The last week's photos

Max has been staying asleep when you take him out of the car lately. Usually I'm holding him though and can't appreciate how cute he is. I made Carl freeze for this one.

Max's new trick is to clear the tractors off the toy box and climb up here. He pulls all the toys out and revels in the mess. Check out hat floor. Rawr. 

We all went for a drive up to Estes Park yesterday just for fun. It was super windy and annoying when we got out to walk around in town though. We stopped at the little playground and could only play for a while because we were cold. 

Look at that little tear on his cheek. haha

We explored in a bunch of new places and came across this huge herd of elk. (Are elk in a herd??) We pulled over and tried to get some pics out of the car windows and hoped none of them got mad. They seemed to not even know we were there though. 

The highlight for Carson is that he gets to sit in back when Grandma comes. 

Max and Daddy playing grab the hat at lunch. 

This is Saint Malo church outside of Estes Park. It is historic and called the church on the rock for good reason. Apparently it caught on fire last year which explains why there were boarded up windows. Such a same because it was breathtakingly gorgeous. 

I broke down and finally got an iPad this weekend. ::happy dance::  The boys claimed quickly. 

Action shot. Carson takes the brunt of the attack baby. 

Clothes. You're doing it wrong. 

Elf on the Shelf: Day 11

As a continuation of Carson's bad attitude, he got a stern letter from Shawn. Will it sink in? Time will tell. I'm going with a big probably not. 

Elf on the Shelf: Day 10

Carson had such a good week when he was off school during thanksgiving week. This last week he has been a sassy terror though. Sunday morning he found Shawn acting like a baby in Max's swing. Again, we told him his elf reflects the way he acts so Shawn was being a baby. He didn't think it was funny. 

Elf on the Shelf: Day 9

I think Shawn got together with Daddy for this one. This was a big dirt track made from our basket and pillows and blankets. Lets just say it was a hit for the whole weekend. 

Elf on the Shelf: Day 8

Shawn wanted to read books in Grandma's bed is morning like Carson does. Grandma's bed is always better, right??

And I'm posting this from my new iPad!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm only a little excited .........

Elf on the Shelf: Day 7

Shawn the Elf did a little wrenching last night. He likes to pretend to be Daddy too. :)

Brothers

To say we didn't sleep last night is an understatement. Luckily Carson is great and said he would take quiet time early with us. I put on a movie and they did this all on their own. My mommy heart about exploded. Now it's time to sleep.

Elf on the Shelf: Day 5

Carson has an obsession with plain glazed donuts. He asks for them every single time we go to the store so they have to only come at special times now.

His elf must have listened because he brought Carson donuts for breakfast and made his own little elf-sized ones. :)

Find the chub.

The latest random iPhone and other pics from the last week or so.

As soon as I tell Max I'm going to take a shower he runs right for his little couch and wants to watch Yo Gabba Gabba. He loves it just as much as Carson did at that age. He always wants my pillow and a blanket, but the other day he fell asleep right there before one episode even finished. We're still working on this whole "sleep through the night" thing so he was probably still tired. 

I took the boys to the prairie conservation center by us over the weekend. When we went in the spring we saw the baby chicks in a box and so Carson thought they'd still be there. He wasn't having it when I told him the were grown up so we had to drive down to the farm to find them. That's chickens and one turkey.

Max loves playing hide and seek with Carson. He was wandering around and I realized he was hiding in the towels and thought I was playing with him. Just this sight is enough to make me smile for days!


We took a drive to see the lights at the Capitol on Saturday night.


This photo is no joke and straight out of the camera. Carl was playing out front with the boys the other night and told me I had to come out and see the sky. Man, he wasn't lying! It looked like it was on fire! Can you believe that???

Elf on the Shelf: Day 4

Carson's favorite game to play when he's with me in the office is Connect 4. Like most little kids, he doesn't really play the game, just puts the coins in and then leaves them lying all over for me to step on. We're working on that last part.

Shawn the Elf thought he'd try playing last night with Stuffy the Dog.

Elf on the Shelf: Day 3

This morning we woke up to find that Shawn the Elf had gotten into my jewelry. Carson kept telling him that my jewelry is for girls. LOL

Elf on the Shelf: Day 2

This morning Carson woke up bright and early to find his elf had spent his free time putting all of his puzzles together. He keeps laughing and telling me the elf made such a big mess!

Elf on the Shelf: Day 1

We asked that an Elf on the Shelf come visit us this year and Santa delivered. This is "Shawn the Elf", as named by Carson. Hopefully this stays fun and not ridiculously stressful having to come up with something silly for Shawn to do every night. I mean, I hope it isn't stressful for him.....

We woke up this morning to see that Shawn had set up our Christmas tree. :)
Carson thinks it is so cool and keeps asking adorable questions. "Why can't he talk to me?" "Did you see him move?" "How does he get his magic?"  I love this kid.

Daily Shmaily

For realzies......a daily project is HARD. I'm so done with it. I had a good 5-month run, but I am swamped with real work and I do not do well with a looming feeling of a backlog. I need it to still be fun to keep it up and when I feel behind it doesn't feel fun any more. So back to our regularly randomly scheduled blogging!

A trip to play at Barnes and Noble.

For weeks straight this kid has had bonks on his forehead.

One day last week Carson got an ice cream bar from the freezer and told me it was for me. I didn't want it and told him to put it back. Eventually it was way too quiet and I found that Carson had opened it and left it on the counter where Max could reach it. I literally found this and couldn't come close to being mad. This was one happy Max.

Carson has had this entire week off of preschool AGAIN. After hanging around home Monday and Tuesday they were getting stir crazy by Wednesday. It was literally 70 degrees and gorgeous so we headed to the zoo. Unfortunately all the schools were out so it was packed! We had a lot of fun anyway. We got to the big cats first and they had the tigers in the small glass cages, which is cool because you never get to see them that close up.

The baby leopard is 7 months old now She's almost as big as the mom. When we first saw her she was tiny and only about a month old.


Carson has to pick the giraffe every time now, even though it's one of them that doesn't move. We sort of forgot to do his hair before leaving home...

This is the saddest face while watching brother on the carousel. :(  He got to go with us on the train though.



There was a baby orangutan too! I am a sucker for the zoo babies.

The lost photos: 2011 trip to Utah

Oh my. I went back in my files to try and find this family photo and realized I never ever posted any of these last year! They were all finished and sitting there in a folder, but never made it on the blog. We made a trip out to Utah last year over Labor Day weekend.
Max is soooo little here, only just over two months old!

Keeping Carson busy next to me in the hotel room while I got ready.

Great Grandma Stonehocker loves!

Max was originally due on June 23 and my grandpa's 80th birthday was June 22. We obviously couldn't travel back at that time to celebrate so my grandma set up a big dinner for the weekend we would be there at the Timbermine.

Me, Max, my grandma, Carson, Isabella, Aunt Erma

This was ligitimately the darkest room I've ever tried to take a photo in. I pushed my camera as far as I could and the photos were still so dark and grainy!
Carson used to love wearing Grandpa's reading glasses.

Uncle Bob, Aunt Janet, Aunt Marie, Carl, Carson, Isabella, Nick, Grandma Stonehocker, Me and Max, Grandpa Rick (my dad), Aunt Erma, Uncle Prett, Grandpa Stonehocker

The monsters on the way home. This was not long after we got our van so the TVs were still new and the funnest thing ever.