicopter--monkey--train--conductor--ride." It is funny because he doesn't talk in sentences yet so he just lists off words related to whatever he is thinking about. Thomas combined with the fact that he was wearing new pajamas from the outlets with race cars on them and he had a lot to say! He kept talking for about 45 minutes before finally dozing off . . . only to wake up about an hour later with more to say. Then he woke up about 5 more times during the night talking about Thomas until about 4 a.m. when he woke up screaming for "Milk!!!!" Usually I don't give in to feeding at night, but it occurred to me that with all the excitement he really hadn't eaten much during the day so Dad finally went and got him some milk and then he fell back asleep until 11:30 in the morning. He woke up talking about Thomas and we had to read all of his Thomas books multiple times today and I let him skip his bath because he is so interested in his tattoos and shows them to everyone he sees. So I guess his Big Day Out was a success!

The other pictures are from Will's trip to southern Utah right after my graduation. It just so happened that Bryce's younger sister and her husband and some friends were visiting from London that same weekend so Bryce took Will down to visit family while I stayed up north and visited with my family before they had to go back home to Connecticut. The longest I have ever been away from Will before was 8 hours when I went to an all-day mediation training so 3 days was quite the trip! Will got to ride a pony. The band-aids are because of some nasty mosquito bites he got and kept scratching. In one of the pics Will is clearly hamming it up for someone else's picture.

Freedom!

All I can say is that if I had known how nice it would be to just have to worry about taking care of Will and not having to deal with school at the same time-- I would have stopped going to school a long time ago! Of course, I'm sure after a few months I will be wishing I had a reason to get out of the house on a regular basis, but for now it is summer and the livin' is easy.

Our camera battery is dead and I can't find the charger so I haven't gotten any new pics in a while. I discovered it was dead the other day when Will stole the box of Q-tips from my bathroom and ran off into his room and behind the rocking chair (his never-fail hiding place). I ignored him and after a minute he walked back into my bedroom with a Q-tip sticking out of each ear. He had to check himself out in the mirror for about 10 minutes. He is always up to something.

The last few weeks Will has developed an intense phobia of bugs--which he pronounces more like "boogs". I think the bug fear has led to his obsession with q-tips because he knows that q-tips are for ears and for some reason he thinks there are bugs in his ears. I think he had a cold which made his ears hurt and he determined it was caused by bugs because he kept pulling at his ears and saying "boogs, boogs" and trying to get the q-tips. The cold has mostly gone away, but he is still paranoid about bugs. The other day he walked into the family room and started screaming "Boogs!!" so I went to check on him and sure enough he was keeping track of a spider walking across the carpet. He was convinced that the brown specks on his Doritos were bugs too. (Heh- maybe he was right- we all just like to tell ourselves they are spices.) He saw a freckle on my arm the other day and was very concerned...he kept pointing at it and saying "Bug!" "Bite!".

It is funny to see him figuring out how the world works and seeing his little brain in action. He has also determined lately that certain things are "scary". For instance, in his Richard Scarry word book there is a drawing of a fox driving a truck and he loves to look at the book, but for some reason he always announces that the fox is "scary"--and I have to admit it has kind of a creepy fox grin on its face. We went to a barbeque for a friend's birthday on Sunday and Bryce and the birthday boy got in a water fight which also freaked Will out. He just started bawling and we couldn't figure out what was the matter until he calmed down enough to sob "Daddy. Scary!" I think he thought they were actually fighting and it worried him.

Not only is the world more scary these days, it is a lot more dangerous. This is my own fault because I tell him constantly that most of his favorite activities are dangerous. "No Will! Licking the end of that electrical cord and then trying to stick it in an outlet is DANGEROUS!" or "No Will! Opening the oven while mommy is baking something is DANGEROUS!" or "No Will! Running away from mommy and into the street is DANGEROUS!" or "No Will! Climbing on top of the stool and then trying to stand up and reach for something 3 feet away is DANGEROUS!"-- and those were all just from yesterday. Of course, knowing that something is dangerous doesn't actually prevent him from doing it. For example, everytime he tries to climb on our kitchen stools he says to himself the whole time "No, no, no, dangerous, hurt!" I did have a rather proud moment the other day, however, when he was playing in the driveway and his ball rolled into the street and instead of chasing it he started yelling "Street! Dangerous!!" and then ran over to me. Maybe he will survive toddlerhood after all. I think he invents 8 new possible ways of killing himself every day.

The other day I was in the bathroom and I could hear some muffled screaming so I went looking for Will and quickly discovered that he was in his closet with the door closed. I opened the door to rescue him, but he just stopped crying, looked at me for a second, stood up and said "Close this!" and then pulled the door closed again...and started screaming again. We repeated this strange game about 10 times in a row before I went and got the video camera which then proved much more interesting than his weird game. I guess he was just having fun pretending to be terrified, but he had real tears rolling down his face!

Speaking of bathrooms--Will has gone on his potty 6 times! Wowsers. He is so proud of himself everytime. He is motivated by toilet paper. I tell him he can only use toilet paper if he goes potty--so he does and then is so pleased when I give him a square of toilet paper. You're living the high life now kid! The potty usage is only about once a day, but it has gone smoothly so far except for an incident the other night that involved a huge mess of bodily fluids and waste products all over the bathroom. Eeeewwww. If only my law school peers could see me now. I filled out a survey on Westlaw today about my post-graduation plans...only problem was that there was no option that really applied. My choices were: I have a law-related job; I have a non-law related job; I don't have a job yet, but am looking for a law-related job; or I don't have a job yet, but am looking for a non-law-related job. I thought to myself "Hmm....where is the option for "I don't have a job, I'm not looking for a job, but I would like to know the best method for convincing my child that it is not funny to run away from the potty and then pee in mommy's shoe." (Part of what occurred during the above mentioned incident).

Since I don't have any pictures that actually relate to this post I will try to find something to put on here anyways just to add some visual interest. Pics: #1 Will wearing Easter bunny ears--he wasn't into posing for a picture. #2 Will's birth announcement. He used to be so small...and uncrazy!

Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

I graduated from law school today. Yippee! The camera apparently wouldn't take pictures indoors that weren't just all blurry so this is the best shot we got of the action itself. I think it is from when we walked in at the beginning of graduation. Will did pretty well, but after an hour was pretty restless so Uncle Kyle had to take him out. Afterwards we went out to eat and Will made a huge mess as usual. We got lucky and had beautiful weather and all in all everything was very nice. PS: Happy Birthday Cousin Melissa!!

Note to New Viewers

To anyone who clicked on my name on Michael's blog and ended up here allow me to explain the following.
- I made this blog to avoid having to retype identical e-mails to the many friends and family members who are more interested in my child than me. (I don't blame them- he is more entertaining) That is why it is about Will.
- I also made this blog because I have not scrapbooked/babybooked/or any other kind of booked a single page since Will was born--an unpardonable sin I know especially in Utah.
- I specifically try to avoid including much information about myself or family members other than Will because I think it is kind of creepy that someone creepy could be reading all about my life. Posting too much information online is just asking to be the basis for a "ripped from the headlines" episode of Law and Order. Dun dun. Plus I got in trouble when the internet first came to the Dickerson household for telling someone in a chatroom that I was an exchange student living in Paris-- Mom thought that was too much information. Please note: at no time have I ever been an exchange student nor lived in Paris.
- When Baby #2 comes something will indeed have to be done. Possibly we will just name him Will #2 and avoid the whole problem.
- If I were to give into the temptation of writing things not related to Will on this blog I can assure you they would consist of rantings about whoever has annoyed me lately. For instance: I ran into the grocery store to buy birthday candles the other day and was starving so I took a look in the deli counter while I was waiting to pay--which I thought would be faster than going to the registers at the front of the store. They had a bunch of bags which professed to be kids meals but all they had in them was a juice box, bag of chips, and cookies. Now this is exactly the kind of kids meals I would generally have preferred, but I thought to myself "Surely, they must come with a sandwich or something." But there were no sandwiches to be seen anywhere. So I wait in line behind an elderly couple who have both just ordered Kong Kones (which are soft serve icecream cones that contain about 1 gallon of ice cream each--all for the low price of $1.29--hurry down to the Macey's deli counter today!). So instead of making said ice cream cones the cashier girl just stares at the couple and the following conversation ensues:
-Cashier: Are you sure you both want Kong Kones?
- Man: Yes.
- Cashier: Cuz they're really big.
- Man: We know.
- Cashier: So you don't want to share or something?
- Man: No.
- Cashier to other deli worker: They both want Kong Kones.
- Man: What you don't know is there is a whole bus of people waiting outside and we're going to all just take licks off of it.
- Cashier (looking relieved): Oh, then that makes sense.
- Man: If you believe that then I've got a tv set to sell you.
- Cashier (looking contemplative): Hmm...I don't need a tv set right now.
- Man: laughs (clearly an "I can't believe how stupid this girl is" laugh)
- Cashier proceeds to make the two slowest Kong Kones in the history of the country. Meanwhile Erin is getting more than a little impatient. Finally man and woman both get their Kong Kones and leave. The following conversation ensues:
- Erin: Do these kids meals come with a sandwich or something?
- Cashier: Yeah.
- Erin: .........Well are the sandwiches somewhere or do you make them or what?
- Cashier: Oh yeah I'd have to make it.
- Erin: Well what are the options?
- Cashier: You can have peanut butter & jelly, or ham, or turkey, or roast beef.
- Erin: Ok, well then I'll get this and can I have a roast beef sandwich?
- Cashier: (after a 45 second pause in which she just stares at me) Actually, you can only get peanut butter and jelly. Sorry.
- Erin: (tosses kids meal back into deli cooler) Can I just pay for these candles then?
- Cashier: ......So did you want the kids meal?

Buying my birthday candles took like 25 minutes. Veteran readers may recall that I didn't resist writing about the housekeeping and security regulations at The Flamingo during our trip to Vegas last summer. But I try to keep these things to a minimum. If I ever ran for public office the entire Vegas casino industry and the Associated Food Stores network would be lobbying against me.

- Michael will be glad to know that Will's first words upon waking up today were "Church? Aunt Michael? Google."

Nearing the end

I am very pleased to say that I graduate from law school next Friday. I finished my Advanced Negotiation paper today and turned in my Substantial Writing paper last week so the only thing to finish is my take home Alternative Dispute Resolution final which I can hopefully get done by Saturday. I think Will is also pleased that I am almost done. When I am on my laptop he says "All done! Close!" and tries to close my laptop. As we speak he just got in trouble for trying to color on my laptop with a crayon--when I took it away he stuck out his tongue and said "Oh Brother!" --> a new expression he learned from Grandma. He has been kind of a pill all day. I think he has teeth coming in and he has been awfully whiny. He is also suffering from withdrawals since my Mom went down to southern Utah for a few days so he hasn't had a constant audience to dote on him.

Will is very into logos. He picks them out when we drive around town, on junkmail, when I'm online, and on commercials. So far he recognizes: Geico, Comcast, Pizza Hut, Walmart, Macys, Applebees, Best Buy, McDonalds, Arbys, Xbox, Einstein (as in Baby Einstein), Credit Card (which he says whenever he sees a Discover, Visa, Wells Fargo, or Utah Community Credit Union logo), Sprint, Google (which is always followed by "Aunt Michael"-- he doesn't say Uncle), BYU (which is always followed by "Aunt Mollie"), Hurley, Black Hat, Doba (where Daddy works), Borders, AT&T, and that is all I can think of for now. His main source of information is junk mail because he thinks it is very important that he be the one to get the mail everyday and then he studies the junk mail and makes me read it to him. All very important correspondence.

<-- Pic from sometime last summer/fall of Will and Daddy wearing their matching Black Hat t-shirts.

Will is also very into dancing. He has to dance whenever there is music on the radio, on a commercial, in a movie, whatever. He also dances to the sound of the washer and dryer and to our cell phone rings. His dancing is hilarious. He shakes his rear end and bops his head up and down. He especially loves to dance if he has an audience. This child will do anything for an audience. Like wear a bucket on his head. When Will sees a camera he says "Smile! Cheese!" and strikes a pose. Then after you take the picture he immediately runs over to check himself out on the display screen. Usually he then announces "Cute!" which sounds like "Coot!"

This picture is from when Aunt Megan was left in charge of doing Will's hair. Megan was here for a few days after BYU-Idaho finished their semester ridiculously early (before Easter) and before she flew home to Connecticut.

This picture is from when Will and I went home for Mollie and Megan's high school graduation about 1 month before Will's first birthday. He liked to smear his nose down the entire length of the glass door in the front of the house.

As far as Baby #2 goes: I had a check-up yesterday and set my c-section date for August 6th. However, if this one is anything like his older brother he will have other plans and will arrive whenever he pleases.

It's a ......

So we had our ultrasound today....and we are pleased to announce that we will be having.... (can you stand the suspense)....another little guy around our house. Yup, it's a boy. We should have known it would be a boy because we agree on a girl name, but not a boy name. So now we get to debate names for the next four months. We got to see his cute fingers and toes and made sure that everything looks healthy. He was a little shy when the ultrasound technician was trying to show us his profile. He kept turning away from the "camera" and putting his hands up over his face. We got a few pictures, however, which I will try to get on here eventually. We've asked Will a few times what he thinks we should name his little brother and the first time he said "Butt" (I think he was trying to say brother)...but now he keeps saying Bryce. I guess he wants him to be named after his dad.

Will learned a new trick this week...when asked "How old are you Will?" he will reply "One!" and hold up one finger. It is awfully cute. He also learned the word "Alright." I woke him up this morning and told him we had to get ready to go to the doctor and he said "Alllllright." He is a little chatterbox.

Time flies

<--This was Will's first picture taken by the hospital photographer lady. They come take a picture in your hospital room and then want to charge you like $50 for a single copy...so I just have this preview thumbnail version. He looks like a grumpy old man.

So not only is my first semester week off over like I mentioned in my last post...my second semester week off is also over! What has happened since my last post? Hmmm...Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Valentine's Day....

Halloween: Will went trick-or-treating as a monkey and was adorable. Last year I ran out of candy by about 6 o'clock and spent the rest of the night ignoring the kids knocking on the door. This year we bought about three times as much candy so we would be prepared and ended up seeing about 12 trick-or-treaters. Maybe it was because Halloween night was freezing this year! We stuck around until about 7:30 and then decided to take Will out to a few houses. We realized another reason why our street might not be getting much traffic when we went outside and saw that there were only 2 other houses with their lights on in our neighborhood. Will was more interested in people's front steps than in getting candy. We took him to about 5 houses total, but he was content once he had a piece of candy for each hand. He wasn't willing to let go of his candy long enough to put it in his bucket and get more so we decided five pieces of candy was plenty.

Thanksgiving: We hosted Thanksgiving at our house this year. In attendance were: Megan and her roommate who came down from BYU-I, Kyle and 2 of his roommates, Mollie, Becky (Bryce's older sister) and her boyfriend John who came down from Oregon, Bryce, Will, and I. Megan and Mollie brought pies and appetizer, Kyle brought rolls and fruit salad, Bryce made the turkey, and I (with M&M's help) made corn, peas, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, stuffing, pumpkin pies, and I don't remember what all else. You can see pictures of the spread on Mollie's blog. Considering I've never hosted a Thanksgiving dinner before I thought it went well. I decided against getting out the china since we didn't have enough for everyone anyways, but we did use our fancy (which isn't that fancy) silverware. The silverware is, however, still stuck in its box waiting to be put back into the individual plastic bags on my kitchen counter. The day after Thanksgiving (or sometime that weekend) we drove up to Salt Lake to ride the free train (Bryce thought Will would like it). So ride the free train we did...it is only free for about a 5 block distance so we went 5 blocks one way and 5 blocks back and that was about it. The Christmas lights were on at Temple Square but there wasn't a lot of interest in the group so we didn't go see them. We also ate at The Pie...which is a pizza place across from the U that puts ridiculous amounts of toppings on their pizzas. Just what everyone needs right after Thanksgiving dinner.

Christmas: Pic. 1: This is as close as Will would get to the very frightening Santa at our church Christmas party--note Santa was a 14 year-old 90-lb boy...it actually was kind of frightening. We were planning on staying in UT for Christmas because plane tickets were so expensive, but after Michael and Mom offered us enough money to pay for all but $30 of our costs we decided to go back to CT. Plus Bryce got tired of me saying it was all I wanted for Christmas. I was more than excited because I had not been looking forward to Christmas in UT. Will is not old enough to care about Christmas and I could picture Bryce and I just sleeping in and then opening a few presents and then having Christmas be just a boring, lonely day around the house. We flew in on Christmas Eve and flew out on New Years Day so it was a quick trip. I do not do well on planes in the first place and Will does not do well with sitting still for longer than 1 1/2 seconds so the plane rides felt like eternity and I don't think I'll be eager to travel long distances with him again anytime soon. I spent my entire week in Connecticut laying on my parents' couch because I felt so sick---which leads to some news of general interest: We are expecting another baby at the beginning of August! It was nice to be home because Will had a grandma and 2 aunts to take care of him so I was free to do nothing. Will seemed to enjoy Christmas. He was nervous about the dog, but mostly got over it after the first few days. On Christmas Day we were all sitting in the family room opening presents and one of the twins took a bow and stuck it on Will's shirt. He thought this was a great idea and went around the room ripping bows off of all the presents and sticking them on his shirt and looking very pleased with himself. I'm not sure if someone got a picture, but it was awfully funny. Will figured out how to open presents and had a great time ripping the paper off of everything. Will also enjoyed having Grandma give him sugar cookies for breakfast or any other meal of the day. Will got to go bowling for the first time, but I didn't get to see it because I was home on the couch. I wasn't sure if I was going to survive the plane ride home, but thanks to the generosity of a Target pharmacy (long story) and some very powerful anti-nausea drugs I made it back to Utah in one piece.

Valentine's Day: Valentine's Day was not terribly exciting since I didn't get out of class until 6 and Bryce had to work and then go to Mutual (weekly activity for teens at church) at 7. I dropped off some Valentine's treats to Grandma Hurst, Mollie, and Kyle and made a Valentine's dinner, but Bryce and I postponed our celebration to the following weekend. At least that was the plan...I ended up having to work Friday night so we went out for a Valentine's lunch on Friday instead. Will got a Valentine from his friend Sophia which he figured out how to open by himself and enjoyed in the car on the way home from Soph's house.

Other happenings:
- I have 6 weeks of law school classes left! I am very ready to be done with school...and not looking forward to the Bar exam.
- Baby #2 is due 2 weeks after the Bar exam. We will see what happens. I sent in my application anyways so I will just plan on taking it and if the baby comes early we will deal with that then! We find out on Mar. 22 whether it is a boy or girl.
- Today I put Will in the shower with me and then ran him some bath water and let him play while I got dressed. Will loves to take baths and will ask for them saying "Baaaaaath? baaaaath?" Lately he likes to stretch out on his stomach with his arms and legs fully extended and then wiggle his butt around like a fish. He loves to splash like a madman so I usually vacate the bathroom while he is in the tub. I went downstairs to move some laundry from the washer to the dryer and heard footsteps upstairs. I figured Will had escaped from the tub, but a second later I heard splashing again. I went back upstairs and found Will sitting in the tub with my toothbrush! Apparently he got out of the tub, went and found my toothbrush, and then got back in the tub.
- The other day I sat down to eat lunch and Will took off upstairs. I was pretty sure all the doors were closed except for his room so I didn't care. Just to be sure I looked up the stairs and saw that the bathroom door and the door to my bedroom were closed so I figured he was just playing in his room. I finished eating and went up to find Will. He wasn't in his room and then I heard noise coming from behind the closed bathroom door. I opened the door and found Will standing in the middle of an entire unrolled roll of toilet paper and an empty box of 300 q-tips. Will saw me and dove behind the toilet to hide. I went downstairs to get the camera and when I came back up Will hid again (see picture). I guess he knew I wouldn't be too happy about the mess.
- Will's vocabulary these days: Milk, bath, banana, block, Caillou, tv, go, one, two, three, yellow, dvd, xbox, dance, Doba (where Bryce works), Joanna (my friend who watches him), Grandma, snack, trash, cup, bottle, cookie, Momma, Dadda, yes, no, truck, car, bus, horse, meow, snow, Bryce, credit card (the child is obsessed with them- he recognizes all the logos on our junk mail), mail, church, uh oh, whoa, please, Roomba (I got one for Christmas from Bryce), baby, basketball, football, ball, hello, byebye, Einstein (as in Baby Einstein), up, down, mess (one of his favorites), trash, Mollie, Donalds (as in McDonalds, he loves the play area), yuck, fish, keys, shoe, sock, duck, stuck. That is all I can think of at the moment. Of course if you try to get him to say any of these things he refuses to talk. The one word I would eliminate from his vocabulary is "x-box"...I get very tired of hearing "XXXXX----boooooxxxx" all day long while he pulls on my leg and tries to get me to turn it on.
- Will loves to dance...anytime music comes on the radio or on a commercial he stops what he is doing and does this little side to side dance.
- Will has learned how to throw an all-out temper tantrum. When he gets angry he screams, throws himself on the floor and rolls around or bangs his head, and then growls and tries to bite something. He doesn't bite people thankfully, usually it is the carpet or the couch or the handlebar of the grocery cart or something like that. If you ignore him and go in the other room he will stop crying, stand up and walk to wherever you are, and then throw himself on the floor and start over.
- Will is into kissing. And he charms his way out of trouble. When he knows he is in trouble he runs over with lips pursed and a big grin to give smooches. This is also how he gets out of time out. If he gets in trouble and I pick him up and sit him on the couch he usually last about 2 seconds and then starts kissing and I'll admit it works pretty much every time. It is hard to punish a kid who responds to reprimands and time outs with huge smiles and kisses. He thinks he is hilarious, especially when he's causing trouble.
- Will loves Church. Ever since he started going to nursery where he gets to color, do puzzles, sing songs, have a snack, and play with toys he thinks Church is the best place in the world. Almost every morning he gets up and says "Church? Church?". Last Sunday morning we told him it was finally the day for Church. I put him in his high chair for breakfast and he threw his food all over the kitchen. I took his tray away and made him sit in his chair in time out for throwing food. After about 30 seconds he started howling "Chuuuurrrrrccchhh? Churrrrrrccchhh?" I think he was afraid we wouldn't let him go because he was being punished. I guess I'd be pretty excited about Church too if I got to play with friends and have a snack! :-) We went for a walk the other week...meaning Will walked and I followed him and he headed straight for Church. Once he got to the parking lot he said "Go, go, go!" and ran across the whole lot to the doors. He was very disappointed to find the doors locked. The picture is of a different day when Will was purposely trying to gag himself by sticking his hand in his mouth. This is one of his favorite tricks. Once he was doing it repeatedly so I held his hands down and he looked at me defiantly and gagged anyways. He was very pleased with himself.
- The other night we could not get Will to go to sleep. It was about 11:30 and he was still going strong even though Bryce and I were in bed with the lights off. Will was between us and finally started to calm down. He was laying down with his eyes closed and I thought he had drifted off because he had been quiet for several minutes. Then we heard him whine "coooooooookie". Bryce and I both started laughing. Apparently that is what Will thinks about when falling asleep.

<-- Will sitting in a bucket reading a book....followed by Will sitting in a basket playing with toys.

- That is all I can think of for now. Hopefully it makes up for my lack of posts in the last 4 months! I am currently at school, but I will add the pictures to this post at some point.

The Great Pumpkin

I can't believe my week off went by so fast! I think the week off from school makes the rest of the semester harder than if we just kept going and got out a week earlier. It is hard to get back in the routine.

A couple weekends ago we took Will to the Rowley Farm in Santaquin to visit the Pumpkin Patch. We took a hayride out to the Pumpkin Patch which Will loved. Of course, he loves any time he is in a moving vehicle without being strapped into his carseat. Will had fun rolling a little pumpkin around the field and trying to pick it up. Between the rows and vines in the field Will had trouble standing up for longer than a second at a time. Mollie and Bryce thought I was having more fun than Will though---which is quite possible! They had the cutest little mini-pumpkins for a quarter each so I had fun picking out a bunch for our house.

Will's Halloween costume came in the mail the other day. He is going to be a little monkey...because he already is so it seemed fitting. He hasn't worn the whole thing yet, but I've put the hood on him a couple times which has big monkey ears and it is just too cute. Really what else could a little boy who climbs on everything and whose first word is "banana" be for Halloween?

Will has his 15-month doctor's appointment today. His doctor changed to a different office so he will be seeing a new doctor. I am curious to see how much he weighs...which I don't think has changed much since 12 months and how tall he is. He was playing with a little boy his age at church last weekend and I noticed that he was a good 2 or 3 inches taller than the other boy.

Will's latest tricks:
- saying "bat"....I hung some rubber Halloween bats in the front window and Will is slightly obsessed with them. He points at them and says "BAT!" and wants you to pick him up so he can see them better. Most of the time he reaches out his hand like he wants to touch them, but if you move him closer he gets scared and tries to claw over your shoulder away from them. Last night he seemed to get over his fear and kept hitting the bats and making them swing and then laughing hysterically.
- the other day I left Will downstairs and ran upstairs to use the bathroom. On my way up Will sees me and says "Uh oh! Mama!" and came crawling up the stairs after me.
- Will got a haircut much to my dismay. I left him home with his Dad on Saturday while I went to a training and when I got home all his blonde baby locks were gone! (Well, not all but a substantial amount) It made me sad because now he just looks like a boy and not a baby.
- Will was looking at his truck book the other day and when Dad pointed to the tractor and said "Tractor" Will repeated it right back..."Tractor!" It is funny to hear him say things because they all require so much effort...he purses his little lips and then starts trying to make the sound until it just bursts out all the sudden....."BAT!"

Our quest to get Will to sleep in his own bed has taken a downhill turn. As usual just when we started making progress Will got sick and couldn't breath at night and kept coughing, and coughing, and coughing...so I kept him in bed with us several nights in a row and now he refuses to even start the night in his crib. He clearly thinks that our bed is his bed. He will go right to sleep on our bed, but if I try to get him to fall asleep in his room he screams and screams and screams. In the mornings he wakes up and just grins like he knows he won the battle for another night. He is a loving little guy. His Dad and I were watching a tv show last night and sitting on the couch and Will just had to be up there with us crawling back and forth between us both. He likes to be the center of everything.

Thanks to a very generous donor Will now has a broom of his own. Here he is doing his chores and sweeping up all the food he threw underneath his highchair. Okay, maybe it is more accurate to say here he is having a great time using his broom to push around the food he threw underneath his chair.

I wrote all of the above the other day, but didn't post it until today when I added the picture. Will's check-up was actually last Tuesday. He weighs about 23 pounds. This appointment was the first time that they tried to weigh him on a regular scale, but Will wouldn't stand on it for longer than half a second so the weight is kind of a guesstimate. He had to get 3 shots and will have to go back in a couple weeks for a flu shot because they were all out at the time of his appointment.

I took Will to the law school Halloween party on Thursday. He wore his monkey suit and about 50% of people thought he was a monkey and 49% thought he was a mouse and 1 lady thought he was a buffalo. Go figure. He trick-or-treated and got 4 whole pieces of candy which was all he could carry in his little fists. He loved wandering in and out of all the aisles in the library.

Yesterday night was our ward (Church) Halloween party. Will got to fish a little jar of play-do out of a bucket of water. As soon as Dad put him down he ran right back over to the bucket and tripped and ended up a wet monkey. I think we are going to take him trick-or-treating to a few houses on Tuesday and I will have to take lots of pictures then because I haven't gotten any of him in his costume yet.

Will has learned to pull the kitchen chairs out from under the table and then climb up on the chairs and then climb up on the table. He does it about a thousand times a day and is very proud of himself every time.

Fall Is In The Air

I am at the beginning of my week off from school and enjoying every second of it. Next Monday it will be back to school without the help of Mom to watch Will, make treats and dinner, and fold laundry. Will will miss having Grandma in town too. She took him on walks and now he knows what you mean if you say "Want to go for a walk?"...he gets all excited and goes to the garage door. Will has a new favorite activity. He walks in tight little circles until he gets dizzy and then falls over. Then he gets right back up and does it over again. He has avoided hitting his head on chairs, tables, pianos, etc. by a fraction of an inch about 800 times so far. Will loves to read. He will pick out a book and bring it over to you and throw it at your head while squealing which means "READ!"...then he will want you to read the story approximately 50 times in a row. Now he will hold your finger and make you point at the things he wants you to read. He is especially into his word books these days. You know the ones, all they are are pictures of various items with the names underneath. Grapes. Cow. Shirt. Tractor. Exceptionally boring. And he loves them. Just look at the pic of him reading one with his Dad. Will also has a new-found love for...the broom. He throws a fit when I won't let him play with it and if he ever has a chance to get through the garage door he grabs it and brings it inside. He carries it around the house and gets frustrated when it gets stuck somewhere. Today he fell asleep on the floor holding his two favorite things...his broom and his bottle. I am seriously debating buying him a smaller broom so that he will be less likely to put the big broom through a window or tv screen. Yesterday we went up the canyon for a picnic with my Grandma, Mom, Dad, Kyle, Mollie, and Megan. Megan was down for the weekend from school in Idaho and Dad had just flown out in preparation for the ride back East with Aunt Karen and Uncle Tom. It was a very pretty day and would have been very relaxing except that Will was very intrigued by the stream running by. We tried to get a good family picture, but Will is the more photogenic member of our family so I prefer pictures of him.






Addendum: Will learned a new skill today...sticking his finger up his nose. He first did it while I was trying to feed him lunch and apparently found it very amusing and interesting as he continued to do it throughout the rest of the day.

Beginning of the End

Well you can tell school has started since I haven't posted since the end of August. I just started my third week of my last year of law school. Barring any unforeseen difficulties I will graduate at the end of April 2007. Woohoo. I'll try to update this occassionally even though I should be doing homework instead.

Will is walking all over now. When he walks he either has to hold his left arm up like he is holding a torch or pull up his shirt and stick his right pointer finger in his belly button. Once in a while he does both at the same time. He reminds me of Dumbo who can only fly when he holds his magic feather.

We took Will to the Utah State Fair on Saturday with my mom. He got to pet a goat (and then he kicked it...which is when we stopped petting the goat), eat fried dough, do farm chores which earned him a fake dollar with which he bought a little box of cereal (okay Grandma mostly did the chores), play "Pick a Duck" in which for only $2 he got to choose a rubber ducky from a tub which he then traded for a small stuffed duck, sit in a tractor, and otherwise have about all the fun a 13 month-old can have in one day. Unfortunately, a storm blew in and it got really windy and cold so we left earlier than we might have otherwise.

Will tried to climb up the stairs backwards today. He backed up to the bottom stair and put his legs up on it one by one. Then he tried to push himself up the stairs with his arms. I guess just climbing up the stairs was getting too boring.

Will has 3 teeth now! Two on bottom and one on the top left. The 2 bottom ones broke through over a period of about a month and a half (same thing with the top one about a month after the bottom ones) so I don't really have an exact date for when he cut his first tooth...or second...or third.

That is about all the news from the land of Will. He is currently watching his Baby Beethoven movie which will hopefully calm him down enough to go to sleep.

Pics:
1. Will with Grandma Dickerson and Great-grandma Hurst. 2. Will's first lollipop . . . he ate the whole thing. 3. Will helping himself to Doritos from the pantry. 4. Gangsta Will sagging his pants. 5. Prince William.

Everyone's Favorite Party Game

Yesterday I was sitting in the family room reading and Will crawled up in to the kitchen. Nothing new...he goes back and forth between the family room and kitchen all day long. But after he went up to the kitchen I didn't hear anything for a minute so I looked over and Will was sitting on top of the kitchen table. I don't know how he managed to get up there without making any noise. He is a monkey boy.

And now it is time for everyone's favorite party game: Where Has Will Been? Yes, Will spent the day destroying the family room, kitchen, and bathroom. While I folded the laundry, Will emptied out all the cans. While I showered, Will emptied the bathroom cabinets. While I cleaned up the kitchen, Will emptied the entertainment center. Etc. Etc. Etc. So much for getting the house cleaned up before the family gets here!

Starting at the beginning

Will is asleep which is amazing and means I can use the computer without him desperately trying to get at it. Last night I spent a full hour and forty minutes trying to get him to sleep. He wouldn't calm down when I rocked him so I put him in his crib which usually results in him screaming, but last night he was perfectly content to just play with his stuffed animal and pacifier and mobile. That is, he was perfectly content as long as I sat right next to the crib in the rocking chair. Tonight I was watching a movie with my cousin and he just crawled over to me, laid down, and went to sleep- so I guess he is making up for last night. Bryce is on a scout campout which is why I am entertaining myself on a Friday night.

Will is walking more and more. He will stand up and walk from the coffee table to the couch or over to the tv or even across the whole family room, but crawling is still his predominant method of transportation.

His other new trick that he started doing on our car ride to Vegas is singing Old McDonald. If we sing the song he will sing EIEIEI (he doesn't do the O). We thought it was just a fluke at first, but he does it every time.

Since I don't have anything specific to add this time I thought I would go back to the very beginning...

On Friday, July 15, 2005 I was at work at the BYU Bookstore and started having contractions. Everything I'd heard said you'd have contractions for days before you actually went into labor so I didn't really think anything of it . . . especially since we were supposed to be going on a church campout that night (yes, even though I was 9 months pregnant). Will wasn't due until the 27th so we thought we could fit it in. After work we drove up to the campout- but the directions were wrong so we ended up driving on bumpy, curvy mountain roads for about 2 hours. By the time we found the new directions and actually made it to the campsite my contractions were about 5 minutes apart. I thought they might stop when I got out of the car and walked around but they didn't. Bryce ate dinner and then I decided we needed to go. By the time we made it down off the mountain and back into Provo I was very uncomfortable and my contractions were every three minutes. The doctor said to go to the hospital when your contractions were three minutes apart so we stopped at the house quickly (Bryce got the carseat) and then drove up to Timpanogos Regional Hospital in Orem. When we got there the nurses decided to watch me for an hour so they hooked me up to all the monitors and after an hour said that I wasn't progressing and so they were sending me home. They told me to come back when my contractions were 2 minutes apart instead of 3. Before I left (which was at about midnight) they gave me a morphine shot. The morphine knocked me out until about 8 the next morning. When I woke up my contractions were only about every 6 minutes or so ("only"--HA!). We spent the day waiting for them to get closer and even went up to BYU campus and walked around for a distraction. By 10:30 that night (Saturday) they were back at 3 minutes apart and I was very unhappy. My back had started hurting severely by about 5 that evening and was getting worse. Bryce kept trying to talk me into going back to the hospital, but I kept telling him that they said not to come back until my contractions were 2 minutes apart and that they would just send me back home. Meanwhile my mom and little sisters had just arrived in Salt Lake and were getting their rental car to drive down to Orem. They called to tell us they were at the airport and Bryce told them we were just leaving for the hospital. I had finally given in and said we could go back because the pain was definitely outweighing the fear of being embarrassed by being sent home again.

At the hospital they checked me in (again), hooked me up to all the monitors (again) and said that I wasn't close to delivering (again). After an hour they called my doctor who (mercifully) told them I could stay this time (even though I wasn't any closer to delivering than when I went in the night before). Being officially admitted to the hospital meant I could have an epidural though. First, however, I had to have antibiotics because I had tested positive for Strep B at a prior checkup. I don't really know why, but I couldn't have an epidural until the antibiotics were in. The nurse couldn't find a vein to start an IV so after about 15 minutes of poking (which I don't remember feeling at all) she called in the head nurse who spent another 10 minutes trying to get the IV in. Once it was in they started the antibiotic drip. Once the antibiotics were finally in I had to wait for the anesthesiologist who was busy somewhere else in the hospital. All told, I finally got the epidural at about 1:30 in the morning. Shortly after that my water broke and the nurses assured me that would probably speed up the labor process (since I still wasn't anywhere close to actually having a baby---however, with the epidural in I really didn't care--I was ready to get some sleep anyways). About 10 minutes later the monitors all started beeping and the nurses came in to figure out why the baby's heartrate was dropping. They thought the monitor had just slipped off so they kept trying to adjust it and put me on oxygen just in case. The monitor was still beeping though so the nurse said she would just check me to be sure and when she did she said "OH MY GOSH PROLAPSED CORD" and then everyone started moving. She said "Call the doctor STAT STAT STAT" and nurses were running in and out of the room. Then the nurse (who was maybe a year or two older than me) looked at me and said "You're gonna have a c-section, ok." <--It wasn't a question. [Note: a prolapsed cord is when the umbilical cord slips out before the baby and each contraction squeezes it shut blocking off the baby's bloodflow...it's a lot like stepping on the garden hose. Most prolapsed cords happen with breech babies (meaning they are feet first instead of head first), but Will was head first which is very unusual] My doctor was, of course, home in bed so they had to get him to the hospital ASAP. The nurse had to try to push the baby's head up to relieve some of the pressure on the cord and they lowered the head of my bed so that gravity could help too. Even so, the baby's heartrate just kept dropping lower and lower. When the heartrate started to drop into the 50s the nurse said "I'm sorry guys, this isn't looking good" which was the first time I actually thought something bad might happen. Everything was happening so fast that I had just kind of thought "we're in the hospital, they'll take care of things." The anesthesiologist ran back in and started more meds in the epidural to get ready for the c-section. This is about the moment when my mom walked into the room with no clue of what was going on. Apparently she had decided to come to the hospital and see how things were going and walked in right after they found the prolapsed cord. I saw her and thought "they contacted my next of kin?!" because when I checked in they made me right a next of kin and said it couldn't be Bryce so I had written my mom. Doctor Gordon and Doctor Judd arrived and wheeled me into the operating room. Two nurses held up a sheet so I couldn't see anything, the doctors splashed some betadine on me, and they did a very fast c-section and pulled out Will. He was born at 2:14 am on Sunday, July 17th. I could hear the nurses thumping on him and then he started screaming. After a while a nurse showed him to me for about 1/2 second - he had gone to sleep and looked like a miniature old man - and then they whisked him off to the nursery to get an IV and some fluids in him. The nurses cleaned me up and wheeled me to a recovery room and after a while Dr. Gordon came in and said that he had set a new record tonight: from when his phone rang until when Will was born was 18 minutes! All I can say is that it was a very quick ending after being in labor for 2 days!! My doctors and nurses were excellent and we owe them for our healthy baby. Since Will was being worked on in the nursery I didn't get to see him until a little before 6 in the morning. (I'd been up all night, but it was sort of an eventful night so I didn't really notice). The same nurse who had discovered the prolapsed cord came in to check on me and asked if I had seen the baby yet. I said no so she called the nursery and they told her they would bring him in when they were done with him--which they said would be soon. About 15 minutes later they still hadn't brought him in so my nurse loaded me in a wheelchair and took me down the hall to the nursery to meet Will. (She was a very good nurse.) The nursery nurses were annoyed to see me and said "We told you we'd bring him down," but my nurse just said "Yeah, we just felt like going for a stroll so we came to see him instead." Finally by about 8 am I had been moved to a regular room and they finished with Will and brought him in to us. Bryce made some calls to tell people I wouldn't be at church and they would have to find subs for my Primary class and then we finally got some sleep! We were very thankful: - that we went back to the hospital even though my contractions still weren't 2 minutes apart (a prolapsed cord at home would have been fatal for the baby) - that I got an epidural as soon as they would give it to me (the extra time it would have taken to numb me for a c-section if I hadn't already had the epidural could have lost us our baby = it is good to be a wimp!) - for the labor and delivery nurse who found the prolapsed cord and remembered exactly what to do even though she had never seen one before...and later took me to meet Will - for Dr. Gordon and Dr. Judd --> the fastest c-sectioners in all the land and very nice too!
- for my anesthesiologist - I tell Bryce that I would have married him if I hadn't already been married...after all, he made all the pain go away instantly which was very endearing! and he was the only one I could see when they were doing the c-section and he gave me a play-by-play and described Will for me
- for the cooks at the hospital -- they had good food there! :-)

*Will turned out to be just perfect with no lasting effects from the oxygen deprivation caused by the prolapsed cord. He does not, however, have a uvula (hangy thing in the back of your throat)--but that is unrelated!! :-)
Oops- Will woke up!

R&R

So I think I have finally recovered from our vacation enough to write an update here. Not that our vacation wasn't enjoyable...it just always takes a few days to unpack and get things back in order at home. Bryce had to go to Vegas for work (BlackHat) so Will and I went with him. The conference was Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and then we headed to California and returned this past Sunday evening. Some highlights: (pic 1: Will and me in front of window in our room at the Flamingo)

-Bryce's work put us up at the Flamingo (not Caesar's Palace as we originally believed). Let's just say you know it's going to be outdated when the website touts the hotel as "an anchor of the strip since we first started rolling dice in 1947." Now it did appear to have been updated however...in approximately 1965. Orange carpet is never a good idea. Orange carpet with yellow bamboo on it is an even worse idea.

- The first morning in the Flamingo I pulled back the curtains and found dirty clothes. A little disturbed by the presence of dirty clothes in my supposedly cleaned room I called and asked for housekeeping to come. (I was on my way out and wanted them to turn over the room while I was gone since I wasn't planning on being gone for very long...also I wanted them to remove the clothes.) Here is my conversation with the annoyed-sounding housekeeping lady after being on hold for over 15 minutes just waiting to talk to someone:
Me: Hi, I was just calling to request housekeeping.
Them: For what?....like to turn over your room?
Me: Yes..and also there were some dirty clothes on the floor of our room when we arrived
Them: Well are they your clothes? (sounding very annoyed)
Me: Nooo...they are NOT my clothes...they were here when we arrived. (Thinking: Yes, clearly I put my dirty clothes on the floor and would now like housekeeping to come pick them up for me)
Them: Can you hold?
holding approximately 7 minutes
Them: Hello? (I think they were hoping I'd hang up)
Me: Yes
Them: Security is going to have to come get the clothes
Me: Well I was on my way out. They are on the bed with a note.
Them: Maam you have to be in the room for security to come.
Me: Can I just put them in the hall or something? I was just leaving.
Them: Can you hold?
holding approximately another 7 minutes
Them: Hello
Me: Yes. (unfortunately for you I'm still here)
Them: Maam security can not come in the room without you being present and you CAN NOT put them in the hall.
(* Now please explain to me why every housekeeping person under the sun has full access to my room, but security absolutely can not enter?)
Me: (more than a little annoyed--mostly because the woman is saying everything so disgustedly like I'm really bothering her) Well maybe I will just put them in the garbage and forget I called. I am on my way out. They are not my clothes. I do not care about them. They were in the room when I arrived which frankly is kind of gross.
Them: Maam I understand that they are not your clothes. They must have been left by a previous guest. Security will have to come get them.
(*No maam I don't think you understand...they were OBVIOUSLY left by a previous guest and your cleaning of the room apparently did not entail removing them...THAT is the problem)
Me: Well I don't have time to bother with this now.
Them: (all sugary sweet all the sudden) Oh of course not maam...just call security whenever it is convenient for you.

- So I went out shopping with Will and when I returned in 2 hours the clothes were gone and the room was cleaned....which is clearly a miracle since security HAD to get them and COULD NOT come in my room without me.

- Will found every disgusting little bit of stuff in the hotel room - including dead bugs, a cheeto, several "made in china" stickers...all of which I pulled from his mouth

- The pirate show in front of Treasure Island has been changed. It now features "a pirate ship seduced by a boatload of sexy sirens" = terrible dance numbers performed by women in bikinis who must have been too old to be strippers or something. Definitely glad we dragged Will out and stayed up late to catch that.

Now for the real highlights:

- I think Will out-ate both me and Bryce at the hotel buffet. He was still eating pieces of cantaloupe and watermelon and rolls after Bryce and I were finished. Kids under 3 eat free--- Ha! They didn't see Will coming!

- Will's trick of the week was waving. He suddenly learned how to rotate his wrist and developed this perfect little parade wave. Sometimes he waves with one hand and sometimes with both. We'd push him down the strip in his stroller and whenever we passed someone he'd give a big grin and wave.

- We took Will to the hotel pool which he loooved. The first day I took him he played for about 45 minutes and then fell asleep while we were still in the water. Bryce took him the last night we were there. Bryce put his sunglasses on Will and Will actually left them there. Will was wearing his little swim trunks and no shirt and these big sunglasses and waving at everyone he saw. He had a fan club of his own by the time we left. There were no other babies around so he got lots of attention. I wish I had a picture, but we didn't bring the camera down to the pool. You will just have to picture it. He is a little flirt.

- Lauren and I went to the Ethel M chocolate factory. The best part is the free sample of your choosing at the end. Will did even better though, he got three free samples because all of the different ladies working gave him one. Unfortunately, I stuck them in the side pocket of the diaper bag, forgot about them, and they melted and got on Lauren's shorts.

After Vegas we headed for California. We took a ferry to Catalina Island which turned out to be a very expensive form of transportation to a few touristy shops. Bryce did go snorkeling twice though and said there were lots of fish. Luckily it doesn't appear that Will got his mom's aversion to all forms of travel. He loved the boat- unlike his mom who was seriously in danger of throwing up. (pic 2: Will trying to grab the camera as I try to take his picture on the "beach" (aka rocks) on Catalina)


We took Will to Huntington Beach. He like playing in and eating the sand. He also liked crawling along the edge of the water until a rogue wave came and knocked him over. He crawled over to another baby and was doing his excited "hello" screech, but the other baby wasn't so interested. I doused Will in sunscreen and kept a close eye on him and thought he was well protected, but when I changed him into pajamas hours later his little back was totally red. Bad parents. (pic 3: Will and Dad at Huntington Beach)

On Saturday we drove back to Utah and stayed with Stacy and Angie and family in St. George. Will loved having other kids and new toys to play with and explored the whole house. I think he was a little too excited though because he would not sleep at all that night. I got up with him four separate times and couldn't get him to calm down.

On Sunday we went to church, said happy birthday to Cameron (Bryce's cousin-- now 13) and drove back home. Will did very well in the car on the way home. He seems to like the car better now that he faces forward and can see out.

Unfortunately we didn't take many pictures...it seemed like we could either enjoy ourselves or add a camera bag to the stuff we were already carting around (diaper bag, purse, stroller, Will) and then worry about taking pictures.

This week has mostly involved trying to get things unpacked and catching up on sleep. Will came down with a cold right after we got back and then Bryce got it and then I got it so no one has felt like doing much. Will is beginning to take more and more steps. Yesterday he took 6 steps over to Bryce. He usually only walks when diving for something though. He wants to get somewhere so he takes a few steps while diving forward at me or Bryce or whatever he was trying to get to. I don't think he realizes that he could just keep walking.