Finally another post!

Ryan had to go to California for work at the beginning of November and we got invited to come.  So we went to Disneyland with the kids while the boys worked.  It was so much fun.  At first Boston was scared of some of the characters, but as they kept showing up, he started loving them.  Goofy was kind enough to let us eat in his kitchen one morning for breakfast:)

This is my favorite ride...It's A Small World!  I love it.  It is so cute...and there's not a height limit so we can get on as a family!  I love how it is all lit up at night too.

We were there for the first day of all the Christmas decorations.  It is beautiful!  Sleeping Beauty's Castle was just breathtaking.  I love the firework show they do for Christmas and then at the end, it snows on Disneyland.  So magical!

We have made it a tradition to get our kids a pair of Mickey ears with their name engraved on the back the first time they go to Disneyland.  Carter still has to grow into his ears.

I just love this picture of Boston.  It's A Small World was starting to put him to sleep I think.

Shauna and her cute family came to Utah for Thanksgiving.  So we got all the kids together one day just like old times (but we are missing sweet Remy).  From left to right...Carson, Jaylee, Ian, Boston and Braelyn.  I can't believe how big they are getting.  They are so stinkin cute.  Boston sure does miss Ian though.  There will be days that Boston comes up and tells me he wants Ian.  My heart feels sad that we can't just call him up and play anymore, but I'm glad he hasn't forgotten him.  

Later that night we let the hubbies take the kids and all of us girls went and saw New Moon.  I was so excited because I hadn't been on a girls night out without kids for so long!  Even though yes I  miss my kids when I'm away from them, it really was so fun!  While we waited in line, we watched Twilight on my laptop until the movie started.  New Moon was just ok for me.  But it was just fun being just the girls.  We did have little Gavin with us and he was so funny.  He decided he needed to relieve his tummy of some gas right during the quietest part of the movie!  It was so funny because he is so teeny tiny, that people didn't know we had a baby with us!  We couldn't stop laughing and people kept looking back at us!  Too funny!  Thanks girls for such a fun night of waiting in line and being the first in line, laughing, giggling, trying to listen to the laptop, the Weber State football team making fun of us, and my little sister being embarrassed of it all!  Love you girls!

This year for Thanksgiving, we went to Arizona.  What a blast that was.  But I'm mad because I took hardly any pictures!  So I need to get them from my mother in law.  So I will have to post more pictures of our trip later.  We had so much fun shopping, eating, relaxing, staying warm, and playing rook!  Can't wait to do it again!

Yesterday we had our annual Christmas party.  Everyone (except Shauna of course) was able to come this year!  (But we are missing Jaisha and Andrea in the picture)  It is so fun to get together and just chat and enjoy some yummy food.  I made Chicken Parmesan and potatoes and everyone helped bring the rest of the meal.  It was delicious!

This year we had a couple more added to the bunch!  This is Treyden (Lauren's baby), Carter and Gavin (Karilynn's baby).  Treyden and Carter are 3 days apart (down to the exact time even!) and Gavin is just a month younger.  Aren't they so cute?!

While we were in Arizona, Boston and his cousin Jane would make little huts all the time.  They were so funny.  They would build a hut and call it their houseboat.  I guess they just can't wait to get back to Lake Powell!  So now Boston loves making his house boat.  This is Boston's house boat.

This one he called his bed house...

Here he is driving his car.

And this one is his room.  What a sweet, sweet boy he is.

The first video is what my Carter's been doing a lot of lately...and the second video is how my hubby gets him to do it...you'll wanna turn the music off for this one!  He thought I was trying to snap a picture, but little did he know that I had it on video:-)  Oh the things we do...or rather, say to get our babies to smile...He would die if he knew I had this on here!  I love my boys!:)

to nap or not to nap?

So I've been debating whether or not I should cut out Boston's nap during the day.  You see here is the problem.  My child is just like his dad.  He can run all day long with little or no sleep and not let it affect him at all.  Normally he takes a nap around 1:30 and sleeps for anywhere from an hour and a half to two or two and a half hours.  Then he won't go to bed until anywhere between 9 and 10.  But he is SO hard to get to sleep.  We started a terrible habit of laying with him to go to sleep and now we have to do it every time.  It gets annoying sometimes especially when it takes like an hour to get him to sleep.  On the weekend, we usually don't get a nap in cause dad is around and Boston cherishes every moment he has with his daddy.  So Sunday,with the time change, he hadn't taken a nap so I decided to put him down at 8 and he was out like a light in 5 minutes.  So here's my question...do we keep a nap and struggle to put him to bed at night, or take the nap away and put him to sleep earlier?  What do all you mommies do/suggest?

A couple weeks ago we went to a wedding reception down in Provo.  The groom is a distant relative.  But mostly we went down to see these guys.  Sunitha (holding Carter) is my mom's cousin and these are her kids with mine.  They live in California and so we hardly get to see them, so when they came for their nephew's wedding we couldn't miss the chance to see them all.  Rachel, Aaron and Hailie are all getting so big and Boston was having so much fun with them.  But Boston couldn't say Hailie's name.  He has a friend in nursery named Kaylee so he kept calling her Kaylee.  Then I would tell him to say H-H-Hailie.  And Boston would say H-H-Kaylee.  The kids got a kick out of him:)

We wished you guys lived closer!  Love you guys!

Last week we had our annual Smith family Halloween party.  Jill and Shawn came as the Swine Flu...hilarious!

Boston saw these guys and didn't dare come in the house until he realized it was Uncle Scott and Aunt Christy.  Scott and Christy have adopted two adorable little boys and just put in hoping to adopt a little girl.  Good Luck guys!  You and your soon to be little girl are in our prayers!

Here are the three little munchkins.  Carter, Gavin and Khloe.  They are so stinkin cute!

For Halloween, we spent the night at my parents.  Ryan's parents were out of town, but Boston had a blast trick-or-treating and getting candy.  But we only did like 6 houses but it took forever cause he walks so slow!  But he was lovin it!

I was looking through my pictures and found this one...this is how you can find Boston quite often...picking his nose.  Such a funny kid!

Aren't these two the cutest pair you've ever seen!!!  I love my boys!

MMM Whatcha Say

This was too cute to not share!  My brother Travis taught this song to Boston and now he just loves it.  All he aks for is "Say mom Say?"  It's hilarious!

Carter's Big Day

Today was Carter's big day.  He was blessed by his daddy today and Ryan did such a wonderful job and gave him a beautiful blessing.  And Carter was perfect.  He didn't make a peep through the whole blessing.

One of my high school friends Chaz and his cute family is in our ward and he blessed his little girl also.  After sacrament, we sat the two babies on the couch and they just cuddled up to each other.  It was too cute!  This is definitely a picture for their wedding video!

These are all the men who helped bless Carter today.  What a great bunch of handsome men!

4 generations

Carter and Gavin are 10 days apart and already best of friends!

I was a little worried at first at how we were going to fit all of our families in our house.  Our basement is unfinished and we just used it as a storage area.  So my mom came over last week and helped me clean it all out and we brought tables and chairs down there and it ended up working out perfect!

My parents

Ryan's parents

My family minus Eric. He had to work right after.  Love the outfit Dust!  It was such a wonderful day.  Thanks to all who came to support us!  We love you all!

Here are some more random pictures...

Ryan has been working like a maniac to get our yard done.  Him and my dad spent many many nights working as hard as they could to get this yard done.  Thanks dad for offering so much of your help.  We couldn't have gotten it done without you!

Here is our yard before the grass...

And here it is after the sod was all layed!  On Saturday all the boys in both of our families came over and helped Ryan lay the sod so we would have a yard before the blessing.  It turned out so good!  Thank you thank you to everybody who helped!  And thanks to Chuck for helping Ryan figure out what he was doing with the whole sprinkling system.  Love you guys!

This is what Boston would do while Ryan was out working.  I would open the window and he would talk Ryan's ears off.  This way he wasn't in the way.  But it was just cute cause Ryan would always look up and see this little head poking out.

The other day I had carter just sitting up on the couch by himself.  He was doing just fine.  Boston runs in the room and, being the sweet big brother he is, he started getting worried that Carter would fall over because I didn't have any pillows on the sides of him.  So Boston got the two little pillows and put them on each side of Carter so he wouldn't fall.  It was pretty funny because he was sqishing Carter with the pillows and Carter didn't seem to care one bit.  So cute!  

Carter has started responding to us more and smiling so much!  He is getting so big already and it makes me sad.  But I am so grateful he is in our family.  He adds so much love and joy.  I don't know what we would do without him.

And Boston too.  He has so much energy and is so fun right now!  We are sort of trying to potty train...sort of....I know I'm terrible!  But now that the blessing is done and the yard I think I will have some time to concentrate better.  I'm planning on potty training in a day...I've heard so much about it I thought we would give it a try...Wish me luck!  Any advice from those that are done?....

I just can't get over how handsome my boys are!  I am the luckiest woman alive to have these three boys in my life!  They are the light of my life and the reason I live...for them.  Thank you for making my job as a wife and mother so easy and rewarding.  I love you three more than you will ever know!!!

What we've been up to lately

I can't believe Carter is already a month old!  Time flies when you're havin fun!  Here's what we've been doin for the past month...

Since Boston's birthday (and now Carter's) was spent in the hospital, we had a little party for him so he could open his presents and have a birthday cake.  It wasn't anything fancy we just needed the traditional picture!

10 days after Carter was born, Ryan's cousin Anna had her little boy.  Here are the proud new grandmas!  And Ryan's other cousin Krystle will be having her little girl in a couple of weeks.  We can't wait to meet her!

Lately, Boston has loved reading books.  It is so fun to sit and read books with him.  He has always liked reading books, but it wasn't until recently that he's really tried to read them and understand what's going on in the book.  He has to read one (or two or three or four) everytime before he falls asleep, and quite often this will happen.  Its so dang cute!

On Labor Day we went and watched the fireworks at the Country Club with Ryan's family.  It was a blast!  They shoot the fireworks off so close to you that the ashes land on you!

This was funny...I'm too cheap to buy the actual bubble bath.  So normally when I give Boston a bath, I will pour a little of the baby wash in the water and kinda swish it around with my hand to make a few bubbles that eventually go away.  Well this day, after Ryan was soaking in the tub because he was so sore from digging all the trenches for our yard the day before, I threw Boston in the tub with him and told him to quickly wash him down.  Ryan asked me if we had any bubble bath and I told him no and that I just use the baby wash.  So he poured some in and instead turned the jets on and this is what I walked into.  It was so cute to see how hard Boston was laughing!  

This is Boston all ready for church.  This outfit is from India that my cousins sent for Boston.  He loves it and he looks so dang cute in it!

I could not ask for two better boys than the two I have.  They make my job as a mother so rewarding!  Boston just absolutely loves Carter and is so sweet and cute to him.  Every morning he wakes up and says good morning to him and every night when he says his prayers, he says "Father thank you daddy, carter, mommy, bossy, carter, daddy, carter"  It's the cutest thing in the world!  Thank you Boston and Carter for choosing me to be your mother.  I love you both more than you'll ever know!

The best birthday present ever

August 15th was Boston's birthday and this is what he got...

A new brother!  That's right, Boston and his new little brother Carter share the same birthday.

And what a cute big brother Boston is to him.  He just loves and kisses him all day long and it's so cute cause sometimes I will catch him just talking and giggling at him.  I love it!

So what a crazy crazy day that was.  Here we are just right before delivery.  My whole pregnancy I said over and over again that I didn't want this baby to be born on Boston's birthday so that they could have their own special days.  But apparently Carter had plans of his own! 

The story for those that care to read....

 So I woke up around 2 in the morning with contractions that were coming every 10 min.  They were painful, but still somewhat tolerable and they stayed that way every 10 minutes until like 8 in the morning.  We were about to go to the hospital when they started to slow down to about every 30 minutes.  Since I didn't get any sleep that night, Ryan took Boston to the grocery store while I slept.  I continued to have contractions every 30 minutes but the pain got worse and worse.  Then they started coming about every 10 again after I made Boston's birthday cupcakes. Ryan would push on my back to help relieve the pain and it really did.  But Boston would see Ryan and run over and touch my belly or back trying to copy his dad.  He really was trying to help, but it was just bugging me.  So we had my mom come get Boston and as soon as she got to the house, my contractions started coming like every 5 minutes and the pain by now was pretty unbearable.  So we decided to get in the car and go to the hospital.  Ryan was driving like 70 mph the whole way to the hospital cause by now my contractions were just one right after another.  I was dying.  We rushed to the emergency room and they wheeled me upstairs.  When I finally got dressed and in a bed, the nurse checked me to see how dilated I was.  She didn't say anything at first, and then when I asked her, she told me I couldn't freak out if she told me.  I said ok and she told me I was at an 8.  So I freaked out for a second.  She had to talk me through every contraction and asked if I was planning on having an epidural.  I asked her if it was too late and she said not if we do it right now.  So they rushed me to my room and the anesthesiologist was there waiting for me.  He got it in really fast and 15 minutes later I had finally got some pain relief.  Now I could finally start enjoying the whole birthing experience.  then about a half hour later, the Dr. came in and broke my water and about 20 min after that out sweet baby boy was born.  From the time we got to the hospital to the time Carter was born was only two hours.  It just happened all so fast!

The proud new daddy.  Carter Jeffrey Smith was born August 15 at 4:44 in the afternoon weighing 6 lbs 12 oz and 19 1/2 in long.

Holding my little boy for the first time.

My mom and sister were in the delivery room with us when Carter was born.

First family picture.

Smith family

Randall family

My sister recently got a job as a CNA on the OB floor at the hospital.  She wasn't working that day, but she was still able to give Carter his first bath.  She did work one of the nights we were there though.  It was nice because she took Carter to the nursery all night long so I could get some rest and I wasn't stressing because I knew who had him all night long.  It was fun having her as my CNA that night!

Proud Grandma and Grandpa

I love this picture because of how wide-eyed Carter is.

Two days before, Boston came down with croup and got pretty sick.  This was the only time he actually kept the mask on.  It didn't last long.  So we just tried to keep Boston away as much as possible until he wasn't contagious anymore.  Thanks to all who helped watch him.

My friend Shauna told me this was the best thing she got for Ian when she had her baby.  So I got this little baby for Boston and he was so cute with it.  He loved feeding it the bottle.  It was hilarious!

Proud daddy getting ready to go home.  We had the hardest time naming little Carter.  We could not think of a name forever!  We finally named him as we were walking out of the hospital.  But he definitely is a Carter!  It fits him really well.

I absolutely LOVE my boys!  

Two brothers just admiring each other

This was hilarious.  The other day, Boston got into the floss and was trying to floss his teeth acting like a big boy.  Well next thing I know he walks up to Carter and starts trying to floss Carter's teeth.  I tried to explain to him that Carter doesn't have teeth yet, but I don't think he quite understood.  What a good big brother!

I guess when Ryan was a little boy he had a rocking horse that he would ride for hours.  So Boston got this cute rocking horse for his birthday with a basketball hoop to shoot hoops with his dad.

Carter

Boston

Do you think they look alike?