Kaitlyn turns 1

It's hard for me to believe Kaitlyn is one. Where did the first year go? She is on the petite side so it's easy for me to forget how old she is getting.

She adores her brother and usually the feeling is mutual. Evan gets so excited to do things for her. Here he is singing to her.

With in the last two weeks her personality has really developed. She loves giving hugs with little pats on the back. It is so cute. She also has taken a great interest in stuffed animals.

We finally found a stuffed bear she will fall asleep with making bedtime much easier. She was given her first doll for her birthday which she loves. Here is a clip of her opening her gifts and giving them loves.

She is so close to walking and loves to try. I'll turn around and she is bracing herself as she lets go of the furniture she was holding onto. She gets so proud of herself when she can stay standing for a bit or take a step. We love her to pieces and can't wait to see what the next year brings.

Easter Fun

Our little "Easter Walk" tradition, where we have to find items correlated to the Easter story, was a big hit this year. Evan found all the items with out even leaving the driveway. He was very excited and insisted we keep them and put them up on the mantel. In fact a week later he is still talking about them.
thorny thistle, wood twig, dead leaf, dark mulch, round stone, live flower

They also enjoyed their Easter baskets. As long as I can pull it off I will still keep giving the practical gifts mixed into the Easter basket, Christmas stocking etc. He doesn't look like he is complaining : ) Evan had a sugar high after opening the first Easter egg. Concentrated sugar at 7am never looked better right?
We also had a great time with friends over for dinner and an Easter egg hunt. I am not sure who really has more fun with Easter egg hunts the kids or the dads.

This is Kaitlyn at 11 months. She is getting around, very quickly I might add. I turn around for one second and if the gate isn't on the stairs she is up them. She is so anxious to be running with her brother. She has 5 almost 6 teeth. She is learning her signs rapidly. She can sign "hungry", "milk", "more" and "all done". She loves animals and flipping through books. She has a cute little personality.

A wonderful weekend

Spring is in the air and we love it. Flowers everywhere. This weekend we had the opportunity to listen to the prophet and other church leaders as they instructed us about issues facing the world today. We had some fun activities to help involve the kids and they loved it. Here's a few pictures.

Evan helped put the "Armor of God" on his balloon soldier. He thought it was pretty cool. This was Kaitlyn's first experience with balloons and she thought it was fun too.

Evan played word bingo while listening to the talks. He really enjoyed this and even after he had eaten all the M&Ms and cheerios we were using as tokens he would tell us, "mommy you listen for the word "righteous" and pretend to put an M&M on when you hear it"; "daddy you listen for the word "repentence" and pretend too".

We built a tent like the people of King Benjamin's time to listen to the prophet speak. Evan said his favorite speaker was President Monson. Then he preceeded to ask us what our favorite parts were. Steve said he enjoyed just spending the whole weekend home with the family. I said I enjoyed Elder Robbins talk regarding parenting. Definately one I'll have to go back and study. Kaitlyn's favorite part was the music. At one point Kaitlyn started waving her arm around like she was conducting while the music was being sung. It was pretty cute.

Tour of the ball park

Evan is really into baseball recently so we went on a tour of the Minute Maid ball park with our local play group. Evan loved it and is very excited to attend a game this year. Kaitlyn enjoyed it too and was very anxious to crawl all over the field. The staff was very anxious to make sure she was no where near it : ) This is the only picture I got of her on the day she became 10 months. Where has the time gone?

Moser March Madness

March in Houston means the Rodeo. We had a great time going with grandma this year. Evan was really into dressing like a cowboy and Kaitlyn loved the animals. She even did a little mutton bustin'.

We even brought some of the animal play home. (Sorry mom had to post at least this pict.) Evan loved wrestling with his grandma.

Kaitlyn is getting quite adventuresome. It's so fun to see her little personality emerging. The picture below captures a common expression of hers with her little tongue curled up. She is also sporting her first little ponytail.

Both our kids teeth came in this way with the two fangs on top. I've never seen this with any other kids. Interesting genes I guess. : )

We went on a tour of the fire station with our community play group. It was lots of fun. Evan particularly enjoyed this part of the tour. Here is Evan practicing for the March Madness games. He's getting better every day.
Recent projects have been this little 5 gal bucket garden my neighbors introduced me to. It's super easy just buckets, dirt, trellis and plant. Now all I have to do is water and reap the produce. No weeding : ) No horrible TX weed grass taking over the bed. I think I can handle this type of gardening as long as the bugs stay at bay. We planted tomatoes, zucchini, peppers, and rosemary. Evan is very excited and every day we have to go check the tomatoes that are already growing.
I also was recently called as the welfare specialist in our ward (aka food storage). I decided I better clean and organize my pantry so I can see exactly what I need and what space I have to store it. My pantry is one of my true loves of our house. It is so nice and big. It may look full already but really the sides are quite empty. Now let the storage begin.

Gone Fishin'

We went fishing at a local stream the other day with some friends. The fish weren't quite big enough to have for dinner but Evan had a great time!

On the move

The last few weeks Kaitlyn has become very mobile. She loves to roll around and scoot. She is a pretty determined little thing. When she sees something she wants she will get herself to it no matter what obstacles are in her way (other toys, pillows or big brother).
She also loves to jump in her jumper, especially when she gets a boost from Evan.