Tatiana's Orations

11/12: Just put some pictures up on facebook

Hi guys! I have some fun pictures that I uploaded to facebook of Mikey and his friends, and his dusting, and my sister's visit and my cousin's visit. I'm also going to put up a video of Mikey saying thankyou "ankyou" it's pretty cute. He just started that today.

I also have some fun pictures of him in the snow. There were like 2 inches here last night, all our neighbors were out playing in it, it's the first time in 20 years that it's fallen and stuck, and it's the first time any of the neighbors could remember it falling this thick. (The neighbors were young students, by the way.)

Love you!
Tatiana

30/11: I have been pampered MAJORLY

Let's hope I can remember all the sweet things my husband has done for me this year for my birthday. Let's see, I guess it all starts Wednesday when Ross didn't have to go to class so he decided to stay home and he dubbed the day "Make Mikey Happy Day", Thursday, Thanksgiving was "Make Tatiana Happy Day" and Friday was "Make Ross Happy Day." I realize that some of the nice things that happened where nominally because it was make whoever happy day, but I know it was really because of my birthday :).

So we played with Mikey an extra lot on Wednesday, and went on a long walk to the park and wrestled and danced to Ross's music and played toys and gave Mikey a bath and had way too much fun. Then our friends wanted to go see Twilight and wanted to trade babysitting with us, so we went out to dinner while they watched Mikey, which made him happy because he got to play with his friends. Then we came back and babysat Mikey's friends Carter and Corbin and that was also very fun! Ross let me pick the restaurant so we went to Cheddars and I had a delicious chicken pot pie and some scrumptious potato skins with cheese and bacon. Yummy!

Then Thursday Ross helped me a ton in the kitchen with cleaning and getting the food ready. He also got up early to help me so I wouldn't be all alone cooking. It was a huge sacrifice since he hates getting up too early. We went to the church and had Thanksgiving with several families from the 2nd ward and some of our friends the Redds came from our ward. It was very nice. Then we went home and I wanted a nap and Mikey didn't so Ross stayed up with him ;). Then we had boys game night and girls game night. Ross hasn't had a chance to get together with the guys in months and months, I think there's a relief society activity twice a month. So the girls took the babies and played games at Tiffany Redd's house, and the boys played games at our house. This was super fun!

Then Friday we saw a movie and went out for sushi.

Then Saturday Ross had set up this surprise of going to the movies and my friend who he had asked to babysit called me to confirm the babysitting with me, so I guess she didn't get the memo that it was supposed to be a birthday surprise, but that's ok. It was still a really nice thought. I babysat Carter that morning while his mommy and daddy went to the temple. It was ok, because Ross had to get some work done at school that morning, but he came back at about 2:30pm so we could go shopping for the dilectable dinner of beef stroganoff that he made me for my birthday dinner. We took Mikey and Carter to the store and they were both really good. Ross was so sweet and tried to have me go relax in the car so that he could pack the groceries in the trunk for me, but I hadn't heard him so I packed the groceries merrily in the trunk anyway. Mikey and Carter both took really nice afternoon naps so that we got to have a romantic dinner for two. Then we were running late for the movie and Mikey had just gotten up, and Carter had been picked up about 1 hr ago and Beverly and Regina from our ward came over and needed to use the internet really fast, which was fine while I fed Mikey. We were running so late that I packed up the rest of Mikey's dinner to have Teasha feed him while she babysat. Ross wasn't worried about being late, but he always figures on really long previews anyway.

So we got to Teasha's I was in a terrible rush but Ross wanted to go inside and say hi to everyone before we went to the movies, I thought that was a little annoying, but he is such a free spirit when it comes to punctuality. So I quickly gave Mikey to Teasha who handed him the Ross. She told me that she had had to close the door to keep the kids in the living room where they were supposed to be playing and she wanted me to take Mikey in. OK I thought, meanwhile the time is ticking away, it's 6:20 and the movie starts at 6:30 and Ross is blissfully unaware of this...Oh well, after the second time she told me that the kids were in the living room and to take Mikey in there, I went in reluctantly and there were all these yellow balloons on the floor, and there were Beverly and Regina, and Andrew and TIffany and Scott about about 6 or 7 other people and I didn't even see the kids for a while and Scott was tape recording. And they all said surprise and I thought, this isn't Sunday, Sunday was when Tiffany was going to have a party for me. How very odd, what's going on here. And Scott is still tape recording as it begins to dawn on me that it's a surprise birthday party for me. I begin laughing harder as I realize that I missed every single clue as to the surprise party from the presents in the trunk of the car to Ross taking the car to work, he always takes the bus. He wasn't at work when I called him, but I figured he was on his way home (He was actually at Teasha's making cake and party games). Beverly and Regina thought the party was at our house but I didn't think it odd that they should drop by at 6pm, to use my internet at dinner time. No wonder he wasn't concerned about the time. Wow...he got me good, what a delightful surprise. I can't remember ever being so surprised by something special for my birthday, but that's not all. There is a huge mountain of presents from Ross and family and friends. Ross had planned some super fun party games including the candybar tied to a string game where you try to catch everyone's candy bar under the bowl so they have to give you a candy from their stash. Then he had this cool quiz about me that I had trouble answering with questions like "how many siblings does she have" "how many countries has she lived in" (8 and 5 respectively but both required counting). The person who won got 2 out of 8 right.

Then they brought out the extremely delicious cake he had made and frosted all by himself. Then I heard sister Kuttler from the ward talking about how he'd sent her an invitation in the mail and I just kept hearing more and more snippets about how much he put into this. Evidently he did it all himself, and planned really far in advance, wow I was so impressed! He organized the games, he made the invites, he did everything, and he did so many other fun things this week that I really couldn't have guessed he was up to anything.

What a fun birthday Ross! You are the best!

25/11: Thought you guys might have some clever ideas

I am hoping to drive with my husband and baby Michael and new baby from Texas to Utah in August. I am just doing some reconnaissance to see who we know along the way that might like us to stay with them. The two possible routes (and we may end up taking one way coming and one way going so we can see everyone) are the Northern route: Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado then home to Provo. The Southern route is Western Texas (it's such a long state), New Mexico, Arizona and Southern UT then home to Provo.

Any ideas who might live in those areas and want us to visit?

Lots of Loves!
Tatiana

13/11: Ross's B-day Party

Here are some pictures from Ross's b-day party. That cake is a delicious peach cake that fits on the WW core plan :). It was pretty good and very filling. I used oats instead of flour and flavored it with sugar free jello and pudding mixes. Also had yummy peach chunks in it. It looks sort of strange though I have to say. Maybe next time I'll ice it with fat free cool whip. That would look nicer at least.




This shirt is part of one of the pairs of PJs that I made for Mikey. The pants are 3 inches too long, I made them in size 3. Oh well, they are cute. This shirt sort of makes me thing of something that belongs in Star Trek the original though. Like on an alien race or something. Maybe it's just the pattern, it looks almost metallic or something.


Cuddling the webcam, he sure loves to chat with all of you on the computer. A ha ha ha. (That was for grandma Larsen from Mikey)

Playing in the gravel at the park. Yeah, I love dirt! It was foggy and a little nippy, probably 65 degrees. I was still in shirt sleeves, but didn't want Mikey to get cold. I guess we'll be in for a shocker when we get to UT :).

Cuddling my precious boy. Here's a hug for all of you. He must have been getting tired, he is usually too busy to just sit and cuddle. Though when it's his idea he's all for it. (He's holding a cloth book in case you are wondering, he is in love with books and especially likes singing books like The Friendly Beasts that Tara illustrated, and Hush Little Alien that is absolutely ridiculously silly. We borrowed it from the library. His next favorite are books with animals that we can make the sounds of. He learned to waddle like a penguin today when I showed him to waddle while reading about a penguin.)




Laura, Job and Levi (their baby) are coming out for Catherine's wedding the weekend of the 21st. We are so looking forward to seeing them. They'll be staying with us Friday, Saturday and maybe Sunday night. Rachel Canyon Sparrow (my cousin, Joe and Sam's older sister) and her little James are coming Saturday and spending the night and hanging out with us Sunday. It is going to be really fun. We are planning on having an early Thanksgiving feast and playing games and staying up too late. It should be a huge party! I'm so excited.


PS-I'm going to put a bunch of videos up on facebook, take a look if you want. They are cute!

05/11: Pre-Halloween and recent pix

Finally got the new camera cord! Woohoo! Don't worry, there will be Halloween pix too. I'll have to put them on Facebook though due to time constraints. If you have any pointers on speedy picture postings I would really appreciate them!

Love you guys!

20/10: Guess I should make an official announcement.

Ross and Mikey and I are expecting a new family member near the end of May. We are very excited, and mommy is tired and having trouble thinking what sounds nice to eat. Love you guys! Sorry no pix, our camera power cord is lost. I'm sure it's Ross's fault, NOT MINE!! *grin*

27/09: A few cute things

Sorry if it's annoying but its so easy to upload pictures and videos on facebook. I just put up about 15 pictures and 1 video. Hope you enjoy :).

9/23/2008

Mikey's words- 2 days before he's 15 months old:
People and animals
Michael (My-koh)
Mama, Mom
Dada, Daddy
Carter (Kah-tah) that's his little neighbor friend
doggy - signs, (gah-gee) doggy sound- oof oof (oo oo)
chicken sound - (bah bah)
piggy sound - he snorts outward, it ends up sounding more like a juicy k + ch like in Ba"ch". Ross says that's the sound I make when something stinks. He's trying to snort.
monkey sound - aah aah
bee sound - zzzzzz
birdie - signs only. Also signs bird for flies, mosquitos, and other things that appear to fly like the part of the grass with seeds, and little lawn flags.

Food
cracker - (ka kuh) (the first vowel is a like cat)
more - signs or (mer mer)
banana - signs only; sometimes says (na nuh) but it might mean no, I can't tell. Hillariously inaccurate sign, you're supposed to pretent to peel your left pointer finger like a banana, He wiggles his hands all around in bizrre angles, but he has at least one pointer finger pointing up. So that's banana.
drink - signs
all done - signs (ahl duh) with duh said much higher like in a question cause I always ask "Are you all done?"

Other
i love you- (ay ya yoo) if I whisper it too him he whispers it back
bath - signs

Also does most of the chicken dance. I think those are most of wht he says above. He's a great mimick. Today I asked if he needed more attention and he said (uh ten tuh). Tuh was said like it was a question, much higher than the rest. Also, today walking through the grocery store we walked past the crackers and he started signing "more" madly and bam he suddenly knew how to say cracker.

He also plays boop, this is a Larsen tradition where you touch pointer fingers and you move the fingers up toward the ceiling while saying boooooooop and the pitch gets higher the higher your fingers go. This is very cute!!

Yesterday he started blowing bubbles on mommy and daddy's tummies and thighs to tickle us. This was very hillarious and surprisingly tickly!
Daddy says it's all very cute. Mommy agrees.

19/09: New pictures on facebook

Sorry, they are just so easy to upload to my facebook account. I just put on some fun ones of Mikey eating, talking on the phone, and playing in his toy box. We'll see about videos too :)...

07/09: Mikey Walking and Climbing

Enjoy

27/08: Back home

We're back home and we've finally gotten everything back together. We miss all of you so much, and are also very happy to be back home in our own little apartment. We met our new downstairs neighbors yesterday and saw many friends at church in addition to meeting many new people. That's the fun of a college town, you always get to meet so many new people. This is the first year of my college life (I guess I'm graduated...) where I've lived in the same apartment for 2 years. That feels really good. I love stability, even if all I can get is 4 years of it, that's good enough.

Hope you are all happy!



Tatiana