I’m not even going to pretend that I didn’t get clotheslined by this. It wasn’t fun. To my defense.. it didn’t have any dinosaurs hanging off of it when it happened.
It’s amazing what creative things Bode comes up with when I don’t let him play computer games, watch TV, or play the Wii. :)
Poor Owen doesn’t have many options as far as toys. It’s either dinosaurs.. dinosaurs… or more dinosaurs. He doesn’t seem to mind!
Bode cracks us up with his obsession!
Clint’s brother, Reuben, flew in from Florida to visit his daughter for her 15th birthday. We had such a great time hanging out with him and everyone else! We ate at Bonsai for a really yummy dinner with everyone, the next day we met for lunch and then his sister Kindra’s baby shower.. and then a few days later we met up at this awesome place called Planet Play. Bode loved seeing all of the family so much. He loves hanging out with his cousins, especially his cousin Jaysen! Poor Jaysen couldn’t have gotten rid of him to save his life. He was a good sport and was super nice to Bode. I loved spending most of that week with everyone. It’s just a bummer that having Clint’s brother in town was the only thing that got us all together. We make sure to hang out with the family, just not all at once unless it’s a holiday or something. We need to do better!
This is Reuben and Mikayla.
Owen was a pretty good kid. He sure gets fidgety though! He’d much rather lay on the floor and scoot around than be held.
Kayla blowing out her candle!
Above is the only picture I got with all the kiddos (besides Owen). From left to right: Mikayla, Jaysen, Abron, Bode, Drextin, Mason, and Braxton. Reuben has another 4 girls at home plus his wife Jess who couldn’t make it out. We would have loved to see them!!! We need more girls around this bunch of boys.
Bode’s cousins thought it was really funny to hide his dinosaurs from him most of the night. Bode did NOT appreciate that! It’s good for him to get picked on a little because he’s pretty spoiled. Owen took advantage of the little game and chewed on the dinos for a bit.
Reuben and Clint’s mom, Cozette.
I didn’t get a picture of the whole gang, so I thought a picture of this picture was the next best thing. Bode was the only one not in it. Go figure.
We were all hanging out in the parking lot saying our goodbyes and Clint’s sister, Ali, came up to Bode and grabbed him to fly in the air like an airplane. Bode screamed and kicked and freaked out the ENTIRE time she was trying to play with him. He was so grumpy. I told him, “Ok – fine. You don’t want to have any fun so let’s go. Go get in the car.” He perked up and said, “I want to have fun!” He ran over to Aunt Ali, jumped in her arms and said, “Fly me!!!” And just like that he had the time of his life flying with her. He’s such a crazy kid.
I didn’t take any pictures of the lunch we had the next day. It was really fun though because Clint’s dad was there with his step mom, Bonnie. Jodi, Andy and their kids were there as well… and Reuben and Kayla. We ate at Noodles, as usual when we meet with his dad - and it was yummy. Bode was kind of out of sorts…. He never goes pee until he’s about to burst. He can hold it forever so I really don’t bug him about going because he always says no. He doesn’t have any problems and just goes when he has to, but he ended up falling asleep on the way to this lunch and peed his pants. Clint was asking me if I had spare pants and underwear and I was like no way! I hadn’t needed those in like a year. It was the craziest thing. So the poor thing had to air dry. That sucked.
The boys had to drop off the girls to the baby shower and so for a few minutes they were there with all of the siblings. Cozette asked me to take some pictures.
Mikayla and Cozette.
Left to right: Top – Clint, Kindra, Andy, Reuben. Bottom – Ali, Cozette, Rachel.
Somehow a family picture always ends up with the boys tipping over the girls.
This was the best sibling shot and of course Clint is making a farting noise. Classy huh?
I snapped this picture from Planet Play with my cell phone. It’s pretty crappy but it’s Bode and his loot. Rachel sat Owen down last minute so he could be in it too. :) Bode had such a fun time. The food was pretty good, and he played games and followed Jaysen around the whole time. We didn’t have any tickets to get anything at the end, but lucky for Bode his cousins are awesome at the games and they had lots. They were nice enough to give some to Bode and he got THREE dinosaurs! He only wanted two and Rachel kept saying, Bode you can get one more. She finally talked him into getting a third one for Owen. Sometimes I just don’t know about him.
Phew that was a long one!
I feel bad but sometimes when Bode is extra whiney, grumpy, annoying, mean, purposely does stuff I just said not to .... or whatever else I lose my patience and start yelling. I feel like it takes a lot for me to get to this point, but it definitely happens. I even catch myself yelling at him to stop yelling! AHH. I’m such a hypocrite. I hate that I do that and I am really trying to work on it. It breaks his little heart when I yell at him and then it doesn’t even matter what he did because he’s bawling that I’m being mean. One day I sat him down for a chat. I told him that I was really sorry I yelled and sometimes I make mistakes just like he does. I told him I was going to try my hardest to be nice, but that it’s a lot easier for me to be nice to him when he is nice and listens to me. I tried to go into details about why we have certain rules and what they mean and why they are necessary. I told him that I was going to try really hard to be nicer and I wanted him to try really hard to be better, too. I praised him for being such a good boy and helper and anything else I could think of and told him he just needs to work a little harder on listening to me. I gave him a big hug and told him he was such a good kid and I loved him so much and it’s ok to make mistakes, but we also need to try harder to do what is right. Both of us! Then I asked him if he wanted to make cookies. Baking makes everything better, right? He lit up and said, “Sure mom! Thanks for asking me!”
I don’t know what clicked for him this time because we’ve had that same chat multiple times, but he really has been trying! It’s been so much more pleasant around here and I LOVE it. I’ve been giving him extra attention and trying to make more compromises with him. Whenever he wants something he says, “Mom! I’m being so nice!!” It’s been a few weeks and although we still have our issues sometimes, we’ve both been much better!
I took him to the dollar store for a new Dinosaur. (Such a great gift, huh?) Clint couldn’t believe I got him another dinosaur, but I just had to do something! It’s all that kid ever wants.
The sun was setting and it was so pretty. I had my camera with me, so on the way home I pulled to the side of the road and snapped these pictures.
It was literally 3 minutes into me taking pictures and he was giving me sad faces. He asked if we could be done and I said, “Yep! We can be done. Thanks for letting me take pictures of you with your new dinosaur!” He grinned this cheesy grin and said, “Oh thanks for asking me mom! Thanks for being nice to me!”
I just love him.
Bode saw this dinosaur on the Museum of Ancient Life building the other week while driving on the highway and was SO excited about it! It made me realize that we haven’t taken him to see it since he started the dinosaur craze. We decided we needed to go!
He was upset I was taking a picture, but he was super excited to go inside. (He picked out his outfit this day in case anyone was wondering… at first I thought he looked crazy, but it grew on me through out the night!)
Since it was Monday night, they had a bunch of tables set up for family night. One of them was coloring a dinosaur tooth. It looked like plaster hardened into a tooth mold. I thought Bode would be in love, but he wanted NOTHING to do with it. Some little girl was trying to grab his dinosaur away and he was mad about that, and he didn’t want the tooth. I tried to have him color it like the other kids, but he was mad about coloring it. I finally grabbed a color and started to color the dumb thing myself. Bode flipped out and immediately tried to lick his finger and get the color off. He’s such a funny kid. I had to take him aside and remind him we were there to have fun and if he wasn’t going to stop with the bad attitude that we would go home. He did cheer up a bit.
I got him to wear it for a little while. This is the only picture of him wearing it… and you can’t see it very well.
Clint was going to meet us there, but he was running a bit late. He had the stroller in his car and so I had to lug Owen around until he was able to show up. That kid is so heavy these days!!! Especially with the car seat. We started going through the museum and Bode wanted nothing to do with the discovery room, the star room, or anything else before the actual dinosaur fossils. Once Clint got there we had to double back and Bode was a little more excited to go through the star room the second time around.
Clint had to give him another reminder that we were there to have fun. That kid.
He did start having fun thank heavens! He loved looking at all the fossils and big dinosaurs. We went over some of the names and he’s been having fun identifying some of his dinosaur toys since we got home.
Poor Owen has had a little cold but he was such a good little thing.
Bode loved seeing all the exhibits, especially the ones with plastic dinos in them. He wanted to get more dinosaur toys so badly.
I think the water sand part was his favorite. He loved playing in it. Clint was appalled at how this could be a real activity for a kid and thought it was nothing but a big mess maker. He cracks me up sometimes.
He did lighten up a bit and actually ended up playing with Bode in it. I wouldn’t even do that.
Next up was digging for fossils. If Clint thought the previous activity was going to be messy… he was in for an even bigger mess!
He had a great time! We kept telling him not to throw the sand, but of course he didn’t listen.
Poor thing got it in his eyes. :(
Bode was having a bad case of plumbers crack. Clint had to get a picture of it. He kept telling me to pull up Bode’s pants because he didn’t want sand in his bum. Bode ended up sitting down shortly after and … yep! Sandy bum crack. Gross.
Clint was playing with Owen. It was pretty cute. :) He’s just as grumpy as Bode when I try to take pictures of him, so I’m glad I got this one without him knowing.
Last part of the night was the toy shop! Bode was in dinosaur HEAVEN. I ran into my friend Ashley who was there with her cute family. While we chit chatted, Clint took Bode to the gift shop. Once I got done talking and met up with them in there Clint told Bode that he couldn’t get any toys. He was really wanting one, but surprisingly he was ok with it. I would have totally gotten him one!
It was so funny because we kept telling him it was time to go and he kept telling us, “Wait! I gotta show you something!”
It was a pretty fun night out! I was glad to be able to do anything as a family really. We’ve all been sick for SOOOO long, it’s nice to rejoin life outside the house. :)
