Noah's Superhero Celebration

Noah is 4! We had a party in his honor. We invited a few friends, as guinea pigs for our first kids only party. I was a little nervous about it, but with all the help of Kyle, Lauren, Andrew, and Christian, it turned out to be a success. I was happy we got a whole day before the new baby comes to celebrate the Biggest Brother. Here's our very own Batman, in all his glory.

The kids all got to be superheroes for the day. When they arrived to the party, they filled out a superhero questionnaire about their superpowers and uniform and superhero name. (Uncle Choo Choo did an awesome job posing as the Superhero Bureau Investigator!) We took that information and Auntie Lauren and I made capes for them. Here's the group.

(FarmerMan, SuperGirl, BatMan, Football Man, SpiderGirl, GameGirl, DancerGirl, and FlowerGirl)

When all the capes were done, they were ready to save the world. There just happened to be an emergency with our collection of Fisher Price Little People, which demanded superhero intervention. The evil Mr. Freeze came along and froze them all! The superheroes had to use their water guns to melt the ice and free those poor little people.

Noah opened presents (his friends are so nice!)

and ate cupcakes

(I'd like to point out the amazingness of Noah's cupcake toppers. I was planning on printing all the superhero emblems, but Noah volunteered to draw them himself. He worked so hard on them! The finished products were my favorite part of the the party. From now on, I will always use Noah as my co-party planner.)

Notice Jake in this picture, and laugh. Don't feel sorry for him, he preferred swinging on this day to wearing a cape and saving the world!

Kids are the best. They are so full of energy and imagination, that they really do make the world a better place!! Happy Birthday, SuperNoah!

Jake's last days as The Baby

Now that we have less than a month until baby #3, Jake's days as the baby of the family are numbered. He will be 2 1/2 by the time that the baby comes, and that age is such a sweet mix of baby and big kid. I read this on pinterest the other day, and it made me love this part of Jake's life even more.

Sort of sad, but very true. And so here's a tribute to our 2 and 1/2 year old.

What is still so sweet and babyish about him:

1. He loves to pretend to be a baby. He rolls and crawls around on the floor and says: "goo goo ga ga" and other baby things. Obviously we have been talking a lot about babies lately, in trying to prepare him for what is to come. So now he likes to pull the bottom of my shirt over his head and then pop out and announce joyfully: "baby came out!" and leap into my arms to be cuddled. Yesterday I asked him if he was excited to have a new baby soon. He answered: "I'M baby." and proceeded to babytalk in his high-pitched voice and lay his head on my lap. (hmm. the next few months should be an interesting transition for little Jake.)

2. He clings to his blankie "Mimi" as much as ever. One night a few weeks ago we stayed the night at my sister's house and Mimi was 30 minutes away. I thought he'd probably be alright without it, if I could just trick him to sleep by watching a late movie. Wrong. He kept asking for it and when he finally did fall asleep, he woke up every hour or so sobbing and crying out for Mimi.

3. The next best thing to Mimi is mommy. Last night as I was putting him to bed, he held my hand up to his face and said sweetly: "Mommy, you my mimi". He loves me to lie down with him at bedtime and at night, and usually still cries when I leave him with a babysitter or in the nursery at church. It gets a little hard sometimes, but it is nice to be loved. Sometimes he reminds me of how great he thinks I am by announcing: "best mommy world!!"

4. He loves to be held. I can't tell you how many times a day he demands: "HOLD ME!" I used to play the pregnancy card, because even though he is still pretty small, it's getting harder to tote him around. But I kind of surrendered, because I know he won't want me to hold him for too much longer!

And ways he is leaving behind the babyhood:

1. He is getting more skilled at using big boy words to make things happen. Even though he still loves me or Kyle to lie down with him at bedtimes, he can now put words together into compelling arguments. Instead of just crying when I leave, lately he pleads: "Mommy no go! NO GO! Stay here! I love you! I NEED YOU!!!" It's much harder to walk away from that!

2. His personality is coming out and he is eager to assert his individuality. The sweet little guy can be verrrry stubborn when he feels strongly about something. Whatever you try to do, do not try to make him sit on the potty unless you are prepared for a tantrum of epic proportions. He will do what he wants to do when he wants to do it.

3. But despite all that, Jake did graduate from diapers to the big boy potty. Potty-training went quicker than I thought it would. (with the exception of horrible week #4 when I don't know what happened...I changed the seats and washed loads of pee clothes I can't even tell you how many times!) But after that, he jumped back on the potty trained bus and has been pretty dry ever since. We are praying to avoid a relapse when the baby comes!

4. He is very interested in the big people world around him. He loves to interrupt conversations with this question: "Talking about??" and will repeat himself until his curiosity is returned with a summary of the current conversation. He especially loves to be a part of whatever Noah is doing. It is entertaining to hear him talk with Noah about big boy stuff like football and transformers, and to hear him use words like autobots, transform, fierce animals, quarterback, running back, receiver, first down...

Jake surprised us the other day when we asked Noah to recite the scripture he had learned for Primary. Noah was preoccupied, but Jake spoke up and said almost word-for-word: "And Jesus said unto them, go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature" It was impressive.

Jake--we love you and are happy you are growing and learning new things all the time, but still staying as lovable and sweet as you were as a baby!

Fish Lake

August 2011 Mock Family Reunion at Fish Lake

Granny Pie

This summer we were able to make the trip up to Rigby for a visit with Granny Pie.

It was great spending some good quality time with her.

We wish it could be more often. There's no place like Grandma's house!

I have some sweet memories of trips to Grandma's house, and they always ended the same way: my arm stuck out the window of the van, waving goodbye as Grandma cried and stood on her porch until we were out of sight. She gives the best goodbyes! We love Granny Pie!

Pioneers

In the month of July we talked a lot about pioneers. I think the lessons stuck. Just the other day, the boys took a break from Transformer play to do this:

I love my pioneer children!

30-year-old Kyle

Also while in Kentucky, we celebrated Kyle's big 30th birthday! I'm married to an old man now. At least until I catch up with him! We ate cupcakes decorated with 30 things to love about Kyle.

(He's Superdad, the biggest sports fanatic I know, He loved looking at cows out the window when his parents would take him out of the city for a trip to Pioche, ulcerative colitis survivor, flip flop wearer of the world, climbed a ladder as a child and then hit himself in the head with a hammer and fell off, Homecoming King, the cleaning champion of our house, EBay book salesman, co-CEO of pickthefights.com...)

And to further celebrate the man of the day, we colored in an original Kyle Campbell coloring book.

It wasn't an elaborate celebration like you might expect for a 30th birthday, but it was filled with lots of love anyway.

Kentucky pictures

We fit a lot of fun into our 2 week vacation. We would have had more pictures, but alas our camera is broken. Here's the good times that Chief was around to capture with his phone camera:

The Grand Prize Game...a Bozo show/Pieper family tradition. The grand prizes were magazine cutouts of cool toys. The boys really did get excited about winning the pictures. Who needs the real thing?Playing Transformers

Fishing in the Thompson's pond (the boys' first experiences with a pole)

And who needs a beach?

Our trip to Kentucky just wouldn't be complete without a trip here:

The birthplace of Bluegrass Music...

That bluegrass got Jake all riled up.

(a T-Rex moment)

The Kentucky Horse Park

We made the 3 hour drive for our little horse lover Jake. We thought we'd capitalize on the horse obsession while we were in the middle of horse country. We got to see some retired Derby champions and other beautiful horses.

for a horse-crazed little boy, you would be surprised at his reactions to the real horses up close.

but that makes this all the more impressive:

Jake loved his little pony Twix. And he still talks about it a month later. Noah had a great time too.

And we even spotted Grandpa Henry! ha ha.

And one more thing: ice skating!

Jake's balance was impressive for a first timer (and a two-year-old, nonetheless).

The milk crates helped too!

And Gramma was especially impressive. All that time spent in snowy Minnesota paid off, you should have seen those skates cut through the ice :)

Thanks Mom and Dad for a great time! We can't wait to go back.