Interesting Items from this Week

Lots of little things have happened this week. First, Aaron and Melissa moved away. They dropped off their leather sofa Monday afternoon and said goodbye to Matthew. Then Monday night, I got to go down to their apartment to help them finish packing and say goodbye to Ayden. I'll miss my little nephew. He will be so big next time I see him. While I was gone, my Grandpa came over with his lawnmower. Apparently, Matthew thought it was quite an event. I am told that Mark did take a turn mowing and did the backyard. It was nice to have the lawn finally mowed. It was looking kinda shabby.

My most exciting event of the week was playing soccer for the first time in a long time. Our stake had women's futsal. Unfortunately, only 5 people showed up (usually you play 5 to a team). But we played 2 on 3, and it worked out just fine. I have to admit that was the best player there. It was so nice to see that I hadn't lost my touch. I really ought to look into joining a women's indoor team.

Uncle Aaron and Aunt Melissa

Watching Great-Grandpa Pingel

Enjoying the front yard

Playing with Daddy

Oh, and here is a video of Matthew walking. He has pretty much completely given up on crawling and just toddles around the house all day.

More Grandparents!

Mark's parents were here last weekend for his sister's graduation. It was fun to see them, and for them to see Matthew. The last time that Diane, my mother-in-law, saw Matthew was the day before he started to crawl. He has made quite a lot of progress since then. One of the fun things Diane and I did was take Matthew to the duck pond here in Layton. There's a rather large park right next to the library with a stream that ends in a duck pond. My nephew loves feeding the ducks, so I thought Matthew would enjoy it. The had some ducks and geese - we even saw a rare Trumpeter Swan farther up the stream - but mostly we ended up feeding the seagulls. I'll definitely have to take Matthew there again.

At the duck pond

A goose

Feeding a duck up close

What was that strange creature?

Grandma and Grandpa Robison

Uncle Jacob

Jacob and his fiancee Serene were in town to say goodbye to Aaron. We were lucky even to have them spend the night at our house on Sunday. Matthew really enjoyed having them there, though he wasn't in a very good mood when we took the group shoot.

Matthew and his future aunt Serene

Matthew with Jacob and Serene

Happy Easter

I didn't think Easter was going to be very exciting this year. Matthew had been sick for several days, and on Saturday night, Mark also got sick. However, Sunday morning Benjamin texted me asking if he could stop by on his way back from Idaho to put some items in our storage room. All of a sudden, an Easter party was born. I had randomly bought a big turkey the day before, so we had a feast. Benjamin's fiancess Jess was there, along with her sister, Ginger. Then Matthew entertained us with his Easter egg hunt. He was pretty good about finding eggs, as long as you took away the eggs once he found them. If you didn't, he would just play with the egg he had already found. After that, Mark and I hide eggs in the back yard for Benjamin, Jess and Ginger to find. I thought the Easter egg hunt would be too easy, but it took them a little bit to find all the eggs. In case you were wondering, I did follow the Pingel tradition and hid the Golden Egg  - an egg with a dollar inside. Appropriately, Benjamin was the one to find it.

Ginger

 The lovebirds, Benjamin and Jess

Shoes

I bought Matthew his first pair of shoes yesterday. I totally spent way too much - baby shoes are not cheap. I'll have to buy second-hand shoes from now on. However, since he is now walking, I decided he finally should own a pair of shoes. They are just so cute! I think they make him look much older, though he is much older - he'll be 11 months old on Monday

A Visit from Grandma

My mom was on spring break this last week, so she came out to visit her Utah children and grandchildren. We went to my Aunt Christine's for the Sunday sessions of conference and had a blast. My uncle made the best ribs ever. After 6 hours in a smoker, they were just amazing. Matthew got to play with his cousin Ayden and with my cousins. He loved their dog Nova, though I don't think she liked Matthew quite as much. Somehow, a santa hat came out and Matthew entertained everyone with his antics trying to get it off his head.

My mom got a lot of time with the babies. Monday, we had her babysit the two boys while Melissa and I went to lunch with my Grandma Pingel. I've decided that Zupa's is the best lunch place ever. On Tuesday, Mom and I got to babysit Ayden and then she watched Matthew while Mark and I went on a date. We saw the Hunger Games, which was fun. They played it safe, but at least they didn't ruin anything (and here I am refering to the final fight scenes of Harry Potter 7.2). On Wednesday, we went to the new City Creek Center in downtown Salt Lake. It was so nice and very much upscale. I though it had a good mix of high end stores (Tiffanys and Rolex, etc) and more regular stores (Gap, Gymboree, etc.) I thought that since it was a Wednesday afternoon, it wouldn't be so crowded, but what I didn't realize was that it was spring break. Thus, the mall was packed. I only wish the mall had been open when I lived downtown. Oh, well.

Wednesday night, things got interesting. We went to my grandparents' house while Mark was at school. We couldn't have been home more than half an hour when Matthew threw up all over my mom. Luckily, my mom sacrificed herself so that very little got on my carpet. He threw up a couple time Wednesday night, slept all day Thursday, seemed fine on Friday, and started really throwing up Friday night. Poor kid. Hopefully he is on the mend. And I'm really glad my mom was here that first night, because I have never dealt with a sick kid before. It was nice to have her advice. I have to admit, I love my family.

Matthew and Ayden watching Conference

Matthew with my cousin Kaelyn

Ayden and Melissa

Mom and Benjamin with Benjamin's fiancee, Jess

Matthew and Grandma Pingel

Ayden in the Santa hat

Matthew in the Santa hat

Matthew entertaining the crowd

Ayden and Grandma Pingel

At the new City Creek Center

Playing the piano

With Grandma and Great-Grandma Pingel

Loves the cookie cutters Jaclyn and Steve sent

Step by Step

Matthew took his first steps yesterday, just in time for my mom's visit. We have had a hard time getting a good video of him. He usually only takes a few steps, as in these videos, but occassionally he walks 3 feet or more. Once I get a better video I will post it.