Mason loves Red Robin

he earned his toy!

Andrew earned his toy on Thursday! He did such a great job working on going to sleep on his own. There were a few times he told me he didn't care about his gold star and that he just wanted me to stay in his room with him, but we worked through it all but 2 nights.

He loves looking at toys, so our time at Toys R Us was a very exciting time for him. He had a hard time choosing but finally narrowed it down to three Spiderman things. He told me all about each one of them and asked me to help him decide. :)

Mason had fun too.

I think Andrew looks so cute when he's really having fun playing. Here are a couple pictures of him enjoying the heck out of his Spiderman 3-pack. :)

of course we celebrated

Mason wasn't interested in getting dressed but I had to put on his vest because I had just taught Andrew about pinching people not wearing green!

The boys sporting all their goods from their grandmas. (thanks!!)

Mason is doing so many things that I remember Andrew doing. He's learned how to move the stool to where he needs it, he loves playing in the sink, he hates leaving daycare because he knows he's going to be stuck in the car, and he's copying everything anyone does. Plus, he's just cute!

To celebrate, we made rainbow cupcakes. They were very easy (a little time consuming, but I was expecting that). All I have to say is if I can do it, anyone can. :) For instructions on how to make these bad boys, go here. We shared the love with our neighboring friends by leaving cupcakes on their porch.

We partied pretty hard. :)

my boys

I just love you guys

Andrew isn't going to bed any time soon... One thing that usually helps is to let him sleep in our room, so we moved him over and put on a show (something we've never done before but will probably be asked to do again every night from here out...). He's the happiest boy in the world right now. He looked up at us and said "I just love you guys!".

no thank you, asthma

Andrew started getting a cough last night. I realized that every time he would cough, he would go through a little time of having short, fast breaths afterwards. It freaked me out so I pulled him in and had him sleep with us. Today I took him to the doctor and found out it's asthma symptoms caused from a virus. He has to use an inhaler every 4 - 6 hours until he's better. The scary part for me is that they don't know yet if it will go away when he's better and never come back, if it will come back every time he's sick or if it will be here to stay.

Here's Andrew's day in review...

Here he is decorating something that goes into a plate. The reason I took a picture is because he drew a real picture (of a penguin) then covered him up with a blanket because it's cold. He then added snowflakes. I've never seen him draw such a detailed picture. I wish he didn't cover him up with a blanket. :)

Before his doctor appointment we made our usual stop at Starbucks to waste some time.

Waiting in the lobby... I was taking pictures of Andrew from behind the fish tank to keep us both entertained while we waited.

Andrew was having fun in the doctor's office. He was smiling and laughing the whole time.

This is a little mask he has to wear to make sure he gets everything from the inhaler. We picked a superhero (Astro Boy) and pretended it was his mask, so he thinks it's pretty cool. I also think he likes having something that Mason can't have.

The bummer is it is tends to keep a lot of kids awake. I'm not sure if it's the medicine or day light saving or maybe a combo of the two, but he is still wide awake at 9:00. He needs another dose at 9:30 so we'll see what kind of night we have. Hopefully he gets used to it because he could be on it for a week or more.

good news

This little cutie said 'I love you' for the first time today! He can now have anything he wants (potato peeler? you got it!).

I also got the results from his blood test and all is good. We get to keep his dose where it's at and the number they wanted to see go down went way down!

Also - have you noticed spring is starting to peek out?!! I love the sight of these trees in bloom. Other than the fact they're beautiful, it's proof spring will eventually be here!

pockets

I just think this picture is cute... I hid his paci in his pocket in case he needed it at church and then forgot to take it out. He was very excited when he put his hands in his pockets and found it. :) He's still very much in love with his paci (and his pockets).

gotta love post alley

I got my mom tickets to Theater Sports for her birthday (last April...) and on Saturday we were finally able to make it work. If you haven't been before, I highly recommend it. It's a fun show, plus the theater is in Post Alley. :)

Thank to Melissa for hanging out at our house so the boys could sleep while we played in Seattle for a few hours!

surfer

I took Mason for a haircut to see if I wanted to continue growing it out or if I was ready to cut it short. After the lady listened to what I was looking for she started calling it the 'surfer cut' which I think is exactly what I'm looking for. It still needs to grow out to really get the look but she cleaned it up and was able to leave some curl! She also told me that she thinks Mason's hair will be think once it's all grown in so I'm definitely going to grow it out while I have the chance.

rain boots

Mason found Andrew's rain boots and put them on all by himself. Cutie.

Mason definitely likes to (try to) do things for himself. He's been trying to put on his pj's by himself the last few nights and he tries to put on his socks & shoes on all the time. He's also randomly interested in using the toilet lately - enough so that we're going to pull out the potty chair (just so he can sit on it and I don't have to sit him on the toilet all the time). He has spent one week in the two-year old classroom and he is doing what he can to fit in - he is ready to be two!

good choice!

Every year my company has a 2-day planning meeting and they have the nerve to ask me to show up on a Thursday! :) Since today isn't a school day for the boys Matt took the day off and headed to E'burg, leaving me kid-free after the meeting! I was about to go home and clean but then I came up with a much better plan.

I'm in charge of organizing and making sure this meeting runs smoothly and it tends to stress me out just a bit. With the meeting plus an hour and a half commute home, I decided to treat myself to dinner. Any time I eat without Matt I tend to choose Thai because he doesn't really like it. Tonight I found out that Thai food is even yummier when paired with a Corona...

Here's what I looked like at the restaurant. :)

Then I decided to see if I'd be lucky enough to be able to walk in and get a pedicure at In Spa and it worked!! I had a gift card that has been waiting to be used, and tonight was the perfect night to use it up.

I'm happy with my choice. And very happy to share my random pictures with the world. Enjoy!

a (rad) day in the life of Mason

His first time in a booster seat was hit.

His first time in the drivers seat was an even bigger hit!

perfect kid chart

Part of Andrew's bedtime routine includes me laying with him, usually until he falls asleep. I tried changing this routine a while ago but it was more trouble than it was worth - instead of taking 15 minutes to fall asleep, it was taking an hour or more. Unfortunately for all of us, it's time to put a stop to it.

In an effort to get him excited, we thought we'd have him work toward earning a new Leapster game. He, however, got more excited about being able to pick out a toy, so we made that the reward if he goes to bed on his own 7 times. We still want to get him the new game though (it's our guilt gift for making him commute to work with me...) so we decided to also reward other good behavior and have the game be the reward for it.

His goals are mainly things that he should be doing at his age with an emphasis on a few things that drive us a little crazy. I'm no dummy! :)

He gets 'golden stars' for the following:

1. Going to the bathroom when he needs to without me making him go. (drives me nuts!)
2. Getting dressed on his own (he tends to put it off and I end up helping to move it along)
3. Going to bed without arguing, asking for another show, etc (this drives Matt nuts)
4. Putting his dishes in the sink without being reminded
5. Other: being responsible for his things, using his manners, etc

Like I said, it's mainly a way for us to be able to get him the video game without just getting it for no reason. At least this helps him work on being a big kid, right? Seems like a win-win to us!

Tonight will be the 3rd night. The first night he did great; last night he just wasn't interested. Hopefully we'll be back on track tonight, although I expect it to be a bit tough - that's why we had to make the reward something he'd be excited about. Wish us luck!

art corner

When we bought our new kitchen table we also set up a little table for the boys to use for crafts, etc. The good news about finding out the table's finish was going to chip after the first week is there's no worries about letting the boys do projects, play dough, etc right on it!

We kept the little table out, mainly because I never thought of moving it, until just recently. Now instead of a table that ends up being a place for us to pile a bunch of junk on, we have a nice clean space with room for their easel. It feels so nice and clean and roomy now. I love it!

We'll worry about refinishing the table when the boys are done making messes.

garden

Matt and Andrew have been working on cleaning up the side of our house to turn it into a garden this spring. It'll be fun as a garden area because both boys' rooms look out into that area (so now they can keep an eye on the garden instead of yard waste...).

On Saturday the boys started some seeds.

I'm so excited! I hope they have some success so they'll be excited to do it again. Andrew is already talking about pumpkins. :)

Stay tuned for progress pictures along the way.