Look What We Did Today!

In the late morning:

In the afternoon:

That's right! It was finally warm enough today to go outside and play. In the late morning, Josh took the boys out in the front yard to play (the cat even joined in the "festivities"). This afternoon, after naptime, I took the boys into the backyard to play. It was wonderful. Especially since last Monday it snowed for 20 hours straight, this past Thursday it snowed for 6 hours straight, and yesterday it flurried throughout the day in different parts of town. It was so nice to have the sun come out and stay out all day long. Let's hope we're in for a lot more of this kind of weather now.

These Boys

As the baby's arrival gets closer, we have been doing little things here and there to prepare ourselves/get some things ready. After months of Josh saying that we would have to switch cars when he gets here because all 3 carseats (well, 2 carseats and 1 booster seat) would not all fit in my middle row together, and me telling him he's out of his mind because there's plenty of room back there, he finally got the baby's car seat out of the shed, I finally washed it, and sure enough, there is not enough room back there for the 3 of them. Thankfully, Josh was able to come up with a second option (one that did not involve me having to drive his vehicle from now on):

That's right. Zeke is now sitting in the third row of my car, and loving it. When I was moving carseats and stuff around, trying to figure everything out, I looked up Volvo's regulations about the third row and apparently, with their "specifically designed and fitted" booster seat, the third row is actually the safest place for a child of Zeke's age/size to be. I had the local Volvo dealership order me one of their "specifically designed and fitted" seats so we'd have it before #3 showed up. Guess what, $114 later I now have two booster seats that are essentially the same thing. Awesome. But, like I said, he loves it back there and can't wait to sit "in the back of Mommy's car on the pretty circles" (the seat has polka dots on it) whenever we have to go somewhere.

* * * * *

Speaking of driving, there's a newish pothole on the road that we pass over whenever we're coming home from town (school, church, walmart, mcd's, etc). When you hit this pothole it's a very noticable thing. In fact, if I hit it Deacon usually asks in a rather incredulous voice, "What was that?!" I have since figured out how to avoid it while still making my turn on time (it's positioned right where we switch lanes to turn off the main road to get to our house).

On Sunday, Josh was driving us home from church and hit the pothole. When the car was done shaking, I turned to Deacon and said, "What was that?!" Deacon, rather noncholantly, said, "Oh. Daddy's driving." Yeah, I guess it was silly of me to be surprised that something "crazy" would happen with Daddy behind the wheel.

* * * * *

I had my 36 week appointment on Friday. Everything's good, progressing and growing right as it should. I got a quick ultrasound to make sure his head is down, and it is. Like I said, everything's good.

While the doctor was scanning though, she made 3 comments I thought I'd share with you all here.

1. "Well, he is definitely a boy and proud of it!" That made the other girl in the room, who was learning the ropes of the clinic, crack up.

2. "My goodness is he moving a lot. You must not get any sleep at night." Yes, because his moving is the only thing that makes sleep a hard thing to get most nights. But it's funny, because he doesn't "move" as much as Deacon did. I felt like Deacon was con.stant.ly. in motion in there. This guy moves, but he does more of a pushing thing, where he picks a spot and just sort of pushes against it with whatever body part he chooses. It's not that much fun, but I'm thankful he's not much of a "mover" like his older brother.

Okay, rabbit trail there. Sorry.

3. "Wow, he's just taking up all the room he wants, huh? His head is all the way down, but his feet are all the way up in your ribs. You must feel him all over." Yes, yes I do, and I really could do without the feet in the ribs thing, thank you. Now I wonder how long he's going to be?

* * * * *

The other night at dinner Zeke finished his glass of water and asked for some orange juice. As Josh was getting up get it for him, Zeke decided he wanted to help. So the two of them went over the fridge and poured some juice. I was watching because I enjoy watching Josh with the boys first of all, and second of all, I enjoy watching Zeke attempt to do new things/help out. So, all 3 of us had our focus on the kitchen when I heard Deacon say, "Where's Deacon?!" I turned to look at him and almost fell out of chair when I saw this:

Seriously, this kid is too much sometimes. Family dinners just get better and better as Deacon develops his sense of humor more and more. I can't wait to see what he comes up with next.

* * * * *

One day, a few weeks ago, two of the boys in Zeke's class were at McD's on the same day and thought it was the best thing ever. The next day in school they planned on doing it again, their mother's said okay, and invited us to come along. Since then we've all gone to McD's for lunch one day a week (usually Wednesdays, but sometimes it gets pushed to Thursday). It's fun for the boys, it's nice for me, and Josh is sad he doesn't get any cheeseburgers.

What cracks me up the most about it is that Zeke usually spends most of our time there playing with Deacon, instead of the two boys from his class. In fact, last week while we were there, Zeke and Deacon ran around the play area together holding hands. There was much "aww-ing" going on by the other parents around us each time they ran past holding hands. They're such sweet boys.

Anyhoo, one of the last two times we were there (I can't remember which time because I really have almost no brain power these days) I saw Deacon pulling on another kid. The kid was just sitting on the steps to the big slide, blocking they way for everyone, so Deacon was trying to clear the kid out of the way so everyone could continue climbing. I stood up and called his name (so I could tell him to stop pulling on that kid). As I was calling, "Deacon...Deacon!" Zeke popped his head around the play equipment and yelled back, "Yes, dear?" Needless to say the every adult in the room started cracking up and I just sat back down, shaking my head.

Good times. Goooooood times.

Seven Years Ago

Seven years ago today this picture was taken:

Happy Anniversary Josh. I love you.

For Joni

Really, it's for all of you, but since Joni is the one who harasses* me the most about it, here is the "belly shot":

And since I feel like that shot does not do the belly justice, here's another one, that looks a bit closer to how big I feel. I cannot even begin to tell you the number of times I've opened the refrigerator door into my stomach because I didn't stand back far enough. :)

And because Josh took this shot, thinking he's funny, here's an "up close and personal" shot:

I'll be 36 weeks on Thursday, and I'm ready to meet this "little" guy. I think he's close to ready to meet us as well. I guess we'll see.

*By harasses, I mean that she actually asks why I haven't posted any belly shots here yet. That's all.

This Kid Kills Me

I feel like I've been writing a lot about Zeke lately, and that's probably because I have. After all, over the last month the kid has lost his first tooth, took off with the potty training thing, and started school. All pretty big accomplishments, all pretty exciting stuff. Deacon, on the other hand, hasn't done any of these things yet, but what he has done, is raise the level of cuteness in this house by 1,867,392,000%. Or there abouts. And just when you think he can't get any cuter, he pulls out something new and just knocks us over. The other day, Josh said, "That's it Deacon, get cuter. I want to see if the universe will actually stop." Here are just a few snapshot of some of the things Deacon has been up to recently.

First, we have the fact that absolutely everything can, and most likely will, be a hat. Tupperware is a favorite "hat go-to". And since he's pretty good about sharing (when he wants to share, that is), and since he likes to help, he will be more than happy to help you adorn your head, whether you want the help or not.

I mean, just look how thrilled Josh is to have a new piece of headware.

While we're on the subject (sort of) of Deacon helping, he does love to help. He loves to help cook, clean (unless it's picking up toys...that can be like pulling teeth sometimes with him), carry stuff, put the groceries on the counter to be rung up, etc. One night Josh was doing the dishes, and Deacon, of his own accord, got the stool out from the bathroom, carried it to the sink, and proceeded to "help".

He's also very good at helping me empty the dishwasher. He's a speedy little thing, so most stuff ends up on the counter before being put away since dishes and glasses come at me in lightning speed.

At night, he's been a bit of a bugger though. He refuses to stay in his bed. When he's out of his bed, he has this fascination with the heating vent in the floor in their room. If he's not laying across it, he's laying next to it, kicking it, or pulling it out of the floor and playing it like a bongo. My favorite part of nights though, is when Josh goes in to check on him (and put the vent cover back) and says something like, "Where are your pants?!" That's right. Deacon likes to run around like this:

when he's supposed to be in bed sleeping. I guess I had him in some jammies he really didn't want to be in the other night because when Josh went in there I heard, "Why are you naked?!" He had completely stripped, diaper, socks and all and was running around the room naked. Even better, when I opened their door in the morning to get them up for the day, he ran out of the room naked again. I guess he can undress himself if he really wants to.

But the bedroom mischief isn't contained to only nighttime. While he is getting better about keeping quiet during rest time and naptime, he did come out of his little rest time the other day like this:

Still in his jammies, but with his rain boots on (this is what prompted the start of our water walks), swinging Zeke's dirty underpants around. That's right, those underpants are dirty, which means he fished around in the hamper for them. Why he was even in his closet when he was supposed to be in his bed is beyond me. Most of what this kid does is beyond me, but that's what makes him so much fun.

Like this:

This is Deacon sitting at Josh's computer with Josh's headset on (astronauts, you are cleared to land). He insisted on sitting there like that (pushing buttons so he could hear the bell sound) for at least a half hour.

Deacon is also very, um, creative. We got these dragons when we went out to lunch the other day. After eating what he wanted of his lunch, Deacon decided to share the rest of his sandwich with his dragon, who, as you can see, was quite pleased with it all.

It's also a little bit creepy, no?

Here he is using my shoes and skis, and my knitting needles as ski poles. He goes around the houes like this, using a pretty good technique for only having ever seen skiing a few times during the Olympics.

Then there's his favorite activity of sitting in boxes. I have no idea where/why/how this started, but if there's an empty box laying around, you can be sure Deacon will be in that box in one way or another.

Another new favorite place of Deacon's is "Daddy's head". This is what he says when he wants to go up on Josh's shoulders. In fact, Josh hadn't been out of bed for 5 minutes when Deacon was lining himself up to Josh's legs saying, "Daddy's head. I want Daddy's head." Poor Josh. Although, I don't think Daddy minds too much.

Besides all this, Deacon also makes some of the greatest faces I've ever seen. Of course, he won't make any of them for the camera, but I promise you, they are classic. Especially when he says things to go along with his faces.

For example, the other day we were eating lunch. Zeke was so tired he had his head on his arm on the table while eating his sandwich. So I said, "Mommy's tired" (because I was). Zeke picked up his head and said, "Zeke tired too." So then Deacon opened his eyes as wide as they could possibly go, smiled his biggest smile, and said in a rather upbeat and high pitched voice, "Deacon tired tooooooOO!!!" For some reason I just didn't believe him.

His most used phrase though, and it's really funny sometimes, is "I can't". I'm not sure where he picked this up from but he uses it for everything he doesn't want to do. Like, if we try to put his pants back on him at night after he's taken them off he'll say, "I can't pants. I can't." Or if I ask him if he wants his sandwich cut into triangles or squares he might say, "I can't triangles. I can't squares. I can't sandwich." Or if Josh asks him for a hug when Josh gets home from work Deacon will sometimes say, "I can't Daddy. I can't hug." "I can't Deacon" is another favorite, but I'm having a hard time figuring out what makes him say that one. "I can't Deacon." Oh, I'm sure you can Deacon as you are Deacon.

But my favorite thing about Deacon is how sweet and snuggly he has become. Not that he wasn't always sweet, he was, but he was not always snuggly.

See, Zeke used to love being held from the beginning. He didn't like being put down as a baby, and would sit and snuggle with whomever. Deacon, never much liked it. He was a bit more independent I guess? But over the last year I guess (so fear not you mothers with little ones who don't like to snuggle, you may still get your chance) he's been such a little snuggle bug.

Moments like this just kill me with its sweetness.

Even though he can be difficult at times (he's stubborn, and wild at times, and there seems to be absolutely NO form of discipline that seems to work on him), he is such a joy and just so much fun. He's the cutest thing and he knows it. Which is probably why discipline doesn't work on him. He just makes a face, flashes a smile, or makes a funny comment and it's very hard to keep a straight face and stay stern. For example, the other night I went in to put him back in bed and to tell him, again, to leave the vent alone. I said to him, "Deacon. Stay. In. Bed. Do you hear me?" He just sort of looked at me so I said, "Say it, Deacon" meaning, repeat the command to stay in bed, right. So he smiles a little smile, looks me straight in the eyes and says, "You hear me?" (Make sure you read that with a little bit of sass.) It was very hard to keep myself composed.

But that's our Deacon. And we love him.

I Thought We Were Done With This

Sigh. I woke up this morning, looked out my living room window, and saw this:

I pretty much figured it would look like this when I woke up at 1:30am to use the bathroom and saw that it had already started snowing. I knew for certain it would look like this when I saw that it was still snowing the next 3 times got up to use the bathroom.

It looks like it dropped 2-3 inches before stopping this morning. I did snow again while Zeke was in school, but has stopped again and now the sun is trying to shine through the clouds. There's no doubt the snow is beautiful, and it will make more water for the boys to splash through (their supply was getting low - not low in that all the snow was almost gone so there wouldn't be any more melting, but low in that the initial melt had even itself out so the water levels were lowering and draining in a more effective manner), but I'm ready for it all to go away. It was so nice seeing the grass again.

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Afternoon Constitutionals

With the weather being so nice lately, the boys and I ( and Josh when he's home) have started going for little walks after the boys get up from their naps.

And with everything melting, it's been perfect for putting the boys in their rainboots so they can go puddle jumping, as there is a lot of water all over the place.

Sometimes the boys even hold hands. Okay, the usually don't but this picture is too cute not to post.

The boys have a great time splashing about. I have a great time just being in the sun. And it's a good way to use up some of their seemingly endless supply of energy.

Oh, and here's a little video I took of the boys splashing the other day. I hope you enjoy it as much as they enjoyed splashing in that puddle.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone