Woof Woof

Here's a funny little video of Carter with his favorite part of the monuments.

Washington D.C. Day 1 & 2

For Spring Break we decided to take a big trip this year. My aunt and uncle live close to D.C. and we've been wanting to go back and see them and the sights for a while. We finally just did it. Good thing too because they're moving next month. The last time I was back there was in high school and Lance has never been. We had a lot of fun. It will take me a few days to get some of our pictures up from the whole week but here are the first couple of days. We flew out of Salt Lake and learned quick that a stroller and baby are like a magic ticket. We got to go through a seperate line through security which meant by passing a hundred people waiting in line. They also let us board right after first class. Here's a picture of Carter and Lance waiting to get on the plane. Carter had fun looking out the big windows and the planes and people down below. He also had fun climbing on all the chairs. Our flight left about 5pm on Friday, March 18th and left right on time. Carter did great on the plane. He played with a few of the toys we'd brought but was mostly entertained by people of things on the plane. We can always count on Carter to make friends where ever he goes. We were having trouble getting our stroller to collapse, so Carter and I boarded the plane first while Lance was trying to figure it out. The lady that was sitting on the row with my seat offered to help hold Carter while I got settled. She became one of Carter's friends on the flight. Our seats were actually a row apart because there were none together when I had booked our flight. This lady that helped ended up trading seats with us and Carter had fun playing peek-a-boo with her the whole flight. Besides her on the row behind us there was another couple with a little baby. The younger lady sitting in the window seat on our row was oriental and didn't speak much English but seemed to understand a fair amount. Carter kept wanting to go play and see with the windows but we kept holding him back. She finally gestured for him to come over and he spent almost the entire last hour of our flight on her lap playing with her and opening and closing the covers on the windows. Due to a great tail wind we got their earlier than planned, around 10:30pm D.C. time. My aunt picked us up and we got Carter and ourselves to bed. The next morning we took the metro down to start seeing some of the sights. We mostly just walked around the mall and on the back side of the capital a bit because it was such a nice day. Here is Lance and a sleeping Carter out on the mall with the Washington monument in the background. Carter woke up by the time we had walked down to the Capital. Carter had fun looking at the ducks. We went to the botanical gardens. It was so pretty inside and I really liked the smell! This is in between the two main art museums. It looks down into part of the cafeteria that's in the basement. Carter had fun looking at his reflection. That night we went down to Alexandria with my aunt. We went on one of the ghost tours which was fun. They walk you around some of the historic places and you get some of the history along with the mysterious stories. This is the old church there.

Big Day at Church

Today was Carter's first day in nursery at church. Just like we thought he would be, he was a pro. He just walked right in with no looking back. When I'd peak in he was just having fun eating snacks at the table with all the little kids and playing with all the toys. All the leaders said he did such a good job when we picked him up. He didn't want to leave. I guess it probably comes from the fact that he is so use to being dropped off at people's house to play because of our work and school schedules. I think it also really helps that some of his good friends are in there with him and due to his easy going, friendly personality. Hopefully he continues to mostly have good days in there! When we got home Carter was not interested in standing still for a picture, surprise surprise. He just want to eat and get his blankey, ready for nap time. He was playing some peek-a-boo with me too. Here's his first picture from nursery. It's really the first time he's colored much.

18 Months

Yikes! Can Carter really be that old already? I can hardly believe it! He had is doctor's appointment right on his 18 months. Here are his statistics:

• Weight 23lbs 5 oz - 25th percentile
• 31 3/4 inches long - just above 25th percentile
• Head of 19 1/4 inches - 75th percentile

The doctor said Carter is finally growing into his big head, proportionally wise. From the time the nurse had left and the doctor got in the room Carter had completely torn up the paper lining on the patient table. He had lots of fun doing that, looking in the mirror, and pointing to things saying "this." This was his first appointment he really put up a fight any time the nurse or doctor were trying to listen to him or lay him down to measure him. For those who don't know, Carter has pretty bad eczema from the waist down. Within the last couple months he has really started itching it. I was asking the Doctor what we could do for the itching and he said if it got too bad we could give him a little liquid zyrtec. Well a little later in the appointment Carter, still just in his diaper, began rubbing his bum against the chair like, like a bear. While he was sitting on the floor he also starting dragging his bum across the floor to scratch it. He does both of these fairly often at home. Dr. Moffitt just started chuckling and told us we needed to start him on zyrtec. A few times when I've seen him at work since then he'll bring it up, telling people the story of how my son was dragging his bum around on the floor. This was the first time they gave him some animal cookies when he was all done, which he really deserved because he did great during his shots. He was excited about the cookies and carried the bag, eating them the whole way home. Carter loves climbing in the Noah's Ark box to retrieve things he put down in there. Unfortunately the last time he climbed in it the box broke open. Carter loves shoes. He great at bringing our shoes to us, always bringing a matching pair. He also loves putting them on himself. This day he got a hold of some of my church shoes and had fun walking around in them Carter has discovered he can just barely up on his tip toes reach the door knobs. He can't open them but he pulls them shut. He loves doing that. We started calling him our "door police" because he'll go around closing all the doors that are open. Carter is getting so big. He is still mostly a very happy and easy going but busy boy. He can say many words now and surprises us all the time by suddenly repeating a word we've just said to him. Some of his favorite words are "Ace/Acey", "mom", "da-da", "thank-you", "sauce" (for applesauce), and "no". He really likes reading books still and loves playing games with mom and dad. He really likes ring-a-round the rosy. He'll start turning himself in circles and will sing "ashes ashes down." He is wearing some 12 month clothes still but a lot of 18 months, the pants are just a little to long and some are too big in the waist for him. He's in size 5 shoes. We sure love our big boy and are so happy to have his happy smiley spirit in our home.