holiday weekend recap

I've decided every weekend should be three days.
This weekend has been a blast.

Friday I got home from a work retreat late afternoon. Bryan went to a Twins game with Aaron, Craig and Trav so Connor and I hung out at home. I missed him! (had been gone since Tuesday morning on the retreat) He's becoming such an independent little boy. I kind of dozed in and out of sleep on the couch for about an hour or so, and he just played in the living room with his trucks. I was very thankful :)

Saturday morning Bryan worked then Connor and I went to go pick him up and head to my parent's house to be at the lake. It was a WONDERFUL day to be at the lake! Sunny and hot! We took two boat rides, Connor sat on Grandpa's lap and helped him drive. By the end he was working the throttle and steering all by himself. Thankfully no one was thrown overboard :) Then Saturday night we headed to our friend's house in Nicollet to hang out with them, my brother's family and another family. Kids had a blast and it was a beautiful night to sit out by the fire.

Sunday we went to church (well, Bryan went to church, Connor and I spent our time out in the entry way being VERY VERY VERY naughty...okay to give him credit, he was VERY tired), then later in the afternoon headed to the Twins game. We had a fantastic time, thank you to G & G Bode! It was to celebrate Aaron's golden birthday so 10 of us made it to the game. Super fun and Connor was such a good boy, sat on our laps the entire time!

Today so far we played with Madelyn and Ava for a few hours then went to the park to see the animals with cousin Ashlyn. Connor just went down for a nap at 1:30, hopefully it's a long one!

The weekend's not officially over yet, but it's been great! Next week I'm in Chicago all week for a conference then I'm done traveling for work until late August/September ish. Three weddings this summer, a trip to the Dells and more...summer is going to go so fast!

So, happy Memorial Day everyone! (pictures of all above mentioned events coming soon, I know you were bored, ha)

fun with grandpa b

Finally caught some pictures of Connor doing one of his favorite things...riding the 4-wheeler with Grandpa Bode. Scary, Connor knows how to start it all by himself. Not surprisingly.

Telling him he had to go back to Grandma's house for supper.
(which would require getting off of the 4-wheeler and going inside)

We probably bribed him with fruit snacks.
Parenting at its finest.

skid loader fun

Our neighbor borrowed one of Bryan's skid loaders this weekend so you can imagine how much fun it's been looking out our windows. Then on Sunday Connor got to help Bryan load up the skid loader and bring it back to the job site. Fun times. :)

Waiting for Bryan to finish hooking up the trailer.

SO happy (aside from constantly itching his elbow)

Watching dad hook up the trailer.

Had to go see what was taking so long.

Will his obsession for daddy's equipment ever end? Kind of hope not, it's pretty cute :)

1st Annual Golden Heart 5K Fun Run/Walk

The first annual Golden Heart 5K Fun Run/Walk and 1/2 Mile Kids Run was a success! We were hoping for 80-100 participants and ended up with just over 180! We had the most beautiful morning and everything went really well. Lots of people asking if this will become an annual event, we'll take that as a good sign! Thanks to all that participated and hope to see you again next year :)

Me, Mom, Krystal and the kiddos.

Giving Connor a pep talk before the race.
(stay in your stroller, listen to Grandma, stay in your stroller, be good, etc.)

They had already exchanged treat cups at this point.

The committee! Angie, Matt and myself. Great team :)

Matt and his wife Trisha. Trisha led Operation Goodie Bag and was quite successful.

Kids activities (aside from the 1/2 mile run) included intense face painting and

balloon animals. Both were a big hit.

All in all, it was a great day and we look forward to next year!

mother's day

Here are some pics from Mother's Day when we were at my parents.

Connor and Ashlyn discovered that hills on their bikes are really fun :)

Fishing!

Tickling my favorite niece :)

Connor helping Grandpa get wood for the fire.

W caught one! (only took a bazillion tries)

Eating chips :)

This was either right before or after she tried kissing the fish :)

Looking for fish.

Watching Uncle Joe release the fish.

Up to something here...

And of course, we had to get the tractors out.

two year appointment

Well, I was a bad mom and didn't get Connor in for his two year for almost a month after his birthday. And then I forgot all the papers at his appointment so I can't really tell you his official stats, I'm just trying to remember.

He refused to stand on the 'big boy scale' and ran down the hallway by the doctors' offices, in only a diaper. Then refused to have his height measured on the 'big boy' height thingy. So, we had to resort to the infant measuring table, which also didn't go well. Wow, and why do I think he's such a good boy?

I 'think' he was 34" high and 29.5 lbs. Put him somewhere in the 39th percentile for height and the 60th something for weight. Everything else was good, developmentally, etc. Right on track. He of course had to show the doctor his dozer, skidloader and backhoe and their coordinating trailers (I think a fruit snack wrapper was used for one of the trailers...so creative, ha).

And, no shots! Whoo hoo. Oh, and there is a little thing on babycenter that predicts your child's future height once they're two. He's destined to be 5' 10". I'm good with that, ha. Thanks, babycenter.

bugs.

Well, I took Connor in this morning to see if he had chicken pox. Supposedly only 2% of fully vaccinated kids get them, but it wouldn't surprise me that he'd fall into that lucky bunch. He doesn't have a lot of the bumps, but enough to do a bunch of googling on the subject :) No fever, no bumps on his stomach, or in the 'hot' spots (arm pits, groin, etc.). But, he seems to be the only kid at school with this many bites.

So, we took a trip to the doctor's office this morning, they did poke one and swab it to send out for official testing, but they're (nurse practitioner and dermatologist) pretty convinced it's just bites. Oh, and he has an ear infection along with the pink eye he has right now. Normally for the ear I'd take him to our trusty chiropractor but with the pink eye I figured some additional antibiotics couldn't hurt. Eye drops are NO fun in this house and I would guess I successfully get the drops in maybe every other time we do it.

Picked up some anti-itch creams that we'll start using tonight, hopefully that helps. He keeps saying "Off, mama, off!" while trying to pick off the bites. Poor guy. He has like 4 on the bottom of one of his feet, those are the worst. However he does lay pretty nicely with a cold rag on the bed or floor and just sets his feet on it :)





I feel like it's worse in person. Maybe because you can see all of him at once, then :) Happy Friday!

3 years and counting...

Happy Anniversary, Bryan.
Love you.

Weekend Recap

We had a great Mother's Day yesterday! Started out by going to church with Bryan's mom and then to a small town diner for lunch, it was yummy :) Came home, Connor napped (and I snuck a 2.5 hour nap in as well...felt amazing!), then we went out to my parents house. We fished, grilled ribs and had a fire. It was a relaxing day, considering the Saturday I had (you don't want to know, trust me), and an overall great weekend! To start the weekend off, I drove up Friday night to Wisconsin to scrapbook with some friends and left early Sunday morning. Was nice to have some girl time but I missed my little man! However, it's SO fun to have somewhat decent phone conversations with him. He was so excited to tell me that he went to the park to see the animals, rode in daddy's backhoe and mowed the lawn that it came out. "MAMA! ANIMALS, BACKHOE, LAWN!" Over and over again :) Too cute. Oh and he has to tell me that he slept in Daddy's Bed on Mama's side. Stinker.

Hope you all had a wonderful Mother's Day as well! (oh, and Connor got me a nice little basket of flowers for my desk and is getting really good at saying "I Love You" :))

sweet mothers day gift

Connor's daycare does lots of arts and crafts, which is great. We get lots of BEAUTIFUL artwork almost daily. I actually think I probably have every piece, just in his stash of daily sheets. I know, crazy. Really crazy if I took the time to show you a few of them. Oh well. This is what Connor brought home this past week. I loved it! Too cute.

However, it did come with a disclaimer that it was not advised to actually grow the flowers in the provided pot, as the paint comes off when watering the plant :) But it will definitely become a desk accessory!

like father like son

Connor is definitely in the 'imitation' stage, if there is such a thing. And mostly it involves imitating Bryan. Whatever Bryan is doing or does, he does. Like opening the pack of fruit snacks with his teeth. Or drinking the milk out of the cereal bowl. Doesn't matter what it is...he does it. Now, if he would only imitate daddy going the bathroom we'd be golden :)

summer fun begins

Summer softball and volleyball have begun! Softball on Tuesday nights, with the occasional sub on Monday nights and then volleyball Friday nights.

Tuesday nights if the games are early enough, Connor will get to play with Kate :) It was pretty fun, when I was catching one inning, he was just yelling thru the fence, "Hi Mama", over and over again.

Taken from a camera phone, Kate joined Connor in his bike trailer.

ed's tractor

Bryan takes Connor out to Stan's (Bryan's dad's cousin) house as much as possible. Tractors EVERYWHERE, dog (still doesn't like to touch it, but getting more and more comfortable), kitties, 4-wheeler, and did I mention tractors?

The other day Stan, Bryan and Bryan's dad surprised Bryan's Uncle Ed with his tractor...all fixed up and painted! Ed had purchased the tractor because it was just like the one he had while growing up and had intended to fix it up himself. The guys surprised him! It was pretty cool.
(hope I got the story right :))

Here's Connor taking it for a spin.

Thanks for the pic, Vicky!

day at the farm

So I was blogging so well for so long, and then I take a two week break, sorry about that :)

To catch up, a few weekends ago I dropped Connor off at Joe's on the way to St. Cloud for my girls weekend. My parents met me there and explored the farm.

goof balls

must have been VERY tiring :)
Thanks for the pics, mom!