New Blog

I've decided to just keep everything on the other blog. I'll keep this blog up for a little while but will delete it eventually.

So if you'd like to stay updated on our family you can find us at:

bryceandkathleenwright.blogspot.com

For anyone that cares...

Okay, so I am tired and ready for bed. I have been working for a little while on changing the background of our blog. I also had the great idea to change our blog over to a gmail account. Because our other blog uses hotmail and for some reason you can't change the main email to a gmail email. Is that confusing? Yes. And annoying? Yes. For some weird reason it annoys me to log in using a hotmail account and I just have to have everything be nice and organized. Anyway, so I figured I'd create a new gmail and a new blog, transfer everything over and then delete our old blog and use the same name. And as I was doing it I figured out that you can't use the same name.

This is probably too much explanation. But I'm tired and sick of computers and am not really thinking straight.

The point of all of this is, that I posted on our new blog. Because it's a post that just HAS to be posted today otherwise the whole post is ruined. (you'll understand if you click over) And I don't feel like staying up to figure out how to fix everything, so I will just redirect you.  If you'd like to read my update go to:

bryceandkathleenwright.blogspot.com

I might just change our blog over to that sometime anyway. I haven't decided. But for now, for all of you out there that really care, click on the link above.

Playing Outside

We are loving this fall weather and have been spending a lot of time outside. Spencer loves the outdoors and would be happy to play outside all day! We spent some time out in the front yard tonight until it got too dark.

Spencer waiting for daddy to kick the ball to him.

Bugs are one of Spencer's favorite things right now. He always has to stop when he sees a bug. And usually he tries to pick it up or stop it from crawling away. He had a wasp cornered on the back porch one day last week! He kept laughing and jumping up and down so I went over there and figured out what he was doing. That was the end of playing on the back porch! I hate wasps!

I tried to get a good picture of him in his cute new shirt but that is a very difficult thing to do. Usually when I pull the camera out he just wants to hold the camera and watch the videos and look at the pictures of the "baby". I think he knows it's pictures of him but he always says baby when he sees himself on the camera. :) The only way I could get him to hold still and not take the camera away from me was to give him another camera. And then it was impossible to get him to look at me. So this is as good as it's gonna get.

Spencer is learning new words and new things every day! Usually when I get home from work I feel like he has gotten so much bigger because he's saying new words and doing new things. He is definitely into doing things himself and doing it his way. He refuses to sit in his booster seat at meals. Which makes things difficult because when he sits in a big boy chair he can get down and run around instead of eat. He loves to be outside and to read stories. We've learned a lot of new words from reading stories! He is also getting pretty good at recognizing letters. He has some foam bathtub letters and numbers that has helped with this. This morning he was behind me while I was picking something up off the floor and started pointing out some of the letters on the back of my shirt. He also loves to count and usually starts with the number three for some reason. Some of his favorite foods right now are yogurt, bacon, ham, hot dogs, pretzels, cheese, and strawberries. Those are a few things that if you put in front of him he will usually always eat! He also of course loves anything sweet. He loves watching Thomas the train and playing with his train tracks. He's finally figured out how to put the tracks together too, so he's good at helping daddy create some pretty cool tracks. Spencer also loves to jump. He jumps off of things, jumps up and down. He also loves to just run around. The other morning we went to the duck pond with my mom to go on a walk. He was not happy about being pushed in his stroller. So I let him out and he ran for about half of our little lap! He's got quite a bit of endurance. Now we'll just have to work on his speed. :)

Here are just a few funny videos we've gotten of Spencer lately. Spencer loves popcorn! We were eating some one Sunday evening and Spencer loved feeding daddy some popcorn while he was talking to his family on the phone.

Bryce was throwing some pillows at Spencer one night. I don't know why he loves to do this so much...I guess just to toughen him up or something. :) Anyway, we found out that Spencer will be a good soccer or basketball player because he is a huge flopper! Bryce would hit him with the pillow and a few seconds later he would fall down onto his tummy. I think he just really loves falling down. His favorite game is ring around the rosies.

Halloween

Our Halloween week-end was pretty eventful. We started things off by making some sugar cookies! Spencer loves to help make cookies. Probably mostly because he likes to sneak cookie dough while I'm not looking. And he's getting pretty good at it.

He is a pretty good helper too. He likes to pour things into the mixer. Sometimes he totally misses the bowl but it's good practice I guess, right?

My sister Jessica and her kids came down for the weekend. Spencer loved having the kids to play with! Thursday night our church had a trunk or treat. This was the only time Spencer got dressed up because unfortunately on Friday Breeny, Grace, and Jilly all woke up with the stomach flu! We apparently passed it on to them because Spencer, Bryce, and grandma had it not too long ago. Benson and Jessica got it before they left for home too. We were pretty sad to see everyone sick! Spencer kept wanting to play with everyone, but when you've got the stomach flu running around isn't quite as fun.

Spencer was a train engineer for Halloween this year! Grandma Barbara got him the hat while we were in Utah and Bryce's dad got him overalls for his birthday. So all we had to find was a red handkerchief and we were all set!

Spencer with his cousins Breeny, Grace, Jilly, and Benson.


They only stayed to play a few games because it was pretty crowded. Spencer has been getting pretty shy around a lot of people lately. And he usually is always chewing on his fingers when he gets shy. It's funny because there is a picture of me when I was in nursery and I used to do the same thing. I'm hoping this is just a phase and doesn't mean he'll be shy forever like me... But he looks pretty cute even when he chews on his fingers. :)

So our Halloween week-end started out pretty well but the stomach flu kind of ruined our plans! We were glad to spend some time with the Richards though and I think they all had fun, at least until Friday night.

Utah!

It has been way too long since I've posted! I have been meaning to post about our trip to Utah (which has now been over a month ago!). I wanted to get some pictures that my sister-in-law gave us on a CD but for some reason the CD drive on our computer is no longer working. So here are a few pictures we got from our trip with our camera.

Our trip was great! There is always so much to do when we visit and it seems like we never have enough time for everything. But we did get to do a lot of fun things.


One day we went on the Heber Creeper with Bryce's mom, Kylee, and Jaxson. I don't think Spencer ever realized that he was on the train, but he loved seeing the train when we got off of it!



We also spent one morning at the zoo. Here is Spencer with his cousins Kaleb, Alek, Kylee, and Jaxson. Spencer was a little grumpy for the last half of our visit. He was really ready for a nap. We decided to save riding the train for last. As we were walking to the train Spencer fell asleep. And he was out of it. I kept trying to wake him up because I knew he'd love the train but he wasn't having it. So we are waiting in line and the train comes by and blows it's whistle and Spencer sits straight up and starts saying "train! train!" and then fell back asleep as soon as it was gone! He did this a few times until we pulled the camera out to take a video.


We also went down to Provo on Saturday and spent the day with my sisters because it was Jenny's birthday! We hiked the Y. And yes, we hiked all the way to the top...or close to the top anyway. Or maybe not even close to the top. Spencer is pretty heavy in one of those carriers and isn't quite ready to hike the Y on his own yet.


We also went to the BYU football game. It was pretty hot so Spencer, Sarah, and I decided to leave at half time. Bryce stuck it out until the very end of course.

On Sunday we got together with all of Bryce's family. Here are all of the cousins! Aren't they such a good looking group? Spencer had a lot of fun playing with everyone while we were out there.

Everyone again...except Spencer? Actually you can see him on the ground if you look close. He decided he didn't want to sit on the wall anymre and so jumped off!

Perhaps I'll have to update this post later when we fix our dumb computer.

I have really been terrible about taking pictures lately. So these are the only other two that aren't from either our trip or Spencer's birthday.


Spencer loves wearing his backpack around! Doesn't he look so big? Like he's ready to go to school or something?

And this was right after his nap. He had some crazy hair! Shortly after this I gave him a haircut. And cut it too short again. I do that everytime! Someday I will figure it out and he will finally have some good haircuts! Maybe that won't be until he learns to sit still though...I guess we'll see!

Not too much else is happening in our lives. The stomach flu has made it's way around our house. Except with me! And hopefully I don't get it. Spencer was up all night one night throwing up like every 5 minutes. It was awful. And we didn't know it was the stomach flu yet and he just happened to eat a little dishwasher soap out of the dishwasher that night. So we thought it was from that. It was a very long night! But everyone is pretty much back to normal now.

Two!

Two years ago today Spencer was born, October 7th at 10:54am. Don't worry, I won't retell everything I remember about his birth...you can read that here if you're interested. :) It's hard to believe he used to look like this.

Spencer on his actual birth day.

He really is such a sweet and fun little boy and his mom and dad love him tons. He is really growing up fast.

We had a great day celebrating. First Spencer woke up to a decorated chair and donut holes (thanks to Grandma for the donuts!). He was so excited about his chair that he didn't want to sit in it, just wanted to be able to see it.

Grandpa sharing his banana with Spencer at breakfast. Spencer wasn't too interested in any of the fruit we tried to give him at breakfast. Grandma also got him some strawberries, which he usually loves, but all he wanted was donuts! I can't really blame him either.

My sister Jessica always does this for her kids on their birthday, and I stole it because I think it's such a cute idea. So last night we taped a few "2's" to Spencer's door. I had to give him the iPod to make him stand still for a few seconds so I could get a picture, but even that didn't work too well. He is definitely two! And we're still working on holding two fingers up. It's either one or all five right now. :)

I decided to make a train cake for Spencer's cake since he's obsessed with trains right now. I thought it turned out pretty well. I used this cake and frosting recipe and it tasted pretty delicious as well. It took a lot of time but was totally worth it.

Spencer really loved it. So much that I couldn't get him away from it. It's a good thing I took pictures right after I finished decorating it, because he decided to make his mark on it (which you can see in a later picture). And when I tried to take him away from it because he was messing it up he got pretty upset with me. He's definitely obsessed with trains. :)

Before we had cake Spencer got to open all his presents. He got some great new clothes from Grandma Stacey and Grandpa Jeff, new tracks and train cars from Grandma and Grandpa Gaisford, a train flashlight and DVD from Aunt Julie (which was definitely his favorite of the night), and a backpack, letters for the bathtub, and a car toy from mom and dad. He also got a few presents that we opened in Utah from Grandma Barbara, Grandpa Glen and Suzette, and Aunt Sharayne, Aunt Trudy, and Uncle Chad. So he definitely had more than enough presents and has plenty of new toys to keep him occupied for a few months. :)


Bryce went to walmart yesterday with the money his Grandma and Grandpa Gaisford gave us for Spencer's birthday. Needless to say I probably won't be sending him to get presents unsupervised again. :) He ended up spending more money because he couldn't decide between two different track sets, so he just decided to get them both. And he confessed later that he was really picking out new toys for himself, not so much Spencer...although he knew Spencer would enjoy them just as much as he would. And when we opened up all the tracks it was Bryce and my cousins Jack and Austin who were setting up the train and playing while Spencer was content to just sit and watch the older boys have fun.

After presents we sang happy birthday, blew out the candles (with a little help from Grandpa)...

*and notice the smushed "enc" in his name, that was his mark.

and ate cake!

Before putting him to bed we took a little video of Spencer and asked him how his day was. He was a little distracted with his new toy, but I'd say he had a pretty good day.

We sure do love our little Spence!

It's a...

So we just got back from our Utah vacation. And while I have a ton of pictures and will be updating the blog soon with a few more posts, we have some exciting news that deserves it's own post without pictures!

I am now 20 weeks pregnant and yesterday we went in for our ultrasound. The baby looked good and was giving the lady a little bit of trouble because it was moving around so much. But she got all the measurements she needed finally and we found out that our new little baby is....




A BOY!!!

Yes, another boy! I'll definitely be outnumbered for a while, maybe forever, who knows. :) But we are very excited to have a healthy baby boy coming in February. He is very active, just like Spencer was/is, so I'm sure two boys will keep us pretty busy. And I figure I can always look forward to some alone time at least once a year when Bryce takes the boys out on the father son campout. ;) Now all we need is to figure out a name...

ABC's

This is just a little video I got of Spencer repeating his ABC's. Most of the letters in the middle all sound pretty similar, but he's getting there. He's also started saying "have a good day!" because that's what Bryce always says to him when he leaves for work.

Today we are just trying to get all packed for our trip to Utah tomorrow! We are pretty excited and hopefully the plane ride goes well. I'm just grateful we aren't driving so I'm sure it will be wonderful even if Spencer gets a little crazy. :)

Week-end Trip To Texas

A few weekends ago Spencer, my sister Chelsea, and I took a short trip down to Houston to visit my brother John and his family. Spencer did pretty well during the long drive. But we were all happy to be out of the car once we got there. Spencer and Sam had fun playing together. We are still working with Spencer on sharing and being gentle and not biting! He is really into biting lately. Sam is a pretty tough little kid so he dealt with Spencer's occasional shoves and bites pretty well. One time Sam was sitting in his high chair eating. Spencer came over and was kissing his toes. All of a sudden we hear Sam crying and realize Spencer decided he'd rather bite the toes than kiss them! Hopefully he will grow out of this stage soon. :)

While we were there we took a trip to the beach. I didn't pull my camera out much during the trip (I didn't even get a picture of Spencer and Sam together!) but I did bring it to the beach. I was a little nervous about how Spencer would do at the beach. Mostly because as we were walking out to the car Spencer fell and skinned his knee pretty bad. So the whole car ride to the beach he was crying. I think mostly because he could see his knee. He would cry a little and stop, then he'd look down at his knee and start crying hysterically again. And salt water stings! But after he got up and his shorts covered up his hurt knee he was totally fine! He didn't even notice his knee at all, even when he was in the water. It took him a few minutes to warm up to the waves coming at him, but after that he loved it! He was chasing the bird, running around in the water, picking up the sand and throwing it in the water. We had a great time.

Spencer digging up sand...probably his favorite part of the beach.

Chasing a bird..

Other than our trip to Houston not much else has been happening around here. Bryce is busy finishing supplemental applications for PA school and after those are finished he'll be busy with a few online classes. I am still working a few nights a week and am trying to find things to keep me busy while I'm there. So if anyone has any really good books to recommend, please let me know! Spencer just keeps growing and is such a fun little boy! I can't believe how big he looks in some of these pictures..

Spencer loves reading stories. And he also loves to sit in his bumbo!

A little while a go I bought Spencer a little potty. While we are still far from ready to potty train I figured we'd get him used to sitting on a potty and see how much interest he had in it. And mostly he just likes to play with it and pull it apart. I'm sure that will cause problems when he actually starts using it but oh well. So far he has only used the potty like it was meant to be used once. And I had to keep sitting him back down on it because he kept trying to get up and walk around while going poop. And after he did his business we took the potty and showed daddy. Isn't it funny how exciting going to the bathroom is when you're almost 2? TMI? Most likely...I apologize if anyone can't handle talking about poop. Or if you don't think it's kinda funny. You probably shouldn't be reading our blog if thats the case. :)

I just put this picture on because I can't believe how big Spencer looks!

Spencer loves to be in the car. While pretending to drive he found daddy's sunglasses and thought he was so cool.

They're a little big, but still so cute.


Grandma Stacey got Spencer an early birthday present that he could enjoy with this great weather we've been having. A new bike!

And he absolutely loves it! He keeps trying to go down to our neighbors driveway, which is a pretty steep hill. I always stop him before he gets there which causes quite a scene. The boy has no fear.

Photo Shoot

So I decided to try my hand at freezer paper stenciling the other day. I've always heard that it's really easy and have wanted to try it out. And seriously, it was so easy! And turned out pretty cute. So Spencer and I had a little photo shoot to show off his new shirt.

He was pretty resistant at first.

But after we gave him a sucker...

He was willing to give us a few good smiles!

The shirt did have a purpose of course. We tried to be as creative as we could when we told our families that we will soon be a family of four! A big brother shirt isn't very original but it worked. :)

So, in case you haven't guessed it already...we are expecting a new baby and Spencer will be a big brother in February! We feel very grateful and blessed to be able to welcome a new baby into our home soon. And although we know it will probably be quite an adjustment for Spencer, we know he'll make a great big brother!

A New Bed

Recently we inherited some bunk beds from my aunt. They don't need the bunk beds anymore and were getting some new furniture and asked if we'd like to take them off their hands. We of course said yes! So then a few weeks ago we decided we might as well move Spencer from his crib/toddler bed to the bunk bed. Bryce and I had talked about it for a day or two and then one morning I just decided to do it. So my mom, Sarah, and I put it all together before Spencer's afternoon nap.

Spencer in his new bed. There's a little space between the wall and the headboard and footboard. So I just used Spencer's old crib bumper and quilt to get rid of the space.

Spencer has been sleeping really well in his new bed. During his first nap he woke up once and I heard him on the monitor and he kept saying "oh no! oh no! oh no!" so I think he woke up a little confused. :) And one night he fell out of his bed. I went in to get him and he was just laying on the floor with his blanket still asleep! He didn't even wake up! I just put him back in his bed and he slept fine the rest of the night.

I think the big bed has been a good change. We always give Spencer his teddy bear and a little train at night. And the new bed gives Spencer plenty of room to play with his train in the morning, so I usually don't hear any noise from him until 7:30 or 8.


While we were moving everything around we found a little TV. Sarah hooked it up to the cable and Spencer had fun watching Sesame Street while we worked. He of course also loved "helping" us put the bed together.

Summer Fun

I can hardly believe it is August already! School starts here next week! Isn't that crazy? Not that it affects us...but it's still weird.

It has been so hot here lately too. August is definitely the worst part of the summer. Yesterday it was 104! Needless to say we play inside most of the day and occasionally venture out to get the mail or play in some cold water.

This past week has been pretty exciting for us because we had some visitors! Spencer's cousins Benson, Grace, and Breeny spent a few days with us and then my sister Jessica and baby Jilly came down a few days later. Spencer had a lot of fun following the big kids around. We have learned he has a few issues with sharing...especially with baby Jilly. Anytime she would pick up a toy he would run over to her and grab it away while saying "no no no no". But by the end of their trip he was doing a lot better and was actually giving some of his toys to Jilly to play with. So that's a good sign anyway.

One morning while they were here we decided to play at the park. It was early and a little cloudy so it wasn't terribly hot outside yet. We did leave as soon as the clouds moved away though. But it still gave the kids enough time to run around and have a good time together.

Spencer and Sabrina on the see saw.

We also spent a few mornings at the splash pad. Spencer and I just recently discovered the splash pad and I can't believe we didn't know sooner. It is free and so much fun!

Spencer playing in his favorite part of the splash pad. (don't you just love how Sabrina is in the background laying out? haha)

He loves to cover the water with his foot or just touch the water so it splashes his face. This time when he uncovered the water with his foot he forgot to move his head! :) Such a silly kid.

The kids decided they wanted to make a bat house. Actually, it was mostly Benson who wanted to make a bat house. He is such a smart kid, it's really amazing sometimes. But he loves animals and I guess has been reading about bats or something. Anyway, one night he kept asking if we could make a bat house and so I told him we would in the morning. I was just going to have each of the kids make a little one out of shoe boxes, but they all wanted a really big one. So I found the biggest box we had and decided they'd probably have fun playing inside of it after we put it outside to see if any bats wanted to live in it. :) So I cut a door on one of the sides. And we decided to make it even more fun by finger painting the box! Benson only painted with us for a few minutes and then he wanted to make food for the bats to eat (which was jell-0 with raisins and carrots in it) but Grace, Breeny, and Spencer had a lot of fun decorating the box and getting really messy.


Painting our bat house. Isn't it beautiful?

More painting. After a few minutes we figured out the best way to paint was to just dip their hands in the paint and rub it in everywhere. It made for a very colorful box!


And they all got very messy. Grace somehow got some paint on her lips! It's a good thing I made sure to buy washable fingerpaints.

For Family Home Evening while they kids were here my mom did a lesson on patience. She used Elder Uchtdorf's talk from this past General Conference. He talks about a study done with 4 year old children on willpower. Basically they put a marshmallow in front of the kids and told them they could either eat it right away or, if they waited for 15 minutes, they could have two marshmallows. So my mom gave each of the kids a marshmallow on a plate and told them that if they waited to eat their marshmallow until after Grandpa read them a story that they could have something special to go with it. I was so impressed that Spencer hadn't eaten his marshmallow after a few minutes that I ran upstairs to get the camera so I could get it on video. He kept picking it up, but would put it back down, look around at everyone else's marshmallows, listen to the story for a second and then pick it back up. So I run get the camera and as soon as I start video taping him he takes a bite and it's over after that. :)

Really I was just impressed he waited at all. He loves his marshmallows, as we have seen previously! We'll have to try it again when he's four and see how it goes. All of the other kids of course waited through the whole story. And after the story we got to make s'mores in the microwave with their marshmallow!

And even though Spencer cheated and ate his marshmallow he still got to have a s'more. He was a little upset with himself for not having the willpower to resist his marshmallow, but he got over it pretty quick.

Our little Spencer will be 22 months in just a few days! 22 months! Which means he isn't that little anymore. Well, he hasn't been little for a while I guess but I can hardly believe he'll be 2 soon. He woke up one night and I went in and tried to rock him and I realized how big he really is getting.

He is starting to say quite a few words. He will usually try and repeat most words but there are only a few he will use on his own. His favorites right now are "where is it" and "oh no". He says "where is it" at least 50 times a day. The other day I was reading him a Dora the Explorer book we got from the library. And if you've ever watched the show Dora has a backpack. And when they use the backpack they sing a little song that starts out "backpack backpack". So I was singing that to Spencer and he started saying it to. And speaking of singing, Spencer loves to sing songs in nursery. I helped in nursery this past week and he does all of the actions and just loves to sing songs. His favorites seem to be the three little monkeys teasing mr alligator and popcorn popping. And I think it's so hilarious that he loves singing time in nursery, but anytime I try to sing songs with him at home he starts crying and screaming until I stop! I try to sing songs with him anyway, but he seriously gets mad at me until I stop. It must just be my voice! Who knows...but it's kinda funny.

The other night while Bryce was making some spaghetti for dinner he heard Spencer start yelling "dad! dad!" and heard the piano and so he figured he'd better go see what was going on. So he goes to the piano and there is Spencer standing up on the keys stepping up and down with his hands up in the air! He sure is a crazy baby but that's why we love him!