The Bishop's Birthday Month

Keith constantly mocks my family because whenever it is someones birthday or there is a holiday, they like to celebrate for more than just the actual day of the event . . . they celebrate for the entire month. For example, Happy Mother's Month, Happy Father's Month, Happy Birthday Month, you get the idea. So in the spirit of extending celebrations, we continued to celebrate Griffin Bishop's birth past the actual anniversary date and had another little party. This time he had cousins and aunts to join in on the fun! I even made a cake. I hate to say it, but it was the first time that I actually made one from scratch. :) I made the "Died and Gone to Heaven" Chocolate Layer Cake. It is from my most favorite cookbook, Eat, Shrink, and Be Merry. (http://www.eatshrinkandbemerry.com/) I love this cookbook. It has all low calorie and low fat recipes that are fun and interesting to make. There is only one recipe in the entire book that is not low fat, and this cake is it! It turned out pretty good for my first time. Here are some pictures of my to die for cake.

I am pretty sure Griffin liked it.

Benson did too. I finally threw the rest of the cake away today so that Benson would quit asking to have cake for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. He ate more than anyone else at the party did.

I think the birthday celebrations have come to a close for now, until they spend all next week with Grandma and Grandpa, they are planning a party too. We love birthdays.

On a side note, I am in serious need of a haircut and dye . . . any suggestions?

You've had a birthday, shout hooray!

Griffin Bishop was born on January 13, 2008 in the afternoon. He weighed 7 lbs and 6 oz. He had long dark hair and blue eyes. He came out screaming and hasn't seemed to stop making noise since. It took him several days to catch on to the whole eating thing and took him almost 12 weeks to sleep through the night. He has never been good at sitting still. He learned to sit up at around six months and learned to crawl at eight. He has recently mastered going up and down the stairs. He thinks his brother Benson is the funniest thing on the planet. He loves peek-a-b00, Elmo, dancing to music, drinking milk from a sippy, snuggling just before nap and bedtime, his grandparents, playing with trucks, eating food off the floor, throwing toys out of the bathtub, being squirted with water in the bathtub, standing at mom's legs while she cooks dinner, and getting into trouble. We just love our little Griffey and never could have imagined being blessed with such a wonderful boy.

We celebrated his first birthday on Tuesday. He was born the day before his Grandma's birthday. And as an added bonus, our very dear friends gave birth to their firstborn son on Griffin's birthday (just a year later)! She had her baby almost a month early and we are so excited that they get to share their special day. Having a friend give birth on my baby's birthday definitely caused me to reflect on the day of Griffin's birth. My due date was January 26, but as soon as I found out I was pregnant I always said that he would come on Sunday, January 13th. (I think I have a special power for guessing birthdays, I guessed right for Benson also.) On that glorious Sunday morning I put Benson into the bathtub to get him ready for church. As I sat down I thought that I wet my pants. Thankfully that was not the case, but my water had broke, kind of; well, it had a hole in it. Needless to say I was in labor. So we dropped Benson off at our neighbor's house (his surrogate grandparents) and we headed to the hospital. I got an epidural rather quickly and four hours, three pushes later, out came our second boy. Has it really been a year since that happened? Now he is an almost walking, pre-toddler with ten teeth (he got two molars today). He has taught me sooooooo much as a mother. Hooray for G-riff. We love you baby, oops . . . I mean big boy!

We took the kids to McDonalds for Griffin's birthday celebration. Are we lame? We let Griffin get his own kids meal (generally the boys share) and he ate every single bit of his chicken nuggets and french fries. He took a chicken nugget in each hand and went to town. It may have been the cutest thing I have ever seen. We also each took a kid and crawled through the tunnels and slides. Griffin loved it, Benson was pretty scared.

I had to include this picture. My husband is so dang cute, and in case you haven't noticed Griffin and Keith are practically twins.

I get my kids apple juice at McDonald's, that's healthy right?

Griffin "opening" his present. He mostly just tossed it around, until Benson decided to open it for him. I wish you could see his face better in this picture because this kid's eyelashes are soooo long. That comes from Dad, not me unfortunately.

Happy Birthday Griffin. The best is yet to come!

One of these things is not like the other

Please look in the picture below and guess what item does not belong. I promise you, this won't take long.



You guessed it, it's the insanely bright hot pink couch sitting in the middle of my beautiful newly finished basement. We inherited this couch from Keith's Bishop and good friend growing up, Bishop (yes, we refer to him as Bishop, always have, always will). In fact, even Griffin (who turns one today! and whom I will blog about sometime later) is named after him, Griffin Bishop. Anyway . . . we lived in Bishop's house when he and his wife served a mission and we LOVED this couch that used to belong in their basement. When they returned home, they gave it to us. I thought it would be so fun to put this in a cute little girl's bedroom, but the tally still remains: Boys 2, Girls 0. So unfortunately for me, this bright pink couch is an eye sore for all to see. Well no longer my friends because I am married to a brilliant engineer husband who designed and cut a couch for me and had it built by a buddy in the couch building business. And here I sit in on my brand new sectional that seats 10, blogging and watching E Fashion Police while my kids nap away the afternoon. Life couldn't be better (unless I could bend over, but that is a different story for a different day). Here is a picture of my sweet sofa . . .

Yes, that is a diet coke and a box of reduced fat wheat thins on the floor (it was my late night snack) and the pink couch still hasn't been moved because I can't bend over, but is that couch not fantastic? I love it. It is huge! It has plenty of room for visitors, come and see us!

And yes, it is my baby's birthday today. We sure love our Griffin Bishop. He is one today! So bye bye to bottles and binkies (we said bye to binkies a long time ago), and hello walking and talking and growing up! YAY!

The New Year is already here?!

Dear Diary . . . (just kidding . . . kind of)

Has it really already been nine days since 2009 started? I can't believe I am already thinking that it is going by too fast. I really can't complain though, since Keith and I leave for our Caribbean cruise in T minus 15 days! Yes, we received a free cruise through Keith's work and my mom is going to watch the boys for eight whole days, so that Keith and I can go sit on a boat and drink pina coladas all day (virgin, of course).

We rang in the New Year with my parents in our brand new basement. The boys didn't quite make it to midnight, they went to bed at the usual 8:00 pm, which created a big problem when they didn't get the memo that you are supposed to sleep in on New Year's Day. So, we went to bed at 1:30 and the kids were up at 6:30. Thankfully my house has expanded a bit with the new basement, so my parents were allowed to sleep in a room with a door that closes and they got to sleep in. Keith too. The kids and I cooked a big breakfast (stuffed french toast, hashbrowns, sausage, bacon, the works), already breaking any New Year's resolutions about losing weight or counting calories that anyone had planned on. Actually, I am not one for resolutions because I am what you would call superstitious. I hate to say things out loud, I would hate to jinx anything. There are a few ideas I have for improving 2009 that I am willing to announce. I have decided that I would like to read each and every Ensign cover to cover. How do I plan to accomplish this? I leave the newest issue on the table and read one at every meal. To be honest, it has already dramatically changed my life. I didn't realize there was so much good stuff in there! :) I also am doing my best to add a fruit or vegetable to every single meal that we eat. Of course I have already failed at this goal, but I am trying and that is good enough for me. I'd also love to paint the upstairs portion of my house, install wood floors, redo my kitchen, get a minivan(you heard right), but I don't think I am allowed to set resolutions for Keith am I?

Anyway, we have had some developments around here. Griffin has decided to try and walk. He turns one next week and I am so excited. I love watching him grow. He is certainly a fascinating child who keeps me on my toes. It is such a blessing to be his mother, he has taught me so much. But that is a post for another day, perhaps on his birthday if I find time amongst all the partying I have planned (let's be honest, I don't really have anything planned. It is kind of lame to have a birthday this close to Christmas). Benson has started to call Griffey "Nahnee." We are not quite sure where this came from, but it is the cutest thing ever to hear him say, "No no Nahnee."

(Please ignore the bedhead, I had to post this picture, I love it!)

We all went to see the Jazz play the other night. Benson decided to have a small nervous breakdown when we got there. He is a very sensitive child, but we were still surprised at the freakout because he has been to several Jazz games before and never had a problem. Thankfully it was nothing a bucket of popcorn and a huge soda couldn't fix. Griffin loved it and everyone around us loved Griffin. These boys couldn't be more different, but that is also a post for another day. Let's just say, a year ago I thought all children were the same. So my lesson in 2008 is that we are all children of God, born with our own personality, and divine destiny. We are not all the same and what a wonderful blessing that is. My lesson for 2009 . . . to be determined.