silly

Porter had a string of funny things to say yesterday. He slept in and I couldn't get him up, no matter what I tried. He didn't wake up when I opened his blinds or turned on his radio. He didn't even wake up when Dallin told him we would have donuts. I finally woke up when I started dressing him while he was still asleep. He asked if I knew why he slept so long. I said it must have been because he was so tired. He said no, it was because we grow in our sleep and he wanted to grow a lot. He wanted to be taller. Later, in the car, I asked him he wanted to go to the mall to see Santa tomorrow. He said no, Santa already knows what he wants. Finally, he noticed that it was foggy out and said, "Santa comes on a foggy Christmas Eve."

Today we went to see Santa the mall (we were there already and Porter changed his mind about seeing him). When it was our turn, Porter clammed up. Dallin made his request for a BYU Candycane and Porter couldn't speak. Santa asked him he wanted cars and Porter nodded. Afterward, Porter was astounded. He had told a previous Santa that he wanted cars. Even though he knew this wasn't the same Santa, he figured the first one must have been a helper or something because he reported Porter's desire to the real Santa. Then Porter told me that Rudolph isn't real. Santa only has 6 real reindeer and Rudolph isn't one of them. I wonder where he heard that.

Lest you think Dallin doesn't say his share of strange things, here are some Dallin examples. First, Dallin has decided he has a baby in his tummy and one in his head. The baby in his tummy is named Dallin Jr. and the baby in his head is named Koen (after his friend at daycare). He thought they would come out about a week ago but they are still inside him. Dallin also decided to fix my hair this morning. He spent about twenty minutes blow drying me and fixing my hair with different brushes and combs.

a couple more

I accidentally deleted these from the first post but I like them too much. The first is another example of Porter's special smile. The second is just cute. And the third is another one of his little antics. He always thought he should wear toilet paper on his head for dancing or spinning.

Porter bellow

Today my Porter-bellow turns 5. That seems very old to me.Porter is such a great kid. We are lucky to have him. He is a smart kid with a good memory (sometimes too good. He won't let you forget anything).

He loves treats. He loves cake especially. He doesn't care for pie, considering it a lesser dessert to cake. He also loves ketchup on everything and I mean everything. He loves it on chicken nuggets, cheeseburgers, apples, grapes . . . You name it, Porter will probably eat it with ketchup. He tries very hard to eat things that he doesn't like, in the hopes that it will make him big a strong. Once he told me, "I ate a carrot at daycare. It was disgusting. I will be as big as Uncle Jacob now." His ability to eat hated items usually only extends to one bite though, and sometimes ends in crying or throwing up. Porter also likes pizza, mac and cheese, peanut butter and jelly, and tacos just like most kids. (We discovered the love of tacos and nachos after they had them at daycare. He asked for sandwiches with skinny bread around them with cheese and brown stuff inside. I had to guess for a while until I figured out he was talking about tacos).

Porter is a devoted fan of whatever his current interest is. When he was young, he fell in love with Thomas the Train. We had to go to Target almost daily to check for new trains. The trains slept with him, ate with him, bathed with him. He would always check on the trains to make sure their coal cars were turned the right direction, that the right trains were hooked to each other, etc. When he first learned to talk, he called the trains "toots" and "chooka choos" He would talk to them and talk like them. (My favorite was when he sprinkled his floor with cheerios for them to eat). He has shown the same devotion to his love of dinosaurs, superheros, legos, etc. We go to the dinosaur museum at least monthly to look at the dinosaurs and collect new dinosaurs for his collection (he generally prefers predators). We also watch dinosaur train and read dinosaur books. He also has a Curious George that he sleeps with. For a while, George went everywhere with Porter. We even had to put him in a plastic bag and take him sledding.

Porter is my very shy child. Even as a baby, he didn't like people to look at him or hold him (except me or grandma and sometimes dad). He even gets nervous around family members he knows well and won't talk. He doesn't like to tell people things about himself and would rather say he doesn't know or nothing at all than have to answer questions. Along with being shy, he can get very anxious. He worries about being a good boy (sometimes) and gets really upset if he has done something wrong and has to tell us about it. He also worries about making a bad decision. He doesn't like to pick out clothes, toys, etc. himself. He prefers to select a couple of things and then have me or Joe decide which one is best. He is afraid of a lot of things. He especially doesn't like to be alone or be in the dark. Every night, he prays for help to be braver about things. He is getting braver though. He goes to daycare without getting upset. He goes outside by himself sometimes. He uses the toilet without worrying about how loudly it will flush. And he will even go into the basement sometimes (if Dallin comes with him).

Porter likes to play pretend with other people. It makes him happiest if he and I can each take one of his toy sharks or wolves and talk for them and play. He likes to play "tigers" with Dallin. They snarl at each other and jump on each other. He also likes to play Wii and X-box. I'm afraid he is a bit of video game addict. Luckily, he tempers it with a lot of physical activity. He likes all sports and is getting pretty good at gymnastics.

There's so much to love about Porter. All his funny little stories, his quick mind, his efforts to keep Dallin in line, etc. We are lucky to have him.

Porter at the fountains at the Gateway
Porter's 4th birthday. He is a diehard BYU fan.

his 3rd birthday. His first big birthday party

Right before turning two, Porter got saddled with this younger brother. Porter works hard to take care of him and keep him in line.

Porter's 2nd birthday. Back when he loved all things Thomas

When I think back on Porter as toddler, I think of (1) all of his crazy antics (like constantly climbing into the vents,

and strangely adorning himself)

(2) his terrible hair

(3) his first friendship with Vanessa

and, of course (4) his beautiful smile

Porter's first birthday

these are just baby pictures I like of Porter (it was hard to pick just a couple)

Porter as a brand new baby, five years ago

singing

Tonight Dallin decided that we should all hold hands and stand around the Christmas tree singing. (He had been watching Charlie Brown Christmas and saw everyone singing). So we did. We sang Jingle Bells. It made Dallin very happy. I think we will do it again.

marriage

On Saturday I went to a good friend's wedding. It is her second marriage (and his as well). Between them, they have five kids, all very young. As I was watching my friend's daughter during the wedding, I kept thinking what a bittersweet event the wedding was. I am happy that my friend has found a new companion and I am not passing judgment on her reasons for divorcing. I know that she had good reasons for ending her first marriage to her children's father and, though I don't know her new husband well, I am certain he had good reasons for divorcing too. But still, it makes me sad. Having become friends with my friend while she married to her first husband and having been friends with him as well, I kept thinking about much better it could have been for all involved if the first marriage had worked. I was sad for my friend's ex-husband as I watched my friend remarry. I thought about how his bad decisions had cost him this family that he loved so dearly. I know that he misses his wife and children and had hoped to reconcile, but she has moved on. Another man will spend Christmas with his family. Another man will discipline his children, will comfort them when they are sad, and will build a life with their mother. Mostly, I was sad for my friend's children. I'm sure their new stepdad is a good person who will be kind to them and love them, but he is not their dad. They will live an even more divided life than they had before. Now they not only divide their time between homes, but they divide their loyalities between two family. And most importantly, they are not part of a family that is sealed.

I know there is no easy answer to this. I didn't expect my friend to stay in a marriage where her husband was making poor decisions that would negatively impact them. I want my friend to be happy and hope this marriage is long and happy for her. I know there are many marriages that are bad and in some cases, couples truely are better off without each other. Certainly I would never want someone to stay in a situtation where they were being abused, physically or mentally. But, I know that divorce is also oftentimes a terrible solution as well. I was thinking specifically of the Tiger Woods situation. Obviously, I don't know him and don't the truth of the situation, but it does seem that he dealt with his wife and family very callously. I was listening to an NPR show the other day about infidelity and one of the segements was about wedding announcements. It discussed how so many wedding announcements allude to the fact that the couple had an affair before marrying. The couples act like their former spouses were simply roadblocks or something to the couple finding each other. I just wish that first marriages could be valued more in our society. That there wasn't almost and expectation that marriages won't last. I also wish that people took more responsibility for their actions. Instead of acting like they were compelled to start drinking, that they met their sole mate and couldn't resist having an affair, that they fell out of love with their spouse, etc., that people would accept that they are responsible for the situation that they find themselves in. That they could have acted differently. That they made a choice. Okay, I will come off my soap box. I just wish that families could stay together and be happy. That kids never had to face divorce or even parents that treat each other unkindly.

chipmunks

Porter loves Alvin and the Chipmunks movie. We watch it in the car all the time. Porter likes to sing in his "chipmunk" voice. Yesterday he told me, "when I sing in my chipmunk voice, you can't tell if it is me or the chipmunks, huh. When I sing in my regular voice, you can tell it is me."

funny

to Porter, one of the funniest things in the world is when Joe's character crashes his motorcycle on the x-box game. This was a particularly hilarious game.

nativity

One of the women in our ward sent out an email to everyone, telling us about a live nativity that one stake in Draper has put together. I took the boys. It was FREEZING. We waited outside for about two hours and were miserable most of the time. There were fires around, which helped, and live animals to pet, which took the boys' minds off being cold, but it was still kind of miserable. Dallin kept crying and being thirsty and Porter kept getting annoyed with Dallin and with being cold. I kept getting annoyed about the slow moving line, getting edged out of line when we tried to pet the camels, etc. I thought about throwing in the towel a couple of times but Porter said that he wanted to see baby Jesus. By the time we finally got the "Bethlehem" I was feeling pretty grumpy and was expecting to be let down. I was not. When we got to "baby Jesus," I was surprised at how moved I was. I could really feel the spirit. I wasn't sure if the boys would appreciate it though. We stood in front of the nativity for a few minutes and then I told them that we needed to give other people a chance to see. The didn't want to go. When we finally did go, Porter was crying and agreed to hold my hand (which he generally refuses to do). He said he was glad he waited, that it was very special to see baby Jesus. Even Dallin seemed to understand that it was important. He came home and told Joe that we went to see Jesus.

nut

Today Dallin was having a difficult day. He threw a big tantrum at McDonalds that culminated in me dragging him out screaming, "I want to eat! I am hungry! I don't want to go home!" It was terrible. In the car, Porter had had enough and said, "Dallin is driving me like a nut."

is it just me?

is it just me or does this child look an awful lot like his dad? (His dad is the one at the bottom). For the record, Porter doesn't think he looks like Joe because he doesn't have any "spots" on his face like Dad does in the picture)

Last night, Porter told me that he couldn't go to sleep because his eyes wouldn't let him. Bedtime was a big hassle. I may have to do away with naps. Porter and Dallin didn't want to go to sleep, they were up until almost 11. At one point, I went to brush my teeth and get myself ready for bed. Dallin followed immediately and sat on the rug. Porter came in about three minutes later and said with a sniffle, "I tried to be a big boy but I was too scared."

Right now, Porter and Dallin are playing some sort of Christmas game where Porter is giving Dallin all the old toys in the basement and telling him they are for Christmas. Porter keeps calling Dallin "son."

Grammy

one of the things we did with Grammy was to go to see the lights at temple square. Clearly, a good time was had by all.

We had the good fortune of having Grammy (Joe's mom) come to visit us last week for Thanksgiving. It was really nice to have her around. Joe and the boys took her to the airport today to go home. When I came home from work, I asked Dallin how his day was. He said "good but Grammy not here." Porter said, "she went home today." Dallin added, "and I was sad. I cried." I asked if he was okay now, and he said no, he is still sad. He still misses Grammy. Porter didn't want to talk about it.

songs

I took Porter sledding yesterday while Dallin napped. It is nice to be able to do things with Porter alone sometimes. When he is not focused on fighting with Dallin, competing with Dallin, etc., he is a pretty fun kid. When we first got the sledding hill, we were the only people there. Porter wanted it to stay that way so he wrote, "this park is closed" in the snow, hoping that it would fool other people into staying away. When other kids came, he wrote his name on the trails he created, again trying to deter the others from sliding down his hill. He also discovered that he likes to eat snow. He said that he was having it for a snack and offered me some. Then he found a bunch of foot prints in the snow. Some of them were huge. He thought perhaps they had been made by a giant. He and I had a lengthy discussion about giants and how big this giant my possibly be. Then we looked more closely at the footprints and found that they were mine. I'm not a giant, I just have giant feet, I guess. Porter also found some old footprints that had turmed to ice. He thought they were like fossils and then he tried to bury them so someone else could find them.

Dallin was writing little songs in the bathtub tonight. The first one went like this:
Aunt Mallory, Aunt Mallory
da da da da da
stinky poo poo
we love you.

The second one went like this:
Uncle Brett
ba da ba
buncle bett
dett dett dett
uncle Dett

Then he told me that I wasn't his friend and neither is Aunt Mallory. His best friends are Uncle Jacob, Uncle Brett, Uncle Jess and Porter. He also likes some of the boys he goes to daycare with and some of the boys who live in our neighborhood. All of his uncles are his friends in some degree or another. He also likes all his cousins. He does not like any of aunts or any other girls that he knows except Grandma.

My Dallin

Tomorrow is my little Dallin's birthday. He will be three. As he always reminds us, he is not tiny, he is not a baby. He is a grown up. My grown-up Dallin loves to have "piky" hair and look well groomed. He will comb his hair at least five times a day, trying to make it look just right. He loves to eat candy and cheese-its. On the more healthy side, his favorite dinner is turkey (or chicken because he doesn't really know the difference) with rice and fruit. He also loves to eat chicken McNuggets from McDonalds dipped in caramel and root beer. He may be the only child I know who doesn't like pizza. As it turns out, he actually just doesn't like pizza sauce. He loves cheese pizza with garlic butter sauce though.
Dallin is also one of the funniest people I know. He doesn't make us laugh intentionally, he is just so sincere and makes such funny little faces when he tells us things that you can't help but laugh at him.
Dallin is a little ball of energy. He likes to do his gymnastics moves all around the house. He also likes to run and jump and he can't let an opportunity to wrestle pass him by. He is a chatterbox. You can't understand half of what he is telling you, not because his pronunciation is bad, but because he talking so fast and often leaves out key words, but he still wants to tell you. He is especially bad when he is tired. He ramps up the fidgetting, talking, and general complaining to keep from falling asleep.
Dallin has a good memory for things that were important to him. We can't drive by the hotel where Grammy and Grampy stayed the last time they can to visit us without Dallin yelling that was where he went swimming.
Dallin loves his family. He always wants to be with Porter and do whatever Porter is doing. He is often heard to say to me or Joe, "I want give you kisses and loves" or "I want snuggle you." He likes to be kissed and hugged back in return. When he is tired, he likes me to hold his hand and pat him "in the middle" (the middle of his stomach/chest area) to help him fall asleep.
My Dallin is a very sweet and fun little boy and we are lucky to have him. Our family wouldn't be complete without him.

Playing in the fountains at the Gateway.

Dallin on his 2nd Birthday

Dallin's first birthday.

Dallin back when we used to call him "the Chub." He was such a happy little chunk of a baby. We could tell that he was just thrilled to be on earth in the little body he was given. I think he was waiting anxiously in heaven to come down and be with us and Porter and this was his little dream come true.

I have always loved this picture. He had just eaten his first popcicle and it was over him. He seemed to think that we wouldn't notice the mess he had made of himself.

Three years, the day he was born.

punishment

Porter has started telling me that if I don't do as he asks (buy him a toy, play Candyland again, etc.) he will not let me come to his birthday party. Yesterday, he added that I would also not be allowed to take him places ever again. That would really show me.

Dallin has been having a hard time going to daycare, nursery, etc. lately. The last couple of weeks, I have leave him crying with someone. I call after a few minutes and see if he is okay, and he is, but it is still hard. This morning he told me that he didn't want me to leave. He said if I left, he would be sad and would have to cry. It is heartbreaking. At least Porter likes to go now. I'm not sure what to do with him. I think some of it is because he is not feeling very well. He has had a cold for a couple of weeks now so that makes him grumpier, but that probably doesn't account for all of his attachment stuff lately. Ugh.

more

Tonight I was putting Dallin and Porter to bed and Dallin kept telling me to go away (as he does when he is tired). I said okay and got up. He started to cry and said, "don't go, I will be sared" (how he says "scared.") I told him not to tell me to go away then or I would go away and not come back. He said, "but I can't stop."

Dallin has been telling me that he will be scared all the time lately. He didn't want to go to nursery on sunday and so he told me he would be scared if I left him. I told him there was nothing to be scared about, there was nothing scary about nursery and so he replied, "but I will be sad." He also told me that when he was tiny baby he would cry. I asked why he was sad when he was a baby and he said that he was scared of monsters. He is still scared of monsters.

Porter passed on more advice to Dallin tonight about good manners. At dinner, Porter told Dallin that when you are eating and your mouth is full, if you want to talk you need to put your hand over your mouth. Then he demonstrated how to cover your mouth. At least he is learning something at daycare.

words of wisdom

Porter learns all sorts of things at daycare and comes home to pass them along. Among the pearls of wisdom he has shared with are:
(1) if your head is sweaty, you need to drink water
(2) if you are good to the earth, the earth will be good to you
(3) it is bad manners to hit. It is good manners to keep your hands to yourself.

Also, Porter and I were at the grocery store to buy food for the can drive at daycare and he asked why were buying food. I told him that some people don't have food. He said, "because their moms are mean and won't buy food for them, huh? I said no, some of them don't have any money to buy food. He said they should go to the bank to get some. I couldn't get him to understand that is not how the monetary system works.

Finally, today, Porter and Dallin were fighting, Porter said, "Dallin do you have any last words before you die?"

double beds

Yesterday, Porter told me that people like to have their own rooms. It is very weird that I share a bed with Dad and he shares a bed with Dallin. He said "that is just weird" about four times. Then he told me that a bed for two people is called a "double bed." "It is called double because it is for two people. If someone else wants to sleep in the bed, they will have to lay at the bottom because there isn't room. There are some beds that a really big. They are for like 60 people. I don't know what they are called." I asked him what a bed for one person is called, he said, "a one person bed."

I took Porter and Dallin to the dollar theater yesterday. We saw Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs. Porter stood on his seat the whole time so he could see better. Dallin had to hold my hand because it was "sarry." He did enjoy the popcorn and milk duds though. Also, Dallin apparently really likes the cartoon movie cat that is the face of cinemark. He wanted to walk by the poster multiple times and laugh.

Dallin also told me yesterday that he doesn't like to be in the "grown up" gynmastics class. There are too many kids. He wants to go back to the "baby" class.

two gymnasts

today was the biannual gymnastics tournament. Both boys were able to participate this time. They both loved it and were happy to win medals (though Porter reminded us tonight that he still has more medals and trophies than Dallin. He brought all of his out to the living room and displayed them by him on the couch). Afterward, we celebrated at Golden Corral.

battle

Earlier this summer, an epic battle began in our house. Two strong-willed opponents faced off and the outcome was by no means certain. Multiple tactics were employed, some more above-board than others. At times, the tension in the house was almost unbearable. I am speaking, of course, of Joe and Porter's fight over the training wheels. After the seemingly unending struggle, summer has come to an end and bike riding will soon no longer be an option, a winner has emerged. dunt da da da (drum roll) . . . It is Porter. The training wheels remain on the bike. I have to admit that I was rooting for him all along. I am glad that he didn't let his dad threaten, bribe, cajol, or talk him into doing something he didn't feel ready to do. There are times when Porter's stubborness, coupled with his boundless anxieties, try my patience and hold him back. However, I think there is something to be said for knowing your own limitations and deciding for yourself when you are ready to do something. I'm sure that next summer the training wheels will come off and probably with very little struggle.

Happy Halloween

On Halloween, we had Wolverine and a red ninja visit us.
Wolverine showed off his muscles

while the ninja showed off his sweet sword skills

and they both teamed up to chase bad guys off the lawn