Birthday Cake

I had a request for instructions on Corey's Cake.

It was super easy.  I made a 2 layer white cake(Betty Crocker cookbook) and frosted it with chocolate cream cheese frosting (1 cube of cream cheese about 1 cup whipped cream and about 1 cup powdered sugar and 6 tbsp of cocoa.)
Then put around the edges kit kat bars and sprinkle reeces pieces on top .  Tie a ribbon around and Viola!!

For a more peanut butter chocolaty experience, you could make a chocolate cake and frost with a peanut chocolate frosting.  I thought about it......bit didn't have time to hunt down a peanut chocolate frosting recipe.

Super Yummy.  I loved the fact that the cake and frosting were not very sweet at all and then you had the bite of extra sweet reeces pieces............I thought it was well balanced.  You could eat a lot of this cake and not get too sweet-ed out!

Happy Birthday Corey

Here's to a Great B-Day celebrated with family.  

Spending the whole day hanging and watching football with Lars, eating a fantastic Reeces Cake, and visiting with his Bro & Family = Good Birthday

 p.s.  unfortunately this cake was not my idea.  I used the idea off someones website.   Loved it!

I've been Dissed

Well it has finally happened.  It is Saturday, Football Season, and his dad is home to play with.  He woke up from his nap:
1. calling for his dad
2. when he came out of the room he didn't even look at me, but heard the football game on and signed "Touchdown"
3. Ran to the couch to watch the game and control the remote...

Does he like football or what

The last 3 months

 In Sept. we went camping to Mammoth Cave.  It was beautiful and a much needed vacation, and packed with a few unexpected thrills.
Corey's parents came up and stayed the afternoon with us. As they only lived about a half hour away they decided that their own beds were more comfortable than tenting it.
Lars did great and loved exploring everywhere. There is no fear in this kid.  Because of his adventurous spirit we found the tiniest little tick on his arm when we went home. It was so small I wasn't sure it was even a tick. But it would come off his arm.  Lars was so brave because we stuck a match to his arm to get it out and sure enough it's legs started wiggling...........good thing we got it.  We were able to get it out without incident and Lars did great through the whole procedure.
During the night we also had a few suprises.  Knowing that Lars thinks it is play time whenever he gets on our bed, i worried a bit about him sleeping on the air mattress with us. We brought extra blankets just in case.  We put him to sleep at his regular time on the air mattress, and later when corey and i decided to turn in, he woke up and decided he wanted to play. It took us about 1 1/2 -2 hours to get him back asleep again. This time i made him a little bed with all the blankets we brought and that seemed to work. He slept the rest of the night................However, We did not.  About 2 or 3 in the morning i woke up to some howling outside the tent.  It seemed far enough away, but being a bit of a light sleeper due to parentage, I struggled to go back to sleep.  Well, while I was dozing, the howling started again and this time it was super super close. It even woke corey up. We could hear creatures crawling outside our tent and hoped it wasn't the wolves that close but perhaps a deer.  For about 1 hour the very close wolf would howl and a couple farther away would respond. After a while it finally died down and it seemed they were gone, although I think it unnerved us a little bit so it was hard to go back to sleep. Corey also decided he really needed to use the restroom.....Convenient timing i know, but when you gotta go you gotta go!!....He was waiting at the door contemplating if he should go or not, when i mentioned that he should yell or something so i know if he is getting attacked or not.........and he said it wasn't himself he was worrying about it was his unprotected family.........I laughed because we were perfectly fine in the tent and if it had been me, i would have been terrified to go out there for fear of a wolf attack. Needless to say all went well and the wolves had disappeared, and we ended up only sleeping about 3 hours between Lars and the Wolves.  But it was a great trip.  Just nice to get away from home once in a while.

'

This is Lars' Toy Box.  he dumps all his toys out and gets inside and saysChoo-Choo and sign Train. He will just sit inside it with a bood and read.  It is quite cute 

And most recently Halloween

We were the Super Family and I made some monster cupcakes for the ward cupcake walk.  They were fun to make and looked awesome

the happenings of late

I apologize for the posts being few and far between, and while I don't know who actually looks at this blog, I will try to be better about updating it.
This last month we went to a Civil War Train. To celebrate by Father-in-Laws Birthday, we went up to Lebanon Oh, about 45 minutes from us, where they have restored an old train, and do themed train rides throughout the year. Since he Loves the Civil War part of our history we chose that theme.  We got on the train and took a 30 minute ride on a very hot 90+ degree weather day, with people in full Civil War costume.............they looked hot,

The Lebanon Train does 2 civil war train a year, one is  a reinactment and the other is a visit to a camp of the soldiers.  We meant to go to the reinactment, but ended up at the other one.  It ended up being good though.  They had permission to blow the cannon..............it was crazy loud. They also shot off a pistol, which startled the crowd. 

Here is the family in front of the cannon.  Luke is wearing a hat and Terry is wearing hats and coat of the soldiers.  And you can't see Lars but he is strapped to my back fast asleep.

On another note....we went to our first Cinci Reds Baseball Game. It was fun and as we were looking for our seat we met up with the mascot......I can't remember what he is called. Lars was a little nervous about him, he couldn't keep his eyes off him. On our way to the Stadium(we parked across the river) we had to walk over a bridge to get to the stadium. We got to cross over one of the first Suspension Bridges built in the US.  The man who built it later designed and started the building of the Brooklyn Bridge. He passed away before the Brooklyn Bridge was completed and his son finished construction as an invalid from his bed, with his wife relaying his instruction to his contractor.  It is quite an interesting story, and  David McCullough wrote a biography of the Roeblings and the construction of the bridge.  Although, the bridge over the Ohio River is much smaller than the Brooklyn Bridge, it is neat to see his inspiration for the Brooklyn Bridge.  

Milestones......Hooray

With a few previous attempts with no real commitment, Last week marked the "real" start to my potty training Lars.
Perhaps my previous attempts just got him used to sitting on his potty, but he never actually went potty. Recently I was reading in Baby Whisperer to put him on his potty right when he wakes up and then 20 minutes after he eats . So I bought a book "Pete's Potty" which we read whenever he is in the bathroom and I tried it and Voilla!! He went potty in his little boy potty. A few days later with no other incidents in the potty, he went poo.....I was sooo thrilled. Today he has done both, and we have had a dry diaper all day. It is so motivating to see this progress and to think he might be out of diapers soon.
I'm still giving myself a couple of months to make sure he is good and trained. My goal is when Lars enters Nursery he will be in big boy undies. My mom has had great advice with it as she had us all potty trained between 1 and 1 1/2 year old. She put on a timer so every 45 minutes we were put on the potty. If we didn't go then she put us back on 15-20 minutes later. That way she was catching most of it and apparently we got the idea becaue it worked. She says that a couple of weeks of that and we knew what to do. Obviously night time is a little trickier because you have to wake them up so they learn to know when they are sleeping that they have to go. However, seeing as Lars is still in a crib we will work on the night time training a little later.
Hooray for Lars

Also, while he was going potty this morning he did the sign for ball and dog (they are in his potty book) which he has never done before.
He is funny, his first sign was duck and probably his second word has been Quack or Duck (he says them both even though they sound almost similar). he also does the food signs.....please, more, all done)
His first word was Hi.........and it is his favorite still. He has to say hi and wave to everyone that walks by us, whether at the grocery store, the pool, the park, everywhere. In the grocery store I talk to more people cause he is saying Hi to them. Such a social Kid.

We miss you.....

I am going to get a bit sentimental here, which is something I usually shy away from, especially in front of the whole world. However, 10 days ago marks our departure from the city we thought to stay in for a long time. We miss you NYC. 10 days ago we packed up the truck, headed to church to bless our baby boy and then drove out of the city. NYC is the first place Corey and I lived as newlyweds. Our honeymoon was driving a Uhaul from Utah to Manhattan, with a slight detour to Kentucky, to begin our life together. And it is the place(literally......we had a home birth) where our son was born. Some of the wonderful things we will remember from our time in the Big Apple
1. Corey received his masters degree in Fine Arts from the New York Academy of Art
2. I should have won an award for all the frequent flyer miles I racked up in the first 3 years, traveling 3-5 days each week, but didn't. What I did get was some arm muscles in my right arm from lugging my suitcase down into the subway then up onto the street and then on the m60 bus to LaGuardia.....woohoo!!
3. Went on our first and only (so far) helicopter ride
4. Went to some broadway shows on and off broadway
5. we were introduced by some great friends Ethopian food and loved it . (suprisingly Corey really enjoyed the food even though he dislikes the lentils I cook........whatup!)
6. New York Pizza and Bagels..........need I say more
7. The authentic "NY Deli" where you get the best sandwiches in the world
8. Walking everywhere! As much as I enjoy driving, I love that NY is so pedestrian friendly.
9. I miss my fruit and vegetable guy on the corner
10. Central Park......Corey and I used to go out every sunday in summer to a secluded spot and just read and nap in the afternoon sun eating fruit I picked up from my much missed fruit and vegetable guy.
11. Going to the grocery store with basket in hand and leaving because it got too heavy to carry.........and that was what we ate for the next few days. I get serious overstimulation when i enter the gargantuan grocery stores here
12. Running with a great partner (Jill) around Central Park
13. I just miss the energy of well educated ambitious people cramming manhattan with a purpose in mind and working their hearts out for more of something!.......I'm not talking tourists
14. I miss the birds outside my window.........it was always great to hear among the sirens and whizzing of cars the sounds of birds chirrping.
15. I miss the quiet of the city streets when everyone left for holidays...........it is so fun to walk around when the streets are empty and everything has an abandoned feel to it.
16. Corey misses Ultimate Frisbee.
17. Game Nights and Knitting Night .........wonderful friends getting together
18. Last but not least........WE MISS OUR NEW YORK FRIENDS!!

New York..........you are a wonderful part of our lives and maybe one day we will be able to retire to your busy streets and enjoy your energy again when we are old.

a Little Late to the Party

I was late getting started, however, you can't say I lack for team spirit......Team Edward that is!! Hahaha.
(Secrets to be told......if there is a team Carlisle I would be on it. He is way hotter to me, even though he is only a secondary character.)
A couple of months ago, Corey's boss, shocked that we had not seen Twilight, lent us the movie. I watched it while Corey was at work. Not having read the books, (I went through my vampire stage many many years ago) but knowing there was a lot of hubub about how great they are, I kept an open mind. I thought the movie was entertaining enough, albeit the characters seemed fairly shallow and the plot somewhat slow.
As the day went on I just kept thinking about the characters and little things from the movie, and decided that I needed to see it again. I ended up watching it about 5 times in a week. So then while Corey was working late one Friday night, on my way out of the grocery store I saw one of those red box video rentals and decided to rent New Moon. By now I was a complete fan! I was planning on keeping it only one night but we ended up watching it a couple of times and returning it 3 days later.
So Corey's Boss, the reason for my love of Twilight and Corey's "it's o.k" of Twilight, insisted we all go to Eclipse together. Corey was the only guy (what a good sport). For my birthday Corey's co-workers got me a Team Edward t-shirt. The plan was that the other girls and I would all wear them, but ya............who in this picture is wearing their's.................YEP!! only MOI!! The movie was great! I ended up reading the 3rd and 4th books so I am up to date on the happenings of Twilght!

Camping

After a 5 year hiatus from camping, partly due to living in NYC, we finally went camping. We got to cumberland falls in 96 degree 90% humidity weather. It was HOT!!. But look how beautiful.

Cumberland falls is the only place that has a moonbow, seen only on a full moon, with clear skies. Well we had the full moon and clear skies, until about 5 in the afternoon of the full moon, and then everything clouded over and the rain came...............so no moonbow. but we saw some beautiful falls and some beautiful hiking. It wasn't hiking in utah but it was great to get out into nature again.

Lars loved it. He would be outside 24/7 if i would let him. he did great and got dirty and played in the mud and gravel, had fun swimming in a lake and hiking in the backpack.

All in all a very successful trip.

My Utopia

As many of you know, I love Nutrition. I love reading about it and learning all there is to know regarding holistic healing and mind body wellness. And much thanks to a dear friend in NYC (Kassie) my eyes have been opened about "the conspiricy" behind the food we eat. Before Kassie my learning had leaned more toward holistic healing more than on prevention; That is not to say I didnt' eat well. I haven't eaten much in the way of refined foods except for the occasional thing in social settings, but there were still changes I could definatly make to improve even that. So this weeks marks a great turning point. I now live in Kentucky where homebirth is illegial (which is unfortunate) and it seems Natural Things were going to be hard to come by (Ex: heath food stores, homeopathics etc.) However I have finally found a farm where i can by Real milk and Pastured eggs. My first delivery came this week and i must say it tastes delicious. Since childhood I have never tolerated milk well. As a baby my mother says i threw it up a lot and perhaps i was mildly allergic (I now see that my body didn't like dead milk: the stuff that has been killed by pasturazation and mangled by homogenization) But real milk tastes great with it wonderful cream on top and i haven't had any problems drinking it. I am now looking into a fruit/veggie coop to participate in. The only thing left is to find a meat supplier to buy pastured beef and chickens. In my reading lately It has come to my attention how much nutrition is lost because we are feeding our cows the wrong foods. They were not meant to only consume grains. Whereby they are not absorbing enough good nutrients..........affecting in turn our consumption of beef is now lacking in nutrients.
It has gotten me really excited and i have finally decided to finish getting my degree in Holistic Nutrition.
My dream (although probably too grandious) would be to heal the world with natural methods.
I just know that what you eat is sooo important to not only your physcial health but to your mental health as well. I have a grandfather who in his late 90's doesn't take any medication. Can you imagine everyone over 30 to never have to take the 20 pills you're going to have to as you get older because you didn't take that great care of your bodies. I think much of what is happening in the world would stop if we really took a moment to take care of our bodies, treat them with the respect they deserve and feed them real foods. All these mental chemical diseases would dwindle and it might even be the cure to cancer:) seeing as 100 years ago cancer was a rare disease. This is my utopia.................although realisticly i know i won't be able to cure the whole world but if i help in my small area maybe it will inspire others. So Thank you Kassie for being my inspiration and for opening my eyes.

A Little Tangy

We were eating strawberries the other night and he was making such a hilarious face. And the fake laugh.........he does it all the time. He makes me laugh all the time.

He can't walk yet..........but he sure can climb

Yesterday we were working in the garden and Lars decided to brave crawling across the grass over to the swing set. He then proceeded to the slide and started climbing. I couldn't keep him away from it. I put a backpack in front of it to prevent it but he just climbed above it and got on the slide anyway. Before I took hm off and refused to let him get on again i had to take the video. It was taken on my phone so it isn't the best quality. But watch with amazement how good a climber he is for not walking yet

Hi

Lars is with his Grandma Bjarnson. He loves to wave at everyone and everything. It is pretty cute. This week has been a milestone for Lars. All of a sudden he is just hungry and is ready for 3 meals a day. Here is his first experience with noodles and a veggie cheese sauce. He loved it and ate quite a bit, which I thought was great until it made him so constipated today that he hasn't been too happy. He loves to feed himself and is his usual method of eating.

where has all the time gone.

My days seem like a crazy running together of never quite getting anything done. Really, Where has all the time gone? As I am sitting here thinking of what has gone on, my mind becomes all blurry. So here is what i do remember

I am down to only babysitting 3 days a week, which is a schedule I am much more fond of. The days I don't babysit, Lars and I go to the park and either walk, run, or play on the swings. As you can tell on the picture below with his cousin, he loves the swings. He is going to love amusements parks when he gets older.......he loves swinging high and you can toss him in the air or swing him around any which way and he just laughs. He seriously has no fear.


He has 4 teeth and only wants to eat what i am eating. In order to get him to eat his food I have to hide in my bowl and feed it to him with an adult spoon, while he is also holding an adult spoon. Such a big boy. And he would much rather have real looking food vs pureed foods. So i make him a lot of curried sweet potatoe fries (baked w/o oil of course) but seasoned with curry and garlic. They are so delicious i usually make a bunch of them so i can eat them too. I have started cooking peas for him with mint.....odd combo?..............just try it. stick a bunch of mint in the water you steam your peas in. Fantastic! or even better make split pea soup with mint in it!! yum yum. It has been fun to make all his baby food.
He is 30 inches long now and his weight gain has started stopped accelerating at such a fast rate. he was 19 lbs 3 months ago and as of last week he is 20.4 lbs. But with how chubby he was before he still looks healthy and chubby still. He is crawling around so fast and is scaling furniture. He will definatly be walking soon. He loves to play and gets so excited when he sees other kids that he says hi to them (literally says hi many times and then squeals in delight)and starts waving both his hands.

My sister in law and i started a garden. It was my idea but she is the one with the backyard. So we plotted it out. and then we decided to start growing them indoors and then we would transplant all the wonderful vegetables into our garden after the first frost. We found a cool class held through the county about gardening and our indoor veggies grew really well. So 2 weekends ago we transplanted all the spring veggies and then planted more seeds straight in the ground. Well she told me last night that all the veggies we grew indoors and then transplanted have not made it but all the seeds planted are blooming and thriving...............So next year.......we are only planting seeds straight in the ground....it was much easier anyway!
I can't wait for it all to grow......strawberries, onions, carrots, radishes, beets, corn, peas, green beans............and more. we still haven't planted the summer veggies and fruit......that will be done in May.
Lars and i went to the zoo on monday, which was fun. he did great and loved the animals. and he and i fed the giraffes.......i'll post the picture when i can find the camera. Giraffes tongues are like 2 feet long and them come out and you put a cracker on it. Suprisingly it wasn't very slobbery.

Negotiation Generation

I was at the library to get a book on parenting and found 2 awesome books I wanted to share.
I totally recommend both. they are awesome
"How to behave so your children will too!" by Sal Severe (i heard about this one from a friend giving it as a baby shower gift) It is a great book on how you can become a proactive parent. It explains how you can act differently to your childs responses to create better behaviors in your child. It works on raising a cooperative child while still giving them age appropriate freedoms. Very positive book. I love this one because it discusses what i as a parent can do in creating more harmony in my home.


"Negotiation Generation" Lynn Reeves Griffin (a friend told me that when she read a book about "stop negotiating and start parenting", it changed the whole outlook on raising and teaching her 2 children. I am not sure if this is the book or not but it is awesome. It Talks about how we have become a society that instead of setting clear boundries for our children we negotiate with them and end up with our children in control of everything and how out of control our homes become. She sets up clear positive ways to set boundries that are age appropriate and following through without feeling like you are punishing your children when they test their boundries.

There were a few quotes i wanted to share.
This first one is about when she does her workshops, she asks for volunteers.
"If you volunteer to assist me, i ask you to join me on stage and stand facing me. There's a chair behind where you're standing. The directions are simple: just do what i tell you to do as i tell you to do it. Are you ready?
"don't stand. Stop looking at me. Don't sit down. Stop looking at teh audience. Don't turn to your right; don't turn to your left. No laughing"
As the exercise progresses, you're likely to feel flustered because you can't seem tochoose the right thing to do, or to do anything right. Some volunteers laugh because they're embarrased they can't seem to figure out exactly what i want them to do.
At first the directions seem simple enough, but the reason they're difficult to follow is because they're really a two-part exercise for your brain. First you must figure out the opposite of what i've asked you to do. then you have to actually do this opposite action. There's no question about it: whether you're a parent or a child, directions are clearer when phrased in the positive. "sit down. Look at the audience. stand up . look at me. turn left. turn right.""


The other point that they made, which I thought was very interesting, is that it is harder today to parent than it was in our parents and grandparents day and age. Back then people had generally the same values and morals. But because everyone has such differing values today it can be confusing to parent and confusing for the child why he isn't allowed to do something that others may do.

Anyway........i totally love these two books and totally recommend

Love Being a Mom

Lars will be nine months next week. Kind of hard to believe. Time has flown by so quickly, and yet i cannot imagine what life was like without his giggly smiley self. When he was only a few weeks old a friend asked it if was like Christmas morning every morning to find him in our lives. It was the perfect description for our bundle of joy. Now, nine months later, it is still like Christmas morning most every morning. (we do have the occasional nights when sleep decides not to visit our household) Every night when he is curling up in my arms to fall asleep or When he wakes up happy as a clam,(no matter how much sleep he had during the night) and we listen to him in the baby monitor playing and talking to himself, waiting for us to come get him, or during the day when he laughs out of the blue at nothing, my breath catches in my throat and i am amazed at what a wonderful blessing he is. It is hard to imagine having another one a perfect as Lars is. He doesn't whine when he wants my attention. He crawls close to me and flops on his tummy wiggles his feet in the air and open and closes his fist saying "I want you! I want you!" He gives a little "hey I'm right here" squawk and waits until i pick him up. In the mornings we bring him into our bed and play with him and lately he has started to roll over and give me kisses and then roll over and give Corey kisses. He will do this over and over again like a game. It is hilarious to watch because his mouth will be wide open forming a nice big OOH as he comes at you for a kiss. They are usually extremely slobbery and you must have a rag close by to dry your cheeks and chin off, but oh so worth it! He has taken to cuddling with his head on my shoulder in the cutest. He also loves books and loves to turn pages on books. This is great for church because i can keep him mostly still through most of sacrament meeting reading and turning pages. Lately I have noticed him to be very sensitive and caring. When Chase cries Lars will look over at him with the cutest expression of "what is the matter" and he usually crawls over to lay his head on chases chest or head (whichever one he reaches first) and tries to give kisses.
He loves people (although lately he has been a mama's boy, but if I'm around he loves playing with other people. He also loves little kids and watches them intently when they are around. On the bottom shelf of our entertainment center i have put his toys and some VHS videos (i didn't have any other place for them and i don't mind if he tears them down to play with, which he does) he found the video "Annie". he pulled her off the shelf and started talking to her and laughing like he was having a great time. it was hilarious. he does the same thing to the picture of the baby on the diaper box.
He loves to cook and i am convinced he is going to be my little soux chef. If I am in the kitchen he much come in to see what i am doing. he would rather play with my cooking utensils then his own toys. Most of the time when he comes in he wants to be picked up at some point to look (very intently) in the pots to see what i have made. i usually give him a giant spoon to hold so he doesn't grab for the hot pans and he reaches out with the big spoon and wiggles his hand as if he is going to stir what is in the pan.
He loves music and dancing and we often listen to his favorite CD "Dog Train" which is the most awesome CD we have for him (thank you Margaret). Corey and i love it just as much as Lars and frequently are found singing the songs from it.
All in all.............I love being a mom. even though what I accomplish each day doesn't seem to amount to much and the housework usually gets put on a back burner while we are playing and since Corey works evenings dinner never gets made anymore...........it is so worth it to be playing with Lars and enjoying his happy and joyful company.

Lars' Kisses

We have been pretty crazy busy here. I have taken up babysitting a 5 month old. It has been good but it sure keeps me super busy. This week i have tried to calculate how much time i actually have to do housework and things with the two babes..............it has averaged about 2 hours from the time i wake up and lars wakes up to when chase gets here and then leaves, and lars goes to bed. That isn't much time to do much of anything.......hence i haven't posted in a while. Lars loves his new friend. Although Chase is a bit frightened of lars he is getting better to not cry when Lars squeals at him and attempts to give him kisses.

It is super cute. Here is a video that i captured of lars kissing chase.

Other than that......i was called to teach relief society........did that for one month and then they released me and called me to teach the 6-7 year olds in primary(were they trying to tell me something????) And i am on the enrichment committee where i am now leading a religious topic discussion group every month. Where do i find the time in my 2 hours a day to do all this i don't know yet........but they are keeping us super busy here. Corey just got called to be in the bishopric again....So Lars gets to come to primary with me and help me teach the lesson.(although he is more distracting to the class than anything).

ok lars thinks he is a big boy and wants to type so here is what he has to say

YJUVTRDS3E7UUIPIOREUJJ

a Late Merry Christmas

Christmas this year started out with The Cincinnati Zoo lighting festival which we went to. It was fun to see all the animals with all the lights......it almost rivals Temple Square for how beautiful and lit up it was. I couldn't find any pics of it.......not sure if I brought the camera.

Corey then had a work party on a riverboat which went up and down the Ohio river. That was fun but awefully cold. There was eating and a bit of dancing. Corey suprised all his coworkers and put on the moves on the dance floor. Needless to say he is a legend at work.
As per Bjarnson Tradition we have started getting Lars' picture taken with Santa. He did great as you could see from the picture. There was the cutest little girl in front of us in line who Lars was flirting with and she was making him laugh. Well when it was his turn with Santa she stood in front of him and made him laugh. It was great.

We then drove to Utah (36 hours in a car), moving just ahead of a big storm that dropped snow in the double digits in Nebraska, and arriving the afternoon of Christmas eve. It was wonderful to see family and spend time with them. Lars was so happy to be out of the car. Although I must say he was a wonderful road tripper. We began our trip 12:30 pm eastern time, drove all night and all day and it wasn't until 7pm that he hit his wall and was done being in the car seat. Being stopped anyway because I-80 was closed we went to a hotel and let Lars (and the rest of us for that matter) stretch out for an hour or so before we opted to take the detour around I-80. We continued to drive the remainder of the night and arrived in the valley about 11am. Quite the long trip for staying only 4 days and returning by car (another 36 hours) home. Luckily Lars was almost as patient on the drive home.
I am not posting pics of us on our trip because we look bad!! but here are highlights of our christmas. Lars looking at his first Tree and opening a present.

This pic is great with Lars Laughing!.





We did stop by Nauvoo on our way to Utah. I had never been there and it was cool to see the temple. I think we are going to try and go back when we can actually tour the place.

Who does He look like?

Who does he look like? That is the big question. One I get the most often. But honestly I am not sure if he looks like a Bjarnson or a Sloan. However, after taking this picture I got my first clue.

Can you figure out who Lars looks like?

(hint: look at the ears)

Lars is growing so big. He is beginning to crawl (he looks like a worm inching forward) and get into everything. But he is a joy and always happy. Yesterday he was punch drunk happy, laughing and giggling at anything and everything. It was hard to settle him down to go to bed. But i managed to do it without much fuss. He has learned that when he is in his bed, if he lifts up on his hands he can see over the crib bumper........that means i can't stay in there on the rocking chair anymore when he is awake trying to sleep. Darn!