Just to look at...

I wanted to capture all the rolls Laila has while they're still cute! I thought this was a cute shot, even though her rolls are not showing too great. She loves her toes. I don't remember Aiden being able to stick them in his mouth like she can!


This was from a couple months ago when she was first able to sit up. It was a major goal of hers and could do it on her own at 5 1/2 months. Plus I love this cute outfit!

First time I sat Laila up in the bath instead of laying her down. Isn't Aiden being so modest?

Big Brother just LOVES to help...

Both kids LOVE animals. I think that's how Aiden started crawling, was by chasing after the cat!

Aiden fell asleep with a book. Not like Dad at all...

Cousin Lauren. These two are a week apart.

Cousin Drew. He was born on Aiden's birthday!

What a messy birthday boy!



Doesn't look like it, but Aiden was excited about the addition of Batman to his collection of Superfriends.

Every year we plan to make a cool super hero cake, then time just doesn't allow. I made this awesome ice cream cake instead, with layers of chocolate ice cream, Reese's ice cream and hot fudge sauce with oreos crumbs in the middle. REAL healthy, right? SO good!

For some reason Aiden decided he likes to sleep on the floor. Guess he got a little adventurous in his sleep :)

By the way, Joslyn took a couple of pics of Laila ( I had to do something before her teeth show and she starts moving), and they are on her blog
http://www.themcnairfamily.blogspot.com/

she says she did not edit the first one, where the light is behind Laila.

I know the pictures are random but that's what I have right now!

I had a friend tell me once that kids seem to go in 6-month intervals of bad, or good, behavior. Well right now I think that may be right on. I haven't had much positive to say about Aiden the last six or so months, but he has been a whole new little boy the past few weeks. I mean, he's still a crazy bugger a lot of the time, but he has been much more manageable, much sweeter, and I don't feel the need to scream NEARLY as often these days! Hallelujah. That's all I can say. He often tells people "I like you".

So he has an imaginary monkey. That's new. Named Iron Man. He usually sits on Aiden's shoulder. And yesterday he told me he now has a dinosaur too. Today he was talking on a pretend phone and informed me that his monkey was in trouble so he and his dinosaur were going to go save him. I figure that as long as he's not blaming bad behavior on his monkey-friend, we're ok. It's fun that he's starting to pretend. He is just so stinking smart too. He never liked telling anyone his age when he was two, but now he can hold up his three little fingers to tell you how old he is. And he has been asking about letters more and more, pointing to them and asking for you to "do these letters now".

He is still asking a million questions a day. My mom asked him why he asks so many questions and he told her "Because I am a question mark. And that's what question marks do!" When she asked him who told him that he said "Oh, the missionaries at church". He will occasionally remind me things I am forgetting, like reading a story at bedtime or saying a prayer before eating. And he really understands the whole apologizing thing. If he gets sent to his room or to time out, he quickly says "I want to say sorry now!"

His favorite thing to do is play Hide-and-Seek. "Let's go hide", he tells Lindsay every day about 2 seconds after she wakes up. He doesn't understand the concept, of course, which makes it hilarious. He just keeps hiding in the same spot over and over again, giggles the whole time, and when you ask where he is, he immediately responds, "I'm right here!"

He is very concerned with people's names. He always wants to know "What's your middle name?" He will ask that about everyone he can think of, like his friend's mom or grandma. And the other question is "What do you like to do?" Whenever he meets someone or hears of someone new, that's the first thing he asks.

I think Aiden is trying to say "Let's go! Let's go!" to Lindsay, and somehow it turned into "stosti stosti" Which he told me is the name of this video.

Laila has been growing and changing like crazy, too, of course. Last week she got her first TWO teeth! As a mother, you're always glad when those things pop out because it means that your child has had an actual REASON for being crabby! Though she is still such a sweet baby, she has no problem telling you if she is unhappy--espeically if brother is getting to her or she wants to be picked up.

In the past two or three weeks, she has decided that she wants to eat big-people food. Before she thought it looked interesting, but didn't like the taste of it. Now I can't hold her when I'm eating without her complaining at me to share. She didn't like baby cereal or baby bananas or applesauce, but instead started with yogurt and my mom's applesauce.

She is finally starting to be interested in moving, too. She has this feminine little way of kicking her leg so that she can roll one direction or another. I think she'll figure out creeping and crawling before too much longer. I'm not complaining this time, I'm happy to have her stay in the same general vicinity as I place her for a while still! A couple times this week I've heard her crying in her room during her nap, only to find her stuck in a corner on the opposite side of the bed as I laid her!

Most of you know how crazy the past couple months have been... with the end of school for Price and since I started school at BYU-I. I'm sorry to say that posting on the blog, though it's been on my mind, has taken a backseat to my ACCOUNTING homework. That's right. I am beginning the long journey to becoming some sort of accountant. I have an associates already (in university studies), so I don't have to do much in the way of general coursework. But don't worry, there are plenty of specific major classes to keep me busy for more than two years, including an internship. How did I choose this major? How does anyone make any important life decisions like that? I guess I just felt good about it. One reason I hadn't finished a degree before was because I didn't know what I wanted to do for sure. The other is that the timing was just never right, I got into several schools where I planned on getting a degree in speech language and pathology, but it never seemed to work out. So now I go to class, get confused, wonder what the heck I'm doing, meet with smarter-than-me classmates in order to figure out the homework, which takes For-ev-er, eventually catch on to some of the basic principles (it is a whole other language I tell you) then by the time I'm practicing for the test, it somehow seems to click. Then it starts all over again with the next chapter. So I guess the school part of my brain that has been latent for far too long is beginning to function a little again, and it's kind of fun (even though it's really tough balancing school and the kids). So that's been my life for the past 8 weeks. I'll post the blog you've really been waiting for, including PHOTOS here in a second.

The Big Bounce

Beautiful Laila just hasn't been content to lie on the ground or in her bouncy chair, she pikes her little legs up and lifts up her neck to try to get into a sitting position so she can be big and see what's going on!



Luckily, Aunt Heidi had this amazing bouncy chair just waiting for Laila to grow into it! I think she is just the right size!



It sings and lights up and the chair spins around. You can see how seriously Laila takes her job:




Henry apparently loves soft blankies, and the other night he found the perfect place to snuggle up.



This is how Laila prefers to sleep: in her boppy pillow. If you read the tag, it warns against this, but it's the only way I've found where she'll sleep more than 30 minutes! At night I can usually just lay her down, but this is how she naps! Look at all the pink :)





Aiden thought Price's bald head was pretty interesting. He kept touching it and asking "has Daddy's hair grown up yet?"

I put on his jammies tonight and he pulled them up as high as they could go. The picture isn't nearly as funny as the actual event was, but he's very proud of himself



I really need to take more pictures of the silly things he does, but he'd much rather be on the other side of the camera these days! Plus lets face it, most things he does are not only funny, but probably either unsafe or big no-no's! The past couple of days he has been running up to the bathroom when he thinks I'm not paying attention and getting into my sister's 'make-up'-mostly glosses and sparkly pre-teen stuff (harmless) but we are trying to teach him to stay out of other people's things. His logic was "I just gotta put on my make-ups cuz I gotta go to the temple!" He thinks he is so smart!



He found these socks and put them on himself. "Glubbies" for his hands. And this kid can do a teriffic summersault! I think in the fall I want to enroll him in gymnastics! Hopefully it will give him an outlet for all his energy!

My College Experience

I am attempting to start a game of Gotcha (also referred to as assassins) at the school where I work. Obviously, due to school violence issues we are taking a much less aggressive approach to the game. I remember playing this when I was in High School and the variety of stories that came out of the game live on in my memory like cobwebs in an unused attic. Yes, it is true, my head is empty. Anyway, I revisited the game several years after I graduated, while attending college, and here is a story recounting one of the experiences I had while playing the game. If you are interested in hosting or playing your own game of assassins here is a link to a website where you can set up your own game or search for possible games being played in your area.

Cheers,
Price

My College Story:

The day was warm, the sky blue, the air crisp. Fall had officially begun, but the season had not quite accepted the change from lazy summer evenings to busy autumn afternoons. Class had been in session for about two weeks, and assignments were passing hands daily—from student to staff and back again in an endless progression of grades and revisions. While attempting to fill the space between classes, a larger group of students gathered together and began a game of Gotcha—a version of elimination tag where each person playing has the name of another person in the group. The object of the game is to systematically eliminate each person until only one player remains.

Our game had been running for roughly a week, and I had personally eliminated three participants in that time. By entering and exiting my apartment through a ground floor window at the back of the apartment building, I felt fairly confident that I was safe from any attacker who was trying to monitor my movements. This game, if nothing else, had filled me with a very healthy sense of paranoia. There were a few safe zones, classrooms, work, church, and home, where elimination could not take place. I had plotted the best rout for getting to each location while maintaining the least amount of visibility possible. In some cases it meant that I had to leave for class 20-30 minutes early to make it there on time.

I plotted my eliminations meticulously, using the college’s student directory (aka the StalkerNet) to find their apartment address, class schedule, and in some rare cases pictures of the target. I would align their schedule and mine to make sure I knew the quickest rout to where they would be throughout the day. I moved through crowds like a breath of air, silent and imperceptible. There are, at times, advantages to being small in stature.

I was tailing my fourth target, intent on learning her “path of safety” before making an attempt at eliminating per prematurely. Always cautious, I would check my surroundings for anyone who looked suspicious of doing as I was—scouting for the best moment to make my move. In the corner of the room was a gentleman I had seen several times earlier in the day. Since this was a small college, it was not uncommon to run into the same people from time to time, but his presence seemed too calculated to be chance.

Perspiration began to bead on my forehead and the hairs on the back of my neck began to tingle a warning. This guy was going to try and make his move; in my gut I knew he was stalking me as I stalked my target. Two birds with one stone, this guy was good. In my mind I was wondered how long he had been watching my movements. Had he looked me up on the StalkerNet as well? Of course he had. As we passed, him sitting casually in a chair some forty feet from where I passed, our eyes met and he winked. The game was afoot and I knew it. My target would have to wait for another day; I needed to escape and time was not in my favor.

In a fraction of a second I needed to decide which of four possible exits would be my best option:
• Exit number one was a stairwell that would take me to the ground level where I could leave from the closest set of doors and race across the quad, hoping to loose my pursuer in the crowd. Unfortunately, this was not an exceptionally busy time of day and the typical throng of students was replaced by a few stragglers working their way home at the end of class.
• Exit number two required me to ascend the same set of stairs to the top floor, and either back track through the building to a service stairwell at the opposite end of the building or dodge into an unused classroom and hope to avoid detection while hiding under a desk or behind a podium. This option was the least desirable because it either left me trapped in a room where my only exit was blocked by my pursuer, or carelessly careening down halls and through doorways, making enough racket to raise the dead.
• Exit number three would require me to stay on the same level and quickly make my way to a service elevator located at the far end of the building which could only be accessed by cleaning crew employees (which I just happened to be)! While this option seemed to be the safest in theory because it placed me in a position where my tracker could not follow, even if he wanted to, it also left me exposed to attack far too long. The elevator was located in hall way locked off to anyone save building employees. I would have to unlock the door before I could make my way to safety, needlessly using up precious seconds that could be the difference between survival and elimination.
• Exit number four was by far the most risky, but potentially the safest. Because I worked on the late night cleaning crew, I was aware of a few rooms in the building that were never, if ever, used. One of these rooms just happened to be right off the entrance a women’s room located on the bottom floor of the building; it had a window, roughly three feet tall by four feet wide, set about six feet off the ground. If I could make it to that window, I could get away with relative ease. In order to make my way to this room undetected I would have to descend one of two stairwells, backtrack through a bowling alley/arcade, and enter the restrooms at the back of the food court. A race that would leave me exposed even longer than option number three as the distance to safety was much greater.

Typically this latter route might be thought of as an inescapable trap like the classroom, and under normal circumstances I would never have considered it as an option, but desperate times left me no choice. I knew option four, as risky as it was, served the best possibility for escape. There were no exits close enough to the window that my pursuer could catch me in time, even if he discovered immediately that I had exited through a window in an unused women’s restroom. The second door had a lock on it that would provide me time to make my escape and I could simply unlock it again that night as I cleaned. The plan was perfect despite its flaws.

No time to worry about the outcome, in two short strides I cleared the corner and the chase was on. If this kid was as good as I assumed he was, he would not simply jump up and start chasing me recklessly through the building. He would make sure I was aware of his presence first, and then the chase would begin. This knowledge bought me a few seconds of time to change aspects of my appearance. Fortunately, since I was not in class that day, I had left my backpack at home, opting instead to wear a light jacket and a stocking cap. I pulled the cap from my head, shoved it in my back pocket, stripped off my jacket, flipped it inside-out, and tied it around my waist. It wasn’t the perfect disguise, but hopefully it would buy me a few more precious seconds to lengthen my lead and make my escape.

Less than ten feet ahead of me sat the first stairwell, the second set of stairs situated around a corner roughly thirty feet ahead of me and on the opposite side of the room I was passing through. The first stairwell had the advantage of doors at both the top and bottom which were held open with simple wooden wedges. The second stairwell was much too exposed and the risk of early detection was much too great. Quickening my pace, I passed through the first doorway, kicking the doorstop out of the way as I passed. The door began to slowly close on its spring hinges. I could only hope that it would close fast enough to either obstruct my pursuer or alert me to his approach. Near the bottom of the stairs I heard the first door begin to catch and then stop before being thrust open again. Hurried feet began to slap against the stairs indicating that the chase had officially begun. I darted through the second door, again kicking the door stop free to hinder pursuit.

Had my actions been enough to slow this chase? The entrance to the bowling alley/arcade stood roughly one hundred feet away, hidden behind a large planter filled with tall green stalks of various silken plants and Ficus trees. I ran for the doorway, pushing my way past a few people who happened to move into my path unaware of my flight. Instead of making my way around the planter’s box, I threw caution ahead and leapt over the box and through the silken fauna, rough and exposed wires raking against my arms. Behind me I heard the sounds of my pursuer pushing his way past the same people; he was much closer than I would have preferred and I needed to make an adjustment to my escape plan. While the bathroom still held the best chance for escape, fleeing through the open food court and arcade would not be advisable. Instead, upon entering the bowling ally I made my way down the side of the lanes and into the service area where the machinery sits. Hydraulic arms shifted up and down, back and forth, across my path as I made my way to a door that would deposit me in the exact hallway I needed, roughly fifty feet from the women’s room and safety.

As luck would have it, the bowling ally attendant stopped the kid chasing me from entering the backroom as I had. Were he a little quicker, I would have been stopped too. His shouts and curses pushed the adrenaline coursing through my veins to surge even more violently. A sudden burst of speed overtook me and I crashed through the backdoor, barely getting it open in time to keep the door jam from exploding outward like in so many Hollywood films. I knew I was safe, the chase was over and I could casually make my way home to begin planning a new defensive strategy. I knew what my pursuer looked like now and I would be better prepared when next we met. I would need to change my routes, adjust my travel schedule, be less consistent in when I left my apartment and from which direction I went to and from class. I would blend in and become a shadow. If I could survive this, I could survive any attempt at elimination. My instincts were primed; I was as good or better than any secret agent employed by our government. For a moment I thought about changing my major to International Spy. How cool would that be! Think of all the dates I would get then!

Reaching for the door to the women’s room I took one last look down the hallway. At the far end stood the kid who had pursued me, perspiration beginning to leave marks below his collar and armpits. In his hand he held my jacket. Apparently I had lost it during my flight, maybe snagged on a branch as I hurdled carelessly through the planter’s box. I gave him a saucy “maybe next time” grin, winked, and tugged on the door to freedom.

Something hard and cool pressed against my chest; looking forward I found myself staring into the crystal blue eyes of Jody, my co-worker from the nighttime cleaning crew. I knew she was part of the game, and earlier we had discussed exit strategies for several of the buildings on campus, but I never suspected her of such nefarious deceit. I looked down at the spoon pressed against my sternum and in a soft voice, as if from a great distance, I heard her say …

… “Gotcha.”

Four Months and counting!

So I know I'm not very good at keeping updated. But Laila has just started doing some fun stuff, so I will try to keep you 'posted'.
This week she has found her voice and loves to squawk and coo to her herself and to anyone who is within earshot. She of course started when we were sitting in church, and had to be taken out!


I have been helping her practice rolling over since she has been doing the little baby crunches, with her legs and head up in the air, showing signs of readiness. Aiden learned this so early that I have been watching for Laila's turn. She was working on it for a couple of weeks, and would turn to the side easily, then allowing me to pull her over with a little help, and this Tuesday she got it! On the video, I did help just for a second, but now she can roll over on to her tummy all by herself! The funny thing is she doesn't really like being there...


Also last week I began letting her cry herself to sleep. Lately she has had a hard time being put to sleep, and I can't really spend all day rocking her since Aiden can tear up the house in just minutes. She has done so much better than I even hoped. Aiden used to cry FOREVER and it took us a while to get him trained. She will only cry for a few minutes and I just go in to replace her binky a couple times and she's out! The only other issue is her naps are too short! Finally yesterday three of her naps were over an hour, instead of the 30 minute catnaps she was torturing me with! Yeah Laila!

Then there's Aiden. He has found even more numerous to wear me out as the days progress. His new fascinations include soap and writing utinsils. Need I say more? We have been working very hard to teach him "we only color on paper!" although he has 'known' this rule for some time now. Lately if I find him doing something he shouldn't, like holding a pencil near a wall (or toy or book or anything really), he'll quickly hide it behind his back, as if to cover the evidence. I'm sure if it wasn't my child I would find it highly entertaining.
And soap. The other day he was going potty, and he likes to have the to himself to do his business, so I was waiting in my bedroom with Laila. He started calling for help and saying "uh-oh!" When a CHILD says that, you know it's trouble. So I go in there and he has sprayed Daddy's shaving cream all over himself, all over the floor, all over the tub and all over the toiled. Oh joy.
Tuesday we were at my sister's and virtually the same thing occured. We left him for a moment, thinking he would yell "i'm done" as he does, but when we went in the bathroom he had toothpaste all over his hands, the sink, and his clothes. SECONDS it takes, I tell you!
The truth is, when it's 'too quiet', he's most likely up to something, just like they always say. I have to remind myself that he really is a sweet boy and I think I remember the time we liked him :)
I am sure it is a difficult time for him, as he is really quite smart and is trying to do things like a big boy, and mommy has to help Laila a lot instead of playing with him. And it doesn't help that we have given up on naps altogether. One positive thing we have discovered the last week is that if we feed him something right before he goes to bed, something a little heavier, then he doesn't wake up so early. YEAH! Thank you, Mike and Wendy for that life-saving concept.
These videos are mostly for Jessie and Michele, but the rest of you can enjoy my cute and crazy kiddos too!