ring bearer prep

Andrew was measured for his ring bearer suit today. I can't wait to see him all dressed up for the wedding!

proof that I'm weird

A friend of mine did a post about 10 things we might not know about her, and I thought it was a really fun idea. Thanks to a picture I took tonight I decided to copy her idea, sort of.

1. I cannot stand it when people don't have their socks on right. Cannot stand it. If one is twisted or if they're not pulled up all the way, it drives me crazy. It's been a rough go for me having a toddler who likes to do things by himself...

2. I can't handle having only one hand wet. If this happens (which it does a lot for some reason) I have to get the other hand wet before I grab the towel.

3. I look forward to peeling the protective cover off of new electronics.

4. The word 'pet peeve' is my pet peeve.

5. I'm not a grammar perfectionist at all, but a few things drive me crazy - the main one being the misuse of to/too.

6. Remember that game MASH? I had a crush on someone with the initials MD and used to put that down for someone I'd marry. It's a different MD, but that game was right! : )

7. My grandpa took me bungee jumping as a high school graduation gift. We went to Canada so we could jump from a 150' high bridge! There was an option to dip your head in the river. I passed on that - I figured that's how I'd know if I was dead. My crazy grandpa chose to dip.

8. I'm an only child. I never wanted a brother or sister (although I always wished I was a twin).

9. I got married on a Tuesday. We planned our wedding in 3 weeks.

10. The only future child I ever named was Mason. I named him in high school. I also hoped for two boys. : )

Such random things came to mind while making this list. Funny.

he's already more high-tech than I am

This picture has nothing to do with this post, I just think he looks adorable.

My dad gave Andrew a Leap Pad for Christmas. Today it finally clicked for him just how awesome it is and today was the first day I had to talk to him about limits. Although, when I see him writing his letters and listening to stories about the alphabet, it's tricky to know how much is too much...

I wish this was as cute as it looks, but Andrew was really annoyed with Mason taking up his space and kept trying to push him off. You can see that Mason was not affected by it. : )

I decided it's time to have Andrew work on writing his name correctly. He usually does an uppercase E and W and the R is as big as the D and sort of keeps getting bigger and bigger as he goes. Today was the first day we talked about it and he's already rockin' it.

potty training: as annoying as I thought it'd be

A quick really long potty training update.

1. Mason is 100% potty trained (as long as we're at home); 1% poop trained.

2. He is scared of regular sized toilets.

3. Today was a big day. He told me he had to go potty (instead of just saying yes when I ask) AND he went poop on the toilet for the first time!! I was so excited until he pooped in his pull-up about 30 minutes later...

4. This is his potty chart. It cracks me up that he refuses to put the stars in the blank area.

5. We have a tub of little toys to get him excited to poop. Since he went in the toilet (or so I thought) he got to pick his first one tonight. He chose this little hex bug - the one thing I almost didn't buy because they only had a pink one left. I suck at knowing what he thinks is cool. Seriously.

6. He is very proud of himself and completely adorable every time he goes in the toilet. He is also very excited about pull-ups and underwear. It's the only thing that is keeping me from setting him outside until he gets this whole thing figured out. : )

7. All I can think about is how after he gets this figured out, I will have to plan my outings around his potty schedule. And that is so, so annoying. Potty training is annoying. But apparently it's something every kid has to learn, so we'll keep at it.

bounce

Rysen invited Andrew and Mason to 3, 2, 1 Bounce on Tuesday. It was awesome - we had the whole place to ourselves except for one other little girl!

The little guys deciding what they wanted to do.

Mason has never really been into bouncy houses for some reason. He always has fun, but without some pushing he'll just watch. He loves Haylen though! : )

It was fun to be able to play on a weekday before life gets back into a normal routine for them. Thanks for the invite!!

lego club

We were invited to join a fun group of kiddos for Lego club on Tuesday. It was one the cutest thing ever. Ivor was so excited to have Andrew sign in, he waited outside the bathroom door for him. Cute.

And. I love Mason's mustache. : )

diaper free house?

Mason has been asking to use the toilet about once a day for a while now. I keep telling him no because I find diapers to be very convenient and the thought of potty training very annoying. But, then I realized this is about how old Andrew was when he showed interest (although I waited because I was about to have Mason) and we have another friend the same age working on it too. So then I decided I'd do it as soon as I had a few days at home. Thanks to the snow, that happened yesterday. It's actually really annoying that we had a whole week off due to the snow - I could've had him trained for sure, but instead I decided to wait until the last minute. But whatever.

I'm using the same technique I used with Andrew which means all I'm doing is talking about potty and poop, cheering for every win, cleaning up the misses, keeping sticker charts, bribing, and setting timers all day for the next few days. The one good thing about round two is I know what to expect so it's not nearly as frustrating as it was the first time.

For the record - Mason is rockin' the potty part but not the other part. He has 5 (out of 6) stars and even woke up dry this morning! Tomorrow (day 3) I'm going to try something different for #2's and hope for the best. If I don't have any luck, I'll have to reevaluate the plan.

Matt wishing Mason good luck before heading out for work.

Mason getting excited about his new unders.

: )

Another benefit to round two is that my fear of toilet germs has gone way down. I think it has something to do with that statistic about cell phones being dirtier than a public toilet. I think the point was to get you to wash your phone but it just made me realize toilets aren't so bad. : ) Anyway, my point is I don't think I let Andrew read books while he was learning because I didn't want anything to touch anything. Big mistake! Reading has been a huge hit for Mason. And they're all board books, so it's nothing a Lysol wipe can't fix...

Here's a video of him reading 8 Silly Monkeys. I didn't get the camera in time to catch him really getting into it, but with a little prodding from me he repeated some of it... still cute.

let it rain, let it rain, let it rain

We got a little more snow (evident by our drowning snowmen), but it has finally stopped and is starting to melt.

Here are some pictures from our drive yesterday to show how crazy it was.

This was by far the most cars we'd seen on the road through the whole snow storm. This is a main road intersecting with a very main road.

And this our pretty street.

winter wonderland

The only thing that is keeping me sane during this crazy winter wonderland is that we've done something different every day (and because I have a truck and a Matt so we're not stuck at home). Yesterday we headed back over to our friend's house and checked out a different park and a different sledding hill. Oh, and we had steak French dips and lobster bisque for lunch and homemade chicken nuggets and jo-jos for dinner, but that's kind of off topic... : )

The kids could play Mario Brothers all day if we'd let them...

So, just for the record, I'm done. We've had new snow everyday for almost a week and it's snowing now as I write this. I've been trying really hard to enjoy the snow, but my love has run out. Goodbye snow. It's been fun(ish).

snowmen

Today's snow was the snowman making kind.

Isn't he cute? : )

Mason's.

Andrew's.

snow day: the inside version

Even though there's a chance I wouldn't have done anything outside the house anyway, I don't like it when it's not even an option. So we dug out all sorts of 'rainy-day' stuff today to keep busy.

I put the trampoline together that we got from grandma for Christmas, even though the instructions claim you should have 3 people to do it. Feel free to be impressed. Or not.

The boys love it!

We also pulled out the box of random stuff filled with necklaces and goggles...

Andrew got out their awesome tent, and with just a tiny bit of help from Mason, put the whole thing together on his own! (Thanks, Millers!).

And we tried spiking Mason's hair. : )

the fun continues...

This is the first time in a few years that I've been excited for the snow. I'm going to try to work on being excited from now on - it makes a huge difference in how the day turns out...

Andrew is loving it! He told me today that winter is his favorite.

Mason likes it too.

After playing in our yard for a while, we headed over to a little hill in our neighborhood. We found a sled run that someone had built up with a little jump at the end. It was perfect!

There were a couple older girls sledding next to us and the were trying to go down standing up. I think Andrew has added that to his list of cool ways to go down the hill.

The weather report shows more snow tomorrow and then a bigger snowfall for Wed. If that happens, my excitement might start to fade, but for now we're all having a lot of fun!