Tyler's 3rd Birthday and Party

We celebrated Tyler's third birthday with a party at our house.  I had mentioned to Tyler at least six months earlier that maybe we could have a Minion birthday party for him this year, and when the time came to really choose the theme and I asked him what he wanted, he said Minion right away, so I was very happy.  We'd been telling him for weeks that his "Minion Party" was coming up.  On the morning of his birthday I heard him coming down the stairs so I met him at the bottom saying, "Happy Birthday!!!" He looked hesitantly excited and asked, "My birthday here? Now?"  He spent the morning running around with his new minion friend and all of his yellow balloons!

Tyler loved his Minion cake, which I designed and Baba made.  Going to bed the night before, Tyler tried to get me to stay in his room and I told him, "I have to go make your cake," and he excused me immediately.  When he saw it that morning he was very excited.  We turned a show on for the boys and then Tim, Mom, and I headed different ways to get ready.  Suddenly we heard Tyler sobbing!  We had moved the cake from the kitchen table to the dining room so we could get ready for the party.  Tyler had gotten up to look at it again, and when he couldn't find it he started to cry, he told Baba, "I want to have my party now but my cake is gone!"

The backyard was still a little muddy from heavy rain earlier in the week, but the weather during the party was perfect!  Tyler was allowed to open Timmy's gift before the party because it was a bubble machine, which was a huge hit during the party!  The kids enjoyed running around, chasing bubbles, bouncing in the moon bounce, and drawing with the sidewalk chalk that Aunt Jenny gave Tyler as part of his birthday present.

So cute he gets his own collage!

The cake was the highlight, as it should be. Tim protected the candles from Timmy, and Tyler blew them all out in one try.  For some reason Tyler wanted the hand for his piece.  I don't think he even took one bite though, just licked some off of his finger.  That boy is just not really into dessert, unless it's milk chocolate!

Shortly after cake the party started to wrap up.  Tyler opened a few of his guests' presents as they were leaving.  The rest we did later in the evening.

Baba and Grandpa got Tyler a pair of shoes that I had my eye on for him for a while.  Not only are they super cool shoes, covered in Super Heroes, but they are his first pair of brand new shoes!  I think they are a tiny bit big for him right now, but he says they make him go really fast!

Tyler and Timmy had more energy then we did, so we sent them back outside to play to wrap up our day!

To Tyler, at 3 Years Old

Tyler,

You are something else!  You are at an amazing place where your innocence and honesty are coupled with a vocabulary that lets you express what you feel; when you feel you love someone, you tell them; when you've missed someone, you say that; it's refreshing to witness!  Of course, you also make it clear when there's something you are not pleased with... but that's a different story.  You are so expressive, with your words and your face.  I love this series of pictures, taken to make your party invitation with.  Your face runs the gambit from being a happy participant to boredom, mischievousness, and silliness.

You are as much a mamma's boy today as you ever have been!  I'm not complaining, I'm happy to be your favorite person in the World, but it is physically tiring!  You have always wanted me to carry you up the stairs at bed time, down the stairs and to the car in the morning, and into the babysitter's house.  I don't argue with you much in the morning because I know it gets us where we need to be faster, but at bed time if I tell you that you need to walk you tell me, "Moooom... I no have no more super powers to stand up!"  A hundred times a day I hear, "Mom! Pick me up!"  You make this demand while standing directly in front of me with your arms stretched up my stomach and a pout on your lips.  Timmy even feels empathy for me, saying one day last week, "Geez, he always wants you to pick him up, good thing I'm not you!"

When you get to sleep in and wake up on your own you come down the stairs announcing, "I wake up now!"  When I tell you it's bedtime, you gauge the sky for how bright it is and tell me, "it's not darkness, it's still wake up time!"  In the last year you have switched from sleeping with your Mickey Mouse to sleeping with your Snuggle Puppy.  Timmy has a Snuggle Puppy, and before you were born he picked one out for you to have, but you didn't take to it until one night when you heard Timmy asking for his puppy, and you asked, "Where mine?"  I showed you that you had one of your own and you've slept with him ever since.  You are getting more interested in trying to learn the words to our bedtime prayer.  You say the prayer part with me some nights, and you announce you want to do our God Blesses "all by myself," which really just means you don't want Timmy to say them, you want to copy me one name at a time.  No matter who says them, you giggle when we say your name.  You still talk about your monsters and their rainbow house.  You told us that they were going to come to your birthday party, but you didn't say anything about them during your party.

You are so funny and such a ham.  You make silly faces and use a sing-songy taunting voice, point your finger and say, "ha!"  when you tease.  You also point your finger when you are mad, or cross your arms and stomp, or clench your fists and teeth and growl, "I'm so mad at you!"  When told that you are going to time out for that, or for generally throwing a fit, as soon as I pick you up to move you to time out you stop immediately and announce that you have stopped.  You are fast to burst into tears and fast to stop them!  You won't let me call you my baby any more, you tell me, "I'm not you baby, I'm big!"  Some days you say you hate going to school, other days you don't complain at all.  You are usually very happy to hear that you are heading to Susan's house for the day.  I'm pretty sure that you are spoiled rotten over there!

You are such a stink pot.  You still suck your thumb and you know full well that you are not supposed to.  When you are sucking your thumb and I can get your attention with just eye contact, you will take it out, give me a huge grin with your tongue almost sticking out, but keeping it just behind your teeth, and you shrug.  When Daddy catches you and tells you to stop you just laugh, and then you will usually hide behind a pillow, or your other hand, to keep sucking your thumb.  You also refuse to use the potty still, though I did catch you getting ready to fill your diaper a few weeks ago now, I grabbed you and ran you to the toilet where you went immediately.  You yelled, "I did it! I did it!" and we celebrated with cheering, high five's, a really cool poop prize, telling everyone in the house, calling Susan to tell her... but that has been the one and only time so far!

You ask, "What is it?" "Why?" and "How come?" more then any child I've been in contact with.  Sometimes when you really get on a roll it feels like it's straight out of a movie, with every response I give you eliciting another question!  You have a very curious mind.  You love to help Susan with baking and with the dishes... though you usually don't even taste whatever you've baked, and she has to take your shirt off to do the dishes!  You go straight to the art table when you walk into your classroom door.  People have been telling me for a while that you can count to ten, but you've never been willing to do it when asked.  Recently I have heard you saying the entire alphabet and counting to twelve while playing.  You have also gotten the hang of puzzles and are making impressive, symmetrical, structures out of blocks.  I love seeing that!  You are finally, finally sitting still to read books and letting me turn the pages at the right time!  When you want me to pay special attention to something you have to say you almost whisper, "Mom, I tell you somefin."

Tyler you are everything we could hope you would be and we can't wait to see all that you will become.  We love you big boy!

Recently

My blog has been suffering lately because I am the coordinator for the Fox Mill Yearbook and it is due soon!  All of my blogging time has been going to the yearbook!  I have been dying to do several entries as both boys are changing, quickly, again, so here's a recap of what's been going on with both of them the last few weeks.

They love each other so much!  They have been saying goodbye in the morning with Tyler telling Timmy, "I'm going to miss you, Timmy!"  and when they are reunited after school there are lots of hugs.  They fight like cats and dogs too... but they definitely love each other.

Tyler's vocabulary has really exploded!  He talks like crazy, though I can't always figure out what he's talking about. He also describes everything as awesome.  One morning when he clearly wasn't feeling well, I asked him if he felt good or bad, he responded in a very pitiful voice, "I feel awethom, Mom."  After my last update about him, Tim told me that I should edit it because he definitely has a silly side to him too.  He is a walking contradiction; the most serious goofball I know!  He still plays his I'm a superhero, I'm not a superhero game all the time.  Telling me pitifully  when he's tired and it's time to go upstairs for bed, "I no have my super powers no more, I can't stand up."  The next day it will be, "My super powers back, Mom!" with complete surprise.  I'm also pretty sure that Tyler has some imaginary friends... he has been talking about "my rainbow house of monsters" for weeks now.  The monster part doesn't worry me, since his favorite movie is Monster's University, but Timmy hates when Tyler starts talking about it at bedtime.  Tyler will go on and on about his rainbow house though, and ask if we are going to it sometimes when we are leaving the house!

Tyler grew a full inch in three weeks last month!

Tyler will not eat any fruits or vegetables right now... this is his reaction to my asking him to eat a banana!

We got lots of snow this winter!  Tyler wasn't too in to it the first snow, he did not like being cold.  A few storms in though, and both boys were happy to be outside for hours.  They would entertain themselves while Tim plowed the pipestem.  These pictures are from two different storms.  Even the boys have had enough of the snow at this point, opting not to go outside to play in the last two storms we've had!

Joe and Lindsey treated us to Disney on Ice.  The kids were excited to see the characters, and our seats were right in the center of the ice, so we had a great view.  Tyler waved goodbye like crazy during the finale!

Timmy and I went to the Son Challenge at his school last month.  It was a really fun night, with lots of activities to keep the boys active (and therefore happy) and one especially for the mom's: a photo booth!  Timmy chose all of our accessories and poses. The first strip is Timmy and his best buddy Nate.

Timmy's writing has exploded!  Mrs. Sheaffer started sending very excited notes home about how great Timmy's writing is becoming.  Timmy writes wonderful stories and uses lots of descriptive words and is even starting to figure out periods.  He is very proud of his stories and loves reading them to us right when we get home and before bed.  He is also doing great with his sight words, but he is still guessing before sounding out words that he doesn't know.  I'm hoping the reading skills aren't far behind the writing ones!

Timmy has also really enjoyed themed days at school this year.  For Wacky Wednesday during Dr Seuss' birthday week, Timmy decided to wear his shirt inside out and his pants backwards!  He was surprised that he was the only one wearing backwards pants.

Timmy just finished a season of indoor soccer.  He really likes soccer, since he loves running so much.  This season offered a new experience for him, there was a player names Brayden who was fantastic, he could really dribble the ball with a lot of control and shoot with good accuracy with both feet.  Timmy was the second best player, so whenever the coach split them up to scrimmage she put Timmy and Brayden on separate teams.  Timmy fully understood why she was doing this, but he hated it.  He would have much preferred to be on the same team and run up the score, then to know his team was going to lose.  While Timmy was successful at stopping Brayden most of the time, he never had anyone else on his team that could score or give him much help.  It was also the first time that Timmy was playing competitively in a full contact sport and he would get very frustrated after going up against Brayden against the wall, regardless of who came away with the ball.  I kept trying to explain to him that he couldn't be mad at someone else because they are good at something, that he should respect the other person's skills.  His last practice of the season Timmy did score two back to back goals and was loving life.  When we left, Brayden's mom complimented Timmy to me, and I returned the compliments to Brayden.  Then she told me Brayden is only four!!! Walking out, Brayden looked at me, pointed at Timmy, and said with a huge smile, "He is sooo fast!!!"  I pointed out to Timmy that Brayden was impressed with his skills, and asked if it made him feel good.  He was a very happy kid on the way home!  Timmy showed a lot of improvement over this season and he has great positioning!  That plus his love for running, I see him playing halfback for sure!

Timmy got his first stitches last week.  He decided he wanted a cream cheese bagel and got out a steak knife to open the bagel, and opened the top of his hand instead.  He knew he shouldn't have tried to do it, so he cleaned up the mess and put bandaids on it himself, not even telling anyone he was hurt.  When Tim saw the bandaids just before bed time he discovered Timmy needed stitches!  Timmy was very brave during the stitches too, no tears at all.  And here he is all smiles with a chocolate ice cream mustache when he got home.

Joe and Lindsey also treated us to a CAPS game this month!  Neither of the boys had ever been and they really enjoyed it!  They met some of the Red Rockers before the game, Tyler made friends with the guy with the siren hat behind us, and Timmy mostly enjoyed his popcorn and hoped to see a fight!  They both got really excited with each goal.  It was all too much for Tyler, who slept through most of the third period!

Our handsome Timmy begged for a haircut for weeks before we found the time to get him one, he looks so different!

We've been going to church regularly for a few months now.  Each boy has had an interesting take away from their Sunday morning program.  Tyler heard the story of Zachareus the tax collector, who was a bad guy, and how Jesus changed his heart and got him to give everyone their money back.  Tyler is now insistent that "Jesus is a bad guy, he takes peoples money."  He will argue, cry, and throw fits if you tell him otherwise!  I've told the program director and Tyler's teacher about this, and they are both working on teaching him otherwise!  Timmy heard the story about Jesus healing the blind man.  The next day in the car, he says, "Mom, I know how to help blind people.  You just spit in the dirt, make mud, and put it on their eyes."  I spent a while explaining miracles to him and told him that that only worked for Jesus.  The poor kid probably thought the World was full of idiots for that day, wondering why we didn't just heal all the blind people if it was so easy!

This is where they stand to brush their teeth... Tyler on the back of the toilet, Timmy on the toilet, so they can both lean over and look in the mirror...

Peas in a pod!