11 Months

 This kid is almost 1!  I can't believe how fast this year has gone by.  Spencer's life these days consists mostly of crawling and walking.  He walks everywhere he can, and crawls if it seems too far.  He particularly likes to walk while touching walls, couches, toys, people, whatever he can reach.  He can walk on his own, but he's still a bit timid about it at times.  He's getting more and more daring though and he's already decided walking is way better than crawling.

 The next thing he does all day is climb.  He's not so good at getting up on things yet, but that's not going to last long. He climbs all over me and Bill, his toys, the love sac, up from that onto his dad's desk, etc.  He's learned that he's supposed to go backwards to get off things, though the finer point of actually looking where he is going hasn't occurred to him yet. :)

And of course he loves to put things in his mouth.  We recently discovered he has molars coming in, though it's super early, so he's trying to chew on everything in sight.  My shoulder is a particular favorite, though not for me.  He took a big bite out of the foam roller a minute ago. 

Spencer dearly loves putting things in cups and pulling them back out.  Big cups, little cups, it doesn't matter.  Our laundry hamper is just a big cup to him.  He pulls out as many clothes as he can reach and then puts them all back in.  It's pretty funny to watch.  At least he puts them back! 

He loves to throw things on the floor when he's eating.  Crackers are meant to be thrown, right?  I wouldn't say he's the best eater I know.  It seems like he immediately spits out most things before we coax him to taste it for real.  Half the time it seems like he's surprised when he does like it.  I'd love to know what nearly 1-year olds will actually eat, as I spend a lot of time trying to figure that out every day.

Spencer's really starting to develop a sense of humor.  He's so fun to interact with these days.  He loves to laugh, and he thinks pretty much everything we do is funny.  It's quite gratifying.  What a fun little guy he is!

Family Christmas Letter

This has been such a great year.  As I look back I can't believe how many things we have packed in.

Spencer made his grand entrance on my birthday in January.  I can't believe it's been less than a year since he was born.  He's filled up our world in so many ways.  These days he's learning to walk, exploring everything in sight, and generally enjoying life.  He's a happy toddler most of the time.  He loves everyone, but particularly Mom and Dad and Grandma Jones.  He has the best smiles and laughs and we love him to pieces.

Bill has spent the year going to school, continuing his studies in civil engineering at BYU.  He conquered two of the infamous 300-level math classes this summer and is generally enjoying his program.  It keeps him incredibly busy, along with working as a TA for one of his professors.  He graduates next December, so we are looking into grad programs and are happily anticipating finishing school.  Bill is working with the scouts in our ward as the Scout Committee Chair and is currently helping to plan a Klondike Derby for them in January.  Bring on camping in the snow!

 I also went to school for the first part of the year, finishing my graduate degree in Public Administration at BYU in April.  That was quite the feat with a 3-month old baby along for the ride.  Spencer came to a lot of classes with me and generally charmed everyone who met him.  I worked throughout the summer for my department and was pleased to be hired on as staff for the Fall semester to help a professor out with one of his executive MPA classes.  Mostly though I am a stay-at-home-mom and love every minute of it.  It's delightful to have so much control over my time and the ability to slow things down a bit. Though that time appears to be ending as I was just called as the Young Women's President in my ward and I imagine life will get a little crazy now.  I'm so excited for the new calling though.  I've been in Young Womens for a year already and this new calling will be fantastic.

 We're still trying to go hiking and do some of the other things we enjoyed before Spencer entered the scene.  It's a little different with a baby, but it turns out that with a bit of planning we can still do a lot of outdoorsy things.  Spencer adores being outside, so that works in our favor.

 Here's to another great year.  We love you all and hope life is treating you well too.

Family Photos

My SIL Miriam is a fantastic photographer and she took a few pictures for us while we were at Thanksgiving.  We may or may not be giving them to a few people for Christmas, so I'll only share the ones we didn't pick, because we got a few really awesome ones to pick from, but here's some of the ones on the way to getting those. :)

Look at their eyes.  Exactly the same shape.  I've never noticed that before.

Hey Daddy, it's time to go play!

I have no idea what's with the leg...

Let's blow this one up big and put it on the wall!

Slouching.  And Spencer is looking a little crazy. Oh, and my necklace is backwards. I didn't realize that until about 10 shots later. :)

Nice, but we got better ones!

The smiles are getting a bit weird.

Oh dang, closed eyes!

Spencer's far off look is pretty amazing here.

Let's just say Spence and I were fighting over whether we were taking more pictures.

Again, dang that slouching.  It's cute otherwise.

Spencer was so done.  He was trying so hard to get down off my lap.  But this is the only one where he's remotely smiling.  Ah well.  You can't have it all. 

 

An Idyllic Day

I babysat my downstairs neighbor's two girls this morning for a few hours.  It was fun.  And crazy. And hectic.  I didn't get a single thing done until they left.  It made me seriously wonder how it's possible to do anything with more than one child.  Ready or not, here we come here soon enough. (No, that's not an announcement. :)  ) We had a good time though.  Then it was time for Spencer's nap and I cuddled with him for a bit reading a book beforehand and it was such a huge change from the chaos of the morning.  It was just delightful.  In the evening Spencer woke up from another nap just when Bill came home tonight, so we cuddled up on the couch and read the latest REI Christmas magazine ad while Spencer played with my hair and my eyelashes and the Christmas tree next to us all before noticing Bill.  Then he got all excited and tried to grab Bill's glasses like he does nearly every time he sees him.  It was totally normal and yet so idyllic.  It reminded me of why I enjoy being a mom so much. 

Spencer snacked on some Apple Jacks while Bill made dinner and I practiced some songs I'm playing for our Young Womens in Excellence on Sunday.  He apparently prefers the green ones, as he ate every single on of them before touching the orange ones.  I felt immensely proud of this for some reason.  My 10-month old can tell the difference between colors already and has a preference.  Oh, and he's not color blind.  Why this fills me with pride I have no idea, but it does and I'm happy about it. :)

I love how such simple things bring me so much pleasure.  I've had lots of years to do lots of things and my life has been exceptionally busy in past times.  It still is, but I have enough time now to enjoy the little things and that is just great.  Here's to more moments to remember how great life really is.

Donut Falls

The day before Thanksgiving we decided it was high time we went on a winter hike.  Well, Bill decided several days earlier and I followed along because after all, that is a great idea.  We almost didn't go because we were trying to get all of our stuff school and work stuff done and it took longer than expected, but thank goodness we did because this was a fun one!  It's called Donut Falls and it is in Big Cottonwood Canyon.  It's not very long.  It was a bit over an hour round trip, but that was good for us since it was rather chilly and we're trying to get Spencer used to hiking in small steps instead of going all out.  Supposedly in the summertime this waterfall comes right out of the center of a rock, thus the name, but it was covered with snow when we went so we didn't get to see that.  It was still really pretty and a fun little hike.

 This is how Spencer was pretty much the entire time until he fell asleep.  He just looked around and grinned.  He knows how to appreciate nature. :)

  At the Falls.  Notice Bill's mustache.  I'd say it's a pretty good speciman for No Shave November.

 The Falls that didn't look like Falls.

Cutting Down a Christmas Tree

The Saturday after Thanksgiving we headed down to Ephraim with some friends and then up into the mountains to find ourselves a Christmas tree.  We had a great time! I liked what my friend said on her blog about vetting Christmas traditions.  We definitely try different things each year to see if we want to make it a continuing tradition.  This one has definitely made it onto the list! 

Our day involved quite a bit of sliding all over super snowy roads in a huge truck, tramping through snow for over an hour to find the perfect tree, which we did indeed find, and generally having a great time with our friends and their family.

Spencer loved it.  He thinks being carried around in the hiking backpack is one of the best things ever.  And who wouldn't like wearing a barbalute suit?  Can anyone guess that quite obscure movie and/or reference?

So here it is.  The perfect tree.  You can all give up because this is it and we've already got it. :)

10 Months

 My little guy is a heart throb.  That's all I have to say. :)  Well not really.  I can and will say lots of other things.  He did not like being put in the boots.  This is the best picture of the lot.

So let's see, what has Spencer been up to lately?  He finally learned to crawl on all fours instead of army crawling during Thanksgiving.  It's just in time to learn how to walk, which he is also doing right now.

Lately if I'm not paying enough attention to me he'll grab my face and turn it to his and then put his face really close to mine.  Then it's like he's not sure what to do so he let's go and heads off to play.  He also plays really well on his own still, but he comes and finds me every once in a while to get a hug.  He loses it whenever I leave the room.  Not always, but anytime he's tired or hungry mostly.

He likes his dad now.  For a while he wasn't so sure, but now he thinks Bill is the best.  He likes most people these days.  He'll smile and talk to anyone who notices him.  He loved being in a big group at Thanksgiving with tons of people to play with him.

He's a big fan of eating anything I'm eating, though he's kind of snooty about it if he doesn't see me eat it first.  He'll totally turn away from so many good foods sometimes.  What a goof.  Aside from Kix, he pretty much doesn't know the meaning of feeding himself.  He'd much rather sweep everything off his tray. Apparently that is much more fun.

Probably my favorite thing about Spencer is he thinks the world is just a delightful place.  He is always smiling and laughing at everything.  It totally makes my day.

This is the best video we have of Spencer walking so far, which isn't saying much since it looks more like he's falling.  But he really can take several steps at a time without just falling forward.  Sometime we'll actually get it recorded. 

Catch Up Days

28. I'm grateful for my comfy bed.  I'm currently laying in it blogging and the memory foam topper is just heavenly.

29. I'm grateful that Spencer is learning to walk.  Call me crazy but I'm excited for him to come running after me instead of crying because I'm going too fast.

30. And lastly, I'm grateful for things that make me stretch.  I've got some new things coming down the pipe that are pushing me and though it's a bit scary, I'm excited for the growth.

Thanks

23. I'm grateful for my cute sister-in-law Miriam who took some family pictures for us this week.  They turned out great.

24. I'm thankful for wonderful in-laws.  We had a fantastic Thanksgiving up in Park City with almost all of Bill's family. 

25. I'm grateful that Spencer started crawling for real this week.  He's been army crawling for 5 months and finally decided hands and knees is fun too.

26. I'm grateful that we got to go cut down our own Christmas tree yesterday.  What a great time!  This is going to be a new tradition.

27. I'm grateful that I get to teach the young women in my ward.  They're so much fun to be around.  Love them!

Day 21 and 22

21. I'm grateful for sunshine.  That gets a little scarce in Utah in the winter sometimes, but it's beautiful outside right now and I love it.

22. I am grateful for three-hour naps.  Spencer recently decided he wanted to take really long naps, and it is amazing how much I can get done.

More Thanks

18. I'm thankful that my grandparents moved to Utah.  They had the most amazing place they lived up in Washington, but it was so far away we couldn't see them very often. It's nice to have them just a few miles down the road.

19. I'm grateful for my mommy friends.  There are a bunch of us who have kids similar in age and it makes for instant friendship.  It's so nice to have girls to talk to that totally understand the kid thing.

20. Dare I say it? I'm thankful for Facebook and blogs and all those other avenues that make keeping in touch easier.  I'm totally a techie, not going to deny it. :)

Day 17

17. I'm grateful for Spencer's walking toy we found for $8 at Kid to Kid.  Seriously, it's a lifesaver.  He wants to walk so bad and this helps him get so many more places for the moment.

Day 15 and 16

15. I'm grateful for mountains.  Oh how I love them!  I grew up in Colorado and now that I've lived in Utah for 10 years, these ones have really grown on me.  I will dearly miss them if we move somewhere flat. 
16. I'm thankful for baking.  I spent the evening baking delightful things and it was just so relaxing.  Banana bread, granola, and some beautiful white bread because I love the stuff and hardly ever indulge.  Yay!

Month of Thankfulness

I keep seeing entries from friends who are posting something they are thankful for each day and I love the idea.  I wanted to do it, but I kept thinking it was too far into the month.  But that's not a good reason!  So I'll just put my first half of the month all in one post and it will be great. :)

1. I'm thankful for Bill.  Best husband ever.  I know, I know, everyone says that.  It's true though.  He is.
2. I'm thankful for Spencer.  He's the cutest thing ever.  He makes me smile constantly and I love being his mom.
3. I'm grateful for all my family that lives close by, both mine and Bill's.  They are all so supportive and spending time with everyone. 
4. I'm thankful for the gospel.  What would I do without that rock in my life?  Seriously, it makes everything make sense and is completely who I am.
5. I'm thankful for good friends, both here and scattered around the country.  Living in Provo, a lot of friends come and go, but they're never really that far gone what with all the ways we can keep in touch.  It's wonderful to be surrounded by wonderful people.
6. I'm grateful for the house we live in.  It is seriously the best deal.  We're not moving until we leave Utah or settle here for good, whichever one ends up happening.  Still don't know on that one.
7.  I'm grateful that Bill is going to school.  He is working so hard to finish his education and is doing a fantastic job.  This really is a great time in our lives. 
8. I'm grateful for my several jobs.  I wish at times I didn't have any need to work , but for now that is still the case and the jobs I have offer me flexibility and quite a bit of satisfaction.
9. I'm grateful for a strong, healthy body.  I've gotten back into exercising after far too long a hiatus what with school and baby and other things, but it is so good to be working out again and seeing my body respond.  It feels good to be in good shape and taking good care of myself and I find a lot of satisfaction in working on that aspect of myself and my life.
10. I'm thankful for the degrees I got from BYU.  I have loved every minute of my time at BYU.  I'm done now as a student, but I still get to work there and enjoy the amazing atmosphere.  I'm very blessed to have had this time in my life.  In a year or two when Bill is done, we will be gone and I'll definitely miss this phase in our life.
11. I'm grateful for my father-in-law Doug.  He's been living with us for a while as he and family transition up here and it is so awesome to have him here.  He's such an easy person to live with and truly enjoyable to have around.  Spencer thinks he's pretty fantastic too, and we all know that counts for a lot. :)
12. I'm grateful for the down time I've had in the last few months.  I'm still pretty busy, but nothing like the 15-hour days during my grad program.  I'm getting close to the end of the 13-book Wheel of Time series, which I've spent the last three months reading.  It's amazing to have time again to do that kind of thing.  I'm relishing the lower key schedule now that I am at home most of the time.
13. I'm grateful for having time to rediscover my love of cooking.  Again, the added time in my schedule recently has helped that happen.  Bill and I both enjoy cooking, but we don't always do it.  I've realized lately just how much satisfaction I find in making good food. 
14. I'm grateful for all the possibilities still up ahead for me and my family.  We aren't doing all the things that we filled our time with in the past, but new good things fill the space, and the future only holds possibilities for more or the chance to circle around and get back to old loves. 

Peel Banana!

I want to like Halloween.  I really do.  I like the part where people have cute costumes.  It just turns out that I almost never do.  Lack of imagination maybe?  Well this year the day of the ward trunk or treat and Halloween party Bill and I had a bit of a busy day with an all-day test for Bill and teaching in Salt Lake for me.  So we forewent costumes ourselves.  However, you can't not get a costume for your baby's first Halloween.  It would just be criminal. :)  Thankfully DI came to the rescue with an adorable costume for all of $1.50.  Behold, Spencer the banana!

 One of our friends gave him a Kit Kat.  We gave it to him, figuring he would suck on the wrapper.  Oh no.  He chewed through the wrapper and inhaled the whole thing.  And he screamed anytime I took it from him.  It was hilarious.  The kid likes chocolate.  He's a smart one.

Lately he's been doing this funny thing where he opens his mouth huge and sticks his tongue out as far as it goes.  I managed to get a picture of him doing it yesterday.

Our "new" house

I always like posting pictures of the new places I move.  This one is a little slow in coming, since we've lived here for three months now.  It really feels like we've lived here forever though.  We had an amazing opportunity fall into our laps in the form of the opportunity to rent this house.  It's inexpensive, bigger than anywhere we've ever lived, in our same ward, and in a great location.  It will do just fine for the next couple years we are in Provo.  Since moving has become quite the affair these days, this is by far the best part.  So here goes.  Behold, our house.

Here's the living room from every angle.  My sister and BIL were nice enough to give us their old couches when we moved in here, plus let us babysit their piano.  It definitely gives me piano envy.  So beautiful!  I love the huge front window, except for the part where it's freezing in the wintertime.  Nothing a little plastic window covering won't solve.

 Here's the hallway. 

 The bathroom.

 Our bedroom.  We're in the process of installing a fan.  We have to get into the attic to brace it, so thus the "in the process" status.

 The office.  This was the only place our lovesac would fit, but I actually love it in here.  This also plays part time Bill's dad's room.  He stays with us sometimes since they're in the midst of moving here.

 I love that Bill and I both have a desk.  It makes life so much easier.

 This is Spencer's room.  It has serious need of some wall hangings, but the layout works well.  The red carpet here and in our bedroom is classic, leftover from the owner years ago.  Not so pretty, but really soft.  I'm looking at the bright side, you know? :)

 This is the kitchen.  It's so big compared to all the other places I've lived in!  I could go for a bit more counter space, but it's definitely good for now.  Oh, and a dishwasher.  I will really appreciate one of those when we get one again.

 The dining room.  Yes, a real dining room!  Yay!  Here's to living in houses not apartments where that seems to be optional.  The washer/dryer is in a closet between this room and the living room.

 And the view of the living room from the dining room.

And there you have it.  Our house.  I didn't take a picture of the yard because well, it's cold outside.  I'm only so ambitious.  Just imagine plenty of grass and a big gnarly bush that is coming out in the Spring. Woohoo!