A Few Pic's

Nixon loves to put things in his mouth as all babies do. However, he also likes to CARRY things in his mouth as well. Anything really, he loves his baseball and also his green blanket, it's really quite funny. I sometimes wonder if he is picking things up from the dogs... like eating food off the floor????

We put my headband on Nixon and it totally reminded me of the 80's aerobic show. I know you all remember it. They had crazy tight outfits and wide hair and they stood on those round platforms. There was two girls and a guy and they would work out on on the TV, ok maybe it was only in Utah but I have fond memories.
Nixon could totally have been on this show with his awesome sweatband.

What a cute guy to work out too right?

There is a little hamic in the backyard that only "Little" ones can swing in, I found out of course the hard way. Yes I was sitting it one day and fell on my butt.. oops! Nixon fits perfectly though and laughs when I swing him.

His little legs come through the holes as he kicks, it's silly.

Church Day... Yeah!! Isn't he the cutest in his vest.?

Ok so I did knit this little vest and before he grows out of it I thought I had better take a few pictures.

Nixon LOVES the shower. If he hears the shower going and can get into the bathroom he will pound on the door and say "Da Da" and want in. I sometimes find him IN the shower IN his clothes. What a goof ball.

How can you say no to that face?

A video of Nixon swinging in the hamic.

Nixon will clap when you say "Yeah" it's a new trick that I use endlessly throughout the day!

Hives, Sun and Water...???

Well the little Spear family has been having fun in the sun recently. It has been such nice weather that we have been out and about. This is not typical for Spokane to be so nice in May and the beginning of June but it is a nice change.

We borrowed Emily's bike and trailer and took Nixon for a ride. Don't worry we made it out of the driveway.

But not far until the little guy was asleep. We had fun though riding around. I haven't been on my bike in years and I had to quickly remember HOW to ride a bike. And afterward I realized why I don't ride my bike so much, my butt was sore after just a short ride.

Cute Boy...nine months old almost ten months...where did the time go?

Hives are NOT fun for anyone!
Well last week or so Nixon had been fussing and had a temperature for a few days. I thought at first it was just because his other top tooth was coming in, BUT three days of a high temperature. We went to the doctor and he had fluid in BOTH ears and possibly strep throat. The doctor asked if I had been around any sick kids, and I hadn't. Man I felt bad I had let it go for three days. Poor little guy was miserable. They put him on amoxicillian and we were off. By day two our little happy boy was back. So we went on amoxicillian thrusday night and on tuesday night I noticed these red dots on his leg. I thought the mosquitos had gotten him and didn't worry about it. Then Wednesday more dots by his neck..."Those mosquitos are worse than I thought," I thought to myself. But by Wednesday night, we realized those were NOT mosquito bites. They were all over his body so I racked my brain to think what I had fed him that was new and he could be allergic to. I had given him strawberries on sunday but that was too long of a wait for a reaction.
Thus we were off to the doctor AGAIN. Man I swear the nurses kringe when they see my name on the note to call back. BUT good thing we went in because Nixon had HIVES and he was allergic to amoxicillian.

This was the hives on Thursday when we took him to the doctor.

On his face too, with some snot mixed in.

And his chest.

But OH WAIT... they got worse. The doctor said they could last up to seven days after the last dose of amoxicillan and she was right. They got worse and worse everyday.
This was Friday night. I was going to take him out to the softball game but I figured I better not. Other parents might think he had chicken pox or measles or something awful.

Saturday morning they got even worse.
Now they were bigger and redder. But surprisingly enough Nixon was a happy boy through the whole thing. I would have been a mess but he played and laughed and thought nothing of the hives all over his body. I think it was worse for me than him in some way. By Sunday morning they were all but gone, it was crazy. He was good as new and we were over the scare of the hives.1st Boating Day

On one of Karens days off we took the boat out to Pondara and cruised the lake in the boat. It was so beautiful and relaxing. We took Nixon onto the beach and he got to sit in the sand for the first time.

Jon put sand on his feet and Nixon wasn't so sure about that.

Nixon was nervous to touch the sand, it was cute.

But slowly he figured it out.

Yeah sand!!! He started liking it more and more. And of course got it all over him and in his diaper and hair and all the places you expect to find sand on a little boy.

The water was another story, however. He wasn't so sure about any of us being in it either.

But he got daring and almost went in.

Nixon on the boat in his lifejacket, which he didn't like at all.

A DAY AT THE POOL

Jon and I decided that since we would be at the lake a lot this summer we better get Nixon ready for the water. So we decided to take "baby steps" to get to the lake. We start with the pool: we took him up to Grandpa Spear's pool and tried it out.

Nixon LOVED it!! Well at least the first step of it.

Yeah Nixon and what a cute swimsuit and swim shirt:)

And he's in with Daddy. Splashing around just like the tub.

Swimming boys!

Drying off in the sun with of course "Mr. Duck"

Where's Nixon???
Nixon is into EVERYTHING these days and loves to be right under your feet. I try to distract him and thus he finds ways of entertaining himself really well. But if he gets lost these are some of his favorite places to be.

In mom's sock drawer.

Pulling out ALL of the socks and undoing a lot of them in the process.
Or he could be upstairs in the kitchen taking everything out of the pan cupboard.
Banging the pans onto the floor and together making lots of good loud noises.
OR
Nixon could be found in the dishwasher where he LOVES to take out the dirty or clean silverware and throw it on the floor. Or he will just get IN the dishwasher if you try and stop him from getting everything out.
Nixon also can be found under the table. He likes to be like dad and work at the desk downstairs. Although he just likes to take all the paper and throw it every which way.

Nixon also could be found behind the couch downstairs. He follows darby behind there.

Darby must think she can get away from Nixon... ha ha she can't.

But he might try and stand up which is never a good idea behind a couch, that head is just way to big!!!

And lastly he could be found in the car. Isn't his new carseat cute?!! Jon laughed at me but I LOVE it!! He loves to ride in the car and go anywhere.

Here is a little video of Nixon testing the water and sand.

For Nana B Nana

Nixon is pulling himself up and walking along anything he can. He is so cute, but I am realizing what it is like to chase him around the house all day. What happened to my baby that sat so nice on a blanket and played with toys????

Nixon LOVES his green blanket and will drop everything to go and get it. We can't leave home without one, lucky me I made three so I can wash and have one clean at ALL times.
Jon thinks Nixon is a bull....it's a hit at church:)

We've Been Busy

Well we have been busy here in Spokane. This might be a long post, as we have taken lots of pictures and had lots of fun these days and I have been a slacker and not updated this blog. Nixon has been keeping us busy that's for sure, he is now pulling himself up on EVERYTHING and is a master of climbing the stairs. He is just starting to open and shut doors, cupboards and drawers and his little fingers are finding their way into little spaces, hopefully he will learn soon the concept of all these closing things.

Here is Jon and Nixon being TWINS... I didn't plan it, it just happened one day.

Nixon loves to stand next to the lovesac and taunt the dogs. Gauge is fine with him pulling and patting him but Darby jumps off when she sees Nixon coming toward her resting place.

Go Red Sox's .. Nixon has this cute onesies from Cam and Hillary and of course Nixon was not going to let me take a good picture of it before spitting up all over it.

Master of the Stairs!! Nixon just starting climbing them one day and has never stopped. He makes it all the way up, a bit to fast I think.

Concentrate....

Gauge trying to "HELP" Nixon move it along.

He made it to the tippy top!!!

Loving to play with Boxes, he even will crawl inside to get something at the end. It's so entertaining.

BASEBALL GAME
Jon took Nixon and I to a U-High baseball game a few weeks ago. Jon's old High School team was playing at the Minor League field, so we decided to go. Nixon was so cute and clapped at all the wrong times.

Go Titans!

Ok... how CUTE is this picture. What a perfect set up for my two boys!

Coeur d'Alene BOAT SHOW

We had a bunch of family come into town over Memorial weekend and we had a lot of fun showing them around the Spokane area. We took them up to Coeur d'Alene to see the lake and it happened to be the boat show.
Jon checking out a Cabin Cuisier... only 150,000.

Nixon liked the boats and walking around on the board walk.

We all decided we should sell the house and buy this boat for 400,000. I mean we can all squeeze into a two bedroom, two bathroom boat right?

And I will be the Captain..

Aunt Marsha will be the navigator.

Beautiful day to be at the lake.

Nixon thought the water was a bit too cold for him though.

"Why did you make me do it. It's COLD."
Ok it was mom's idea...Oops!

So Pretty!

RiverFront Park
One day we took them down to Riverfront Park and saw the falls. We fed the ducks and let the bigger kids ride the carosel.
Tanner and Jon.

The falls were rolling fast.

There is Caden, Marsha , Tanner and Jon looking over the ledge. Nixon and I will stay back and look from a far.

Nixon, Me, Jon and Aunt Marsha.

Nixon got to have a taste of a Snow Cone for the FIRST time. He liked it!

Garett got some bubbles for his birthday and Cameron was teasing Darby with them. She kept jumping and eating them. Silly Dog!

After LOTS of running and jumping Tanner and Gauge are tired!

Manito Park
On Sunday we took everyone up to see Manito Park. It was so pretty and such a beautiful day.

We took a bunch of pictures of Nixon up there. He is NINE MONTHS old these days and growing like a weed.
He liked the lilac garden but wanted to eat the flowers not just smell or touch them.

This one is my favorite. Grammy blew in his face and we took a picture. What a stinkin' cute kid.

The Liliac Gardens.

Then to the Japanese Garden. Sitting on Grammy's lap.

Trying to eat the little rocks on the ground.

My boys!

Then over to the conservatory.

"Hello!"

"Here I come.."

"I'm not afraid of the grass"

"I'm gonna get you"

Momma and Nixon just relaxing.

So as you can see we have had a lot of fun. Nixon turned Nine Months on the 11th and we took him to the doctor where he was healthy and growing big.
He weighed in at 23 pounds, 75%
Was 30.5 Inches Tall, 90%
and his head is off the chart, big surprise!

A Trip to Utah

Cousins in the Costco Cart!!
Mac and Nixon made quick friends on my trip to Utah!
They were so cute together.

Nana gets lots of magazines in the mail, they usually throw them away but Nixon LOVES to tear them up.

Such cheap entertainment!

Nixon got to swing for the first time in Nana's backyard, he LOVED it.

Swinging with the cousins!

Totally cute face... I just want to kiss those cheeks!

Nana loves hanging with her boy Nixon!

My brother's birthday was on Sunday and we had a little party on Saturday night in Nana's backyard. It has a creek that flows through it and makes the prettiest sound. It is a perfect backyard for a party.

Brandon, Wally and Tim

The kiddo's playing.

Bella got my camera and took a few pictures "for me". This is Hailey!

My mom's bird Hermione.

Aunt Katie and Nixon.

Lilly REALLY wanted Tim to have a pinata for his birthday so my mom got him one. The kids LOVED hitting it. This is Beau, Casey's sister's little boy!

Hailey taking a whack at it.

Then Chloe.

Bella getting a piece of it.

Lilly was last because she is a tough cookie and got a good piece out of it.

But in the end the birthday boy got to hit it last and get the candy out, (before anyone got hurt:)

Yeah Candy!!!

Even Mac got some candy.... Yummy he didn't want to let the sucker go!

Happy Birthday Tim! Homemade chocolate cake and ice cream Yum!!

It was also my step mom's birthday while I was there. She was turning 50 and decided to go ski diving for her big birthday. A bunch of us went out to watch.

Surprisingly enough you only have to get there about an hour early and they just take you quickly through what you need to do. Linda was a little nervous as she told us everything she was suppose to do.

Grandma and Nixon.

Grandpa with McKyah and Nixon.

Suited up and ready to go.

This is her camera man that videoed the whole thing, it was crazy. He gets out of the airplane first and holds on to the top -- yeah of the plane and videos while she jumps.

Let's get this party started!

Ready for take off.

Nixon was pretty excited ... as we waited to see them come down.

Here she comes....

Weee.....

And come in for a soft landing... on their rears.

She did it!!!

Here we are waiting ...

Yeah Grandma did it and survived, she said it was AWESOME!!

While we waited for the video Grandpa took Nixon to see the cool bikes. Of course the people that work there would drive fast motorcycles too, why not if they like to jump from planes for a living right?

On Sunday we had a little surprise party for Grandma.

The whole big Pickett family was there.

Happy Birthday Grandma Linda, I made her a little scrapbook of some pictures of all of us growing up. It was fun to remember all the funny times of our crazy family. She loved it and I am glad I was able to be there to give it to her.

If you look closely you can see a big long stick in the air - Justin my cousin was trying to catch the balloons because his son had tied his binki to them and then let them go. Well bye bye binki!

Mac and Nixon enjoying some toast one morning.

Mac wants them both.... Nixon is not so sure.

Nixon learned to give kisses while we were in Utah, it is so adorable and funny. He does the whole open mouth kiss, then he laughs. I love it!

We went to my cousin Alec's baseball game at Bountiful High too. He is a freshman and plays on the JV team, he did a great job, hit a home run and got to pitch for the first time.

We went and swung everyday in the backyard, Nixon just loves to be outdoors.

Binki boy!

HOGLE ZOO!!
We all went to the zoo one day, Nixon's first time.

Can you see the baby chick poking his head up???

The black bear eating some watermelon.

Nixon was amazed by the animals, he wasn't quite sure what to think.

A stop to have a coke!

Casey and Mac, Nana and Chloe, Katie and Lilly. Nixon had had enough of the stroller by now.

The camels....

The big gorilla.

Lilly - we had so much fun at the zoo!!

Thanks everyone for making our trip to Utah so much fun!! We love you guys!



When we got home Nixon found out how to crawl and found Darby too. She is now hiding from Nixon all the time!

Poor Darby hiding from Nixon....

Nixon found the screen door and smashes his nose against it and licks it, it is the funniest thing ever.

A video of Nixon trying to find Gauge or Darby, he knows they went around the couch somewhere.

Finding Darby

Swinging and loving it!

Nixonian!

Nixon is a moving around, and I turn my back for a few seconds and he is off like lightening. He loves to crawl under anything and I find him under the table or piano all the time. He is so funny about it.

So Nixon LOVES Baby Eisenstein, I don't know if I have said this before but it's true. He has now gotten Gauge to like it too and they watch it together, like this.
How cute are they?

Nixon slaps Gauge whenever the puppets come up, (that is Nixon's favorite part). Gauge thinks he is petting him... what a perfect combo!

They are good buddies!

I put Nixon in the cart at Costco for the first time a few weeks ago, and he loved it! He has outgrown his baby carseat, man he is growing so fast. But to distract him at Costco he got to hold onto my Costco card, luckily it made it all the way through the store and back in my wallet at the end.

So I left the bed for one minute and Darby jumps in with Jon, under the covers AND steals my little pillow. She is a turkey, but a cute Turkey.

Nixon loves to make noise... of any kind!

So this video is of Nixon watching me play fetch with Gauge. He does this sound when he gets so excited, I hope you can hear it, it's totally cute!

Our Easter Celebration!

So I might be a bit late but here are our Easter pic's. We of course colored eggs all together, a tradition. The kids love to do it and we love to watch them.
I think Katie is the most fun to watch, if we gave her 5 dozen eggs she would still want more at the end.

Jon got an egg and Nixon of course tried to put it in his mouth. He didn't think it tasted very good!

The many eggs....

Nixon's egg.

We all write our name on one egg and color it. It is a Spear Family thing I guess. So here is Nixon's egg!

Jon of course has to be serious about his egg and get it just right! Just like pumpkin carving I think.

Then there is my egg that I just throw together because Nixon wants to play with the cups with "water" in them.

Katie color the last of the eggs and putting shimmer on them.

Yeah Jon's egg!

And of course we had an Easter egg hunt. HOWEVER.... Jon, Cameron and Karen put together a Geo-cashing Easter Egg Hunt for us, where we had earth coordinates and clues to where to find the eggs around Spokane Valley. It was VERY clever and I think it was a success. Karen is on this big kick right now of finding Geo-cashing treasure, it's kinda funny.


It all started in the driveway and these were our clues:
#1. This is going to be fun - Find a yellow Easter egg out front near the sun!

The egg was in the front yard by my yellow sun stepping stone. Inside the egg it gave longitude and latitude coordinates to the next clue.
Garret was pretty excited as you can tell!

Which took us to the park by the Temple. And here was our clue #2. Some tables have metal this one is ALL wood - Find the egg around the wood if you could.

There are a bunch of tables under the pavillian but a few in the woods and we found the one that didn't have metal legs.....

And there in the trees was our yellow egg.

Very excited spectators

In the car we go to the next coordinates.

Which took us to Chester Elementary. #3. Can you spell Easter? That is the gig - to find the egg you might have to dig.

Here we were and Tanner and Katie dug for the egg. Garret was happy to play on the slide...that might have been wet from the rain that day..oops!

Digging, digging

They found it! And we put the coordinates in the GPS.

It took us up to Ponderosa.
Clue #4. Follow the trail an "X" you will see use your good eyes to find the dead tree.... Ho Ho Ho.

The "X" on the trail.

That looks like a dead tree alright, a dead "Christmas" tree. Clever!!

Katie found the egg in the tree.

This egg took us up to the new houses up in the back of Ponderosa. Clue #5. In this quest we are not seeking a pine, look for the BIG rock with a RED line.

Found the BIG rocks.

There's the line!

And the egg!!

Which took us to Grammy's house. Where clue #6 said: The eggs are calling, they can't hardly wait you will find them out beyond the back gate. (Where the dogs wouldn't find them..)

Here is Tanner and Katie with their "loot", yeah don't get too excited about it now....

We had a lot of fun on our Geo-cashing Easter Egg Hunt... Thanks Grammy, Cam and Jon! Too bad Nixon slept through the WHOLE thing. Hee Hee

Easter Morning Nixon awoke to a basket from the Easter Bunny, man he is a tricky one to find us here after all of our moving around:)

My Dad and Linda gave him a singing "Duck Bunny" that Nixon thought was pretty funny.

A new outfit from Nana B Nana!

But of course our boy LOVED the card and paper the best, I had to dig it out of his mouth after he sucked on it for a minute.

Easter Sunday pictures.... of course.

What a handsome family!!

The End,
Hope everyone had a Happy Easter!!