something to talk about

Ok, I think it is pretty normal for a toddler to be fascinated with the telephone and imitate dialing and talking on the phone. I also know that my toddler loves to press buttons, any buttons. If it has a button on it Jace will find it and push it.

The problem we have found is that my parent's phone has a special button. It has one brightly marked, red button that direct dials 911. Jace called 911 twice in the two days we were visiting Wray last week! Needless to say we had to implement stricter rules about playing with the phone at grandma's house. Hopefully we won't have any more calls to emergency services. How many times can you tell them, "sorry, the toddler is playing with the phone" before they fine you or ticket you or something? And why do my parents have a one touch dial to 911?

Jace is allowed to play with an old phone at home. He will not be doing this at Grandma Joy and Grandad Doug's house.

Mile High Monday Night

What an amazing experience. My Dad and I got to go to the Broncos/Steelers game at Investco last Monday night. Wow. Mom got a cold and I got a Broncos ticket. I know that is not fair but it is hard for me to feel sorry about it. Of course it would have been better if the Broncos could have won (or even scraped together a decent Offence) but it was awesome to experience Monday Night Football at Mile High.
The crowd celebrates the only Bronco's touchdown of the night (scored by the Defense) with and eruption of noise and color. Smoke still hangs in the air from the fireworks.

Candy, candy, candy

The few days after Halloween looked like this at our house. Jace is, surprisingly, not that interested in eating the candy. He loves sorting through it, carrying it around in a bucket and dumping it out all over the floor. One night I moved the candy bowl off the kitchen table so that we could have dinner. You would have thought I broke the kid's heart. He cried and cried. I was a really sad cry, not the usual angry at Mom for taking something away cry. I think he really thought he would never see the candy bowl again.

Crazy Daze

Our schedule is extra crazy right now. Joel successfully requested time off from his job (where he was traveling all the time) to go and work corn harvest this fall for my Dad. It is nice to have him in Colorado but it still means that we are NEVER home. Harvest has had a rough start. There was so much moisture late in the season that the corn is not drying out as quickly as it should. Joel threw his back out this week helping cover the wet pit at the feedlot. Jace and I were in Wray for a couple days but had to be back to Denver today so that I can go to class. It was so hard to leave Joel. I'm not sure what the next week will bring. I am desperately trying to make it through the end of the semester. It seemed like such a good idea to get 9 of the 15 credits that I need done this fall. Now I'm having some doubts. I am barely keeping up. Assignment due dates are one on top of the other for the next 5 weeks. Obviously, I have lost most of the time that I used to keep up with the blog posts. I've also been relying heavily on Joel and the Grandparents to help with Jace.

Jace is teething but otherwise doing great. He has spent hours outdoors the last two weeks "helping" rake the leaves. Helping is a bit of a stretch. While Elaine and I raked leaves he found an ankle deep puddle to stomp in soaking his jeans up to his knees. Then, two days later, while Mom and I were raking leaves he tipped over the bucket that was already full and rolled it across the yard leaving a trail of spilled leaves on the freshly raked lawn. He is fun and exhausting at the same time. His personality is increasingly mischievous and playful. He is not a baby anymore.