Hard Core Henry

Justin has been really excited that Henry is getting to the age where he may be able to understand and like winter sports, so this month we took Henry ice skating and Skiing, both times during his scheduled nap, so it was dangerous, but with Justin's impossible schedule that's the only time we could go.

Ice skating was first. He didn't seem to have a problem walking around in his skates on the rubber, but when we got out on the ice, he just wanted us to hold him up and push him around. He was all smiles until he tried to get some snow off of the ice and his hand immediately froze and then he freaked out. Henry is always wanting to touch the snow, but every single time he does, after a couple seconds, he turns and starts screaming and instead of trying to clean off his hands by himself, he slowly waddles over to me so I can do it and then "hhhaaaa" my warm breath on his frozen hands until they are warm again. So you ask why Henry doesn't have gloves on? Well, the few pair of gloves we have don't allow Henry to use any of his fingers, so he hates wearing them. We might have had some functional gloves, but Daddy had to buy gloves for a 10 year old thinking he would quickly grow into them and that it would save money. Well, all we have is a baby with cold hands. Ugh!
So, after we took a breather we went back out and Henry finally understood that he could stand by himself and he even balanced and moved around for a good 10 seconds before he fell again. His favorite thing was to be sitting on my skate looking backwards as I went around the rink. Everyone with screaming children thought it was a great idea.


So because we were impressed by Henry's general ease with having strange shoes strapped to his feet and that he was so easy going as we dragged him around and around the rink, we decided it was time to take him skiing. There is this really great place called Boyce Park that's about a half hour from us and the rental for Henry's skis and ticket were a total of....$12! His lift pas was only $4 and since he only went up the lift once, it ended up actually being a really expensive ticket. Once again our only choice was to take him during his naptime, so we were ready for the worst. When he doesn't get a nap he is easily excitable, but also easily annoyed. Since it ended up taking FOREVER for Justin to park and get all his gear down to where we had been waiting and get dressed and get everything in a locker, it was already a rocky start. We also had to wait in line for a while to go up the bunny hill's "flying carpet" which is a rubber moving walkway going up the hill. By the time we got to the top, he had had enough. After failing to soothe him, Justin snowboarded him down the mountain and I took him in for a while and Justin went back out to take a few runs. We got chile cheese fries (which no one out east knows about even though they have the fries, the chile and the cheese at every resort, they never think to put them together to make the ultimate ski treat)and I had to beg them to make it since they "have no idea how to price it." I'm sure it's really hard to figure out. So, that basically did the trick and so we went back out again and instead of going up the huge bunny hill, I stayed at the bottom and put him on this smaller hill and let him go down a bunch of times with me running backwards in front of him. He LOVED it and after a couple times would say, "ready, one, two, free, go!" and put his arms out like Titanic and go down the hill with little help from me. He finally realized how much fun it was and he even learned to walk around with his skis on his feet and seemed to really enjoy it as well. We took more video of him than photos, so maybe I'll figure out how to put that up. These photos aren't all that great and he's not smiling. He did, however take a major fall and face planted in the hard snow, giving him a snow rash on his upper lip that actually bled. He cried for a while, but wanted to keep going after we hugged him and kissed his wound. I guess the photographer for the resort was taking photos for a new brochure that day and was taking photos of him, so we'll see if he's in it when it comes out. Already a celebrity:) haha! The world better watch out for Henry Jackson Hohl!

I think Henry remembers Jesus

You know how we all believe that babies remember the pre-existance and that they see angels and ancestors, but they slowly forget just as they might be able to tell us what they know? Well, I seriously think Henry remembers Jesus because no matter how abstract the art and even if he has never seen it before, he always knows if it's Jesus. I think he must just feel the his spirit when he sees the paintings and drawings. Henry has a toddler Bible that he makes me read to him every night. Every night as we walk up the stairs to his room he starts yelling, "Jesus Book! Jesus Book!" and I've actually had to limit reading it only at night and not for his nap because he never wants me to put it down and often we look at it for over 20 minutes when he should be sleeping. So far he knows the story of Adam and Eve, Noah, David and Goliath, Daniel and the lions, and Jonah and can recognize them all by name. His favorite pages are Eve eating the apple from the snake and Goliath who he calls "Go-wy-fuf." haha! After we go through the Old Testament stories he starts chanting, "Jesus, Jesus!" and loves hearing about him helping people, especially the little children. When we ask him "what does Jesus say?" we taught him to say, "follow me" and now whenever he sees Jesus with his hand outstretched in any photo he points to it and says "follow me." It's so adorable. There is one really cute illustration in his book where a blond boy about his age is being held by Jesus and it's just them together and no other kids, so it looks really personal and special for that boy. I always ask him who the boy is and he he says that it's Henry and then I tell him that Jesus loves Henry and he repeats it back to me, "Jesus loves Henry." I really wouldn't have guessed that he could understand so much at this age, but they are smarter than we think. Henry is already starting to count everything he sees and he understands how to do it! It just blows my mind sometimes. Well, I'm going to start really emphasizing the presence of Christ in our lives by talking about him more often when I point out things in nature or when I try to help him understand why we need to share and be reverent. I think he'll really respond to it since he seems to be gaining a great respect for our Savior.

I also found out earlier tonight that our wonderful Prophet, President Hinckley died. I was shocked and couldn't hold back my tears. It occurred to me that Henry wouldn't ever remember living under President Hinckley's time as Prophet like I did and it made me feel sad because he was just inspirational beyond what words can describe. I'm sure President Monson will be just as fabulous, but we'll surely miss our beloved Prophet who loved us so much and did SOOOO much to bring this church into such a positive light to the rest of the world to see. We love you President Hinckley!

A cold nose and baby toes

Last night our furnace turned off at some point and since Henry rolls around in his bed a lot, he usually doesn't have any blankets on him even when I pile them on when he goes to bed, and then again when I go to bed. I was awakened by his crying and immediately noticed that my nose was frozen, so I got up and brought him into my bed. Luckily Justin was on call or else it would have been pretty crowded in there. He curled up into a ball with his hands wedged in between his knees and I snuggled against him and put his frozen little toes through my thighs and soon we were asleep again. We woke to an absolutely freezing house. Henry was trying to burrow his way to china against my body like he usually does when he sleeps with us, but I tried to pretend that I was still asleep. He kept putting his frozen little hand on my cheeks for some reason, then when I turned over towards him he put both of his hands on both my cheeks and looking at me very seriously from one inch away said, "food, food." I guess he wanted to make sure I saw and heard him. haha! So we made some eggs and salsa, which he threw all over the floor and then we headed off to the bathroom where he took about a two hour long bath in deep warm water while I cleaned the bathroom, then turned on the blow dryer which warmed it up even more. Since the rest of the house registered at 50 degrees, we liked our little warm nook. The moment I took him out of the tub he started shivering and shivered and cried until I put him down for his nap dressed in two sets of pajamas and ten blankets. As soon as I put him down, I heard the heater finally kick back into gear and it took the rest of the afternoon to warm the place back up again. I'm afraid to look at the heating bill. Ugh.

Couple of stray photos that I love

These are from Thanksgiving, but I had to put them up because they're so darling...

In like a lion, out like a lamb

This morning Henry started crying...and he cried for about an hour straight and I couldn't console him with anything, even blueberries, which are his favorite all-time fruit. Luckily, we had a trip to the Science Center planned so as soon as he saw his cousins and his best friend, his mood changed, but holy morning from hell- that was insane. He got progressively better as the day went on, and since he's still on a super late schedule we were up until 11 pm taking down the Christmas decorations. He loved scavengering around the floor for fallen candies off the gingerbread ornaments. Henry did a pretty good job of eating at least one per day, so they didn't all go to waste. I finally put him down to sleep, but since I have to squeeze myself in his toddler bed to snuggle for a minute, he had lately gotten angry at me for using his pillow or not giving him enough room, but tonight he was happy to have me there. After he had fallen asleep I tried to get up, but he instinctively, but half-asleep, rolled over and put his little arm around my neck to hold me down. I was so touched that he had his arm around me (which doesn't happen very often) that I stayed for a couple more minutes before leaving the room. He was so sweet and happy to be with me. I just love him so much.

Hoping for a better year

Well, it's the new year and if I could forget last year, I think I would. Anyway, there's so much to be said about our three week trip over Christmas and New Years, but for now I have to relate what's going on now until I can get Christmas photos off my new camera! yes! Henry learned how to crawl out of his crib, so we are borrowing a toddler bed and we're trying to get him to sleep in it. When I go in to check on him, he's sleeping in it about half the time. He does get up a few times during the night and knocks on the door calling out for either me or Justin. He really doesn't cry that hard, so I let him put himself back to sleep. Thank goodness he can't open the door yet, even though it's only a matter of time when he'll also be able to escape. I have big Birthday plans for his room, so there are a lot of changes that need to be made in order to create outer space:) Henry was kind of a nightmare on our trip, but he's back to his usual happy self and I'm so glad it was short lived. This is a pretty lame post, so I'll write when I have something better to say.