Happy Birthday Jace (only 17 days late)

Jace's turned 3 on the 1st of March! We were in the midst of the craziness of trying to get our house listed, looking for a new car, school, work, etc. and so it was like Wednesday or Thursday before it even occurred to me that I should order a cake (his birthday was Saturday). Good thing I am super pro at ordering cakes. :) All he wanted was a Spiderman cake, so at least we came through on that. We decided like Friday that we would go to the Dinosaur Museum at Thanksgiving Point on Saturday morning and invited Sarah and Daniel to come with Josh.

The museum was great fun and the kids had a blast. It is super interactive, which is great for little kids. After spending a few hours there, we came home to have lunch. I bought some tamales off a lady on the street and we had those. We had no idea how they would taste, but they were super delicious. Winner.

Here are a few pictures of the event. I have got to get a new camera. I legitimately have no idea where my old camera is and I only use my phone, which is not the best because the quality suffers. Super convenient, but not the best quality for sure.

When he was busy at the museum and I'd ask him to smile, this was the face I'd get. Lovely.

I promise, Flor was there too! One picture as proof. Poor girl. She just wasn't as thrilled with the museum as the other kids.

Cute Josh. I thought I had better pictures of him, but apparently not.

Opening presents! He was just thrilllled with this train from Grandma Lisa. Favorite present by far.

Still looking at the train when he had other presents to open...

Hallie wanted to buy him a present, so she brought her own money and bought this at the grocery store while we were buying his cake. haha. Apparently he liked it though!

Blurry, but he is such a cheeser...

That is one cute face if I do say so myself.

A few things about Jace at 3:
Jace is a handful, wild boy, but can melt your heart so quickly the next minute. He is animated and makes the best facial expressions. He loves trains, trains, and more trains. He also loves to ride his wiggle car that he got for Christmas and is a real pro at it. He has picked up on learning things that I haven't taught him (probably from Hallie), like counting (he counts to 20 pretty well), spelling his name, etc. He loves to play games with the family and obliges Hallie and plays the cupcake princess game with her often. Jace and Hallie are the best of friends and they can play for hours together making up games. While Flor adores Jace, Jace is still rough with her sometimes. Lately, though, I have caught him hugging her and telling her things like "Hi cute Florinda" when he doesn't think I am looking. :) He really is sweet (except for when he's not...).

Jace is quite fond of telling everyone when we go places, "I pee my pants." This is true. The kids has no desire to go to the bathroom at all and must be reminded constantly to go to the bathroom. He gets red in the face and crouches down when he has to go and then continues on with his playing because he thinks he has surpressed the urge enough. I am telling you-- I have no idea what to do with him. He is well aware of when he needs to go, he'd just rather not. Never had this issue with Hallie...so not sure where to go from here. I am hoping it is a phase he'll grow out of. Right, moms, right?

Okay and we'll end with some Jace-isms:

During his prayers:
*"Please bless the green bananas to turn yellow"
*"please bless that we can eat cereal in the morning."
*"Please bless Grandpa Dave to give me doggy jammies."

In church, very loudly,
"Mommy, I play with your hair. I make it Beeeuuuuuutiful!"

After I explained one day that he is named after Uncle Chris, who is a good man, and that he should be a good man like Uncle Chris (this came after a particularly naughty day), he went around telling everyone, "When I died, I went to heaven just like Uncle Chris!" He caught the wrong part of that story....

At church, every time he has to use the potty, he sits on there and then goes over every letter on the toilet paper holder as follows, "What letter is this mom?" "You tell me, Jace." "okay, R." He goes through each letter that way and gets them all right. I am super proud mom that about the only thing he can spell is "ROLLMASTR".

I obviously need to be better at keeping track of these! He is a funny kid.

We love our 3 year old big boy!

Flor's Testimony

I am glad that I have this little space to record little stories about the kids as they happen. Here is one such story about Flor.

I am in the primary presidency in our ward, so I get to sit in primary with Flor (and Hals) each week. This week, the primary president, my friend Annie, taught the kids a lesson about having a strong testimony. She brought in lego blocks with different ways to build your testimony written on them. The kids build a solid base and then a big tower with the blocks to represent their testimonies. At the end, Annie asked the kids, "Are our testimonies done growing? Or, like this tower, can you keep building them up? Does anyone think their testimony is done growing right now?" No one in the room raised their hands, except Flor, and she raised both of her hands high in the air. A girl in the class behind her tried to help her put her hands down, but Flor gave her a kind of crusty look and then raised both of her hands high in the air again. She was quite proud.

While funny, I also thought this story was symbolic of the truth of the matter. Flor probably does have a perfect testimony of Jesus Christ and of the gifts He has given us. I know she came to Earth in the state that she did for a reason and that she will be able to express that perfect testimony to us someday.