Happy Halloween!

Hoo hoo Haa haa! Sawyer enjoyed trick or treating and consumed more sugar today than he has his entire life. He did great at grabbing the candy and running away like a bandit. Love this little monkey :)

The best part was getting to go with these guys!

British Columbia

On Oct 8th Sawyer and I boarded a plane in Cedar City at 6 am to head to Canada to visit papa. The travelling went great and I got Sawyer to snooze for both legs of our trip. Thankfully the second flight wasn't full and he stretched out on the seat next to me.

Getting his wiggles out in SLC - it was great we had the whole place to ourselves!

Relaxing with papa - time well spent :)

This is our condo - 1st floor on the corner. Deer are always passing by munching on the grass. Sawyer LOVED watching them through the sliding glass doors.

Calan (2-year-old nephew), George, and Sawyer relaxing after Thanksgiving dinner. Canada celebrates Thanksgiving on Oct 10th. Jody (George's bro) and Alison had us over for a delightful Thanksgiving dinner. We feel so blessed to have family in town, especially with a playmate for Sawyer!

This is on our street, just down from our condo. Elkford is a beautiful town surrounded by mountains.

Stinker always trying to rip his hat off. Maybe when we drop to negative temperatures he won't be as stubborn.

Bundling up for a walk.

Sawyer and I kept entertained while papa was at work by taking lots of walks. This is the path to the swimming pool, library, park, ice skating and curling rinks. It's about a ten minute walk from our place.

It was SO so SO good to spend time with George. I can't wait until we are settled and together all the time.

Boise

The day after we got back from Canada we hopped in the car with Sara, Kaden, and Sadie and made the 9 hour drive to Boise, Idaho. Sara's sister-in-law Misty, and her family live there. I'd never been and since George isn't in town I didn't feel like staying home being lonesome. It was a fun trip and Sawyer was thoroughly entertained by Quiggly and his cousins! I was so impressed with Boise - at least the neighborhood where we stayed. It's beautiful and green with great walking paths that interconnect the neighborhood. It seemed like it would be a great place to raise a family.

This is Quiggly - definitely not too impressed with Sawyer's poking and prodding, but thankfully very tolerable. Quiggs is a labradoodle.

Here is the gang out on a lovely evening walk.

Our cute Soy boy!

Another Baby BOY!

Another baby boy will be joining our family next spring! George was right yet again. He had a dream a couple weeks ago that he had to deliver this baby by himself and it was a boy. The best part of the dream was that I only had to push three times! I'm not sure I want the dream to come true, but it might not be so bad :) We're thrilled that Baby Canuck is looking healthy and strong. His heart is pumping strong at 140 bpm. The only 'bad news' is that it appears I'm not as far along as they thought :( According to the ultrasound my tentative due date would be April 1st, but my midwife said we'll just keep it at March 28th. I wasn't thrilled with that news, but Sawyer came 6 days early, so hopefully that'll be the case with this little guy too. Don't be too disturbed by the 4D imaging below...this little guy is still pretty skinny since it turns out I'm only about 17 weeks along. Sawyer looked a lot more filled out because I was 19+ weeks when we had his ultrasound done. He is a squirmy little guy as you can see in the videos. We already love this little guy and are so excited for him to join us on the outside world.

Happy Birthday Sawyer!

Our sweet baby Sawyer turned 1-year-old today. We love this precious boy SO much. What a wonderful year it has been! We'll get some photos and stats later on this week, but for now here is a video clip from the party tonight. We sure missed having papa (George) here with us in person, but we skyped him in for the party.

Pale Green Pants With Nobody Inside Them

We love Dr. Seuss. Sara and Grandpa Lewis are in competition to see who can grow the best pair of 'pale green pants with nobody inside them'.

Sara 2010 carrot with Sadie

Grandpa Lewis 2011 carrot with Sawyer

3 and SLC

George and I have been married for 3 years, 3 months, 3 weeks, and 3 days today! 3 is my favorite number so this is fun. (I only know this because of the little counter on the bottom of my blog.) What's even more fun? That George has been home for the week! It's wonderful to be together.

George's brother, David, and his wife, Colleen, and their soon-to-be 8-year-old daughter, Natalia, took a road trip to Salt Lake City from Kelowna, British Columbia (not where we'll be moving). We drove the 4 hours up to spend time with them on Thursday and Friday. We met up with them at their hotel and had a great swim, then enjoyed some ribs for dinner.

Lisa was awesome to let us have a slumber party at her home with Natalia. This gave David and Colleen a mini vacation on their vacation. We played games and had a great evening.

Natalia - en route to our slumber party! She was fabulous at entertaining Sawyer in the truck.

On Friday we hiked to Timpanogos Caves. It's 1.5 mile hike (gaining 1100' elevation) to the entrance of the cave. I was a little hesitant in my pregnant state to do it, but a couple weeks ago I started taking ondansetron (zofran) and it has worked amazingly well. I have enjoyed two weeks of puke-free pregnancy! I still don't feel normal, but I'm much more capable of doing normal things (like road trips and hiking)! It was a beautiful day for a hike. Aly and her 3-year-old, Ben, joined us as well. It was SO fun! I felt great on the hike, and it was a beautiful day to spend outside. The cave tour was a little rough because Sawyer only wanted me to hold him and he was upset for the first half and I was tired. We made it through tho and got to enjoy some of the columns, stalagmites, and stalactites.

Bates Clan: Natalia, Liz, George, Sawyer, Colleen & David

Tall Bates Boys

Aly, Ben, Liz, George, & Sawyer just getting started on the hike.

Tough guy George. Ben actually only got carried for a short while, I was impressed with his endurance!

Close to the top!

We made it! Liz, George, Sawyer, Natalia, Colleen, & David. Colleen was smart enough to pack rolls and cheese...thank you!

On the way back down Sawyer fell asleep on George's shoulders. So sweet.

Ben was so cute, all he wanted to do was hold Natalia's hand.

David and Colleen want to take each of their children on a special trip when they turn 8-years-old. Natalia was in heaven on her special trip without any other siblings. I think it is such a neat idea, and Natalia will remember it forever!

The trip was great up until we tried to go home. Construction and traffic, UGH! It took us 3 hours to go what normally would take 30 minutes. So many detours and waiting and accidents. I was dying. That is why I don't want to live in a city. We made it home, just 5 hours after we had planned. Fortunately Sawyer was pretty nice to us, and only screamed the last 30 minutes of the drive. I was right there with him, so I couldn't blame him.

I wasn't very good at taking pictures, but I'll snag Colleen's when they get back home. I'm glad we took the time to go visit family and it was fun that I got to spend time with friends too.