Labor Day

We had a lazy, uneventful Labor Day, which is just the way I like it. The best part was that Cory was off of work and we got to spend the whole day with him. We woke up, made pancakes for breakfast, and then washed and vacuumed my filthy car.

My sister and nieces came into town mid morning, so we went over to my parent's house to play and eat lunch. We spent a lot of time playing outside, swinging, and digging in the rocks. After naps, we set up the bounce house and let the kids enjoy jumping.

For dinner, my mom made a crock pot lasagna, which is so much easier than making regular lasagna and tastes just as good. After dinner, the kids went swimming before we had to head home for bed. As always, the kids had a lot of fun playing together. It was so nice to have an extra day of relaxing before starting back to work today. I just wish all weekends could last 3 days!

Playing in the rocks

Relaxing with Granna

Fun at the Park

We woke up yesterday morning to cooler temperatures and took advantage of them by playing outside all day long. This morning it was still perfect outside so we loaded up and headed to the park to feed the ducks and play. It feels so nice to be outside again and I can't wait until the cooler temperatures are here to stay.

Parker and Eden both enjoyed feeding the ducks. This is the first time Eden has been big enough to feed them. Last year at this time she was still watching from her stroller. I was so proud of her. Not once did she go close enough to the water that I worried she might fall in.

After we fed the ducks, we headed over to the playground. The kids enjoyed climbing, sliding and swinging. Eden was able to do so much on her own without me worrying about her falling off the play structure. She climbed the rock wall and went down the slides all by herself. It's amazing how just a few months of development has made her so much more independent.

Feeding the ducks

Swinging

Climbing the rock wall all by herself
Sliding

Look Who's Talking

I would love to report that Eden has started talking up a storm over the past few months since getting tubes in her ears, but unfortunately that is not the case. Although she babbles all of the time and thinks she is talking, most of what she says is still unintelligible. She has, over the past few weeks, picked up several new words and uses them all of the time. Here are the few words that she has mastered:

Go- used to tell Rocky to get away from her snack

No,no- also used to tell Rocky to get away from her snack!

Bye- used when she wants to do something she knows she is not supposed to do (She will look at Cory or me, wave, and say "bye" so that we will leave her alone and she can go about getting into mischief!)

Uh, oh

Cheese- used when she sees a camera

Boo- used when you walk into her room in the morning or after her nap

Hopefully more words (like mommy!) are just around the corner and she will be talking in complete sentences in no time.
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Parker's newest thing to ask is "How?".

Parker uses it the same way other kids use 'why', but Cory and I have quickly discovered that it is a lot harder to answer a 'how' question than a 'why' question. For example, "How is that truck in front of us?" is a lot harder to answer than "Why is that truck in front of us?". Or, "How did that bee sting me?" isn't as easy to answer as "Why did that bee sting me?"

I am hoping that this will be a short verbal phase and he will stop asking me "How?" about every. little. thing!

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A few new Parkerisms:

Parker has a knack for mixing up compound words. Here are just a few that he has come up with lately.

Casesuit= suitcase

achetummy=tummy ache

achehead=headache

broweye=eyebrow

Cooler Weather

Yesterday we finally got a break in the hot, humid weather that has confined us to our house for several weeks. It was cloudy with a nice breeze and I definitely wanted to get the kids outside and take advantage of it. In Texas, you never know when the 100+ temperatures will return and make you a prisoner in your house again.

After I got off of work, we left to go visit a friend in Aledo who has three girls. Every season, she calls me and lets me know when she is selling some of their cute clothes that they have outgrown. I always get some great gently used clothes and shoes for Eden at a really good price. My sister and her girls met us there to "shop" and play with her girls for the afternoon.

On the way to her house, Emily and I saw this great park and decided to take the kids on our way home. The kids had a great time running, jumping, sliding, chasing, hiding, climbing, swinging, and digging. I think they were just glad to finally be outside rather than cooped up in the house. We stayed as long as we possibly could and Parker still asked for 'one more minute' when it was time to go.

SLIDING

RIDING

SWINGING

CHASING

CLIMBING

CRAWLING

PEEKING

When it was time to go we told the kids to give each other good bye hugs. So sweet! I love that they love each other. One of the best parts of the day was when we were swinging and Parker told me, "Addison is my favorite friend." It is so nice that they truly love being together and miss each other when they haven't seen each other in a while. I hope it will stay this way for many more years to come.

Mission Accomplished!

The one huge goal that I had to get accomplished over my summer vacation was to get Parker completely potty trained. He is starting a new preschool in a few weeks and has to be fully potty trained to attend.

I fretted and worried all spring that Parker was never going to master potty training. He showed no interest for such a long time that I was sure he would be the only kid in his kindergarten class that was still wearing diapers! Throughout his whole life, he has always been on the later end of reaching his milestones, but once he figures something out, he does it quickly and never looks back. For example, he took his first steps and started walking all in the same day. Also, I never thought he would learn to talk, but once he started, he has not stopped. I was hoping the same thing would happen with potty training.

Our first attempt at potty training was back in March over spring break. We had one successful day and then the stomach bug/morning sickness hit and potty training was quickly put on the back burner.

As soon as school was out, we tried again. This time Parker was completely ready for it and he did a great job learning to go pee on the potty. To this day, he has still only had 2 accidents and one of them was on Day 2 of training. At first, he still wanted nothing to do with pooping on the potty, so I would give in and let him have a diaper to do his business.

After several weeks of successful peeing on the potty, I decided that we had to take the next step and get rid of the diapers completely. After a LONG day with lots of screaming and crying, Parker was finally successful with pooping on the potty. It took several days for Parker to realize that I was not going to give in and put a diaper on him. There were lots of crying/screaming fits but my stubbornness won out, and Parker finally realized that his only choice was to go poop on the potty.

Because of how stubborn Parker was with learning to poop on the potty, we decided to reward him with a Hot Wheels car every time he was successful. He now has an entire bag full of cars that he plays with all day long and takes everywhere he goes. He even asks to sleep with them at night!

I feel like a huge weight has been lifted off of me now that Parker has reached this milestone in his life. It is so nice to be able to trust him to tell me when he needs to go potty and not have to worry about him having an accident during the day.

Over the past week, he has made the final transition from using the little portable training potty to only using the big grown up potty. Parker is now ready to start preschool and I am able to say "Mission accomplished!"

Gone

As much as Eden doesn't want to hear it, summer vacation is over. I started back to work this week and we are being forced to get used to our new back-to-school routine.

Gone are the days of sleeping in as late as we want.

Gone are the days of staying in our pajamas until lunchtime (or sometimes all day!).

Gone are the days of playing with friends at Wednesday playgroup.

Gone are the days of waking up without an alarm clock.

Gone are the days of mommy being home to play all day.

Gone are the days of lounging around in t-shirts and shorts.

Gone are the summer days of only having two kids to take care of and enjoy.

School is back in session and although we have a lot to look forward to this fall, I will miss spending my lazy summer days with Parker and Eden. They have been so much fun the past few months and I have really gotten spoiled being a stay at home mommy.

As much as I hate to see summer come to an end, I am looking forward to getting this school year started because the sooner we get it started, the sooner we will be able to meet our sweet baby girl!

Good-bye summer!

Hello to the next season of our lives!

Daddy's Birthday

We began Cory's birthday with a special birthday muffin complete with a candle, which Parker loved. The kids and I sang "Happy Birthday" to Cory and then Parker insisted on blowing out the candle for him.

When I woke Parker up and told him it was Daddy's birthday, his first response was, "Is he going to have a jumpy house?" I guess he thinks everyone gets a bounce house on their birthday!

Later that day, we invited both of our families and a few friends to come over for a cookout and swimming at my mom's house. The kids got a little restless while we were preparing dinner so we let them play on our iPhones for a few minutes. These kids are going to be so technologically savvy!

After dinner, all of the dads took the kids swimming, but they didn't last long because it was just too hot. Where else but Texas in August is it too hot to even swim?

After swimming we came inside for cake and ice cream. Parker helped Daddy cut the cake and then enjoyed 2 pieces himself! Overall, it was a fun day celebrating Cory's birthday with family and friends.