Daredevil in Training (video)

Peter got an early Christmas gift from our friends at the 7/11 near our house. They have a little girl maybe 9 months older than Peter and she had outgrown her electric quad 4x4 so they offered it to us for free. Since we figure free is the perfect price we gladly accepted!


It's pink and purple but Peter doesn't seem to mind that. Daddy says maybe we will take some paint to it and style it up a bit. At first Peter was a little scared of it. It has an electric foot pedal and when you put your foot on the gas it goes forward or backwards. It can be a little scary to ride on something that can move itself!


This week though Peter conquered his fear and found out how much fun it was!


He even started to try and do some daredevil stunts! He wanted to stand on the seat, but it was hard because he still had to keep a foot on the gas pedal to keep it moving. John says we are going to have a little stunt rider. Oh no!!!


Peter liked to hop on his new jeep, wave goodbye to us, then go driving away. He got his first taste of life on the open road...enclosed in the safety of the tennis court.


I had lots of fun taking video of Peter on his bike. This is his introduction. He loves to clap when he is having lots of fun!



In this video he figures out how to work the switch to go forwards or backwards. He's so smart!

Xmas Playdates (video)

We've been staying busy with holiday playdates and events. So many fun things happen at Christmas time! Peter is learning all about Santa, snowmen, penguins, and christmas trees. These are all very cool things!


Peter loves trying to get ornaments off the trees. We have a small 2 ft tree on the side table at home. There are no ornaments on that one this year!


One of our play dates Peter made his own ornament. It was already cut out and all Peter had to do was put stickers on it. He liked the sparkley stickers the most.


At one of our friends house Peter fell in love with a singing and dancing snowman. He figured out that to turn it on you just had to squeeze its hand. After about a dozen times playing the song over and over we finally took the snowman away and put it on a higher shelf just to look at.


Later I went out and bought a similar snowman for our home. Peter is in love with it and carries it around hugging it while it sings "Holly Jolly Christmas." I took some video of him playing with his friend Abigail's snowman. Enjoy watching it!

Holiday Parade

Tucson may not have July 4th parades because it is 110 degrees out, but we can throw one heck of a holiday parade! This past weekend Peter and Jen went to the Oro Valley Holiday Parade. This was Peter's first traditional parade!


It was maybe in the 50's when we staked our claim at the side of the road but it quickly reached almost 70 degrees and we were walking around in t-shirts and jeans. I love Tucson!


Peter loved watching the cars and motorcycles go past. The convertibles all had their tops down and Peter enjoyed waving at the people in them. He was shaking his hand so hard I thought it might fly off his arm!


There were three marching bands from the area high schools and one from a middle school. Who knew we even had marching bands!?! Peter clapped along with the drums.


We were having so much fun dancing to all the holiday music. They had choirs, a tuba group, an irish bagpipe marching band, and a jazz quartet all pass by too.


Then they started throwing candy!! A lot of the time they just handed it out and Peter is so adorable that everyone wanted to give him candy.


Then when they threw the candy he quickly figured out that you are supposed to run out and pick it up.


He loved running back to me and giving me the treasures he had found. Sadly, most of the candy he cannot eat. There were a few lollipops and candy canes that I knew the brand was safe so I let him have one of those. In any case, I think it was the thrill of the chase that was so much fun!


At the end of the parade Santa arrived on a big red firetruck. Peter loves firetrucks and loves Santa so he was especially excited to spot him. I put Peter up on my shoulders so he could see better. He jumped a little when they set the siren off but once he figured out it was from the truck he was fascinated.


There are some great things about living in Tucson and this was definitely one of them. We love parades!

Peter at 20 Months Old

Just some random thoughts and random pictures...

Our little boy is now 20 months old! Wow! He has been growing so much lately! We no longer have a baby boy, we have a full blown toddler in my home. Peter is growing up to be super sweet, friendly, easy-going, curious, brave, enthusiastic, and independent.

Peter opening the door to the play area all by himself!

I am always amazed at how easily he can make friends. He will make friends at the park, in line at the grocery store, or just driving down the street and waving at the driver of another car. Every once in a while I will look at the car next to me and the driver is making faces at me, it takes me a moment to realize that Peter is laughing and pointing at them from the back seat. He is hardly ever shy, he will go up to anyone and try to strike up a friendship.

Peter & his friend Lillian

Every time we walk to the car it is a challenge. There are so many distractions along the way! We have to stop to go down the mini-slide on our porch. We have to stop to touch or hug the trees. We have to stop to pick up and throw some rocks. We have to stop at the basketball court to see the hoops. We have to stop to peek through a hole in the gate. We have to stop to sniff the flowers. When we finally get to the car the goal is to get him in his car seat before he notices that we are parked near the 7/11 because if he sees it he wants to go to the store. We always leave the house atleast 5 minutes early to allow for all this exploring.

One trick to get him to the car: Push the corn popper there!

Peter can do a little Head, Shoulders, Knees & Toes…but he thinks his chest is his “shoulders”. When we ask where his elbow is half the time he points at his wrist. Oh well, we are working on it. He knows lots of other body parts and finding them has become one of our favorite distraction games when he is getting cranky.

Peter and Lillian finding each other in the maze.

Peter got his H1N1 shot. He cried. Not terribly surprising. But what is cool is that he gets over it pretty quickly. Before we left the room he had stopped crying and was starting to laugh again. I’m so glad that he recovers pretty quickly. Maybe its because he’s been watching mommy give herself shots his whole life. That’s my theory anyway.

Peter is no cowardly lion!

Elmo is the new obsession. He wakes up every morning, comes into the front room and starts pointing at the tv yelling “Melmo, melmo!” When we are watching our shows he will go to the tv and start pushing buttons trying to change channels to find him. We got a bunch of Elmo DVD’s from the library and a few days ago I found them shoved into the VCR because he was trying to play them. We officially have an Elmo-holic. At the store when we go to the toy aisle he instantly starts pointing to anything Elmo making sure that I see it. “Yes, Peter. Your right, that is Elmo. Say bye bye Elmo!” Thankfully, as long as he is able to say bye-bye we are able to leave relatively peacefully.

Driving the car.

Peter is just beginning to get introduced to potty training. He knows when he has a dirty diaper and if I don’t change it fast enough he started trying to take it off himself. He has gone pee-pee in the potty once but usually just gets practice sitting on it. Small steps. He also LOVES to practice flushing and watching the water go bye-bye. I think our biggest hurdle will be that he just doesn’t have the patience to sit there for long.

Reading on the potty.

Communication is getting better. Peter has starting using his words more and more every day. He does the signs for “more” and “all done”. He is starting to say a few 2 syllable words: cookie, Santa, sticker. I love watching how excited he gets when we understand him. He loves when we give him what he asks for, so much that he starts dancing and jumping up and down. I don’t know how many other people will understand what he is trying to say, I think a lot of it is just me knowing because I’m around a lot.

Peter loves "Dan-da" aka Santa!

Peter has no fear. He is so independent he will just bolt off away from me. He is definitely not a clingy kid. I have to always be at attention because in 10 seconds he can run off and be halfway across the park. I’m glad he has such an adventurous spirit, but it is sure hard to contain him! He just wants to explore everything around him. We can’t go out to restaurants anymore, we can’t go to a movie, we can’t keep him in the stroller, we can’t even really keep him inside the apartment for an entire day. Only time he clings to me is when the landscapers come and the lawn mower or leaf blowers are going, those loud noises send him running to mom.

Peter mowing the lawn.

Peter’s sense of humor is growing by leaps and bounds. When Peter finds that something gets a good laugh he will do it over and over again. This includes hiding then jumping up to scare us. He loves to chase the dog around in circles. He giggles with pure joy and you can’t help but laugh right along with him.

Having fun with his twin.

Evening in Phoenix

As John was getting ready for work this past week he went to check his schedule and found out he wasn't working that day! All of a sudden our plans for the afternoon changed. John wanted to go visit his parents who were still staying in Phoenix so even though it was late afternoon we packed up the car and headed up for a quick visit.


The car ride wasn't much fun. Peter had JUST woken up from his nap when we put him into his car seat for the 2 hour drive. Ugh! That is the LAST thing he wanted when just waking up. We ended up stopping to let him play at a McDonald's half way there. It helped. But he was definitely happy when we got to Great-grandparent's house. He was so excited to see family, get a chance to play, and to find their tree of balls again.


Great-grandma Eva showed Peter how to peel a tangerine and gave him a taste of them. He LOVED them. He kept bringing her more and more tangerines to open.


Peter was in a super happy and playful mood. He enjoyed playing with Grandma & Grandpa Palmer. He kept saying "papa" to grandpa and bringing him things. Grandpa helped him put his socks back on when they were falling off.


Grandpa even got down on the floor and chased Peter around. Peter had lots of fun trying to run away from him. There were lots of big squeals of laughter!


I am so glad that Peter is getting to know his Guam grandparents. They don't get in the area very often so its wonderful to see Peter connect with them. We were only able to be there for about 2 hours but it was worth it for John to see his family and for Peter to feel at home there. As we were getting ready to leave he went around to everyone and gave them big hugs. My little boy is so sweet!


One of my goals over this visit was to get a picture of us all together. I got it! Peter was fascinated by the toy commercial on tv so he isn't looking, but oh well!

Our Cookie Monster

On Black Friday John's mom braved the Black Friday morning sales to get us a few presents before she left the states. We even got to open them early! John got a new GPS system so now he won't get lost. We've been having fun driving around town and figuring out how it works.

My present was a brand new Kitchen Aid mixer!!! YAY!!! I have named him Clyde, and he is now a new member of our family. I spent the past week scouring the web and the stores for things I can make and I decided to make Peter some cookies!!!


For the longest time I have wanted Peter to be able to have chocolate chip cookies, but figured with his allergies it would never happen. But I was wrong. We have a recipe from Grandma Cindy that we just altered a little with Peter friendly ingredients. I found some 100% palm oil shortening to use instead of butter. And after nearly a month of looking I finally found a chocolate bar without milk or soy in it. Mixing it up even the dough tasted yummy!


Peter LOVED the cookies! He said the word "cookie" for the first time and kept doing the sign for more. He kept disappearing into the kitchen and coming out with more cookies, after 3 I told dad to stop giving him so many cookies! But John just said he never gave him any. Turns out Peter figured out to take his stool into the kitchen and stand on his tip toes to get them off the cooling rack on the counter. Smart kid!


He even finally figured out what the heck the big deal was about Cookie Monster. He opened his Sesame Street book and pointed at Cookie Monster over and over.


Peter was so bummed when he learned that we weren't giving him anymore cookies for a while. That sugary, chocolatey goodness was pure heaven for our little boy. I'm so glad he got to experience this childhood landmark. And boy, did I love mixing with that new mixer! It was AWESOME!!! I can't wait to get more attachments for it!