Mish-Mash

Photo dump people - get ready!

Carson has been obsessed with the couch recently. He's figured out how to get on and off by himself and now he's unstoppable

Social distancing drinks!

So there was this Facebook thing going around called the Cookie Challenge where you put a cookie in front of your kid, ask them to wait to eat it and see what they did. Before starting this challenge, I made a prediction. Miles would eat the cookie. And - see for yourself. It's a little long, but you have to watch until the end.

"Reebow"

Prepped and ready for some beautiful weather *pinkies up!* haha

My hamster cage tunnel extravaganza realized

Reunited and it feels so good! After months of staying distant, our families discussed the current circumstances, what precautions each of us are taking and decided that as long as both families keep up with the same precautions and stay open about each other's current conditions, we are safe to join pods. SO EXCITED!

The kids missed each other so bad. They played SO well together for hours. (the water slide helped too...)

"Big tower Mama. Big tower. Up HIGH. HIGH Mama. Tower HIGH!"

....minutes later. Godzilla distruction!

Sweet boys :)

Miles found this TINY frog in our backyard. So cute. He carried it around for awhile and decided to show it how to go down the slide. To then be smashed.... oops. Sorry frog :(

Carson showing off his playscape skills!

Lia comes in. "Mimi... can you come help me? Miles is stuck in the swing." We go to the window and this is what we see. haha!

Father / Son montage. And... Action...

...Cut! Good job people. That's a wrap!

I have no idea what was so funny....

"Looking" for Yaya haha

One of Carson and Miles' favorite games:  Grab some cars and crawl chase around the island. So cute 

And the best way to end the day? DANCE PARTY!

Dada's Day

Alas, Stephen was able to take a break today - his day. He's been working so hard and doing a fantastic job keeping the business going during all this Covid stuff. He needed this day badly.

That morning, I kept the kids quiet while Stephen slept in. We worked on saying "Happy Dada Day!" and making a card from the boys to him. I opted away from doing a fancy handprint/footprint type card and wanted it to be specifically created by them. Miles picked the colors for all the words and both Miles and Carson "decorated" the rest. It might look rough, but they had so much fun doing it!

We prepped coffee and waited for Stephen to wake up. Miles was SO excited when Stephen rounded the corner and couldn't wait to have him open the gifts. "Coffee first bud. Coffee first." Once he perked up, we opened gifts.

We got him a remote control car that operates on land and on water! Miles was pumped. "Mud truck Dada! MUD TRUCK!" We plugged the truck in to charge and made a big breakfast with mimosas before heading out to test out the new mud truck. 

Love how both of them are just smirking. ha!

We headed back in to cool down before Miles' rest. But, not before a little dancing.

Stephen spent the rest of the day out by the pond with the guys. 

Stephen caught 3 huge fish. insane!

Todd caught some too.... just not quuuuuite as big haha

Once Miles woke up, he joined in on the fun for awhile.

Overall, this was just what Stephen needed. Such a fun day!

From Different Perspectives

This was awhile ago, but cannot be left un-posted!

Miles was playing in the backyard one day just GIGGLING. Stephen and I poked our heads out and immediately started videoing. You can't really tell, but he was sticking small sticks through the fence for Birdie to grab.

He was having such a ball playing with Birdie. We peered over and saw Becky on her porch. Funny enough, she was videoing too!

Steps on Record

We're up to 40 - FORTY STEPS! He's getting so much more confident and taking steps on his own to get from place to place. Crawling is still his preferred method of movement, but he's doing so well. I have a feeling the counting of steps will be a thing of the past here soon. Yay Carson!!

Paw-E & Neenees

Over Memorial Day weekend, Stephen and I opted to try out potty training with Miles. Our original thought was to do this in August when he would be out of school. But because of COVID, we have a lot more time with him. So, we used the 3-day weekend to go for it.

I bought a potty, some fun undies, treats and solicited advice from Becky on the method she used. Potty training in 3 days - I'm in! We were ready to go. 

We woke up that morning and told Miles it was a super exciting day. "Today you are a big boy! Today we are all done diapers!!" He was all excited... not sure if he knew why... but excited nonetheless. 

Day 1:  A mad success! SO many parties at the potty and over the top excitement. It was pretty fun. No accidents and in great spirits all day. Could it be? Would this be THAT easy? 

Helping Dada with his new sno cone machine. Delish. Purchase approved

When it's too hot outside and you need to stay close to the potty

Day 2:  We lessened the amount of of reminders and we had a few accidents. But with all things considered, he did great.

Day 3:  I retract my previous "easy" statement. This day was pretty exhausting. I learned that what you feed your toddler may come back to haunt you. Something did not sit well and we were back and forth, in and out of the potty with more dirty undies than expected. Lots of wiping, lots of changing. My back was spent at the end of the day. Apart from his belly troubles, he fell into the "too busy playing" category and didn't make it to the potty in time. We also think he was experimenting with his body to see what did what and how long he could hold out. "Mama! PAW-E!!" *runs to potty*.... leaving a little puddle of pee on the floor. It wasn't all lost though - the idea was definitely still there. Some additional reminders and assistance from us and he was back on track.

Shirts with no pants has been the preferred attire in our house lately

The coming days were similar but getting increasingly better. It's been almost 2 weeks and we'll go ahead and call it - potty training has been a success! We've noticed the little wetting of the undies before going to the potty has been a re-occurring thing. So, I took some advice from Becky and put a basket full of clean undies in the bathroom for him to grab plus a bin for wet undies. He's gotten the hang of pretty much everything, which is so nice. Wet undies go here, grab dry undies here. Putting the undies back on..... well.... he's still working on that. "Look Mama! New Neenees!" *waddling into the room with both legs through one hole*

I am so happy for him and his new found independence. We're still on alert and have told the girls to be on alert as well since he's still learning. But, we've made so much progress. I'm confident (even with his speech a little behind) that when school starts, he'll be ready.

Note for future potty trainers:  7 pairs of undies is NOT enough...... pretty sure I'm up to about 30 now 

Miles Speech Update

As many of you know, we did a speech evaluation for Miles last Fall. We felt that he was doing fine for his age, but might be a tad behind. So getting a second opinion offered that extra validation. Like we thought, the therapist said he was age appropriate and on par with where he needed to be. She sent us over things to look for as he neared age 3 as well as 3 and a half.

Since quarantine, I feel like Miles' speech has grown exponentially. I'm not sure if it's because he's home more often and I'm hearing more, or if that "light bulb" has gone off. Some of his words are a little muddled and we haven't reached the goals set by the therapist yet, but he's doing so well!

For those curious, our goals:
- Finishing the end of words by age 3 (she said if he's doing it sometimes, but not others, it's a good indication this skill will develop on it's own)
- Using the K and G sounds by age 3.5
- And being understood 75% of the time by friends and family by age 3

[ Note:  This video is LONG. We got an ABC box of books from Becky with words starting with each letter. He was cooperating so well, so I went ahead and did all the letters ]

...yes, it's supposed to be a black screen :P

It's Official - Carson's First Word(s)!

We've been listening for awhile now and it's the same pretty much every time.

First he signs it, then he says it. "All Done!" Sometimes he just says "Done!", but it's there. Yay Carson!

When Stephen reads this, he's going to tell you Carson's first word was "Dada". Let me set this straight. Yes, he could say that a long time ago. However, he doesn't use to when talking about Stephen. He doesn't correlate the two. So technically, not a word yet. *wink*

A little update on his walking: We're up to 10 steps! I was hoping he'd pickup on it a little faster, but he just isn't interested in practicing. Sometimes when we're working with him, he just keeps his legs lifted and doesn't put weight on them. We have him just bobbing there in mid air hoping he'd plant his feet. He does not. If he's not into it, he won't do it. Such a stinker.