Silly boys

Thomas, Gordon and I had a fun afternoon hanging out together. We went to the park and the zoo (if you can call it that), then came home and played inside. It's still a bit chilly out! The boys were being so silly today and it was fun to hear them giggle so much.

My adorable Gordon is just such a little imp! I tried to take some good pictures of him, but he was more in the mood to tease me. He kept running in between my legs or saying "cheese!", then falling on the ground. Even though he's naughty, it's impossible for me to resist these gorgeous blue eyes. I love how you can see the mischief in them!


And finally, a snapshot of life with these kids. We started out trying to video an interview with Tom, but as you can see, it turned into a hostile takeover by Gord. Please ignore the messy family room...

GOOOOOOAAAAALLLLLLL!!!!!

Here's our little soccer star at practice yesterday. He's wearing the yellow jersey and I think he's a pretty good little ball-handler. I also think it's cute how he kind of jumps up and down after he gets the ball between the cones. GOAL!!

It's Official: I'm a Soccer Mom

I've heard that when young kids play soccer, the sight resembles a swarm of bees chasing the ball. This afternoon, at Tom's first soccer practice, I saw first hand how true that statement is! Tom's team consists of about ten kindergarten-aged children, a few of whom are classmates of Tom's at Edith Bowen. The fact that he already had friends there helped him overcome a short moment of shyness to join the practice. He had a great time! It was so much fun to watch him running back and forth, kicking his ball. I got a great video of Tom in the "swarm" (it's still uploading to Google), and here are some cute pictures of him at practice. The games start in mid-April, so I'm sure there will be much more soccer to come.

No more American Idol...

I'll admit it: I have, in the past, been a big fan of American Idol. I religiously watched the first season (Thomas was a baby!) and even taped the second and third seasons. The past few years, I have not been quite as involved, and after tonight, I'm ready to swear off the show forever. I wasn't a huge Stephanie fan or anything (she was voted off, in case you missed it), but the thought of watching another installment of Sanjaya butchering another song makes me nauseated. I guess it's a good thing I'm not watching AI anymore-- I have much better things to do with my time, right?!


Thomas starts soccer practice tomorrow and he could not be more excited. Today he wanted to put on his full uniform and practice in the backyard. We played for a little bit and I discovered that he has an interesting way of scoring. He counted a goal for himself when he kicked the ball to the fence; after his first score, he said, "Yes! Twenty to zero!" My score was when I kicked the ball over to the other side. Did I get twenty points? Nope-- "Oh man! You're out of bounds!"


For some reason, the bruise on Gordon's left eye doesn't look nearly as bad in the picture as it does in real life! He tried to pull a puzzle off a shelf in his closet and it fell right onto his face. The poor little thing just seems to collect battle scars, doesn't he?

How we kept busy last week...

It has been a busy week for the Hansen household! I've managed to take a few pictures, but I've been unable to blog until today. This may be a lengthy post, but at least you'll understand why I've been a bit lax on my blog updates!!

(Last) Saturday in Idaho Falls
Let's start with last Saturday, when the boys and I took a short trip to Idaho Falls. We had a really fun day and I was disappointed that I forgot to bring my camera! I guess you'll have to take my word on it.

We drove up early and I dropped the boys off at the Freed home, then went with Ann-Michelle to meet my mom and Caitlan at Community Park for a 5K race. We ran a pretty good race and were able to shave quite a bit of time off of our previous races. I felt pretty good about that!

Afterward, we went over to my parents' house and just hung out. (I fell asleep-- sorry Mom & Ann-M) The kids had a great time playing together and, as always, were sad to leave.

Abby's Blessing
We had to get home quickly, though, because the next day, Sunday, we drove down to Salt Lake for Abby's baby blessing at Jon's parents' ward. It was a really fun day-- the blessing was beautiful, Abby was adorable, and we got to reunite with the the Hales, the Myers, and Gramm and Gramp! In all the excitement, I only managed to get one picture of the sweet little star of the show, and she was fast asleep.Isn't she a sweetheart? Thomas and Gordon were not as thrilled with Abby (after all, she's still little) as they were with their Myers cousins, Sophie, Audrey, and David. It is so much fun to see how well these little guys get along! Aside from the mess, Grammuh and Grampuh were in heaven with all of these cute kids running around. We did miss Tyler! :)

The Children's Museum
I went back to Logan on Sunday night, but Chris stayed with the boys to hang out with the family while I had to go back to work. On Monday, they all went downtown to the Children's Museum. The kids always have so much fun there, and the many pictures Chris took show that this time was no different.


After the Museum, they ate a fun lunch at Happy Sumo (Thomas even ate Tempura sweet potatoes!-- Thanks Sophie!!) and just had a really fun day spending time together.

We were thrilled to have everyone visit us on Wednesday afternoon in Logan! It was fun to show off our house and our little town, and just to have a few more moments with the family. We feel truly grateful that we have such great relationships with Chris's family! We miss you guys already!!

EBLS Science Fair
On Wednesday evening, Thomas participated in his first Art, Science and Technology Fair at Edith Bowen. The fair was held in the student center at Utah State University and it was quite the event!

Thomas's project had to do with his constant questioning of "How Come?" He has been asking why we have eyes, ears, legs, etc. lately, so what better way to learn than to do a project? Chris helped him take pictures of eight different body parts, then I had Thomas write a use for each of the parts and we pasted the answers and pictures on the posterboard.

The project turned out well and Thomas really enjoyed presenting it at the fair. He especially enjoyed receiving his trophy!

On Thursday, the boys were excited to visit Gramm once again when I had to go back to Salt Lake to finish up some training for Mrs. Fields. They love their Gramm so much, and I appreciate her being so willing to hang out (ie: baby-sit) them for the afternoon. Thank you, Marilyn!!

The Scooter Skirmish
It was so lovely outside yesterday, so the boys and I took advantage and went for a nice walk on the Logan River Trail. Thomas decided to bring his scooter, a decision I should have probably denied. Gordon looked so cute trying to scoot along (I had to pull most of the time.)

The problems came when it was Tom's turn to ride. We're trying to teach the lesson of "sharing" to Gordon, but he hasn't quite figured it out yet. In this picture, you can see Gord closely following Thomas, on the scooter. What you can't see is that whenever Gordon wasn't taking his turn on the scooter, he was screaming.


Eensy, Weensy Gordon
And finally, I am totally loving Gordon's ever-increasing vocabulary! He has really been excited about singing nursery rhymes lately; his favorite is "Eensy-Weensy Spider." I caught him doing the actions yesterday. Never mind the perpetually dirty tee shirt-- he's still adorable!


And, that's it... at least that's the brief summary. Whew!

Night at the Fun Park

One of the benefits of working for a local company is that they occasionally sponsor fun events like last night's adventure at the Cache Valley Fun Park. Harris Research rented out the entire facility and employees were invited to bring friends and family for an evening of roller skating, games, bowling, laser tag, and a giant McDonald's Playland-type structure-- and really, really bad pizza. Other than the pizza, we had a great time! Thomas and my boss's son, Statton, are the same age and have become instant friends. It was fun to see them running around together. At Statton's insistance, Thomas actually tried roller skating. It lasted about 10 minutes, but he sure looked cute in those little skates!!
 
 
Gordon mostly wanted to run around and look at all of the arcade-style games. His favorite thing to do was sit in the video game cars and play-- he's too young to realize that the games get more fun if you pay for them!
 
Here are the little buddies-- they had such a great time together. It was a fun night!
 

Wild Child(ren)

Since we had Chris here tonight, we let the boys stay up almost an hour later than normal. The result: they were totally wired! I tried to take a video of Gordon jumping across the room, but the presence of a camera tends to ruin those moments. Take my word on it, though, it's hilarious.

Chris tried to take some pictures of the boys and me... you can see how well that turned out!



A conversation with Thomas (with pictures):

T: "Mom, what is this for?" (pointing to Buzz's belt buckle)
M: "It's just his belt buckle. It's just for decoration."
T: "Decoration? Oh."
M: "Give me a big smile!"
T gives one of his cheezy fake smiles.
M: "No, a real one!"
T: "Don't take any more pictures of me!"

Gordon could not get enough of climbing all over Chris tonight. He loves his fun daddy!!

March Madness

It's March 1st and we can already feel the madness creeping in at our house. Tonight we had the pleasure of Chris hanging out at home with the boys and me for a bit while waiting for the Utah State Aggie's to finish up their game. Lucky for the Ags, they'll be making the front page tomorrow-- with a huge win over 9th ranked Nevada in overtime. Love it!

Chris has been reading his favorite college basketball book, My Life on a Napkin, by former Ute coach, Rick Majerus. He reads this book every year at this time, and it's always a signal to me to start thinking in terms of brackets.

I haven't been paying a lot of attention to college hoops this year (the Utes have had a bad season), but I'm considering that an advantage coming into tournament time. The first year I filled in my own bracket, I thought the Sweet Sixteen was some kind of birthday party, and after the first round I had more right guesses than wrong. Of course, by the time the Final Four came around, I was completely out (I love Cinderellas-- maybe too much). Ahh... that was fun, just using all that March lingo. Hee hee.