Sunday, January 31, 2010

Bird World

Oftentimes in the mornings LT doesn't want to go anywhere. He just wants to play toys in our basement. Today was no exception. When we asked him if he wanted to go to the zoo, he insisted that we stay home, so we did. However, at lunch, he started crying because he wanted to go to the zoo, I guess we misunderstood. We made him a deal that if he took a good nap, we would all go to the zoo after everyone woke up. The plan worked, he was asleep less than 20 minutes after lunch.
During the lunch discussion about the zoo, we asked him what animals he wanted to see. He became fixated on seeing bird world. Its probably the oldest building in the zoo, definitely the sinkiest. But... we promised him we would go there. He said he wanted to see blue birds and red birds and show the birds to his brother.
When the boys both woke up, we packed everyone into the car and headed for the zoo. LT chatted the whole way about going to bird world and all the birds he was going to show his brother. LT was also very insistent that we figure out what birds eat. Neither Brian or I were confident in our abilities to answer that question for LT.
As usual, their personalities showed through from the time we got out of the car. LT very serious about getting to bird world as fast as possible to find out what birds eat, while Adler laughed and smiled in the bjorn, just happy to be outside.
Adler in the bjorn smiling.

Alder learning about the birds from his big brother.
Magically, the first really colored birds we saw were blue and red! LT insisted that we take a picture of them.
In a hurry getting to bird world.
LT was really excited about this exhibit because it had no windows.
The exit from Bird World leads you right to the penguin habitat. LT asked a few questions about the penguins and we were just about to move on when Bri noticed that the penguin feeding was just 5 minutes later. We stayed and watched the penguins eat their herring. Above are the three boys learning about penguins from the zookeeper.
LT riding on the ox pulling the covered wagon. Next to Bird World, I think this has been there the longest. They both were definitely there when Bri and I were kids.
After about 2 hours of the zoo, LT didn't want to leave, but Adler was fading. I took Adler on a drive around Park Hill while he napped in the car. LT and Brian stayed for another 1/2 hour. Oftentimes I think LT is a big kid now, but when I came back to pick him up, he was pushing his stroller and I could hardly see his head. He just looked like such a small little guy. Compared to Adler, he's a big kid, but in reality he's still just a little guy still.
After the zoo, we headed to our favorite pizza joint, Oblios. Oblios is just blocks from where both of us grew up. Growing up, however, the neighborhood had no restaurants, and definitely no Oblios. Now, we take any chance we can get to drive across town to eat their pizza. Its become a habit to go after afternoon visits to the zoo.

Saturday, January 30, 2010

Toothers came party for #2

got teeth?
Adler's first tooth popped though today or at least we noticed it for the first time. His toothers came party amounted to him sleeping though the better part of a play-date for LT and his friends. Just another example of life being a little different for the second child.

Inevitably I went back and looked up the post about LT's first tooth - the bottom front right tooth was the first for both boys. But that's where the similarities end. LT was quite a bit older and, *sigh*, apparently sleeping though the night for as many as twelve hours. I think Adler's best stretch of sleep last night was a grand total of three hours straight. Maybe he'll sleep better now that this tooth has broken though. Maybe.





Friday, January 29, 2010

A, mostly, good afternoon

Today, LT had a few of his buddies over for a last minute playdate to help end the week on a good note, or so I thought (and it was mostly good).
Z with a car.
Baby Sean, who will forever in my mind be "baby Sean". Hes almost a year younger than LT and at the time he was born seemed so small compared to LT. He's talking, walking, playing just like the older boys now, but I still can't get the baby out of my mind. He has a younger sister, Erin, who is a few weeks younger than Adler. She was at the playdate too, but was sleeping at the time I actually thought to get the camera out and take pictures.
Sofi testing out Adler's bumper jumper.
LT in the jumper playing some game with Z.Before nap, I told LT we could make cookies when he woke up. He was so excited about this that after about 1 hour of napping (he usually takes pretty long naps), he woke up announcing he was ready to make cookies. Lesson learned, I will not mention something so fun BEFORE nap. However, I kept my promise and we went to the kitchen and made some oatmeal butterscotch cookies. When his buddies arrived, the dogs were creating more chaos than good and so I locked Bowen up in our room. He knocked down the gate and headed straight for the kitchen. I heard some ruckus upstairs when we were playing in the basement and rushed up, but not fast enough. Bowen ate 2 trays of cooked cookies and a bowl of raw cookie dough. This made him pretty sick and I spent a lot of the rest of the afternoon cleaning up after him while Shawn watched the boys. LT created some sort of game that involved going to sleep on the guest bed and Z brought some tractors to make the game more exciting. When I took a break from cleaning and walked in, they had a whole family of tractors. It was, mostly, a good afternoon.

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Playdate with Phoebe and baby Shane

As I said in the previous entry, we don't venture out as much as we used to due to different schedules with the two boys. However, this morning, we went to see Phoebe and her brother Shane (2 months older than Adler).
Adler and Shane playing on the play table. Its amazing how much difference 2 months makes at this age.
Adler playing.
LT taking a break from playing trains to make his usual facial expression for the camera.
Z playing cars or trains, as usual.
Phoebe monitoring all the boys to make sure they are all in line. What a fun morning, thanks, Beth!

Just a few shots

LT is often heard saying, "I yuv my brodder, I yuv Addyar". Its more than we, as parents, could ask for when raising two little boys. I hope it lasts. Between the two boys sleeping needs, we find ourselves at home a lot more now, which is perfectly fine. Here are some shots from the other morning at home.
Adler watching the star on his playmat.
Apparently this is how 2.5 year old LTs smile. Every shot I have of him from the past few days is the same.
Adler loves his jumpy.
A little drool never hurt anyone.
He's definitely found his hand, and thumb on many occasions. LT was never a thumb sucker, will Adler be?

Saturday, January 23, 2010

Little Buddha

Adler has been very patient with me as I experiment and learn with my new camera. Below are are few shots from an impromptu photo shoot a few weeks ago.

Little Buddha
Little Buddha?

Glimmer in his eye
A happy little guy with a glimmer in his eye.

Trouble on the horizon
His patience isn't limitless, however, and here he's letting me know that hes done with pictures for a while. He knows how to use that bottom lip to express his discontent!

Funny boys

I laugh daily, actually hourly. My boys make me smile and laugh constantly. As Adler grows up, their friendship becomes more apparent. Adler is a happy guy, LT says funny things constantly. What better job is there than being a mom?
Adler adores his big brother, LT loves being a big brother and helping. He hands Adler toys, plays on his excersaucer with him, rolls on the floor with him, translates what Adler is "saying", I couldn't ask for more. All of this makes the trying times with two worthwhile.
Adler strapped into his car seat, Nikes on of course, ready for some adventure with his big brother.
Happy baby.
Funny 2.5 year old. (When I asked LT what he was doing in this picture he said, "Just being cute!"

My two love bugs.
As I wrote this blog, I realized how much water damage my little point and shoot camera has. I told LT, "I think I will go get a new camera today". He said, "Oh, you gonna get a big camera yike dada?" I said, "No, mom isn't responsible enough, I would lose it, or ruin it or get snot on it or who knows what else." LT said, "Mama, I know you can do it, I just know you can do it and get a big camera". I am glad someone has faith in my ability to not ruin everything.

Stock Show

LTs new school had a field trip to the stock show last Friday. Brian and I are not fans of the stock show, its crowded, stinky, chaotic and a variety of other negative adjectives in our minds. Steven, however, loves the stock show. I thought I would get away with just sending LT with Steve this year, but, nope. I headed back again this year with LT and his class. We met up with his class early, before everything opened. We all started out together, but within minutes, it was just Zack, LT, Shawn and I, lost from our group. First stop, duck game. Luckily the boys aren't quite old enough to know that the game really involves paying money to choose a duck and possibly win a prize. To them, just watching the ducks swim around was enough.
LT checking out the cooped up chickens.
They have all kinds of kid friendly things to do. Our little engineers were immediately drawn to the train ride. Luckily, we were the first and only kids in line and the man running it let the boys go around and around and around, for a very long time. LT was very serious (as usual), making sure I wasn't too far away, while Z laughed and smiled the whole ride.

After awhile, we wandered into an exhibit and I am not sure what set LT off, but he insisted that we leave immediately and find something else. Shawn and Z stayed. That left LT and I to wander the thousands and thousands of square feet and check out some other things. After racing through the horrific smelling cattle grooming area, we found our way into the retail section of the show. LT found this globe filled with stuffing. He kept pushing the button on it, hoping something would happen. I didn't tell him that you had to put money in AND buy an unfilled stuffed animal in order for it to work. I'm not sure how many more years I will be able to trick him into this sort of thing. He was happy just watching it.
Next stop, the John Deere tractors. When I found out I was having a boy, I was super excited, thinking I could really relate to boys better than girls. What I didn't realize was that along with boys came trucks, tractors, trains, cars, etc. I have quickly had to learn the names of these vehicles. LT helps me out when I am not sure.
I have to secretly admit, however, that a great memory of mine as a kid was visiting our farms in Iowa and driving the tractors with the farmers.
Soon after our adventure alone, we met back up with a few of the kids in the class for snack. Above is Jack, Zack and LT enjoying a little snack. After this, the boys wanted to play on the playground there and about 5 minutes into playing, LT announced he wanted to go home. It was more than enough time for me, but I was happy to see my little boy so happy.

Saturday, January 16, 2010

Some holiday pictures


I feel like Kari and I are always qualifying some cute thing LT says as our favorite. Of course, they can't all actually be our favorites but the way he says Christmas has to be near the top of the list. He says, "kissem" - like kissem trees, kissem lights, etc.

Anyway, below are some pictures from over Christmas and the holidays.

Decorating the kissem tree.

Telling Papa about something important at the zoo.

We (well, really Kari) made fondu for one of our holiday meals. LT must be my son because you can see us both digging in shamelessly.

LT loved doing the fondu but it might be a meal better suited for a few years from now. He did accidentally burn himself pretty bad on one finger. He didn't cry or anything, he just suddenly announced that he was done. It took us a while to even figure out what had happened. A Scooby-Doo Band-Aid would become a fixture on his finger for the next week or so.

Doing a big puzzle with Grandpa. LT is really into puzzles lately and it's amazing to see how quickly he's learning to do them. Just a month or two ago he couldn't do even the simplest ones without a lot of help and now he's doing bigger more complicated ones all by himself.

At 2 1/2 years, this was the first Christmas where LT started to get what was going on. Here he is coming down the stairs in the morning to see what Santa had brought during the night.

Presumably inspired by The Polar Express book and move, LT asked for a silver bell from Santa. Thanks to some help from Grandma, Santa didn't disappoint.

LT loves it when his cousin comes to visit and Nicholas is great with his little cousin.

Working on his new work bench with Papa.

Adler got some tools and a tool box too. LT had to check them out to make sure they were up to his workman like standards.

"Kissem" lights at the "Tantic Gardens".

Enjoying a grape while Papa shows off volume III of the blog book.

Helping his aunt and uncle check out a new table.

Of course, with two sets of doting grandparents, LT was not deprived of the Christmas gift receiving experience. Although we do try (especially his mom!) to teach him about giving too.