Spontaneity

Brent's school system had a flood day two weeks ago. Yes, a flood day. We'd had torrential rains and the flooding blocked off some major roads in the county, preventing kids from getting to school. If we hadn't already missed over three weeks of school this year, I would have been ecstatic about it. As it was, I was happy to have my husband home, but a little concerned about what this means for when school gets out as I get bigger and more pregnant. I just want school to be OUT! Brent told me last week that last Friday would have been his last day of school if they hadn't missed so much during the winter. I have to admit, it made me more than a little sad. Despite the circumstances, we decided to capitalize on some unexpected family time and have some fun. Brent is not a spontaneous person. In fact, spontaneity seems to unsettle him considerably. When I suggested at 11:30 in the morning that we head up to the zoo for the afternoon, he looked at me like I'd grown three heads. He eventually warmed up to the idea and we quickly packed a lunch and headed up to the zoo.
This little guy kept the kids occupied for at least 20 minutes. He was just a little penguin, but he was so cute and charming that the kids kept wanting to watch him.
The zoo recently underwent renovations and had this brand new playground. The kids LOVED the playground and played forever. Maura even made a little friend and played for a long time with her. It feels like a victory when I see her make a friend. She's finally starting to come out of her shell.(no pun intended!)
Daddy loved helping his boy across the obstacle course. Tristan is a Daddy's boy and will not be separated from Daddy's side for long.
SHADES!! Two men in black shades.
Maura loves peacocks these days. She pretends to be one all the time. There are peacocks everywhere at the zoo and the kids loved following them around, but they were both floored by this impressive specimen. He kept his tail up the whole time we waited for the zoo train. He was beautiful. Our first ride on the zoo train. It was expensive but totally worth it. The kids loved it, especially my train crazy boy.
Workin' the belly! Hard to believe that the next time we visit this zoo, I'll probably be carrying baby #3 in my arms!
We had to go all the way up to visit the engine for Tristan. We had such a pleasant day at the zoo that it made me wish we could always go on a weekday in the middle of the school year. Hooray for spontaneity!

Tristan's REAL Birthday

Tristan's real birthday fell five days after his party, so of course we had to celebrate for the whole week! I was SO disappointed when I realized that Brent wouldn't be able to be there for his birthday, or even see him on his birthday, so we tried to make the best of it and celebrate earlier in the week. See my next post for our fun, spontaneous trip to the zoo for some stolen family time. But THIS was his very special day. I tried to pack in as much fun as possible.

Sleepy eyed, sweet little two year old mister. I can't believe that my boy is two. He is so precious, so cuddly in the morning, yet so very crabby when I go to get him. Most mornings, he calls for daddy and he's a bit disappointed to see me show up. He says, "NO!" and lays back down. In spite of that joyous welcome, I still would like to kiss that sweet face off.
After his refreshing cup of milk, he was ready to start his day, but not before he protested the balloons tied to his chair. I told him I'd remove them once I took his picture, but once in the chair, he warmed to the idea.
Ahh, this is the life! Sprinkle pancakes on your most special day.
After dropping Maura off at school, we took a quick trip to Target to let Tristan pick out a few birthday toys. He picked out a cool helicopter and a bubble gun. Fun times. We then went to the park for a picnic with Grammy, Lorie and Alex. Tristan was styling in his shades and bib.
Who better to share your birthday with than your Grammy--especially if she's going to bring the picnic lunch! Thanks Grammy!
This might look like a sweet photo of two cousins, but it's really Tristan playing keep away from Alex. She wanted the Teddy Grahams and he didn't see any reason to share them. Notice that helicopter clutched tightly in his hot little hand. He hardly put it down all day.
We had a little photo session in the beautiful outdoor gardens. Tristan isn't exactly the most cooperative photographic subject, but we did our best. Aunt Lorie brought her nice camera and we attempted to get some "just turned two" images.
Farmer Tristan
Fisherman Tristan. I'm not digging the comb over look that he's got going on. I didn't realize at the time how bad his hair looked. Wish I'd noticed a bit sooner and employed a hairbrush! He looks a bit like a mini Donald Trump!

It's a brave momma that allows her boy to put his feet in the fishpond while in his good clothes and while standing across the pond from him. This could have been all kind of catastrophes, but it worked out OK.
LOVE this baby boy. He just wanted to touch those fishies so badly!
Just a LITTLE closer!!
What a fun day at the park. We packed up and went to pick up Maura and some ice cream! Yum.
One last sniff of the posies and we were ready to leave!
Aunt Lorie came over for steak, baked potatoes, corn, salad and broccoli salad. Yum. Not diabetic friendly, but delicious!! Tristan was most excited about the ice cream and cake. He LOVED having the candle and having us sing to him. In fact, we had to sing "Happy Birthday" three separate times. He grinned every moment while we sang to him. He melted my heart.
The birthday boy with his loot. He was much more interested in opening his gifts on his birthday than he was at his party, I guess because there was a lot less distraction!
OH. MY. This boy was crazy about his remote controlled car. He still thinks it's hilarious to run things over with it and giggles the whole time he's running it. GOOD present!
Cars, the movie, was a big hit too. We have yet to watch it the whole way through, but he asks for it all the time now.

Tristan at Two is a giant. Most people think he's closer to three than two, which is difficult because Tristan still acts like a two year old. VERY much like a two year old. He's into throwing screaming tantrums when he doesn't get his way. It's not uncommon for me to leave him screaming on the floor of a public place and walk away so that he knows that I'm serious about not giving in to him. He generally notices I'm gone and comes running penitently back to me soon afterward. My "favorite" reaction from him lately is "NO! Never EVER!" I'm not sure where this came from, but I hear it a LOT. We're still trying to work on his reactions. I'm not a fan of the screaming, throwing and hitting, so we've been spending lots of time in time out. Thankfully, it's very effective with him and he's learning a lot.

Back to the giant part, Tristan is 37.5 inches tall and 38.5 pounds. That puts his squarely WAY over the hundredth percentile. When we saw the doctor for his two year old checkup, he came in and said, "Tristan continues to make his own growth curve. There's no such thing as anything above the 100th percentile, but if you had to label his curve, he's probably about the 120th percentile for height and 150th for weight. Hilarious--except for my poor back! The doctor isn't concerned about his size because he looks so proportionate. If I double his height at two, he should end up being about 6'3'' as an adult. Brent is so excited!!! He envisions a pro-wide receiver someday.

Communication-wise, Tristan is really exploding. For a boy who was communicating in one to two word sentences at 18 months, he's practically having conversations. He comes out with multiple new words every day. He's using 4-5 word sentences now and speaking more every day. He is a very effective communicator and I understand most of what he says to me. He uses his tenses correctly all the time. He's working on being very polite. He says "Thank you" most of the time and he's really great about asking politely for things by saying "Please Ma'am!" It's hard to resist that and he pretty much gets what he asks for!

Physically, Tristan is VERY active. He's strong as an ox, too strong for his pregnant momma. I wrestle him out of his crib, into his highchair, up to wash his hands, and into his car seat multiple times a day, so when Brent gets home, I allow him to take the lead in Tristan care. Tristan is fast and loves to jump, but he's a bit klutzy, so he falls down and hits his head multiple times a day. Poor baby. He's always coming to me for kisses to fix the "broken" part and for multiple band aids. We joke about Tristan and say he goes from pillar to post. Mostly, he just doesn't settle on one activity for more than a few seconds at a time. It's hard to keep him occupied when he's always in motion.

Tristan is very friendly and much more relational than Maura was at his age. He knows lots of names of people than I would expect. At church tonight, he looked up at a guy who works in the nursery once a month and said, "BOB!" I was impressed! He gives hugs and kisses to many people other than family and he loves having little friends. His favorite friends at the moment are Liam and Carter. He asks to go to Liam's house all the time. He LOVES his Daddy--no one even comes close, except maybe Poppa. He asks to go to Grammy's house all the time--I think mostly because he wants to ride on Pappap's tractor!

Some Tristanisms:"I do dis BY MYSELF!", "Where Nee-nee?"(blanket), "No, Maura! Time out!"(I've had to explain that only Daddy and I are allowed to send anyone to time out.), "MINE!", "MY TURN!", "Go OUTSIDE!", "Jesus book"(when he wants to read just one more book before bedtime--manipulative??)

I love this sweet baby boy--he's not going to win any awards for best new brother of the year, but we love him just the same. Pray for him and for us as we make this huge transition in the next few weeks from him BEING the baby to us HAVING a baby!

Random Spring Fun

I have lots of random photos from the past few weeks that are just too cute not to share. We've really enjoyed being out and about in the warm spring weather. I try to take the kids to the local little playground as much as possible so they can run out their wiggles! I've also been putting off changing out the kids winter and spring clothes this year. One day, I just bit the bullet and started the clothing migration.
The kids had a big time. They loved checking out all the new spring clothes. They also LOVED the barrettes I'd bought to go with all of Maura's new spring outfits. I found four packages at the bottom of Tristan's box, which meant there were 16 barrettes to share between the two of them. Maura helped Tristan to apply all of his barrettes and they were super happy with the results.
Maura was pretty proud of herself! So cute! She's turning into my girly girl and big helper. I know she's going to be a huge help to me when the baby comes. She loves being known as my big helper.
One beautiful day, we called our friends Leah and Carter and headed to a nearby wildlife sanctuary for the morning. Carter is Tristan's favorite little buddy. In fact, at church the other day, we could not get Tristan to stop talking about how Carter was in the row next to us. I love seeing Tristan's budding personality and social life. He's so different than Maura was at this age, and much more interested in his little friends. The kids all loved checking out the eagles at the sanctuary.
Tristan decided to go swimming in the stream. Actually, he was just picking out rocks and throwing them back in, but he managed to get soaked in the meantime. I didn't care, though! I was looking for any excuse to change him out of the pajama top that he'd refused to take off that morning! The kids had a great time running all over the wildlife park and Leah and I just tried to take it as easy as two pregnant mommas with crazy children can!
I hosted a shower for Leah at the end of April. She was expecting her first baby girl and we just had to celebrate. Maura and Lainey were big helpers and brought Leah all her gifts before she was even ready for them!
We also spent a LOT of time up at the school and soccer field during the months of March, April and May. Brent was so busy with soccer, college classes and school in general, that we had to go visit him instead of the other way around. The kids loved going up to practice and for games and loved seeing Daddy in his coaching role.
Tristan looks like a natural out on the soccer field. He can kick a ball pretty well and throw it even better. He LOVES soccer balls.
The highlight of the kids trip to the ball field is usually running up and down the ramp behind the control booth. SO much fun.
We celebrated my birthday at the end of April. I had recently had my abnormal glucose tolerance test and was having to prick my finger to check my blood sugar. Happy birthday to me. I was not able to indulge as I would have liked. It was Angel Food cake for dessert. Thanks, Mom, for making me a diabetic friendly meal. Maura loved celebrating with us.
Since Brent was going to be busy the night of my birthday, we celebrated as a family the night before at Ruby Tuesday. My how I love those cheeseburgers!
These last photos are from when we would visit Brent during the school day. Tristan and Maura love climbing up to write on the white board and fight over board space on the HUGE board.
Daddy and his sweet baby girl. She's so grown up these days. It makes me sad!! It was such a whirlwind spring and it's getting ready to get busier very soon. Stay tuned for some baby news.

Tristan's Choo Choo Party

Tristan's birthday was last Thursday, but we celebrated a bit earlier for his party. It always feels like a little bit of a letdown if you celebrate the party after the birthday has already come. We chose to celebrate on May 1st, which, as it happens, was also the day that the monsoons struck Kentucky. I don't think I've ever seen so much rain in a single day, or a single weekend for that matter. I was super excited(not) about the prospect of having the entire party indoors at my house. I had planned on having all these fun outdoor activities, but had to scale back when I realized that I'd end up with seven crazy kids and their parents stuck in my house with no backyard to escape to. Despite the meteorologic difficulties, we still managed to have one rockin' choo choo party!
Tristan woke up early on party day to discover a new train table all set up and ready for him! He LOVES playing with train tables whenever we see them at other people's homes, so I'm hoping this will be a hit for him. After I'm done being pregnant and don't mind getting down on the floor again, this train table will go up in his bedroom in place of the changing table. Sadly, I think that the changing table is going to have to go long before actual potty training commences. Notice my son's layered look. He could be a GAP model for as much as he loves layers. Actually what happens is that he never wants to remove his PJ top, just to add the day's shirt on top. Most days it's just easier to go along with it than argue the point.

Be prepared for over the top party decorations. I know I'm over the top--no one need point that out to me!! This would have been a perfect birthday to have had at Monkey Joes or Chuck E. Cheese due to the fact that I'm eight months pregnant. Remind me of that next time I'm NOT pregnant again!
The favor table. I lucked out and found the favor buckets on super clearance after Easter. Every kid got an engineer's hat, train whistle, train lollipop, bubbles and Play-doh.
Birthday Crossing!! Fun Times ahead. I had planned on making even more signs, but the fact that I had to work the day before put some major kinks in my plans. Some of these props were made at work in between patients. Notice the railroad tracks made of electrical tape to the right of the table. So cute...so permanent. I now have permanent railroad tracks where the electrical tape pulled the varnish off the floor. Ooops.
Ready to celebrate my sweet two year old!!
The party room just waiting for some food. It's hard to tell, but I wrapped the front of the island in blue paper, added some windows and black paper plates for wheels and made it into the dining car.
Choo choo--he's two!!
I was pretty happy with the way the banner turned out. The green paper had little trains on it--just a little hard to see in the photo.
All of Tristan's loot! I borrowed trains from my mom and took all of ours to set out around the room and on the mantle.
Here's the truly over the top part. I borrowed a logo from a site on the Internet and used Paintshop to take out the other kid's name and put in Tristan and Friends. We then wrapped each water bottle in paper and added the logo. So cute!

Even the napkins sported the logo! The food turned out awesome. My mom and sister were such a HUGE help. I couldn't have done the party without them. Mom came over on Friday night and prepped pretty much everything. Mom and Katie came over early Saturday to help me decorate and finish the food. Brent was a huge help too--he took the kids to McDonald's and got them out of our hair!! We ate mini sliders, choo choo wheel pasta salad, broccoli salad, and fruit salad. I made pb&j sandwiches for the kids and cut them out with a train cookie cutter. I think everyone enjoyed the food a lot.
The birthday boy himself, proudly sporting a train outfit. I looked high and low for a dressy train outfit and ended up buying a plain Jon Jon and having my mom embroider the train on top. It turned out so adorable and Tristan LOVED it. He showed his train to anyone who was interested. He loved showing up to a completely decorated house when he came home from McDonald's. He was in awe of all the choo choos we'd placed everywhere.

The thing that he was most excited about was his choo choo train that we'd placed in the main room. He's had this train for a year and he's always liked it, but I think seeing it in the house in the midst of all the decorations was really something for him. We had a hard time getting him to let the other kids have a turn!
Mommy and Daddy with their sweet two year old. I can hardly believe that this baby boy is already two!! He's growing up WAY too quickly.
Aunt Katie with her favorite nephew(for now!) Lorie and Micah weren't able to attend because they were out of town. The next day, Maura asked me why we didn't invite Aunt Lorie and Uncle Micah to Tristan's party!

Grammy and Pappap were so proud of their big two year old grandson!!
We set up the bouncy house in the garage and the kids bounced amid all the chaos that is our garage. They didn't seem to mind!!
Rachel, Audrey and Avery were some of the first guests to arrive. I remember when Avery was born and I thought he was so big compared to Tristan. Now they're the same age!

Carter and Chad. Carter's mommy was home resting--she had a baby four days later!
Miss Amy and Liam wouldn't miss all the fun! I love seeing Tristan play with Liam. He's got a serious case of big boy worship!

Elizabeth and Thomas. These are our friends who will be moving away this summer. We're going to miss having our boys grow up together! I didn't manage to get a photo of Jack and Lindy. but they were there having a great time too!
The boys were all immediately drawn to the train table. Glad we set that up for them to play with. They loved it!
We played a few short games--as much as two year olds really play games. We played stick the logo on the train and had a beanbag toss into the front of a train. They kids enjoyed the games, but I think they liked the free play with the train table, ride on train and bouncy house even more.
Tristan was VERY enthusiastic about blowing out his candles. I lit the candle and lowered the cake in front of him so we could sing and he immediately blew it out. I lit it again and managed to keep it lit while we sang. He LOVED having everyone sing the Happy Birthday song to him. He had the biggest smile on his face! On his real birthday, a few days later, he actually made us sing the song three times. Mom made the cake for me because I knew I'd go crazy if I tried to do that too. It turned out awesome!!
Present time. This photo cannot adequately convey the chaos that is present opening at a two year old's party. Tristan was not particularly interested in tearing off wrapping paper, but Maura and Avery were happy to help out!
One thing Tristan WAS interested in doing was beating the pinata! I made it out of a shoebox and toilet paper tube when I realized that pinatas cost $18. The kids loved this activity, I just wish I'd thought in advance and gotten a better implement than a toy broom. Tristan waylaid the pinata with that broom. If he'd had a bat, he would have torn the thing apart!
Two tired but happy kids. Maura loved the party almost as much as Tristan. She's Engineer Maura in this photo!
Tristan with his favorite present of the day--a ride on ATV that Grammy and Pappap got him. This boy had too much fun on his birthday party day. We were ALL exhausted and headed up for early bedtimes! Happy Birthday sweet Tristan!!