Cuteness

Yesterday I was organizing the boxes in the bedroom and Nathan wanted to sit up on the box full of bedding. He thinks it is fun because when Curtis is home he usually throws Nathan onto the box and they have a grand ol' time. He was just being so cute talking to me and laughing so I grabbed the camera. As you can see our bedroom is now Nathan's bedroom as well as the box storage room. Yes, Curtis and I have officially moved out into the living room, but it is only for these last few weeks. I sleep on the couch and Curtis uses our pillow top pad from the bed on the floor. It works, we don't bother Nathan (he stopped sleeping through the alarm clock) and he doesn't bother us (we can go to bed and get up whenever we want). Everybody's happy.

Not looking too comfortable.

Our happy little boy.

See our bed, leaning against the wall behind a bunch of boxes?

Like Father Like Son

Curtis has been known to have an array of items hooked to or hanging from his belt loops. The one constant are his keys, except for on Sundays he puts them in his pocket because I asked him to. Curtis has a lot of keys that he needs to take off and use at different times so he has them all on a karabiner. We have several extra karabiners and every now and then Nathan likes to play with them. This last time that he played with them I hooked them onto his belt loops and he thought it was the coolest thing ever. When Curtis came home from work he noticed them right away.

Besos

Nathan gives besos (kisses) and it is the most adorable thing to Curtis and I. We love his besos. He is even starting to close his mouth more now. I got the picture of Nathan kissing Curtis after he had come home for the day.

Date Night

Curtis and I have officially reinstated date night. Every other Friday we get a babysitter and go out just the two of us. On the off Fridays we rent a movie and watch it after Nathan has gone to bed. It has been wonderful to feel like a young, fun couple again. This last Friday our date was in memory of our wonderful time here in Flagstaff, Arizona. We had a night of "firsts", we did things we had always wanted to do but that we had never actually done in Flagstaff. We started the night out with eating dinner at the Dog House, a weiner and burger drive through joint. Curtis is the big hot dog lover and he has longed to eat there for a very long time. Curtis ordered the chili cheese dog on a pretzel bun and I ordered the mushroom burger and I have to say it was very good. We also tried their onion rings and they were delicious. Next we headed to the east side of town to walk were we had never walked before. Curtis and I both have a love for shoes so we went to a new strip mall (we have never been to) that has a Shoe Pavilion store and we had blast trying on and modeling shoes. Next we hit Marshalls where we tried on more shoes, and then we ended at Cost Plus World Market. Curtis was hoping to find some Argentine food and goodies there but we came up empty handed. However we did find some awsome hats that we tried on and took pictures of. On our way home we stopped at Wendy's (we had ran out of time and it was on the way) to grab some dessert. Luckily they had a few frosty options that we had never tried out so we were able to stick with our theme of firsts. When we got home Nathan was happy to see us although he does love his babysitter Alix, she is great with him. She had him all bathed and in his PJ's ready for bed. Nathan is really a good boy for the babysitters, we are so lucky. He doesn't even fuss when we leave. All in all it was a night to remember.

Naptime Greeting

A cute thing that Nathan says now is "Hi". He doesn't just say hi, he almost sings it. When he is happily playing he will all of a sudden come to find me and he will walk up to me and say/sing "Hi." It is the most adorable thing ever. Today I went in to get him after his afternoon nap. I could tell he was awake because I could hear his little pull lullaby toy playing. As I opened the door and walked in I was greeted with a big smile and a beautiful "Hi." It made me melt. I grabbed the camera and tried to capture him saying hi, but I only caught the end of one and then I couldn't get him to say it anymore but he did some other cute little talking and he was so happy so I posted the video anyways.

"Shows"

With Curtis being a spanish linguistics major and all, we are trying to raise Nathan bilingual. Since I don't speak Spanish fluently at all and I am the one who is with him the majority of the time, Nathan watches Disney movies (so far Peter Pan is one of his favorites), Baby Einstein, and Plaza Sesamo DVD's in Spanish. At first I would get him set up in front of the TV and say "Let's watch a show" and he would enjoy it for 15 minutes or so. But now he expects and looks forward to our 3 times a day routine. He knows when it is time and he will bring me his seat or pillow and point to the armoire that houses our TV, eagerly waiting. Now he will even gesture towards the TV and do his "I want" grunt when he is sad or glumy. He loves his "shows".

13 Months Old

I can hardly believe Nathan has been 1 for a whole month now. Nathan talks a ton, but we don't know what he is saying. It is his own little language. But a few words are starting to take shape. He says bye-bye, no, Hi!, baba, yeah with a head bob, papi, what?, and one noise that he says a lot is "doodle-ee". He says it over and over in a sing song manner, it is pretty adorable. He makes a certain little face when he is unhappy. He furrows his brow, scruntches up his nose, puckers his lips and says "no, no, no, no", we call it his needy face. One funny little thing Nathan has started doing is backing up. All of a sudden he will get a silly little grin on his face and will start walking backwards, he thinks it is a blast. The other day he walked all the way from the kitchen into the bathroom going backwards. He also loves to try twisting lids on and off, his favorites are watter bottles lids. He is getting pretty good at it, but we have to start it first. When it is screwed on tight he can't budge it. He is still a great sleeper and eater. Some of his favorite snacks are gold fish and dry cereal. He also loves fruits of any kind and he always eats all of his vegies. He loves meal times now which makes it so much more enjoyable for us. And it just makes his day if I take him outside, he knows what I mean when I say "lets put your shoes on". He still loves to be doing what I am doing whether that be vacuming, dusting, mopping, emailing, doing the dishes you name it he does it, or at least trys to.

Nathan's First Birthday! (post from old site)

Nathan is One! He is such a big boy too. He started walking about a week before his birthday, and he loves it. Nathan loves balloons so Courtney got up a bit early and decorated the dining room with a bunch of balloons. When Nathan woke up I brought him out and he was so thrilled, he immediately reached for the balloons. Since Nathan's birthday was on Tuesday, and Tuesdays are Curtis's late nights, we had a lunch time celebration. We ate hamburgers and enjoyed Nathan's birthday cake. Later that day Nathan and Courtney traveled to Prescott where we enjoyed a little get together with both sets of Grandparents. Nathan opened a few little gifts and had a blast popping the bubbles that Grandpa Kleinman was blowing for him. All in all it was a very fun and memorable day.

Daddy's Big Helper (post from old site)

For Nathan's birthday we got him a child bike seat so when the weather finally gets warmer, we can go for family bike rides. But Curtis was anxious to give a test ride so on Saturday afternoon, the warmest we had felt in a long time, we bundled up Nathan and they went for a ride. But before they took off Curtis needed to blow up the front tire on his bike and Nathan was fascinated with the bike tire pump. He watched Curtis pump with his foot and he even tried to step on it and help out. When Curtis was finished Nathan immediately grabbed the pump and walked a little way off and then tried his hardest to pump the foot pedal up and down! It was adorable.

Sunday Bike Ride

I love General Conference weekend. It is such a special event. I love all the wonderful talks and counsel, and now that we have Nathan is so nice to stay at home and watch or listen to General Conference online. Just our luck that our wireless internet was not working all weekend (bummer, I know) so we had to suffer through dial-up but we were able to listen to all the talks in the end. Sunday afternoon after the last session of Conference we all went out for a bike ride. We have a front riding seat for Nathan and he loves going for bike rides. We rode along one of Flagstaff's great urban trails and stopped for a while at a little playground. Nathan had a blast walking around and exploring and he got pretty good at going down the slide and staying sitting up all the way down. He usually falls back half way down. Then we rode through a nice little neighborhood and headed home. It felt great to get out in the fresh air and enjoy the gorgeous Sunday afternoon after a wonderfully uplifting General Conference.

This is a picture of Nathan in his bike seat but it was taken back in January, we no longer have snow on the ground and he has a little blue helmet that he looks adorable in. Our cameras are currently in Prescott so we can't post a new picture right now, but this will do.

Hogle Zoo

For part of our spring break we were in Salt Lake City and we decided to take Nathan to the zoo for the first time. The Hogle Zoo in Salt Lake City is a really nice one, and it is not too big, just the right size. He enjoyed it but he was deffinitely more interested in pushing the stroller than any of the animals.










He fell asleep for a little bit inside the reptile house but the minute we were back outside in the sunshine he woke up. We took the train ride and Nathan got to go down a slide in the kiddie play area.