The Wilhelmsen Botanical Blog

Earlier today Brandon, Aiden, and I were in the car on our way to run an errand.  Imagine my dismay when all of sudden I hear Aiden in the backseat saying aaaa-ss, repeatedly.  My first thought was where in the world did he hear that word?   We certainly never say it at our house.  Just as suddenly I realized that Aiden was not in fact swearing but saying, “ice” in toddler speak.  How did I know that is what he was saying you may wonder, well it is because he was holding our water bottle which of course, had ice in it.  Oi.  I still don’t know when he learned the word ice, or incidentally basketball (which he was saying in a very modified form but still with 3 syllables at Wal-mart).  Kids sure do pick things up fast.

On a similar note Brandon and I were watching Jumper (pg-13)  the other night and it has a LOT of language in it.  Aiden was playing in the living room as we watched and at one point they dropped the four letter word starting with f and I started to worry about Aiden repeating it.  Thankfully he did not but Brandon and I have vowed that we will check the language of all movies before we watch them and if they have any at all we will not watch it while Aiden is awake.  Curse the ever changing rating system and the lack of demand for family friendly mild themed movies.  Bah!

No blogging this week.  These pics. are pretty self explanatory and I don’t feel like writing anything.  Enjoy.

Incidentally he is reading the Federalist Papers.

Monday morning we had a scare, Brandon and I were working on putting the tent away and were shaking water out of it when I noticed that I could not see Aiden and that Brandon had not barricaded the door way when he came back from running to grab something.  Terror filled me from my toes to the top of my head as I ran down the hill and through the open door, searching for Aiden on the lawn and in the road.  I ran all the way to be the bottom of the driveway and when I didn’t see him I of course got more worried.  He could have been snatched off the road that quickly by some creep.  Brandon had followed me out to the front and I was screaming for him to not follow me and to go look in the backyard some more (I didn’t want Aiden to slip out front while we were both out front).  All this time I was screaming Aiden, Aiden and of course he is too young to reply but it will sometimes cause him to come to me.  Anyway I ran from the bottom of the driveway up toward the gate on the opposite side of the house and through it just in case he had wandered to it and I couldn’t see due to him being in a blind spot or something.  He wasn’t so I ran through the open gate hoping he was in the side yard and by the time Brandon and I came into the backyard Aiden was standing by his sand box.  I picked Aiden right up and I was so relieved and all of my pent up terror and worry just gushed out of me and I was sobbing and sobbing.  My little boy is so precious to me.  Needless to say I asked Brandon to work on the tent so that I could keep a very, VERY close eye on my little boy.  I was shaken up most of the day about it.  We still don’t know where he was, we have two possibilities but there is no way to know. Here are some pictures of Aiden playing on my computer box.  Oh yea just in case I didn’t mention it before I got on new computer a little over a week ago.  YAY!

Brandon got me these flowers on Monday too.  He mentioned he was already thinking about getting me some flowers and that it was a good day to because of what had happened with earlier that morning.

Here is Aiden playing in the gym at playgroup.

On Tuesday after playgroup my dad suggested that maybe we start putting the gate where it will block the kitchen and not the stairs so that Aiden can have his choice of the upstairs or downstairs during the day.  He is really good at going up and down now but when we open up the stairs to him all he does is go up and down over and over.  I haven’t dared just sit in the living room yet for fear of him falling, so I just sit at the bottom of the stairs and watch him.  We also got the ads in the paper that day so I made Aiden a little paper hat.

This picture is another messy face picture.  Aiden really is a lot better at eating without making a mess but sometimes he still smears it all over his face.  This was particularly funny because Aiden had “painted” his eyebrows with yogurt on top of smearing it on his face.

Later that day Brandon and my dad were replacing the brake light in my dad’s car.  I decided to take Aiden out to watch and set him in the trunk when he started to get heavy.  As you can see below he got into the tools and started to “help” out.

Friday we went to Mimi’s Cafe for lunch.  We had joined the online e-mail club and got a free breakfast entree coupon (Note to anyone who does the same, they do have like 5 ALL DAY breakfast choices but if you want to have many more breakfast choices then go before 11:00 a.m.)  Anyway, my experience at Mimi’s was 100 times better then the first time I went.  I think I must have just been in a bad mood when I went before and all the food looked to fancy and I couldn’t find something to eat…This time was awesome.  They brought out a little bowl of cheerio’s and some crackers for Aiden as an appetizer.  The ham, egg, and cheese croissant I ate was delectable.  The entree came with juice and a side dish and Aiden’s mini corndogs came with a drink, dessert, and a side dish as well.  I was impressed with our entire experience.  Kudos to Mimi’s Cafe.

Saturday we went over to my cousin Will’s to watch the West Bountiful parade.  Once it started I strapped Aiden in and can you believe that he did not fuss or squirm or want out of his stroller the entire parade?!?!?  I was just as shocked as you are.  He really liked watching all the different things coming down the street and started to boogie any time there was music.  For the first time he was a captive audience!!!  HOORAY!!!  After the parade we stayed for lunch and Aiden explored the backyard and got into things.  It was a fun morning.

Happy Father’s day to all you father’s out there who read our blog.  I don’t know why but lately I have just been so burned out with blogging.  This will be another blog with mainly just pictures.  We had a fun week though and Aiden and I gave Brandon dinner at Red Robin yesterday for his Father’s day gift.  Aiden is also learning a ton of new words, literally 5-10 each day.  Here are few of the words that he has learned this week car, bus, closed, toes, lala=lollipop, cuddle, scip tures=scriptures, lat=chocolate, doh, poo poo, boat, poopsie, ahm=arm, hand (which is more like ham), to do, all go=all gone, dude, tato=potato, go, buhys=boys, and buh bye.  I try to keep track of all of the new words but it is getting crazy!  He is also showing more and more understand of things, the other day he pointed to the oven and said, “cooked.”  Then at See’s we were waiting in line and he points to their gold wrapped suckers and says, “lala” (although on first attempt it was much clearer more like lolli.)  Then of course we are driving down the road and he starts saying, “boat.”  I couldn’t believe lollipop or boat because he hasn’t had much exposure to those words.  I had no recollection of him hearing lollipop whatsoever.  I had told him boat only the day before because he saw a toy boat while we were getting ready to swim.  Anyway, he is catching on very quickly and it truly amazes and shocks me.  He is also learning how to sign please.  It is a work in progress.  Well, enjoy the photos!  Until next week thanks for reading…

So last week was a busy week.  Monday I helped my dad at work to prepare the library for the sprinkler system to be installed in the ceiling over the summer.  In the evening Aiden and I went grocery shopping with my dad to get groceries for camp and to get us through the week until camp.  The monitor on my lap top also went out on Monday.  So for now I am borrowing a monitor of my dad’s so that I can use the dang thing.  Boo.

Tuesday I got a hair cut.  Sorry no pictures yet.  It looks a little silly when dry because my perm has grown out quite a bit but I really like it when I straighten in and flip it out.  Aiden’s hair cut made him look older and I like it a lot as well.  In the evening we went to see Voice Mail at Assembly Hall.  There is a free summer concert series at Brigham Young Historic Park all summer on Tuesdays and Fridays.  (They are held at Assembly Hall when it is raining).  Tonight my mom and a guy named Randy are singing.  I am excited to go listen.

Wednesday I helped my grandma pack her camper a little bit and do a few other preparations for camp.  We spent most of the day with preparations for camp.

Thursday my mom came over to visit and I had her french braid my hair for camp.  She also brought us some very tasty eclairs from Glauss French Pastry.  Oh yummy, yum!  We left for camp at about oh, two and it was raining when we did.  By the time we got up to the reservoir the rain was down to a light drizzle and so we were able to put up our tent without to much worry of soggy everything.  😉  It was a chilly night to be sleeping in a tent but we survived and Aiden was warm.  He slept really well until I got up to use the bathroom.  But he fell back to sleep so it was ok.

Friday was good weather, sunny, warm, and Aiden had a lot of fun running around camp.  Sleep Friday night was perfect.  I didn’t shiver once and the rain was relaxing.

Saturday rained all day and by 5:00 I was done.  I didn’t want to have another shivery night in the tent so we packed up to go home.

Sunday was spent unpacking and relaxing.  So there you go.  Have a good week!  Thanks for reading…

This will be a picture post because I have a lot to do to prepare to go camping on Thursday…Enjoy!

Ok so these next two need a small explaination.  We have a few books in Aiden’s crib to keep him entertained if he wakes up early for nap.  Well, I found this book in there the other day when I was moving his blankets.  I would have thought that a mouse had nibbled on it if I weren’t 100% sure it was my cardboard eating son (seriously he gnaws up any cardboard he can get his hands on within a matter of seconds).  Anyway, now he truly is my little book worm.  ;P

Well, it was a doozy to find a song lyric for the title of our blog this week.  But then it came to mind that there might be a hymn that would more accurately reflect my feelings then one of the patriotic songs like, “Johnny comes marching home.”  I know that memorial day is technically a patriotic holiday but for me it has been a time to remember my progenitors and friends that have passed on before me.  I generally remember those who fought for our freedom and have served in the military on Independence Day.  Anyway, this Memorial Day was spent the same as always with us meeting the Ferguson branch of extended family at Murray cemetary and trapsing through the cemetary (or wandering in the general direction of the next stop until someone who really knows tells us that we have arrived :p) and putting flower arrangements on head stones.  I even brought some flowers to contribute this year out of my dad’s back yard.  After we have placed all the flowers we caravan over to Murray Park (after my dad, Brandon, Aiden, and I stop at Subway to get our picnic lunch) and we make plans for who is in charge of what up at camp. 

Tuesday we still attend playgroup in the morning.  It is still a work in progress, it is hard to get the word spread about it and then we have to figure out how to meet the needs of more people so that we get a better turn out.  In the evening we went out to visit my friend Katie and to swim in the pool in her in laws neighborhood.  The water was pretty warm but the air was cool and we got chilly pretty quick.  Swimming with a baby you have to get out when the baby starts to shiver.  That can shorten swim time (which is ok by me, I am usually the party pooper when it comes to swimming).  It was fun to swim and visit with my friends and their families. 

Wednesday we cleaned up the laundry room and rearranged part of the living area downstairs so that Dave could get in and work on the plumbing.  I also took Aiden to the pediatrician so that she could check his lungs.  He has started to sound rattley again (is rattley even a word?) and I was nervous that the pnuemonia had come back.  She had good news, his lungs still sounded good but then mentioned he had allergy looking eyes and recommended Children’s Zyrtec.  She then suggested that we try an inhaler for possible asthma because I had mentioned that he got winded running around.  I haven’t tried the inhaler yet because I wanted to see if clearing up allergies would help the winded breathing.  We just got the Zyrtec and so it will be a wait and see for a couple of days.  I do have the albuterol and special chamber to administer the medicine.  (Medicaid covered the inhaler but not the $35.00 chamber, how do they expect a 16 month old to inhale at the exact moment I spray the medicine?  Honestly!)  We are prepared just in case though and we even will have an epipen jr. to keep with us if we notice a severe allergic reaction.  In the evening we went to the bookstore to get out of the house.  It was fun to browse because I haven’t been to the bookstore in ages.

Thursday my uncle fixed the plumbing in the laundry room.  My mom also came to visit Thursday.  It is always fun when she comes to visit.  She is very silly and Aiden likes to have visitors.  My grandpa also came while Dave was plumbing because he was curious about the existing plumbing and how it would be changed.  He stayed for awhile to chat.  We visited my grandma and grandpa in the evening.  She let me cut some roses for myself and I came home with a lovely assortment of 11 roses.  They sure have smelled good but I have thrown 8 away and the last three are getting there.  They have a beautiful yard.

Friday Brandon worked on pulling out bushes/sage brush in the back.  I put pants on Aiden and we went out back for awhile while Brandon worked.  Aiden enjoyed checking everything out and tried to “help” Brandon remove trees.  He is a curious little guy.  Brandon and I also unwrapped a bunch of crayons and broke them up and sorted them into various groupings to make tie dye/color changing crayons.  They turned out pretty cool but I suggest not mixing different brands of crayons when you do it.  I will not be buying anything but Crayola from here on out!  They are the best quality by far.  Dinner was homemade and fried fish sticks.  They were tasty but I was worried that the fish wasn’t cooked enough.  It seems to have been though because none of us got food poisoning.  Brandon and I did get a cold however.  Boo.

Saturday we went on a date to see Ghosts of Girlfriends Past.  I liked it but he is a player so there are some inapproriate themes in the movie for a bit, but by the end he learns his lesson.  Aiden had fun playing with grandma while we had our date.  He even played in the dirt.  We went to the open house for at the bishop home of  the 900 court ward.  It was good to see our old friends and give them a chance to see how Aiden has grown and changed.  After Aiden’s nap we made a trip to Lowe’s and then went swimming at grandma’s.  We put Aiden’s life vest on him so that he could try it out.  He seemed to enjoy just floating around for a bit.  Hopefully he will get to use it at least one more time before camp next week (next WEEK?!?!?!?  AHHH!).  We got the life vest by sheer luck at Kid to Kid.  It was a good price so I snatched it up!

Sunday was pretty good aside from feeling like death due to having colds.  We got to go to a combined Relief Society/Priesthood meeting because it was the 5th Sunday and the youth taught the lessons (youth being YM/YW).  It was nice to be in the adult class while Aiden played in nursery.

So this week I worked on a few projects.  Below are the pictures.  Enjoy!  Until next week, THANKS FOR READING!!!

Well, I am running out of greetings for my blog.  Hmm.  How about this, “Happy Memorial Day!”  Here are the highlights from our week. 

The plumbing in the laundry room got a plug over the weekend, as a result we went to grandma’s on Monday to do a coupld of loads of laundry. 

Tuesday after playgroup we went to Costco.  In the evening we watched the pilot episode of Glee.  It won’t be on until the fall but I think that I am going to really like it.  We also had onion rings with dinner.  I have really enjoyed Brandon using his new deep fryer to make us delicious side dishes.

Wednesday we bought Wii Active.  It is a fitness game for Wii.  So far we Brandon and I have worked out together twice (yes together one of the features that won me over is that you can work out together on a split screen) and it has worn me out both times.  Our plan is to do Wii fit 3 times a week after Aiden goes to bed.  Then I will have to find something to do the other two times in the week as the weekend will be my “off” day. 

Aiden has learned to fold his arms somewhere between his 40 mins. in nursery and being home during the week.  It is super cute!  I was also hoping to keep track of all the new words he is learning but a lot of times several pop out in a day and as much as I want to keep track, it is impossible.  A few of the newest ones (since I posted earlier this week) are eye, and uh oh.  I think that there was another one but I can’t remember it. 

Thursday my mom came to visit.  It was nice to see her and to chat with her.  She will be coming to visit us more regularly on Thursdays and it will be good to visit with her more often.  My uncle also came on Thursday to look at the plug in the plumbing.  The prognosis was not good so the plug stayed.  As a result we (Aiden, Brandon, and I) had a family outing to the laundromat.  We picked up a pizza and some chocolate milk from the store and did all our loads at the same time.  It was nice to get everything done at once (5 loads in 90 mins.) but cost nearly ten dollars.  Aiden had a good time.  He liked watching the machines go around and around and was very well behaved. 

Friday was story time at the library and grocery shopping in the evening. 

Saturday was our big back yard clean up morning.  We had a pretty good turn out and got a lot done.  Thank you so much to everyone who came to help.  It made things go so much more quickly and things look much better.  In the evening we took our $5.00 off coupon for Chili’s and had a delicious dinner.  All three of us ate for only $15.00.  It was nice to go to a fancier restaurant then the norm (Wendy’s, Arby’s, Arctic, you know).  After dinner we ran to Lowe’s to price a temporary above ground sprinkler. 

Today Aiden has a fever again but no other symptoms.  Brandon thinks his lungs might be rattling a little bit.  We were able to break the fever with some ibuprofin but it came back as the ibuprofin wore off.  Oi.  Poor guy.  I hope the pneumonia isn’t recurring.  It isn’t exactly easy to convince a toddler to rest and take it easy.  😉  Enough for this week, thanks for reading…

My little Aiden is very clever.  We have various barricades and things to keep him from things that he should not get to (and this after trying to discipline him with repeated time outs to teach him that it is not ok to get into those thigns).  Well, everytime he learns a new thing I can almost hear him thinking in his little head (to quote Peter Pan) oh the cleverness of me.

Monday Aiden signed a sentance to me by signing “more” and then “eat”.  He can also sign hat, banana, phone, teeth, ear, all done, and is working on signing cracker and water.  He has also signed dad, broken, and hurt.

Here are the words that he says and how he says them, uice=juice, ee=eat, nana=banana, ight=light, eez=cheeze, mo=more, eeth=teeth, ahh-oo=flower, baoo=ball, zuz=jesus, guck=truck or duck, ock=clock, sock, or block, at=What’s that?, and cacka=cracker.  He can also say hot, hat, dadda/dad, mom/momma, yea, apple, num, woah, wow, lock, and hat.  He also says keys but he says it kees.

He has also discovered his belly button and will show it to you when asked if he can access it.  (This depends on what clothes he is wearing.)

Tuesday evening Brandon was changing Aiden’s diaper and Aiden folded his arms by himself for the first time, while saying, “dad, dad.”  After he was changed, he pointed to a ball on the floor and said, “Baoo.”  Yesterday Aiden kept folding and unfolding his arms.  He was walking around with them folded and then he sat down, folded his arms, got up turned a little and sat down then folded his arms (he did this a few times in a row.)  He cracks me up!

Today he took my keys went over to my dad’s bedroom door and tried to unlock the door knob (which incidentally has a lock in it).  He then did the same to my door knob.  What a smart little guy!

Hey everyone, I don’t feel like saying much this week so here are the very highest of highlights.  Aiden got his first head scrape, which I may have mentioned last week.  He fell off the two cement steps outside my grandma’s house and got a scrape on his forehead from the sidewalk.  This eventually resulted in what happened yesterday which was that I put a bandaid back on because the scab looked dry and was starting to peel off and I wanted to protect it.  Later that day Aiden started pulling and tugging on his bandaid and finally unbeknown to us got it off.  When we noticed that it (and the scab) were both missing I scanned the floor for the bandaid, I found it quickly but alas no scab.  EEEEWWWW!!!!  I did not want to be the one to find the scab (which reminds me I was not the one to find the umbilical cord when it fell off, thankfully my mom was) so we started to pick up the floor in preparation to sweep.  As I swept Brandon found the scab (thank goodness) and threw it away so I didn’t have to find it.

The second highlight was our visit to and purchase of an annual pass to the Living Planet Aquarium.  I thought it was pretty cool but was too scared to touch the animals.  I did touch the thing that resembles the shock of an electric eel.  I won’t be doing that again!

Lastly, Aiden had his first experience in nursery.  Now I realize that he is not yet old enough so he only goes to nursery the last 40 mins. of church while we teach our Sunbeams their lesson.  He did really well yesterday.  Unfortunately, he misses out on play time all together.  Poor guy.  I am not ready for him to be old enough for nursery yet.  They grow just too darn quickly.  It did make a difference for the Sunbeams not to have the distraction of his cuteness so the idea was successful. 

As for Brandon and I.  He has been looking for jobs and anxiously waiting for his grades to come in.  He has also been doing some design work for Thumbprints and job prospects.  I attended book club and craft night and have started on Christmas projects (when you don’t have money and you have a lot of people you want to give to, you have to start early with projects).

I think that is all for the MAJOR highlights of the week.  Sorry this entry is so short, enjoy the pictures (it was a slow picture week as well)!