Updates

Conner had his 6 month check-up a couple of weeks ago. He is doing very well. Here are his stats:
weight: 16 lbs. 9 oz. (30th percentile)
height: 28 inches (90th percentile)
Conner is starting to sit up really well. He can sit for several minutes but he does occasionally fall over. In the past week his lower two front teeth have come in (you can kind of see one tooth in the picture below if you look close). We have continued to introduce him to veggies, which has been fun. We have found that Conner likes squash, sweet potatoes, and peas. He absolutely does not like carrots which Reed and I thought was strange since carrots are one of our favorite veggies. Tonight we are going to give him some green beans for the first time. In other exciting news Conner is now sleeping through the night - from 7 pm to 6 pm. It is so nice to get a solid 7 or 8 hours of sleep at night.

Reed is working half days on Saturdays from now until Christmas. When he isn't working he has been winterizing our yard by raking up the leaves. Alan usually helps him. In the picture below Reed asked Alan to take a picture. It turned out pretty good.

Alan laying in the leaf pile that Reed made.

Squash, anyone?

We started Conner on rice cereal while we were on our trip up to Canada. He was not a huge fan. I thought maybe he would like it better with veggies but the pictures below show his reaction to his first taste of squash. I think the pictures say it all.
I don't think any of it ended up in his mouth. However after 3 or 4 days he warmed up to it and now he seems to like it.

Halloween

I am glad Halloween was last week and not this week. Last week we had beautiful weather...it was so warm that Alan didn't need to wear a coat for part of the time. Today has been windy and cold and cloudy. For FHE before Halloween we went to our zoo's Spooktacular. They had hundreds of lit jack-o-lanterns and they had all of the zoo staff dressed up as characters from movies (Batman, Indiana Jones, Winnie the Pooh....) They had a couple of scary things too - a life size Frankenstein that was writhing on a table. We tried to get close to it but Alan froze about 20 feet away, stared at it, and then he turned and kept walking without looking at it again. They also had a dinosaur dig where Alan found a fossil and at the end he got a big cup full of candy. Alan tried to just take one piece of candy out of the cup and he was surprised and delighted that the lady gave him the whole cup full. Also at the zoo they had several of the characters that you could pose with (see the next 3 pictures).

Alan got right in there with his spoon to clean out the pumpkin. He told us he wanted a "not scary" face so we made one happy face pumpkin and one kind of scary face pumpkin.
Our happy pumpkin.
Alan was very excited to light the pumpkins and put them outside.
This year Alan was a knight in shining armor. He wanted to be a monkey but he also wanted a sword so I convinced him to be a knight with a sword because I couldn't find a decently priced monkey costume and I didn't know how to make one.
Conner dressed up in a little Japanese suit. I took both boys trick-or-treating down main street and then Reed took Alan trick-or-treating around a block with one of Alan's friends.
Alan loves his candy. He is very good about sharing though. Reed or I can ask for almost anything in his candy and he will just hand it over, no problem.

Canada Trip

Warning: this is a LONG post with lots of pictures.

We went up to Canada to visit my family for Canadian Thanksgiving (we actually celebrated Thanksgiving on a different day so that we could be there). We left on a Friday afternoon and made it to Mom and Dad Bassett's house that night. We got to visit with them and Austin and Mindy the next morning, then we finished the drive on Saturday afternoon. The boys travelled SO well!! I was so excited. Here is a break down of what we did and pictures to go with it:

Sunday - went to church and visited with my parents and Grandma and Grandpa Elzea

Monday - My Grandma Pitcher passed away last month and we didn't make it up for the funeral. We visited my Grandpa Pitcher and talked for a while and then he showed us Grandma's grave site and marker. She was sure a great grandma and I miss her. That night my brother Reed and his girlfriend Jodie arrived. They have been in Australia for the last year. It was so good to see them again! They got to see Conner for the first time and Alan took a special liking to Reed. Alan spent a lot of time playing with Reed and admiring the scabs and marks Reed has on his leg from his motorcycle accident.
Tuesday - I can't remember what we did that day...Mom, Dad, any reminders?

Below - Alan is trying to use the boulder catapult to knock over the men before my dad can make the men charge the castle.

Cute picture of my Dad and Conner.

Wednesday - we celebrated Thanksgiving with a huge feast. Yummy!!! Conner got to try out the Jolly Jumper while we were in Canada and he seemed to enjoy himself.


I love this picture. It looks like the boys are dancing and Conner's smile is so cute.

Thurday - was a busy day! In the morning we went to the temple. Thanks again mom and dad for watching the boys so we could go. We had a picnic lunch afterward which was fun even though it was a little chilly. Then we drove back to Lethbridge and went swimming at the Ramada with my cousin Janae and her triplet girls (who are the same age as Alan). We had a blast!! For the first hour or so we had the pool to ourselves. The kids had fun pushing the tubes around in the water and then we took the kids down the water slides. They all seemed to enjoy that.

After that we went home, had dinner and then headed off to the fire station. Since Alan loves fire trucks my parents arranged with Dave, a family friend who is a paramedic and fire fighter, to take us on a tour of the fire station. Alan got to sit in the driver seat of the fire truck, with the lights flashing, which he thought was the best. Dave showed us the fire fighters equipment, which Reed and I thought was really interesting. Alan got to sit in the back of the ambulance and have his heart monitored. Dave showed Alan all of the different hoses and he even let Alan spray water on the drive way with the smallest hose (normally used for putting out grass fires). Reed and I learned a lot of cool facts about fire fighters and their equipment and Alan had the time of his life, being so close to the big trucks.


Friday - I visited with my friend Heather, who had brought her twin boys home to celebrate their first birthday. It was nice to visit and get caught up. I missed seeing my other friend Deanna, because she moved to Edmonton :( Then that night Reed and my Dad took Alan swimming. They have a really nice little pool there that Alan can wade around in.

Saturday - we said goodbye and left early in the morning and made it to Mom and Dad Bassett's house in time to go to their ward halloween party. We were glad to visit with them, even though it was a short visit.

Sunday - went to sacrament meetingand then drove home.

I can't tell you how nice it was to take a break and visit with everyone!

Dinner in a Pumpkin

Before we left on our trip to Canada we made dinner-in-a-pumpkin. Yummy!!! First we had to gut the pumpkin though. The expression on Alan's face in the picture below might be hard to make out, so in case you are wondering, it is disgust. He touched the pumpkin guts at first but then he wanted a spoon.

Cheers! Here we are enjoying the meal!

Here is how Conner entertained himself during the meal - pulling Daddy's hair. He had a very tight hold!

Happy Canadian Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Unfortunately, I got sick with the stomach flu last night and I am still not feeling very good. Poor Alan has been watching so much tv today because I don't have the energy to do anything else. We are driving up to Canada on Friday and Saturday so as long as I am better by then and no one else gets sick I will be happy. I am so excited to go.

On Saturday we went to a pumpkin patch to pick out some pumpkins. Reed and I had a lot of fun but it was pretty cold so Alan was done pretty quick. He told me his hands were cold and then he went sprinting back to the van after a couple of minutes.

We found one pumpkin for eating and now Alan asks everyday if he can eat it. We will see if we get to it before we leave. I can't think of anything else that has happened in the last month...oh well.

Conner's 4 month check-up

Conner had his 4 month doctor's appointment about a month ago. He is doing very well. Here are his stats:

Height: 27 1/4 inches

percentile: 97%

Weight: 14 lbs 12 oz.

percentile: 50%

The doctor suggested giving him more tummy time. He absolutely hates to be on his tummy and now that he can roll over he doesn't get much tummy time - little stinker. Oh well.