Tash Visits

On Monday and Tuesday, Tash came to visit. Sadly, this was her very first time meeting little Reed! They got along great the whole time, he really liked playing with her.

I picked Tash up Monday morning and we headed for some yummy waffles at Bruges in Salt Lake. Then we headed over to Wheeler Farm. I've never been there before and it was very cute. Unfortunately, it was so freaking cold the whole time that Tash was here. Therefore, there was almost no one else at the farm. We got there and bundled up for a few hours outside. We got some duck food and were promptly attached by very plump, aggressive geese and ducks.

Reed still had fun feeding them. He would get a handful of seed and throw it at them.

How cute is this kid?

Loving the tractors that were all over the farm. He wanted to sit on all of them. He's even dressed a bit like a farmer.

Love it! Sorry I cut off half of Tash's face! But Reed is so happy and already warmed up to Tash quite a bit.

Love, love!

Reed wasn't too into taking pictures, so we did as good as we could.

Here he is asking for me to put him down, but his word for that is "up?"

Now he is about to try to get down on his own.

Here is his picking out his pumpkin!

After the corn maze and picking out a pumpkin, we found a really cool treehouse. Reed really enjoyed climbing up to the second level all by himself. And he turned around at just the right time for a picture.

After the treehouse, we got on the wagon ride. He was getting a bit tired and cold by this point so he enjoyed snuggling with Tash.

Then he wanted to sit on my lap, but not too excited about a picture.

Last stop on the way out was the old sleigh, obviously used when there is snow on the ground. He climbed on it anyway, how cute is this face?

One last picture with Tash!

We headed over to Ikea for some lunch and light shopping before heading home. Reed had a great time playing with the toys they had set up, a slide, a rocking horse and a tunnel. I got him a little table and chairs for the soon to be new rec room and a few Christmas gifts. Headed home after that for a nice dinner with some friends and crash out for the night.

Tuesday we headed to Ogden and Weber State so Tash could visit some old stomping grounds. After a few errands, we headed home to meet up with Fogg. We decided to head down to the Salomon Center in Ogden to show Tash around and do some activities. In the bowling alley, arcade, we found this gem. A little kid play area (free and empty) with a climbing area to a slide. Reed went around and around a thousand times. He finally got to the point that instead of turning around to go down the slide on his butt, he would just dive into the tube headfirst on his belly. I got some good pics of his huge smile.

Then it was time for some dinner at Sonora Grill, which was delicious! Unfortunately, Tash headed to the airport early Wednesday morning. It was a fabulous visit, everyone had fun, it was sort of relaxing too. Thanks for visiting Tash!

I'm THAT mom

So I am, I'm THAT mom who dresses up her kid and takes cheesy pictures - so sue me.

17 Months

Reed was 17 months old yesterday. It's hard to believe that he's already a walking, talking, toddler when sometimes I feel like I was just pregnant! Here are some recent milestones that he has reached.

• Has a few new words - ba-bye (along with a wave), off, out, baby
• He is eating from forks and spoons, and he's actually pretty good at it.
• Got his last molar on the bottom right - finally!
• Talks a lot in his language, asking "questions" and I just respond however I feel like it.
• Gets into EVERYTHING! every cupboard, every drawer, every basket.
• Lost his favorite blanky, new one to be purchased today. We have no idea where it is, but we suspect that he stashed it somewhere and we'll find it when cleaning out something bizarre.

We went to the zoo last weekend. It was so warm, weird for the end of October. We loved it and unfortunately couldn't stay for very long, so I'd love to go back before the snow falls. And I'd like to go NOT on a Saturday with some more friends. Reed really did love it and would have spent way more time at each exhibit if I had let him. Next time.

Staring at the carousel, he was fascinated by it.

He got to ride the lady bug, shoving his hand in his mouth to get that tooth out! He thought it was fun, didn't want to get off when it was over.

Reed posing with his friends, from left to right, Reed, Carden, Brooklyn, Ashton.
Notice Reed is petting the statue.

Reed's absolute favorite animal was the giraffe, he just sat there staring as above. Then he started to talk to them. So cute!

Oh and he liked the train ride too, he smiled the whole ride.

Cheers~

Backyard - before and after

Ok, here is the long story of the backyard as it's been mentioned in a few previous posts. At the beginning of the summer, our neighbors asked if they could access their backyard through our side yard in order to do an addition to the back of their home. They agreed to pay for the repairs for the damage incurred. The addition was to include an extended basement as well as a main floor. We said that we would take some of the dirt from the excavation of the basement in order to flatten out our yard.

Fast forward, we have a severely damaged side yard and mound of dirt in our backyard. We didn't anticipate having so much dirt so Fogg was able to borrow a machine from a friend of ours to start getting rid of this dirt. While he had the machine, he decided to do some much needed rock work on our walkout from the basement. Well, this machine was not quite big enough to move some of the massive rocks, and one got stuck, as you can see in some pictures below. Also, we planned on digging out some of the yard next to the walkout and under the deck to put in a patio and as we started, a very smart neighbor of ours (who was around when the house was being built and is also a general contractor) said that we can't take the dirt around the foundation or we will ruin it during the freeze/thaw cycle. Crap, we already dug up the sprinklers, took off the stairs to the deck, and put a few good holes in the ground. So now we have a torn up yard, large mound of dirt, and rocks all over the place. Time to call in the pros.

We had a guy come in and fix our rock wall, build a new walkout with rock stairs and level out the yard. A few weekends of digging trenches for sprinkler lines and drains and putting in the patio space by us. Sprinkler guys to finish our work and lay sod. So lots and lots of money out the door which we didn't really expect to do. We literally and figuratively dug ourselves a hole we couldn't get out of. We aren't too psyched about the money we had to spend but are happy about the end being in sight. Our yard is MUCH flatter than it was at the beginning of the summer, which is super great. The yard sloped towards the house so water was a problem. Lots of steps in our remodel process and pretty much eliminated that problem. Also, with Reed running around now, we won't worry about him rolling down the hill, now all we have to worry about is falling off the rock walls. And we'll have a nice patio in the back to hang out next summer. We will also install a shed in the spring to house our lawnmower, snowblower and various yard tools. Eventually a new deck will be put up but we need to get more money first!

So without further ado, here are the before and after pictures of our backyard project.

Before and After of the walkout:

See the rock there in the center? That's the one Fogg couldn't move past that point.


Before and after from the doorway of the walkout:

Before and After from the doorway of the walkout:
The rock that is stuck in the middle.
Gone!


Before and After of the whole back of the house:


Before and After of the walkout from the deck:
There is that pesky rock again!
It's now the top step on the far left of the picture!

Here is a walking tour of the new grass from the side of the house to the back:

New tier in the upper corner of the yard to transition to the other tiers better.

Now looking back from where we just came from:

Ta Da! We are done (well almost)

Thanks for taking the tour today, hope you enjoyed it. Left on the to-do list is to finish that patio on the right of the picture above and to install the shed that will be next to the tree that you can see on the left side of this picture (in above pictures it's where there is the blue pool). Please send money or workers if you'd like to see either of those things happen soon ;) Just kidding - sort of.

Cheers~