First Day of School!

. . . . of pre-K preschool that is! Erik is attending a program just down the road at our local Baptist Church. (Texas is much different than LA was in terms of preschools. . . . basically all of the preschools down here are associated with a church and have a Christian-based curriculum.) Looks like it will be a great program though, and after one day of school Erik seems to think it is great! His teachers are Miss Andrea and Miss Marci. (Another apparently Southern thing that we are getting used to. . . adult women are all 'miss' and then their first name.)

Anyway, I can't believe how handsome this guy is. :-) Elizabeth and I sure miss him when he is at school!

We're Alive!

Ok, so don't fall off your chair, but I really am posting again! :-)

We've had an eventful last 7 months so I'll just run through the highlights chronologically.

--In January Ben accepted a Job with Exxon Mobile in Baytown, TX. He works for the chemical part of Exxon (not the refinery) making polypropylene. Or for the rest of us, plastic. :-) He's involved with the control engineering aspects of making the plastic.

--In March, Ben and I traveled to Houston (Clear Lake area) for a house hunting trip. We were very lucky to find a house that we love that is at the end of a cul-de-sac.

--In April we actually closed on the house! Finally the long awaited mile-stone of owning a home! We moved down to Houston the end of April. We're loving the home and of course I'm still excited about a kitchen with more than two drawers, laundry in the house, a garage, a backyard, and, and, and :-) The kids still love playing in the house too. Several of the rooms are still empty, so there is plenty of room to just run around--quite a change from our little apartment! We have also been blessed to have good neighbors. When it is cool enough Erik and Elizabeth like to go out and play with the other kids that live on the street.

--In June we were able to go to Ben's graduation, so we can now call Ben "Dr. Ohran". :-) We were also able to go to Idaho for my brother Michael's and new sister Becca's wedding. It was so fun to see all the family.

--In July Ben had a two week training in Phoenix, so I took the kids and we visited him over the weekend. We were also able to visit with my cousin and her family and a friend that lives in the area. As well, while we were in Arizona, Erik had his birthday and turned 4 years old! Perhaps Erik's most exciting present was his new bike! He is starting to get the hang of riding it around.

Well I think that pretty much sums it up. . . . maybe I'll post again before another 10 months have passed!

Front of the house--not that you can see much with the trees.

Side view of the house.

One of the many 'nooks' that the kids like to play or hide in.

Erik fixing his 'car'--just like Daddy.

Pinewood Derby Champion!

This past weekend, our ward had an Elder's Quorum Pinewood Derby! It was a really fun activity, and I think Erik enjoyed making his first pinewood derby car.

The making of the car was a family event. Ben did the body work on the car. . . with his drill and pocket knife! I'll admit I was a little nervous that we were going to end up with all fingers still intact, but Ben did a good job. Erik was the artist and painted the logging truck all by himself! (Well, other than the "E".) My job was to disguise the weights (ie three rolls of quarters) as logs. And for all you hard-core Pinewood Derby-ers out there--this was a no rules race. Anything goes as long as it doesn't involve fire/combustion. :-) Hence the quarters. . . .Here are a few pictures from the races.Between races, Erik was happy to help himself to a few cookies. . . . And the championship race. . . . Yeah!! Erik's car won first place!! Congrats to Ben and Erik. :-)

Yay for Elizabeth!

This past week has been an exciting one for Elizabeth!  Although she had been scooting around for several months, she is now officially crawling.  She is already fast and is having a great time exploring and getting into everything.  

This afternoon I was trying to get some good pictures of her crawling.  I enlisted Erik's help hoping that she would crawl to him while I got some pictures.  Elizabeth wasn't very cooperative, but she sure thought we were playing a great game.  :-)  We did finally get a few pictures though.  After I loaded them on the computer I noticed she was sticking her tongue out in most of them.  Silly girl!  

A Girl-Man?

Lately Erik has been very interested in trying to figure out all the gender-related words. . . Man, woman, boy, girl, lady, sir, etc. We had been talking about how mommy was a woman since I was a 'grown up girl'. A few hours later, Erik came up to me and said "Biffis a girl, mommy a girl. . . . man?" He was obviously thinking very hard and trying to remember what I had told him before. It was very cute. :-)

Oh, and yes, Erik calls Elizabeth, Biffis. . . Elizabeth is just a little bit too much of a mouthful for him. . .

Happy Labor Day everyone!

Yellowstone

A couple weeks ago we were able to go to Yellowstone for an Ohran Family reunion. Erik had tons of fun camping. He loved staying in a tent with Ben, and Elizabeth and I were just happy that we could stay in a cabin with Meredith and Zander. While we were there we got to see Old Faithful, the Paint Pots, some great waterfalls, some elk, and one bison. We even had matching t-shirts!


At the Paint Pots, Erik was much more excited about the signs than anything else.


Eight of the grand kids enjoying lunch together.

Trip to Utah

I need to play a little catch up, so today we're going to post some pictures of our trip to Utah that we took a couple weeks ago.

While we were in Utah, we attended the Hillier family reunion. The first day we spent in the canyon. This included a hike where Erik found pinecones. As you can see, Erik LOVES pinecones!

The second day of the reunion we went to Heritage Park in Salt Lake City (This is the Place Monument). I would highly recommend this park to anyone. It was a lot of fun!

Some of the activities we did were the pony ride, arrowhead necklaces, leather embossing, print shop, and the train ride. There were tons of other activites too, but we ran out of time.

Another highlight of the trip was Erik's new friend Jackson.

And finally, the plane ride home. Erik found the Safety Information packet quite captivating. Apparently if you read it upside down it is more interesting. :-)

Happy Birthday Erik!

Last Friday we celebrated Erik's birthday. I can hardly believe that he is already 3 years old! Time really does fly.

We went up to Thousand Oaks so that we could celebrate with Erik's cousins. First we had a yummy BBQ thanks to Grandma Maralee, Ema, and John. Next we had a pinata. We decided to do a pinata after Erik got to do one while we were in Utah. He loved the idea that not only could he beat something with a stick, but then you get candy for your effforts! Life doesn't get much better for Erik. :-)


Anyway, then we opened presents and had cupcakes. Happy Birthday Erik!

Congrats Ben!

First, I want to say Happy Father's Day to Ben and both of our wonderful Dads!

This past week has been an exciting one for Ben. He traveled to Seattle where he presented two talks at a conference. He also got the great news that he recived the Dissertation Year Fellowsip! And, last but certainly not least, the students voted him as the TA of the year!

We're proud of you!

Erik's Car, ABCs and Counting

Today was a marathon Stampin' Up! workshop, so me and Erik and Elizabeth had a fun day together. I figured I'd do a blog post too since I was playing Mr. mom at home (Allison says I can't call it "babysitting" since they are my own kids) .

Here are a couple video clips I took of Erik so I could test out the video posting feature.



Erik had fun driving his "car" to Grandpa's house. Also has Erik singing his ABCs.




Erik showing off his counting skills.

Sleepy Time

Sleep is one of those things that doesn't happen enough in our house! Although I suppose most people would say that. :-) I had some pictures of the kids sleeping so I thought that could be the topic for today's post. Fortunately Erik hasn't had too many problems rolling off his toddler bed, but he does occasionally get into some funny positions. One of the most common ways for me to find him during the middle of the night is with his feet off the side of the bed.

Elizabeth is still sleeping in her little bassinet, and although she does still have a few inches, she will grow out of it soon. I'm not sure what we are going to do at that point. I keep hoping that Erik's and Elizabeth's sleep schedules will become a little more synchronized. Elizabeth likes to stay up late and Erik likes to get up early. . . and Elizabeth hasn't been sleeping through the night lately so that also adds an interesting twist to having the two kids in the same room together. I'm sure it will work out somehow, but I can imagine all sorts of late night parties with Erik (very light sleeper) waking up because Elizabeth wants to eat and then no one wanting to go back to sleep. :-) I guess we will cross that bridge when we get there. . .

The last picture is of Elizabeth and Erik both on Erik's bed. This is more remarkable than it may initially seem. If Ben or I try to touch Erik's bed he quickly reminds us that it is his bed and he doesn't want us to touch it. We aren't sure why he is so protective of his bed, but fortunately Elizabeth seems to be immune to the 'rules'. Erik is actually excited for Elizabeth to share his room, and I try to convince him that he needs to sleep more (i.e. sleep in later) before she can sleep in the crib in his room. . . But so far I can't convince him. :-)

Elizabeth

I figure it is about time that I do an update for Elizabeth :-) . . . At her 4 month check up she was 12 lbs 4 oz and 25 inches long. Although hopefully those are outdated stats as she will be 5 months this week!

Elizabeth is still happy as can be and has found that she can manipulate her way around the room a little by doing a combination of rolling and scooting. She will now roll tummy to back and back to tummy. She also 'scoots'. When she is laying on her back she arches her back and pushes off with her legs so that she can move up a bit. As you can see, she has a spot on the back of her head where she is rubbing all the hair off! A few days she has even given herself a little rug burn. :-( Although she thinks its great that she can get to items that she wants. :-)