Firehouse Party!

Since Aedan is very into fire trucks and all things fireman related, we decided to have his 4th birthday party at the fire station. It was so much fun!!

We started off with a tour of the station and midway through the firemen had to leave for a call!

We headed back up to their day room and had pizza and cupcakes. Check out these cute ones made by Krystal. If you are local, you can find her info at facebook.com/WellYeahCakes. They were so cute and so delicious!

The firemen got back and we got to head down to check out the trucks.

 

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Then all the kids got to take turns turning on the hose. Probably the best part! Oh and Aedan insisted on wearing his hat backwards the whole time! Ha!

And because she is so cute and had a great time too…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It was such a fun party. I am not sure how we will top it next year! On the way home Aedan just kept saying he had so much fun over and over!

-Lauren-

I have to give a huge thanks to my parents and in-laws! I had zero time to take pictures so these are all thanks to my mom! My dad picked up all the pizza and my in-laws were a huge cleaning up the place!

And of course a huge thank you to the 3 firemen that graciously entertained our group during their down time on a busy rainy morning! I think everyone had a great time!!

4 Years Old!

Today is Aedan’s 4th birthday! In some ways I feel like I have known him forever and it some ways I feel like it was just yesterday that he was a little baby. Where did the time go!

Aedan, here is what you have been up to lately…

• You go to bed around 8:15/8:30 (although you still stay up talking to yourself for awhile after that). You wake up around 7:30 most mornings and you still nap from 1:30-3:30/4 everyday. I am wondering if you will still be napping when you start kindergarten!
• You still love milk, although you don’t drink as much as you used to. Sometimes you eat well and other days you eat nothing. You love everything sweet. You tell me all  the time that fruit snacks are your favorite. You definitely have my sweet tooth!
• You have the biggest imagination! We have a million toys but you are always finding something random and pretending it is a laser or a walky-talky or anything else.
• You love to just stay home and play. You have gotten into Legos which is so fun!
• You go to school three mornings a week now and while you still hang your head out the door and call after me when I leave, I am happy to say you haven’t cried at drop off once this year.
• You still love to rough house with daddy and run around with Hiro.
• You are really good with Adelaide. Now that she is into everything, you do a pretty good job of sharing your toys and you always watch out for her. I here you telling her to watch her fingers when you close the back door. You guys also love to play together in the bathtub. Unfortunately this usually results in lots of water on the floor.
• You still talk all the time. Daddy and I can’t have a conversation without you trying to jump in. Usually you will say “excuse me” and when we pause you will just throw out some random story or bit of information just so you can be the one talking.
• You still prefer to hang out in your shirt and underwear. As soon as we get home, you take off your shoes, socks and pants!
• You are still pretty dramatic. You and Adelaide play sword fight. She loves when you immediately fall to the floor dramatically when she barely touches you with her “sword”.

 

Aedan, you have grown up so much this year! I just love watching you grow into your own person. You are all boy most of the time, but you have a big heart and are sweet and kind at the same time! You are such a blessing to our family and I can’t imagine life without you. We love you so much! Happy Birthday!! – love, mommy.

Phone Pictures!

It’s been awhile again! At least everyone has been well this time! I’ve just been busy with work. So here are some pictures of life lately…

Adelaide is obsessed with finding Aedan’s clothes. She will pull his pants or underwear out of the (clean) laundry basket when ever she can. Jon put this pair on her head that she had been carrying around and she thought it was the best thing ever.

We spent a morning at Cabelas a few weeks ago. Both kids loved checking out the fish (alive) and the animals (not so alive). Aedan wanted the animals to move and make noise. Then he found this little outdoor kitchen set up and immediately started “cooking”. I think he could have stayed there all day!

This is Adelaide’s new picture face. As soon as she sees me with my phone out for a picture, this is the face she makes. Clearly she is not lacking in personality.

My parents where in town this past weekend and my mom was able to stay over through Monday. We took the kids to Zilker to ride the little train. I hadn’t been on the train since I was a little kid! It was such a fun morning!

Aedan and Adelaide got to a in-home daycare when I see clients. Nana has been so wonderful and has been watching Aedan since he was 12 weeks old! Her husband is a fireman and she made Aedan this super cute fireman shirt using some of his old patches. It is so fun and Aedan loves it!!

This is the pose I got when I asked Aedan to show me the other patch. Clearly this one is not lacking in personality either. Ha!

-Lauren-

Back on Track

Ugh, last week was possibly the longest week ever!

We all passed around a pretty nasty stomach bug. I think it hit Jon and I the worst. It was no joke. I dealt with some pretty severe morning sickness with both pregnancies, but I’m not sure that holds a candle to the 8 hours I was down with this bug! Thankfully, Aedan and Adelaide had a pretty mild case. None of us had it at the same time, which made for a long week of being stuck at home!

I have completely cleaned my house twice now. If it could be wiped down with Clorox or washed in the washing machine, it has been. Jon and I still find ourselves washing our hands an extra billion times a day and when we go out, I just can’t stop thinking about the germs everywhere!

Everyone was better by Friday so we got to enjoy the weekend. Here are a few pictures from our weekend a few weeks ago. We all love taking long walks together!

Jon’s birthday is tomorrow and I am pretty excited about the gifts I got him. He always says he doesn’t want anything, which was the case this year as well, but I think I did pretty good coming up with a few things. Tonight he and Aedan are going to see the Lego movie and tomorrow we are having a date night!

Happy Monday!

-Lauren-

Five Things Friday

Whoohoo! Back to 3 posts a week!

So glad it is Friday!

• It is super cold here today. All this cold weather has made me very thankful for a big bonus room upstairs for the kids to play in. Slowly toys are migrating upstairs. We finally moved an unused cubby shelf upstairs to keep them organized. It is so nice to have multiple places to play when it is too cold to go outside!
• I started reading this book this week. I had downloaded it when it first came out and was free on kindle. I think I was in the middle of another book at the time so I never started it. It is hilarious. I have been laughing out load while reading it and Jon pretty much thinks I am crazy. If you are a mom, especially a mom of little kids, you need to read this book.

• I’m making some changing related to work in the next few weeks/months. Vague I know, but I’m excited!
• Speaking of work, we have decided to send Adelaide to preschool next year since it will free up some mornings for me to work while both kids are at school. I remember deciding to sign Aedan up for preschool when he was 2 and even though he wouldn’t be starting until 2.5, looking back he was such a baby. I’ll be signing Adelaide up at 16 months and she will start at 23 months…such a baby! I think she will like it though. Every time we drop-off/pick Aedan up, she runs in the room, pulls out a chair and tries to climb in. I could pretend she was doing this, because she wants to sit on the table and look at books/color, but I know her ultimate goal…to climb up on the table, stand up, and clap for herself, as this is her goal just about everywhere…

• It is supposed to be warm again this weekend, so I am hoping for some outside play time for the kids….otherwise we may all go nuts! I’m looking forward to a long family walk Sunday morning!

-Lauren-

If I’m Being Honest…

I would say the age that Aedan is at is my most favorite and least favorite stage yet.

Favorite, because he is just this little person. We have such funny conversations about everything from the moon and back. He has such a great imagination and it is so much fun to watch him play out all kinds of different scenarios/games.

When I took this picture, the trampoline was his spaceship and all the firehouse furniture were the controls.

My least favorite because, well, he is almost 4 and can be pretty stubborn and moody.

Recently he has gotten pretty creative when I tell him not to do something. For example, one of the rules we have is that he can not close the playroom door. He likes to close it so he doesn’t have to worry about Adelaide coming in and destroying whatever he is playing with. Honestly, she  totally does run in an try to destroy his stuff, so I get it. He knows he is allowed to take his toys in his room and close that door if he wants to play alone.

Well, one day, He was playing in the playroom and kept trying to close the door. I reminded him not to close it, so then he stood there with the door cracked and kept saying Fireman Sam was trying to close the door. He would have a whole conversation with “Fireman Sam” about how I said he had to leave the door open. Then he told me I should put Fireman Sam in time out since he wasn’t listening.

Seriously.

Then one day when I told him it was time to come sit down and eat dinner, he told me he couldn’t. I looked over and saw this…

He told me the robot had him tied up and he was stuck.

Sometimes at dinner, he gets in trouble for not sitting nicely on the bench. He will totally act like someone is pulling him off the bench. He talk to whatever imaginary person/thing is pulling him and really give it a hard time about getting him in trouble.

These are the more funny scenarios, don’t even get me started on the “eat your dinner”, “it’s time for bed”, or “it’s time to put your pants and shoes on so we can go” battles we have.

There were a couple of nights this past week that he went to bed hungry due to the “eat your dinner” battle, and he woke us up 4+ time in the middle of the night saying his tummy hurt. He would come into our room and wake us up and then flop down on the floor and say his tummy hurt so much he couldn’t walk.

After two nights of this, and him not really being interested in eating much during the day, I even took him to the doctor…

Yup, that would be him having a ton of fun in the fire truck room at the doctor’s office. Anything wrong with him? Nope, probably not. But the doctor did say we are ahead of the game if we just make him try everything on his plate and offer him a healthy snack before bed. That’s what we have been doing for awhile, so I guess that’s good.

Maybe someday he will win an Oscar. Until then, I may need a glass of wine after bedtime for the next few months!

-Lauren-

15 Months!

I took Adelaide for her 15 month check up last week. So crazy that she is almost 1.5!

Adelaide, here is what you have been up to lately…

• At your check up, you weighed 19.5lbs and were 29 inches tall. You are in the 10th percentile for both. Such a tiny one! Your brother was a good 5lbs bigger at the same age.
• You sleep from 7:30pm to 7:30am every night and then you take an hour nap in the morning and a 2.5ish hour nap in the afternoon.
• You love your sheet protector just like Aedan. You carry it around with you everywhere and you hold it up to your mouth just like Aedan did/does when you both get tired.
• You love breakfast food and can easily finish a bowl of oatmeal, toast and fruit and then still want to finish any of what Aedan leaves from his breakfast. Lunch and dinner can be hit or miss. You do love those fruit and veggie pouches so I can at least count on you getting some good food in then. Even if you and Aedan have the exact same meal on the exact same type of plate, you are convinced that Aedan’s meal is better. Same goes for his drinks. 
• You love to walk/run everywhere. You learned how to walk backwards a few weeks ago and you think that is pretty cool. You will kick a soccer ball all around the backyard even though it is about 1/2 the size of you.
• You also love to climb everything. Your favorites are the bench in the kitchen, the picnic table outside, slides, any little chairs, and piles of pillows or anyone laying or sitting on the ground.
• Your favorite toy is pretty much anything that Aedan is playing with as well as your little people plane and house. You also love shape sorters and books and cell phones.
• You “talk” a lot, but not quite as much as Aedan did at this age. It is funny, because we notice you talking so much more when Aedan is at school. Apparently he talks enough for both of you when he is around. We are starting to understand a few things you say…”mama”, “dada”, “o” (for Hiro), “oh oh” (for uh oh), “shoes”.
• You understand a lot and can follow simple instructions (when you want to).
• You are pretty much obsessed with snacking. You know I carry snacks in my bag and if it is anywhere close to you, you try to find them. You will also bring me my bag at home when you are hungry or random things from the pantry.

Adelaide, you are such a sweet and happy baby. We love seeing your little personality come out more and more each day. You are such a wonderful part of our family and we love you so much! – mommy.

-Lauren-