Spring?

We had a few days of Spring. The snow was pretty much melted, not quite a sunny blue sky - but no gray clouds, and warm enough weather to go play for a while. Reid loved it of course. I loved getting out with him in the new jogging stroller. He digs hanging out in that as we go around the neighborhoods. He waves to all the cars as they pass. For me, that stroller is freedom on wheels. Sadly, it didn't last long....
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A new experience for him, bare feet outside...
He's not really sure what to do when we go out to the playground. Mostly he just watches the bigger kids run around. He's definitely an observer. His middle name Hunter really seems to fit. He watches everyone around him, slow and stealthy, then he makes his move. Even when he was a tiny little guy, when someone would come up to him and talk and smile to him, he would just stare at them for 15 seconds or so...and then break into a smile. He makes you work for it. Reid, the Hunter.

And then this is what I saw on Friday morning when I woke up. Not pretty. I guess it was too soon to call it, I thought that Spring had come, but I guess Erik took it with him when he went to Alabama. He'll be gone for another 3 weeks, and then I think we'll all get to be together for a good long while.

The little man turns 1 on Saturday, so while that is his official birthday, we're going to celebrate when Erik gets home. It's like when official holidays have the actual day, and the "observed" day. So "Reid's First Birthday Observed" won't be for a few more weeks. Good thing Reid can't tell time yet, or else he might be bummed. He's sort of getting a party on Saturday, though. I'm having a bunch of girlfriends over to make these (the middle one). So cute, right? And we're going to have build-your-own panini sandwiches, and I'll think of something clever for dessert. While the party isn't really for Reid, a houseful of women is definitely Reid's kind of party. He's a shameless, shameless flirt. I'll post pictures of the cute aprons when they're all done. It's going to be great.

The long winter is over.

Okay, so it seriously took me like a half an hour to upload all of these pictures, so I hope that I'm not in trouble anymore for not posting for the last few months. I hope this post will be satisfactory. Honestly, my dad is chomping at the bit for some new Reid pictures, so...Hi Dad! Here's the latest!

This is what all of February looked like. Reid with crazy hair and boogers running out of his nose. February was a long, hard, cold month. Seriously, I hated it.
Reid loves it when I let him sit on the bench to play. Here he is working on the piece that I had set a goal to learn by when Erik got home. Didn't happen. I bet Reid could play it as accurately as I could. It's a dang hard song. It's possible that I'm not as talented as I think I am, because that song is really killing me.

Reid is a very busy kid. Busy busy busy. He's a problem solver, too. He'll pull down books to stand on top of them to reach higher books. Genius.

Okay, these aren't exactly in order, but this is the night that Erik finally came home. His flight came in around midnight, and some friends came to the airport to see him so we all went to Denny's afterwards. Here's us at the northernmost Denny's in North America. (are there Denny's anywhere else?)

These pictures are in the Fairbanks Airport, just moments after Erik got off the plane. I was worried about how Reid would adjust to his daddy being home. Reid was only 9 weeks old when Erik left, and 10 months old when he got home...so it had the potential of being a hard adjustment. The adjustment was about 30 seconds. They have been inseparable ever since. You'll see, the next 20 pictures will prove it. Reid doesn't want to have anything to do with me anymore, he's OBSESSED with dad. When Erik leaves for work in the morning, Reid practically spills out of my arms reaching out to him, "Da! Da! Da!" He just wants it to be all dad, all the time. I can't really blame him.

The day after Erik got home we got down to business. Reid needed a haircut, big time. These pictures are a bit out of order, here's the end result with Erik looking as though he's saying, "Well, there you have it, folks."

We started out trying to trim his hair with scissors. Neither of us have any haircutting skills, and when Reid starting looking like Lloyd Christmas then we knew that we needed a better plan. Out came the clippers and we just went for it with the longest guard on. Much better. And, Reid didn't flip out at all. He loved all the fuss.

Dad getting set up and Reid making it difficult. Say good-bye to those sweet little curls in the back!

Here's the start of it. Seriously, Erik came home in the nick of time. That little boy has a shaggy hair do that would be the envy of all the young men in our ward. Is your ward like that, too? It's crazy. When they pass the sacrament I keep thinking, "did all of you just roll out of bed or something? Where are your eyes?" Seriously shaggy hair going on up in Alaska.

Since Erik got back, there's has been a lot of male bonding going on. Here it is in the form of crazy faces. Erik can make the most amazing crazy faces. He can instantly endear children to him with these crazy faces. Looks like Reid is entertained as well.

Just a cute shot, and it shows the new hair do pretty well.

When they're not playing, Reid remains underfoot. Honestly, he's obsessed with Erik. He's tagging along with whatever Erik is doing. Here Erik is either working on the master's, or the ipod. My guess is the ipod.

Just a cute shot. I'll have Erik post about his snowmobile adventure in Logan a few weeks ago. Crazy.

Reid and dad playing on the swings.

Reid is a walking machine now. When he took his first steps, Erik was still gone, so I pretended for a while that it was just a fluke. Then 5 steps became 10, 10 became 15, and then I resigned to the fact that it was official, Reid is a walker. In the last month, however, Reid has become a pro. He can stand up on his own now (meaning he doesn't have to pull up on anything) and when we've been travelling it's been great to let him walk around and wear himself out before our flights. He's really into the freedom and adventure that come with walking. In this picture Erik is helping him figure out what to do with that lawn-mower/popper toy. Don't mind the pajamas. Most of our pictures from the last month show us still in our pajamas. So, if you've noticed a drop in blogging/phone calls/emails from me, here's the reason. I've been busy playing with my boys...very busy.

This is one of my favorite things to do. Erik loads up the little man and we go for a walk in the neighborhood. Reid loves it. I think he knows that he's got VIP seating up there with dad.

In the middle of March we all went to Utah for a week. Erik's grandfather (Grandpa Reid Olsen, our little Reid's namesake) passed away and we went down for the funeral. It was so amazing to see all of the Olsens. It's really touching to see how big of a difference one life can make. At the service there was over a hundred direct descendent of Grandpa Olsen. More than 100 people who directly benefitted from his example. I loved hearing the stories about his life and his testimony. Many people commented on his trademark saying that goes something like this, "Live the gospel. Follow the commandments and your life will be better. Your car will run better, your wife will be prettier, your neighbor's dog won't bark as loudly, you'll have more money, etc." We have a recording of Grandpa Olsen talking to his family, I think it was recorded a few years ago, and so I've heard him say that. I don't know if he meant that following the commandments resulted in blessings that made our lives better, or if he meant that when we do what's right that our outlook on life is more positive and hopeful. Or if he meant both. Either way, I agree. My life is better when I'm doing what I know to be right and good. I am really grateful that I got to meet Grandpa Olsen 3 summers ago when we were driving through Washington on out way up here. I loved him instantly, and I think he liked me too.

When we were in Utah we stayed at the house of some friends of Erik's parents. The friends are on a mission in Ghana and they were so nice to let us stay at their house. Here's a picture of Reid with his grandparents. He loves grandparents.

Here is my very miserable attempt to get a good picture of the boys playing. Reid loves it when Erik throws and flips him around. Loves it.

These two have a great time together.

Just a cute picture. My goodness, look at that face! So cute!

Celebrating Erik's birthday.

I got some of those really gross candy letters, and it had the words "Happy Birthday" and then the alphabet (with a few extra vowels) and numbers. I thought it would be funny to try and spell out words using all of the letters. What a dumb game. I think of some really dumb ones sometimes. It was so hard. After we spelled a few words all we had left was a bunch of useless consonants, so we gave up and just put his name on there. Dumb game.

Hey, if you want to know an awesome game, leave a comment and let me know, I've got some favorites that are always winners. Not like the dumb candy spelling game.

More bonding time. Erik's lap is Reid's most favorite place. And again, we're all still in pajamas. Check out Reid's bed head.

I wish that I had planned this out better, but after we all got dressed up for church on Easter, and when we were almost out the door I remembered "a picture!" So I ran and grabbed it and got this lame shot before we dashed out the door. Not a great picture, but Erik looks killer in his new suit and tie (don't you love that gray/salmon-peachish combo? I love it!) and Reid is a little heartbreaker in his outfit, as well. What a good looking pair. I had on a cute outfit too, but we all know how much self-portrait skills are...not good. So just imagine me in the picture too.

Even more bonding. We've had such a great month just hanging out, enjoying each other's company, going on some fun trips, and just being. Being our little family of three.

To wrap this up, I'd like to share with you Reid's new face. We first saw this face about a week ago and it cracks us up every time we see it. For no reason, Reid gets all playful and starts making this crazy face. It's hard to capture, but here's a pretty good example.

He makes this big growly face, spreading his mouth out as wide as he can get it, and showing his teeth. He has the two little chompers on the bottom and four teeth on top. His two front teeth are about halfway through...and about 1/8 of an inch apart. They are so funny. His bottom teeth can almost fit in between the top two. SO cute, seriously. It kills us. Another shot of the crazy face. We see it the most at mealtime.

And that brings us to the end of our tour. My sincere apologies for those of you who frequent this blog and have seen the same old post for the past 2 months. It's been a really good March, and so far April has been just as wonderful. When Erik came home, he brought Spring home with him. I mean that figuratively and literally. There were a lot of days when it felt like Spring would never come, but it did. My Spring finally came.