Our First Visitors

Grandma Karen and Grandpa Dave came to visit last week, our first house guests in our first home! We tried to make sure they had plenty to do--mostly fun things--while they were here.

While we were trying to make our house ready for visitors, Paul discovered the following amazing toy and made a big mess:

One of the first things we did with our company was drive to Tubac for the Luminaria. Beautiful lights, music, and Paul got to meet Santa Claus!

That is a real Saguaro skeleton, filled with Christmas lights.

Paul insists he has been quite good this year, and he's so cute I just can't disagree.

No jackets necessary!

We visited the Pima Air and Space Museum and it was pretty fantastic. Hundreds of planes, including some more hands on activities, and lots of floor for Paul to wander around on.

Pilot in training!

Baby astronaut.

This is the same kind of plane that Grandpa Lietz flew in as a flight engineer. Isn't that a cool bit of family history?

Lee and a missile which I cannot identify for legal reasons.

 We started a little home improvement project with the help of our hard working visitors. Paul tried his best to be underfoot and in the way at all times, he thought digging with this spade was just about the best game he's ever played.

Paul and Grandma Karen workin' in the yard.

Did you know that we live a mile away from a Cold War Era Missile Silo? It has been maintained as a museum, and the missile is still here (it isn't loaded, obviously.) but we got to take a look at one of the largest missiles ever made: the Titan II.

The missile is about 7 stories tall.

Sadly, we had to say good-bye to Grandma and Grandpa Phillips on Friday, but we are sure glad they came to spend the week with us!

Birthday #1

I can't believe that our little man has been with us for a whole year. It is hard to imagine how he will change and grow in the coming months and years. Paul came downstairs to see a birthday surprise all set up and waiting for him:

Thanks to the Grandparents and Aunties/Uncles who sent Paul presents!

We tested his present opening skills. There is a lot of room for improvement for next year.

We eventually got his presents out for him and dressed him up in his new birthday clothes. He liked all his presents except the new sneakers. He does not like wearing shoes one bit.

Paul makes sound effects when he holds this plane because Dad showed him how.

New birthday clothes!

Later on in the evening we had a little party for Paul. We all ate nachos and cupcakes and of course we sang Happy Birthday.

Every baby does their cake a little differently. I confess that I was rather surprised by Paul's approach.

After a fun evening full of friends and frosting, Paul was full, exhausted, and ready to call it a night.

I call this one: "Frosting Hang-over."

I have learned that balloons are the best party accessory and that I can eat a lot of nachos. Good things to know as we prepare for many more birthdays to come!

Paul's First Halloween

I cannot get enough of how cute Paul was in his Halloween costume, so I am going to share a lot of pictures. Hope you appreciate them as much as I do!

 We went to a kind of country fair at Buckelew Farm where we visited a petting zoo, ate some kettle corn, and got some pumpkins. We went on a tractor ride out to their pumpkin patch and chose our own perfect pumpkins.

Paul didn't pet the animals, he just poked them.

I got a baby pig to eat out of my hand

Just picking our pumpkins!

Our family fall photo.

 I made some seriously amazing sugar cookies, they tasted even better than they looked, so special thanks to Kate Grant for giving me the recipe! We decided that the cat cookie cutter, when turned upside down, looked like Ichabod Crane.

Ghost, Moon, Broom, Ichabod Crane, Tombstone, Pumpkin, and Candy Corn.

 We went to the Sahuarita Spook-tacular where we did some trunk-or-treating. There was also a Haunted House, which was fun...except that Paul was very tired and after the first clown jumped out to scare us he started crying. He didn't stop crying till we got out. It was pretty hilarious...and sad.

The coolest trunk at the trunk-or-treat.

There was also a pirate ship trunk. We felt very at home there.

Paul has the best grin in the history of photography.

Be impressed by the plumage on that parrot! I made it myself.

We have the coolest decorations.

Paul loves his little pirate sword.

Our very cool carved pumpkin.

 We went to two trunk-or-treats, so we didn't take Paul trick-or-treating. He really liked wandering over to see who was at the door and at first he cried when the big kids left without him. When our doorbell stopped ringing, we did a movie with friends to finish off a fabulous Halloween.

Two good lookin' buccaneers.

We have a seriously photogenic little bird.

Paul wanted me to eat his spoon. Anything to get him to smile!

Paul does not want a cracker, he wants a tootsie roll.

Just to finish of the post, here are a couple cute videos of Paul playing ball with his daddy.

Welcome to our Virtual Home Tour!

I've said for months that I would post a video tour of our new house, and here it is! We finally got every room in presentable shape, we even put Paul's toys away! Well, most of them...

And here's a little behind the scenes action for ya:

This is about Paul's walking skill level at this point. He likes to combine cruising, walking, and crawling. He is terribly fast at all three.
Now that we've done all that work, it is time to literally enjoy the fruits of our labors. Literally. We made amazing caramel apples, as has become our tradition at this time of year.

1/2 are Heath 1/2 are York mint.

And no post could be complete without a cute picture of Paul, here he is after his first ever slice of pizza.  He is doing his classic bottom tooth grin (he has two top teeth, but he likes sticking the bottoms ones out) and we caught him mid clap. I am pretty sure he uses clapping as a way to indicate he is done eating, I'm not sure why.

Next time: Paul's first Halloween! We can't wait!

A late birthday and a hot hike.

Lee's birthday was a month ago. It has taken me that long to plug the camera into my laptop and get some pictures uploaded because I can only use my computer when Paul is asleep. Here are just a few little photos of Paul being cute and some hiking we did at Madera Canyon:

Here is Lee's birthday cake, a heavenly combination of brownie, oreo, whipped cream, and pudding. And rather than using 25 candles, we used a row of lit and unlit candles to count to 25 in binary. Engineers...sheesh.

To celebrate, we went to Madera Canyon for hiking and a picnic. Most of the trails up there are too advanced to do with a 20 pound dead-weight strapped to your chest, so we chose a shorter one and didn't hike the whole thing. We thought we'd be higher elevation so it wouldn't be so hot, but it wasn't that high and it was still darn hot.

Paul likes it when we hike him around.

Paul does not much care for hats.

Fortunately, there was one trail at least that was handicap accessible, which meant a stroller could be used instead of the back-breaker (aka carrier).

Paul has been exploring foods more and more lately. He really likes raspberries, but he learned that he could squish them and play with them instead of eat them:

You can't see it, but his arms were stained pink by raspberry juice.

We let him play with some strings of apple peel while I was making apple pie. Turns out it was the best toy a kid could ask for. Tangly, sticky, and tasty!

That's apple peel dangling from his mouth.

We hope to have more exciting adventures now that it has cooled down to the low 90s, and I am horribly jealous of everyone who is starting to see fall weather already. We probably won't see that till December! Till next time!

How we spent our summer vacation.

We are officially home owners! I know, I know, I know, I know. You want to see what the new house looks like. I am working on that. I just want it to not look like crazy people live here before I take a video tour. No one needs to know what level of crazy we are. In the mean time, I will use the age old technique of misdirection and distract you with photos from our trip to Utah! I swear they're really good.

We had the great joy of seeing my cousin Katie married first thing on this trip. Paul got his first taste of chocolate cake, and I took several pictures of my baby boy with various relatives:

Paul and Uncle Daniel

Grandma Jamie and Pa Duane with their grandbaby at Temple Square

Cousin Kimball was kind enough to hold Paul so I could eat without a helper.

We also spent a day exploring the mountains at Snowbird.

Paul loved being outdoors, he just wished he were walking!

What a beautiful view! The mountains are okay, too.

 Paul got to spend lots of time with other little tots. He got to meet little Ayla Beazer and he had a great time playing with his cousin Noelle:

They are wild little things.

The Phillips Clan held our first family reunion. What fun it was to have everyone together! Here is the whole troupe at the Ogden Temple open house.

No poolside picnic is complete without Red Vines! Paul loved splashing around the pool, but I think he liked lunch best.

Not Aubrie! She was crazy about floating in the sunshine tube!

Cousin Aubrie and Grandma Karen

Lee and I got to go on an actual, real live date without our adorable third wheel. While Paul played with Grandma Jamie, we went and saw Wicked. Thanks for the tickets and the babysitting, Grandma!

Paul, Grandpa Dave, and Scout in Paul's first dog encounter.

Paul loved the sandbox and hardly ate any sand :)

He also enjoyed giant bubbles almost as much as I did.

We got some fabulous family photos (by Sarah Knight
photography), some of which are displayed here:

Paul mostly wanted to eat rocks and Aubrie was all too willing to help him.

We have a very photogenic boy!

 I think Paul misses all his playmates now that we're back home. But he sure likes the fort we made for him out of our refrigerator box!

More to come soon, thanks for reading!