Easter Weekend

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter this year. We sure did! We started it out with a trip to the zoo on Friday afternoon, where we were up close and personal with some wolves.

On Saturday we went to an Easter eve concert at the Levitt Shell, where I didn't have my camera, so no pictures, sorry. The concert was great and the boys had a blast, although it did cause a pretty late bedtime.

Easter morning started with church, and then we headed to my parents house for lunch. Caleb got to see his cousins (my cousins kids) who he doesn't get to see often so that was alot of fun. He had fun "holding" the babies. Have I mentioned that he has told me multiple times now that he wants a baby sister?? Anyways, he got to play with his cousins Greta, Evan and Emily and they had alot of fun together.

Here are some pictures of our day.

And coming up, a ... I have a ton of pictures that never made it to the blog because I haven't posted in so long post.

Blast Off

We've been enjoying all the pretty weather we've been having around here lately. These pictures were all taken a few weeks ago and it's gotten even warmer since then ... like go to the park in shorts and a t-shirt warm... it's been lovely.

Doesn't he look like such a big boy in that picture above? He looks older every day.

We played with bubbles.

We went for a walk around the neighborhood.

Then we pulled out the cardboard box from Ethan's new carseat.

It eventually became a rocket.

It's amazing how much fun can be had with a cardboard box.

Sweet Brothers

Little Man

Since I've been slacking on the blogging and it's been awhile since I've posted any real information, I decided I'd do a little update on each of my boys, and to prevent a ridiculously long post, I'm splitting it in two, starting with Caleb. (that was a really long, probably completely grammatically incorrect sentence, sorry) The pictures in this post are from the other night when Caleb asked me to take a picture of him with a sad face. So I did, and then asked him to make some other faces for me as well.

sad face

So, my little man...he's 2.5 years old now, actually 2 years and 8 months, to be precise. Here's a few things I want to remember about him from this age :

I know I've probably said this on here before, but he is so stinkin sweet, except for those occasional 2 year old moments when he is anything but sweet. But for the most part he's a sweetheart.

He loves his brother (E-E) and loves playing with him, although he'd prefer it if Ethan would leave his toys alone... you know how it is.

mad face

He likes giving/getting hugs but not kisses. If you do kiss him, he quickly wipes it off and says "No me like kisses".

He is all about The Doughnut Man right now. Please, someone tell me you know who that is. In case you don't, it's a Christian kids show from the early 90s, and he randomly picked it out from our churches lending library a few months ago and fell in love. You're only supposed to keep these movies for a week, I think we've had it for six (If anyone from the church bookstore is reading this...I promise we aren't stealing it and it will be returned) Anyways, we watch it daily...I can quote the entire movie, and Caleb's close to being able to do the same, and he can sing every word to every song, complete with the super cool 1991 dance moves.

scared face

He goes to Mother's Day Out once a week, and loves it. His teachers are so great, and he has sweet friends he gets to spend time with. One in particular goes to church with us as well and, according to Caleb, is the only person he plays with ... ever. When we pick him up from church or school and asked him who he played with his answer is always either "Helen" or "No Helen here". I'm glad he has such a sweet friend that he enjoys playing with so much!

He loves playing with trains and cars and it's so fun to watch him play. He has a great imagination and very often I'll hear him say something and when I say "what Caleb?" he looks at me, puts his hand up, and says "noooo". How silly of me, of course it was his trains having a conversation and not Caleb talking at all.

tired face

He loves candy. I know this is a horrible habit but the boy has a serious sweet tooth. He says candy is his favorite food, that's healthy, right? And if there's no candy to be had he'll settle for gum. I've gotten some questioning looks for giving my 2 year old gum, but he does great with it, leaves it in his mouth, doesn't swallow it, and just chews away.

He still takes an afternoon nap, which is wonderful. I have to limit how long I let him sleep in the afternoon or else he stays awake long past bedtime, but I just can't give up that afternoon nap yet, even though he might do fine without it.

happy face

He's potty trained! That was a big accomplishment on his part. He's been ready for months, but I waited until I was ready and had the time to be consistent with it, and it paid off. He caught on very quickly and after a few days there were hardly ever any accidents.

He loves reading stories out of his Bible, particularly David and Goliath (which he plays all the time ..."Mama, you Goliath, me David" and then he precedes to find something to be his slingshot, and he takes Goliath down) Jonah and the whale, Daniel and the lions den and Noah's ark.

silly face

We started working on memorizing scripture with him, and I wasn't sure if he was quite old enough, but he's surprised me. He knows Psalm 23:1-3 so far, and it's so sweet to hear his cute little voice reciting it.

His favorite songs to sing right now are the ABCs and God is So Good. And his favorite songs to have sung to him are Tender Shepherd, Baby Mine and Sing, and he asks me to sing those songs to him every single night before bed.

He is learning his letters and the sounds they make, and he has impressed me in this area too. He knows a lot, if not most, of his letters along with the sounds they make. He's a pretty smart kid.

He loves watching movies and playing games on the ipad and completely understands how to work it. While he has lots of kid games to play, his favorites are Cut the Rope and Temple Run, go figure. He's horrible at both of them, but he has fun anyways.

This is getting long so I'll stop here, but that's a little (or big) update on Caleb and what he's up to these days.

Super Caleb

I love this little super hero!

Christmas 2011

We had a wonderful Christmas this year, and while it very different from last year, it was lots of fun!

On Christmas Eve we spent the afternoon with Charles' family; eating great food, opening gifts and playing with cousins. Then we headed to the Christmas Eve service at church. The music was great, the sermon was wonderful and the congregation singing Silent Night in the candlelight at the end was beautiful. From there, we headed home for a quick dinner and to get the boys in bed since they had gone all day without naps.

(My boys with their cousins, Phillip-Giles and Naomi)

Christmas morning was hectic but fun. Our boys are still to young to really "get" Christmas, although Caleb definitely knew it was baby Jesus' birthday. But there was no waking at the crack of dawn in this house. Ethan woke at his normal 7:30ish, and we finally had to wake Caleb at 8:00 so that he'd have time to open his presents before church. They both loved all their new toys!

We headed to church for more great fellowship and another great sermon and then to my parents house for lunch. After a delicious lunch and quick naps for the boys we opened gifts. And once again, the boys loved all their new stuff. We had a relaxing afternoon just hanging out with my family and headed home around dinner time.

On Monday we headed back out to my parents house to get together with all of my mom's family. It was great to see everyone, and Caleb loved being the center of attention. He kind of steals the show when we're around crowds of people. He definitely didn't inherit his Mama's shyness. He did some dancing, played some instruments, sang some Christmas tunes, and just generally strutted around the house like he owned the place. Sweet Ethan just enjoys watching his big brother, and being passed around for everyone to play with and hold, although he's quite a dancing machine too. I'll have to try and get a video of their moves to post on here at some point. After lunch and gifts, the Christmas festivities were finally over after a long weekend of fun, family and lots of food.

We've finally caught up on sleep and after celebrating Charles' birthday today are getting back into the swing of things around here.

I hope everyone had a wonderful time celebrating with family and friends.

sshhh... don't tell Caleb

This is one of Caleb's Christmas presents that I've been working on. It took alot longer than I anticipated, but I finished in time for Christmas!

He loves cars right now so I'm hoping he likes it.

Weekend Recap

We had a very busy, fun-filled weekend this past weekend. So I thought I'd do a little recap. I wrote last year about Halloween and how our family chooses to celebrate, which you can check out here, if you're interested.

On Fridays Caleb goes to Mother's Day Out and this past Friday they had a Halloween party. They all wore their little costumes and looked adorable. Caleb went as a baseball player. He loves baseball, and it happened to be quite timely with the world series going on. Apparently it was a huge hit with all the people in the church offices upstairs.

On Saturday, Charles got up and went to participate in "Jesus Loves Memphis". I stayed home with the kiddos but I heard it was a great time of work, fellowship and prayer with a bunch of local churches, all working together to love this city we live in, by cleaning, building, painting, and I'm sure lots of other stuff as well.

Saturday afternoon we headed to a barn party at my great aunt and uncles house. It was lots of fun getting together with some extended family that we don't see all that often, and Caleb had a blast, once again dressed in costume (this time a bumble bee).

He got the chance to play with some distant cousins and he was the life of the party. Running, dancing, and just generally capturing the attention of everyone in attendance. Shy is one word that does not describe this child. Ethan had a good time too, being passed around from person to person, and he looked adorable in his froggie costume.

Ethan and his Aunt Rachel

Caleb and his Aunt Rachel or Ray Ray, as he calls her.

Sunday began with church and ended with a community Reformation service at one of the local presbyterian churches. I sang in the choir along with several hundred other choir members from churches all over the city. It was quite an experience and the music sounded amazing, if I do say so myself. The paster of our church preached the sermon and was, as usual, outstanding.

So that was our busy weekend, lots of stuff but lots of fun. And now, while we won't be trick or treating tonight, I do have my supply of candy ready to hand out to the neighborhood kids who come knocking on our door. I'm just hoping Caleb is ok with sharing his stash of "treats" that I've been using as potty training rewards, which he's doing very well with, by the way. There will be a post on that coming soon, I know you're thrilled ... potty training adventures, what more could you want?

10 months old

My little guy is 10 months old now. It's hard to believe. He had his check up at the doctor and everything was looking great. He weighs 21lbs 6oz. He's a good bit bigger than Caleb was at this age. He's 28 inches long, as the doctor put it ... he's short and stocky. Apparently my children have inherited my height (or lack thereof). The doctor commented that Caleb is short and stocky too and Caleb looked at her and said, "No me stocky... me Caleb", such a cutie! Caleb was with us at the appointment so that he could get his flu shot, and man ... it's hard to entertain 2 little ones in a closet sized room while you wait for the doctor to come, and then wait for the nurse to come back to give shots. Ethan desperately wanted down, but I didn't want to let him crawl all over the floor and Caleb was just ready to leave so he could get his sucker from Ms. Bobbie.

Both boys did great with their shots, Caleb obviously still doesn't associate the doctors office with getting shots (which I'm thankful for) because when the nurse came in to give shots at the end of the appointment, she asked me who I wanted to do first, but before I could think about it and decide, Caleb piped up with " Caleb's turn!" So he went first and cried for about 2 seconds. Ethan cried a little longer, but both were fine by the time we left.

I can't believe how big Ethan has gotten, and believe it or not, his crazy hair isn't so crazy anymore. Something about turning 10 months old tamed his hair a bit (or maybe its the cooler weather). Either way, over the past week, his hair has started laying down instead of sticking straight up. I've gotten several comments that I need to cut it so it'll be shorter and stick up again. Everyone loved that crazy hair, and don't think I haven't considered it, but he's adorable however his hair is behaving at the moment.

At 10 months old Ethan is crawling like crazy, but still an army crawl. He's pulling up on everything, all the time, but hasn't quite figured out how to get back down. So he pulls up and when he gets tired of standing he either lets go and just falls or he cries until someone comes to his rescue. This has happened quite a few times in his crib. He pulls himself up and can't get back down so he cries and cries until I come lay him back down.... and then, of course ... he just does it all over again.

He's still eating some baby food but we're adding more and more table food to the mix, and he loves it. The boy likes to eat. He sleeps great, except for the fact that he wakes for a bottle between 4-6am almost daily. I'm just gonna have to quit giving it to him to break that habit. He does go to bed at 7:30 and after the quick snack in the early morning hours (it only takes him about 5 minutes to drink his bottle of formula) he goes back to sleep until around 8am. So I hate to complain, because I don't know what I'd do if he woke at 6am and was ready to start the day. I'm not a morning person. But still, I know if I work on it, I can get him going a bit longer at night.

He's such a sweetheart. He loves his big brother and would follow him anywhere. His little one toothed smile is the cutest thing ever, and it's not hard to get that smile out of him. He's a happy boy. It's a little bittersweet, but I'm looking forward to when he's a little older and can actually play with Caleb. We're still in the stage where Caleb plays with his toys on the table or couch or on his bed because otherwise all I hear is "no no E-E" as Ethan destroys the beautiful line of cars Caleb has made or whatever he happens to be playing with. But I know it won't be long and they'll be playing like best buddies.

We're so thankful for this sweet little guy!

This post ended up being longer than I anticipated so if you're still reading, thanks.

Harvest Festival

On Saturday we headed to a local harvest festival for the morning. Caleb is finally old enough to really enjoy stuff like this, so I knew he'd have a good time. Throw in some popcorn and cotton candy and you've got the makings for a wonderful time.

They had a petting zoo, pumpkin painting, face painting, a hay ride, and a couple of bouncy castles. Caleb wanted to do it all!

checking out the petting zoo

his first taste of pumpkin

Caleb wanted a spider on his face

my boys on the hay ride

hanging out in the stroller

(if you look closely you can see his one and only tooth peeking out)

my sweet boys

We had a great time and will probably make this festival an annual thing. Lots to do, and did I mention it was completely free? Well, it was. Can't beat that.

I'm still planning on taking the boys to another little pumpkin patch we go to every year to pick out pumpkins towards the end of the month. I'm hoping it'll feel a little more like fall by then, cause I can't miss out on taking our annual pumpkin patch pictures.

Remember Caleb's first trip?

and then last year?

Can't believe how big he'll be this year!