Our December Adventures

Here are a whole bunch of random pictures and videos for our family that is far away. We had a really really fun day and are so grateful for each other. Our boys are a riot and we had a wonderful time spending the day with them. WARNING: A lot of pictures! We won't be offended if you give up before you get to the end!

Mason and his cool new underwear.
He's been wearing them all day with no pants so that we can see them.

I think all of the excitement wore this one out!

Mason when we told him he had to take a nap. ;(
He was so tired, but he wanted to keep playing with his new trains.

Christmas Morning at our house!

I think Carter is a fan of Santa Claus!

Mason meeting his Hamster. (After we found him.)

Carter and Daddy.

Carter being his happy self while Mason opened presents.

Carter all bundled up and happy one day.
Mason helping Carter open his Christmas Eve present.

The boys in the Christmas "jama-ramas."

Mason wanted to put out 8 brownies for Santa and 20 carrots for the reindeer. We had to settle for two of each.

Santa didn't shut the hamster's lid tight and he got away. We found him in one of our back rooms after only 25 minutes of searching. Mason named him Baby Beluga.

Carter's First "Real" food. I think he likes it.

Going to see Santa a few weeks ago.

My cute sleepy boys. I enjoyed this moment!

I had a piano recital a few weeks ago. It we a lot of work, and a lot of fun!

Snow in Saint George!!!!!

Mason and Carter playing on Nana and Pawga's blow up bed.

Your opinion is needed. . .

Please vote in our poll. It's on the right at the top! ;)

It's the most wonderful time of the year. . . .

The kids jingle belling and everyone telling you be of good cheer is great don't get me wrong. But I have a few different reasons for thinking this is really the best time of the year. If Mason is throwing a fit, getting into something he shouldn't, mauling Carter, or otherwise being naughty, (I know it's hard to imagine such a sweet boy doing all of those things, but it does happen. ha ha ha.) all I have to do is say, "Mason, are you on the nice list, or the naughty list?" and instantly he is an angel child who will do ANYTHING I ask him to do. It doesn't last long, but when he starts being naughty again, I just have to remind him of that glorious nice list and he remembers to be good again. Thank you Santa!! Your obsession with lists and children's behavior is keeping this Mom just a little bit more sane this holiday season!

One small step for Mason. . .

If you know Mason, you know how BUSY he is! It is hard to get him to sit long enough to eat a meal or go potty, let alone hold still and try to write something! Well he is getting really good at coloring in the lines and concentrating on his work in preschool. Here is his latest attempt at writing his name. It may not look like much, but the fact that he traced ALL FOUR of his names and wrote all of the letters himself on the last one is a huge accomplishment. We are so proud of him. He is such a smart boy. A little too smart sometimes!

Diarrhea. . .

Diarrhea is the WORST thing about being a Mom. I can handle blood, puke, even the occasional booger, but I detest cleaning up diarrhea. I'm sorry if this post is inappropriate or any of you find it offensive. But, it is the truth.

Impatience

Do you know what I HATE? Waiting for pictures to be printed. We got Carter's 3 month old pictures taken and some pictures of both boys for Christmas taken at JCPenny's this week. They turned out SO GOOD!! If you know me, you know that I love pictures. Our house is covered with them, I'm always taking them, and I really can't get enough of them. Maybe it's because kids grow so fast and I want to remember everything, or maybe I'm just OCD. Anyway, we are getting them back really fast this time, (Saturday!) but I still hate waiting for them. Thanks dad for at least getting the little proof versions for me!!

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Halloween, Carter Laughing, etc. etc. etc.

Mason and Carter were a hot dog and bottle of ketchup for Halloween. It was so much fun. Today Dora was talking about different careers you can have and she said, "What do YOU want to be when you grow up?" Mason answered back, "A bottle of ketchup!!" I got a kick out of it!


The boys cuddled up on the couch. They sure love eachother! And we kindof like them too. . .



Mason had a RIOT trick-or-treating with his new friends Gary and Liv. THANKS for the fun night Tami and Todd!!


What a happy hotdog!


Carter is growing way to fast. We had to take him to the doc last week for an eye infection and they weighed him. . . He is almost 15 lbs! crazy. Anyway, he is cooing and laughing all of the time now. We think he is pretty dang cute.

Stockpile Sale

So, I'm sorry if you are sick of reading about my coupon obsession. Don't read on if that is the case. Albertson's is having a crazy good sale. It was my first super coupon trip. I had a coupon for almost everything and almost everything was on sale. They were having computer problems, so checkout took FOREVER!!!! But I think it was worth it. Retail for all of the stuff we got was $335.36 total. Can you guess how much I paid for all of this???????


If you guessed $74.09, which I'm sure you did, you were RIGHT!!! So we saved $236.27 total. Pretty exciting. Spencer cam with me, but I don't think he was as excited as I was. Oh well. It was fun and we are following the prophet and filling our pantry. :) I'm getting 6 copies of the Sunday paper now, so we can get even more stuff. This is really better than Las Vegas!!!

The Blue Spider

Let us have a moment of silence!! Our dear friend and scary spider has returned to his spider family above. He slipped away from this carnal life sometime in the night just before Halloween. We hope it was a peaceful death and he did not suffer. He lived a good life. Spending most of his time underground. He decided to come out one day and enlighten us with his presence. We were all scared and would jump when he lurched at you trying to attack! He always kept us on our toes. Roosafee is survived by his loving owner Spencer and his lovely wife Jenny and their two kids Mason and Carter. He is also survived by GusGus who was afraid of him. He is also survived by Spencer's 2008-2009 Science class. He will be dearly missed. His family and friends will always remember the joy that he was to our lives. He is in a better place now with his loving Father. We love you roosafee and your absence will be felt!!

Spencer Ballantyne
8th Grade Science SCMS

Good Intentions

So I haven't had time to post all of the great blogging ideas I've had as our lives have gone quickly by the last few weeks. Here are a bunch of mini posts to let you know what the Ballantyne's have been up to. . .

Carter sucking his thumb. . . Again. . .

The day I put up our Halloween/Fall decoration on the front porch, a little bat came to visit. He stayed on the house all day, and then flew away that night. We joked that he wanted to be a decoration too!

We carved our pumpkins for FHE last night. We love pumpkins! Pictures never do them justice though. Hopefully you can tell we went with a disney theme this year.


We finally finished them up around 11:30ish. Mason slept through half of preschool this morning! Oh well, it was fun family bonding time.


He doesn't look tired at all. . . . .right?



What a big helper. I found Mason feeding Carter the other day. "He was hungry Mom." He really was hungry and for once, Mason's attempt at "helping" really did help!
He is a great big brother!



We definitely have a thumb sucker on our hands. We give him the binki and he spits out and and puts the thumb back in. It's cute for now I guess. . .



Our boys. Aren't they cute? Don't tell Mason though. If you tell him he's cute he says, "I'm not cute, I'm . . . sssss . . .Hot!"



The boys work really hard to help me out around the house!! ;)



For UEA I had tons of vinyl to do, so we didn't really do anything fun. We did go to the part and have a picnic and Spencer and Mason played some football. The weather was PERFECT and it was so much fun to have a little family time.



We found a tarantula on our house the other night. I think they are cool in glass cages in Spencer's classroom, but not so cool in our yard uncontained!



Carter is at that fun cooing, happy, smiley stage. He is so much fun!

Ben and Jerry Goodness

So, my husband will tell you I have a recent obsession with coupons. And well, he is probably right. He will thank me one day! Actually he did thank me last night. Every once in a great while, we splurge and each purchase ourselves a little pint of Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream. This Sunday's paper had a coupon in it for the ice cream, plus it was on sale at Albertson's. I had a Get $2.50 off your next purchase coupon from another shopping trip to Albertson's last week. We were having a stressful day and decided to go get some last night. When we got there, they were running a deal that you got a cute little ice cream free if you bought one pint. We bought two pints, got 2 little ice creams free and used our 2 coupons. Our total for that ice cream came to $2.48 which is great in and of itself. Then another coupon printed out with our receipt. We decided to get another pint and little ice cream since we saved so much the first time and so we could use that coupon. I went to pay for those, and another coupon printed out before I paid, which I was able to use. The total for those 2 ice creams was $1.08. Holy Moly. So in all, we spent $3.56 on ice cream and got everything you see in the picture. Ben and Jerry's ice cream is usually $4.19 a pint, so this was a very good deal. It's better than Vegas. I'm serious!!!!!!! I've been meaning to call and get more copies of the Sunday paper delivered to us and just haven't done it yet. Just think how much ice cream we could've bought with more of those coupons. . . . .

Husband Tag

Husband Tag!!!

1. Where did you meet your husband? SUU. I was kind of (very unofficially) engaged when we met, but he won in in the end. I was his FHE Mom.
2. How long did you date before you got married? We were engaged 2 months into our datingness and dated for a total of 6 months before we got married. It was really fast.
3. How long have you been married? 4.5 years
4. What does he do that surprises you? He comes home at lunch sometimes, that's always a nice surprise. A little adult conversation does a Mommy good!
5. What is your favorite feature of his? His bum. Am I allowed to say that online? ;)
6. What is his best quality? He is so easy-going and very caring.
7. Does he have a nickname for you? Babe, Wifey, Hun.
8. What is his favorite food? Yes. Pizza, Steak, anything chocolate, anything he sees on Food Network. He is a very good cook.
9. What is his favorite sport? Football. He coaches the 9th grade team and has a recent obsession with the Utes. I like 'em too, but really, do we have to listen to the game on the radio in the car??
10. When and where did you first kiss? Well, we kissed before we even went on a date. He tried the night before and I didn't let him. Then the next day he snuck one in at my apt. before he left for the night. He is a very good kisser by the way!
11. What is your favorite thing to do as a couple? Make out. Just kidding. I don't think we even remember how. We like to go camping, cook new foods, and craft. He is a very good crafter.
12. Do you have any children? Mason is 3 and Carter is 2 months.
13. Does he have any hidden talents? Yes, but they are still hiding. Just kidding. He is very good at lining up quilt squares for me to sew. Our little assembly lines make the process go much faster! I am making him sound really girly huh? He is also really good at blowing things up and catching things on fire. (There. . . is that manly?)
14. How old is he? 29
15. Who said 'I love you first'? He did. Under the table at my apartment. Random.
16. What is his favorite music? REO Speedwagon, Van Halen, Veggie Tales. He secretly LOVES Oh where is my hairbrush!
17. What do you admire most about him? He is really good with kids and 8th graders.
18. What is his favorite color? He doesn't even know. . . Probly Red. Go utes!
19. Will he read this? He is sitting here editing as I type. Don't you hate when people look over your shoulder while you are on the computer? Ya, me too.
20. Who do you tag? Katie, Kim, Kenzie (ha ha, just kidding maybe in 23 months), Tami, Natalie, anyone else who wants to. . . . . And Spencer. But maybe call it Wife Tag instead, otherwise it might be a little weird!

Pretty Feet

My sweet Mom-In-Law got me one of these after hearing me mention to Spencer that I wanted to try it. Anyway, Spencer and I both tried it out last night and it is AMAZING!! It really works if anyone was wondering. I've tried lots of different creams, tools, and other remedies for my yucky dry cracked ugly feet, but none have worked as well is this darling little egg. Just a little FYI. If you want to feel my feet for proof, you're more than welcome!

Carter's Blessing Day

Spencer blessed Carter a few weeks ago, I just haven't had time to blog about it. So, here is my post for September 21, 2008. As you know, we named him Carter T. Ballantyne. We named him Carter just because we both liked it. (The middle name was debated for MONTHS before he was born. We finally decided at the hospital.) Spencer also just has a letter for his middle name, so it's to honor his Daddy. My Dad's middle name is Thorpe, so it's also to honor his Grandpa. They are both amazing people and will be great examples to him as he grows up.) It was a wonderful blessing and it was fun to have so many visitors. It wore Carter out for sure. He was a little fussy from all of the attention. We had yummy haystacks and played a huge game of Apples to Apples with out houseful of visitors. Mason was in Heaven showing his trains to anyone who would listen and holding them captive in the toy room until they could escape. (Not an easy task.) Thanks everyone who came and supported us and Carter on his special day!

Love and Logic

So I always give Mason choices like "You can choose to (whatever I want him to do), or you can choose to go to time out. What would you like to do?" Today I was trying to get him to lay down in his room by himself (Which he is doing REALLY good at lately.) and he said, "Mom, you have two choices. I can sit on your lap for naps, or lay on your shoulder. What you like a do?" At least I know he listens to me occasionally right? Little stinker.


Here are a few pics of him after he dressed himself the other day. Mr. Independent these days. He also finds himself very funny. . .

Mom, I'm Ready!

I was feeding the baby and I told Mason to go get dressed so we could run errands. He was in my room for a while. I went in to find him and he said, "Mom, I'm Ready!" He was so proud. He did get himself dressed. He also put on some mascara. He did a pretty good job. He even tried to put it it his eyebrows, but it didn't quite work. I don' t think his Dad was as excited as Mason was when I told him about it later. ;)


Even without the mascara, I think he is a pretty cute kid and we sure love him!