Haircuts and Birthdays

Here are a few long overdue pictures... We got a new computer a few weeks ago, and I'm just now getting to where I'm pulling pictures off of our camera's card. We've been slacking lately on taking pictures, too, so that hasn't helped. Here's what's been happening...

Tyler's hair has been getting longer and longer (as has Brayden's, but we'll buzz his), so he's been needing a haircut. We were going to get one for him the week before this, but the wait at walmart was 1.5-2 hours!! Eek. So I went to Chickasha one Monday and met Mom there. She kept Brayden busy while I sat with Tyler. He did a great job! Here is is Before Haircut:


Here are the boys (see Ty's nice short hair??) watching TV together. Yes, Tyler has a huge bandaid on his face. He had a little zit or something and he just keeps picking at it. The only way to keep him from messing with it is to have a Nemo bandaid on his face. But aren't they the cutest little brothers you've ever seen???


Mom, Dad & Erin came down on Monday to celebrate Mom's birthday a day late, and Tyler's a week early. We had burgers, Erin's potato salad, baked beans and LOTS of birthday cake. YUM!!! Tyler got to open a few presents, too...


He got a Percy the Train!!


PaPa got the train track out with the boys and built a nice big track in the living room for Thomas, Percy and Henry.


This is Brayden's "usual" face right now. Every time he talks to us he frowns like this. I have no idea....


Playing trains with PaPa

Instrumental to Brayden

This is his second or third attempt... He got a LOT better about 10 minutes AFTER we turned off the camera. John was very impressed with the way he picked it right up and can make the right mouth positions and stuff. He plays better than Mommy does.



I am always amazed at the things Brayden can do. He doesn't really listen to instructions, he just does his own thing. But he will watch how you do something and then try to imitate it. He's very musically inclined. He plays drums, piano, trumpet and sings. He can almost sing a song pitch perfect! But music isn't his only talent. He seems to just soak up anything and everything from day to day. He knows how to make things work, take things apart, put them together...it's just amazing. He plays on the computer, too!

Last night John and I were talking about how much of a challenge it is parenting such a curious and strong-willed child and he made the comment that he thinks Bradyen is just one of those kids who longs for stimulation. When he isn't active enough, it just has to come out whatever way it can, and it's usually destructive. (See Ex. 1: The crayon marks on my coffee table.) But I'm very awed by him and his abilities. I can't wait to see what the next few years bring us with him.

Little Thing

Appointment update.

Baby's heartrate is 162, everything looked great to the doc. I lost 5 lbs since last appointment, but with last week's 12 hour date with the toilet, I understand why. We got the "big" ultrasound scheduled for 4/15 which is just a tad less than a month away!!! Too exciting.

Not Much...

I don't have much to say, but I was really trying to blog more since I've been a slacker lately.

Um... John and I had our 5 year anniversary this past week (3/13, which, yes was Friday the 13th this year). I celebrated it in the bathroom. Sick. Very. Not fun. Today is the first day that I've had any semblance of normalcy. I pretty much just had to tell myself that tired or not, I had to get back to the Mother Land. ;) We needed groceries, the boys were getting restless, and John's tired of fending for himself on all fronts. So I called for reinforcements (Mom) and went shopping in Chickasha. Of course, I forgot my money at home (isn't that the way it goes??), so I was very lucky she was along to bail me out. Phew. Funny how being sick can totally mess with your mind along with everything else important.

I have my next dr's appointment tomorrow (and John will be left with the boys alone again... poor guy). I'm hoping that we'll be scheduling the "big" ultrasound at this one. It's weird to think that I'm already into my second trimester. But honestly, the thing that's excited me the most about this pregnancy (and yes, I know this is totally weird and messed up) is labor. I didn't really have pregnancy fever - I had no desire to be all tired and big again - I had labor fever. Every time I watched A Baby Story or anything, all I could think about is how much fun it is to wait for those labor signs and then head off to the hospital and then getting ready to push... Oh!! It's just so exciting!! Of course, with both of my boys, I kind of missed out on a lot of that because I was induced with both. I'm really hoping that this time everything kind of goes according to nature's plan and I get to say those, "I think it's time!" words. Only time will tell.

We've got Brayden and Tyler in a bedroom together (again)... It's only sort of working. It's been rough to figure out how to do naps because Brayden is still only sometimes taking naps and is very hard to get down when he does. Last night was trying, too. About 3:30-4ish, I hear Brayden calling me. So I drag myself out of bed to see what, or more appropriately WHO, is up. Both of them are. So I get them both something to drink and get them all settled down again. Or so I thought. A few minutes after getting nice and comfy with my body pillow again, I hear, "Mommy! He's making NOISES. Mommy, he's making LOUD noises." *sigh* Off to figure out what's going on. Obviously Tyler figured that if they were both going to be awake, they needed to play. Good thing he's still confined to his crib (which is an amazing thing in and of itself). So I get Brayden up and take him to the guest room for the rest of the night. Back to bed... snug and slipping off to dreamland around 5 am I hear, "Mommy! I need a snack." SERIOUSLY?!?! And when Brayden gets his mind set on needing something, you may as well give in if you ever want to go back to bed or whatever else it was you were doing unless you're prepared for a few hours worth of struggle (which happens VERY often around here - one struggle to the next, I tell ya). So he got two crackers, a pat on the butt and a pillow under his head. Thankfully the boys slept until around 8:30 this morning!! I don't know what I would've done if they decided to get up for good around 6 or 7.

But speaking of... I've got Tyler in bed and it's time to go try to get Brayden settled down in there. Wish me luck.

A long week...

This has been a LONG week. Trying. Very. Both boys (mainly and mostly Brayden) tried their best to see how far Mommy had to go until she was permanently riding the crazy train. They like trains, you know. It wasn't too far, but luckily, I have a great hubby and sister who rescued me from the loading platform.

This is how I felt most of the week:


But then Erin came out from Thursday night until Saturday afternoon and, if nothing else, took us out to eat a few times so I didn't have to worry about fixing food. She also cleaned my kitchen!! :D I had to go get her and take her home - which wasn't horrible since they only live a little over an hour away... While I was at Mom & Dad's house, John called and said HIS sisters were coming to stay Saturday night with us!! MORE HELP!! Yippee!!! So last night the boys got two more aunts to entertain. And I got to go to bed early! Well... I WOULD have if it weren't for the "spring forward." But whatever. So they left today and decided to take Brayden with so they could drop him off for the week with Grandma Rhonda and cousin Nikolas. Can I just TELL you how quiet my house is?!?!?!? Wow. It's amazing how much stress and noise a three year old can emit. I sent the pullups with him... I have high hopes maybe Grandma can potty train him in a week. (Yeah, right.)

Oh, you don't even wanna know....

There has been so much stuff going on lately, I don't even know where to start. But you probably don't really want to know everything anyway. And who am I kidding, I write this stuff mainly so my wonder of a mommy brain doesn't forget the cute little things. lol

Anyway. Like I said last time, we're pregnant. Went for my first visit the other day and had the bravery to take Tyler in with me. John had Brayden, but they went to Sears during my appointment. We both kind of made the agreement that it wouldn't (or couldn't) be all or nothing for either of us, so we each took one. I have no idea how we'll split baby #3. Haha. Back to the doctor, though... Tyler and I had to sit for just a little while - it was mainly waiting on me to get all the initial paper work done and what have you. He was pretty good. I won't even venture to say that he WAS good, though. Finally we get called back. My "starting" weight is officially 128 - even though I've probably already put on a few pounds because at that appointment I was already 12 weeks. But we did the whole lovely long history thing and then the nurse let us hear the heartbeat. Tyler really liked that - he said it was a choo-choo train. :D The heart was beating at 170. I like the old wives tales right now because the faster beat means girl. But it's pretty unreliable.

The weather turned nice for a day last week - Thursday. I loaded up the boys that morning and took them to my mom's so that they could play outside all day. Which they did. They helped her plant some flowers, rode in their truck, and played in the mud. After that was supper and bath... THEN Brayden escaped the house before getting dressed. So... yeah... he played outside for a little while with nothing on but a smile. (I think the whole neighborhood probably heard his little chant, "I nakkid!!!") Fun stuff that we will forever have photo blackmail proof of.

So we come home on Friday and had a wonderfully crazy weekend of boys who had been spoiled a bit too much at Grandma's house. I'll just skip all that because I don't want to try to remember it.

A few nights ago Lord of the Rings was on TNT, and I hadn't seen it in a while, so I was watching part of it while the boys ate supper. They got done and came to join me on the couch for a few minutes... Tyler pointed excitedly at Gandolf and said, "Jesus!!" John said that we now know what Tyler's perception of Jesus is. lol

Brayden on the other hand is a bit more creative. He and I have a little thing we do while scratching each others' backs called "Desert Island." He loves it and makes me do it multiple times. I finally got him to do it for me the other night. He told me he needed to do it on my back so he pulled the back of my shirt out of the way (cause I always do his on his bare skin). As he pulled up my shirt, he let me know that I had a seat belt on (the back of my bra). I about died laughing at this. It's funny how little kids put what they know onto things they don't. Oh, by the way - to Brayden, it's called a "beat selt."

Last one, I promise... Brayden's been playing on an online letter recognizion website (starfall.com). He LOVES this thing - and he's really good with the mouse, too. It's almost scary how quickly he took to using a computer. It's worked wonders with him and his letters, too. He can click on almost any letter you ask him to if you help him by saying, click "t" for "train." Well, we were watching Super Why on PBS the other morning and they were sounding out "ladder." I paused the dvr after each letter trying to get him to tell me what the right letter for that sound was. I didn't get to L in time, but they did the short a - and he got that. He tried to tell me that "d" was actually "b"... they didn't do "e" because I think they skip vowels that are confusing?? I don't really know. But they said "e is next." I paused and asked Brayden what starts with E? I expected him to say egg or elephant... but he broke out the big guns and said, "Erin." That's my little genius. I have no idea where he learned that, but my jaw hit the ground. I think he'll be reading before too long.

Only....

I haven't been here in a little while... Need to post a LOT of stuff. I've been a slacker, though. I haven't scrapped since Christmas, which has often tied to my blogging. Maybe I need to drag out some pictures tonight and get going on that. It's tough because we got a new camera for Christmas and my laptop doesn't seem to like the sd card. So it's not easy to transfer the pictures I need to scrap. However, I need to start being careful of all the pictures and whatnot on here because I'm quickly running out of space on my hard drive. I have two external drives, but have yet to move everything over to them. Can you tell I'm in the mood to make excuses???

Anyhoo... there's some other things going on...


At the posting of this blog, it says I'm 7 weeks, 6 days pregnant... "Only" 225 to go. ONLY?!?!?! Are you kidding me???!?!? That's a lifetime. But I'm sure it will go quickly. We found out that there's a good chance that I may be able to use the same practice in Norman that we used for Brayden. There are a few hoops to jump through first, but it sounded like it was a very likely possibility. So poor Tyler will be the only baby not born in Norman. Maybe.

Other than that, not too much is going on. I'm tired and cranky most of the time. I really don't care for pregnancy horomones. But I've also been cold, appetiteless, and hermit-ish. It's a load of fun.

Well, I just wanted to get on and post something... I really need to take a shower and get some laundry done... AND do the dishes... AND clean up the living room. *sigh*

Testing this out

John just got a blackberry...So of course I'm having to try it out. I've never been a texter, either, so this isn't exactly easy. But anyhoo... I will be back later with my real computer to post some Holiday updates and talk about B's bday tomorrow and to share some other stuff going on. I really need to do this blackberry thing more so I can talk John into getting me one.

Dear Jesus...

I was in Brayden's room tonight putting him to bed. We spent a few minutes reading (Dooby Dooby Moo) and then we said prayers. I started him off by saying, "Dear Jesus, thank you for..." And Brayden picked right up with, "Dram-ma's house. And... (here he mumbled a little and I'm not sure what he said). And Mal-Nart." I was trying so hard not to giggle. I mean, my kid is thankful for Grandma's house and WAL-MART?! Is it really THAT great of a place? It must be to him because he'll all the time ask if we can go there. Actually, he'll ask if we can go to Grandma's and we'll say not right now, then he follows up with asking if we can go to Wal-Mart. I guess it's just the whole idea of getting out of the house... Anyway - it was just so cute that (of course) I had to scrap it.

On the Flip Side

I've been meaning and meaning and meaning to get my rearend over here and blog about everything that's happened. I'm going to try to do it in sections so that I don't miss anything.

HALLOWEEN
We went down to Fletcher for Halloween because we had a church visit scheduled for Sunday, Nov. 2. Not to mention we *had* to do something on Saturday for my birthday (more about that in a minute). I put off getting the boys' costumes this year because I really didn't want to spend money on them. I mean, Mom & Dad were going to be in Hawaii and I wasn't even totally sure we'd be doing anything, so I wasn't going to go all out... Well, it got closer to Halloween, and we realized we were going to go to Fletcher. I decided that I had better get the kids SOMETHING to wear. I didn't want to be a bad mom. Haha. So one night while putting Brayden to bed, we read "The Cat in the Hat." Well of course you can see where my mind went from there. A can of blue hair spray, two red shirts & two pairs of red sweats later and voila! Thing One and Thing Two. Cheapest Halloween costume a mother could make - I'm sure of it. I think the entire getup was under $15 - and I get to use the red shirts & pants the rest of the winter! They were really cute - even if we didn't technically go trick or treating. (But fear not! Brayden got PLENTY of candy at the harvest carnival. He knows how to work the scene.)



MY BIRTHDAY
So on Saturday, Erin, John & I got up and got all ready and then went and dropped the boys off at Hannah's house and then picked up Alan & Jen. We all enjoyed a nice jaunt over to Lawton in the minivan. It's so very nice to have a vehicle that seats so many and still feels like there's plenty of room to spare. I'm looking forward to taking it on road trips. Anyway... We went to eat at Chili's and had a pretty good time. Our waiter was kind of slow and obviously cared less than an iota that it was my birthday. *sigh* I was pretty disappointed about that, but oh, well. So after that we went to Wal-Mart because, as everyone knows, you can't go "to town" and not stop by Wal-Mart - it's like some sort of unspoken policy to small town life. As soon as we walked in the door, Mom called to wish me a happy birthday. They were having a great time! I'm so happy that they got to go on that trip. We finished up shopping (actually, we were getting groceries so that I could fix everyone supper!) and headed home. We picked up the boys and then went back to Mom & Dad's. Alan & Jen ran to their house and grabbed the Playstation and Guitar Hero. We spent the rest of the night goofing off. All in all it was a pretty good day.



JOHN'S NEW OBSESSION
While we were in Fletcher, Alan gave me my birthday present of two tickets to see Twilight during opening week. Of course, everyone (Erin, Alan & Jen) are going with. Well, Alan somehow got sucked in to the obsession of reading the books - he was finishing up the fourth one while we were there... And it ended up that John got bit by the vampire bug, too. He had seen the trailers and had already determined that he wanted to see the movie - but I guess the books were too much to resist. He's had them for 2 weeks now and is almost done with the second one. That's pretty hefty reading for someone who has a job and two or three other full time hobbies. I'm actually pretty excited that he's reading the books... It makes for better post-movie conversations. However, me and my big mouth keep upsetting him. I'm horrid at being a plot spoiler. Or even a plot hinter. I give too much away unintentionally, so I am now forbidden to even MENTION the books in his presence.



THE BOYS
Brayden & Tyler just keep on growing up on me. Tyler keeps picking up new words (mo-mo: Nemo; sues eee: excuse me) and he LOVES to sing with, dance with and watch the TV. He likes to sing along with the "Jack's Big Music Show" theme song. It's very cute to watch. He's still our little cuddle bug. But he's also as onery as the day is long. He likes to throw things and his favorite game is hitting Daddy and watching him fall down. He likes to wear shoes (Brayden's especially) and HATES to be in trouble (you should see his bottom lip!!). He is Brayden's shadow and tries to do anything and everything Brayden does. He's started really liking books, but will only hold still for one.

Brayden is growing like a weed. I think he'd fit 5T now if I had enough to put on him; 4T still works, though. He's started using the potty on his own. We have a sticker chart for him which he loves. It all began one night last week when I was doing stuff on my computer... I heard the toilet flush and knew John was in our bedroom, so that only left one other suspect. Sure enough - a second later he comes bolting out of the bathroom yelling, "I deh eet! I go pee!" And that's how it started. We are no where near potty trained, though. He's still in diapers most of the time, but will go to the bathroom about 4/10 times all by himself. If I can remember to ask him, it's about 6/10 times. He's also learning new words and phrases every day. He's a little sponge!!! The other night we were driving into town and he goes, "MOMMY! I see stars! I nee a telescope." Huh? What's that? My kid knows what a telescope is?!?! The the next day he's watching Little Einsteins and yells, "MOMMY! Look! Is a pyramid!" Sure enough. Where is he getting these things?!?! He also is very opinionated and lets us know what we can and cannot do. It's funny how bossy he is (not funny haha, funny roll-your-eyes-and-sigh).



Oh...and one more thing... Brayden AND Tyler (!!!!) spent two nights at Grandma & Pa Pa's house all by themselves!! That's the first time that Tyler's every stayed somewhere overnight without Mommy. Huge milestone. And it was a very, VERY nice two nights for Mommy & Daddy. I actually got to sleep in as late as I wanted and didn't have to worry that something/someone wasn't being taken care of ('cause John's a big boy and can fend for himself for the most part). So for the first time in almost three years, I had a childless night. As great as it was, I wouldn't want to do it too often.... I missed my little boys tremendously.

I almost forgot my biggest news.... Thanks to anyone who read my last blog and actually went and voted for my layout in that contest! I actually was one of the ten winners, and I get an AWESOME prize. It should be here Nov. 20th!! I'm super excited and happy. What a great belated birthday present!!!!