Cereal Monster

I don't think that there is anybody that loves cereal more than our family. Ben even puts chocolate chips in it at night and eats it for dessert.

Well it must have rubbed off on John because he is always happy to eat it. Every morning we pour him a bowl and he goes to town using his spoon, then his hands, and finally slurping down all of the milk. I have to be careful about leaving the cereal box out though or this is what happens.....
 

Mr. Mischief here thinks that he can just take the bag out of the cereal box and fest on the contents. As you can see his place of choice for this delicacy is mommy and daddy's bed. I have to be pretty swift because once he knows that I know what he's doing he runs out of the kitchen through the house laughing and screaming. He makes it pretty hard to be cross sometimes and I have to try not to laugh as that would defeat the whole purpose helping him understand that he's doing something naughty. Sometimes I just can't help myself though.

Do you see this face to the left? This is what I mean. This cute little expression just makes it that much more difficult. It's a good thing you're so handsome little john. Lol.

Taylorsville Dayzz

LOVE me some T-Ville Dayzz!

One of the downsides to living in Magna now is our vastly different proximity to Valley Park and the Taylorsville Dayzz festivities. Luckily our friends, the Tappanas, still live in the old neighborhood behind the park and we had a great excuse to go. Nothing better than food, fireworks, and fun....oh and of course shopping:) They had so many great booths this year and I picked up a lot of company cards for further perusal.

What was really great was watching John have fun with Lydia Tappana and Jackson Bassett (son of our other friends). He ran around and around dancing and laughing and playing.

Here's John enjoying some eats at Taylorsville Dayzz.

 

A blurry pic of John  but that's ok.

Here's our baby girl Miriam along for the ride in her stroller.

John's friend Lydia. She's pretty stoked about the straw she has. She and John have a pretty good time together. And it was really cute to see all the running around they did. I was amazed at all the words she knew.

All of our friends chillin and waiting for the fireworks to start.

John loved seeing the fireworks. After each one he kept saying "whoa" or "ooh" or "wow" and often "boom" and he would twirl or run or play. It was hilarious and really made the fireworks more fun.

More of the show

Here are my boys. Ben and John always take cute pics together. It's really nice to have John at this stage of "not too heavy to carry on your shoulders" because he really loves it.

 

No matter where we live for the rest of our lives I definitely plan on coming back every year for Taylorsville Dayzz.

Junior Picassos

Today  I took the kids to the Salt Lake Arts Festival in downtown Salt Lake http://www.uaf.org/. I was hoping that Ben was going to be able to go, but it just so happened that the only day that we could go was also the day that Ben was going to have to work late. So I packed the kids into the car with extra clothes and a huge water bottle and cruised on downtown.

There are a few things that I wish I would have thought about before making the trip.

#1- Parking

Parking downtown already sucks. I went in the afternoon- so parking meters weren't scarce but you can only put in so much change and A: I didn't have any change B: there's no way I'm walking back and forth with two kids just to put change in a meter. There are parking lots but they were charging 6 and even 10 dollars to use them. That is RIDICULOUS!!! Especially since one of the 10 dollar places was the library. Yeesh! I ended up deciding to Park on 5th south in free parking. This did require me to walk with John while pushing Miriam in the stroller a few blocks. Which brings me to my next thought...

#2- Event Transportation

Had I been thinking, I would have parked by the trax station further up the street and taken the kids to the library. That way  I'd besitting in an air conditioned train with total control of the kiddies. The next ideal would've been to bring my sling to carry Miriam and push John in the stroller. (What I would've given to have already bought the double stroller) I had decided not to take the sling because I thought it would be easier to have a place to put Miriam knowing that John would just get restless and I'd be stuck pushing an empty stroller while chasing one kid and carrying the other.

In the end, what I did end up doing was walking with John those few blocks,and then; quickly realizing at that rate I wouldn't get there til Christmas, putting him on my shoulders and pushing Miriam to the entrance. This is also how we came back. The upside? Excercise for me. :)

#3- Making the health booth your first stop is the best idea.

 Here you'll find free cold water and fans. They also gave us a plastic water bladder to fill up for John to carry (yes, I did bring our own water but this was way more fun for him). In addition to that they had adult and kid sunscreen and sunscreen in packets. I'm really glad that we stopped here first because it made the festival a lot more enjoyable.

#4- Swimsuits

If you think that there is going to be water for your kids to play in  where you are going, bring the inswimsuit either in your bag or by having them wear it there. We stopped at this little fountain (before and after we did everything else) and luckily I had the foresight to have John wear his swim shorts. He had a lot of fun and I didn't worry about him getting his clothes wet AND it dried quickly. PLUS it made a hot day bearable for my little boy.

We walked into the water and at first John was a little unsure of what I was letting him do. "You want me to play in the water and get my clothes wet mom?"

It didn't take him long to warm up to the idea though and pretty soon he was splashing and even sitting in the water here.

#5- How hard it really is to take to small children to any public place.

I applaude single parents who do this kind of thing everyday. It was an interesting experience and I think that I'll definitely take Ben with me to this next time because it sure was a balancing act.

.

"Mom, get me out"

Someone's a little sad. :(

John thought that this dragon was pretty neat and he kept trying to shake his hand. I had to pull him away finally though cause I didn't want to be "that mom" who let her kid break the dragon art.

Playing with the blocks in the shade

John is trying to figure out how to get up on the slide. One little girl saw him and said, "um I think this one is for the bigger kids." Lol.

John loves the teeter totter and this Aligator one was right up his alley

This green sand was really soft and John loved playing in it with the other kids. They also had other sand boxes full of blocks and other toys.

Under the red shade of the stroller is Miriam dozing away while John has his fun in the sun.

FYI the arts festival is a great place to take kids. Ages 12 and under are free and they have some great activities for them. There were 6 to 8 booths with things to do and take home and they were free. There were even a few more things to do if you wanted to spend 7 - 10 dollars more. I'm glad that we went and I hope to make this a tradition.

Sunset with Daddy

Ben called me outside the other day and I'm glad he did. There was a beautiful sunside outside our door and it was lovely to watch together. It's nice to take some time and just enjoy nature together as a family. It's fun, pretty, and free :)

This photo reminds me of a baby picture that my mom and I have together in Hawaii in front of a sunset, except the ocean is there instead of the street.

John decided that he would run around in circles as an expression of his love for letting him be outside.

Can you see John? This is the only pic I could finally get where he was holding still and by then it was almost too dark.

What a great night!

curly sue

My little princess' hair is so curly. I thought it was wavy when it was born, but then we took her out of the bath the other day and this is what we saw.

Can you believe it. SO cute!!!

Marcus Aurelius aka Mac

So a couple weeks after we have moved in and began putting the kitchen in order Ben advises me of a better arrangement for our food and dishes. One morning I go to the cupboard in our dining room and proceed to move the food out and the dishes in. Much to my surprise and dismay I notice that on the second highest shelf a package of instant oatmeal has a hole in the middle of it and oats sprinkled onto the shelf. I'm sure you've guessed. Yes, our almost ninety year old house must have at least one mouse. GROSS!

Of course like the scared housewife that I am I immediately text my husband and advise him of said problem. He comes home and says that yes, we are going to get a cat. A CAT?! My first thought is defnitely not.

Ok, ok, okay. I'll be the first to admit that I was the first to suggest that now that we had our own home we could start the pet process. But I was thinking puppy and 2012 sounded nice together. While I understood the necessity of a cat (because I really can't stand the thought of finding a dead mouse in a trap) I also thought of my newly complicated life of a toddler and a newborn. And now I had to take care of a cat? So I proposed a plan. We could go to the animal shelter and if we found a cat that we loved and knew would be the best fit for our family then we could get it.

Guess what? We found one. After wandering passed a gazillion barking dogs we got to the cat area and there were at least 40 cats who needed a home. I saw a few that I liked and settled on one that I really loved because she looked nice and was beautiful. We took her out to meet each other and she scratched Ben in the face. We put her back.

Then John started to play with a skinny orange tabby cat and somehow our whole family fell in love. We took him out and he purred and we knew that this was our cat. Good job John.

John loves Mac. He chases him around and tries to feed him. Mac definitely needs some help in learning house rules like not sleeping in certain places or jumping on the table and breaking things. Sometimes all I can think is "oh that dumb cat" but he really is sweet and seems to be able to tell the difference between the adults and the kids. He leaves Miriam alone and plays well with John. He likes to play bite too, which truthfully I hate but all the guys sure get a kick out of it. He has his cute cat moments though, so he's a keeper.

HAIR

My hair for halloween 2010. Someone actually asked me if it was all mine.



John's "I fell asleep during sacrament meeting" hairstyle

Miriam's first bath and hair washing experience

I never realized how much people notice hair until I grew mine out again and had two children blessed with an abundance for ther young age. EVERYWHERE we go at least one of us gets a comment on our hair. I hear things like, "look at all that hair" "such beautiful hair" "wow that's a lot of hair" "can you cut off the bottom of your and give it to me?" "How do you/they have so much hair?" "My so and so has a lot of hair too" "That is thick hair" " there's more hair there than I have had in a lifetime" "all my babies were bald" " That's more hair than my kid has and they are ____ years old" "how often do you have to cut their hair" and on and on.

Really I'm flattered, and to be honest, I am also ecstatic that my children have a good head full of beautiful dark locks, I just never realized the extent to which people notice/think about it. I'll tell you what though...I now spend a lot more time down the hair aisle because now I KNOW ya'll be lookin at my 'do and I don't know if I can handle the pressure. ;)

Miriam Losana Roe

Two months later and I finally have a breath to talk about our newest family member. Things have been so busy with the move to our new home, getting settled, the baby blessing, birthdays, graduations, etc. And so, NOW I can share.

For starters, we had no idea what to expect since our first child came in at 10lb 1oz and 21 inches long. When you have your first child and no one in your family has ever had a ten pound baby you don't expect to go in there and pop one out and so you're not thinking about it. What I was thinking was, "Women everywhere do this, the dr. is expecting about an 8 pound baby and that's normal, so let's go." It's an entirely different feeling when you think that you know what to expect and now your nervous because you know that there is a very real possibility that you could be going for another good sized child.

Miriam was 7 lbs 3 oz and 19.5 in long and was born in the evening. I can't believe that we went from ten to seven. For the first few weeks (and really who am I kidding, even now) we didn't know what to do with such a tiny baby (when we took her home she had lost the normal weight that they do in the hospital and was under 7 pounds). We had to go out and buy more newborn diapers because we weren't expecting to get a child who would actually use them.

 

Things that were nice about this hospital experience:

-I knew what to expect. I had already done this once and I knew how I wanted things to go, when to call people to come and visit, when I wanted the epidural, I knew how the whole birthing process worked, etc.

-I knew what to bring. I didn't pack for a two week bunker down, I packed for a couple of day stay at the hospital. I knew what I liked and lacked from the last time.

- I got to watch Miriam be bathed. I totally missed out on John's first bath, but this time I asked and made sure that we got pics, etc.

-Miriam and I both knew how breastfeeding worked. It was crazy amazing. I think that John would have gotten it faster if I had known what I was doing. From the moment she was born she knew what to do and so did I. Yay for passing that stress ball right over.

Miriam was born with a lot of hair and at first I thought it was just as much as John's but I have since realized that she has more.

John loves his new sister. He always wants to hold her and sit next to her, hug her and kiss her. I think he didn't really get that she was around for good at first, but now he is finally getting that she is not going anywhere.



Miriam coming home



She spent the first few weeks waking up in the night sometimes, but for the most part our little girl has been a fantastic sleeper and has been sleeping through the night.



John is giving his new sis a little too much love and attention.

I will say that it has been an adjustment with both kids. John is at an age where he is able to get into everything and he usually chooses the time when I am busy changing, nursing, or doing something with Miriam to get into mischief. Typical.

We really love her. I didn't realize how much you could love one child and now I can't believe that my cirlce has expanded and I am able to give so much love to two children. It amazed me constantly. I am just as excited to see her do things as I was with John. I wish I was a little more camera happy though. Sometimes there just isn't time to grab the camera (again, the mischief maker). Hopefully that will get better soon.

Miriam's Baby Blessing

One of the first things that we did in our new neighborhood and ward was the blessing and party celebrating the coming of our daughter Miriam. It was a pretty hectic time leading up to it as we had to unpack, organize, paint, fix, etc. our new home. In the weeks leading up to this we had Ben and my third anniversary, my brother's high school graduation, mother's day, my dad's coming to town, my school finals, actually moving, and the day before was my 26th birthday. Needless to say, May left us a little worn out.

It was a wonderful day. Up until the day before I was wrestling with myself on whether or not to buy a blessing dress. I had made John a blanket for his and had always hoped to have something to pass to my daughter someday that was special. I caved. I found this gorgeous dress at the LDS Distribution Center and made the rhinestone flower on this headband myself. Miriam looked absolutely precious that day and I was glad to get so many pictures of her. I actually wasn't able to take too many of just her on the actual day so the pics of just her I took the following day.

Here's a group shot of some of our guests. We had Ben and my immediate family and their kids as well as our grandparents and some of our friends. I had wanted to keep it small and I think that it worked out nicely.

This is my niece Kaylee. She is a week younger than John and is my sister's third child. Isn't she so darling? I don't know why, but for some reason she is the only kid besides ours that I took a picture of. I must have been too busy handling the hosting to take any pictures of anybody :(

Kaylee's mom aka my sister Milika. Isn't she cute?! I always tell people that she's the beautiful one of the two of us, cause she is. She's got great skin and seems to be effortlessly beautiful. I hate that. ;) Lol. JK sista!

 

YAY!!!!!!!!! I got a generation photo. I always wanted to have one. This is my mother's mother Roseann, my mother Sara, myself, and Miriam. Four generations.

One of the most special parts of the week was having my dad fly in from Hawaii. He spent time and money to be with family and it really meant a lot to me especially because I really want him to know his grandchildren and for them to know and love hime. I've learned a lot from my dad. Many of it has come in hindsight and I wish that I could go back in time and soak up more of the knowledge that he tried to impart to me during those growing up years. He's a good man and has a good heart.

Grandpa Tafui and our sweet girl. We gave Miram the middle name Losana which is tongan for Rosanna. We did this so that our children would have a piece of family and heritage in their names. I still don't know a lot about my Tongan family background but I hope to learn and love it along with my children.

Ben and I each with our turn to hold this special girl. She has truly changed our lives. We had a great family before she was born. We loved each other and we truly loved and still love so much our son John. Miriam allowed us to love yet another person and for me, to love more people so much more than I thought possible. She has truly affected the three of our lives and everyday is full of new experiences and happiness together.

These next two picture are our attempt at a family portrait. Unfortunately I waited to long to get it organized and, as you can tell, John just didn't want to participate. He just couldn't hold still with all of the excitement occurring around him. Ah well, C'est la vie!

Here is our next attempt. At least Ben was able to corral John, but a happy face just was not in the cards for us. Maybe in the coming years.

Blessed on June 5, 2011.  In this picture you can really see how precious she really looks and what an adorable, darling, cute, loveable, and so much more baby she is. Just like her brother was before her. We sure are truly blessed.

I thought it appropriate to put feet at the end of this post. Just a little peek at the tootsies and the detailing in the dress.