Life and Times of The Johnston family

Monday, March 4, 2013

Devin's 2nd Birthday!!

So...picking back up on Saturday. In the early evening because Elizabeth got the required amount of star stickers on her "super star behavior" chart and because it was the day before Devin's birthday we went to Chuck E. Cheese's (you have to know that Elizabeth has been asking to go there for months!...Darn commercials!) It was actually a lot of fun! We found some awesome coupons that helped us do a lot for cheap! We got a pizza and drinks, and the kids had 65 tokens each...which they couldn't have possibly gone through since everything is only one token there, so they ended up splitting 65 tokens between them and they got to do everything they wanted pretty much as much as they wanted! I took the other 65 tokens and won over a hundred tickets for them on the coin pusher game....cause I won the bonus...ya I'm THAT good, try not to be jealous, it's a gift. ;) Any how we spent a couple hours there letting the kids have tons of fun, and at the end of it we traded in our tickets(and a few dollars) to get Devin his begged for sucker(ugh, hate that thing!) and Elizabeth her much anticipated, all she wanted stuffed animal. She got a teddy bear with a pink Chuck E. Cheese hoodie. They both left the happiest kids in the world!
Sunday was of course Devin's 2nd birthday! We could not believe it's been two whole years since he came into our lives! He certainly comes with unique challenges, but in the end we wouldn't have it any other way. We have learned so very much from him and the challenges he presents, and we have grown so much spiritually while being guided in helping him grow and learn. I've had many sacred experiences while raising him, and though it is extremely tough...most of the time, I feel incredibly blessed to have been chosen to be his mother. I learn so much from him and his special needs that I would not learn otherwise, and for that I'm grateful. Devin's smile and laugh are still the sweetest things in this world! If you can get a smile from him you instantly melt, because it's so special. He doesn't exactly give them freely so it's all the more special when he gives you one. He is very smart in his own right, he has a very curious and mechanically thinking mind. If he's determined to do something he'll find a way to do it, this gives us and everyone who works with him a lot of hope for his future. We really love our beautiful boy!! Before he went down for his early nap we let him open one of his presents, it had a super cute new outfit to wear to church and a a Thomas the Train birthday book. We brought birthday cookies to nursery so they could celebrate with him, and after church and dinner both our parents came down and Tony's parents gave him his second present from them and he opened some of his presents from us(he has his last birthday party next Saturday) he really enjoyed all the fun things he got for his birthday! We didn't have birthday cake but we did have yummy birthday cookies! Sometimes it's hard to tell with him....and he was certainly having a bit of an "off" day, but all in all I think he really enjoyed his birthday!

Whack the mice! This was a fun and cool game!

Elizabeth cruisin' with Chuck

Devin's favorite ride..BY FAR! He rode this little train with Barney 6 or 7 times throughout the evening!!

Lots more fun going on!

Elizabeth won like 14 tickets on this game!

Happy 2nd birthday Devin!!

Just Another Week

Ok I know what you're thinking (even if your not, you are now!), just another week?! What about Devin's 2nd birthday?!! Never fear I'm going to do another post with all the fun things we did for his birthday! This post is about all the other stuff we did last week. :)
So lets see, Monday was FHE of course and I was really looking forward to it, as the lesson was on the sacrament(Elizabeth has been kinda struggling with being reverent during that time). It was a really good lesson and I felt like she got a lot out of it. I really felt like she understood the importance of the sacrament and that it would help her be more reverent during it on Sunday(fast forward to Sunday...during the sacrament song Elizabeth was being anything but reverent, she wasn't listening to our pleas to sit on the bench reverently, so she and I ended up out in the side foyer, sitting on folding chairs talking about it again....*sigh* maybe next week...) her defiant stage(oh how I hope it's a stage!)has been really frustrating and trying on us lately. Tuesday was dance and tumbling which Elizabeth is really loving and I'm so glad! I was worried she'd miss The Little Gym, but I think she's just glad to be doing a fun...activity class again! Wednesday afternoon we drove down to Taylorsville to have Janel cut Devin's hair as it was is desperate need of cutting! Then we picked up Tony at his work went to dinner at Arctic Circle where the kids could play for a while. Then we went to Tony's brother Matt's house so he could do our taxes, Elizabeth enjoyed playing with her cousin Keira and really enjoyed playing with her fun toys! Devin did as well! Thursday was the Blue and Gold Banquet, our first activity as newly called Bear leaders! We had the most delicious food! It was a tropical theme so we all got leis to wear and one of the men in the ward smoked pork and it was soooo good! Fun Friday we had a pajama morning, which the kids were totally excited about when I told them! After we got dressed we went to the backyard to play and Devin was not at all ok with that idea...he screamed the entire time, so I eventually just brought him back inside and I calmed him down...so calm that he fell asleep in my arms, I must admit I loved it! Elizabeth played outside until lunch time. Then I got her Light Bright(that she got from her good friend Liza for her birthday....and we're now just getting around to enjoying it!) she loved it! We'll definitely be doing that more often! Saturday we got Devin's 2nd birthday pictures...or I should say attempted, and worked really hard to get some good birthday pictures as he was not handling it well AT ALL! The original plan was to get Devin's birthday pics then change the kids into their adorable Sunday Easter clothes and get some Easter pictures like we did last year....but Devin was not on board with our plan. So when Devin freaked out five minutes into his photo shoot Tony took him to calm him down and I got Elizabeth into her Easter dress and we got lots of adorable pictures of her! Then when Devin was calmed down and the photographer now believed me that getting Devin to look at the camera was the LEAST of my worries we managed to get some more fun pictures for his birthday. Consequently we scheduled an appointment for next Saturday to hopefully get some cute ones of them together and of just Devin in Easter attire. Then we came home put Devin down for his nap, and had lunch.(Devin fell asleep on the way home) Just after we got home Eric and Jen knocked on our door and we visited with them while they waited for my parents to get home. Tony got Elizabeth's pet net put up so we could finally unpack all her stuffed animals.(Elizabeth was in heaven!) Then he went and got the tires rotated on the Pilot(as needed to keep the warranty on them valid) he went to Lowes and got some things he needed to do some things around here. Came home and checked off quite a few things on his "Honey Do List" Go Tony!....and this is where we'll end! Til' the next birthday post!

Dress up fun! I love how Elizabeth has her Snow White dress on...a summer hat...a glove...a mitten...and one snow boot! Devin was content with just his "go cougs" hat.