Grandpa Bell's Visit

 Last weekend Grandpa Bell came to visit!  I also got my wisdom teeth out last Friday, so I'm sure that I wasn't the greatest company in the world I also can't tell you for sure all the fun things they did with Grandpa since I spent most of the weekend relaxing in bed.  I know it involved a lot of eating out and they were kind enough to bring me a few milkshakes.  They also went to this kids event that had all sorts of fun things.  It had a giant inflatable slide, but apparently Brady chickened out on that one.  He did enjoy looking at the fire truck with Grandpa, and I think Grandpa enjoyed that too since he was a fire fighter for quite a while!  There was also an area with balls and bats, which I'm sure you could have guessed would be his favorite.  This boy absolutely loves balls and bats!  Thanks for visiting, Grandpa!  Come back when I can play (and eat) next time.

 

Pumpkin Carving

To finish celebrating Quentin's birthday, we carved our pumpkins.  Brady L-O-V-E- LOVED it!  He was not so helpful on the actual carving, but he sure loved picking the goop out.  And then putting it back in.  I made him wear one of my t-shirts in case he got super nasty.  I remember we always used to wear my dad's old shirts for potentially dirty projects.  What a good idea, Mom!

 I didn't know how much Brady would really notice or care about these pumpkins, but he sure loved them.  Brady's is the Mickey Mouse one (isn't he so talented?) and Quentin did the ghost/tree one.  It's kind of hard to see in the pictures, but they turned out pretty well.  Brady even got to stay up almost an hour past his bedtime to see the finished products! 

 After Brady went to bed, I got to start on mine while we watched Modern Family.  I did a witch riding a broom stick.  After carving Mickey and the witch, I could barely feel my hand it was cramping so bad!  But they are pretty impressive, if I do say so myself.  Today I will roast the seeds! 

Happy Birthday Quentin!

Yesterday was Quentin's birthday.  He turned 26, and our celebrating began with dinner with my parents and Kirk and Kirsten at his favorite restaurant, Texas Roadhouse.  It was Kirksten's first time there, and I think they liked it. The food there is sooooooo yummy!  Brady always fills up on the rolls and he loves the applesauce.  When you go there for your birthday, they make you get on this saddle, so I made sure to bring my camera along so we could always remember :)  They even let Brady sit in the saddle for a little bit,

After dinner we went to the grocery store and picked out pumpkins to carve.  I thought it would take Brady forever to pick one, but he went right up to a really good looking pumpkin and tried his best (to no avail) to pick it up.  Then he got to ride in the cart with them.  He kept saying "punkin" and was pretty upset when he had to briefly separate from the pumpkins in the car.
Presents this year were pretty unexciting since we are trying to make it through the next 7 months without any student loans.  Did I mention just 7 more months until we are done with school?  He got two shirts from my parents, which was more of a need than a want, but he likes them so I guess that's good.  From me he got this licorice that he likes, rainbow chip frosting, a caramelo, and IBC root beer.  Then this morning I made cake batter pancakes (from pinterest of course) and served them to him in bed.  I may have enjoyed them more than Quentin, they were delicious!  I'm going to take a stab at making a home made cake, so we'll eat that Sunday.  Three days of celebrating sounds pretty good huh?  Stay tuned for our pumpkin carving post.

Lately

Here's Brady sporting his Mizzou gear and fighting Butters off his snacks.

I know I am wayyy behind on updating here, but life gets busy, especially when you're chasing around this cute kiddo.  And trust me, he is tough to keep up with sometimes!  We haven't really had much excitement lately.  Quentin went to an ultrasound conference for school for about a week in September, so I had a brief encounter being a single mom.  Let's just say I am glad it was brief.  Brady is a good kid and I'm blessed to have family close to keep me company, but it's nice to have live-in backup.  Anyway, Quentin had a group project that he has been working on for about a year that they presented at this conference, and his group placed third, much to their surprise and their teachers (who were less than supportive and kept telling them how bad their topic was. Hmmm...)  Did I mention only 7 months until graduation? But who's counting?  One fun thing we did when Quentin was gone is visit the dog park.  Brady insisted on taking a ball in and then was less than thrilled at the dogs who wanted to share.  And there were some big ones.  At one point, there was a dalmation up ahead and Brady pointed to it and said "Cow.  Moooo."  It was sooooo cute!  Almost, kid.  The closest thing he's seen to a cow in real life anyway.

When I needed some extra time after he ate to finish making breakfast burritos to keep handy in the freezer (which I very much recommend), I kept Brady busy playing with bubbles.  My mom used to do this with us too.

 Brady is not as fond of the camera as he once was.  Remember that cheesy face that couldn't get enough camera time?  Well, I know it's hard to tell, but this is the same kid.  Fighting to not have his picture taken.  Yep. He is very independent now. 

 Really I was trying to capture the cute outfit (the shirt at one point was tucked in).  He's just a little man!

 Sunday I decided to get out these Halloween window clings.  If I was smarter, I would have saved the initial thrill time to coincide with General Conference so that I maybe could have heard a whole (or at least most of) a talk.  Maybe next time.  Probably not.  Thank goodness for the Conference edition of the Ensign!  And yes, we did stay in our pajamas most of the day.  And now that it's getting cold, Brady gets to wear his footie pajamas, which I love for some reason. Anyway, he had even more fun when Daddy showed him he could stick them to your face.  Unfortunately, I did not get a picture of that.  I probably still can though, because Brady has not forgotten this trick, and still thinks it is quite fun.  I just need to trick Daddy into joining him again...

 Brady has an obsession with shoes.  Really, I can't help but love it.  I share his passion.  Mostly for tennis shoes.  Brady got some new shoes (that he has not grown into yet) in the mail the other day and wanted them on right away.  He then modeled them for Quentin, Aliisa and I.  As in did little poses and lifted his legs to make sure we all saw.  Then he wouldn't let me take them off, and cried at bedtime when I had to.  He really likes to wear shoes all the time anyway, but it was so cute to see how excited he was.  Also, he likes to put on other people's shoes.  Not just put them on, but walk in them.  And while he may not be able to say he's walked a mile in your shoes, chances are he's walked a few steps in them if they've ever been within reach for him.

 It is so fun to watch him grow up.  He learns so quickly and speaks really well for his age.  He is learning new words everyday.  Yesterday he said "bless you" to Butters when he sneezed.  He tries to say almost everything he hears.  And usually does a pretty decent job of it. 
One more story and I'll tie it up.  The other day when I went to lunch, I checked my phone and had a text from Lori that said something like, "Kylie was sitting on the floor building a tower with the blocks.  I couldn't figure out why Brady was standing so still and quiet behind her.  After a few minutes, he grabbed a few strands of her hair, yanked them out, shoved them in his mouth and ran.  Without looking up Kylie yelled 'Bradyyyy...I hate it when you pull out my hair and eat it!'"  Obviously this is a recurring event if she knew what was happening without looking up.  For some reason, my kid loves to eat hair.  I don't know why.  It's disgusting and I always make him stop and spit it out when I catch him.  I just didn't know this obsession went to the extent of ripping hair off people's heads.  I'm hoping it's something he outgrows...fairly quickly too!