February 2013 - Love

February is the month to celebrate
love
and we had a month filled with loving memories.  Here is a bit about each of my three LOVES and what is going on with them this month!

BLAKE
 Blake is definitely a busy toddler!  He doesn't hold still - ever.

Close to Valentine's Day I tried to take some pictures of the kids holding x's and o's.  I was planning to put a little photo collage together to send to grandparents and such, but it never happened.  Partly because I got really sick the week before Valentine's Day, and partly because Blake DOES. NOT. HOLD. STILL.  :)  And I do not have a good camera for shooting action shots.  :)  These were the best ones I got of him, and I only include them because they are pretty funny!

Blake had a good Valentine's Day.  Here is his Valentine from mom and dad:

And he loved our special french toast Valentine's Day breakfast.

Blake went with me to Katelee's class Valentine's Day party, where he helped me run the game.  :) 

He was especially thrilled about all the candy he kept finding on the classroom floor.  Ick!

 

At the beginning of February, Blake had his first ear infection.  You can see in the above picture of his face on Valentine's Day that he broke out in a red, angry rash all over his body when we discovered that he is allergic to amoxycillon!  

Blake is changing so much.  It's crazy that just a few months ago he was a baby.  He seems so big to me these days and is growing and learning new things.

His favorite part of each day is when we walk to the stop sign to meet sister after school.  He knows what to do when we get out his shoes and coat, and has become very helpful and pushing his feet in his shoes and his arms in his coat because he is so excited to go outside.  He will hold my hand and walk along on a slow day, but most of the time he likes to do everything at a dead run!

He must always collect 2 - 3 interesting rocks along our way, and taste them to make sure they meet his approval.

 This month he has started opening(and often unpacking) all my higher drawers.  Yikes!  He is into mischief much too often.  :)  The other day, I found one of his treasured rocks . . . in the silverware drawer!

 

Speaking of reaching new things, he can open and close the dishwasher and push all the buttons.  Man, we are in trouble!

He LOVES his sister.  Here he is watching her leave for school one morning.

And hanging out together in their favorite hide out.   

 Blake is getting his molars right now, and it's been a rough month for him.  Between teething and having an ear infection, he hasn't slept through a night once in February, and is usually up several times.  :(  We are all a little tired around here.

Blake loves to jabber.  He doesn't say many real words, but he will jabber and chatter and babytalk away as if you are having a real conversation for minutes.  He loves to 'talk' on the phone.  I didn't catch any of his best talking moments, but I do have this video of us having a little breakfast talk. You have to get a little way in before he really starts talking. At first he's just deliberately throwing his food on the floor while I reprimand him!   :)


Oh, and he's learning how to take his clothes off.  One day I watched him as he took off his pants.  It took him about five minutes, but he did it!  Another day, he got his shirt about halfway off.  Oh, dear!

Here's a cute little snow hand print!

Blake is 100% completely in love with his daddy.  Once Gerald walks through the door he wants nothing more to do with me!  Daddy must do everything.  Gerald loves it!

He loves to eat snow.  Hopefully it's not too dirty...

He definitely keeps us all on our toes, but one look into these adorable baby blues, and we are all wrapped around his little finger!
I LOVE this little guy!

KATELEE

Katelee was a much more willing and cooperative model for me with our (failed) Valentine's photo shoot.

 

Katelee has a loving heart, and did some sweet acts of service for me this month.  One night, I had a particularly crazy evening, and left to a Relief Society meeting without having had dinner.  I came home to find this delicious smiling dinner on the counter, courtesy of Katelee.

The poem that was attached to the plate:
For you to
Eat when
you have cold
feet.

LOVE that girl!

Katelee also had a nice Valentine's day. Valentines from mom and dad:

She also loved her breakfast.

I tried to pack Katelee and Gerald special lunches for Valentine's day.  I made 'love' cheese and heart sandwiches...

I loved attending Katelee's class Valentine's Day party!

Katelee participated in her school's storytelling festival this month, and did a great job!  She was a bit nervous to do it, but she was brave and did it anyway.  We were very proud of her!  Here she is performing her story for the first grade.

Katelee continues to excel at school, make friends everywhere she goes, and loves to play outside.  Climbing trees is a special passion for her, and would probably live in a tree if she could!

Katelee has also discovered Nintendo recently, and has become a bit of a Mario maniac.  We have one of these old school Nintendo systems, along with Mario 1 and Mario 3.  If we didn't monitor her playing time, she would probably play it all day long.  Though Gerald and I also enjoy playing Mario with her too!  ;) 

Katelee continues to be a loving big sister.  It's no wonder Blake adores her!  No one can make him laugh the way Katelee can.

 

GERALD
February is also the month we celebrate Gerald's birthday.  His birthday this year fell on a Sunday, so after church we made him one of his favorite meals for lunch: Mexican haystacks, complete with birthday candle and singing!

 

What a handsome guy!

Later that evening we invited some friends over for birthday cake!  Although only a small group of people were able to make it in the end, we had invited a large enough group that we made two cakes just to be safe:

Gerald's new favorite: Peanut Butter Cake

This was the first time we had made PB cake, and it is officially a new favorite!  I shared the recipe here if you care to have it.

And Gerald's usual favorite: Triple Berry Cake

We joked that if you had them together, they tasted like a PB&J sandwich in cake form - ha ha ha!

 

Gerald also had the day after his birthday off of work for President's Day, so we took him to his favorite restaurant, Tucanos for a birthday meal and spent the day having fun together.  

I love Gerald so much and am so grateful to be married to such a kind, wonderful, hardworking man.

I love my family and feel so blessed to have each of them in my life.