Timmy 3 Years 10 Months & an Athlete!

Timmy has official begun his athletic career this past week!  First thing Saturday morning we went to Reston Town Center for his first Little League Kick Off Parade.  Timmy is playing Blastball, which is a step below even T-ball!  The kids were so cute with big smiles the whole time.  The older age groups had banners for their teams and some of them passed out candy or baseball cards to the spectators.  After they came down the street there was a presentation and some speakers before everyone sang "Take me out to the Ball Game".  The whole thing was really cute.

At noon on Saturday we walked up to the elementary school for Timmy's first soccer practice.  I was really impressed with the program they have set up for such young kids!  Each team has two parent coaches, but there is also a "professional" who was there all morning working with one team after another.  He ran the drills and besides breaking them down for the kids to be able to understand them easily, he learned all 8 of their names by the end of the first drill!  Timmy's practicing at home paid off and he did a really good job with everything.  He got so excited each time he scored a goal!  Apparently as the weeks go on they will end practice with scrimmages.  I'm looking forward to seeing how far they all progress!

 

Tuesday evening was the first Blastball practice, Tim is the coach and had set up several drills for the kids to go through.  Practice is right around the corner from my office and Caleb is on the team as well as my friend Kristina's son, Carter, so I am going to enjoy getting to visit with Suzanne and Kristina every week during practice!  We enjoyed watching, the kids all paid attention and got into the drills.  Timmy did suffer his first blow to his self-image at practice.  While fielding, another player kept beating him to the ball, he came over to me fighting back tears and telling me that, "everyone is faster then me." This realization was a shock to him because he had thought he was "the fastest person in the whole World."  I was relieved when he decided that, "they are the fastest people in the whole World too."  :)  Tim is happy to see this strong desire to win already in Timmy, I'm fine with it as long as he can be a good winner and a good loser, rare as losing might be... ;)

So, after vacation our next 5 Saturday's will consist of 9:30 Blastball games, Noon Soccer, and naps the rest of the day, I hope!

Our new Daycare

As I mentioned in my last Five For Friday post, Timmy and Tyler will be starting new daycare this summer as soon as my parents move to Florida.  I have literally been researching our options for two years and I was having a really hard time coming up with a situation that I liked.  I wanted Timmy to be able to finish preschool at United Christian Parish Preschool and I wanted Timmy and Tyler to be together when Timmy wasn't in school.  This eliminated Kindercare set ups, it just didn't make sense to me to take Timmy out of preschool for a year just to have him get into Kindergarten the following year.  But in home daycare was going to be problematic too, because the care giver wouldn't be able to pick Timmy up from school in the middle of the day. I was really getting worried about finding something that would work for us.  I was looking at places as close to my work as possible thinking that I might be able to run Timmy over after school but that wasn't going to be ideal either.  Not to mention that the quotes I was receiving were about to give me a heart attack!  I got to the point that I didn't know what else to do but pray about it, I pray regularly, but it's usually for other people or just being thankful for my blessings.  I am beyond blessed and rarely have a need to pray for this type of thing for myself, so this was different for me.

Mom invited me to a Mom's Night Out dinner through the church playgroup she takes the boys to and I decided last minute to go.  Suzanne, a woman we have gotten to know over the last few years through events and playgroup dates, walked in and I lit up, leaned over to Mom, and asked her if knew what kind of car Suzanne has (hoping to hear a minivan or SUV!).  Suzanne has an adorable son, Caleb, who is just a month younger then Timmy and goes to the same preschool already, and an adorable daughter, Stella, who is just a few months older then Tyler.  I knew Suzanne had recently become a stay-at-home mom and she had mentioned when I saw her at Christmas time that it was totally worth it, but the new budget was tighter then they were used to, obviously.  A little while into dinner another woman asked me if I'd found any daycare options that I liked yet, and I briefly started going over all the cons I'd come across.  Suzanne, hesitantly asked, "Well what would you like to find?" I answered that I was up for any situation that could fit us.  She rephrased, "But what would be ideal...?"  My response, as I restrained my excitement, was, "If you would like to discuss the possibility of you keeping my boys, I would be very open to that."  About a dozen emails and a week later, we had everything lined up for Suzanne to start keeping my boys in August!

We have had a few trial runs the last few months when Mom went to Ohio and the past week and a half while she got a new kitchen put in.  I am very happy to say that everything seems to be going well and that I could not be happier with the care the boys are getting.  Timmy is excited to go to Caleb's every morning and Tyler reaches for Suzanne right away!  Getting fun pictures throughout the day, which are breaking up this novel, is a nice perk too!  Suzanne and I have a lot in common besides our kids' ages.  When Mom first met Suzanne, she called me to meet them for lunch because she knew we would get along.  We are both married to our high school sweet hearts, her family is from the Akron area also, and we do get along really well.  In the past week we have gotten Caleb and Timmy on the same blast ball team as well.  I'm looking forward to continuing to all become good friends!  This is definitely an answered prayer!

Easter

I'm playing catch up again!  We had a very nice Easter Weekend and enjoyed visiting with all of our family.  Saturday evening my parents and Joe came over to color Easter Eggs with us.  Tim was in charge of getting the eggs and dye ready this year because I had been out running errands.  He put 3 of each color tablet into each cup, and the results were life changing for our egg dyeing, the colors were SO much better!  Timmy really loved coloring the eggs this year, he wanted to put his eggs into all the colors "to make them beautifuler and beautifuler!"  We showed him how to put stickers on or color on the eggs to keep those places from changing colors which he thought was really neat too.

Of course for Timmy, the highlight of the whole Easter experience was his basket!  The Easter Bunny knew exactly what Timmy wanted: Angry Birds!

Tyler had a nice haul too, the Easter Bunny found my vintage Peter Rabbit stuffed animal and put it in my sweet baby's basket along with some new books.

Sunday we followed our recent tradition of going to church in the morning, stopping at my parents for Easter Baskets before going to lunch with them at PF Chang's.  Then we relaxed for a little while before heading out for round two at Tim and Susan's, where we enjoyed an incredible spread (with healthier versions of everything this year!)  And finally visiting with Elena and Al, where we got to see (and save, from the window well) a real baby bunny!  It was a wonderful, beautiful day!

Five for Friday

1. My parents are moving.  This is something that's been in the works for well over a year now, but they are hoping to have the house on the market in May, so it is approaching quickly now.  I've been ignoring this on the blog but their move will make for a huge change in all of our lives.  For the boys it also means new day care.  We have set up a wonderful situation for them though, which I will write more about next week, as they will be staying with Suzanne for a few weeks while my parents house gets a new kitchen.  It also means I'm selling all of my parents cool stuff for them!

2. Timmy is obsessed with Angry Birds.  When I say that he's obsessed, I am in no way exaggerating.  As proof, this is what we discovered when we opened the door to check on Timmy after he had been in the bathroom for quite a bit longer then usual the other night:

3. Tyler had his first time in the grass recently.  He immediately struck the same pose Timmy did when he was first placed in the grass, holding his leg up!  Timmy came over to tell Tyler that it was okay to touch it though.

4. Timmy likes all the baby toys.  I have been trying to get age appropriate toys out of closets for Tyler to actually use, but even if Timmy is busy playing Xbox when a "new" toy makes it's debut, he drops what he's doing and comes over to steal the baby toy!  He is slowly getting better about sharing them, and occasionally I'll hear him saying, "Tyler, when I was a baby I played with this and now you play with it."

5.  We're getting healthy.  I realized this is another big thing in our lives that hasn't made it to the blog yet.  Tim and I are about two months into a new lifestyle where we don't just sit on the couch all the time!  On February 6th we each started walking, counting calories, and exercising 5-6 days a week.  Tim bought us fitbit's that we wear all the time that count our steps, stairs climbed, and calories burned  each day.  We also started using www.myfitnesspal.com to track our calorie intake and exercise.  We are both settled nicely into this new routine and seeing big results.  I reached 20 lbs down after 8 weeks, which puts me back to Pre-Timmy weight.  I'm hoping to lose another 30 lbs before my birthday, which will bring me to my goal weight of the "ideal" weight for my height.  My parents, Joe, and Tim's parents are all in various stages of getting into similar habits.  It's nice that we're all doing it together (and easier, without tempting food everywhere we go) and that we are all seeing results!  I'm very proud of all of us!  No picture to go with this item, but maybe when I reach my final goal weight I'll share the before and after picture of me, to all 9 of my readers!  ;)

Easter Egg Hunts

We enjoyed the annual Preschool and Church Playgroup Easter Egg hunts this past week. The preschool one is held at a nearby picnic area and Timmy really enjoys seeing his school friends outside of school.

The Church Playgroup Egg Hunt has been held at a member's home the last few years, but this year the priest asked them to hold it at the church and make it open to everyone.  Mom and Suzanne (our future daycare provider, lots more about her coming up in future posts I'm sure!) were some of the organizers.  They did a great job, making it a 3 hour event that was fun for babies up to 10 year olds!  Brayden joined us and Timmy got to play with Caleb (Suzanne's son) too.  First we enjoyed making some Easter crafts

Then it was time for Egg Rolling Races

Egg Spoon Races

The cutie on the left is Caleb

Brayden got his face painted

Timmy was excited that his Baba read a book to all of the kids during snack time

Then they got to the main event, the egg hunt

Followed by some playground time

This little beauty is Stella, Suzanne's daughter

Later in the day Timmy told me the best part of his day was playing with his Best Buddy Brayden and his other Best Buddy Caleb!