a peek into 31 otter court

Timberwolves Game

2012-01-27T23:23:00.000-06:00

We took Connor to his first Timberwolves game tonight and we had a great time! The game was very exciting and we won, which obviously adds to the enjoyment. Connor got a little tired near the end but was a trooper. Bryan got the tickets through his accounting firm, they were about six rows up, center court, nice! I'm not a huge pro basketball fan, but having good seats definitely helps. Plus...Rubio is easy on the eyes.....

The Bode Boys: Grandpa Nate, Connor & Bryan.

Rubio. Isn't he a little cutie? Ha.

Oh and my boss* was there, too. He had a little better seats than we did.

*Hope you all know I'm kidding when I say he's my boss...he's just a few steps up the ladder from me :)

project 52 | week 2: variety

2012-01-26T21:31:00.001-06:00

Week two of Project 52: variety.

Variety. Funny how a simple word made me think really hard on what to photograph this week and even my final selection was a little forced (I suspect this won't be the first week I struggle with the subject matter). I was going to try and take a picture of all of Connor's 'gym' shorts he has, it would have made for a very colorful photo, but couldn't figure out a unique way to prop them. Wanted to capture the variety of meals I make for my family...ha. Enough said on that one.

But finally, it came to me that I've been thinking about variety quite a bit lately when it comes to my workouts. Bryan and I have been incredibly diligent at our daily workout routines, Bryan probably more so than me (I've missed two days in January, I don't think he's missed one, and he thinks it's debatable whether volleyball counts, I absolutely think it does :)), but in order for me to continue to be motivated (other than I better start seeing the needle on the scale move) is to switch up my routine daily. Variety. So tonight I made up this little chart to tape onto my treadmill so that every morning or evening that I go down there (we moved the treadmill to the basement) I don't have to think for a few moments, should I run? Do the weight loss interval program mode? Just a brisk walk? I just decided for myself in advance so I can get right to it.

Challenge: Variety
Subject: Workout Routines
Skill: Low Light

Definitely struggled with this one. Horrible light in our basement (ie two lightbulbs in the entire space) and I took the photo at 9 pm. Was good to experiment with the settings and I'm sure had I tried long enough I may have been able to reduce some of the noise, but not sure I (with my skill level) could have reduced it by much more. But, that's what this project is all about, right? Practice (for me anyways)!

PS. I really should tape the schedule up in a better way, I was just in a hurry to tape it up and get the photo taken :) The ugly tape isn't doing my chevron design any justice.

frosted

2012-01-22T16:51:00.001-06:00

My co-worker, Shelly, of Frosted, makes amazing cakes and cupcakes. She asked that I take a few photos of her Valentine's cupcakes she makes, and well, you know the drill, I need the practice :) Anne was over as well to help and we will admit we struggled with the lighting this afternoon but I think we managed some really nice shots for Shelly! Check out her Frosted facebook page to see more of her amazing work (and to place an order?) :)

this one was fun :)

kiddos of movie night photo shoot

2012-01-21T15:36:00.000-06:00

This morning I had my movie night girls (Aleta, Angie and Sarah) bring their kids over to my house for a little Valentine's Day photo shoot. I love to send out Valentine's Day photo cards and obviously at the same time, want to practice, practice, practice my photography skills. You can say with 4 sets of kids it was a little crazy, but I'm really happy with how some of the shots turned out! Even in this one session, I learned so much. Mostly since it was my first semi-real 'session' so the pressure of getting children to cooperate, making sure to adjust with the lighting as time went by, trying not to feel rushed, etc. was a lot, but good to experience. Unfortunately, I didn't really get shots of my own kids, but that's okay, I can try them again tomorrow :) Overall, I so enjoyed doing it and it makes me eager to continue learning!

(oh and warning, picture overload, but was hard to narrow down from over 800, ha)

why does my child never cooperate?

miss kate

miss gemma

miss adelyn

mister miles

as much as I love chevron, it was a little too busy here

have no fear, my love for chevron comes right back in this photo :)

And yes, I realize there are no pictures of Grayson. I took a few of him before the girls all arrived but he was tired and then napped for most of the time everyone was over. Like I said, I'll get them tomorrow :) And, just looking at these photos makes me want to do it all over again but take more time and be more thoughtful! Thanks, ladies, for letting me practice on your children. I'm certain I'll be doing it again :)

snow!

2012-01-21T06:02:00.000-06:00

We finally got snow! Now, I am not complaining about the weather we've had this winter. 50's? Unreal. There have been days I have been THIS close to busting about the flip flops, this close, but it just seems so wrong in so many ways in December and January in Minnesota. However, I wasn't too bummed to see some snow coverage. It's so ugly in winter and a coat of white just makes everything nice :) Plus, gave our little helper something to do. Although I'm not sure we needed to shovel our yard or landscaping...

Yes, I tucked his pants into his socks. Left his boots as school but thank goodness for his work boots!

And yes, he's wearing his pjs (it was pj day at school).

I basically had to force him to come inside, he's been such a great helper lately. Always asking if there is a job he can do for me, etc. It's hard sometimes, because I know I'll be much faster or efficient if I just do whatever it is myself, but definitely can't turn him down when he's so eager and willing to help! (thanks to Golden Heart, I'm positive he gets this from them!)

my first garden

2012-01-20T06:10:00.000-06:00

I admire those that have gardens. I will be the first to admit, I'm not great at eating my vegetables. Like, at all. But I always think if I had a garden, I would. Then when Bryan tells me I can't and that I'd never take care of it, I think of joining/purchasing (whatever you call it) one of those share things that you can pick up your package of produce from the farmers market each week. But, never have.

Enter Pinterest. And this pin, where I discovered I could grow my own never-ending supply of green onions. And I love me some green onions.

So, in case you're like me and had no idea this was possible, next time you buy green onions, instead of throwing the white part away just put it in a class of water. NO LIE, there was new growth within HOURS. So rewarding, ha.

Aren't they cute? This is about 4 days worth of growth.

And, this might be as big of a garden that I'll ever have :)

sick.

2012-01-19T09:27:00.000-06:00

Grayson was sent home on Tuesday from school with a fever. 11 out of 14 kids, including Grayson, were sick that day. Normally with a fever I'd just take him home, give him some tylenol or ibuprofen, and wait for the fever to go away. With strep, RSV and ear infections (those aren't contagious are they?) in his room, I figured I should probably just take him in.

Now Care had an hour wait so they kindly found me a family doctor to see which ended up taking forever anyways, but after 2.5 hours or so, he was diagnosed with RSV. Which, essentially sounds like a 'super cold'. No antibiotics or medication to give him, just have to wait it out.

Yesterday Grandma Cheryl was kind enough to stay home with him during most of the day and he seemed okay, needed cuddle time, but only needed ibuprofen once. Thought for sure he could return to daycare today.

Last night. Not so good. Horribly congested, coughing like crazy, hot, cold, you name it. I hate seeing my baby sick. And then to top it off, Bryan caught something so he's not much help today and staying home sick himself.

So, here's to hoping this passes quickly and that Connor and I stay healthy! We want our chill, happy little baby back.

Being elevated helps and he seems to be really comfortable on recliners (don't worry, I have the foot stand out, and remember the child barely moves, very low risk of falling :))

bribery

2012-01-16T05:58:00.000-06:00

We use bribery quite a bit around here, I'm sure it's not the best parenting technique (similar to parenting via ipad), but, obviously it works (for the most part). I wanted to get a nice picture of the boys in their DMI shirts for Bryan and knew this cool backhoe replica we have would work to get Connor's attention. Unfortunately Grayson was beyond tired, so my grand vision didn't turn out, but at least I got a few fun ones of Connor.

this is the best 'smile at the camera' shot I got, thankfully his nose was booger-less

grayson: ten months

2012-01-15T17:19:00.001-06:00

Well, our little man is ten months old today. NEARLY A YEAR OLD! Geesh. He is seriously such a joy in our lives, always cracks a smile, sometimes a little bashful and just in the past few weeks has been laughing more and more. So different in comparison to Connor, that boy laughed ALL the time. (one of my favorite videos of Connor laughing, click here)

So, what's #2 up to?

-as I mentioned, smiles all the time
-still not crawling, but trying, very, very hard, can't imagine it's TOO much longer before he's mobile
-sleeping great, knock on wood, anywhere from 7:30-8:30pm to 5:30-7am or so. Just in case you didn't hear it, knocking on wood again to be sure.
-approximately 200 bags of breast milk left, should be able to make it a year
-eats about anything and would prefer to eat all table food if we'd let him, but please see next item.
-still only two teeth, and I don't see any that appear to be coming anytime soon
-still issues with constipation, appointment with GI specialist is the 25th
-rolling, spinning and scooting around
-will kind of pull himself up onto your leg or something low, but not really great at this
-loves watching his brother play
-gets a little cranky if everyone leaves the room and he's alone (okay a little more than cranky, but step back in the room and all is well again)
-on occasion has a little bit of mommy-separation anxiety, which most of the time, I adore
-seems to love daycare, only one morning has he been sad to see me go
-talking all the time, says 'ma-ma' a lot, but I'm sure it has zero reference to me
-likes his nuk, especially when he's tired, but really could be without it the rest of the time (another stark difference to his brother)

And I'll leave you with a picture, our little man at exactly 10 months. Have a great week!

(and if those of you who know me and know my house are confused where I took this photo, I spent $25 at Menards and bought a carton of laminate flooring and a section of white trim, nice, eh? I need to spend some time getting the trim to sit nicer but with incredibly low effort, I'm pretty happy with it)

project 52 | week 1: necessity

2012-01-15T17:12:00.002-06:00

The first challenge of Project 52: necessity.

Many things went through my mind, if it was a year ago, it would have been Connor's nuk and blankie, now he's really not into those things (for sure the nuk, blankie is here and there). Grayson isn't really attached to anything yet and then I was thinking of things we couldn't physically live without, but I couldn't think of any great photo to take involving those. So I went nearly opposite, taking a picture of something I very much could live without, but...they sure seem like necessities :)

Challenge: Necessity
Subject: Technology (ie cell phone, computer, internet)
Skill: Depth of Field

I often say, "I couldn't live without the internet", and although that's far from the truth, I sure spend a lot of time on it, not only personally but professionally as well. Working for an ecommerce company, internet is, well, I'd say pretty critical. I absolutely am guilty of checking my phone in the middle of the night if I wake up for whatever reason, or before even swinging my legs out of bed, checking my email. It's amazing how different a world our children are growing up in, Connor is a master of the iPad and we are often very thankful for our Netflix app and the others he enjoys. (ie he's driving us crazy and just need to distract him, you know, parenting via iPad, I'm sure there are books on it).

To the actual photo, I took this opportunity to work on my depth of field. I think I ended up with not enough, since technically the iMac and the phone were both subjects of my photo, but it was fun to play around and explore what I'm learning at class. I welcome any and all critique!

changes

2012-01-14T16:36:00.000-06:00

We've done some spur of the moment furniture shopping and rearranging in our house over the past few weeks and pretty sure both Bryan and I will tell you we are d.o.n.e. assembling furniture for at least the rest of 2012. Maybe even through 2013. However, we're really liking how everything has turned out. I don't have any pictures of the new office furniture set, I'll update this post when I get some, struggling with the lighting. Thanks to Rachel for helping assembling those pieces!

New dining room table from Sam's Club. I only have 6 of the chairs showing, but it came with 8. Love the counter height and square shape!

(table was easy to assemble, just had to add the legs...chairs were a bit of a pain)

This isn't new, just in a new location. The new office furniture went into the actual office downstairs and then part of the Ikea set came up to our master bedroom (treadmill moved to the basement). I actually LOVE having the computer in our room. Since the boys (Bryan included, ha) go to bed 8, 830ish, which is then the start of 'my' time, I didn't like being downstairs away from everyone, so now I at least feel I am 'with' my family while spending hours on Pinterest :) Win/win for all!

Need to figure out some other cute decor to go on/around the desk/shelves yet, it's a bit boring.

Project 52

2012-01-12T22:39:00.002-06:00

Photography is something that has really started to interest me of late. I got a new fancy camera and have now taken two classes at National Camera Exchange with my friend, Anne, and am really eager to continue to learn. I know I have a long ways to go before I could walk into a situation and perfectly set my shutter speed, aperture and ISO to get the perfectly exposed shot but it's still really fun to learn :)

So, today when I saw my old high school classmate post a photography challenge on her blog, I thought, why not. (well at first I thought, fun, but I'm not creative enough, but then she talked me into it). The challenge is to take one photo a week for 52 weeks with the subject matter each week inspired by a random word generator. I clicked on the link and it returned 'stable'. My first thought? Table legs (more than likely because I just assembled a table). They're stable, right? Who wants to see a photo of table legs? BUT, this will also force me to get out and practice what I'm learning in my class. So again, why not? :)

The first week's challenge is 'necessity'. I have a few ideas that came to mind right away so now I just need to go get the shot.

Hopefully I'll spare you a bunch of shots of table legs each week, but I can't make any promises. Maybe they really inspire me :)

Here's to Project 52! Want to join in? Head on over to Marta's blog (Something Good in my blogroll) and get all the details.

Grayson: Official Nine Month Stats

2012-01-05T21:15:00.000-06:00

I took Grayson in for his official 9 month appointment on Tuesday, although it was a few weeks late and he's closer to 10 months. Oh well. Shoot, reminds me I should schedule his one year appointment...

Onto the stats.

Height: 27 3/4 inches - 18th percentile (eek!)
Weight: 22 lbs, 4 oz - 65th percentile
Head Circumference: 18 1/4" - 70th percentile

Both height and weight numbers surprised me. I didn't think he was tall, but I didn't think he was THAT short. And, I was expecting him to be in the 90+ percentile for weight. For the most part, happy, healthy, baby boy. Two concerns.

1. Very dry skin, borderline eczema, borderline need for steroid prescriptions. We're going to try very hard to use very, very thick lotions and creams and she also prescribed a non-steroid oil to try as well. Doesn't seem to bother him? But can't feel good.

2. We are still having issues with his BMs. They occur once every 6-8 days and take about 15-20 minutes of me working with him (read: forcing his legs onto his chest, forcing him to push, he's screaming so bad he's red in the face) to get it out, and then it's solid, formed, hard, and huge. I have a picture but I'll certainly spare you all. (sorry there is SO much poop talk on this blog, maybe I should rename our blog...KIDDING) I asked to be referred to a GI specialist and we have an appointment on January 25th. I am praying every night that he doesn't have Hirschprungs (what Connor was diagnosed with at birth). The symptoms, or so I've read, include lethargic and not wanting to eat, neither of which we see, but obviously the other main symptoms are constipation and gas, both of which he has, and I would say severe constipation. We are going to start (well, started last night) trying to feed him a lot of foods that have natural fibers (we've been pumping juices, including prune juice, the last few months with no success or change) like raspberries, blueberries, sweet corn, etc. Hopefully this will start to make a difference, but at least we have the appointment lined up. I think part of me is just thinking, no way could he have it, no way, but, I'm also just trying to prepare myself that he very well could.

You might be asking if this is genetic and to be honest I'm not sure the doctors are entirely sure. When we were at Children's with Connor they said there was no official genetic link but I've since read that I had a 7-12% chance of having another child with the disease and the disease occurs more often in boys. They can't diagnose it without doing a rectal biopsy (requires being put under anesthesia) and so I doubt we'll know anything final on the 25th but hopefully will have a plan or an appointment for the biopsy.

Hopefully, I'm worrying for nothing :)

In much happier news, he is semi-mobile :) Consistently rolling both back to front and front to back, gets up essentially on his hands and knees, just has one leg that is still a little stuck under his body. Scooting a little backwards, spinning, etc., so I don't think it'll be THAT much longer before he's officially on the move, but it does take this little man quite awhile to do most things :)

Still only two teeth, really wish he would pop a few more through so he could chew the food better he so desperately wants to eat.

Knock on wood, sleeping really well for us. Most nights, entirely through the night but definitely more of an earlier riser than Connor ever was, so is up generally between 6-630. Connor tells me every night 'Mom, don't wake me up in the morning, I'll get up when I'm ready'. I have no idea where he gets this from... ... ...

Sorry no pictures, haven't really had the camera out lately! Soon, I'll have to have a little Valentine's Day Photo Card shoot, I'm sure :)

first sleepover

2012-01-03T05:47:00.000-06:00

We had Ashlyn over the other night for Connor's first sleepover at our house. They've both spent the night at my parents' house together before, but never at our house. It wasn't probably the best night to pick, it was after Christmas at my parents so it was pretty late when we got home and Ashlyn was going to her other Grandma's in the morning, but, it was still fun :) We bought up a mattress from the basement to Connor's room so they could sleep together, had blueberry waffles for breakfast and had lots of fun with their new suitcases they got from G&G Loula. They traveled to Florida, Hawaii and many giant waterparks via planes, trains and even a few long walks. :)

In the car on our way home

Love his new spidey pjs

Taking a break in their travels to show off their new suitcases.

Can't wait to do it again when we have more time!

Loula Christmas

2012-01-02T10:42:00.001-06:00

A few shots from when we celebrated Christmas at my parent's house. So fun to see the kids playing together!

being silly

attempt at all four kids

Fashingbauer Christmas 2011

2012-01-02T08:44:00.000-06:00

On Christmas day we went to my Grandma's house in the cities to celebrate with my mom's side of the family, the Fashingbauers.

Loula/Bode - pretty good picture aside from Grayson :)

about sums up how our attempt at family photos turned out

cousins + my adorable Grandma!

Altho it appears this would be really annoying...it was actually really cute :)

me + my boys + my Grandma

Thank you, Mary, for the pictures!

Santa

2012-01-01T22:57:00.000-06:00

Connor had a countdown going for how many days it was until Santa came. Every day we would tell him and he would get sad, saying that was too many, but was so excited to finally get everything ready for Santa on Christmas Eve. Thank goodness Grandma Cheryl had leftover cookies for us to leave out for Santa otherwise he was maybe going to get a ham sandwich. We left him four cookies and a cup of hot chocolate. In the morning Connor quickly ran over to the plate and gasped at what appeared to only be traces of one cookie left and the hot chocolate was all gone. Since we're not sure Santa could actually fit through our fireplace, we found the front door was unlocked, so either he came through the front door or he sent his much smaller elves through the fireplace. Either way, Connor got EXACTLY what he wanted :) A snow plow truck.

ready!

pure. joy.

Grayson watching the action.

There wasn't any time to turn on any of the lights and I didn't want to miss any shots, so, for that we have to settle for poorly lit photos :)

Christmas Eve

2012-01-01T07:54:00.000-06:00

We spend Christmas Eve 'evening' with Bryan's family every year. We start the evening out by attending the children's program at Bryan's parents' church (which is always adorable and entertaining!) and then head back to their house for supper and of course, presents :) The boys did great and we had a wonderful time!

Ha, the dump truck.

Remember this post?

Grayson just got his first crash a little earlier in life...no biggie, he shook it off. Ha.

a side dumper!

Playing with his new favorite toy, the side dump.

Santa 2011

2011-12-23T14:07:00.000-06:00

So I really thought this would go better this year. Connor is very into and aware of Santa, although we have those precious moments when he 'hates Santa' or 'doesn't like Santa', those are fun, but overall we've been able to play the card that Santa's watching pretty well. We've talked about sitting on his lap, etc. Last night Connor was the most well behaved boy I have ever seen, it was so sweet. I would ask him to get Grayson's nuk, 'Sure mom, no problem'. One time he even caught me not saying please and he paused, looked at me and said, 'did you say please?' Love it.

But, as you can see, it didn't go well. Although just with school and class pictures, I think they're more fun when they're not 'perfect'.

I really thought Grayson would do fine, I forgot to do the whole 'place your child on the lap while still facing you', not sure that would have helped any.

Grayson is wearing the same shirt Connor wore for his first Santa visit. Here's a recap of Connor's first three visits.

a side by side comparison

Connor didn't want to go near Santa with a ten foot pole. He did manage to say what he wanted (a snow plow truck), but he was clinging to me for his life so we're not sure if Santa heard it or not...but I'm sure if Connor behaves the rest of the weekend we'll be sure to give Santa a call. Ha.

On the way to the car (Connor back to his bubbly self), Connor mentioned that he's sure Santa heard what he wanted and that since Grayson cried, Santa is only going to be bringing him a nuk.

I would love to promise this is the last post with Connor wearing this shirt, but I make no guarantees.

2011 Class Pictures

2011-12-22T05:07:00.000-06:00

Daycare took their annual class photos back in October (or was it November?) and the print orders came in this week.

Connor and his 'snuffie' friends

typical 'when is this going to be over' expression

(middle row, far right)

Grayson and his 'tigger' friends

This picture makes me look like a liar when I say Grayson doesn't move. I mean really, the kid especially wasn't moving back when this photo was taken and he's the one that appears like he needs to be restrained. Go figure.

(front row, 2nd from right)

Wouldn't be a 'good' school picture if they were perfect, right?

Muesing Christmas 2011

2011-12-21T05:34:00.000-06:00

The annual Muesing (Bryan's mom's side) Christmas was this past Sunday night at Whiskey River in St. Peter. It's a good, semi-central location for all and it's always a good time.

Grayson and April

Evan and Connor played so great together, although we banished them out of the little party room as they were doing what boys do best, running around and making truck and train noises. I know, I know, control the children.

John and Aaron

the 'kids'

Tough lighting so why not play with editing it a bit :)

the 'older' kids :)

Until next year!

vikings game

2011-12-20T05:23:00.000-06:00

Somewhat spur of the moment, Connor got to go to his first Vikings game on Sunday. He did so well and seemed to have fun even though it was right over nap time. He was about done halfway through the third quarter or so, but I think the entire crowd was by that point so not sure I blame him.

After the game we had some time to kill so we stopped at the Mall of America to hit a few rides. Although parking nearly caused a divorce, we eventually found a spot and had about an hour to spend on the rides. Connor definitely enjoyed himself.

Don't let this ride fool you, it looks like the tiniest little track and only has about 6 cars, but it really whips you around the corners.

We had a great day, even more fun that it wasn't necessarily planned!

feeding cattle

2011-12-19T05:04:00.000-06:00

Connor and Bryan went on a little adventure this past weekend with my dad which included making a pit stop to feed some cattle. He must have done well, Grandpa Tim said he earned an entire dollar!

grayson: nine months

2011-12-18T05:43:00.000-06:00

I'm a few days late with this post and also had plans to attempt a little mini photo shoot to go with it, but didn't get to it. Maybe we'll try for month 10.

What's Grayson up to these days? He's still not crawling. Or rolling. Although, he is leaning VERY far, actually a little too far for my liking because as he's learning to reach farther and farther, this is causing him to fall over. Then, since I mentioned he can't crawl or roll, he's stuck, and requires our assistance to sit him up again. I much prefer the purely stationery little boy who didn't move. Kidding, it's fun to see him moving up in the mobility department. Slowly but surely.

However, his new view down on the ground has led to amazing discoveries such as the door stop. Fascinating.

He doesn't sleep super awesome. Most nights, he's up around 12-1 and then again at 5. I'm getting pretty close to letting him cry it out (deja vu, I wonder how many monthly posts in a row I've said that now, ha), but just don't have the heart yet. He typically eats a few ounces and is right back to sleep.

He doesn't poop. Seriously what is it with me and my children?! He'll go 6-7 days and then will pass something bigger than what you and I are probably used to. I'm not kidding. I have a picture on my phone if you're interested. (again not kidding, plan on showing the pediatrician next time we go in).

Speaking of pediatricians, I'm a horrible mom and always forget to book well baby appointments in advance, so his official nine month stats won't come until he's about 10 months. Oops.

Prefers to eat table food over baby food, always. He still eats his cereal (that I mix with pear baby food and prune juice to try and keep things moving, which clearly isn't working) well, but hates eating veggies or the little 'meals' of baby food. But give this kid some banana bread, bites of chicken, green beans, so far, and he'll try it.

Thinks the sippy cup is hilarious. Loves to have us help him use it, but then loves to blow raspberries with a mouth full of water. Enough said.

Mostly wearing 18 month clothes.

Is my snuggler. I.Love.This. We have a favorite position while sitting in the rocker chair in the living room and he just nestles right in, regardless of his mood. Okay, if he's uber pissed it maybe doesn't work, but most of the time, I get some good quality snuggle time.

Loves daycare, or at least it seems like it when I drop him off and he's flashing his two-tooth grin and reaching for his teachers. They also love him, I think, other than the pooping issue, hard not to love a baby that doesn't move I would imagine. Although that causes issues in the self-defense department, hence the gash on his cheek from a 'friend' at school.

Unofficial weight this morning was 23.6 pounds.

Still our happy little guy that we love to pieces. Happy nine months, Grayson!

2011 Christmas Card

2011-12-17T15:15:00.000-06:00

I love Christmas card season. Cliche, but seriously, how can you not love checking the mail to see who sent you a card that day? I love it. Love seeing the pictures, reading the letters. Admittedly, I might be a little more of a nut than others since my day job consists of working with them all.year.long at Pear Tree Greetings (yes, just in case some of you didn't know, that's where I work!), but it has yet to lessen my excitement every November/December when the cards start rolling in. The only thing working there does is put a tiny little bit of extra pressure on me (okay maybe I just put this on myself) to make our cards great. This year I actually went with this Save the Date Card and turned it into a Christmas Card. Huge thanks again to Gina Zeidler for the great photography!

I also love displaying all of the cards we get. Much to the annoyance of Bryan, they stay up until probably February, maybe even March. I guess he's lucky we have a March baby now because I'll probably make sure they are taken down in time for Grayson's birthday party each year. And no, my camera lens isn't dirty, just playing with a new filter app on my phone :)

Disclaimer: In no way do I think I created THE card of ALL cards, ha. I'm happy with how they turned out, yes, but it's probably a similar thing to how we all think own children are the most adorable and everyone else's are just so-so. You know it's true, ha.

Here's to another few weeks of getting the mail with a little extra pep in your step to see what's there!

early Christmas gifts

2011-12-11T16:49:00.001-06:00

Yesterday after Connor's program at church Grandma and Grandpa Bode gave the boys a little early Christmas gift. Surprisingly, the packages made it intact through the entire car ride home and Connor had some things to do at home first before he could open them (he gladly offered to open Grayson's as well, how kind). Then, he even waited for me to get my camera.

I do believe this is the first time I've ever dressed them in matching shirts other than their adorable Halloween pjs. I at least tried to change it up a bit with the undershirts and pants selections. :)

Connor excited for his Charlie Brown trilogy and Grayson still attacking the socks.

What? These are just socks? (kidding :))

hey, nice shirt.

yeah, you too.

Thank you, Grandma and Grandpa Bode!

Christmas Programs 2011

2011-12-11T12:42:00.001-06:00

Connor had two Christmas programs this year, one for his daycare and one for Sunday school. We never once were under the illusion that he'd be the kid singing, doing all the moves, loving every second of it, rather we kind of went into them thinking they'd be a success if he stood there the entire time and didn't come running or crying for us right away. He surprised us on a few things :)

I have video of both performances and at some point I'll try to put a little edited video together.

shy, of course, but smiling.

our first mistake may have been to sit in the front row

you can see his best buds here, lucas in the back left corner and mason, right behind Connor

He's singing! He actually sang!

still happy...still singing...

the singing continues...

and then it went downhill

and he got his bell taken away

got his bell back, but definitely all hope for participation was a lost cause at this point

and the only kid to be sitting during the last song. ha.

The kids had two performances that day and from what I heard from Lucas' mom, Connor didn't sing right away but sang the rest of the program. So I might just steal her video :)

Now onto his Sunday School program. I would have broken this into two posts, but he was already wearing the same outfit, ha.

We didn't sit in the front row this time, but he saw us on his walk in and had the BIGGEST smiles on. It was so adorable. Bryan and I were there, Uncle Aaron and then Grandma and Grandpa Bode (Grayson too, of course).

He was smiling at us the entire time. Singing? Not a word, ha, but smiling.

What more can we ask for?

The whole group. I should have tried to stand up a bit more for this shot so it wasn't perfectly framed by this probably very sweet older couple, and I thought about cropping it, but then the clouds of white in each corner would have maybe been confusing. Ha.

So, I will mark this as a successful first year of Christmas programs for Connor!

I'm sure he's glad to be done with them for an entire year :)

'tis the season

2011-12-04T17:56:00.001-06:00

Tree has been up since the day after Thanksgiving, but it was ornament-less until today.

We had a very much needed low-key weekend. I'm on a 'December De-Clutter' (not sure if I made that up or stole it from somewhere) kick. Cleaning out things and organizing, one thing at a time. This weekend was the office. Cleaned out the closet, my desk and some of the shelves. I am seriously considering having an early spring garage sale and selling A LOT of my scrapbooking stuff (gasp!). I have so so so much and although I'm not prepared to fully give up the hobby, there are tools and techniques I no longer do or don't spend the time to do, and therefore, I should just get rid of it. It's taking up far too much space in my house.

This week will consist of volleyball, some more de-cluttering hopefully and I should really start Christmas shopping. I am trying to avoid going to the stores, just the thought of wading through the masses makes me cringe, so hopefully I can find everything online.

And since I really have nothing exciting to blog about, I'll stop here :)

Here's to a merry and bright December!

photo dump

2011-11-29T21:06:00.001-06:00

Well hello, blog friends. I have had very little to blog about lately and figured I'd just share a few photos from the past few weeks. The funny thing is, I started drafting a post last week about being in a 'groove'. For a few weeks there I was rocking laundry, cooking dinner, keeping the house clean, daily. (many of you I know are already supermoms and superwives, I am not, Bryan and my kids would quickly tell you :), so this was big for me!) It felt great, really great. But, ha, the groove is no longer. Laundry is 2 loads behind and the mountain to fold and put away is now so big I just shut my eyes as I walk past the laundry room so I pretend it doesn't exist. My dishwasher loads are so full I loathe unloading it. My kitchen counters are cluttered. So. No groove post this week, ha. Maybe next week I'll find it again!

I'll try and start taking pictures or doing things with the kids that are blogworthy!

Was trying to find a pic of Connor in this great $3 garage sale snowsuit, but I couldn't find one quickly. I think there is a slight resemblance. Also for the record, I've moved him out of his car seat carrier and into a big kid car seat. He digs it, can see Connor much easier.

Loves his bath time.

We celebrated my niece Kaelyn's 1st birthday!

G-man and Grandma Ruth

Krystal and Kaelyn at her birthday party

sunny morning bathtime

and that's all I have :)

grayson: eight months

2011-11-15T06:00:00.000-06:00

Well, to be honest, nothing much new around here in G-man's world. Although he still doesn't 'move', he's getting more 'active' in his exersaucer. Amazing, right? :) For how much crap I give him, it's seriously sooo nice that he's not mobile, ha. I painted my entire room while he sat on the bed (let's just pretend that's not hazardous, I had the windows open at least) and didn't move. If he fell over, no big deal, just babbled away and took in the scenery from his new position. So, we're really not complaining. He is a decent sleeper still, will give us full nights mixed in with up-once-nights. Not complaining there, either. We're probably ready for the 'ol 'cry it out' method, but I don't mind cuddling with him for 10 minutes in the middle of the night. Two teeth. Back to having BM's every 4-6 days which is really frustrating (for all of us) and when it happens...you feel horrible for the little man. So, we continue to pump juices and fruits into him, hoping that will help. I think three days a week his sheet from school says 'he was so content doing [insert baby activity here]'. Loves watching his brother however is figuring out he does NOT like it when Connor steals a toy away from him [insert terribly dramatic, no sound because he's crying so hard, here]. Drinking 4-5 six ounce bottles a day. Milk supply just went under the 400 bag mark. I think he thinks he's ready for steak and potatoes, because he hates eating veggies for me, however he loves his oatmeal, so I just let daycare force down the veggies ;) And I would try giving him table foods, if he didn't choke on puffs. Ha. (I am horrible) No, I'm joking. He loves his puffs. He just needs help getting them into his mouth. No idea how much he weighs, I just know that I'm ready to move him to a regular car seat and ditch the infant carrier.

So, that about sums up our little (big) man! We love him to pieces.

school pictures

2011-11-11T18:25:00.001-06:00

Annual school photos. Enough said :)

(scanned in from originals, hence the nice line right down the middle of Connor's face)

There is a shot of them together, but I had that taken on the 'fall' background and I'm requesting they crop out the creepy scarecrow in the background, so once I get that back I'll be sure to post.

family photos sneak peek

2011-11-11T05:30:00.000-06:00

The other weekend we had our family photos taken by Gina of Gina Zeidler Photography. I've said it before, but she does such an amazing job and altho I stress out every year (what to wear, will the boys cooperate (Bryan included, ha), what if someone doesn't nap that day, etc.), she makes it so stress-free and fun for the session. I've only seen the few below and a family one that I'll keep secret in case it makes the 'ol Christmas Card! Can't wait to see the rest!

It's pretty safe to say there won't be a great picture of the two boys together (smiling). This was at the end of our session and Connor wanted nothing to do with posing for more photos. He was pushing Grayson over, Grayson was getting a little crabby and yeah. Oh well, this one is still cute ;)

our little ham

Thanks also to my friend, Rachel, who joined us for our session to help keep the boys entertained and smiling. Connor was in HEAVEN with the goodie bag Rachel brought. He still talks about 'that green bag Rachel gave me with lots of cars and trucks and candy'.

And no guarantee that some of these photos won't make our cards, of course :) (as if any of you are too concerned)

girls weekend

2011-11-10T11:33:00.001-06:00

Last weekend five of my college girlfriends came down/over for a low key, relaxing get together. We had no serious plans other than to just catch up, laugh, drink a little wine (beer was accepted as well) and we had the babies, so couldn't do anything too crazy anyways :) Always love our time spent together!

just to clarify, his shirt says 'Certified HUNK'...not CHUNK. Ha.

Ashlynn and Erin

Bibs and I

Steph and Rach

taking the plasma car for a spin

which turned into an activity for all to try

Looking forward to our next get together :)

brotherly love

2011-11-07T20:53:00.001-06:00

love these boys.

Halloween 2011

2011-11-04T05:25:00.000-05:00

As tradition has it, Krystal and the kids and our parents come over to celebrate, hand out candy, let the kiddos play and just hang out. This year was the first year actually taking Connor and Ashlyn trick-or-treating, and I had some reservations on how Connor would do. As he tends to get a little shy, I was imagining having to go up to the door with him, have him standing behind me, refusing to say "trick-or-treat", etc., and thinking it could be a really short trip around the neighborhood. However...he definitely proved me wrong! It was such a fun night.

my little pigskin

First house, neighbor Dave, kids went right up on their own and officially trick-or-treated for the first time! It was pretty adorable, they're growing up too fast.

They thought it was the best thing EVER. Running house to house yelling 'this is SOOO fun' or 'giddyup cowboy!' (no idea why the cowboy references were coming out)

The kids got pretty tired eventually, when Krystal and I offered to carry their candy buckets we were surprised at how heavy they actually were! No wonder they were beat. Krystal and I had a good time reminiscing our own trick-or-treating adventures, especially considering it was the 20 year reunion of the giant snowstorm. While we were out with the kids, my dad told Bryan that he apparently drove around Nicollet for nearly two hours looking for me and my friend that year. Hilarious (probably not at the time).

So, it was a pretty successful Halloween. The fact that I even got Connor to wear a costume I think is amazing. We had 76 kids come to our house which was a record for us. We have two new homes going up in our cul-de-sac so we'll be looking to beat that record next year. If I was a kid out there, I'd probably skip our street, too :) The only downer, I didn't get any decorations or cat eyes up. I need to figure out a new spot for the cat eyes as I didn't think Grayson would appreciate them too much in his room. There's always next year :)

teeth!

2011-11-03T14:40:00.000-05:00

Grayson has been working on teeth for awhile now and you can finally really see them coming in. I swear it's been a month since I could first start to feel the top of it on his gums, but that just makes sense considering the pace he's doing everything else at :) (ie....he still doesn't roll)

(sorry two close up pics of Grayson in a row, playing with my new camera and lens that I have no idea how to operate :))

home. sick.

2011-11-02T15:34:00.001-05:00

Grayson has been up and down with sickness the past week or so. Constant runny nose and congestion, and you can imagine how much he loves the booger sucker thing (I'm sure there is a much better name for that, but why beat around the bush). Last Thursday he got sent home from school for throwing up, I go to pick him up and he's super happy and bubbly, but he still threw up twice within an hour of being home. Thankfully, instantly returned to smiley happy self. He was just fine over the weekend and through yesterday. This morning, he was a little cranky at me, but I was just thinking it was because I added four ounces of water to what was left of his bottle (so like one ounce of milk, ha) and he wasn't really digging that. Connor went up to him and goes "don't worry buddy, your teachers will get you a nice warm bottle of milk with no water in it."

But, it must not have been the watered down milk, as he was sent home a little after 1pm today with a fever of 101.2. He also puked in his car seat as soon as I got him into the house. Lots of naps and snuggle time in store for us tonight, which I'm okay with!

happy halloween

2011-10-31T06:55:00.000-05:00

Happy Halloween from the batty Bode boys!

weekend recap

2011-10-30T15:28:00.000-05:00

Connor is pretty lucky that Grayson still doesn't move, because pretty soon (well, I shouldn't assume with 'pretty soon' more like 'eventually') Grayson will be able to move and defend himself. Although, activities like the below don't seem to bother him too much :)

We are having a nice weekend. Friday night we went up to my Aunt Mary and Uncle Al's house in Stillwater for the evening, family photos with the amazing Gina Ziedler (I'm sure she will once more manage to make us look good and make it appear that the boys were cooperating...and if for some reason we don't look good, or it's obvious the boys weren't cooperating, well, that would be the truth then and not Gina's fault :)) yesterday afternoon, thanks to Rachel for swinging by our photo session with oodles of bribery for Connor and now onto a fairly lazy Sunday (which involves stacking tons of toys on and around Grayson apparently) of church, watching football, naps and playing with my new camera :)

Halloween Party

2011-10-27T19:57:00.000-05:00

We had Connor and Grayson's Halloween Party at school tonight. Connor typically is VERY anti-costume. Hates wearing anything that we try and force upon him. So this year, I tried to plan it safe. I found a little brown onesie with the white stitching to be a football for Grayson and figured I could just throw a jersey on Connor and call it good. While shopping yesterday I found a little set that included pants, shirt and helmet. Thought, why not give it a try. Connor LOVED it. Barely took it off last night. I also had picked up a pair of spikes at a garage sale last year and although they were far too big, he thought it was great. I was pretty pumped :)

Anxiously awaiting the party.

And for the record, I am fully aware the Vikings are horrible. But, it felt a little wrong buying some other team.

My little football :)

fascinated with Connor's helmet

the only pic of the two of them.

hopefully we get a better one Monday night before or after trick or treating

and the BEST part of the night, Connor's best buddy Mason was also a football player so we had to get a picture!

duluth

2011-10-12T20:33:00.000-05:00

Bryan and I decided to do a little spur of the moment trip to Duluth this past weekend. We quickly learned that it would have been a good thing to plan much farther in advance, mostly to get a decent hotel room, especially if we wanted to stay where all of the action was. But, we found a room at the Edgewater Hotel & Waterpark, with really no intention of going to the water park (which we never did), and it worked out great. Was right on the lake and we had a lake view out of our room, was a few miles from Canal Park, but it was just fine. The water park looked pretty cool if anyone is interested. So, we left Friday at about noon, with an unexpected quick trip to urgent care for Grayson and a potential case of pink eye, which was confirmed, but armed with eye drops we were on our way. The boys did fantastic in the car on the way there and back. We arrived about 5:30 and had made reservations at Grandma's Saloon on our way up for supper.

We explored Canal Park while waiting for our reservations and were in love with the scenery. The fall colors were still beautiful (we were a little worried we'd miss it) and since I hadn't been to Duluth since I was very young, it was neat to see the sights! Dinner at Grandma's was excellent and then we waited around for a ship to pass through the bridge, which Connor was in awe over the size of the ship and how the bridge could lift.

The next morning we had lined up a boat cruise of the harbor on the Vista Fleet. We are fully aware that we were the cliche tourists, but we're fine with that. Connor did fairly decent on the cruise, kind of a lot to ask of a busy three year old to sit still for two hours, but it was good and the history was interesting, however the jokes were a little much :)

(photo credit: connor)

Our first attempt at a family photo on the trip, I was a little worried this was telling of how the rest of the trip would go.

After the boat cruise we headed north along the Scenic North Shore Drive to see Split Rock Lighthouse and Gooseberry Falls. The lighthouse was Bryan's favorite part of the weekend, we did the tour, watched the movie and again the history was so interesting. I loved the scenery.

(photo credit: connor...ha, I was just impressed it was fairly in focus?)

exploring Gooseberry Falls

Other than Grayson looking crazy I am happy with how this one turned out!

Connor mad I took the camera away from him.

So we let him take a few of us...

me and my boys, love them

bryan and connor exploring

That night we ate at Little Angie's Cantina and Grill which was also great. We didn't hang around to see a ship as I think we were all pretty exhausted :)

Sunday morning we decided to hit up the Lake Superior Zoo before heading home. The scenery at the zoo was BEAUTIFUL. The colors were amazing, the animals were pretty good, too :)

Connor insisted on being our tour guide at the zoo.

our horrible attempt at a self-timer shot

We had a great time and look forward to going back again someday! (maybe next time without kids, however pleased we were with how it went this time around, it would be a great 'date weekend' :))

jackpot (at the library)

2011-10-03T19:47:00.000-05:00

Connor and I made our first visit to the North Mankato library tonight and I would call it a success! I rarely look at the inserts in our monthly water bill (or I think that's where the sheet came from) but last week I caught 'preschool story time' every Monday night in October. Feeling guilty that I have yet to bring Connor to the library I thought it was a good time to start. He didn't really want to go, I think he was tired from school, but I told him if he didn't like it, we could come home. He sat very well for story time and then after we were finding a few books here and there that he seemed interested in but then we hit the jackpot for construction books. He thought it was the coolest thing ever (so fun!). He couldn't wait to get home and show dad all of his construction books and can't wait to read them before bed tonight. (if you're judging me in that it took me three and a half years to go to the library with my child, just knock it off ;))

so happy about his new books!

fall photo fun

2011-10-02T07:43:00.000-05:00

Yesterday morning Krystal, Mom and I rounded up the kids and went to a piece of property near my brother's house to take pictures of the kids. As you can see, it was difficult to get a good one of all of them, we'll blame that on Grayson, but I loved the location! There were so many potential photo backgrounds that we didn't get to, guess that just means a return trip!

One of the very few of the four together that turned out ok :)

Hilarious, this might be my favorite.

I am always happy when I accidentally take a decent photo, love this one.

just sharing how difficult it was to get them all to cooperate, ha

exploring the bean fields

trip to the dentist

2011-10-01T16:00:00.000-05:00

Connor and I made an unexpected trip to the dentist last Wednesday afternoon. Thankfully there had been a cancellation so we were able to get in right away. Now, to back up for the full story.

About a month ago, Connor fell off of our bed and on the way down, smacked his face on the nightstand. To clarify, he wasn't sleeping and fell out, I think it was one of those moments that he was cranky and didn't want to get out of bed or didn't want to stop watching the ipad, something to that effect. Obviously falling didn't help the mood any.

So, lots of blood, lots of tears. I didn't think that his teeth were loose but he really wasn't happy with me digging around in his mouth so I can't really be honest with you whether they were loose or not. He did complain for a day or so about his mouth being sore, but after that, seemed back to normal.

Fast forward to last Tuesday night as he's brushing his teeth I catch a glimpse of one of his front teeth...and it's not white. More of a tan-ish/gray. Enter instant mom guilt and I began furiously brushing his teeth (as if that would help, ha).

So, we make the trek to the dentist. They do a good job of making me feel better that even if I had brought him in right after the fall, it wouldn't have helped any. They confirmed that indeed both of his two front teeth are turning gray, and most likely, will stay gray and probably even get darker. This is due to damage to the nerve during the fall. There is a chance the nerves MIGHT heal on their own, but we're not counting on it. They also said they could get darker and then lighten back up a little, but again, who knows. I am happy that the teeth aren't going to fall out and have him be toothless for 4 years until his permanent teeth come in.

Guess I should just be thankful we all come with two sets of teeth :)

617

2011-09-30T12:50:00.000-05:00

617 is the number of bags of milk for Grayson I have stored in our freezer, and that's as high as it will get. I have about 3 days or so before I'm officially done pumping, but am not producing enough to freeze any extra. I think I've spared you enough details the past six months, so one post about this won't kill you :)

Other fun facts (ha):

-I will quit about 2 days short of the exact amount of time I spent pumping for Connor.
-I believe I ended up with 444 bags for Connor when I was done.
-There are 6 ounces in each bag, so that's nearly 29 gallons of milk. Sorry. No idea what prompted me to do this math and comparison.
-This will not last Grayson a year, but it will get him close.
-I again recorded every pump session, the time of day, how many minutes spent pumping and the ounces I got. This started way back with Connor when we were at Children's and for whatever reason, I never stopped and then recorded every session for Grayson, too.
-In case you don't know me really well, I have never nursed either of my children, I just pump.
-There is not one minute that I don't despise pumping, but, it's good for the baby, good for me, and saves money.
-I am SO ready to have my kitchen counter back and about 2.5 hours of my life back each day (between pumping and washing, etc.)
-We also are in desperate need of freezer space, but that'll be a few months yet.

Again, I realize many of you really could care less (okay, all of you), but hey, this is my journal, right?

picking pumpkins

2011-09-18T19:18:00.001-05:00

A little family ride on the 4-wheeler this afternoon brought us to our neighborhood 'pumpkin patch' to pick out our pumpkins for the front steps. Connor thought we needed 10. We thankfully got away with only 6.

scoping out the selection

Connor thought this one was appropriate for Grayson :)

scrapfest firsts

2011-09-18T00:04:00.000-05:00

This weekend marks the 5th year Sarah, my friend from college, and I have gotten together for Scrapfest. Scrapfest is an annual event put on by Archivers. They have classes and vendors set up at the Mall of America. So for the past 5 years, we've gotten a hotel near the mall, attended some classes and scrapped away at our hotel in the evenings. This year, we've spent our weekend a little differently :)

-We ran the Dave Ryan Special Olympics 5K. Sarah put together a team for her work and so I did it along with them. I actually had hoped to do the 10k as part of my training for the Mankato half marathon. You know, that race I said I was going to do but never registered and the training plan is still laying on my printer tray (but at least I printed it).
-We went to bed before midnight one of the nights. It's typically one of the downfalls of our weekend, we stay up too late and get potentially less sleep than at home with our children. Worth it, but still, it was great to actually get some sleep :)
-We even took a 2.5 hour nap. It was awesome.
-We never made it to the Mall of America. The funny thing is, each year we register online for classes and every year, it's a little stressful. Sarah and I are on the phone the night before and the morning of registration opener, planning our classes, trying to make sure we get into the same ones, etc. (trust me, I realize I'm painting quite a dorky picture for you all) I sent her a text one day telling her we had missed registration, neither of us were too disappointed. We decided to just camp in our hotel and focus on getting caught up on our books. Or closer to caught up.
-We paid more than $40 per night for the hotel. In years past, I've always scored a hotel for less than $40 on priceline.com and I think for 3-star hotels, too. I finally got one for $41/night and had to downgrade to a 2.5 star, but the Best Western here in Oakdale is treating us just fine. Always a little nervous as you have no idea where priceline will put you, but knock on wood, it's always worked out.
-This isn't technically a first, but neither of us were pregnant. Three of our five years one of us has been and so for the first time we even took a relaxing dip in the hotel's hot tub, right after the 5k. It was wonderful.
-We have a picture of ourselves from the weekend, I am pretty sure this is a first, sadly enough.

That's all I can think of for now. We'll try and get a few more pages done in the morning then we'll pack up all of our crap and be on our way!

Sarah and I before the race.

Grayson: Six Months

2011-09-15T11:26:00.000-05:00

My baby is six months today. I will again go with the cliche, it's going too fast :( I seriously LOVE babies. It's my favorite stage, always has been. I don't remember missing Connor during the day as much as I miss Grayson, no offense, Connor. Maybe there is a small part of me that knows this could be my last baby and that's why I can't get to daycare fast enough to pick up all of his chunkiness. He's such a good baby (insert loud knock on wood) and I just cherish my time spent cuddling with him, even if that means the laundry gets a little behind :) So, here comes the standard list of what he's up to, but thought I'd try and add a few more photos to the mix.

- still eats like a champ. School gives him oatmeal + juice and then a half of veggie a day, at home, if it works out (sometimes timing is just hard, if he's too hungry, he wants a bottle) he'll get another 1/2-1 veggie and then of course, lots of milk. Still 6 bottles a day, 4-5 ounces each. I think Connor was down to 5 bottles by this time so I feel like I should work on that, kid could stand to take in a few less calories :) Oh, and green beans have been the favorite, peas he hated and last night he chowed down an entire squash for the first time. Bring on the orange nose. I think that will coordinate just fine with our family photos this year.

- sleeps. well. Love it. He goes down between 830 and 930, and probably every other night gives us an entire night, getting up around 5 or 530 to eat, which conveniently works out with Bryan's sleep schedule and nearly every morning, Bryan feeds him. The other nights, he gets up around 3 for whatever reason, eats and goes right back to sleep until about 7 when I typically wake him up. Good thing is he doesn't seem to need a bottle those mornings so I don't have to feed him again before taking him to school. Comparing to Connor, I actually think Connor slept a lot longer? I should see if I blogged about it at some point, but I vaguely remember I had to wake Connor up every day to get him ready for school, but he was also WAY more addicted to his nuk and I believe it was around the 6-7 month stage where we had to do the cry it out method, as we were going in 3+ times a night to put his nuk back in. But, it's all a blur.

- the above outfit is 18 months. Before you judge on how tight it appears, it IS the thermal kind where they're supposed to be tight. (smile and nod)

- official stats from his appointment this morning:

Weight: 20 pounds, 9 ounces - 92nd percentile
Length: 26.5 inches - 55th percentile
Head Circumference: 17 3/4 inches - 85th percentile
(sorry, can't find Connor's stats so there will be no comparisons this time)

Appointment went well. She suggested introducing more solids as he should be starting to drink less milk, we're thinking he has eczema so I need to be better about applying lotion, not too concerned about his stools but going to introduce fruits to see if that helps keep things moving, and everything else was all good. She's not concerned he's not very mobile, or at all mobile, thinking it's more that he doesn't have the desire to move, rather than it being a physical issue (unless you count that his tummy is so giant it's hard to roll it over :)) So, all is good!

Until next month :)

art project

2011-09-14T18:57:00.003-05:00

Every so often we get some homework for Connor. Most of the time, I try really hard to make sure we do it (okay, I think there have been some times I've forgotten a hat for him on hat day or something, that doesn't really count, does it?). My favorite are the 'all about you' projects where you get to put anything and everything that the child likes on the page. So, I enlisted Bryan this time around and the logical place to start for Connor is the equipment magazine. So, they went page by page and if they saw a piece of equipment that Bryan has, they cut it out and glued it on. I at least advised to put a picture of him and a picture of Grayson, but the only place there was room was on the back. I had to hold back the scrapbooker in me that really, really wanted to come out and adjust the layout...ha, but I think it turned out better this way anyways :)

No idea where Bryan found the glue, and you can kind of see what Connor's page looks like, right beneath Bryan's hand. I would love to see him tell his teachers and friends what every piece is, and probably the model.

Mount Grayson

2011-09-07T06:14:00.001-05:00

our little active volcano...

He goes in phases of doing this all the time, but thought I'd capture it this time around :)

Snuffleupagus

2011-09-06T21:06:00.000-05:00

Today marked Connor's first day in the second pre-school room at his daycare, the Snuffy room (you know, Snuffleupagus, yes, I had to google how to spell it). For the most part it goes by age, you're a Cookie when you're 3, Snuffy when you're 4 and a Big Bird when you're 5 until you go to Kindergarten. He's not 4 yet, so that probably meant there was a big group of kids that needed to be moved to make room for younger kids in another room (definitely a domino effect), so a Snuffy he is :) Thankfully, I think we're over transition issues between rooms because the three pre-school rooms interact together quite a bit, and they're all right next to each other so there was no change in drop off, etc. Whew. Room transitions pretty much suck for this guy. Won't be long before Grayson moves to Infant II (Tigger), but that transition is easy, since he still has no idea what's going on and as long as they feed him he's a happy camper :)

his new favorite place to play, and clearly I need to clean my windows

2011 Bocce

2011-09-05T10:01:00.000-05:00

Every year our friends Matt and Lora host a bocce ball tournament. This is the third year that Bryan and I have made it (it was their 10th annual this year) and I'm proud to say I was champ in 2007, however haven't made it near the leader board ever since. Bryan always shows up a bit late because he's on his way back from his golf weekend, and somehow this year even though he missed the first round completely, he got 4th place.

Bryan and Ang

Me and my partner, I know, he looks thrilled. However, he was doing something inappropriate with his bocce balls, hence his facial expression, however whoever snapped the picture smartly forgot to get that part into the frame.

Bryan's flight.

and again

Ang and I

Thanks to Matt and Lora for yet another fabulous time! If you're at all interested (ie if you were there), here's a link to the rest of the photos from the day.

chillin'

2011-09-04T07:15:00.001-05:00

Been a lot of this happening this weekend.

While on a self-induced house arrest this weekend (trying to focus on Connor's toilet training) we've had Grayson working on rolling (not successful), sitting (fairly successful) and eating vegetables (tremendously successful, I think he ate two entire containers of green beans yesterday with enthusiasm). The living room has been taken over by Connor's job sites (nothing really new), but laundry and dishes are caught up which makes me very happy :) Bryan gets home this afternoon and then providing Connor is doing okay we will hopefully sneak off to the annual bocce ball tourney at our friend's place. Thinking I should try and accomplish a project or two tomorrow, we'll see :) Happy Labor Day weekend!

Labor Day Tradition

2011-09-03T17:17:00.004-05:00

Every year over Labor Day weekend, Bryan and his brother, Aaron, and friends Trav and Craig go up north to golf. Bryan, who is getting more tech savvy every day, just emailed me this picture from his phone so thought I'd share :) I'm not too jealous that he gets to be away every year because conveniently Scrapfest always comes a few weekends after, so I'll get my own time soon enough :)

Bryan, Aaron, Trav and Craig

grayson's first 4-wheeler ride

2011-09-01T21:21:00.000-05:00

Grayson spent the day at Grandma and Grandpa Bode's getting spoiled so I could have some one-on-one time with Connor. (have today and tomorrow off as Connor's school is closed this week) Thought I'd share a few pics, thanks for taking these, Cheryl!

I don't know about you, but I had a little deja vu when looking at this one...

So I had to dig up Connor's first four wheeler ride shots. They are probably within a week or so apart in age here. I think it's pretty obvious they're brothers, Grayson's head does seem more square...and just larger in general, but, similar expressions. Ha.

frogs take over kiddie pool.

2011-08-28T12:22:00.000-05:00

What do you get when you forget to clean the kiddie pool out after a few months?

Hundreds of baby frogs. I don't even know what to do with them. And I don't know what's worse, the tadpoles or the nasty stuff growing at the bottom. Promise I don't let the dishes go this long.

update on punk number one

2011-08-25T20:40:00.000-05:00

Sporting Grandpa Tim's sunglasses. My dad is notorious for buying a new pair of sunglasses at nearly every gas station he stops at (which is a lot). My favorite pair to date had skulls going down the sides (which he clearly had no idea when picking them out).

Excuse the lack of blogging lately, I have no excuse other than the cliche...life is busy. Thought I'd do a little update for son number one. This kid cracks us up, daily. I need to get better at capturing some of this on video for us to look back on. The other morning he was telling me the things he needed to complete his 'work clothes', as I had just purchased him some work boots (this conversation I would kill to have on tape, seriously thought it was the best thing he had ever heard), he had his work jeans on, his work shirt on, then told me I needed to buy him a hard hat and a billfold. Then he'd be set.

He amazes us by how observant he is and how much he can remember (don't worry, I'm very aware this is all probably very normal for his age, we're just enjoying it so much). He could probably tell you right now all of Bryan's active job sites, what pieces of equipment are at each and who runs them. Still very obsessed with this.

Is loving that Grayson is getting a little more active and for the most part, is good with him. This morning he pulled Grayson around on the bed by his legs...Grayson didn't seem to mind so I let it carry on.

Still sleeps in our room (I know, keep shaking your head). HOWEVER, ha, he's on a mattress on the floor next to our bed. This is progress, people.

Now to the poop (what I'm sure you've all been waiting for). We have gone rogue the last month or so and have taken him off of all MiraLax and other laxatives (against doctor's orders), just trying to focus on getting him enough fiber via his diet. Doesn't really make any improvement, but the fact that it didn't make it worse (by taking him off laxatives) made us feel better. Just couldn't understand how a kid is supposed to learn when it's super soft, all the time. So finally last week we brought him back to Children's and had the botox injections again. It would be clear that there was stool that needed to come out, and he would push and push and push, to get no results. So, we thought it couldn't hurt to try relaxing his sphincter. About three days ago we started seeing some improvements, a good, formed stool, once a day. Like I said, we're only on about day three, but already he seems to be exhibiting 'normal' signs of kids going through potty training. Sneaking off into the other room and just standing there, that sort of thing. Fingers crossed that these types of stools continue. This is what happened last time after the botox and for whatever reason, the good stools only lasted about three weeks or so. We always felt had that continued, we were positive he would have 'gotten' it. So, it continues. It get so frustrating at times (well, all the time) and then throw kid number two into the mix that doesn't seem to have normal bowel movements, ugh. But, that's the update on that. Oh, the surgeon also did a rectal biopsy to check and see if there were nerve cells present (which there were not when he was born and why he needed surgery) and there were, so that was good news. No indication of any Hirschprungs still.

And that's probably all you care to know about his poop and more :) Stay tuned to read about our pet frogs.

happy birthday, mom!

2011-08-16T21:28:00.000-05:00

Happy birthday today to my amazing mother! Mom, thank you for all you do for us and most importantly for being the amazing grandmother you are! We love you SO much!

grayson: five months

2011-08-15T21:05:00.001-05:00

Grayson is five months old today, still seems like my little baby even though he's huge :) Here's a snippet into his life:

-goes to bed between 8:30 and 9:30 or so and I typically wake him up around 6. (knock on wood, his sleep schedule has been heavenly lately) I would let him sleep, but I would hate if he would wake up while I'm pumping.
-just started rice cereal about two days ago, I think he'd tell you he's ready for WAY more than that based on how he watches us eat and seems to kick his arms and legs while we're eating, but we'll follow the recommended guidelines for a little bit at least plus he needs to figure out how to eat from a spoon
-goes days and days without pooping. It would seriously be SO nice to have a normal pooper...but, not in the cards for us I guess. One time he went 7 days, where he proceeded to have a massive amount of solid, formed stool (very uncommon for breastmilk fed babies), screamed so bad there was no sound. Nurse practitioner said to not let him go three days and then to give him juice. So he goes three days. All the time. He had another 8 day stint, but had a normal stool at the end of it, thankfully. Not that you all really needed to know this, but just documenting :)
-is all smiles but somewhat difficult to get giggles and chuckles going, I blame this on the fact that he typically always has his hands halfway into his mouth
-loves to listen to Bryan talk
-likes to watch Connor do whatever he's doing
-has days where he drools gallons, and others where he doesn't drool at all
-drinking 4 ounces every 3 hours or so at school, and 5-6 ounces here at home (therefore I assume he'd drink that much at school, but he's not going to float away anytime soon so I think its ok)
-I think I'm at about ~~450~~ (466 official count on 8/16) bags of milk (I could get you an official total but I'm too lazy to get up and look at my sheet :)), this is already ahead of where I ended with Connor
-still wearing 6 month clothes but they're getting a little snug (part of this is just me not wanting to let him grow out of them as I love so many of them)
-still incredibly chubby, multiple dimples on elbows, knees, etc.
-still not rolling (cut the guy some slack, he's huge) but he is definitely getting close. He gets about 2/3 of his body over but that's about it. Connor rolled at 4 months and 10 days and was roughly 2 pounds lighter.
-No teeth
-Can hang out about anywhere, which has been awesome.
-likes the nuk but is not addicted to it like Connor was
-can say about 3 or 4 words, ha, kidding, just seeing if you were still paying attention :)

I think that's about it for my super random list. I am in love with my two boys, can't snuggle them enough! Well, Connor isn't too much into snuggling anymore but he cracks us up. His latest, "oh mom, what are we going to do with you?" Seriously love these two boys!

swimming lessons

2011-08-14T21:09:00.001-05:00

A few pictures to recap Connor's swimming lessons this summer. He had them Mon-Thurs for two weeks at the outdoor pool in St. Peter. For the most part he likes the water and enjoys it, but just don't try forcing him to do something (like jump off the diving board). If it's not his idea, it's not a good idea. Hard for me, as I used to be a fish in the water and could stay in for hours, but, not Connor's thing maybe and I just need to get over it :) Maybe Grayson will be my swimmer.

Grandpa Tim even came a few times!

At least he likes jumping off the side, he could do that a thousand times and not be sick of it.

Swimming lessons were at 5:40 so since Bryan wouldn't be home from work in time, Grayson got to come with. Thanks to my mom for coming along to watch him!

No hands! (meaning no hands holding him)

kicking and scooping

clearly, swimming lessons were SO entertaining

DMI walking billboard

2011-08-09T06:11:00.000-05:00

Bryan recently ordered some apparel for his work and we had some kids sized clothing thrown in as well, much to Connor's delight. He currently has a black shirt with the DMI logo but he is now SOOOO excited to have a shirt just like Dad's and that he can now be 'official' on the job site (neon vest/shirts required). And yes, he sports this to school. He'd wear it everyday if he could.

Pretty sure the reflective strips confused my flash.

He also has a matching hat and I'm not sure why he's not wearing it for the photo, but he wears it to school on a daily basis. Pretty cute :)

weekend in Winona

2011-08-08T06:10:00.000-05:00

A few weeks ago we went to Winona for the weekend along with Bryan's parents. On Saturday we had the Gurgel (Nate's Mom's side) family reunion in Onalaska, but we decided to extend the weekend into a mini-vacation by staying Friday night as well. We got LOTS of pool time (yes, Connor had fun, just needed a little time to warm up to the idea of course :)), had a great time at the reunion and just an overall great weekend with family.

One of a billion jumps into the pool

hanging with Grandpa by the pool

chillin' with great aunt Vick at the reunion

water balloon fun at the reunion

sports camp

2011-08-05T06:46:00.000-05:00

Better known as the Sports Sampler at the Y, Connor has attended this little activity twice now, missing one time for the first night of swimming lessons. Essentially, a bunch of 3-5 year old kids learning one sport a session. The first night was soccer, I think we missed basketball and earlier this week was football. We have floor hockey and baseball left I believe.

One would think Connor would be fine in group settings as he's with a ton of other kids at school AND one of his classmates is in sports camp with him, but nooooo. You'll see that Connor is the only child that needed a parent out with him (second from right).

Working on his soccer skills. Well I don't know what he's pointing at, but otherwise working on skills.

Eventually, he was able to go off on his own. Which was finally cute to watch :)

This past week during football, he was shy for the first 10 minutes or so but then he did great! He was a great listener which at times was actually frustrating because the children that didn't listen, didn't go to the back of the line after their turn, ended up being able to do the activities more than Connor because he was following the rules. Don't worry, I am fully aware Connor could be one of those annoying non-listening children next week, it was just especially annoying as he was finally comfortable to 'break free' from us and then he got the shaft. We will see how next week goes!

quick update

2011-08-04T06:48:00.000-05:00

I will blame my lack of blogging the past few weeks on swimming lessons. They're right after work and by the time we're home, there seem to be plenty of other things to do (and my house still looks like a disaster). But, tonight's the last night, and pretty sure Connor is definitely okay with that.

Can't find Connor? Check the far left corner of the photo. He and Grandpa Tim off doing their own thing (checking out the life guard?). Oh well, at this point I just care that he's in the water and enjoying himself for the most part. More to come on how swimming lessons went this year :)

Grayson: Four Months

2011-07-30T11:36:00.000-05:00

Well, I'm a little behind. Grayson was four months on the 15th, and I didn't even get him in for his appointment until the 26th. I always forget to book the next one while I'm there, and speaking of, I still haven't booked his six month. Oops. Alright, onto G man.

Official stats:

Height: 25" - went down from the 80th percentile to the 55th
Weight: 17.5 lbs. - went down from the 99th percentile to the 90th
Head: 17 1/4" - went up from the 81st percentile to the 88th

What he's up to:
-Eats well, obviously. However I don't feel like he eats as much for how chubby he is...but, we love it :) Eating about 4-5 oz per bottle, 5-6x a day.
-Tried rice cereal the other night, didn't go so well, but he was also starving I think so that wasn't very nice of me
-Accidentally rolled from tummy to back last night. By that I mean Connor had helped him onto his tummy so you can imagine one little arm stuck way under his chest so one slight movement of his head sent him sailing back to back position. Needless to say I think he was a little startled.
-If he's in a 'zone', whether it's eating or sleeping or resting and there is a loud noise, or you speak to someone across the house, he freaks out, intense screams for a few seconds. Maybe this is normal, but I swear Connor was not like that, it's actually pretty comical, but you feel bad for him at the same time.
-Is still such a content, calm little guy. Can basically hang out on the floor, in the stroller, in his car seat. I think we're enjoying that he still can't move :)
-Sleeping like a champ (you probably heard me knocking on wood VERY hard here). Roughly 8-9 hours a night, down anywhere from 830-930 and up between 5-6. This is beyond amazing for me. There haven't been too many mornings where he wakes up while I'm pumping which is great.
-Speaking of pumping, still going strong. A count and reorganization of our freezer has me at 414 bags. I think I'm producing more than I did for Connor as when I quit after 7.5 months with him, I think I had 440 or something.
-Six month clothes are getting a little tight for the most part. I have a bin of Connor's clothes ready to unpack in Grayson's room, but I am not sure it contains 9 month stuff...since I've already found the 12 month stuff. Weird, maybe Connor skipped over this size.
-Overall doing great :) Doctor visit went well, on track for everything and we just love hanging out with this little man.

4th of July Weekend 2011

2011-07-17T21:12:00.000-05:00

Finally getting around to posting these pictures, and warning, there are lots :) I'll let the pictures do the talking.

Al was far too nice...letting Connor do circle after circle, going super fast, super slow, super fast again, you get the picture. He of course had a blast, not so sure the rest of us :) Kidding.

On the trailer. Off the trailer. On the trailer. Off the trailer. Constantly.

What.

Okay, that was a little funny.

omg hilarious

love this picture

sporting his new hat, he loves it!

my cousins Ellie and Lucy came up on Saturday

I did a lot of this...

Which led to a lot of this...

lots of this went on as well

love this one as well!

spraying a bug with a spray bottle full of listerine, apparently the newest craze in bug repellent

we all had moments of looking like this..hot, sweaty, dirty, tired

the last morning Al took Connor and I fishing, it was pretty successful!

(and yes, I caught this one, it's not the same fish from the photo right before this one)

heading home

Thank you again, Al and Mary, for yet another wonderful weekend at Beaver 25! We loved every minute of it and look forward to next year :)

ahh, life.

2011-07-11T16:28:00.000-05:00

I have posts coming that will be more interesting than this, but thought I'd at least sum up our lives the last few weeks.

Connor: Still having 1-3 accidents a day or so. We are beyond stumped if he actually has a medical/physical issue, or if he's just difficult to potty train. There are moments while I'm changing him that he'll be like 'oh, more is coming out!' and he'll run to the toilet and sometimes get more out, other times not, stating that he doesn't need to go anymore or that 'it's sleeping'. Whatever. It's so frustrating for all of us. We still continue to pump him with laxatives (miralax and actual exlax) and we will be repeating the botox procedure in the next few weeks, based on the initial success we saw last time that maybe just didn't last as long as it was supposed to. Aside from that, still makes us laugh every day and continues to amaze us. However don't bother getting a response to a question unless the question has something to do with equipment, what job sites are currently active for Bryan, etc.

Grayson: Just unofficially weighed him today and he's roughly 18 pounds. Yes, 18 pounds. Just looked back on Connor's stats at four months, 16.8 pounds, and we thought HE was a chunker. His official four month appointment is on the 26th, a few weeks late, oops. Still a pretty content little (ok, not so little) guy. Likes laying on the floor, he likes to get over on his side, but no rolling in the near future I don't think. Talking up a storm and drooling by the gallon. Crappy sleeper. Anywhere from 3-6 hours. Driving me a little crazy, Connor was such an awesome sleeper at this age, but oh well. I've been trying the 'nuk' diet in the middle of the night, but he sees right through that and demands the milk.

Bryan: Busy, lots of work going on which we're definitely thankful for. The best part is that nearly all of his jobs are in Mankato this year, so he's home much earlier than last year thankfully.

Me: Nothing really new. Attempting to get out and run here and there, debating the Mankato half marathon. Getting incredibly sick of pumping, but I'll keep at it for another few months. The end of September would be about the same time as with Connor so that's the goal.

We were supposed to be on vacation this week in the Dells, but as you may have heard my mom was hit by a car while on her morning run last Friday. AMAZINGLY, she 'only' has a broken shoulder, barely any cuts or bruises other than her arm. We are so lucky and thankful that it wasn't any more serious than that! I took her to her checkup today and they still aren't thinking it will require surgery, but just to let it 'hang' and let gravity do the healing. Pretty amazing.

4th of July weekend pics coming soon.

happy 4th!

2011-07-04T21:53:00.000-05:00

We had a wonderful 4th of July weekend and hope you did too! Connor kicked it off with a wildly successful parade at his school then we picked him up early to head up to my Aunt Mary and Uncle Al's cabin on Horseshoe Lake in Wisconsin. It was beyond relaxing and the three gourmet meals a day was amazing (note to self, don't step on the scale this week, however I did manage three runs while there to combat it a little). More pictures to come of the weekend!

This is Connor's 3rd year in the parade. Year one, he had eyes full of sun screen so he wasn't very happy, year two, he saw me and immediately wanted me to hold him, take him home, etc., getting him back into a teacher's hands was difficult but this year, success! He smiled and even waved his flag at me :) (it was too hot for the babies to come, so Grayson missed out on the fun)

Hope you and your families had a safe and fun weekend! Here's to a short week, Ashlyn's birthday party Friday night and heading to the Dells on Sunday! July is BUSY but oh so FUN :)

tyler + leah

2011-06-27T06:26:00.000-05:00

We attended my co-worker's wedding this weekend, here's a little fun from the photo booth :) Congrats to Tyler and Leah!

The design was on her invite, program, etc, thought it was super cool that it also printed out on the photo booth images. The wedding was full of super cute details!

more Heffernan reunion

2011-06-26T07:23:00.000-05:00

Here are a few shots from the official reunion photographer.

Connor wouldn't let the cone out of his sight.

Terrible, or maybe it's just me, well and Connor might be picking his nose. Grayson was screaming his head off and I had no idea when the photo was going to be taken, but here we are :)

Needless to say this will not be making it on any Christmas card.

My dad and his sister, Mary, serving up the pork.

My aunt Mary and her cousin (I think) Kitty, organizers of the event. Great work!

The pork :)

Sunday Funday

2011-06-22T05:12:00.000-05:00

We had a great Father's Day this past Sunday, hopefully Bryan thinks the same :) Started out with Bryan and Aaron taking their Dad and friend, Fred, golfing. Connor joined them for the last 8 holes. Then lunch with the Bodes and Froehlichs at Aaron's. The boys and I left Bryan there as he was napping (probably his favorite Father's Day present of the day :)) and when he came home we swam in the pool a little bit, ate supper, drove around (kind of our family thing) and stopped at Spring Lake Park.

Grayson chilling 'in' the pool. He liked it, I just wish this chair would have been lower so he could have actually sat in the water. I got tired of holding him up :)

I just liked his expression here. He was watching Connor throw buckets of water onto the patio.

my boys

Grayson probably sat in here for over 20 minutes, he loved it, and loved the wind :)

Heffernan Family Reunion

2011-06-21T05:43:00.002-05:00

This past Saturday we had the Heffernan (my Dad's Mom's side) Family Reunion at Theodore Wirth Park in Minneapolis. Although it was a little overcast, and it rained at one point (poured), it was a nice day (I hate being hot :)). We brought two ATV's to transport people and their coolers to the park's pavilion as it sat on a big hill, so you can imagine the fun Connor had. There was a photographer there taking photos as well and we attempted some family photos, but it was muggy, the kids were sweaty and there wasn't a mirror in the place...so who knows how those will turn out :)

I think equipment follows this kid around. Of course there was a packer right outside of the pavilion. (Connor even knows it was a smooth drum packer)

Kaelyn being all serious.

Playing in the puddles from the rain.

The only bummer of the day was as we were getting ready to leave, someone noticed that 4-5 cars (from people at our reunion) that parked on the street had been broken into. Windows smashed in, ipads stolen, etc. Crappy way to end a family reunion, that's for sure. Our three cars from our family were parked immediately across the street from the cars that had been broken into, very thankful we lucked out.

morning face

2011-06-20T05:42:00.002-05:00

I snapped a few pics of Grayson the other morning, of course trying to capture a smile. At the time...you had to work pretty hard for them. As I type this post a few days later, he's all of a sudden way more smiley which is much more fun so hopefully I capture that pretty soon :)

Happy Father's Day

2011-06-19T17:36:00.000-05:00

Happy Father's Day, these boys couldn't ask for a better dad. Love you!

sleepover

2011-06-16T21:23:00.000-05:00

My parents volunteered to do a sleepover at their house with Connor and Ashlyn. It's their second time doing this, so I no longer feel bad for them having to deal with two busy toddlers :) They of course had a great time and I'm sure are looking forward to the next one :)

Dinner on the patio, can't beat hot dogs over the fire!

stoking the fire

my father's dream...kids that willingly pick up sticks

the new bed mom and I put together for the kids, love it!

little green dinosaur

2011-06-16T06:34:00.000-05:00

Starting this past Saturday at my mom's, Connor has been talking about a little green dinosaur that was in our house that 'got' him, and at the same time it was raining, in our house.

Sunday: I met my mom and picked Connor up from his sleepover at their house with Ashlyn (post coming soon) and he fell asleep in the car (actually he was asleep when I picked him up and we successfully transferred him to my car, in his car seat, as one unit, to my car without him even flinching). So I let him sleep in the car (car off, doors open obviously). When he woke up, and I'd say he was 15% awake, he asks me, "Did Grandma tell you about the little green dinosaur in our house?" That might have been all I got until later that night before bed he brought it up again, asking if we let the dinosaur in our house, we reassured him no, we don't let dinosaurs in our house to which he replied, "yeah mom, it was in our house, and it was raining." I wish I had him on tape, because he's like 100% serious when talking about this dinosaur.

Monday: We're getting ready in the morning and he told me again about this dinosaur that was in our house, and that it was raining. I asked him if we got wet, he said no, I asked if we had umbrellas, he said no. Um, okay. I called my mom that night and she said he had talked about it a ton at her house, too. Mom thought we were using it as a threat or something (we're not THAT mean) and was just as confused as I was.

Tuesday: We're walking into the living room and he stops in the kitchen and goes, "See mom, the floor is green!" I am like, um, what? "The floor is green, from the dinosaur." Again, 100% serious. On our way out to the car he stops, "See, there are his tracks!" Is this normal?!

Wednesday: Again, getting ready in the morning, tells me about the dinosaur in our house. However this time he tells me that he hid from the dinosaur so he couldn't get him. I asked if the dinosaur was a mean one, and he said, "No, but he's not my friend.". On the way to school he asked where the dinosaur lived and I replied with really far away, etc., to which he asked which house he lives in. I told him he lives in Africa which is REALLY REALLY far away.

Trust me, no matter how much we reassure him that we don't let dinosaurs into our house, he just is so serious. He doesn't act scared or anything, just like he can't believe we haven't seen the dinosaur ourselves and haven't noticed that it rained in our house........

Grayson's first day

2011-06-13T22:01:00.000-05:00

Today was Grayson's first day of school and I think it went pretty well. He was sleeping when I dropped him off so hopefully he wasn't TOO sad when he woke up in a strange place and with strange faces. They said he did really well, he was crying when I picked him up, but he settled down while we went to go get Connor from outside. He ate well and slept well, can't ask for too much more than that.

Looking studly.

He was not in the mood for photos, a few minutes prior to taking this photo Connor slammed his foot down onto his hand (pretty sure intentionally...) so once we got him calmed down, he was still in no mood to smile. Hopefully he was a charmer at school at least :)

staying cool

2011-06-09T05:32:00.002-05:00

I went and bought a little pool for Connor the other day when it was over 100 degrees and he had a blast. I just bought a cheap 'pop-up' one as I didn't feel like blowing one up, worked out pretty well and took like 2 seconds to get it up. (well, longer than that to fill it of course)

jump!

mall of america

2011-06-08T05:08:00.000-05:00

On Sunday we ventured up to the cities to take Connor to the Nickelodeon Universe park at Mall of America. I wasn't sure how many rides he could or would want to go on, but at least he knew all of the characters. He went swinging with the Backyardigans, flying with the Wonder Pets, on a bud adventure with Diego and more. We even saw a real live Dora...but of course he refused to pose with her :) The mall and park were deserted (it was beautiful outside) so therefore there were absolutely no lines, it was great! Connor is very excited to go back, and will quickly tell you what rides he didn't like, ha.

Grayson did great, chilled out in the stroller the whole day. I promise that I finally filed his nails instead of just trying to cut them. Hopefully we'll avoid additional injuries to his little face :(

The log ride. This would be on Connor's list of rides he doesn't need to do again...I found it hilarious. I absolutely should have purchased the pro photo of them coming down the final hill...the look of sheer fear on Connor's face was pretty priceless. I'm so cruel.

Shocker, he LOVED this one.

Bryan and I were both shocked he wanted to go on this one. We watched the batch of kids ahead of us do it, and he still said he wanted to go. It's one of those where you lift up, then bounce yourself down, little free falls in a way. I don't think I would have even liked it...he didn't either, but he kept the tears away! We were proud that he tried it :)

Had to do the big rigs a few times.

We'll definitely be back, and once he grows about 2 more inches, there are a few other rides he'll be able to go on.

Grayson: Twelve Weeks

2011-06-07T17:04:00.000-05:00

Grayson is 12 weeks old today. Yes, I can say the standard things about it goes too fast, they change so much, but, it's been a really good 12 weeks. The weather has sucked, from rain to gale force winds to now 100 degree heat, but, it's been good. I probably worked too much, and not even that I worked that much, but, hard to stay away. I go back to work on Monday and however much I'll be sad, Grayson has semi-become a little mama's boy so I think he'll be sad too, I know he'll be fine and they'll be much better at tummy time than I have been, ha. And, I'm ready to get back into it. Little worried how our mornings will go to get everyone out the door in a timely fashion but we'll figure it out. So, a little bit about Grayson these days...

-eats his hands and fists like there is no tomorrow. I guess I'm thankful he hasn't found his thumb?
-While eating his hand and laying on the floor, he rolls over onto his side (well his upper body is on his side), arching his back. I don't know why, but I think it's cute. And he's generally talking up a storm while eating his little chubby wrist.
-Speaking of talking, definitely getting more vocal, which is fun
-Nicknames still consist of Chunga, and of course all the standard ones like peanut, buddy, etc. Connor will repeat what we call him, but on his own he calls him "bud" and always "hey, bud!". "Hey bud, you want to look at this dump truck?", "Hey bud, you want your milk?"
-is hungry. I think he eats around 30-35 ounces a day, something like that. And I really only know that because I pump about 45-50 in a day, and freeze anywhere from 15-20 daily.
-Speaking of pumping, I hate it, but I do it. I'll have about 250-270 bags stored by Monday when I go back to work, and I'll keep at it, but not sure I'll last as long as I did with Connor (7.5 months). Obviously the ultimate goal is to never have to buy formula, but probably not going to happen.
-only real fussy times are if he gets overtired, which we obviously try and avoid
-loves hanging out in his bouncy chair, generally sucking on his wrist
-doesn't love the nuk, which we are 90% on board with, but there is that 10% that sometimes it'd be really handy if he liked it, not going to lie.
-cradle cap is way under control. Thank you to everyone for your suggestions. We've been using Cetaphil (sp?) body wash on his scalp and brushing with a baby brush.
-I think his face itches like crazy. I try and apply lotion a few times a day, but he is constantly rubbing at his face or when you're holding him on your shoulder he leans in and does a full facial itch into us. At least I finally started filing his nails, hopefully the cutting decreases.
-wearing 6 month clothes. I had been trying to stretch his 3 month clothes (probably quite literally) so he could wear them a few more times, then I go to an outfit I'd been saving, or something, only to find out it doesn't fit, or really could only get one wear out of it. So, we're comfortable in 6 months clothes right now and I must say he looks a little less like a stuffed sausage. Ha.
-rocking the chubby baby look. I did notice his white onesie he was wearing yesterday had a little blood around the neck which means the skin in his neck folds is getting very sore :( So, we're going to try a few things and obviously be more diligent about keeping it clean and dry. Any suggestions on what would work best to heal it up are welcome!
-is an okay sleeper. And, he's probably a pretty good sleeper, but by this time Connor was sleeping through the night. I think the biggest difference between the two is Connor was a night owl (still is) and Grayson would be content going to sleep at 8, which is fine, but that means he's up anywhere between 4 and 8 hours later. Not very consistent this little man.
-has toxic poop. Meaning, I swear every outfit he poops on, I literally have to soak in oxi-clean, scrub with shout, spray with stain remover and then wash, at least two times. No lie. I honestly think Connor had like two blow outs (I'm sure I'm blocking this out...) and I don't remember it being this difficult to get out.

Okay that got a little long for a little man so young and that really doesn't do anything... :) But, we love him oh so much and I'm trying to capture the memories, to be overly cliche.

Oh, and I finally got around to posting his birth story, I just back dated it so it would be in the right order for the most part. Not that many of you care, but I'm sure some of you will read :)

it's official...the nuk is dead.

2011-06-07T06:55:00.000-05:00

I've been waiting to post this, in fear of jinxing us, but I think it's been well over a week now with no nuk. We went to the dentist early last week (or maybe two weeks ago?) and his bite is a little out on control, all due to the nuk. So hopefully, everything will shift back in place before his permanent teeth come in, which the doctor was pretty positive it would, but just stressed we needed to ditch the thing soon. So, we talked about a nuk fairy coming, but a few days after the appointment, he had had a bad day in terms of #2 accidents so I told him I had to take it away. He sadly looked at me and just said, "okay, mom." I was of course shocked, expecting a massive meltdown. He DOES ask for it now and again, saying if he poops on the toilet can he have his nuk back, which, I wrongly tell him yes, he can have it back if he doesn't have ANY accidents. Sadly, this just doesn't happen, so I knew it was safe to tell him that. Obviously we're desperate to get to a day with no accidents, but, it was good to get rid of the nuk.

Obviously we've cut his hair since this photo :)

boat ride

2011-06-06T05:53:00.000-05:00

We took a quick trip out to the lake after church on Saturday for a spin around the lake. It was a beautiful night and the boys had a great time, well Grayson slept or ate the entire time, but I'm sure he thinks that qualifies as a good time :)

buds

2011-06-05T15:53:00.000-05:00

Grayson is generally full of smiles...however I think he seems to have a huge fear of my camera...

baby gemma

2011-06-02T22:13:00.000-05:00

My friend Aleta had her baby this past Sunday so Angie and I headed over there this afternoon to meet her. She is ADORABLE and so tiny! She's only 6 pounds right now, less than half of what Grayson is :) Of course we had to do a little line up, starting with giant, then normal, then the little peanut. Big congrats to Jeff and Aleta, she's beautiful!

I've been trying to make Grayson's clothes last, so if it still fits, or it's a little snug I try to get a few more wears out of it. Then when I finally cave and try something on that I thought looked 'big'...ha, I find out I was wrong, see exhibit A above. Should have busted this outfit out weeks ago. So, we're going to stop trying to reuse Connor's clothes if there is something new and cute to wear hanging in the closet :)

Ha, Grayson and Miles are trained already, they knew it was Jeff's turn to take the photo (he was positioned to my right), however it must take too much effort on my little Chunga's part to move his head.

Twins Game 2011

2011-06-02T07:37:00.002-05:00

Although the Twins are terrible, it's become an annual traditional to go to a game over Memorial Day weekend for Bryan's brother Aaron's birthday. We get everyone that wants to come from the Muesing side and make a day of it. We lost, shocker, but it was still fun! Only had to get our of our seats for the rain once :)

Our view from section 201.

Memorial Day Weekend

2011-06-01T21:36:00.000-05:00

We had a great weekend, from fishing at the lake, Connor and Ashlyn's first sleepover at Grandma and Grandpa Loula's (my parents' idea!), Twins game celebrating Uncle Aaron's birthday and a trip to the park. Even though I'm on maternity leave, holiday weekends are still great :)

My little man is growing up so fast.

This might be the only time they actually were watching the bobber.

I'd love to say the joy on Connor's face is due to catching a fish, but he probably just attempted to cast, nearly taking Bryan's ear off and thinking it was hilarious.

The babes, Grayson carefully positioned so that Kaelyn doesn't roll over him.

The start of the 'sleepover'. From the sounds of it, it went really well except it took a little extra time getting everyone to bed, which I would say was expected. Thanks to my parents!

Fishing with Grandpa Tim.

pics from the rest of the weekend coming soon

Scotland Reunion: 6.75 Years

2011-05-26T11:57:00.000-05:00

It only took us 6.75 years to get together, and unfortunately it still wasn't 'complete' (we were missing Brittany), but it was SO fun having dinner with these ladies last night and reminiscing. We laughed. A lot. We cried (because we were laughing so hard). And we got all caught up on each others' lives. We're all married and between all of us have six kids. Hopefully it won't be another 7 years before we get together again, but we know that even if it is, we'll still have a great time catching up and remembering the crazy things we did that we would NEVER want our own children doing, ha.

The 'la la' girls of room 103. Wisconsin in Scotland, Fall 2004.

From left: Anne, Marissa, Megs, Lindsey and myself.

day at the lake

2011-05-20T05:58:00.000-05:00

Days at the lake still involve hats and sweatshirts around here (well, not that I'm expecting swim suits already, but yeah), but last Sunday it also involved a mini backhoe, much to Connor's delight. We went out to my parents to help my dad plant some trees (not little trees, hence the need for the mini) and hang out a little bit.

Connor helping Bryan get the mini off of the trailer.

Mostly posting this for Connor's benefit, as he's a big blog reader when using the iPad. Ha.

Grayson chilling in the fish tent.

This guy is ALL work when he's on equipment.

four years

2011-05-19T05:20:00.000-05:00

Happy 4th Anniversary to us!

2nd Annual Golden Heart 5K Fun Run/Walk Photos

2011-05-17T06:22:00.000-05:00

This past Saturday was the 2nd Annual Golden Heart 5K. It was 40 degrees, windy and sprinkled on and off however despite that, it was still a great turnout so we were very pleased. Looking forward to next year :)

We couldn't figure out how to get the tent any taller...(Angie came in and saved the day) but we didn't have any stakes to keep it down anyways. Thanks for nothing, Trish. :)

Matt getting pumped to lead the race.

Our sweet sign that Angie's husband, Jay, got for us.

Ashlyn admiring her balloon animal.

Connor showing me his

it was just such a nice photo, I had to share

Kate proving how freezing it was

The boys getting ready to start the race. Jay is such a natural behind the megaphone, we let him do all of the talking.

Trying to stay warm

Ashlyn getting her ribbon for finishing the kids 1/2 mile run. Connor didn't want to participate. I'll give the kid a break tho, he was shivering.

Thanks to everyone who came and supported Golden Heart, volunteered and/or donated to the event. We were thrilled with the turnout and look forward to planning it again next year.

Grayson: Two Month Stats

2011-05-16T12:49:00.000-05:00

We had Grayson's two month checkup today. It went great, other than we need to work on him turning to his left, more. He definitely prefers looking to the right and has developed a tiny bit of a flat head on that side. Vickie (Nurse Practitioner) isn't too concerned yet, just prescribed some dedicated tummy time and helping him look that way (ie, push his head in that direction :)). We'll work on it and she'll revisit at his four month check.

Everything else looked good, and to no surprise, we have a little chunker on our hands.

Weight: 14 lbs, 10 oz, 99%
Length: 23 3/4", 80%
Head: 16 1/4", 81%

Connor was exactly one pound lighter (90%) and 3/4" shorter (50%) with the same size head. The percentiles must have adjusted so I'm not sure it's entirely apples to apples, as Connor's head was only 75% vs 81% for Grayson. Connor was two days older at his appointment, but can't imagine it makes that much of a difference.

happy monday

2011-05-16T09:03:00.000-05:00

Here's how we started our morning today :)

The boys sleeping while I showered. I pretty much just cross my fingers and hope that Connor doesn't roll over Grayson or push him off the bed...

We have a new neighbor coming in so lots of activity including a backhoe, skid loader, dump trucks, etc. He sat here while I pumped, and we could probably just leave him there all day.

Hope you have a great week, it's finally going to be nice here! I have to work three days so I'll miss some of the sunshine, but it's still just great to see the sun :)

tigers at daycare

2011-05-13T14:15:00.000-05:00

Bryan said he didn't even recognize Connor when he came running up to him at school. Not surprisingly he came right up to me when he got home and was like 'take it off'.

I made him take a few pictures first.

Grayson: Eight Weeks

2011-05-12T12:02:00.000-05:00

Grayson was eight weeks this past Tuesday, and I'm beginning to realize that I barely take any pictures of him. I knew this would happen, we're busier and...we're not crazy first time parents. Not that we're not cherishing the moments...but yeah. You all get it. But, I looked up at Connor's three scrapbook albums from his first year (yes, THREE, and they are overflowing, barely able to close) on the shelf and thought I should snap a few of Mr. Grayson today.

Things are going well here. He teased me with four nights in a row of at least 6.5 hours of sleep, and I think three of those nights I was asleep for at least 6 hours. A-mazing. However the last few nights he's been back to 3-4 hours at a stretch and HUNGRY. Man oh man.

I've self-diagnosed him with a blocked tear duct in his left eye...we'll see if I'm right next Monday at his two month appointment. Hopefully it's not something that has needed drops or medication. Connor had one until he was six months old so I of course thing I'm qualified to diagnose. Ha.

Still looks like Connor, but bigger I think. I put one of my favorite little outfits of Connor's on him the other day and it was too small :( Boo. Guess I need to look ahead to the clothes to make sure we get some use out of them before this Chunga (his nickname for the moment, Chunga Munga to be exact) outgrows everything. I do have everything of Connor's hanging in Grayson's closet up to about 9-12 months in size. I'm hoping to just have a smooth process, Connor outgrows something, into Grayson's closet it goes, Grayson outgrows something, into a tote it goes.

He also has a nasty case of cradle cap. So gross. Connor never had this and I swear every store I go to is out of baby brush/comb sets. Walgrees, Target, etc. Any tricks for this stuff, please pass them on. I feel bad for his head and you have no idea how hard it is to resist from picking at it...

Loving the smiles lately, pretty easy to get out of him if you do the whole baby talk jabbering or if you're Connor and you make silly faces at him. I keep telling Connor to tell Grayson some jokes. Connor then leans into Grayson and goes "a joke backhoe'. Ha.

Otherwise things are really good! Now we just need spring to show up!

flat tire

2011-05-09T14:41:00.000-05:00

literally.

Friday night Bryan's parents awesomely took both boys so that Bryan and I could go on a little date night. I REALLY wanted to see Something Borrowed (yes, I'm a sucker for cheesy romantic comedies...however I was a little disappointed, won't lie). We got right into the restaurant before the movie (being a party of 2 on Mother's Day and MSU graduation weekend was key) and had time to spare so we of course had to go check out Bryan's job sites (our date nights are SO romantic).

Warning: Don't drive normal vehicles on job sites.

I will say, it was a great learning experience. I've never changed a tire, so I'm glad Bryan was there to do it and I could watch :) And even with the unforeseen delay...we still made it to the movie on time.

fresh air

2011-05-03T22:33:00.000-05:00

The sun made an appearance today so we gladly spent some time outside after supper. It was unfortunately still a little chilly, but not raining, snowing or 50 mph winds.

Connor did great riding his bike most of the way. He was very impressed with the marks he could make on the sidewalk if he braked really hard, he had to get off his bike and inspect the mark EVERY time he did it (every 20 yards). He got a little tired (ie naughty and stubborn) near the end.

Yes, he should probably have a helmet on. I realized this when we were on our way home.

Little Schmo enjoying the view from the stroller.

grayson's baptism

2011-05-01T04:24:00.000-05:00

Last night we had Grayson baptized at Hosanna Lutheran Church in Mankato. The service went great, no blow outs or screaming :) Well other than Connor being a terror.

Connor was back and forth from being up by us, back to our seats, back to us.

And I desperately need to get the kid some dress shoes.

Pastor Andy introducing Grayson and a little girl who was also baptized to the church. She hated it, Grayson just stared at Andy. The pastor in the background is Pastor Dan. We weren't expecting him to be there (he's retired) and even though he didn't baptize Grayson it was nice to have him there. He married us and baptized Connor.

Ashlyn and Connor sitting for the children's message.

Clearly we need to work on their listening skills. Connor was showing Ashlyn his latest battle wound from daycare, even pulled up his pant leg past his knee to show her.

Grayson's sponsor/Godparent, Krystal. Jeff (Bryan's older brother) is also a sponsor, but lives in California.

Yummy cupcake cake. Picked it up on our way to church only to have it read 'Grayson Thomas'. Thankfully there was a cake decorator still there to quickly fix it :)

Thank you to both of our families for a great evening!

We appreciate you all coming to celebrate the event :)

the boys

2011-04-30T21:21:00.000-05:00

A quick pic of the boys from the other day. We're able to get a few smiles out of Grayson which is so exciting (unfortunately not yet captured on film). Can't wait til I don't have to work so hard for them :)

We had a great evening tonight. Grayson was baptized and then everyone came over for supper. Pics coming soon!

grayson newborn pics v2

2011-04-28T18:26:00.001-05:00

Here are some shots from Grayson's second newborn session with photographer Dan Dinsmore.

I loved the idea of the crate during the session, but the coolness of the crate didn't come through for me in the pictures.

As well as, in nearly every crate shot...his toes on the one foot could be mistaken for something other than a toe...

cracked a little smile for this one :)

If I ever have another child...I might just have to fork over the $$$$$ for the amazingly adorable newborn photographers that have all the hats, blankets, props, etc. But, this worked :)

numbers

2011-04-25T17:43:00.000-05:00

My life in numbers.

5 - hours that Grayson slept at one time last night, longest stretch yet, too bad I was awake for two of them
6 - ounces of milk that Grayson chugged after his 5 hours...most ounces yet at a time
22.5 - average number of minutes it takes to feed, change and get Grayson back down in the middle of the night (knock on wood...this is really nice...and I'm not really keeping track of it to the minute to be able to determine an average, it's just generally 20-25 minutes)
2.4 - average number of #2 accidents Connor has daily. This is REALLY starting to frustrate Bryan and I. Mostly because we have no idea. No idea if something is wrong, or if he's just taking forever to grasp training on that front. (again on the average thing, it's just anywhere from 1-4 times a day)
7 - number of nights a week Connor ends up in our bed. This MUST stop this week.
130 - minutes I spent pumping yesterday. Yikes. I'm 'over pumping' in an effort to increase production.
41 - ounces of milk I got in those 130 minutes. Hoping to get this in the 50-60 range. As long as Grayson doesn't start eating 6 ounces every time he eats, I can freeze about 5-15 ounces a day.
0 - number of times I pump overnight. This might be hindering how much I get in a day, but, I guess I'm willing to take that trade off.
1 - day left of paid maternity leave (today, boo)
6 - more weeks I'll stay at home, but trying to work 10-20 hours a week (at home)
2 - walks I've been on with Grayson since he was born. Only TWO. Our weather sucks. More rain in the forecast tonight, tomorrow and rain/SNOW tomorrow night. Lame.

That's all I can think of right now :) Happy Monday!