SuperAndrew and BatRyan

Look at our Superkids. Super cute. Cheesy yes, but true :)





p.s. Do you see that sun pouring in the window??!! It has been 8 days of sun in a row!

A day in the life of Erin, Ryan, and Andrew

I sometimes get asked by people who don't have children yet, "What do you do all day?" That question could sound kind of condescending, but usually people are just really curious. Before I had Ryan, I know that I thought, "What AM I going to do all day with this kid??" Sometimes my Mom even asks me this, I think she has forgotten what it is like to be at home with small children. So I tried to pay attention one day, I'm sure this will be interesting to me in years to come.

7:00 a.m. Ryan runs into our room and gets up on the bed and says, "Mommy, I want breakfast".
8:30 We go upstairs to get the boys dressed and to make the beds.
9:00 Vacuum the house (this only takes about 10 minutes thanks to our small apt.)
9:15 Read with the boys before Andrew's nap.
9:30 Ryan stays downstairs to read books and I put Andrew to bed so I can shower.
10:15 Get Ryan ready for school and walk him over to school at the neighbors house.
10:30 While Ryan is gone and Andrew is asleep I clean up the kitchen and clean my floors, and look through our mail and bills.
11:30 Andrew wakes up and has a bottle and then I feed him lunch.
12:30 Pick up Ryan from school and he eats lunch.
1:00 Walk to the bank and stop at the playground on the way home.
2:00 Boys go down for naps. This is my most needed (I won't say favorite and sound like a bad mom) time of the day. I'd like to say I do lots of productive things while the boys are asleep, but recently this time has been dedicated to watching whatever is on TV at the time (Roseanne and Martha Stewart). I usually wait to eat lunch until now, I like to eat it in peace.
3:30- 4:00 Boys wake up. They play and I start dinner.
5:00 Dinner. I know it's incredibly early, but Spencer was getting pizza from his class and wouldn't be home till 5:30 so I needed something to fill the time.
5:30 Spencer gets home and I convince him to go to Fred Meyer with me.
6:00 We head to Fred Meyers. We got Ryan a pair of Nike shoes for $9.19. They were having a huge sale. Ryan of course poops in his diaper at the store and I had forgotten diapers and wipes. The ride home was almost unbareable.
7:45 We got home in just enough time to put the boys to bed so Spencer can watch our favorite show, The Biggest Loser. During commercial breaks we cleaned up and I made some food for a brunch for visitng teaching the next day.
10:30 We go to bed. I don't think I have ever had trouble falling asleep since I had children.

The Story of our Love...

(sorry this is so long. This is mostly for Spencer...and i bet our moms will read it :)

I knew who Spencer was way back in high school. My best friend Rachel was his kind of "pen pal" (arranged by their older brothers at BYU). I remember seeing his picture and listening to an Everclear CD that Rachel bough because Spencer had told her about it.

Spencer turned out to be in my ward at BYU our freshman year at Heleman Halls. We actually didn't hang out that much or anything, but I have a few memories of him from that year: He once challenged me to a contest at a fireside to see who could sit up the straightest the longest. Then we figured out that our mom's graduated from high school together in Bremerton! Random. He dated a girl on my floor and I remember them sitting outside late a night on a grate to stay warm. Apparently Spencer thought that I flirted with him a lot, but I don't remember that.

He wrote to me a couple times on his mission. They were usually silly letters and he would say things like "Date my brother, i want a nephew".

When he got home from his mission, a group of us from our freshman ward got together and went to my favorite place in Provo, The Malt Shoppe. Spencer made faces at me from across the table and then I sat next to him while watching a scary movie. I got a call a couple days later on the phone from some guy claiming to be "Bob". He said he was calling from the Delta Center and they were taking a survey seeing if people would be interested in the Monster Truck Rally coming. I knew that this was not a real thing, but couldn't figure out who it was. I said I thought it would be cool. I got a call the next day from Spencer asking me on a date to the monster Truck Rally.

We dated until the end of April when Spencer was planning on going back to Denver. He once asked me if I thought he should stay in Provo for the summer. I wasn't very nice and said something like, "That would be fine, just don't stay here just for me". Spencer likes to throw that in my face. He went home, but I decided I couldn't live without him and he came back less than a month later.

I am so glad that he came back to Provo and asked me to marry him. I'm even more glad that I said yes. I love you Spencer and Happy Valentines Day!

Tag Team back again

10 years ago I was: a junior in high school

5 things on my to do list today:
1. Clean the bathroom
2. Make dinner
3. kiss and hug Spencer (it's valentines day)
4. feed and dress my children
5. shower

Things I would do if I became a billionaire:
It's hard to imagine what I would do....I'm just excited for the day when Spencer has a job, we can have a house with a backyard, and a minivan. The list could be miles long of things I would do, but right now it sounds pretty fun to travel everywhere and go out to eat everynight. I love going out to eat.

3 of my bad habits are:

1. Filling the trash can as high as possible, so that it overflows everytime I try to balance a new item on top of the pile.
2. Not paying attention to what I am buying at the store. I don't look carefully at labels so I usually come home with the light version of something, or a size xs shirt.
3. I think blogging could become one.

5 places I have lived:
1. Bremerton, WA.- Born there -2, and lived there a few months when we came for grad school
2. Kennewick, WA. -it was awesome
3. Provo, UT. BYU- can you believe I was there 7 years???
4. Denver, CO. - lived there in the summers for Spencer's internships
5. Seattle, WA. - here while Spencer is at UW


5 jobs I have had:

1. 1st and 2nd grade teacher. This is by far the best job I had. The list goes WAY down hill from here.
2. Community Assistant for Family housing at UW (this is actually an awesome job too).
3. Burger King -they made me clean out the grease trap.
4. Papa Murphy's -NOT Papa John's, we are take and bake people.
5. 3 of the 5 cafeterias at BYU, including the MTC where I spied on Spencer. Just kidding, he wishes.

I have to brag about a couple of my other awesome high school/college jobs because they were so cool: concession stands for old men softball leagues: "No, we do not sell beer here!", laundry at BYU: my roommate and I steamed suits for the MTC and faculty at BYU. The steam brought out the awful B.O. smell.

Something most people don't know about me: I have really long toes.

"Twins?", "Brothers?", or "Are they related?"

I get a wide range of comments about my boys and how much they look alike. Some people think they are clones, while others think they look nothing alike. I am somewhere in the middle. I think they sometimes look a lot alike, and other times I don't see it at all. I think they have similar expressions, and they both have those big beautiful blue eyes from their Daddy and the big Grange head (although Ryan got more of the Grange block head than Andrew). And of course they both have those cute enormous smiles showing off their huge mouths and big teeth! Anyhow, whether they look a like or not, we think they are both about the cutest things ever.

These pictures are the boys about the same age, 11 months. (although I'm not quite sure about when the picture of Ryan was, i guessed!)

President Hinckley

We love President Hinckley so much. Here is one of our favorite quotes from our prophet:

"It isn't as bad as you sometimes think it is. It all works out. Don't worry. I say that to myself every morning. It will all work out. Put your trust in God, and move forward with faith and confidence in the future. The Lord will not forsake us. If we will put our trust in Him, if we will pray to Him, if we will live worthy of His blessings, He will hear our prayers".



The picture of Pres. Hinckley is with my sweet Grandpa Sokolowsky.

Our Travels Continue...

We went on vacation again! This time it was to Denver where a certain Grammy and Gramps were missing their grandchildren very much. It was nice to get away and visit. I was also pretty excited to earn a free Southwest flight on that trip. Unfortunatly, we brought our sickness to Denver and spread it to the Denver Grange's. Andrew was the carrier. He got it from Ryan and spread it all around. I have decided that I don't have a good mommy stomach yet. I find myself making a horrible face as my poor little children are in agony. It grosses me out. Spencer is a lot better at dealing with it, but now he is sick too so where does that leave me?

Besides the sicknesses though, we had lots of fun in Denver playing in the snow (it was a little old and crunchy, but Ryan didn't mind), visiting Gramps downtown at work, and going to the Children's Museum. Plus, I got to go out to lunch and to a movie with my sister-in-law Teri. When do I ever get to go out by myself on a weekday? It was great!