Just the Five of Us

Introducing Lucas Paul & Bennett Allen

2010-03-15T18:36:00.001-04:00

I'm sure most, if not all, of you have heard but the twins made their arrival last week! I went into labor on Wednesday night, and after slowly laboring all night, gave birth to Lucas Paul at 12:05pm on Thursday, March 11, 2010 and Bennett Allen at 12:25pm. Both boys were 5lbs 6oz. They are doing great and were able to avoid any Special Care nursery or NICU stays, and didn't need any oxygen or help after being born. We came home from the hospital on Saturday. Saturday night was a bit rough - one baby, or both, were crying almost the entire night. But last night we had a really good night. The boys are a bit jaundiced right now, so they are laying on bili beds to help lower their bilirubin levels. Nothing to be too concerned about, and their levels are barely on the high side, but we're just being cautious. This is pretty common with newborns, especially preterm ones (full-term is 37 weeks, the twins were born at 36 weeks, 5 days). Here are some pictures from their first 4 days. We were assuming since they had their own sac/placenta that they would be fraternal, but many signs are telling us they may be identical. They were the exact same weight, almost the same length, head/chest size, etc. Even little things like a newborn rash and their bili levels have been almost identical. There isn't a test or anything to do to figure out if they're identical or not, so I guess we'll continue to wait it out :). Lucas has a bump next to his right nipple and Bennett has a bit of a stork bite above his right eye -- luckily these things save us from mixing them up! They are nursing really well and are very cute. Having two newborns is a bit overwhelming - as you can imagine - but we're managing! Matt has today, tomorrow, and Wednesday off, but has to go back to work on Thursday. I really wish he had the type of job where he'd get 4-6 weeks paternity leave! Kaden was super excited to meet them in the hospital, and is being a great big brother. He's pretty good with them and is accepting that they are a part of our new lives. He has become much more attached to Matt than before - I guess he knows that I have to spend a lot of time with the boys because of nursing and such, but he still enjoys the babies! He gets a bit concerned when they cry and enjoys giving them hugs and kisses.

PS- Most of these pictures of self-explanatory, and time is a bit short here :). In general, I've tried to a match a blanket or outfit with an initial of one of the boys -- here if the blanket has a boat, it's probably Bennett, because b=boat=Bennett. Also, Bennett is in an outfit with cars and the wording says "beep beep", again b=beep beep=Bennett. In some pictures Lucas has an outfit with an alligator because he was Baby A, which = alligator, thus = Lucas :).

Moving belly & Kaden

2010-02-25T23:01:00.003-05:00

Here is a video of what my belly looks like 90% of the day. The babies are definitely filling up all the space and every movement is felt! Some movements, like in the beginning, are obviously much more noticeable than others. I guess that's what happens with 8 limbs and 40 digits crammed together!

Here are some pictures of Kaden this week. We spend most of our day downstairs. That way I can lay on the couch and still play with him. We have the TV, toys, and a bathroom right there, and I make sure to bring him a few drinks & snacks when we go down in the morning so I don't have to do the steps. I also keep a basket of craft stuff next to me so he'll sit next to me on the couch during craft time. I pulled the little colored balls out yesterday and they've entertained him so much in the past 2 days! I was happy to get 30 min. of entertainment... I never expected 2 days! We've sorted them, made mazes for them, paths for them, batted them, stacked them, put them into shapes, etc.....

Twins' Room

2010-02-10T21:53:00.003-05:00

Last weekend we painted the babies' room. Bri & Amber took Kaden with them to a friend's son's 5th birthday party, so Matt & I were able to work without having a 2 year old as a distraction! The room is pretty complete (and very full) now.

Here are the before/during/after pictures

The red stripe after one coat - it ended up needing three. Matt did the borders and I painted in-between.

We also took out the brown baseboard and Matt put in the white stuff. We painted the closet doors, too.

House updates

2010-01-25T21:50:00.002-05:00

A couple weekends ago we decided to finally get rid of the old lady's floral wallpaper (I know, it was probably nice back in the day or decade she grew up, but not so much for us!). My friend Dana came to help us and Uncle Bri/Aunt Amber took Kaden for the afternoon -- both things made the task much more manageable! We also replaced the 1970s baseboard with the more modern white stuff. I decided this was a good time to take pictures to show some of our renovations (kitchen, steps, front room, living room). We will be leaving our room, our bathroom, and Kaden's room alone. The babies' room will get painted in a couple weeks and we'll eventually work on replacing the carpet/flooring.

Before-living room (this first one is when she lived here):

(still old wall paper/baseboard, but our stuff now)

After:

Before (kitchen - water's running/cupboards open b/c it's during the inspection):

After:

Before (front room):

After:

Before (steps to her unfinished basement):

After:

We're slowly making the place ours!! :)

Some random of Kaden

2010-01-25T21:37:00.004-05:00

Kaden is able to crawl in the babies' cribs pretty easily (scary, huh!). The other day I found that he had climbed in and was playing with one of their toys and laughing so hard. He's also starting to realize that the toys I pull out for them look quite familiar to him. Today he saw a musical duck in one of the cribs and took it out and put it in his bed and told me, in the most sad voice, "That's my duck. I weally, weally missed it last night." He probably hasn't touched the duck in over a year :)

Kaden's getting really good at finding the letters to his name on the computer and typing his name. It's so cute and amazing to watch and makes him seem so grown up! The other day I looked over at his computer to see what he was doing and found this:

I was taking pictures of how my belly looks when each baby pushes against his side, and Kaden was sure I should be photographing him. He climbed onto my legs and gave me the biggest smile!

From a snow day the other day:

And then we came inside and he instantly requested hot chocolate with marshmallows.

A couple weekends ago we went up to Ames to go to Mike & Rachel's wedding. Kaden did awesome throwing petals, being quiet during the ceremony, and dancing until 10:30 pm. We didn't take too many pictures because I was usually busy with Kaden and knew that there were many others getting pictures. But, here are a couple cute ones-- the groomsmen wore bright orange hunting vests during the reception. Matt's was a little large and was able to fit Kaden inside of it!

Not enjoying the long drive home...

Things are going well here. I have another doctor's appointment/ultrasound tomorrow to check on the babies. They are probably around 3lbs each now, and will hopefully stay put another 6-7 weeks. We are all staying busy and enjoying Matt being on a less-stressful rotation this month!

28.6 week ultrasound

2010-01-15T16:56:00.002-05:00

My clinic doesn't do 3D ultrasounds, but Matt's on his ultrasound rotation and one of the sonographers offered to do one. Here are some pictures from it - Baby A was way more cooperative than B and got to show off more, but B gets all the space, so maybe they call it even! B also was kind enough to stick his rear in A's face the entire time - I'm sure A enjoys that :).

B:

These are all of A:

They are both doing well -- at just over 26 wks they each weighed 1lb, 15 oz, and now one weighs 2lbs 10 oz and the other 2lbs 12oz, so they each gained almost a pound in 2.5 weeks.

Wall: 1, Kaden: 0

2010-01-13T20:56:00.002-05:00

Tonight Kaden and Matt were playing in the front room. Kaden ran off and tripped and fell right into the corner of the wall. Matt yelled for me, and I walked into the room and found blood gushing/running down Kaden's face and all over his head. Kinda makes a mom's heart stop. After applying some pressure, calming Kaden, and putting ice on it, we realized it was still bleeding. Our next decision was either the ER or Matt stitching/Dermabonding it. Matt really didn't want to spend 2 hours in the ER doing something he could do, so we cleaned it up, and he used Dermabond to seal it together. Kaden sat nicely on my lap watching TV. I was quite happy we didn't have to stitch it, because I knew giving him numbing injections was not going to be fun. He had some Motrin and got to pick what he wanted to for dinner -- ice cream with sprinkles, cherries, whip cream, and vanilla milk. He's now much happier and playing. I kept him up late to keep my eye on him - after the trauma he was pretty tired and had me worried. He's excited that he gets to sleep in Mommy's bed tonight, which will allow me to keep my eye on him throughout the night. Here's some pictures. The discoloration on his shirt is leftover blood, along with the blood on my face. It was amazing how much it bled!

It's a......

2009-11-03T21:52:00.002-05:00

BOY and BOY!!! So much for thinking pink, huh!!

Baby A

Baby B (I labeled b/c it's not as clear)

Profile of Baby A

Profile of Baby B

Trick or Treating, Zoo, and more

2009-11-01T21:07:00.004-05:00

We went to the zoo last weekend. Matt ended his 30-hour shift on Sunday, so Kaden and I picked him up from the hospital and headed to the zoo together. The weather was great and it was so nice to do something like that as a family! The weather was cool enough that almost all the animals were out doing things, so that was also a nice change!

Touching elephant poop

Kaden LOVES LOVES the goats! He loves brushing them, talking to them, crawling around like them, sitting next to them, etc. They just might be his favorite animal!

(notice the growing belly here)

Matt & Kaden in the back of the train. Kaden even got to say "All Aboard!" into the intercom...it was really cute!

Map reader

Go away, paparazzi!!

2 weekends ago Kaden and I went to hang out at Uncle Bri & Aunt Amber's house while Matt was at work. The weather was so perfectly wonderful. I had dressed Kaden in a long-sleeved shirt and it got too hot. Luckily they had an extra (bit large) tie-dyed shirt he wore. They filled a pumpkin with leaves and made marshmallows. Kaden was determined to do it himself, so Uncle Bri gave him all control and just let him fully burn the first two!

Ice cream lover! Kaden eats a bit slow, so when his ice cream was totally melted, I gave him a straw. He thought it was quite fun.

I can't remember if I've posted this one -- this is how I found Kaden one day when I went downstairs after making lunch for the kids!

Fun game

Because St. Louis apparently gets 97.2 inches of rain in the month of October, we quickly ran out of things to do inside. The kids and I both rely on that outside time, so it was a l.o.n.g month! We started making a tent in the living room for fun.

The Magic House -- the children's museum in town -- had a Halloween night a couple weekends ago. Kaden got to wear his costume and play. It was lots of fun, but his costume got a bit warm (I had assumed it would) so he played in the tiger pants and white onsie most of the time!

Excited to have just gotten candy from Emily Elizabeth (from Clifford)

18 week belly. I've been feeling pretty good. Luckily the morning (well, in my case night) sickness has gone away. I started getting some Braxton Hicks contrations toward the end of last week and through this weekend, so I've tried sitting/laying down and resting when that happens. Daycare gets a bit harder everyday. My doctor is letting me work until 26/28 weeks, and I thought he was crazy when he told me I'd have to stop so early. Now I understand why! Our appointment is this Tuesday and we're excited to see the babies and to see how they've grown. In the 2nd picture you can see how my belly is a bit tilted, the babies must be hanging out on the same side!

This last weekend we spent Saturday afternoon raking leaves. And more leaves. And a few more leaves. We filled 15 large paper leaf bags from just our front yard! I'm pretty sure our house gets hit harder than any other house on the block! We tried many methods -- raking and picking up, using the mower/bagger, using the leaf sucker/mulcher, etc. Kaden had fun outside helping us!

Trick or Treating -- Kaden had tons of fun. Luckily Halloween night was on the night finishing Matt's 30-hr shift, so he was around to go with us. We went through our neighborhood and then went to Bri & Amber's house for dinner and to hang out. We initially thought we'd trick-or-treat in their neighborhood, but it was late and I think Kaden was having too much fun playing and didn't want to leave! He isn't too sure about scary things (Uncle Bri & Aunt Amber had Halloweeny noises playing on their porch and Kaden couldn't get in the door fast enough to get away!) but liked getting the candy! He would exclaim "Mommy, I got MORE candy". He ate a few pieces as we walked. When we'd leave a house, he get back in his stroller and say "more candy, please". He is learning that please word helps him get his way! Two funny stories from the night:

House 1 : a woman handed Kaden a piece of candy from her candy tray and he said "no, not that one, THAT one" and pointed to a Twizzler! I guess the kid knows what he wants!

House 2: a man gave Kaden a fun-size candy bar in each hand. I said to Kaden "what do you say?" (ie: thank you) and he put both candies in one hand, reached up to the guy, and said "one more, please"!! HAHA!

The odd part--every single person thought Kaden was a girl? We're really not sure why... it must be his eye lashes?!

Here's our adorable (yet manly) tiger:

2 weeks 2 days

2009-10-18T21:23:00.002-04:00

That's how long until we find out if I've been growing two boys, two girls, or one of each, assuming they both cooperate!! We have a dr. appt on Nov. 3 and will hopefully know then! :) Here's a recent belly shot -- 16 weeks 2 days :

Silly day - Kaden was apparently super silly the other day, because I got several pictures of him doing different things. We were dog sitting Bri & Amber's dog and Kaden decided HE wanted to play in Breck's bed!

But then decided playing next to Breck was a bit more fun

Tired boy playing with his cars. It's amazing how tired he gets, but still NEVER naps!

Kaden loves wearing his socks up high! After getting dressed that morning, he kept running around the house, holding his pant legs up! Ha!

Kaden climbed in Emma's carseat that day and declared that he's a baby! He told me to hold the handle and carry him.. ugh, he's heavy!

After we got the mail, Kaden grabbed the newspaper insert, some colored pencils, and headed to the couch to color. He's so entertaining!

My little drummer boy

Blankie and TV time

Kaden's rubber boots had been in Matt's car for awhile, and he finally brought them in the other day. Kaden was super excited and wanted to wear them right away the next morning. He put them on, then was jumping around the house saying "wooo....woooo" (there are owls on the boots) He looks so hilarious!

I was picking up the toys and Kaden headed to his room to play. This is how I found him -- he does LOVE his books!

Yummy --- Krispy Kreme pumpkin donut!

Kaden and I went to the Magic House a couple weekends ago (the Magic House is the Children's Museum) and they had a resident pumpkin carver doing demonstrations. He carved Kaden's name into a pumpkin -- it looks so neat!

Back to Kaden loving books.. he also loves Talbot. I was making supper and heard Kaden say "let me read to you, Talbot". I looked around the corner to find this:

(ignore the horrible lighting and what it does to Talbot's eyes... I wasn't going to mess around with turning lights on and miss the moment)

Then Talbot got up and moved, so Kaden followed her:

Kaden loves helping in the kitchen, and was a great helper in crunching up the crackers to make tenderloins the other night. He had just come inside from being out in the cold, so his hair is a mess from the stocking hat and his face is red... ignore all that :). The joys of moving back to midwest!

Kaden with 2 of his daycare friends -- they were doing a color matching craft, then later I put a big sheet of paper on the table and they had so much fun coloring wherever they wanted. In one of the pictures, Matthew couldn't figure out where one of the colors should go, so Kaden -- helpful boy he is -- got out of his chair and went over and helped!

I realized that I hadn't ever shared pictures of Kaden's new big boy room -- here are some (these were before bed the other night, so you see his jammies, etc. out, his blankies draped over the bedrail, and his sheets pulled down.). We still need to hang his pictures, but for the most part, it's done.

His bed headboard/footboard are pieces from his crib, and he has the same dresser. Because his room's not real big, the only real toys he has in there are the books on his bookcase, but since the front room is right across the hall, he often brings toys into there to play. His newest enjoyment is having Matt or I play in his room with him, with the lights off and the door closed! He loves listening to music this way and playing with his glow sticks. He's been in his big boy bed for 1.5 months now and has continued to do awesome. It's so much easier on me than putting him in/out of the crib and he stays in his bed -- a huge surprise to me -- especially since he still doesn't nap, but gets quiet time in his room/on his bed everyday.

Matt's doing his MICU (Medicine ICU) rotation right now, which means he's not doing anything ob/gyn related. He likes it much less than any other rotation and will be happy when the 6 (now 5) weeks are up. He works A LOT (90-100 hrs/week) and Kaden and I miss him a lot. I'm just glad he has this rotation now, which I'm feeling good, able to do stuff, and before the babies arrive!

Update from us

2009-09-30T21:19:00.002-04:00

Sorry for the couple month delay... things have been BUSY around here!! As my previous post stated, I started daycare right after that post. I care for 4 kids, plus Kaden, each day. The kids are all great and we're having lots of fun. We're in a great routine and the days fly by. It took Kaden a couple weeks to adjust to having new friends, sharing his toys, and having to share Mommy, but he's doing much better. I have learned that he's definitely a rough-housing boy, but luckily his friends have figured this out and when he hugs them so hard they both fall down, they just laugh and get back up.

Here are some pictures from the last couple months:

When Kaden's looking for something, he puts his hands up by his eyes and calls them his "super hands". I'm pretty sure this came from TV somewhere...but I still think it's the cutest thing! He was looking for the garbage truck here...

With Elena, one of the daycare kiddos

King of the couch -- Kaden has enjoyed some recent changes around the house that have allowed him much more TV time. One being that he stopped napping towards the end of July and the other will be shared later...

Matt's been working crazy hours and was really exhausted one week. Kaden and I made him his favorite cookies to help cheer him up. Kaden enjoyed licking the beaters!! :)

The Parents as Educators group in St. Louis put on a truck "festival" the other weekend. We decided to take Kaden, even though I know we both had visions of the last time we took him a to see big trucks (crying, screaming, asking to leave, clutching to our waists). He surprised us both and loved it!

Riding a school bus

Walking on a flatbed truck

Driving a big truck

And enjoying an ice cream sandwich on the way home

"dancing" with Talbot

I took Kaden to the Transportation Museum a month or so ago. He had fun, even though it was almost 100 degrees and we were both WAY too hot!

I had to run inside real quick the other day and came out to find Elena and Kaden swinging and holding hands. My heart just melted! It was so sweet!

Having fun inside with the tunnel and catching bubbles

Kaden really enjoys playing with playdoh and has quite the imagination. He LOVES baseball (well, really any type of sport) and was pretending to use a "bat" to hit a "ball". Cute!

Iowa State Fair -- in August we took a weekend to go up to the State Fair in Des Moines. I hadn't been in several years and Matt had never been. Plus we knew Kaden would love it! We all had a good time and got to see several family members.

Kaden was so excited to jump on this, until it was actually HIS turn! Then he cried and cried and I had to go out there, get on the trampoline, and show him it was okay! haha

We took a very quick trip to Minneapolis/Stacyville last weekend to buy our new-to-us van. Matt took one flight and Kaden and I took another (it was cheaper this way) but as usual, Kaden and I had horrible luck and instead of getting to Minneapolis at 10am, we spent extra hours in Milwaukee and got to Minneapolis at 3:30. We visited Mall of America with Aunt Debbie, saw Rainforest Cafe, rode some rides in the mall, then drove to Stacyville to visit with Grandpa Bruce, Grandma Sherri, and Aunt Nicole. Kaden had fun driving the tractor, playing baseball, and playing with a very friendly kitten. This was him waiting in the airport -- watching Mickey Mouse on the ipod.

As I stated earlier, Kaden stopped napping a couple months ago. He spends about an hour in his room everyday, but never naps! An average 2 year old should be getting 14-15 hours of sleep/day...not Kaden, he gets 10-11! I know he's exhausted but have no idea how to give him more sleep. Here's what he looks like during his TV time in the afternoon.

Other changes -- we moved Kaden out of his crib into a big boy bed at the beginning of the month. He's done great. I was fully expecting him to get out of his bed and play in his room, but he never does. Not even during his hour "rest" time. He just waits for me. He really likes his bed and I love being able to lay and cuddle with him while we read bedtime stories. It's also nice on nights when Matt works all night because I can go in and sleep with him... so cozy! He also had his first ear infection a couple weeks ago. He was really tough during it and mentioned to me a few times that his ear hurt, but never ran a fever/cranky/etc... I eventually took him in, and sure enough, EI it was! He's almost done with antibiotics and is doing a bit better.

And, even bigger changes--- as most of you know, Matt and I are expecting again! We found out during the last week in July and were very excited. In August we had our first ultrasound that showed it was twins! We were completely shocked and it took a good 2-3 weeks to settle in and feel real. I haven't been feeling great -- every night around 5ish I start getting super nauseous, sick, feeling exhausted, etc. It's all I can do to make supper, clean up, get Kaden and myself clean, and get Kaden to bed. I am now in my 2nd trimester and have felt a bit better the past 2 days. I REALLY hope it continues! So, between being busy with the daycare and going to bed at 8pm because I feel awful, the blog has really been ignored. The babies are due around April 3rd, but will probably come sometime between the 2nd week in February and 2nd week in March.

First ultrasound

And a couple days ago

Baby A (I think?)

Baby B (I think?)

A couple belly shots, because I know that's what everyone asks for! The first is about a week after finding out. I had started showing and my pants were getting tighter. I really started thinking it might be twins, but Matt told me the chances are so low, that it's barely a chance! Ha!

almost 5 weeks

13.5 weeks

We don't know gender yet, but will find out in the next month or so and will be sure to share! (think pink...think pink...think pink)

Matt has been busy with work and averages 80-90 hours/week. He's doing amazing and his constantly getting compliments at how great he's doing (as if any of us are surprised). He enjoys what he's doing and finds he really likes the surgeries.

sigh Last day....

2009-08-06T22:33:00.002-04:00

Today was my last day of being a stay-at-home-mom. *sigh* This summer has flown by and Kaden and I have had so much fun together. We've traveled, visited familiy/friends, had many picnics, hung out in our jammies until noon, read countless books, gone to storytimes, the zoo, the children's museum, and many parks. I have loved it, but it had to come to an end....

Tomorrow Will comes for the day, and on Monday Elena and Matthew start, and later in the week Will and Emma. Starting on the 17th all 4 kids plus Kaden will be here. Our days will be busy and Kaden will love having friends, and I am excited to start doing daycare again, but nothing can replace just being a mom.

Here is a picture from today from our last today --

Painting outside in the middle of the afternoon. I have loved being able to do spur-of-the-moment crafts around the house, which is something that isn't as easy to do with 5 kids that are 2 and under.

Here are also a few from the past week--

Loving his desk (getting his crayons out of his drawer)

Water table fun

As for daycare... I do have 4 kids that will be starting in the next week or so. Matthew is a week older than Kaden and I'm super excited about this. They are going to love having one another and will form a great friendship (I hope) and will get to learn about sharing and taking turns together (hopefully in the nicest way possible). Elena is about an year and a half, Will just turned 4 months, and Emma is 3 months. Busy, busy!

Our house

2009-08-03T21:23:00.003-04:00

Things are almost complete with the house and the basement now looks organized and set up, as opposed to a mess of drywall, mud, dust, paint, etc. It never would have been complete without the help of lots of family and Matt's amazing skills and determination. Here are some recent pictures:

Also, here are some before pics:

Basement (extra room)

Laundry area

Daycare/play room

Kitchen

The kitchen -- we painted the walls, changed the gold hardware to silver, and changed the faceplates/switches from yellowish to white.

The living room -- not much has been done, however the hallway in the back of the picture has been repainted and in the entryway (that you can't see) I removed all the wallpaper and painted it (with the help of Nicole and Sherri!). We have started hanging pictures, but still have several to do in the next couple weeks.

The middle bedroom upstairs -- nothing really done, but it has fewer boxes than before!

The front room -- it's no longer Kaden's primary playroom and has a few toys, the dining room, our desk, and Kaden's desk. The woman that lived here before us left the desk we gave to Kaden, and he loves it! We also gave him our old laptop so he enjoys being on his computer when we're on ours! He loves crawling up on his chair and coloring. He keeps paper, crayons, and pens in his drawer! My next painting job is painting this room.

The steps headed downstairs -- they are no longer 1970s style!

The playroom

In the back corner is a little baby section for Will (4/5 months) and Emma (3 months). That way they can safely play on the floor without the other three tripping over them! It's such an awesome, spacious room!

The area at the bottom of the steps -- Matt put down the flooring. This will be the painting/lunch/snack area.

Bathroom

Matt's work area -- the bonus of finishing the basement has been getting lots of new, manly tools!

Across from Matt's work area -- where the 2 younger babies sleep, plus the freezer.

My wonderful laundry area

Extra guest room -- and also where the two older kids will nap

The closet that Matt will work on in a few weeks

The pantry area --

And some random pictures --

Kaden only naps 2-3 days week now, and on the other days he reads, talks, and plays in his crib for 30-45 minutes. The other day I heard him talking and happened to look at the monitor to see he had pulled his laundry hamper up over the crib and set it up in his crib! He was quite proud of himself.

Kaden enjoying painting on his new easal in the playroom

Kaden and I ventured downtown to City Garden last week to play outside and have a picnic. I am quite proud I got downtown (thanks to Bri for directions!), parked, went to the park, and got out of the city all on my own and with Kaden! It was fun and quite the experience. Kaden really enjoyed the picnic.

This is how close we were to the arch!!

Matt was really tired last week and when Kaden and I came inside to read books and lay Kaden down for a nap, he stayed outside. After leaving Kaden's room, this is how I found him:

He said it was a great nap!!

Matt's First (night?) Day

2009-06-21T21:29:00.002-04:00

Matt's first rotation officially begins tonight, well, technically tomorrow, at 12:01am. Because interns don't really start until Monday, he won't go in until 12:01, but other nights he'll usually work from 6 or 7pm until 9am. He'll then come home and sleep. He'll have about an hour each day to hang out with Kaden and I, relax, read, research about patients, etc. Unfortunately we're not done sanding/mudding the basement, so this week his hour break we'll spend in the basement working. We're hoping this phase will all be done by Sunday night.

I can't believe the beginning of his residency is already here. 4 years ago we thought this day would never come, and now it's here! I'm not sure either of us are ready. It's going to be a busy, crazy year and I know Kaden and I will spend lots of hours alone and Matt will be working very hard. I hope he has time to relax, sleep, and enjoy himself while staying so busy.

Busy doesn't quite come close....

2009-06-19T23:06:00.002-04:00

Wow, it's been a long time since I've updated the blog (as you all know!), but trust me, I have (many) good reasons!!

The beginning of May we finished packing the house (well, I packed and Matt worked for the Guard) and fixed up little things around the house, including cutting the grass. And by cutting the grass, I mean the tiny patch we had in the "backyard" using a pair of scissors. Kaden decided to help Matt one day.

We had to say good-bye to many good friends.

Colin, Isaac, and Sophia (minus Sophia) who Kaden played with every week.

Matthew and Andrew from playgroup

Mema -- our wonderful next-door neighbor

And Julie, another wonderful neighbor

And of course good bye to our first home ...

Then we loaded everything into our huge (26') uhaul, my car, and Matt's car. Luckily Matt's Aunt Debbie, brother Mike, and future sister-in-law Rachel were there to help. That night his mom and sister showed up to help celebrate Matt's graduation from medical school. He's now officially Dr. Matt Weis!! Congrats, honey!

Kaden slept through the graduation, which actually worked out to be perfect, because I could sit and enjoy the graduation, he wasn't all squirmy, and he got to catch up on some much needed sleep.

We then drove all the way from Raleigh to St. Louis with the help of Matt's mom, Sherri, and sister, Nicole. Nicole rode with Kaden and I to help me entertain him, Matt drove the uhaul, and his mom drove his car. We unloaded the uhaul and Matt worked on various projects around the house for the next week while I unpacked all the boxes and set up the house.

Some of the projects that have kept us busy have been:

Building a swing set --

Which could never have been completed without the help of some supervision.

Kaden decided the lawn was a bit long, so he helped us out by giving it a quick trim

We landscaped an area in the backyard

Built a big sandbox

And our largest project...finishing the basement (still a work in progress) into a large playroom/daycare room and a 4th bedroom

The basement has taken many hours and the help of many people (thanks Mom, Dad, Chris, Heather, Hunter, Bri, Amber, Bruce, Sherri, Nicole...) and luckily we are starting to see a bit of light at the end of the tunnel. Thankfully Kaden is a good boy and entertains himself quite well, as he spent many hours alone (or with supervision other than his parents) while Matt and I worked downstairs or "helping" us.

We did take some time out to enjoy some (microwaved) s'mores

Here are some finished (up until this point) pictures of the house -- I'm sure you can figure out the rooms -- including a new bedroom set, kitchen table, dining room table, desk, coffee table, and end tables. You may also notice the new blinds Matt installed in the living room and kitchen area. The front room (with the desk) will be our office and the toys will be moved downstairs to the playroom in a month.

We also took a wonderful trip to Maui, Hawaii in May -- Kaden stayed with my parents while Matt and I enjoyed some time to ourselves, sans kids. It was great. The scenery is beautiful, water warm, sand perfect. We spent many hours sitting by the pool and ocean reading books and just enjoying ourselves. While there we also did some sight seeing, went to a luau, did the drive to Hana, went to a comedy show, and did a sunset dinner cruise.

(where we sat at the luau)

(pig from the luau)

We saw many waterfalls during the drive to Hana, and even ventured into the COLD water in some of them!

The drive was on a very narrow, windy road with dozens of one-laned bridges

Waves crashing against the lava rock

In a lava tube

Rainbow Eucalyptus trees -- the trunks were striped with red and green

We even saw a few mongoose (mongeese?) while we were there

view from our room:

Our flight home was overnight -- we left Maui at 5:30pm and after connecting in Honolulu, we reached Seattle at 5:30am (and lost a few hours). This was sunrise over the mountains near the Seattle airport.

We also made it up to Stacyville for family pictures, pizza by the pond, and a graduation celebration for Mike & Matt. While there Kaden got to go on several tractor rides with Grandpa Bruce, looked at the animals, jumped on the trampoline, listened to music at Friday Night Out, enjoyed some ice cream, and went fishing. He caught a fish within the first 5 minutes, unlike when he went fishing with Grammie and Papa. Kaden was surprisingly unhappy with his catch and preferred casting and reeling in nothing instead of catching an actual fishy!!

The entire Weis group

with Matt's family

Us

We then came home for a few more days, then Kaden and I went to Centerville while Matt has his orientation week at Barnes. Kaden loved riding horses, watching Haven's softball game, playing pool (or the "ball game" as he called it), playing at the beach at Rathbun Lake, cooking s'mores, and seeing family.

After we got back from Centerville today, I unpacked, then we all went to a BBQ at one of Matt's new co-worker's house. Kaden was a happy guy.

Oye! Our son...

2009-04-26T22:40:00.002-04:00

Kaden has started getting into the whole "2 year old toddler" thing. Here's a bit from his weekend.

We took him to a Big Truck event through Raleigh Parks and Rec. It was very cool -- many trucks (diggers, dump trucks, fire engine, police car, garbage truck, etc) set up and the workers allowed the kids (mostly boys) to run the machines, honk the horns, etc. We thought Kaden would love it since he loves all of those machines. Nope. He cried! As soon as he got there he started saying "Kaden go home, Kaden go home." He tightly held onto Matt or I and would not release. A few times he was even shaking. Silly kid -- even the girls that were there were smiling and enjoying the trucks!! Apparently Kaden only likes those machines from the safety of his house or car.

Yesterday we went for a walk after dinner. The last block on the way home we let Kaden out of the stroller/bike and he runs/walks home. He kicked a ball and tripped and skinned his knee. No tears though (go figure, he cries at the sight of fun trucks, but scraping his knee, no!) and just wanted a kiss. Then he was off again. His knee looks painful though -- this was what it looked like tonight.

Then the true 2-year old test. He was playing a game on the computer and Matt and I stepped outside to see what needed packing in the storage unit outside. I came back in 5 min. later to find this:

Luckily it all snaps back together, and Matt and I tried to tell him it was bad, but it was so hard to do between our laughs and smiles.

And one with Kaden:

Busy!

2009-04-24T22:48:00.003-04:00

We have been keeping super busy. Matt's official last day for UNC was last Tuesday. He rode along in the ambulance for the day, but didn't have any "duties" as he was only there to observe. He had a huge smile on his face when he got home that night, knowing he was DONE!!! On Wednesay he started working/making up drills for the Guard. He worked Wed-Friday this week, and for the next two weeks he'll be working almost every day (M-F). He will be done in September, but is trying to work on drills for June/July/August/September so he doesn't have to find someplace in St. Louis to do them, all while trying to fit them into his intern schedule. This coming week is the last week of daycare. I have also been trying to pack 2-3 boxes every day, just so I don't have an overwhelming amount next week. It's amazing how much stuff fits into a house! We plan on packing quite a bit this weekend, as next weekend Matt has drill and then the following weekend we're moving. Wow! Kaden was "helping" me pack today and was playing with one of his favorite books. He brought it to me and put it in the box and said "take it to new house". So cute!

Kaden has also been missing Talbot a lot lately. He saw a picture of her in one of his books today and was beyond excited. He sat in the rocking chair just looking and smiling at the picture. We often have squirrels in the backyard and he knows Talbot likes watching them. Yesterday he saw them outside and yelled "Talgee, Talgee... Squirrels!", then he realized she wasn't here. So, he got his stuffed dog animal and held him up to the window so he could watch the squirrels. Then he wanted the dog next to him the entire day. Today he found a blankie from when he was little that has a stuffed dog attached to the blanket using a string. He held the dog and "read" a book to him. We went on a walk tonight and Kaden was so excited everytime we saw a dog. I can't wait to see their reunion in a couple weeks (even though we know she's loving staying at Uncle Bri's house and playing with Breck everyday).

Here are some pictures of our week:

Climber--

Showing the "dog" the squirrels

Playing on the computer (notice the boxes/packed stuff in the background)

Using his tools the measure the wall. According to him, it's "fifteen"

It was really warm out today, so I got the water table out for Kaden. Then we put a little water in the plastic pool for him to stomp in. Then he sat down. In his clothes. Once that got cold, he wanted more warm water in the water table. Once that task was complete, he moved into the water table. His love of water has been re-ignited from last summer.

After dinner we went for a walk. Kaden enjoyed riding his bike while eating his ice cream cone. Then we visited the waterfalls on a trail near our house (we will REALLY miss this neighborhood) and Kaden threw rocks in the water.

Kaden pointing at Daddy, who was getting big rocks for him

Off to find more big rocks

Of course he found a stick resembling a fishing rod....

Notice the drool:

He really wanted to "fish" in the waterfall, but didn't realize the water was too deep right there. I tried picking him up so at least he could reach it, and he kept saying "down, mommy. let go, mommy"...

Headed home

A Birthday Party and a few others

2009-04-18T20:42:00.004-04:00

Today we went to Kaden's friend Colin's 2nd birthday party. The weather was perfect -- sunny and 80 degrees -- and the party was a lot of fun. They rented a bounce house for the kids to play in. Kaden wasn't too sure about it at first, but after awhile (and having me go into the bounce house with him clinging to my side) he eventually warmed up to it and was bouncing all around.

In the beginning he would only get down if I was holding both hands. At the very beginning he had found a rock in the yard, and that was how I convinced him to get into the bounce house, by telling him "lets bring the rock!!” so for awhile I was holding each hand and he was holding a rock in one of the hands!

To get out of the bounce house there was a slide, which REALLY helped Kaden ease his fears. He did well with the slide.

And even go in on his own a few times!

Every time I'd try to get a picture of Matt and Kaden, this kid would join in the picture. This is the best one I got :).

Mmm.... then the kids had cupcakes with gummy bears and jelly beans on top! Kaden really didn't care much about the frosting/cupcake, but he loved the candies on top!

Juliet was also at the party. Kaden was excited about that. She was sitting in this little push car and Kaden decided to push her for a ride! They were so cute!

"Here, Juliet, let me turn the radio on for you for your listening pleasure."

"And we're off!!"

A few intermission hugs...

Here he is showing off his muscles to Juliet by pushing one-handed. What a show off. :)

Then Kaden left Juliet for bigger and better things...like sticks.

He really enjoyed the party and didn't want to leave!

We've started slowly packing some boxes in the past week. Kaden sees us packing the baby things, and decides he likes them all over again. Silly boy!

Then when we were packing one room he entertained himself by sitting on his bike.

Last week we used the old plastic Easter eggs and had an Easter egg hunt inside. I filled the eggs with Cheerios and hid them (well, not so much hid, but placed them) around the living room and Marie, Juliet, and Kaden searched for them. I put 2 jelly beans in one of the eggs and Kaden was beyond excited to find that egg. He thought the jelly beans were way better than Cheerios. The egg hunt was a lot of fun for all 3 kids.

A couple daycare pictures

Kaden frequently demonstrates to us how bright he is and what a quick learner he is. He's mastered identifying all the uppercase letters, numbers 1-10, and all of the basic shapes. I decided to start working with him on more complicated shapes (hexagon, trapezoid, octagon, etc). While we were in St. Louis he started yelling "octagon! Octagon!”... Sure enough, there was a stop sign a few streets over that he had spied. This week we were playing with the train set. We often set up different track shapes -- usually by chance. As soon as I put the next to last track piece in, Kaden exclaimed "trapezoid!"... Sure enough, he was right. I told him to stand in the trapezoid and tell me what it was. So that's what he's doing in the picture.

While I was cleaning up lunch that day I could hear Kaden saying "I see blue. I see green. I see Thomas." ...and so on. I looked in the living room and found him sitting in the chair reading his book to himself!

And a few silly, happy, ice cream eating boy pictures.

St. Louis, Easter, and our house

2009-04-12T21:07:00.006-04:00

Last week we drove to St. Louis with a goal of finding a house. We looked at 17 houses on Sunday and another 17 on Monday. We are very lucky/grateful that my parents were able to come to St. Louis and watch Kaden for us while we looked at houses. He would not have enjoyed it, and we were able to focus a lot more on house shopping without him. We had a top 3 that we liked, and on Tuesday we went back to those 3 with my parents to look everything over more carefully to rank them 1, 2, and 3. That afternoon we put an offer on our #1 house, and by 9 pm all papers were signed and it was official. We are set to close at 9am on May 12th. Matt graduates the night of the 9th, we will leave the morning of the 10th and get to St. Louis sometime on the 11th. We'll close the next morning. It's all working out so perfectly!

Little Uncle Bri -- coloring on his work drawings

Uncle Bri & Kaden

Kaden thought Breck's bed was quite comfy!

Reading the paper with Papa

Soaking little plastic capsules so they would grow into dinosaurs. Talbot was really intrigued!

Kaden LOVES Uncle Bri & Aunt Amber's cat, Sasha. Luckily she's a (pretty) patient cat and would tolerate quite a bit of Kaden's love. I'm sure Kaden will be seeing A LOT of Sasha in the next 4+ years -- she'll either decide she hates him and will hide or they will become best friends. Kaden's hoping for the later choice.

Matt, my parents, and I took Kaden to Chuck E. Cheese one afternoon -- his first time ever! He enjoyed it for the most part, but was quite scared of the mechanical toys at first!

Him crying and saying/signing "no more, no more, no more"

More with Sasha...

The last night we were there Uncle Bri, Aunt Amber, and the three of us went to a Mexican restaurant. Uncle Bri put the booster seat up high - Kaden enjoyed this new "seat"!!

The drive home. Kaden did SO well on both 14.5 hour drives. Both times we left around 4:30/5am and drove straight through. On the way there he took one 1-hour nap the entire time, but read lots of books, colored, played with markers, and watched a bit of TV. The way home he took a little bit longer nap (1.5 hours) and watched a lot of TV. These pictures are all from our drive home.

Early on in the drive... happy for TV.

A little bit later -- eating Cheerios and watching TV

Quite a bit later in the trip.. a new outfit, new snack, and starting to get really bored/tired of the drive

Almost home. His brain was dead and he was so over the car ride!

Lucky for all of us we only have to do the drive one more time! YAY!

While we were in St. Louis we celebrated Easter a little early. We dyed Easter eggs, had an Easter egg hunt in the front yard, and had a typical Easter dinner. Kaden liked dying the eggs, but didn't understand the term "gentle" as he threw them into the dye containers. During the egg hunt he would find an egg, then squeeze it until it split in two. He thought this was hilarious and we were all glad it was an outside egg hunt!

He really enjoyed the Easter grass

My Dad

Matt

My Mom

The dogs really wanted to join us

Playing with his new sidewalk chalk with Aunt Amber

Aunt Amber tried teaching Kaden hopscotch

Our house!! The home was built in 1979 and the original owner still lives in it. She remembers picking out all the style options 30 years ago. She is 80 now and is moving into assisted living and is ready to downsize. She put the house on the market last week, and we put an offer on it 4 days later! We had the opportunity to meet her and she is a super nice lady. She has taken GREAT care of the home, and although our decorating styles are a *bit* different, you can at least kinda see what the house looks like before we move in. Kaden's favorite color right now is green, so he approved of our house because of the green door and green shutters!! :)

Basement -- this will eventually be a 4th bedroom downstairs

Laundry area --

Downstairs -- we will finish this area and make it a large playroom/daycare area

Great storage shelves next to/behind the stairs

Kitchen -- it has a small eat-in kitchen area in one of the corners

Living room -- the only room with hardwoods, exactly how we wanted it!

The 3 seasons room -- off the living room and looking out into our fenced-in yard

Our room

Kaden's bathroom

Extra room -- this will eventually be another kid's room so we don't have any plans for it

Kaden's room -- we're excited that it's already painted blue!

Formal living room/dining room -- this room is huge. We will use the formal living room as our office and set up a couple desks and some shelves for Kaden's toys, and then use the dining room as a dining room

Laundry chute

Our bathroom -- it comes off the master bath

The house has these GREAT floor length, newer windows that I love! This one is in the kitchen looking at our yard

Front of the house

The next few weeks are going to be super busy. Matt has one week and 2 days left of med school rotations, but unfortunately his rotations are mostly 3pm-11pm, which means Kaden and I are alone for dinner, clean up, bathtime, bed time, but at least we get some Matt/Daddy time in the mornings. We also will be busy packing our entire house. My last day of daycare will be May 1. That gives us a week to finish packing and we have family arriving towards the end of the week to celebrate Matt's graduation. Hopefully I'll have time to update the blog, but if I don't, now you'll know why! Plus Kaden's schedule has been off and several nights have been spent trying to get him back asleep and back asleep and back asleep.... the next 2 months will be hard on him, too. Also, we left Talbot with my brother and Amber. She HATES the car, so instead of making her take 3 trips, they offered to keep her until May. She'll love staying with them, but we already miss having her around. Our new house is 8-10 min. from Bri & Amber -- we are all excitd about that.

Animal Sounds video

2009-03-27T14:01:00.002-04:00

There is a toddler website that Kaden really enjoys playing. It has various ABC, colors, shapes, animal sound games that he likes, even though he already knows those things! The other day we were playing the animal sounds one and he would guess wrong (on purpose) and then tell me "noooo" and shake his head. It was cute! Here's a video of it.

Birthday Boy and others

2009-03-27T08:10:00.003-04:00

Kaden loves riding in the backpack to go through the woods and take Talgee swimming. He enjoys finding rocks of all sizes and throwing them into the water, which really confuses Talgee because she can't "retrieve" the rock. We will really miss being a 15 min walk from the woods, lakes, and quietness. Here are some pics of the day.

Kaden noticed the ducks by Talgee's frisbee

Throwing rocks into the water

Cheeser!

Trying to show us he's "2"

kinda giving up...

He ventured off to find rocks

Hmm...water puddles. Looks like fun... I wonder....

YES! It is fun!

Bummed when Mommy & Daddy wouldn't let him continue getting soaked because it wasn't real warm outside.

Finding another tiny puddle and nonchalantly playing in it

Fishing with fishing rods of course

The morning after his birthday party. He got this cool ABC floor puzzle, but really wanted to hold D. He wasn't happy when I told him no

After we got the puzzle finished I let him get D.

Playing with the balloons

Playing with some birthday gifts

lining all his cars up

parking them in the dirt

Coloring in his washable book, while having a delicious snack of strawberries

After dinner he got some ice cream, which he loved, and got to eat with a big-person spoon!

And a funny one:

His Birthday Day

Breakfast

Snack of a Mickey sucker (from Christmas)

Lately he has started taking his snack and going right around the corner of the kitchen to sit on the carpet to eat it. So weird! He was also sticking his finger in the baby's mouth!

His favorite entertainment -- watching the garbage truck!!

Coloring a picture I drew for him (which he patiently waited for me)

He wanted me to dump the crayons, which I rarely do b/c of the mess, but since it was his birthday, I gave in. He then proceeded to sort out the green and blue ones. He knows all his colors now,except for red. Oddly enough he even knows pink, but still can't identify red!

EXACTLY 2 years old - 1:37pm -- our camera flash flickered to adjust to the lighting, so he started to rub his eyes. I quickly snapped the picture, then left the room. He went right back to sleep.

Uncle Bri/Aunt Amber sent him a fun tool set/tool belt to go with his tool bench. He's all set now! He really enjoyed the tape measure and putting the tools in his belt.

Opening presents that night

His first piece of Thomas the Train stuff---- he was SO excited.

Opening his train whistle

Amazed when Daddy made the choo choo sound with the whistle

trying to do it himself

train track for his Thomas -- he instantly carried the box over wanting it opened

Putting the track together -- all on his own!

Then he added a piece!

His cake for the night

Happy 2nd Birthday Song!

2009-03-21T22:20:00.001-04:00

Kaden's Birthday Party

2009-03-21T21:18:00.002-04:00

We had Kaden's Birthday Party today at a park near our house. Thankfully the weather cooperated, and although it was a bit breezy, it was warm in the sun. Kaden was so excited for the party and squealed when he saw his friends. He thoroughly enjoyed his cupcake and ice cream and chips, too. Here are some pics of his day.

Passing out his goodie bags to his friends

Playing with his friends

Kaden is with his friends Sophia and Colin here. I'm really good friends with their mom, Angela. She also does in-home daycare in our neighborhood so we see each other a lot. I will miss her a lot when we move, and Kaden will miss Sophia and Colin immensely.

Opening a few presents after we got home

Lincoln Logs

Sticker book & crayons

Food cutting set

A few others --

I have started appliqueing on some of Kaden's shirts. Here's a dog bone one

Don't they look like an old married couple with Marie tending their baby?

Coloring

Determination -- we had the yellow plastic pool over the green turtle sandbox lid and Kaden really wanted to play. On his own he moved both coverings and got in!

One of Kaden's friends couldn't be at his party, so he brought his birthday present early last week during playgroup. Kaden was super excited about an early present!

Match Day is here!

2009-03-19T21:57:00.005-04:00

Today was the big day -- Match Day. The day we'd been waiting for for months. Matt got his letter just after noon and was sweet enough to bring it home so we could open it together. Moments after walking in the door he said "are you ready?" as he ripped the envelope open. Inside we read that he matched at his #1 choice --

Washington University in St. Louis, MO!!!

We are both super excited and look forward to this new journey in our lives. We will hopefully be looking for a house next month, and will hopefully be able to move right in, assuming things go as planned.

Thanks for thinking of us. I'll continue to update here on Kaden and the house/move news.

Here are pictures of the 2 gifts Kaden and I gave Matt today since we're so proud of him!!

and a coaster:

Videos!

2009-03-18T20:29:00.002-04:00

Here are several cute videos from Kaden this past week.

Kaden loves music and dancing.

A is for Alligator... we've read so many books like that that Kaden has started remembering what object matches the letter. We play the "A is for ___" game a lot and he will often change the objects that he says. It's so cute!

The other day -- after having so many rainy days in a row -- Kaden was watching out the window, I think in hopes of it actually being nice. He happened to see a few birds flying around and started saying "Talgee, look at birds. Talgee, look at birds". Of course by the time I got the camera he had stopped and started repeating me. I continued taping for awhile, so you have an idea of what his days are like!

Kaden uses the expression "Mommy/Daddy/Talgee/Blankie/Kaden/Etc, where are you?" quite frequently. I love the inflection in his voice. I finally caught him saying it on tape. Cute boy, huh!

In the last month or so Kaden has started making this noise with his mouth. He somehow sucks in his bottom lip a bit to make the noise -- neither Matt nor I have been able to copy his noise. The noise is often followed by the letter B -- again, we have no idea why! If I randomly ask him to "make his noise" he knows exactly what I mean and can do it. It's so funny! This video is obviously before his haircut!

Enjoy!

On a side note - Kaden ended up getting quite the cold yesterday and went to bed tonight with a 102.5 fever. Please send us get-healthy-quick vibes, since his birthday party is on Saturday!!

I will update tomorrow after we hear where Matt matched!

St. Pats Day, Tool Bench, and Haircut

2009-03-17T22:08:00.002-04:00

Kaden got his hair cut on Saturday. We took him to a kids cut place, hoping it would help ease his anxiety and tears. They have 4 kids seats in the shape of various forms of transportation, but he still picked sitting on my lap! But, they let the kids pick out a video to watch while getting their hair cut, so even though he cried almost the whole time, he at least sat still!

A sucker for a being a brave boy

Jigglers! Kaden helped me make the jello for jigglers today and then used the cookie cutters to cut out his favorite shapes. He loves to help me cook. Today he was playing with his toys and I called for him to come help me cook. He instantly threw down his toys and came running into the kitchen. It's so fun and adorable watching him help.

I found an awesome tool bench for Kaden on craigslist that is in like new condition. Kaden woke up from his nap to find his new toy. He loves it!

The power jigsaw tool makes a noise that must remind Kaden of my hair dryer. He took the toy and waved it over Talgee saying "dry, dry!", then went to Matt and did the same and then to me. It was a bit hilarious watching him use a power tool as a hair styling accessory!

We found this fishing game this weekend and thought it would be fun to get a game the 3 of us could play together. I love this toddler age! Kaden does quite well with the game, especially since it's geared towards the 4+ age. He can't quite catch a fish (I have to admit that Matt and I also had some difficulty) but he figured out he can use a finger to catch one! He calls out a color, then goes after that fish.

Juliet! Kaden had some fun playing with the play kitchen yesterday morning with Juliet. Now that she's crawling and cruising, Marie & Kaden have started realizing she's a playmate and not just a baby. It's so fun to watch them play!

Kaden found my hair ties and insisted I put them in his hair. Even after the hair cut, he still has enough hair on top to put in the hair tie.

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Love, Kaden

It's almost Thursday! Most of you know that this Thursday is Match Day. This is the date that we have been patiently waiting for for several months. We will find out where Matt matches and where we'll be moving to in May. He spent many hours (and money!) traveling to several states interviewing during the months of December and January and now is when all his hard work pays off. On Monday he got an email notifying him that he had indeed "matched". It was a simple, to the point email that stated

Congratulations. You have matched.

Very few words, and yet they mean so much! At noon on Thursday he'll receive an envelope and inside it will be our future. I will update that evening letting you all know where we'll be moving.

More!

2009-03-11T21:35:00.003-04:00

Kaden always enjoys giving Talbot her treats when she comes inside or has been extra patient with kids crawling on her or pulling at her. His newest trick is getting her to jump by standing on the couch and holding out the treat. The other day he was doing this, but instead of giving her the treat he decided to turn around and throw it behind the couch. He was so excited that he quickly got off the couch, ran behind it, only to find that Talbot had beat him and eaten her treats. He was quite upset and was sadly saying "Talgee (how he says Talbot -- he's basically renamed her because that's how we refer to her now) Drop! Talgee Drop!" and crying. It's so funny when he gets mad because Talgee actually ate the treat that he got to give to her! PS-- ignore the hair clippie -- I had one in and he kept telling me Kaden's hair, Kaden's hair.

Today after we got back from a walk we were getting ready to go out back to play and for some reason Kaden got the idea to hang out in the basket below the single stroller. He was beyond happy with himself, and of course he's tiny enough to fit! He kept saying "Marie walk Marie walk"... meaning he wanted Marie to sit in the stroller seat and go for a walk like this. Funny, kid!

And a few more water table pictures -- in one he's trying to get a drink!

Cookies & Water Table Fun

2009-03-09T22:14:00.002-04:00

Wow, it's amazing the difference a week makes. Last Sunday it was snowing and so cold. This sunday it was 82 degrees and super nice!! We finally got to get the water table out and play. Kaden instantly remembered his love for water and had a lot of fun! Before playing with the water table we were giving Talbot a bath, and we were both having a pretty lazy day so Kaden was still in his jammie top and I put shorts on him, so ignore his horrible outfit. And, yes, his hair is a bit shaggy, but he has a hair appointment for Saturday.

Enjoy!

We recently found an awesome container of cookie cutters so I promised Kaden we could make cookies. He had fun making cookies in the shape of cars, hearts, dogs, and ABCs to name a few! Then he got to help mix in the food coloring and decorate the cookies. He's such a fun boy!

Look at his head in this one. After playing with the water table during the day I was changing his clothes and he slipped and bonked his head. It cut open immediately and I felt horrible. He was a tough boy though! You can also notice the drool that comes from his mouth when he's concentrating on something.

Mmm...he couldn't wait to taste the frosting!

Clifford perhaps?

T-Ball!

2009-03-09T22:05:00.003-04:00

Here are a couple cute videos of Kaden playing with his t-ball set. He loves playing "bat and ball" and is actually pretty good. During daycare he's not allowed to play in the house, but after hours we let him play! He also gets to play bat and ball outside and he loves that. As always, he has to be holding things in his left hand and usually only uses his right hand! Such a silly boy!

More from Us

2009-03-05T13:10:00.003-05:00

Playing with Marie - Kaden's best buddy

He is going to miss her so much when we move!

When did these two babies become toddlers....

It was MeMa's (our neighbor) birthday last week. Kaden helped bake a cake for her and picked out a bouquet of flowers for her. He even colored her a card. He was excited to deliver the items to her house that night.

Opening Valetine's Day presents. We got this fishing set from Aunt Debbie when Kaden was much younger and he wasn't old enough to "get" it, so I just kept it in the closet. Since he has recently gotten very interested in fishing and fishing rods, we thought it was a good time to give it to him.

Last weekend we drove to Atlanta, GA. Matt had to take a test there on Monday, so we decided to leave on Saturday to do a bit of sight-seeing on Sunday. I was planning to meet up with some friends on Monday, and then we drove home on Tuesday. We hadn't planned for the SNOW that Atlanta got that weekend and it got in the way of a few of our plans. But, we still had fun and enjoyed ourselves.

Determined to watch Mickey before bed

Getting ready to read books before bed. Notice the taggies in his hands!

On Sunday we went to the Coca-Cola Museum/Store and took a tour of their building. Then we walked up the block and went to the Aquarium. We were shocked at all the snow.

Kaden WAS so scared of the Coke polar bear

Filling Coke bottles

Kaden was mesmerized watching this robot pick up empty/full bottles and move them

The Museum part

The Olympic torches

The coolest part of the tour was the last room, where you could taste all the products that Coca-Cola makes around the world! It was amazing to taste the flavors of Asia, South America, Africa, etc. Kaden also got a few sips, which he enjoyed for the most part.

At the end of the tour we got to pick out a Coke bottle to take home. Kaden enjoyed this

Checking out the snow

Walking to the Aquarium - we didn't even pack winter coats! :)

Kaden remembered the snow from the wintertime and loved it. He was running in it and trying to pick it up!

This is where we ate - it was a fun restaurant. At each table we had a small jukebox that we could put a nickel in to pick a song -- just like in the OLD days, huh Mom! :) We had the best chocolate malt!! Kaden even picked it out on the menu.

Kaden looks a little odd -- I think he had a bit of a sugar high from the Coke samples he had just drank!

The entry to the Aquarium -- super cool! The fish look so fake, but they were definitely real!

You can see Kaden in the bottom right corner and see his smile!

Touching a star fish

The craziest animals -- Garden Eels... it gives me goose bumps just looking at them

Jumping!

Wow! Fishes!

Exhausted on the way home

We hung out in the hotel that night -- the weather was horrible and Matt needed a bit of studying time. Kaden had fun playing in the bed.

The next morning Kaden and I took Matt to his test. The weather was a bit better, and I wasn't sure we wanted to be stranded at the hotel without a car. We did end up venturing to a Toddler Storytime at Barnes and Noble, but it wasn't quite at Kaden's level. But, he enjoyed playing with the Thomas train and looking at all the books.

This was Kaden right after we got back from taking Matt.

Kaden did really well in the car ride going there and coming home. On the way home we stopped by Mayfield Dairy and took a tour of their milk plant. After we got home, Kaden was super excited to play with all his toys. His diaper was soaked by the time we got home so I just left him pantless (even though he quickly soaked another diaper!).

Birthday Ideas

2009-02-25T14:34:00.003-05:00

I've had several people ask for ideas for Kaden's birthday. I know it's hard when many of you don't get to see him weekly to know exactly what he's into!! I made an Amazon wishlist of things he's interested in -- it helps having playgroup b/c I see things he likes to get ideas for gifts for him. Here are a few ideas for you, if you want/need them. Click on the button below.

Tough Kid!

2009-02-15T22:59:00.002-05:00

I forgot to post this story when I posted earlier tonight.

The other day I noticed during Kaden's bath that he had a small splinter in the palm of his hand. He must have got it that day when playing with his "fishy wa" outside. I was really dreading taking it out, because I knew he was going to cry and be upset, but also knew this was one of those horrible parenting jobs that ranks up there with cleaning up vomit and dirty diapers.

So, I took my fingers and squeezed his palm -- What did he do? Cry? Scream? Nooo!! He laughed!!! Like serious giggles! So I stopped for a moment, then started again and the giggles started again!! I was able to get the splinter out without a problem! Our son is a tough a$$!!

Then he started looking at his hands and found a freckle he has on his index finger and said "another one. another one"

What a silly, tough boy!!

Finally time to blog!

2009-02-15T20:22:00.004-05:00

Oh how the days fly by too quickly! I have sat down SO many times in the last few weeks with the intention of updating the blog, then we either get busy doing something else, the internet goes too slowly (thank you Time Warner Cable), or life just gets in the way! We recently turned off our cable to save $60/month, so all our night-time network shows are being watched through the internet, so some nights we are doing that! Plus, one of our laptops was being repaired so we were down to one computer, and for some reason Matt completing our taxes trumped updating the blog!

But, here are some pictures to show that I am taking them and that we've been busy!

Kaden continues to climb on everything and to reach things he shouldn't. One day he was determined to get to his room and I was busy making lunch and was unable to take him upstairs. Then I look over and he was sitting on the boot bench trying to climb over the baby gate! When that didn't work out well, he realized he was the perfect height to turn the hallway lights on & off!

We took Kaden to the circus a couple weeks ago. We all had a lot of fun. Kaden was so mesmerized by everything going on around him. He was super excited about the elephants ("trunks"), dogs, horses, and motorcycles.

Super Bowl Sunday! On SBS we had nachos and blackberries for dinner. Kaden couldn't believe how lucky he was to get to eat NACHOS in front of the TV for dinner! Not a great habit, but okay for special occasions!

A few weekends ago we had sunny weather and decided to take Talbot to the dog park. Kaden loves seeing all the dogs and Talbot enjoys having a large space to play Frisbee.

There were 2 golden retrievers that looked A LOT like Talbot. Kaden was sure they were in fact Talbot and kept yelling at them "come, Talgee (his name for Talbot), come!"

Safety first! Kaden has fun in his Kettrike bike, so the other weekend we finally bought him a bike helmet to start teaching him that when he rides his bike, he wears his helmet. Luckily he loves it!

Hoarding his 2 balls, wearing his super cool sunglasses, while swinging at the playground.

Funny boy!

More pictures from the climber!

Twinners!

Kaden has these glow sticks that we let him use if we're playing outside after it's dark. Last week he kept saying "fishing wa" and shaking the sticks. I realized the next day he was saying "Fishing Rod" and was determined to catch a fish and a turtle! Oh the imagination of an almost-two-year old!

Here's a video of it. A little dark, because we were outside, but you can hear him! Some of his words are "fishy wa", "shake, shake, shake", and "turtle"

Randomness! During his bath the other night Kaden kept singing the ABC song (correctly) over and over again. I had Matt bring the camera upstairs to record it, and of course he doesn't do it after I start recording. But, you do get to hear his randomness. He sings all the time to the tune of the ABC Song, but makes up his own jibberish words!

Fire hats are cool!

Friends! Marie and Kaden are such great friends. He will be so lost without her in May. Even on the weekends when we wakes in the morning he starts asking for "Rie Rie". You may notice his "fishing wa" in his hand!

Kaden has a tee and bat and several big whiffle balls that he loves to play with. He's surprisingly good.

With some help from Daddy after he got home from work.

And discovering a new way to use the bat! haha

Fun Boy

2009-01-27T21:48:00.003-05:00

Kaden's Aunt Kathy and Uncle Carl sent him a package the other day. He got a big box of crayons that he loved. I brought him to the kitchen to color, and I think he thought I was taking them away (hence the red/been crying face). I gave him one of the little boxes and he had so much fun! They also gave him a couple Mickey Mouse coloring books, which he LOVES!

They also sent a backpack/tent kit that had a kid-friendly flashlight (so it doesn't blind his eyes as easily!). He loves the flashlight!

Matt put his head spotlight thing on Kaden and Kaden acted like he had super powers all of the sudden. He started pointing the flashlight at the TV and making grunting noises. He was trying to line up the red dot from the spotlight with the red dot from the flashlight!

For some reason Kaden has a new stance when he spreads his legs. It's pretty funny, and he knows it!

It's amazing the weird spots/positions he can get himself into!

Kaden had his last session at Little Gym for the semester on Sunday. (Now he'll be in the older group) He did so awesome he even got a medal!

Look, no help!! He can now walk across the elevated balance beam sideways (sliding his feet).

A few new scrapbook pages that I've been working on

SNOW! and others

2009-01-20T20:23:00.003-05:00

Yesterday Raleigh was predicted to get snow. I really didn't believe it because it was 45 degrees outside and perfect! Around 10:30pm Wake County canceled school -- I still wasn't sure why because it was doing NOTHING outside. Before we went to bed..still nothing. But, when Matt woke up at 6 to get ready for work, everything was covered white! We ended up getting 4-5 inches (probably). Marie was home with her parents b/c of the snow day and Juliet was also home with her parents because of the snow. Matt stayed home because it wasn't safe to drive all the way to UNC in the snow. We took Kaden outside to play. He LOVED it. I wasn't sure how he'd do, because in Michigan he wasn't real thrilled about snow and in Iowa he hated the cold temps in his face. But, he had fun here. The cold really didn't seem to bother him at all. Talbot also had a lot of fun playing in the snow. We stayed out 45 min in the morning and another hour in the afternoon. YAY for snow! Here are several pictures from our day. (Some of the other pictures you'll notice he's wearing his Christmas jammies -- they worked really well as underclothes for playing in the snow and just stayed in them all day)

He was determined to clear off the brick wall!

He kept falling into the snow, then rolling on his back and laughing

Attempt at "sledding" down the hill -- sans sled!

Shoveling snow! hahaha

Family shot

Talbot loved when Matt put snow in the Frisbee and tossed it at her -- she'd jump and get all excited

Later in the day --- More shoveling

The snow was finally wet enough to make a snowman

How we had to prop his hat on his head

Spying the snowman for the first time

He knocked the hat off the snowman -- Talbot wasn't too sure about that

Destroying the snowman...

I told him "oh no! what happened to the snowman? You better give him hugs"...so he did! Such a sweet boy!

New Fork and Spoon? Kaden has a few drawers in the kitchen where he's allowed to play. He found this spoon and tongs the other day and has fun playing with them. During breakfast he was determined that he could eat his PB toast with them! HAHA! The boy makes me laugh all the time.

Kaden loves any and all balls. It's amazing the random ball collection that he has! He was having fun playing with them today.

He shoots and SCORES!

High-five after making a basket

Smart boy!! Kaden has started realizing that he can't reach something on the counter, he can pull a chair or step stool and it will help him. He wanted the ceiling fan turned on today and couldn't reach the switch. I told him "get your stool"...he went right to the kitchen, got his stool, and brought it to the living room.

While I was doing laundry today, Kaden had fun hanging out in the laundry basket and keeping me company.

Where is Kaden?

There he is!!

Building a tent using the chair and our bed sheet

Peek!

Kaden really enjoys helping me in the kitchen. He's great at stirring and has started to become better at pouring ingredients into the bowl. We make many things together and he hasn't found something he doesn't like -- except for the scary noise the mixer makes! A few days ago I was making deviled eggs and Kaden wanted to help. We pulled the chair up to the counter and he helped crack and peel the eggs!

CRAFTS! Kaden enjoys doing any and all crafts. We do at least 3 different activities every day (coloring, stickers, stamps, markers, playdoh, painting, etc....) We were working with clay the other day. He had fun.

Catching up

2009-01-15T13:48:00.002-05:00

Where does the time go? Oye! The last few weeks have been so busy -- actually the last few months have been busy, but particularly January. It's taken so much time catching up to laundry, bill stuff, organizing and unpacking the house, and just other stuff that comes up. Kaden was basically cosleeping with us for the last 6 weeks due to all our traveling, so this week has been super hard on him because he's back in his crib. Sunday night was awful -- he was so sad and crying so hard he was shaking. He just kept repeating "Mommy's crib! Mommy's crib!" over and over. He really wanted in our bed. I would try to lay him in his crib and he'd have a death grip hold on me. Eventually I was able to soothe him to sleep in his crib. Each night has gotten a bit easier for him -- and me! Here are some pictures from the last couple weeks.

Painting and using the dobber markers:

Putting together his new trike and trying it out:

Our climber still practicing his skills. He has really grown up the last few months. He's talking so much now and using 2 and 3 word sentences. If he can't reach something, he knows to get my stool, set it up, push it to where he needs it, then stands on it. The other day he wanted something in the sink and pushed the chair over to sink and climbed up. He's so smart and extremely observant to everything around him. Today we were playing and Marie leaned back and hit her head on the wall (gently, Scott & Marjorie :)!) and Kaden said "uh oh! Rie-Rie bonk head. Ouch! Sorry!" Even though it wasn't his fault. Another cute Kaden moment this week was Tuesday morning. After being exhausted because he woke up at 5:30 (UGH!) he was super tired. At 8:00am he brought a blankee to me, asked for a paci (which he only gets a naptime or bedtime), and climbed in my lap and fell right to sleep!

Aunt Debbie sent us a box of our Christmas stuff this week. Kaden LOVED the box and the packing peanuts!

Last Thursday-Sunday we were in Omaha so Matt could interview at Nebraska. Matt's parents and sister met us there and we all had fun. One of the days we all went to an indoor waterpark. I thought Kaden would really love it, but the water was a bit cold and scary for him. He did have fun in the pool section shooting baskets though.

On Saturday his family left and we went to meet one of my friends. Amber and Jeremy have a son that's a few weeks older than Kaden. Ernie and Kaden had a lot of fun together.

Can you find Kaden?

Airplane ride home:

Enjoying a nutritious McDonald's chocolate shake!

Montage of Recent Trips

2009-01-02T14:04:00.000-05:00

After uploading all 750 pictures last night, I knew there were WAY too many to post on here, so instead I put them into a montage. Enjoy! I added captions, but after trying to save it for the blog I realized they were a "premium" feature, and not viewable with the free version! Sorry!

Make photo slide shows at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Candy Cane Hunt and a few others

2008-12-09T13:29:00.003-05:00

On Saturday I took Kaden to a Candy Cane Hunt that Raleigh's Parks & Rec dept. had. Matt was in Chicago for his interview with Northwestern, so it was just Kaden & I. We had fun. For his age group (1-2yr) they just had a bunch of candy scattered on an open field. Kaden figured out exactly what to do right away! He would gather 5-6 pieces and then put them in his sack. He did so well! Then we went inside for cookies and juice and to play a few games. They even had a fake snow machine/blower, but Kaden was a bit scared and when I'd put him close and step back to take a picture, he turned around and ran to me saying "Mommy! Mommy!"

Not sure about the penguin at the doorway

Temptation got the best of him!!

He liked the tall candy cane

I asked him if he was ready to inside for cookies and juice and he took off -- not even scared that I wasn't right with him! He's such an independent boy!

Kaden's Great Grandma and Grandpa Kleckner sent a few early Christmas gifts and a couple times the other day he was bored and it was too cold outside with his cold, so I let him open them. He LOVED opening them. After opening one, he went back to where he saw the other presents and showed me one finger saying "One more...ONE more" He is too cute!!! As you can see, he had fun. He's going to be a blast this year at Christmas!

Last year Kaden really liked these singing snowmen. I was curious what he'd do this year -- he instantly figured out how to turn them on and he'd clap and get all excited!

End of Year

2008-12-08T21:41:00.002-05:00

When I was designing our Christmas card this year, I made this for the back of the card. For some reason I couldn't find the right format on the website I used to buy the cards so I didn't get to use it. So, I thought I'd share it here!!

Advent Calendar

2008-12-08T21:20:00.003-05:00

Kaden's Grandma Sherri and Grandpa Bruce sent him an Advent Calendar for the month. He LOVES it! Here are some pictures of his first introduction to the calendar:

Hmm...what's in here?

What? There's candy? Yum! I want some!

Mmm........ SO GOOD!

This is what he looks like everyday when he gets his piece of candy!

Finally cured!

2008-11-24T20:23:00.002-05:00

Kaden is feeling so much better! He was still a bit quiet on Saturday and didn't play much, but by Sunday he was back to his normal self. He woke up hungry and played a lot. It's so great having my healthy boy back! Here are some pictures from when he wasn't feeling well and then from when he was feeling better.

Picking out the DVD he wanted to watch

Trying to smile

Worn out boy

With Marie

Watercolor painting

We have this large piece of paper and Kaden & Marie had fun coloring on it.

Today when I was getting lunch ready Kaden walked into the kitchen with his paci, blankie, and stocking hat!! He loves this hat and apparently found it, put it on, and just walked around the house with it on!! haha

I went to go get him for lunch and found him under the play table, with his blankee. You would think he was tired, huh!! (except fast forward to naptime when he didn't ever fall asleep!!)

Kaden & Marie have so much fun "setting" this table and "eating"!!

Tonight when I was making supper Kaden was carrying around a bowl, baking sheet, spoon, and measuring cup. I put a little water in the cup and he had fun pouring it into the bowl, then onto the baking sheet, and stirring it!

Update on Kaden

2008-11-21T16:28:00.001-05:00

Just wanted to update everyone on Kaden since the last post. He's still sick. I took him back to the doctor on Thursday morning. He's been diagnosed with Rotavirus -- no fun! Dr. Hewett told us the diarrhea could last another week. We were out of the Zofran for the vomiting, and since it had been almost 48 hours w/out him being sick (he'd been on the Zofran during that time), I thought we were over it. But, last night Kaden proved me wrong. About 11pm he woke up because he'd had a diaper blow out and vomited all over the place. So I cleaned him up, re-bathed him, and got him into clean jammies. He hung out in my bed watching Baby Einstein while I cleaned/disinfected the crib and the bathtub and took out the trash. He's now on more Zofran today. He's not eating much, which is understandable, and I'm trying to push fluids. All he's really interested in is watching TV and sitting on my lap. His bottom is getting a bit better, so that's good. Hopefully he recovers this weekend!

Busy at our House

2008-11-19T08:48:00.004-05:00

I've been a bit busy and haven't had a chance to update the blog in the last week and a half -- here is just a glimpse at my last 2 weeks -- my parents visited, the group of teachers I taught with at Brentwood had a get together at my house, I've been working and doing the single-parent thing, showing/selling our house (keep your fingers crossed), and Kaden's been sick. Yep, Kaden's sick. And not just your runny, snotty nose sick. He's really sick. It started last weekend with a few disgusting diapers that caused a bit of a diaper rash. By Monday his rash was SO bad that I called the doctor and made him an appointment for Tuesday morning. I got him out of his crib Tuesday to find he'd vomited a few times during the night and it was everywhere. Ugh... I hate vomit. So, I cleaned him up, cleaned up the mess, just in time to go to the doctor. I got a prescription for Zofran (to help with the vomiting since Dr. Hewett said it would get worse) and for Magic Butt Cream. On Tuesday Kaden threw up a few more times. I have found these are the parenting moments I don't enjoy! I've cleaned and cleaned and cleaned because of course he's doing it in the worse places. Last night after reading bedtime books he was a bit fidgety and grunting -- I had a feeling it was coming. I carried him to the bathroom and as soon as I got there he major projectile vomited. Everywhere. We were both soaked. So, I cleaned us both up, got him into new jammies, new blankies, read new books,got him asleep and then went to clean up the mess. He hasn't eaten in the last couple days, and when he does it all comes up. The nasty diapers have continued and his rash is even worse today. I'm hoping the Magic Butt Cream helps because he is in SO much pain (enough he can barely sit). I've taken a sick day today to focus on Kaden and have 2 less kids to worry about when cleaning up vomit. Please pray that he heals soon! Oh yeah, I also have a cough to add to things!

I realized when I transferred pictures last night that I hadn't done so in awhile on one of the cameras -- there were still pictures from making cookies before Matt left for St. Louis. So, some of these take place before the pictures in the last post.

We made some Halloween cookies on Halloween. Kaden helped press the cookie cutters down and then helped put the sprinkles on the cookies. We all three had a lot of fun.

WOW!

Drinking the leftover sprinkles!

Taster

While I was cleaning up and while we were waiting for the cookies to bake, Kaden helped. First he put all the Halloween candy carefully in the toaster over, then closed the door. It just reminds me how observant he really is!

Then I got him off the counter and he went to "his" drawer in the kitchen and started "cooking", too.

Proof:

We were building with blocks the other day and I'd made a large rectangle...Kaden thought it was a perfect sitting place!

My parents were here last week for a week. The leaves were gorgeous everywhere and had just started to fall. We borrowed a friend's rake and raked them all up. I thought Kaden and Marie would really enjoy it, which they did, but not to the extent I had pictured in my head! I guess they were a bit too prickly.

Before going outside, Kaden had been watching my mom through the window as she raked all the leaves. After playing in them for a bit, he went to the front door saying "sweep, sweep"... we let him inside and he instantly got his broom and started imitating what he saw her doing!

Kaden is always intrigued when watching people fix things and wants to help. We have a kid drill that doesn't work anymore and my dad was trying to see if he could get it to work.

Happy Birthday, Mommy. Marie brought me a cake for my birthday. After dinner that night we all enjoyed it. Kaden even blew the candle out for me! His favorite part were the sprinkles on top (of course!).

Little climber at it again!!

Of COURSE I know what I'm doing, Grandma!

Mischief maker -- my parents have these little doggie bag holders on their leashes. Kaden got ahold of one and pulled them ALL out!! So, we figured it made a great jump rope!!

Starting to not feel well...

Farm on a String

New trucks for outside

This is how we have lunch everyday.

Little Gym day -- Kaden goes to the Little Gym every Sunday. He really loves it and does well.

Pullen Park -- when my parents were here we went to Pullen Park one afternoon and enjoyed the rides.

On the carousel

Paddle boats

Little boats

And on the train -- I promise they were having more fun than it looks by their faces!

A little Wii fun during naptime! My parents had never played the Wii before, and enjoyed a little racing, golfing, boxing, and bowling during naptime.

BFFs again

Helping Mommy vacuum

Really not feeling well -- I was getting lunch ready and Kaden had found his paci and blankie (both of which he's been attached to for the month) and went to lay by Talbot. It was so sweet. I took this one without him knowing.

Then when I got closer he looked at me and said "Cheese!"

Getting ready for Grandma and Grandpa to leave -- Kaden was quite sad and whimpered as they drove away.

For Daddy

2008-11-06T20:53:00.002-05:00

For those of you that don't know, Matt is in St. Louis for the month doing a rotation at Washington University. Kaden and I took him to the airport on Nov 1 and will be SO happy to pick him up on Dec 1! We have been keeping busy though, and my parents arrived today and will be here for the week, so that will be nice.

Standing on his stool playing with the fridge toys

Then he figured out that by using the stool he could reach the water/ice dispenser

Trick-or-Treating at the library's storytime

With Marie

And Daddy

Candy on his way home

"CHEESE!!!"

Checking out his loot after getting home from the library.

Here are some pictures from trick-or-treating (which Kaden loved and was never afraid of going to the door to get his candy!).

mmm...suckers!! As soon as we got home, Kaden dumped out his basket of candy and found all the suckers!

Here's the 2 balloons that we got after dropping Daddy off at the airport.

Entertaining himself while I made lunch after getting home from the airport

That darn toe fuzz!

Playing outside with the rocks we brought back from the trail a couple weeks ago. Because of the rain and being busy and cooler morning temps, he hadn't been outside for quite awhile.

Playing with Talbot (look at all the frisbees he took with him!)

He found a lone "blow"!!!

Trying to convince Talbot to blow!!

Proof that Kaden does NOT approve of Daylight Savings Time!! He was hungry, but mad that I took his blankie/paci away so he could eat breakfast!

Mad again before snack (or lunch, I don't remember!)

M&Ms!! Kaden has fallen in love with the plain M&Ms he got from trick-or-treating. At night after supper I've been giving him 5-6 and he loves them!

Smiling in front of his first batch of candy

I told him to stand by his candy and say CHEESE!! This is what he did!! He makes me laugh!

Checking out the candy

Playing with Juliet and feeding her Cheerios

Then he was putting his head down so she'd touch his head and he'd laugh!!

He was telling her "five, five" and when he'd put his hand she'd reach for him!! It was so cute. They were having a lot of fun together!

Pumpkin Carving and a couple others

2008-10-28T21:25:00.003-04:00

I uploaded pictures from our other camera tonight and realized I missed a few last night. Kaden was so excited to see Talbot after we got home from The Little Gym on Saturday night. He immediately ran to her!

I was playing with Kaden today with the chicken puppet and he decided he wanted it on his hand! Talbot was checking out the chicken and Kaden was making it "attack" her!!

He has quite a bad cold right now and wasn't feeling too well in the morning (watching a bit of TV)

Now to the good ones!! We carved one of our pumpkins tonight and let Kaden paint his pumpkin. He was really intrigued with the carving, but really didn't want to touch the "stuff" in the inside. Matt's thinking he might not be the best fisherman when it comes to putting a worm on!!

I took him straight to the bath after he finished painting, while Matt stayed downstairs and finished carving the face of the pumpkin. Before I started bathing him, I decided to give him a very needed haircut. Here he is after the haircut, a bath, and jammies. We think it turned out super cute!

Then a couple pictures outside with the lit pumpkin and Talbot.

NC State Fair and Dr appts

2008-10-27T21:14:00.002-04:00

Last Thursday Talbot had her yearly check up at 10 and Kaden had his 18 month (a month late) check up at 12. I took a sick day so I could go to both appointments. Talbot's went fine... she's lost almost 10 pounds since Kaden's been born! Apparently he keeps her busy and the daily walks are doing her good!

Kaden's appointment also went well... his head is in the 25%, his length is in the 20%, and his weight is in the 5%! He's doing perfect and doesn't go back until his 2 year appointment!

Instead of coming home to give Kaden a nap, we decided to head to the State Fair since we could actually visit the fair without the weekend crowds. We all had fun.

Playing a Go Fish game

In front of a fountain -- he was in awe of of the water!

In one of the animal barns they had baby chicks that you could pick up and hold. I couldn't believe that I actually held one (the things you'll do for your kids!) but Kaden liked it. I then put it on his belly and he really wasn't sure what to think. He quickly started saying "no more, no more, no more".

Going down the big slide with Daddy (afterwards he started saying & signing "more, more, more")

Kids fun park with TV characters -- Kaden was so happy!

2 of his favorite characters!!! He walked around to the back of the cutouts and was a bit confused that they weren't "real" like they seem on TV!

We also visited a dog show, which he also loved.

The poodles were pretty hyper and Kaden kept saying "jump! jump!"

Mmm...cotton candy!!

City boy --- he liked the cows A LOT so we had him "milk" a cow! He wasn't sure what to think of the cows up close

Then we went to a petting zoo. Kaden was scared of the goats and llamas at first, but quickly warmed up to them. He would bend down and get right in their face and start saying random things. It was hilarious. We called him the Goat Whisperer.

Goat Whisperer at work

Halloween/Fall stuff

2008-10-27T21:01:00.003-04:00

Even though Halloween isn't until this weekend, there have been several Halloween/Fall activities for us during the past week.

First, Kaden got a Halloween package from Grandpa Bruce and Grandma Sherri. He LOVES getting the mail and was excited to open the box. Usually when we come in from getting the mail he starts telling me "open, open, open" (which, for some reason, sounds like onk-ka-konk)and after I hand him a piece of junk mail, he'll go and open it and bring it back to me.

Thank you Grandpa Bruce and Grandpa Sherri for the great books, bowl, utensils, candy, and other fun stuff! Kaden colored his picture and we took them to Old Navy last week, but haven't heard anything, so I'm guessing he wasn't a winner! Bummer.

(Notice the spoon while reading)

The Raleigh Parks and Rec put on a Halloween Trail last Friday night. Kaden went on a hayride, made a couple crafts, and watched some skits that were way over his head.

Trying to pick off his temporary tattoo

Getting a piece of candy after the skits

mmmmm....

Kaden goes to The Little Gym every Sunday. He has SO much fun and has learned a lot by going. On Saturday they had the kids come in their costumes (he came during the 1-2 age group) and they had a few stations set up and a few games. Kaden absolutely LOVED it. He was crazy excited the whole time -- it was like the monkey costume made him invincible to getting hurt!! He got to invite a friend, so of course he invited Marie. She dressed up as Elmo!!

Having some fun in his costume at home

The cutest monkey evah

at the gym

The kids were told to get a scarf. After the activity was over, most kids just dropped their scarves. Kaden went around and collected them.

Man! One can even get the dreaded toe fuzz at The Little Gym!!!

Bowling

At the end...after taking off part of his costume (he was a bit warm, but didn't seem to mind at all!)

Playgroup, Ice Cream, Camo, and BFFs

2008-10-27T20:57:00.002-04:00

Kaden, Marie, and Juliet go to a neighborhood playgroup once a week. There are 4-5 other 2 year olds and another baby that are in the group. The kids have fun playing with one another and seeing "new" toys. Last week playgroup was at our house.

If Kaden eats almost all of his supper, we'll sometimes give him a bit of ice cream (the boy could use some extra calories!). He has learned how to tip his bowl and drink milk at breakfast (thanks, Matt) and thought he'd do it with his chocolate ice cream. Apparently it was good. (He also did this with chili last week)

Grandpa Bruce and Grandma Sherri recently sent Kaden his first camouflaged shirt. It's been a bit too big for awhile, but it seemed to almost fit him today!!

Learning how to drum like a real drummer boy

Marie and Kaden are BFFs.

In trouble...

2008-10-27T20:48:00.002-04:00

Last week Matt was gone on Tuesday evening, so I was in charge of bringing the trashcan around our house. It was cold outside, and Kaden had played outside earlier and his pants were wet, so I'd taken them off, and wasn't going to put new ones on for an hour. So, I didn't want to bring him with me. It takes 90 seconds to pull the trash around, so I just left him in the house. He was playing with his fridge toys in the kitchen, and I didn't even think he'd miss me. This is what I came home to:

He'd dumped Talbot's food into her nighttime bowl, poured her water into her food dish, then attempted pouring the food back into the food bowl (which now had water). It was a disaster! I was a bit upset with him. I told him "Mommy is very mad right now. Kaden was a bad boy. We don't play with Talbot's food.". I put him in timeout and it was SO sad. He tried very hard not to cry, but his lip did quiver a lot. It broke my heart. I so just wanted to tell him it was okay and not make him go in time out, but I knew for the both of us, he needed to sit for that minute. After his minute was up, he got out of timeout and needed a big hug (okay, we both did) and then I put him in his high chair (I needed to keep him confined while I cleaned up) with his 4 favorite bouncy balls. I made sure to give him extra hugs that night and rocked him before bed. This motherhood thing is tough!

Here is him quivering...

And happy again with his bouncy balls...

Trip to Davidson

2008-10-27T20:43:00.002-04:00

2 weekends ago Matt, Kaden, and I went to Davidson, NC to visit some relatives on the Kleckner side. We stayed with Leah and met up with Sue and Carlos several times. They were nice enough to give us a wonderful tour of Charlotte and we visited the town of Davidson and walked through the college. Kaden LOVED that Leah had a cat, and it didn't take him long to start saying "Mocha" all the time. We brought Kaden's pack-n-play and he did well sleeping in it both nights.

Admiring some fountains downtown

Kaden and Mocha

Watching a football game with Carlos -- Kaden kept saying "catch! catch!"

Tired boy

Touring Davidson college

We stopped by a pumpkin patch, but unfortunately it was closed

However, Kaden did find a wagon and had fun pulling it around and being pulled around

Dancer, Shaker, Oh No!

2008-10-22T15:07:00.004-04:00

Here are three recent videos of Kaden.

One day he was playing with Matt's phone and I called it. When the music started he immediately started doing this "dance". It was hilarious!

A video of Kaden shaking a couple blocks very quickly!!!

One of Kaden's new favorite phrases is "oh no!". I often say it to him and apparently he's picked it up! The way he says it is so funny. He'll say it in the most appropriate times, too.

Funny Boy!

2008-10-13T20:41:00.002-04:00

Climbing on the Baby Einstein toy trying to get into the jumperoo

Playing with Juliet

I will sometimes put Kaden's pacis in the freezer and then before naptime/bedtime I'll get them out. He thinks it's so funny to suck on cold pacis and he loves it! One night 3 were stuck together!

One fell off

Kaden has these 4 bouncy balls that he loves -- for the last 1-2 weeks he has played with them daily. One of the days he even brought them to the bathtub, and continued to hold them until I laid him in his crib. He even kept them in his crib that night. Before I went to bed I checked on him, and he was asleep holding one of the balls in his hands!!

Our neighborhood had the annual Pig Pickin last weekend

(dirty hands)

Pumpkin Patch

2008-10-13T20:28:00.006-04:00

On Sunday we visited the same pumpkin patch that we went to last year. Kaden was able to do so much more this year. We all had a lot of fun! (PS - I put some similar shots from last year in this post for comparison!)

Waiting to get in

Maze

Playground area

Duck Race

Pony Ride

Not real sure of the pony!

One of his FAVORITE things -- the corn playground. A round area filled with 1-1.5 foot of dried corn. He had SO much fun. Each session had 5 minutes, then they switched for 10 different kids. Kaden went 4 times! He really, really wants one of these on Grandpa Bruce's farm!

Waiting to get on the train -- he loved all the rocks, you can tell he's been raised in the city!

Train ride (Kaden kept saying "choooooo chooooo" Then when the whistle went off he would say "beep beep")

Slide with Daddy

Hayride to the patch

Heavy

Remake of the picture from last year

Ready to go home

Shapes and ABCs video

2008-10-09T21:31:00.001-04:00

Videos

2008-10-07T20:48:00.003-04:00

Here are a couple videos of Kaden. Also you probably noticed I changed the layout of the blog. I loved having a "fun" looking blog, but hated that the bigger pictures got cropped. And since this blog is really about you seeing pictures of Kaden and not what the website looks like, I figured I would change it.

Remember, you may have to push the play button (the sideways triangle) 2 times!

Laughing Kaden

Some of the song actions that he knows: -- I wasn't even doing the actions for him mimick, except on D is for when... because I figured he might be confused how he was going to "sit down" when he was already sitting! Also, B is for bunny that goes hop, hop, hop -- he was trying to hop while sitting!! He was obviously in the middle of lunch here, so he was somewhat distracted, too! And please ignore my singing abilities -- luckily Kaden doesn't mind a bit of out-of-tune singing!

Some randoms

2008-10-07T20:38:00.004-04:00

New letter! Kaden can identify the letters A, B, C, D, E, K, M (mmm), and P very consistently. Today he learned W!! We work with letters all the time. Today on Sesame Street, W was the letter of the day and we talked a lot about it then (kinda important letter with his last name!). Then we went outside after supper and he saw a storm drain that read "SEWER" and ran over saying "W! W! W!".

Kaden loves to swiffer!! So much that I took the 2 middle "links" out and made it just his size! Plus it's easier for him to get the nooks and corners this way!! :)

Reaching for the fun toy:

Feeding Marie's baby:

Helping Daddy study--- "This Step 2 stuff isn't so hard"

Our artist -- this is the first time of him using the brush and doing it ALL on his own. I usually dip the brush in some paint and then give it to him. But instead I just squirted paint on his paper and gave him the brush. He did REALLY well!!

Tired boy:

Talking to Aunt Nicole on the webcam!!! He sees the webcam and starts yelling "Cole! Cole!" now!!

This past weekend

2008-10-07T20:29:00.004-04:00

We had wonderful weather last weekend. Matt had drill, but on Saturday after he got home we went for a walk to the paved trails near our house where Talbot can be off leash. We all had a lot of fun!

Then we went to the playground where Kaden and Daddy played basketball. As soon as Kaden sees a ball and a hoop he yells "Shoot!! Shoot!" If he weren't so short, I'd say maybe we'd have a future basketball star....but since he's only in the 5th percentile for height, it doesn't look so good!

"kick!!"

Going up the hill

Swinging in the big swing:

Then we went to the pond right there to feed the ducks and turtles. Kaden LOVES doing this! There were also a few friendly squirrels that were running around and not too scared of us, so Kaden enjoyed watching them!

Ok, yes, I know they are geese, not ducks -- but in our house they are ducks!

Begging turtles:

Squirrel:

Family photo shot kinda

And some from that same day:

We got him a magnetic magna doodle so he can draw while I make supper/clean/etc. He took it and then sat himself in the booster seat (without me taking the tray off!). He was pretty proud of himself!

Mommy & Kaden

Daddy & Kaden

Outside time:

Daddy went upstairs to change so we could go walk and Kaden was trying to get up to him:

Then he gave up and went to play with his baby:

After supper that night he was striped naked and while watching Sesame Street (right before bath) tried pulling his diaper off!! haha

Today

2008-10-07T20:25:00.002-04:00

These are pictures from today:

He loves picking dandelions that have gone to seed and blow them. When he spots one in the grass he yells "blow, blow"....

Taking his baby for a walk:

Friends:

Going for a run with Daddy this morning: -- it was chilly here!!

Toe fuzz

2008-10-07T20:23:00.002-04:00

Kaden is obsessed with cleaning out the fuzz in his toes when I take his socks off.

18 months

2008-10-07T20:14:00.004-04:00

Kaden turned 18 months old on September 25th. Last year I tried to make him a 1/2 birthday cake and the oven caught fire, so I was a bit hesitant when baking his cake this year. Luckily it turned out much better! I frosted it while he napped and showed it to him when he woke up from his nap. He saw the numbers and wanted me to write "A" on it -- he kept pointing at the cake saying "A, A, A...", hence the A.

He woke up super early that day -- usually he's up around 7, on that day he woke up at 5:40! Needless to say, his morning started off a bit rough. Oye -- as did mine!! :) He also barely fits into the 18-24 month winter stuff, hence the frequent outfit changes. I was trying to find something that didn't cover his hands or drag on the floor! We thought he would be a bit bigger at this point!

Watching as we let Talbot out SUPER early in the morning:

10 minutes later:

Another 15 min later:

Luckily it just took some Elmo to brighten his day:

I took him (and Marie) to storytime at the library:

This is what happens when you wake up too early in the morning:

Hmm...cake:

And a few presents:

pics and a brag

2008-09-24T22:13:00.004-04:00

Kaden adores Juliet. He calls her "ju-ju-iet"... it's SO cute! Here are some pictures of them playing together.

trying to share his drink

giving her her paci (even though it's upside down)

A different day... patting her back

and smiling at her

He's doing really good playing nicely with her but still needs reminders that she's not as big or tough as he is and he needs to be gentle!!

Our little engineer trying to figure out the buttons on the dishwasher

I found several things to do with Raleigh parks and rec...one of them was called Playgroup Tots...they open up a gym and put a bunch of toys and let 1-2 year olds play. Kaden had fun.

He liked this thing until it started going in circles, then he cried and wanted off.

He found a baseball bat (and later a hockey stick) and ran around hitting a ball!

putting the hockey stick down the slide

leaving

The other day I was picking up toys before lunch and could hear Kaden saying "eat, eat, eat". He was in the kitchen and I assumed he was standing by the fridge waiting for lunch. I went into the kitchen to find him sitting in the high chair waiting patiently for lunch!! haha... look at his feet-- he loves to keep them propped up like that!

And to brag on our smart boy...here are some of his latest things that really amaze me:

He can count to 3 - usually only when he's getting ready to go down a slide.

He can recognize a handful of letters and whenever he colors or plays with sidewalk chalk he insists I write letters -- he'll walk around saying "A", "D", "E", "K"...etc. He wants me to write the letters.

He has over 100 words. The other day we were working on a puzzle with animals and I was asking him the names of the animals -- he calls the elephant "trunk" -- I guess because when we read stories and see a picture of an elephant I always ask him "do you see the trunk"...haha. He calls the rooster a "cock-a-doole-roo"... SO FUNNY! Apparently he listens when I tell him what the animals say!

He has really good manners -- says "excuse me" if he's trying to get around someone/something, says "sorry" if he falls or bumps into someone, and says "please" and "thank you" when it's needed.

He identifies a circle, star, triangle, and square, and can draw a circle. He's able to find these shapes all over the place -- in stores, on clothes, in books, etc. Today Juliet's sister was here and had a sweatshirt with a small star in the corner-- Kaden pointed it out to her . Then he noticed her shirt had buttons, which were of course circles, and he pointed that out to her, too. Earlier in the day he found a hair tie of mine and told me "circle, circle"... which of course it is! We were at Old Navy last weekend and they had stars hanging from the ceiling...he noticed and let Matt and I know there is a star above us!

He loves seeing airplanes in the sky and has the best ears ever (must get that from his Dad). If we're outside and he hears a plane, he'll point to the sky (or just look) and say "plane, plane". I usually haven't even heard the noise when he's telling me this! When the plane is out of sight he'll say "bye bye".

A few nights ago I was getting his jammies on and he was knocking on the neighbor's wall. I said "are you trying to get MeeMaw's attention?"... then I asked him "who does MeeMaw live with?".. he responded "Katie" (Katie is MeeMaw's dog!).

When he gets hurt, he'll come to me and give me the part of his body that got hurt. After I give it a kiss, he's instantly fine!

More pics of Kaden!

2008-09-18T19:51:00.004-04:00

Kaden continues to test his ability to defy gravity by climbing all over to get to things that he either a) can't have or b) can't reach! I put the thermometer on the steps (where we often keep things until we make a trip upstairs) and Kaden thought maybe he should have it.

Scary! I really wanted to just take him down, but wanted to get pictures, and also wanted to see what his abilities are at this time. It didn't end real well...

he let go of his right hand to reach the thermometer and fell! I grabbed him, which saved his head from hitting the ground, but his cheek hit the steps a bit...

When I opened the fridge to get him an ice pack, he saw his carton of Vanilla milk -- and I was feeling pretty bad about him falling, so would pretty much give him anything he asked for at the time! The milk made it all better.

The mark on his cheek went along with the other 2 marks he'd gotten in previous days...

trying to go down the steps outside (which he does ALL the time) but missed a step:

running around inside and hitting his head on the couch -- I still, to this day, have no idea how this happened -- the entire back of the couch is soft! He must have just pushed in so far that he hit the boards building the couch!!

Whenever Kaden hits Talbot or one of his friends, I make him go up and say "sorry". For some reason he thinks anytime anything falls and makes a loud noise, or if he falls, he is supposed to say sorry. For example : today his sippy cup fell and he said "sorry!"; He tripped on his pants today and fell and said "Sorry!". After saying "sorry!" he gets up and moves on. It's the CUTEST thing! He has such good manners! Needless to say, with all his falls, he says "sorry" a lot!
But, despite his falls and bumps and bruises, he remains a happy, wonderful, sweet boy. He's gotten really verbal -- we're just over 100 words now! He is really good at expressing to me what he wants and when. He has busy and fun days and generally is enjoying life -- just as any almost 18 month old (yikes!!) should!

going down the slide--

playing with stamps and Elmo stickers

finished masterpiece:

Kaden also pays attention to EVERYTHING I do, even when I don't realize it. The other day after I clipped his fingernails/toenails he got ahold of the clippers. I had gone to the kitchen to clean up breakfast and found him sitting on the couch like this:

He is so stinkin' cute! I love how he's doing it exactly how I do and how careful he is!

I have started putting Kaden in a 1-minute time out if he's hitting Talbot or his friends or trying to go after Talbot's food/water dishes. The time out really seems to be working -- in fact, it's been over a week or so since he's even thought about messing with Talbot's water. I was too tired of cleaning up water messes! When I put him in time out, I just sit him wherever we happen to be at the time -- he doesn't have a "time out corner" or anything like that. He does well staying put until I tell him to get up, then I give him a hug and tell him I love him and then he goes off to play. I occassionally have to say "Kaden, sit" and he does. He also does his fair share of trying to see what he can exactly get away with while in time out -- which isn't much!

a few tears--

then a smile--

The realtor showed our house last weekend -- I had to wake Kaden up from his nap to leave the house-- he was sleeping hard!

Kaden is still our little blankie/paci boy. I have thought about weaning him from the paci, but know that we'll (hopefully) be traveling in the next few months to visit some of the places that Matt interviews and know that I will want to have access to a paci on a plane ride (as will all the other passengers!). He usually almost always only gets the paci at naptime/bedtime, so it's not a huge concern for me either! One morning after he woke up I was empying the dishwasher. Apparently Kaden thought his blanket needed cleaning.

My little artist still loves to color, paint, stamp, play with Play Doh -- any art or craft activity he loves!

He has always been interested in the laptop -- I'm sure it's because he sees Matt or I using it and know it has to be fun since we like it. He also listens to music on it so that also strikes his interest. Since his Aunt Nicole went to college, he has been able to talk to her using the webcam. He sees the webcam now and will shout "Cole! Cole!"... he got ahold of the computer on his own the other day

Kaden loves playing with his kitchen and play table. One morning he "set" the table by putting food and dishes on it, then carefully cleaned up and put everything into a bucket! He's such a wonderful boy!

(I love how he has all the utensils in the cup here:)

cleaning up:

and putting everything in this bucket:

One of Kaden's newest, most fun presents is his kid vacuum that we found at Walmart. He LOVES to help/watch me vacuum...now he has his own (which actually works and picks up a little bit!)

another way he pays attention to me-- he picks up the vacuum and puts it on Talbot's bed to clean it!!

Also when I'm vacuuming I'll pick up and move Talbot's bed... apparently Kaden did the same...this is where he put her bed and the doormat from the front door!

and then proceeded to vacuum...

he even took the hose part off and did some hose vacuuming like I do!! The boy cracks me up!

Some of my old purses I've put in the toy box for Kaden and Marie to play with. Kaden was busy playing with one the other evening, then picked it up, carried it to the door and said "bye bye". He then went and got a shoe and brought it to Matt, sat down in front of him, and waited until he put the shoe on. Matt told him he needed the other shoe, so Kaden went and found another shoe (not a matching one!) and brought it back. Eventually he was all set with 2 matching sandals and headed to the door. We let him go outside and he walked all the way to the hill by our house! Always carrying his "man bag"!!

Ooooooo---the Moon!

"moon! moon!"

"I'm outta here peeps"

Juliet is now sitting up really well and has started interacting a lot with Kaden and Marie -- Kaden and her were playing with Talbot and laughing at me singing:

attacking Talbot

and laughing about it:

hmm...puzzles!

"I wonder what Talbot will do if I come running at her, screeching loudly?!?"

haha

and then throwing a fit when I took the puzzle away and wouldn't let him torment Talbot

hey -- I didn't say he was perfect and sweet ALL the time :).

cute boy

Marie and Kaden played in the bath the other morning when it was too wet to go outside (in their swimmers diapers!)
"Here Marie, let me help you rinse off"

"Thanks Kaden, I love you"

Messy eater -- first with chili and licking the butter off the crackers, and then playing in his ketchup

New Shoes!! The other day it was a bit cooler and Kaden wore pants. It was then that I realized he only has his sandals and no shoes!! So, that weekend we went and got him a pair! He was so excited to have shoes like Mommy and Daddy!

You know it's been a good nap when....

you wake up and your hair looks like this:

Enjoy the pics!

Busy Boy!

2008-09-04T22:09:00.005-04:00

Kaden has always been an active, busy boy. Lately he's added climbing to his list of hobbies! He is so tiny that he's able to get himself into the smallest, most uncomfortable situations. Examples: he takes the water filter cover off the bottom of the fridge all the time -- he now sticks his ABC magnets inside the tube (it's empty since we don't use the water) and then can reach his arm all the way in the tube to pull the letters out; he was sitting with Matt & I on the couch tonight and started yelling "kite! kite! kite!" ...he saw his kite stored behind the TV and crawled between the TV stand and the wall, pulled at the kite, turned himself around, and got out... there are more! (see below!)

He is still such a happy and enjoyable boy. He sometimes needs reminders to play gently, share toys, etc. (typical 1 year old stuff!) but generally is sweet to his friends and does a great job sharing. He almost always says "thank you" or "welcome" (which sounds like welcomema). It's so cute when I hand him something to eat or a crayon and he'll say "welcomema" -- he says welcome for thank-you a lot. If I make him apologize to one of his friends for something, he usually walks over to Talbot and gently pats her head saying "sorry"... I guess he realizes he's apologizing to her most often from taking things from her, hitting her, pulling her hair, etc. Good thing she's a tolerant dog!

Kaden is a very verbal boy. When I teach him new words, he catches on really quickly and then remembers them. I recently made a word-list of his words -- 95!! Some are a bit harder to understand but are usually pretty recognizable. He is also doing well with signing -- he can consistently sign: more, all done, eat, drink, cat, dog, bird, night-night. I don't sign a whole lot with him, primarily because of his large vocabulary, but he does do well remember the signs. He watches a show called Signing Time and will sit and move his hands like they are showing on the TV. It's so cute!

Here are some pictures from the past couple days:

He loves wearing our shoes and *trying* to walk around in them. Tonight he found one of my shoes and was putting his foot in it -- then walked to the boot bench and pulled the matching shoe out and started walking around in both shoes!

I still have the jumperoo up for Juliet to use. Today Kaden was standing by it repeating "mommy, mommy, mommy" ... when I went over to him, I realized he was wanting IN the jumperoo. He was so cute playing just like he did last year at this time!

I have been working on the quilt that I started years ago -- now that I have more than a 30 min break during the day, I have a bit of time to work on it. (yay!). Kaden found the cord laying under the triple and knew exactly where it went! He watches everything I do so carefully...today he was pretending to sweep the floor and pulled the rug away because he knew he had to sweep under it!! And when he pushes his corn popper toy, he pretends that he's vaccuming and will push and pull the toy and even move Talbot's bed so he can "vaccum" under it!

ClimbeR!!

Kaden only gets his paci when he's going to sleep. He usually doesn't ever think about it during the day, but he knows I keep a paci in the cup holder to the triple (for emergencies on walks!!). He was determined to get the paci after repeated "no's" from me! I was going to take him off the chair immediately, but knew I wanted to get a picture! The whole time I was taking a picture I was thinking "please don't fall, please don't fall, etc!"

More ClimbeR!

I told Kaden we were going to his friend Matthew's house yesterday (for playgroup). He assumed we were walking. After getting Juliet in the carseat I was calling Kaden to the front door when I hear him saying "reeaaaaaaddyy, rrrrrreaaaaaadddyyyyyy".. this is how I found him:

He had climbed from the front of the stroller, up into the first seat, over the back, turned himself around, and was sitting and waiting for me!

Tired Boy! Can you blame him?!? On Monday, after having a busy weekend and morning, Kaden was exhausted. He sat on the couch, holding his blankee and cup, watching Sesame Street!

A few others

2008-09-01T22:39:00.003-04:00

Playing Mario Kart with Daddy -- he loves to "drive" the inactive steering wheel!!

A new way to pull the walker toy

Kaden really loves having Marie back at daycare. They play so much together, although I think Kaden has more fun with Marie than she has with him! He gets really excited when she shows up in the morning and always calls for her saying "Rie, Rie" or sometimes "Maaaa Rie"....

Kaden loves the song "Hot Potato" by The Wiggles -- so when I want him to smile, I just start singing that song and he'll smile and make the hand movements!

First Remote Control car

Zoo trip

2008-09-01T21:50:00.002-04:00

We took Kaden to the zoo on Sunday. We met Marie and her parents there (and a couple of my mom's group friends). The weather was great -- a bit warm, but nice. Kaden had a lot of fun watching the animals. Many of them were lazy and he didn't realize they were actually animals, but the ones that were active he enjoyed.

Trying to put his head as far through the fence as he can to look at the ducks

Painting on a chalk wall using a paintbrush and water. There was a little girl that came between Kaden & Marie and took Kaden's paintbrush out of his hand, even though he was using it! He didn't seem to mind too much -- he just went and found a piece of chalk to use instead. The girl's parents didn't say anything, so I let it go.

Sitting on steps

Riding the Carousel with Daddy and then with Mommy, Marie, and Marjorie

Watching the ducks -- you'd think he never had the chance to see ducks as excited as he gets about them!!

Marie and Kaden traded strollers for a bit

He loved the monkey statues -- for any of the statues he would point and name all the parts on the faces!

I wish this one wasn't a bit blurry

There was a bench surrounding a tree and he had so much fun walking around in circles around the tree!! haha

Visiting the zebras

Riding an elephant!

Kaden the Caveman

On the way home I was sure he would sleep the entire way -- he didn't even shut his eyes once! But, he did learn that it's great fun to suck on your toes while being strapped to the carseat!

After we got home, I was fixing supper and Kaden was playing with the fridge toys and Matt's and my shoes -- I looked over at him and he had his feet in our shoes going the wrong direction!

It's official

2008-08-19T22:28:00.002-04:00

We're on the market....

We plan on moving next May after Matt graduates. We won't know where we're moving until the end of March on Match Day, so we'll have to update you all then!

We would ideally be able to move into a house when we move instead of moving into an apartment, finding a house, then moving again. We know no one is crazy enough to give us a 2nd mortgage in addition to med school loans, so we decided it was very important to get our house on the market (and hopefully SOLD) by next May so we can get find a house to move into when we move (does that make sense or only in my head?)! The sign is in our yard and it's now official! Scary but exciting!

I taught school with Monica and her husband is a Realtor for York Underwood Simpson. As soon as she told me Jordan was into real-estate I knew he would be a great Realtor for us. But he's actually the buyer's agent, so we're with his partner, Jill Flink (great name!).

Here's the link to our listing:
3124 Coxindale Drive House

For Aunt Debbie - Babybel

2008-08-14T22:55:00.003-04:00

Kaden enjoys the cheese!!

(notice he's started to eat it-- it's on the table)

mmm...

He kept trying to get the cracker to stick in the cheese...finally, SUCCESS!