kids

I realize that ever since having kids every picture i post and almost every blog is about them. I'm going to try and do better about putting up pictures of myself and blogging about what I'm doing more often.  However, this is not one of those times.  I feel the need to keep track of what my kids have been doing lately

Colby:

He is talking SOOOO so very much and is talking in crazy sentences.  It's the cutest thing ever to hear him say "i need to do this because of this" its adorable how he puts things together.

He is still taking naps every day, and if i let him he'd still sleep for 3 hours or so, but unfortunately I have to wake him up by about 2:30 every day so he will go to sleep better at night.

Speaking of nights, he struggles a bit at bedtime.  He has realized he can get out of bed and he tries to do that every night.  He'll cry and try to get out of going to bed, and then get out of his bed about 5-20 times depending on the night. (short stage hopefully?)

He's doing really well in nursury.  When I take him to nursury he doesn't even say goodbye, he just walks in like he owns the place and leaves me hanging at the door. (i hear he doesn't give the leaders the attitude he gives me, so happy to hear that!)

He's definitely going through terrible two's.  He tried to get everything and is testing to see what he can get away with.  I see his sweet and sensitive side a lot though, and see the way he treats his bear or parker. 

He loves to pretend to cook, make loud noises, hammer things, fix things, take care of bear like he's a baby, play in his little tikes car, crawl around with Parker, be chased, RUN, and he could swing FOREVER.

When daddy comes home he gets so crazy excited.

He is not potty trained yet.  I've tried and failed a few times with that one. hopefully soon?

He loves being tickled and doing any sort of rough housing.


Parker:

He finally got his two front teeth this morning! That makes six teeth! We're moving right along.

I'm pretty sure he thinks he's a toddler. He is crawling everywhere trying to keep up with Colby. He absolutely admires everything about him (he doesn't even get that mad when Colby knocks him over ).

He's my little cuddler, he is always laying his head on me.

He loves being tickled and having his bak tickled.

He loves being held.

He loves walking (of course it's with help)

He HATES eating his nasty veggies, but will eat anything else we put in front of his face.

He started saying "mama" on my birthday! He also started saying dada again.

When in the bathtub, he'll blow bubbles all the time. So cute.

Is almost impossible to get him dressed, he wants to move all the time.

His sleeping schedule needs adjusting, he's waking up before 7 way more than I would like (making everyone grumpy for waking up too soon).

He smiles all the time, he is such a happy and relaxed baby.

The big 2.7.

I'm beginning to enjoy my birthday each year more and more.  As the years went by, I wasn't a fan of getting older, birthdays were just another day to me. Now, I welcome by birthday with open arms.  Who wouldn't enjoy a day that is dedicated to you (and Ellen DeGeneres - whom I think should give me a birthday present).  I enjoy the "happy birthdays" i get, and people doing things for me.  Just this one day.

 

My parents drove the 8 hours up from Arizona for my birthday (or was it to see the grandkids? i can't remember - they did almost forget to give me a hug before they left).  They are so amazing and sacrificed their time to watch the kids for us while Andrew and I went out.  I had made plans to get a couples massage for both of us because I'm so stressed with the kids all the time and Andrew is so stressed with work and studying that I figured it would be wonderful for us to do this together.  I'm sure it would have been.  We showed up to get our massage right on time and the lady had completely forgotten about our appointment.  There was only one person there.  That just simply wont do for a couples massage.  She asked if we wanted to wait half an hour, but neither of us wanted to, so we left.  A little sad, but now i have extra money in my pocket :)  We just went out to lunch instead and walked around Target (funny we found ourselves looking at little kids clothes, you just can't get away from kids).

 

bonus:

because we didn't make it to our massage, we just happened to be on the street at the same time as this person. Andrew said he would buy this limo.  I sure hope he wouldn't spend our money on this. (note the bull horns on the front)

 

 

I had a fantastic birthday, thank you to everyone who helped make it special. Love you all!

 

Here's a little video clip for your enjoyment

 

 

My favorite week of the year

Christmas time is my favorite. I love the cold weather, the hustle and bustle of everyone shopping and buying gifts. And of course, I love the anticipation of Christmas morning and seeing family. This year was a little bitter/sweet because andrew took the week before Christmas off so we had to leave family the day after Christmas, but it was great being able to see both our families.

We left the warm weather of Bakersfield on a Friday after andrew got home from work, we did a night drive again (those are getting difficult). The kids were great though, they didn't sleep much, but for being in a carseat they did well. We got to Bend Saturday morning and we were able to spend a few days with Andrews parents. We were welcomed by a ton of snow, blizzard warnings and all. It was so beautiful. It was so fun watching Colby play in the snow, he loves it! We tried to take him sledding, it didn't go as well as we hoped. It could have been because we tried sledding in a blizzard. He wasn't enjoying it quite as much as we hoped.

Colby caught on to the whole present thing rather quickly. He decided he loved opening presents. He even helped himself to opening Parker's (just to help him of course).

We headed over to Sherwood on Tuesday afternoon. We took Colby and Parker to Omsi while we were there (a big science museum), there was a ton of stuff for little kids. It's definitely something we would do again, he loved it! Poor Parker sat in the stroller the whole time, but soon he'll be able to play along with Colby. We decorated sugar cookies, made foot and hand imprints, Santa came to visit and we played A LOT. It's so fun being able to see family and having Lea there playing with them.

 

 

I love this time of year, I'm so sad it's over, but there's always next year! I'm so grateful for the time we were able to spend with family. I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas season!

Thanksgiving and mostly Black Thursday

Thanksgiving was so great this year. I love family and I love eating. Win win. The week started off with my parents coming into town on Monday. I just love having them here, it's nice having company during and help entertaining the kids. Dan, Britt, and Kami arrived Thursday morning. I'm so glad my family was able to come and visit even if it was for a short time. Dan, Britt and my parents ended up leaving Friday, but kami was able to stay until Saturday.

This was the first year that we had our eyes on a few items at Walmart for Black Friday (or Thursday).  We've been wanting a new TV for a while, but just haven't wanted to spend the money on one, but when we saw that 60" TV for less than $700 we couldn't pass it up.  Andrew and I headed over to Walmart at 5:00 to see how things were looking.  If there was already a huge line we'd just walk away, if there wasn't, we just might stay.  Well we got there and the place was surprisingly empty.  We found the line for the TV and there were about 15 people there already.  We asked a worker how many TV's there were and he told us 41, so we were like "holy crap we might actually have a shot at getting one!" So we stayed, or actually, Andrew stayed.  We brought Colby along with us so I didn't last long with him.  I put the boys in bed at 8:00 and headed over.  I also had my eye on a sewing machine that went on sale at 8:00.  I got there a little after 8:00 and the sewing machines were gone. That place was absolutely CRAZY, walking through the DVD section took FOREVER.  I met up with Andrew and just waited with him until 10:00 when the TV's went on sale and before we knew it, we had that beautiful TV back in our home.  Was it worth the 5 hour wait? yes, yes it was (dont worry, andrew agrees).  Andrew surprised me after we got home, we were trying to find a place to get a cheap wall mount (we saw one at walmart.com but we didn't want to wait for it to ship - we were anxious!)  I had to get sleep because the boys don't let me sleep very well, so i stayed home, but andrew got all crazy and in the black friday spirit and headed back out at 12:30 to find a wall mount.  He went to Target, best buy, and another walmart store (where he found my sewing machine) and also came home with a wall mount and "how I met your mother" seasons on DVD (funniest show ever by the way). It was a fantastic night :)  We just love our TV, and I am trying my best to sew.  It was a great day :)

I believe I jinxed things...

I would like to take this opportunity and take back almost everything I said about Colby. That little stinker is constantly changing.  I believe he has officially turned into a two year old over night.  He now wants all sorts of independence and do things on his own.  He tends to think he knows what is best for himself.  He fights nap time and bedtime now, he throws fits and whines a lot (I tend to think this is because he sees that I respond to Parker's cries so he now does it to get attention). Just now he tried to take my iPad from me so he could "see something real quick". So basically he acts like a baby but thinks he owns this place. Haha kinda funny.  It's cute watching him get all independent and figure things out on his own (nap time and bedtime are my least favorite of this change). This is just a phase and it'll pass :)

28 month Colby

I can't believe how  fast these kids grow.  I mean, 28 months? really? Colby says the funniest things these day, I've been writing them down in a book so I can always remember them.  He is always cracking us up.  He really does want to be such a good boy, he never wants to disappoint us.  He throws tantrums like any other 2 year old, but I know in his heart he wants to please us.

He is so good about naptime lately, it really is such a huge relief.  He tells me when he's tired and he grabs his bear and begs me to follow him (come on mommy, come on) and he leads me back to his room where he then gets the room ready (turns on the music, heater, fan etc) and then we read a book, he puts it back for me, and then gets into bed.  This is such a huge help since I am usually holding a tired Parker trying to put him to sleep as well.

• He is such a nice brother to Parker.  If Parker is crying, he will give him a toy to try and calm him down.
• He treats his bear like a baby, his bear cries, gets hurt, needs to take naps and even gets time outs.
• He jumps like crazy! He will jump off the couch, jump from the couch to the ottoman, jump off his bed. He's a crazy little dude.
• He always has to sit on the counter when I cook.
• After he eats his dinner, he comes running to us for a treat (yes we had to bribe him to get him to eat).
• He has started doing somersaults and loves it.
• He is very curious in what we're doing and says "what are you doing?" a lot.
• If we complete a task he'll say "good job mommy!" or "good job daddy!"
• He is always asking to go to the park with his friend Alina or to go to the store or get the mail.
• He is really good at understanding when I say "one more time" that it really is just one more time and then we need to go or we're all done with something.

 

Funny little story:

This morning I left Parker and Colby out in the living room while I ran in the back to take a quick shower, when I got out I heard Parker crying a bit (nothing unusual since he cries a lot) but I went out to check anyway, and what i saw was Parker laying on his stomach pinned down by Colby who was just laying on Parker on his stomach, his hands resting under his chin while he watched TV. Just like he would be laying on the floor, only he had Parker pinned down and was acting like it was no big deal.  Oh boy, these kids sure are going to have lots of fun together soon!

Colby really is such a good boy, I just love him to pieces!

Parker 7 months

Parker turned 7 months old on the 6th.  I just took him to the doctor today and here are the stats (at least what i remember of them):

 

Weight: 14 lb 3.5 oz

Height: 25.5 in

 

He's under the 5th percentile for a 7 month old, but since he was a month early they counted him as only 6 months and in that case he's in the 5-10th percentile.

 

• He's rolling all over the place
• He scoots around like crazy to get to all sorts of forbidden objects i purposely put out of his reach
• The doctor confirmed that he's teething (which would explain the extreme fussiness)
• He usually falls asleep for nap and bedtime with no problem
• He smiles all the time (even when he's fussy I can get him to fuss with a smile)
• He just stares at his daddy and gets the biggest grin on his face
• He already suffers with separation anxiety
• He wants to eat everything
• He LOVES electronics and tries to claw his way to get it (phone, remote, ipad, anything)