New Swing

The people who lived in our house before us built a metal swing post so we decided to buy a swing to put in it. Alan loves it!!! The only problem is that the swing is almost too small for him...we might have to buy a bigger one.

A pregnancy update: I have only 19 days left until my due date. I have mixed feelings about it - I am ready to be done being pregnant but I have a mile long list of things I want to get done before baby boy gets here. We'll see how much gets done before baby arrives. I had an ultrasound on Friday. The doc wanted to check on the baby because my uterus is measuring too small. The baby is doing great - healthy heart beat, enough amniotic fluid, and he is a healthy size. He is sitting VERY LOW in my pelvis - most of my discomfort is coming from his position. Since some people have complained about no pictures of me here you go - a nice pregnancy profile for you.
Other things that have kept us busy this week:
- On Saturday our ward had an Around the World potluck. It was really fun and yummy. We made borsch and naniamo bars. Both were a hit. It was fun to try all the different recipes like enchiladas, Indonesian food, Laos food, French food, Greek food and many more.
- Also on Saturday we worked in our yard for part of the morning. We didn't do enough yard work in the fall so there was a lot to do this spring. We spent a few hours raking up all the leaves and sticks. Now it just needs mowed and I think we are going to plant grass seed on some of the bare patches. I want to plant sweet peas along the side of our house but the cats have been using it as a litter box so I might wait until I am not pregnant to do that.
- Alan and I went to FHE group. The group is so that moms can make a FHE lesson and then copy it off for everyone else. That way you make one lesson and get 6 more lessons from the others in the group. The theme that the lessons are supposed to be on this time is Our Heritage (since the lessons will be used in July the lesson could be about our country's heritage or our pioneer heritage).
Thats it for now.

Easter Sunday

Easter morning we told Alan the Easter bunny had hid all of his eggs down stairs. He was so funny to watch looking for the eggs...its a good thing the bunny didn't hide them too hard because Alan had a hard time finding them all. When he would find one he would shriek with excitement and then run over to his bucket and throw the egg in...he only broke two before we convinced him not to throw them.

Alan's favorite part was when he found his Easter basket. He loves chocolate!!!!! He also liked the stickers, puzzle and Curious George book.
When Reed and I found our baskets he looked through them and picked out the things he liked and added them to his basket. By the end of it he had a lot of chocolate in his basket, but he shared with us (very kind of him considering that half of it was ours).
Now we have been using all of the chocolate as rewards for potty training. He is doing really good with the peeing part, but not good at all about having his bowel movements in the toilet. I am getting so frustrated!!! I can't tell if he just doesn't understand the concept or if he understands and is just being stubborn. Any tips?
ps. Shelly - I looked for that book that you suggested and our library doesn't have it and neither does the book store in the mall.

Dying eggs

Alan loved dying the Easter eggs. He couldn't understand why we wanted to use a spoon to put the eggs in the dye - why not just use your hands? Here is a picture of Alan trying to force the egg into the dye (he wasn't the most gentle with the eggs).
Here is Alan's way of doing things:
And here is the result of Alan's way of doing things:
He loved to draw on the eggs first with crayons:
Here is a picture of Alan's special egg. He drew on it and dyed it and we put his name on it. He was pretty proud of it.
The final products: