things to remember (besides crazy skunk stories)...

a few fun/hilarious/cute/crazy things the boy has done lately...

-he's quite the prayer. he insists at dinner that we pray...clasps his hands together and sometimes even closes his eyes SO tight and then opens them right back up. the other morning we had 2 neighbors over for coffee and he came running downstairs, up to the table and insisted we PRAY! he also loves his bedtime prayers. and i love it-he usually wraps his arms around me and lance while the 3 of us pray...one big family bear hug! oh how i hope his love for prayer sticks with him forever!

-we had been telling him we love him to the moon and back. he got a kick out of that and will now sometimes just skip the "love you" part and just tell us "moon back!" but of course he always tells us it at just the right time!

-he loves to tickle people. he wiggles his fingers and runs up to you and starts laughing!

-he is such a sponge and will repeat anything we say. the other day playing "birds" (angry birds" with lance, he started saying something. it sounds like d*#% it but me and lance haven't said that in front of him. but i can't figure out for the life of me what he's saying...maybe dang it?!?! he's said it several times sense and in the right situations...working on telling him we don't say that and getting to the bottom of what the heck he is actually saying!

-ever since sesame street live, he is SO into dancing. he dances to cartoons, dances to my phone, dances with the ipad. and insists on dancing naked every night after bath all over his room. he apparently thinks he has quite the moves!

-he is all boy and wants to be naked all.the.time! getting clothes on every morning is a battle. and of course stripping down at bath time is a highlight in his day! one morning last week, i was downstairs finishing my breakfast and tman was playing (or so i thought) upstairs. he runs to the top of the stairs and yells NAKED! and indeed he was completely naked...no diaper (he was already without clothes because he he gagged on breakfast and proceeded to puke on his pjs). i went up and asked him if he had gone poopy. he said "no, trash." yup, he had pulled the changing pad out into the tv room, apparently laid down (it was covered in poop), taken his diaper off and put it in the trash can. we ended up in the bath tub before 9 am-he had poop all over his legs down to his feet! oh good times!

my life is definitely not boring! :-)

what a nightmare!

last night we were having a nice, relaxing sunday evening. ate breakfast for dinner (YUM!), watched a little tv and were just enjoying the end to a good weekend. i headed to wash my face while lance took the dogs out one last time. over the running water in the bathroom i hear lance yelling my name (well, in a whisper-don't-want-to-wake-the-kiddo-but-really-need-you-ASAP kind of yell).

as i walk into the living room i see him holding dakota by the backdoor...dakota is foaming at the mouth and gagging and his chest is covered in something yellow. all i hear is lance say skunk! at this point we don't even know if gizmo is sprayed or not since he's acting normal. i start googling what to do for dogs sprayed by a skunk. we take them to the laundry room and then decide they just need to be in their kennels until we figure out a plan. at this point we realize gizmo is covered in skunk stink too...ugh! thank goodness lance actually went out with them-we often just open the back door, let them do their business and then let them in a little later...so it could have been much worse!

after a quick call to the emergency vet to figure out if they would be ok besides the stink and some more googling to figure out how to bathe them, we started the baths in the driveway at 11 pm. i'm sure we were a sight to be seen. with a little bit of dawn and 2 containers of baking soda, we scrubbed them down. of course we were just using what we had at 10 pm at night...we were out of hydrogen peroxide (of course that was one of the ingredients people suggested) and the other suggestion was tomato juice, but of course all i had in the pantry was 2 cans of tomato (with garlic and onions...so of course that was out).

so we bathed both dogs, one by one and then took their kennels apart and washed those too. then we had to scrub down the garage floor. we finally came in to start cleaning inside...mopped the floors and then realized gizmo had gotten skunk smell all over the living room rug. so pulled that up and hauled it out the front door at midnight. figured out their dog beds were "contaminated" so those went to the trash.

after de-skunking ourselves and throwing away all towels and clothes that had been used, i finally fell into bed about 1:15 am. and poor lance ended up sleeping in the garage. there was NO way we were letting the dogs back in the house and gizmo decided to start crying/barking in his kennel-he was quite upset about sleeping in the garage and we had no idea how to keep him quiet and not wake tman up so lance was super hubby and bunked in the garage last night.

of course we both still smelt skunk every time we took a breath...not sure if that was in my head/nose or if everything still just stunk. everytime i rolled over in bed, i smelled skunk.

we kicked off this morning with some more mopping and spraying anything and everything that might help with the smell. dogs went off to the groomer for a bath/deskunking shampoo, lance took the rug to a dumpster, we scheduled an electrician to come put up a light in the backyard, and met with 2 cleaning (although it's way more than just cleaning) companies for quotes.

the smell has definitely gotten less as the day has gone on...we've left all the windows open today and had candles burning all day. and you become numb to it. i really thought it was almost totally gone. but we left and ran to walmart for a few things we needed after last night's fiasco, and i nearly fell over when i walked back in the house. the smell is MOST DEFINITELY still here!

so they are coming tomorrow to do a massive clean downstairs with all kinds of special stuff. cleaning floors, carpet in our bedroom and fogging the entire downstairs. the dogs are being boarded until this is all resolved, and i am praying it works because i am tired of smelling skunk and feeling like i'm dirty and stink. the electrician comes thursday to put up a light in the backyard and most importantly, lance is getting his pellet gun back.

next time, skunk, you are going to DIE!

bigbirdelmo

last week tanner and i headed to temple in the middle of the week to go see sesame street live with grammy and ipop. yes, big bird and elmo were coming to temple! we told tanner we were going to see sesame street and the entire week before he talked about bigbirdelmo...just one word to him...he always referred to both of them together! he was so excited. he insisted for several nights that he must wear his elmo pjs and then on monday before we went, he refused to take his elmo pj shirt off so we wore it all day long!

we got there a little too early (i maybe misread it so we had about 15 minutes to kill before they opened the doors). once we went in, they had a whole area set up for pictures and the sesame street set to play on. tanner was quite the piano performer (as he looked around taking everything in!).

trying to get a picture with elmo, but he was too distracted by everything...and then he decided to take off running for another fun character.

 the kiddo does LOVE the trash...throwing things in the trash and the trash truck.

 

characters would come out and sing with the kids. tanner was amazed...

 

and had so much fun singing and dancing with grammy.

 

 after we saw all of the characters' homes on sesame street, it was time for a souvenir (or 2 or 3 or 10). he always likes to pay!

 he picked out a big bird and he LOVES him! since we've been home, big bird comes downstairs every morning, is often included in car rides and is a MUST in the crib for naps and bed.

 headed to find his seat with ipop and then waiving his pennant waiting for the show to start. we were talking about how big bird was going to come out soon, and he sat down and started screaming as loud as he could "BIG BIRD!!!" hilarious!

 the show finally started and he sat wide-eyed watching and waving at all the characters

 

we made it through the whole show with a little help from a package of m&ms and a container of goldfish

 with lots of smiles and laughing and clapping and watching with amazement.

mr noodle and elmo had him cracking up laughing!

 and he must have liked the count because "8" was the number of the day and he actually remembered it. and now any time we talk numbers it's always "8." it's 8 o'clock all day long in our house! :-)

we had such a fun time and it was so fun watching him. he loved seeing them dance and tells me all the time that big bird is tall! we've been dancing every day since the show-apparently it inspired his love for dancing! such fun memories!

lately...

i am loving this age! tanner has really become quite the fun little guy and hilarious to play with. things he's been up to lately...

bouncing and playing in his crib. he LOVES his bed-asks to be put in it every naptime and bedtime and asks to get in sometimes during the day just to play. so thankful that he loves it, but i have a feeling he might not be so thrilled when we move him to a big boy bed. and i think the fact that he loves it has also helped with him not even attempting to climb out (despite what it looks like in this pic)...

 bounce, bounce, bounce!

he still loves his bear bear (although he's added a few animals to the "important" list...he's got a 2nd bear bear from ikea and after our last trip to grammy's big bird and chicken cow (yes, the chickfila cow) are usually in the bed too). the other morning he decided bear bear needed a diaper change.

he still loves outside...driving his car, filling up his lawn mower with gas, kicking the ball or playing tball. he's actually pretty good at making contact with the ball...kicking it playing soccer, hitting it with a baseball bat or golf club. watch out sports, here we come! he is all boy and it's hilarious-some days i feel like he's a little man with the things he comes up with!

he is also very into TOOLS! he loves bob the builder. all the sudden a few weeks ago he started asking for bob. lance finally figured it out-who knows how he knew about bob the builder. we had a few tool books that had bob in them but he now asks for bob books, bob movies, bob on the ipad. and yes, he has taken over the ipad. it is crazy how he can completely work it...pick an app, scroll, change screens...he knows exactly what he's doing!

so he was in heaven when lance and grant decided they were going to start a diy project in our backyard building a deck. they had quite the helper/shadow and tanner had an absolute blast! of course anytime uncle grant (aka gant) is around, he's excited!

 notice the similar expressions?! tanner is like a mini-me of grant in SO many ways (kinda scary!)

 taking a break from the project for a little chase...

 

he is very into his name right now-anytime he sees something written it's always "tanner!" so he decided to "write" his name on the board...

see what i mean...always a resemblance!

 back to work!

 high fives with daddy!

 they traded drills for a bit...

and pictures will be coming...it isn't quite finished yet (as in it still kinda looks like it did when they started, but they have assured me they have a new plan and that it will be a deck someday)!