Clean Up

This is an example of why five minutes of peace and quiet doesn't go unpunished with a little kid around.  Walter took a whiteboard marker and colored all around the walls in the dining area and the kitchen, the fridge, dishwasher, pantry door, and my desk chair.  Luckily, the magic erasers really are magic.

Christmas Eve

I'm posting this picture because this blog doesn't accurately reflect that Walter is a total drama queen.  He frequently throws the fakest crying fits, with a tissue if he can find one.  Very dramatic.

Eensie weensie spider...  sometimes we catch Walter signing it to himself when we're not encouraging it.

We spent the evening videotaping and laughing at Walter then we read the story of Christ's birth while he had his bottle.  It was a low-key Christmas Eve.

Jamaica

AJ and I spent the week in Jamaica, with Walter staying with my mom. It was fantastic! We swam, ate a ton, took a zip-line tour in the mountains, and did a lot of crossword puzzles. We went swimming late at night, AJ took windsurfing lessons, and we managed to not get burnt until the last day there! I'm sure I'm leaving things out, but the point is that we had a great time!

(I'm hoping this will be easier than uploading a million pictures. If you click on the image, it will open bigger.)

UPDATE: Okay, I have had requests to actually be able to see the pictures... so I tried to embed a slideshow, but the vertical pictures look wonky. Well, I did the best I could, people! :)

Breakfast

Mmmm... stale wads of mini marshmallows. I had forgotten that I left it on the floor last night after it was part of his nutritious dinner... uh, pre-dinner snack.

Thanksgiving Prep

We made chocolate pie and rolls for Thanksgiving at my aunt's house in Utah. Good times had by all, but no pictures unfortunately.

Pumpkins

We didn't take Walter out tonight, but we stayed in and carved our pumpkins.  We wanted them fresh so that I could try cooking them for pie!  We'll see how that goes...

Little Man

Our ward had a party tonight.  Walter had a ton of fun running around with the other kids, carrying balloons around, etc.  Think my costume looks familiar?  You're right.  I must have been convincing because I had a lot of people ask me if I really am a black belt.  REALLY?  Well, alrighty.

I am posting this pic of AJ even though it's not the greatest-- because of the memories!  This is what he was wearing when he met my family for the first time.  It was Halloween and I was wacked out on cold meds.  This means that we have been together for about three years now!  Haha, that is funny to me.  I don't really know why.

Bowling at BYUI

Great-Grandpa Evans

Walter and I drove out to Twin Falls to meet Mom and Maria at my grandpa's house. Walter was great on the way there. Maybe you can guess how he was on the way back.  It was lucky Grandpa wasn't in the car with us on the trip home. 

Autumn Leaves

Nevermind that we woke up to snow on Monday. Now the leaves are falling, and Walter had a great time playing in them. He didn't even want to walk over to the swings, which are his favorite.

New Vacuum

Not sure where he got this weird scrunchy face, but he does it when he is trying to grin at you.

As excited as Walter was to help put this together, AJ and I were even more excited to have a freshly vacuumed house.  We chucked our nasty vacuum when we moved and mooched off Emily's sister when we got here.  Since then we have just been waiting while we researched what we wanted.  That was mostly OK, until Emily brought most of my plants up and Walter started throwing dirt all over the floor.

Spray Park

So I have been telling myself that we would let Walter play at the Spray Park once he could walk.  Luckily, we made it the last day it was open!  He had a great time, although it was getting to be quite chilly with the breeze.

P.S.  I cannot figure out how to post video with the upgrades that Blogger made.  Am I mental???  Until that is figured out...  just picture him walking around!  (It's really cute.)
P.P.S.  That is the least of my problems with Blogger lately.  Anyone else having issues?

Yellowstone National Park

(Sunburn courtesy of me waiting ten minutes for Old Faithful to go off, and kidding myself that I would be OK.  I am not smart sometimes.)

Yellowstone is another national park that I missed out on during my youth.  Hopefully Walter enjoyed himself.  I didn't quite realize what my mother meant when she said there was a lot of driving.  He was pretty good about all the time in his carseat, and Emily and Dave were great trying to keep him entertained.  I wish I had video of Emily squealing as buffalo blocking the road moved closer to the car, and Dave rhapsodizing over the the elk he spotted.  It was great of them to come up from Utah, and they were really fun to be stuck in a car with for a long long time.