Five for Friday - 2014

A few fun things from 2014 that I still want to get into the blog.

1.  Susan's daughter, Andrea, got married to Clint in August.  We took a weekend trip to PA with Chris and Jenny for it.  It was a beautiful wedding and a lot of fun; Jenny definitely had the most fun.  ;)  It was also a little extra emotional, as Susan had received her last chemo treatment just days before Andrea's wedding, and her ex had lovely things to say during his Father of the Bride speech.  It was definitely a celebration!

2.  In September, Timmy and Tyler both graduated to new bikes, Tyler to a two wheeler with training wheels, Timmy to getting his training wheels off!  You can see Tim's original plan of action with Timmy involved holding onto him by the hoodie.  After that he took the pedals off and just had Timmy push around until he figured out the balance.  After that he got it pretty quickly!  They were both very proud of themselves when they made their break throughs, but neither of them necessarily loves bike riding or asks to do it very often.  Watching these, I can't believe that these videos are less then a year old!  They've both grown up so much!

3.  Ryan and Sami had baby Graham last October.  A bunch of the girls took Sami to the Melting Pot a few weeks before to celebrate.  I went to meet Graham in the hospital, and then Tim and the boys and I went to meet him soon after he got home.  The boys were excited to have a new friend and they enjoy every time they get to see him.  On top of just getting together with our friends who are now nieghbors, Timmy and Tyler have helped me babysit Graham, and Ryan and Sami have watched Tyler for us.  It's good to have more friends with kids!

4.  We celebrated Stella's birthday in November with a fun party at her house with Mr Knick Knack. Stella and her friends had a great time.  There was lots of dancing and giggling.  Timmy and Caleb thought that they were too cool for the party, there was lots of sighing and eye rolling from them.  Everyone settled in for pizza and cake though!  When it was time to leave, Tyler and Stella did some impromptu prom poses for the camera until Timmy, ever the photo-bomber, interfered.  Poor Tyler needs to grow, but he is six months younger then Stella!

5.  Nats Fest 2014 was in December.  It was a fun afternoon, the highlight was the mystery player reading to the kids again.  We got there early and got Timmy and Tyler seats right up front.  The reader this year was Ryan Zimmerman.  He read two books, the second one was a long, strange story about a child going to the grocery store alone during a snow storm.  Multiple times Zimmerman said that kids should not try to do the things in the book.  Timmy played paparazzi, and it must have been a new experience for Zimmerman, especially when Timmy put his foot up to take a picture.  The video is of Timmy's turn to ask Zimmerman a question, it took a lot of encouragement to get him to ask him anything, but he was excited after he did.

These are actually from a game we went to, Tim's turned out best, Tyler refused to smile, I guess he had his game face on!

Five for Friday

Time is slipping by me again!  Work has been very busy and we're also in the middle of shave ice season, so a Five for Friday will have to do to help keep me current!

1.  My company designed a splash park for South Riding that opened this summer.  It took four attempts (the first three spoiled by weather or maintenance issues) for me to be able to take the boys, but we finally made it!  Afterwards we drove from the pool to our townhouse to give our renters the paperwork to get their own pool passes.  It's funny that it's the only time we ever went to a pool in our neighborhood in eight years, after it was no longer our neighborhood!  I really loved watching the boys enjoy something that I designed, and Timmy thought it was pretty cool that I built it!

2.  We found out why Sophia was a no show to Timmy's birthday party... her family moved to Colorado on short notice for her dad's job.  Luckily, I emailed her mom right after the party to try to set up a playdate, and her mom offered to have Timmy meet Sophia at Chuck E Cheese the day before they were moving.  They enjoyed each other's company and played some games together and did some stuff on their own as well.  I was more upset then Timmy, and that was a relief!  Timmy and Sophia had little ID cards made of each other and traded them, so Sophia has a card with Timmy's face that says he's an officer, and Timmy has Sophia's princess card.  He has mentioned her a few times since then, talking about how she has moved away.

3.  Tyler has reached the stage where he can prove how much his little brain is connecting.  On the way to a doctor appointment a week and a half ago, he saw an airplane, "Mommy! Bearplane!"  "Yeah... I see that airplane"  "It flies!"  "It sure does fly"  "Bird!"  "You're right! It flies like a bird!"  The next day, Tyler begged for a banana that he took a nibble of and then said he didn't want.  He was seated at the table with just a place mat, but I told him to just put the banana on his plate.  He made a funny face while looking at the table, and then told me, "There's no plate here."  These full sentences are still shocking me...  We were hopeful that he had gotten through his grumpy "stage", which appears to be Tyler's version of the Terrible Two's, but it has resurfaced!  He seems to think he can only love so many people at one time!  When we first moved in, he was always very grumpy towards Grammy, and Becky was one of his favorite people.  That has apparently been reversed for now!  At his 2 Year Appointment he was 28 lbs and 2'-10", he didn't cry too much over his shots.  I ordered training potty's today... wish us luck... my least favorite part of being a parent so far is potty training!  But, Tyler tells us all the time as he's about to go potty, and seconds later, when he's all done, so we're going to give it a shot!

4.  Timmy is turning into a frog.  Right around when we opened our pool I also got Timmy into a six session swim class.  It was good timing, as he usually spends the first several weeks of the summer being afraid of the pool and just wanting to play on the steps.  He started out at our house still being weird about getting in, but jumped right in and did everything his instructor asked him to at class, so we put our foot down at home and told him to stop being silly.  I didn't want to get him goggles because I didn't want him to feel like he always had to have them, but after seeing his red eyes a few weeks in a row, I finally bought him a pair.  You would think I bought him gills.  I don't think his face came fully out of the water his first session with them!  It really helped his swimming too, and at this point he can jump from one side of the pool and froggy swim under the water to the opposite side on the same breath!  He also gets dive sticks and can float on his back for almost 10 seconds.  I am planning to put him back in lessons this winter, but hopefully he'll be able to skip a few levels!  At his 5 Year Appointment he was 45 lbs and 3'-9"!  He did cry over his shots... for a long time.  The nurse even tried to help me calm him down by assuring him they were over, but Timmy kept saying, "I told you I wouldn't like the shots!"  I just kept telling him I never thought he would like them, but he had to have them if he wanted to go back to school!

5.  Tim's Birthday was last Saturday and we had a very nice day celebrating him.  As soon as we woke up we baked Tim a cake, and Timmy asked me how old Daddy was turning.  When I told him 32 he made a silly face and then said, "So, he has to have 32 candles on his cake?!"  And so it did.  We finally went to see Monster's University which was a really good movie, thank goodness!  Becky babysat for us and Chris DD'd for us that evening and we went to Dogfish Head Alehouse with Billy and Jeff to wrap up the day.

5 For Friday - Stories

Life has been busy all month and my blog is suffering from it.  Work is good but busy and we are rearranging and reorganizing our house.  I missed both boys monthly updates this month and am realizing this morning that my camera has been put away for too long.  I will still be posting about Christmas too, I don't care if it takes me until July!  January has brought this mommy a lot of happiness though, and I have some stories  I wanted to be sure to share, pictures to be added next week after I stage them this weekend! ;)

1. Roommates ~ Tyler has officially moved into Timmy's room.  We knew we would be combining them sometime in the beginning of this year but after Christmas, when we saw the shear volume of new toys that had no where to live but a cardboard box in the basement playroom/office, we knew we had to do something!  Putting the boys together meant that Tyler's old nursery could become an office (again), which would get the desk out of the basement, giving the whole room to toys!  We also went through all the toys and are donating and selling off most of the infant toys and the things that they just don't play with.

It's not "Pinterest Pretty" but it's functional!

The first night that we put Tyler in the bottom bunk I laid down with him for a few minutes, he was happy and laying still, so I tested the water by getting up and leaving the room.  I didn't hear any crying, but I watched him on the monitor as he got out of bed.  Still no noise, but I couldn't see where he was, so I went back in.  Tyler had climbed up and laid down with Timmy, who was giggling as quietly as possible!  I put Tyler back into bed, and Tim and I have been alternating laying down with him until he falls asleep since, next step, not having to stay til he's asleep!  Tyler has slept through about half the nights he's been in there, sometimes when he does wake up he fusses as he gets comfortable and goes back to sleep on his own, the other times he wakes up he cries at the door until I come in, then he turns around and gets back in bed, but I have to lay back down with him until he's asleep again.  If I sit up before he's asleep, he calmly pats the pillow and states, "down."  If I don't immediately, he puts a little emotion in it and says, "ay dowwwwn."

The best part of putting the boys together has been seeing another shining example of what an amazing big brother Timmy is.  Our bedtime routine used to be putting Tyler in his crib and leaving the room, then reading to Timmy in his bed, turning out the lights, saying prayers, and laying with Timmy for 10 minutes or so before he'd let me leave.  From night one of having Tyler in there, Timmy has not had a single complaint about my snuggling Tyler to sleep instead of him.  Now, we all read in Tyler's bed, then Timmy gets up and turns out the light and gets into his own bed, and we say prayers together and he goes to sleep.  He doesn't complain when Tyler is singing or crying himself to sleep either, Timmy just quietly goes to bed.  I'm amazed and so thankful, and Tim and I have been praising him and lavishing Lego Star Wars sets on him, rewarding him for being such a big boy!

2. Day Care ~ With Timmy starting Kindergarten in our neighborhood next year, in a three hour a day program (so stupid), we have to find new day care for him again.  We knew at the start with Suzanne that the kids being with her was a one year patch to get us through Timmy's last year of preschool.  Still, finding new daycare SUCKS.  There are probably 20 options in our immediate neighborhood but they are either too expensive, sketchy, or do not have any openings.  It is so stressful and upsetting, especially when I have an amazing day care provider already who loves them and takes such great care of them, she just lives too far away.  :(  I know that something will work out, I'm just dreading the change again.  In hopes of limiting the cost of whatever new day care we figure out, I have worked something incredible out with my boss.  Starting in September I'm going to work in the office from 8-1 and then pick up the kids when Timmy gets out of school and work from home from 2:30-5:30.  That I am looking forward to!  The kids will mostly be napping then anyways and I have always said that working part time would be perfect, which will never happen, but this is definitely a close second to that.  I even got to test it out a little last week when Suzanne's kids were sick, just going to work while Timmy was at school and working from home in the afternoon.  It was productive and I had lots of snuggle breaks!  Win-Win!

3.  Medicine ~ Tyler had a sinus infection and "borderline double ear infection" (which I think means we caught it early?) so he was put on that pink medicine that I have vivid memories of taking as a child (I remember it not being bad if you had vanilla wafer chasers, but Tyler doesn't work on bribes yet).  He took his first dose without hesitation and I was so excited.  He spit his next two doses back at us!  I pulled out another syringe and got a cup of water and asked Timmy for his help.  Timmy gave himself a dose of water, and Tyler said, "Wow." and let me give him his.  They have taken "their medicine" together twice a day since.  They are amazing together!  :)

4.  Teddy Bear Picnic ~ Timmy's class has been talking about hibernating animals all month, especially bears.  They've done cute crafts, and even made a full size Polar Bear some how? Haven't seen the pictures yet... but I'm guessing they stuffed a form of some kind?  And today it culminates with a Teddy Bear Picnic.  The teacher's first correspondence on this said that they could bring any stuffed animal they want.  Timmy's favorite is his Snuggle Puppy.  Apparently, the teacher has been stressing that their picnic friend should be a Bear.  We've been talking about him taking Snuggle Puppy to school for days.  Last night going to sleep Timmy told me, "Mrs Schienkle says that we should bring our favorite bear to school for the picnic and if we don't have a bear we can bring our favorite stuffed animal.  I want to bring Snuggle Puppy but I do have bears."  I told him that I would leave it up to him, if he really wanted to bring Snuggle Puppy that would be fine with me.  He stated that's what he wanted to do and sounded relieved.  Then I got worried.  I asked him, "But what if everyone else brings a bear, will you be sad that you have Snuggle Puppy instead of a bear?"  and Timmy conceded, "Yes, I would be sad that I didn't have a bear, but I would be happy that I have Snuggle Puppy.  Can I bring a bear and Snuggle Puppy?"  I told him no, but then I came up with a solution, O-e-wahn-ah-no-e (named after Timmy's pronunciation of Obi-Wan Kenobi) is a Build a Bear that he made right before Christmas.  This was a winner and he is in Timmy's classroom as I type.  I found Timmy's inner struggle over this fascinating and telling.  I have an honest and earnest little boy on my hands.

5.  Words ~ Tyler is talking a ton all of a sudden.  He's been parroting us for a while, but this month there's a shift and it's more talking.  I'm going to try to list off his words, as close to in order of their appearance as I can:

Ball - bal
No - first shaking his head, then saying, now yelling!
More - Mooooooor
Mine! - clear as can be and no explanation needed
Mom - Mum
Dad - Da
Uh-Oh
Up - If he didn't also say my name, I'd think he thought this was my name!
Bye - Buh by and Bye
Oh No - Ohhh Nooooo, uses this instead of uh-oh now, usually while pointing at the problem
TV - TT (usually, Mooooooor TT?)
Eye - in reference to eyes and glasses
Nose - nohs - which he will squeeze and say "beep beep", or he'll decide to stick his finger up your nose
Ear - eer
Arm - started with parotting while getting him dressed, "One Arm, Other Arm" so now I say One Arm and he says "oher arm" automatically
Stella - ehla - usually combined "air ehla?" when we get to Suzanne's
Help - Heh - and mostly when prompted to say it
Where'd it go? - air e ohh? while shrugging
What's that? - Ah Dat? usually when postponing bed time, at every little creak he hears, or when the door bell rings
Down - usually when he wants me to lay down, or him to go down stairs, he rarely wants to be put down
Thank you - T you - starting to say without being prompted too
Mickey Mouse - mee mou - he also "sings" the Hot Dog Song
Baba - when prompted or occasionally when seeing a picture, but has called pictures of Grandpa "Baba" too
Joe - Ooo when he saw pictures of Joe
Timmy - Mimmy, but has only said this a few times when prompted
Banana - ahnana - he has eaten two in a row, and other times he won't even take a bite!
Juice - Juis - when given a choice between drinks, not requesting on his own yet
Milk - Mil - when given a choice between drinks, not requesting on his own yet
My Guys - in reference to Timmy's lego guys, or anything that he wants
Ow - owwwww said when something hurts, or when you want to snuggle and he doesn't!
Wow - whenever he's impressed, usually be Timmy
Amen - he says this with Timmy and I after our prayers *Bonus story - when getting in the car one morning Tyler was babbling and Timmy thought he heard him say Amen.  Timmy said, "What did you say Tyler? He said Amen! That's a new word! He said Amen to me! (brief pause) He thinks I'm Jesus!"

7 For Friday - Halloween Preparation Edition!

Halloween was lots of fun this year!  Timmy remembered everything about trick or treating and was so excited to wear his costume and get candy.  Here is how we got ready for Halloween this year.

1.  PJ's ~ In the past I haven't been into Halloween PJ's, but Tyler's were in his hand-me-down pile and him wearing them prompted Timmy to ask for some too.  I have to admit I've had them in them every night they could be considered clean, they cracked me up!

2. Costume Auditions ~  We had a harder time deciding what the boys should be for Halloween this year.  Neither Tim or I were determined for the boys to be in coordinating costumes, but Timmy was.  After our trip to Disney World, Timmy debated between being Captain Jack Sparrow, Jake from Jake and the Neverland Pirates, or Yoda.  Tim suggested a human Jedi, I liked the idea of Jake.  When Timmy wanted to be Jack Sparrow, he wanted Tyler to be "Jack's friend."  When he wanted to be Jake, he wanted Tyler to be Cubby.  When Tim was trying to get him to be a Jedi he tried to bribe him with Tyler being Yoda.  Finally we decided on Tyler's costume, Buzz Lightyear.  We know that Tyler actually likes Buzz, because he does an impersonation of Buzz by waving his arm around in a funny way, which he started on his own in Disney World.  Once we told Timmy that Tyler would be Buzz, he immediately said, "Okay, and I'll be Woody!"  We did borrow a Yoda costume for him to try out before the final decision, and he enjoyed playing dress up at Miss. Suzanne's in a Pirate costume too.

3.  Playgroup Party ~ As I mentioned in a previous post, I snuck out of work for a little while last week to go to the Saint John Neuman's Playgroup Halloween Party.  The kids were really cute and had a great time.

4. Costume Birthday Party ~ Last weekend I took the boys to their friend's Carter and Callie's Joint Costume Birthday Party!  Even the grown ups dressed up and the kids had a great time playing in their huge yard and on the swing set.  Timmy was happier to oblige my requests to pose for pictures then Tyler was, I finally had to give up on getting one of them both looking at the camera!

5. Pumpkin Patches ~  I met Suzanne and the kids at a small pumpkin patch while she was picking up pumpkins for the preschool Fall Festival.  They had a haunted bus, some slides, and a moon bounce, so the kids were in heaven.  Timmy went through the bus and was very proud to not be afraid of it.  On Tyler's trips through the bus he would stop at each row, point at the spooky mannequin and state, "Ah." in a very unimpressed but "it's my job to be scared" tone.  It cracked me up.

The past few years we have made a day of going to Cox Farm.  This year our attempts failed.  We went one day, even parked and got in line at the gate, but we realized that with the lengthy line outside, the inside would not be fun.  Standing in that line also showed us what kind of mood everyone was in, which would also not make it fun.  We decided to save ourselves the money and just went for a photo op in the pumpkin patch.  Even that felt like work!  The weather has foiled any other try at it.  We will have to go early in the season next year for sure!

6. Pumpkin Carving ~ Timmy asked to carve our pumpkins almost every day after Tim brought them home from the store.  It was a good indoor activity while we were hunkering down from Hurricane Sandy this week.  Notice the tongs?  Timmy is still his mother's son in some regards!  Watching a commercial where a child was holding handfuls of pumpkin guts he actually asked, "Why is he holding the pumpkin stuff..?"  Tyler enjoyed checking out the guts for the first time.  Timmy had a first too, he helped to carve the spider pumpkin!  We were so proud of how well he stayed on the lines and what a great job he did!

7. School Party ~ On Thursday Timmy got to enjoy Halloween with his buddies at school.  He helped me make juice box mummies by gluing on the eyes, also while we were trapped at home.  The kids loved being dressed up together and did a great job singing their Halloween songs.