Growth

I'm going to share a little secret. Being a mother is hard. And a child's discovery of temper tantrums does not make it any easier. Try as I might not to encourage them, Henry still seems to find them effective. It's hard to find motherhood rewarding when your only companion for most of the day isn't being nice to you. I've really been discouraged lately.

Yesterday, though, Henry did two wonderful things that made up for all of the tantrums. Ben and I have been wanting to see Life of Pi, which is playing in the theater in our park, but I was a bit anxious about taking Henry. We went last night, and Henry was perfect. He sat in our laps the whole time, occasionally talking to the screen, but being extremely well behaved. Many people in the theater commented on it. It felt good to know that our son doesn't have to constantly be running around to be happy.

The second thing happened as we were getting him ready for bed. We knelt down on the floor for a prayer, like we do every night, and Ben said fold your arms. And guess what Henry did--he folded his arms! That made me so happy I could barely say the prayer. The thing about being a mom is day after day you try to teach your children things, but sometimes it seems like it's just not getting through. Seeing my son kneeling next to his dad, folding his arms for prayer, was one of the most rewarding things I've ever seen. It's good to know we're doing something right.

So Henry, thank you for helping me realize that I am not a bad mom.

Slam dunk

No surprise that our child is good at sports. Or that he celebrates the way he does.

Grosse

Yet again, we have moved. It seems to happen pretty frequently. I suppose it's this phase of life where (if you're like us) you don't really have solid plans further than a year or two out. We loved our apartment, but we're ready for a bit more outdoors space. Hello yard and safe neighborhoods for me to walk around in. Not to mention hard wood floors and wood burning fireplace. And bigger kitchen.

The house itself is much larger than we need. But we didn't choose it out of greediness--it's owned by a couple who used to be in our branch and don't want to sell the house with the market this low, so instead they are renting it to us for far less than it is worth. Score. It's a very charming, older house, as you can see.

I have to point out my cleverness in the title. The town we live in is called Grosse Pointe. Plus, grosse is a French word meaning "large" (or "fat" or "pregnant", but neither of those apply here). So there is double meaning, because our house is large and in Grosse Pointe. I chuckle at my cleverness, but I suppose if you have to explain it, it's not really clever.

Soccer

Henry and I have this game where he drops something on the ground and I make a random noise and he cracks up and repeats the process. Ben decided to apply this concept to kicking, to teach Henry how to use a soccer ball. The result was pretty adorable.

Dance Like Nobody's Watching

We dance a lot at our house. I like to have music in the background while doing dishes or other chores, and Henry usually laughs at me as I dance. But lately any time music is played (even if it's the piano playing a hymn at church), he bounces to the music.
This is a little compilation of recent dance moves. You can see that Henry has a diverse taste in music. We like to play Just Dance, and obviously Ben is really good. Oh, and don't mind the mess in our house. There are boxes everywhere on account of we're moving in 5 days (!!!)

New Year

Yes, it has been awhile. We spent three weeks on vacation out in Idaho/Utah and while we were there, our computer died. So we had to get a new one, and now I'm having to learn how to use Window's 8. I finally know how old people have always felt about computers.

Our vacation was loooong, but we had a lot of fun. Henry got to play with a lot of cousins and cousins once removed. Not to mention the dogs and cats he followed around/ran away from. And he sure did love to play the piano.

We spent Christmas at Ben's parents' in Idaho. Ben and Henry got matching pajamas from my Mom. They are awesome. And it was a white Christmas, which is always wonderful.

New Year's was celebrated at Russell and Kim's in Utah, with the usual (and delicious) fancy dinner. I can't take credit for the whole thing, but I did make some amazing ravioli.

We completed the evening by releasing a paper lantern. Ben wanted to sing the words to the song from Tangled as we did it, but he couldn't remember the words.

Ben had an annual training in Florida for work the first week of January. I don't think he did much there other than eat candy and go to Disneyworld. We're already planning a return trip before Henry turns 3 and is no longer free.

Henry and I stayed out west the week that Ben was gone. We spent time with Ben's parents (who get funnier the later at night it is) and went down to Provo and saw some old friends there. I was a big fan of the new train that runs from Ogden to Provo. Good job, Utah. Henry had fun too, not having to sit in his car seat for the whole trip.

While we were on vacation, we got good news. We're moving! (You thought I was going to say we're pregnant, didn't you?) We're staying in the area, we're just moving out of the city, to a house in Grosse Pointe Park. Woot woot. We are excited--it's a great deal and a great house for us. And still really close to Ben's work. We move the first week of February. We'll have a garage, a yard, a full-sized washer and dryer, a bigger kitchen.....

It's good to be back to our home and our normal schedules. Except Henry is now a one-napper. Gross. But I'm glad to have my own space, my own bed, and a computer again. I can finally blog and remind everyone how funny I am.

One

Henry is one! So hard to believe. All of the email updates I get on his development congratulate me that he is now a toddler. It's a bittersweet moment, and I have this odd feeling that I'm entering a new stage of my life (that's right, I am turning my son's birthday into a discussion about me).
For the past year, Henry has been forming his basic developments, like sitting up, crawling, learning about food and what his hands do. And now it's his independence and communication skills that are developing (quickly, and with a lot of attitude, I might add). But he is still my wonderful little buddy, and I am thankful for him every day.

Henry got some awesome presents, and we (especially Ben and I) have enjoyed playing with them. Henry's interest in toys is sporadic. We got him bath toys, and he much prefers to play with the bucket they came in. He has quite a thing for buckets.

We had some people over for cake yesterday, and Henry got his own little cake to tear into. His method was slightly hesitant at first, and primarily frosting-focused. But as he became more comfortable with the cake, he settled into a slow, steady destruction.

Basically, I love this kid.