October 2010 Gardner Village

We had a great time today wandering around Gardner Village and checking out the witches. Sunday is a great day to miss the crowds.

Carter (not a cat fan) wanted to know why anyone would want to take a cat fishing.

Sam LOVED the crazy painted pumpkins

Our totally awesome vacation 2010

We stayed at the Excalibur in Las Vegas on our way to California. We went to eat at the Planet Hollywood buffet. The boys really enjoyed the food, as evidenced by Sammy's thoroughly licked bowl and the loads of chocolate covered strawberries consumed by Carter.

They have a SpongeBob 4D show at Excalibur which we didn't see, and therefore, lots of statues of SpongeBob, which we spent ample time admiring.

I found this video of Sammy trying to sing his alphabet a few months ago. "A" for effort.

Graduation Party

Carter played his last song from his first piano book. He is ready to move on to the next one. Someone asked him the other day how he was going to keep busy now that he's out of school. He said "playing piano and playing soccer". So cute...

The photo booth

1995 and 2009

It's nice to know that in this ever-changing world, some things don't change much...

Oh, wait, I had "sport goggles" too.

Sam's Sport Goggles. They are blue and orange -go Boise State (according to Muds)

Sam's New Glasses

Sam got his new glasses today. He has a pair for school, and a sport pair for when he does gymnastics or plays soccer. He's still getting used to the idea of wearing them. On the way home from picking them up he said "mom, I can see the cars". I think he's going to enjoy his new view of the world....

I once was blind...

Well, it's official. Sam NEEDS glasses. Poor little guy. He has been sitting close to the TV for the past year, but when I asked him questions to try to verify that he could see farther away, sometimes he'd get them right. Guess I need to send him to Vegas or maybe it's just that multisensory thing that people do to make up for the loss of one sense with another. It's genetic, I suppose. And it's my fault....

When I was three I walked right off the front porch at our house in South Jordan. It was a LONG drop - like 5 feet. I was knocked unconscious and my poor mother thought I was dead. It was then that they took me in to see the eye doc. Fast forward 37 years....

So, I had joked that Sam might need glasses with all the sitting right next to the TV, but in my heart I thought he could see just fine and this was just an annoying habit that would pass. The turning point was when he ran smack into Melissa's porch, fell down, and hit his front tooth right on the hard concrete. After the blood and tears were wiped away I heard myself say "it was almost as if he didn't even see the stairs"....and then the neurons in my brain began to fire as that childhood "memory" - only because I've heard the story so many times not that I remember a thing - all came rushing to the forefront as if the blood had finally returned to my brain and it was now functioning. Could it be?

It was. 450 in one eye and 475 in the other. In contact speech, that's a minus 4 in both eyes. Worse than either of his big sisters. Wow. Can I get some sort of "observant mom of the year" award?

Carter's 6th birthday

We had a birthday party for Carter and Tim. It was great. We had a house full of family: Marva, So, Dennis and Jen, Austin, Ashley, Ali, Skylar, Paige, Madi, Grace, Susan and Brett, Dallin, Brendan, Don and Ping, Kayla, Brittany, Michaela, Sam, and even Tom and Jawnie stopped by (okay, so they didn't know we were having a party, but it was awesome of them to come by nonetheless). It was so nice to see everyone. My December boys had a great day! Carter picked The Golden Compass for the 'theme' of his cake. He is getting so big.