its been a busy week

not too much to report. i've been busy with work and prepping for miles upcoming birthday party. i have a great theme planned and can't wait to share all the pictures...but that will be next week. :)

i started a new work schedule back in june and it allows me to spend more time in the afternoon with my boys. we've been spending a lot of time outdoors in the great step2 pool i finally found on craigslist. both of the boys love it!

here are a few pics of ethan enjoying the pool and the sun.

miles was too busy trying to drink from the hose to get any good pictures of him.

but how cute are the brothers sharing together here?

a conversation with ethan

"i love you ethan."

"love you momma"

"aw ethan, that makes momma happy!"

"say 'love you ethan'"

"i love you ethan"

"that makes ethan happy"

soooo sweet! i love our conversations.

saturday morning at the park

just a few pics from our morning at the park.

ethan was very brave and went down the BIG slide several times and loved it. and miles enjoyed getting to swing and crawl around in the little tree house area.

why i love my boys

ethan

1. i love how polite he is becoming. it has been a work in progress (almost a please and thank you boot camp of sorts) the past couple of months and it is finally paying off. he has become so polite (most of the time) and will say excuse me, please, thank you, you're welcome and even i'm sorry. and most of the time in the right context ;) i know that our reminders will continue for quite some time, but at least we have a good start!

2. how compassionate he is. he realizes what you are feeling and will ask if you are okay if you seem sad. he'll ask if you are tired and need to go night-night if you yawn. he will come and find me and tell me that miles needs a hug when he is crying. it is so sweet to see how he is paying attention to how others are feeling.

3. how he asks for a hug. "momma, i need a hug" i know sometimes he is trying to buy more time from doing something. but sometimes it is just out of the blue. and how can you pass up one more opportunity for a hug.

4. what a little helper he is. he loves to help with miles and also just in general around the house. i need to take advantage of it now before he starts dreading chores!

5. how much he is talking. i love the things he says and the conversations we have. i especially enjoy when i pick him up from the babysitter and he'll tell me about his day.

miles

1. the way he looks right at you and grabs your face. he has done this from when he was very young. but he will grab and put both hands on your face and just give you the biggest smile. love it!

2. how he looks when he sleeps. you can beat those sweet little snuggles where his little bottom is up in the air and his head is scrunched into the corner of the crib. it doesn't look comfortable at all, but somehow there he is sleeping like that almost every night. it *almost* makes you want to wake him up and snuggle him. i do need to sneak in and get a picture though!

3. his little milestones. i told lance they are just as exciting the second time around as they were the first. he recently started clapping and i thought it was the cutest thing and just yesterday he waved for the first time. i get so giddy and happy when i see him do little things like that. this morning we waved goodbye to lance when he left for work and both of my boys waved.

4. his laugh! it is soooo contagious. and once you get him laughing it is pretty hard to stop. and of course ethan usually joins in on the fun.

5. those big brown eyes. and his wonderfully long eyelashes.

Potty Talk

a little update on ethan and his potty training.

things are going great! so much better than the first time we tried. looking back, he definitely wasn't ready and we should have stepped back earlier. but at least we'll know when we attempt this with miles! while he has accidents, they are much fewer and farther between and he often goes to the potty by himself and just lets us know after he is done. pooping, which was a huge issue when we first tried, isn't perfect, but it is so much better. i bet in a few weeks to a month, he will have figured it all out.

now, i am not sure when we'll start the potty training during naps and nighttime, but at least we made good progress with this and i am not as nervous about attempting that in the future.

and now for a fun little story...

friday night we went out to dinner with a friend from work and some of her family (most of whom i had never met). the boys did great during dinner and after i took them around the mall to walk arond a bit. fast forward to when we got back to the restaurant and i took ethan to the bathroom with me. well, he knows how excited we all get for him when he uses the potty so he must have decided that the whole table (along with plenty of neighboring tables in the restaurant) should be just as excited for me. when we got back to the table he proudly announced that "momma went pee-pee in the potty!" fun times! i am sure that there is much more of that in store in the future...

some xrays for miles

poor little miles has been having tummy troubles on and off since late last week. he seemed fine over the weekend, but they started acting up again on tuesday. i was able to get him in to see the pediatrician this afternoon and while he thinks that it is due to some constipation, maybe from his formula, he sent us to get some xrays. miles was a little trooper and did really well with all the waiting we had to do at the hospital and during the actual procedure...which was very quick! and we had two wonderful radiology techs who were very sweet to him, so all in all not too bad. not sure when to expect results, but hopefully it won't be too long. we were sent home with a prescription that i hope will help the little guy feel better, it makes me sad to see him feeling so bad. :(

here is a pic of my guy in the waiting room.

weekend fun

we had another beautiful (though awfully hot!) weekend at the lake. ethan has already come a long, long way from the first time we tried to get him into the water (not successful) to now (wanted to tube with daddy, TWICE!!) he was even brave enough to let go and give a wave, much to our delight. lots of swimming, boating and eating took place the rest of the weekend and everyone was completely worn out. this is what summer is all about.

the boys

just some pics from over the weekend...love their matching shirts from aunt laura and uncle jeff! and miles has on the CUTEST orange (since you can't tell from these pictures) pedipeds. love them!!

Fun with curtains

This is a frequent pastime in the house. Both of the boys think it is one of the best ways to spend a morning.

11 months!

only one more month to go before miles is a year! it is hard to believe that the past year has gone by so quickly. i still have to figure out what i am going to do for his birthday party!!

sleeping: still doing great! he has about the same schedule as ethan and normally sleeps from 8PM to 7AM. he is usually pretty happy when he wakes up and will play in his crib for 30 minutes or so before letting you know he is ready for his morning bottle. takes one nap, normally from 11:30 or noon to about 2:30 or so. can't complain about that!

routine: a little lazy since we are enjoying summer. it is so hot so we don't get outside as often as i know miles would like!

milestones: he is quite the little crawler now and can get around the house pretty quickly these days. he can crawl up the stairs too. had to bring out the baby gate once again. he pulls up quite well now and is definitely cruising, but hasn't started taking any steps yet. clapping! he loves to clap. he gets a big smile on his face when he realizes he is clapping. it is SO cute! sitting up in the wal-mart cart - much prefers this view than the view from his infant seat. and big brother sits in the basket.

some of his favorites:
food: still loving the puffs and cheerios and he had a few bites of some pasta (plain) and seemed to like it. he also LOVES graham crackers.

fruit: bananas and applesauce still. he tried some peaches, watermelon and blueberries, but not a fan of any of them.

veggies: he does okay with squash and carrots, but that is about it. he has tried some regular green beans (not puree) but wasn't too sure on them.

drink: still going strong on formula, but i guess we'll be making the switch to milk soon!

toy: he has started getting interested in the trains now. of course, he prefers to tear up the track more than anything. ethan tries to bring him all sorts of other toys in hopes that he'll leave the track alone, it is pretty funny. he also loves the leapfrog alphabet magnets. oh and sadly (and maybe a little gross) he loves the frog potty. i've had to hide it back away near the laundry room in hopes that he'll stay away from it!

activity: he still loves to be outside. a huge fan of the swings at the park! and he is our water baby. with the lake being warmer, he is pretty content to swim and splash out there.

learning: he definitely has clapping down and will clap if you start clapping in front of him.

my favorites:
i love his smile! it is huge and he smiles all the time. i love listening to him talk in the morning. he will chat in his crib after he wakes up and it is so fun to hear. i love seeing him with ethan. they are definitely interacting a lot more. of course there are toy stealing episodes that don't go well, but there are a lot of laughs and giggles that make up for those.

and a little video of him just chatting away! you can also see just the tiniest bit of clapping near the end. love it!

happy 4th of july!

we had a wonderful weekend at the lake! the weather was hot and sunny on saturday and we got lots of water time in. we even let ethan stay up late (sooo against my crazy sleep rules!) to watch the fireworks. he enjoyed them a lot more than the ones he had seen the night before at a cookout we went too. those first ones were much too loud, but we watched these from pretty far away so they were a lot quieter and he enjoyed them and was naming off all the colors he saw.

we spent the entire weekend on the houseboat and it was quite the site to watch all the comings and goings to the marina. and after the fireworks, the wind picked up and a storm blew in so it was kind of crazy with all the houseboats that had gone out to see the fireworks trying to get back in. i was glad we stayed put and didn't have to deal with any of that.

sunday was a lot cooler and cloudy but we still were able to get in some swimming, and as you saw in the video everyone got in the water, even miles! grandmother, grandfather, dawn and the younger cash kids came out to play that afternoon. grandmother made some yummy strawberry ice cream and everyone enjoyed it, but i think it is safe to say that miles enjoyed it the most! grandfather had to feed him pretty quickly or else he started protesting, and not too quietly!

water bug!

no doubt miles loves the water! he is so much different than ethan. he loved the bath from day one and is perfectly happy if he gets splashed. he has really been our little lake boy this summer and it has been so much fun. he has been in the lake several times, but always in shallower water, today we decided to give it a try off of the boat dock. he had a great time!

happy 30 months, ethan!

here is a little snapshot of my guy at 2 and half years, i should have stats soon from his 30-month check-up:

sleeping: still a good sleeper, as he has been since he was about 6 months. generally sleeps from 8PM to 7AM, though he'll stay in his room until close to 8 just reading and resting. he still takes a nap on the days that he is at home. he goes down anywhere between 11:30-12:30 depending on what we were doing, though 12 is his normal time these days. he will sleep anywhere from 2-3 hours.

routine: most mornings our routine consists of some train time before and after breakfast, with him doing more of the track building. maybe some outside time on his trike. then we usually go out on errands for about an hour before naps. the two seem to be easier to handle out of the house. lunch, naps and afternoons at the babysitters a couple days of the week. on the weekends we aren't at the lake, we set up the pool and play outside in it. both of the boys love it.

milestones: potty training has been going fairly well. i am not going to say we are there, because we still have a ways to go considering we haven't even attempted anything at naps or nighttime, but there has been a definite improvement from the first time we tried. we have been going strong for a week and even in the past few days he has started realizing more of when he has to use the potty. friday was even his first accident free day! and thanks to the trains (still only had to use one!) i have not had to clean out any undies - what a huge milestone!

some of his favorites:
food: loves to have his cereal in the mornings, like daddy. his favorites are cheerios and frosted mini wheats. i will admit that he gets to share some of mama's lucky charms as a special treat every now and then.

fruit: watermelon, canteloupe, blueberries, strawberries and grapes (green & red). he is a huge fan of fruit. he'll eat most any kind, the ones i listed are the ones he eats most often.

veggies: green beans are still the top veggie he prefers. i tried to entice him with some zuchinni "fries" the other day, but he knew what i was trying and didn't buy it.

drink: he loves to drink orange juice in the mornings with his breakfast, like mama...and also his "special coffee" - warm milk with a little bit of ovaltine.

toy: i am sure you can guess that it is anything related to thomas the train. it can be books, pictures, dvds, toys...anything train related and he goes crazy. and even though it is about 100 degrees and sunny most days, he still loves to ride his trike outside in the driveway, though the other day i brought it inside because it was just too hot.

learning: he is just constantly learning new words and it is amazing how much of a vocabulary he has now. we have been diligently working on please, thank you and you're welcome and in the past week or so i think it has finally clicked. now he still needs reminders on a very regular basis, but he is getting a lot better! he knows the alphabet well and can recognize all the letters. he can count to 15, but can't quite reconize all of the number yet. he loves reading and will sit down with his books and try to read them. a lot of it is because he has heard the stories so many times that he will try to repeat them, but he also takes new books and makes up stories based on the pictures. we go to the library a few times a month to pick out new books.

my favorites:
i love that ethan and i can have little conversations. i can ask him about his day and he will answer and sometimes tell me what he did. i love that when i ask for hugs and kisses he comes right over, usually running, to give them to me. i love listening to him make up stories and talk to his toys. i love reading to him at night or before naps, we cuddle up in his bed and he gets to pick out a story. it is one of the few times of the day that he actually will stay still.

new trains!

my parents know how i love trains almost as much as ethan does, so my birthday gift this year was a new crane and some wacky track for our thomas collection! ethan LOVED the new crane. it was the first thing he asked about this morning and even insisted upon having it at the table with him while he ate breakfast this morning. thanks mee-maw and grampies for the fun gifts! we love them!