He did this one day in the car on the way home and I was able to catch a little of it on video before he caught me. He doesn't like me taking pictures or video so most of the time he will stop whatever he is doing when he sees my phone out. In this video he is talking about the stoplight, saying green light, 1, 2 lights...
Monday, July 22, 2013
Chatterbox...
Alex's talking has really taken off recently and he seems to be turning into quite the chatterbox. The funniest times are when he is tired or bored and just talks to be talking or to keep himself awake.
He did this one day in the car on the way home and I was able to catch a little of it on video before he caught me. He doesn't like me taking pictures or video so most of the time he will stop whatever he is doing when he sees my phone out. In this video he is talking about the stoplight, saying green light, 1, 2 lights...
He did this one day in the car on the way home and I was able to catch a little of it on video before he caught me. He doesn't like me taking pictures or video so most of the time he will stop whatever he is doing when he sees my phone out. In this video he is talking about the stoplight, saying green light, 1, 2 lights...
Poor, Poor Moth...
About a week ago Alex and I went to dinner with my friend Amanda. During dinner he spotted a moth on the window seal and wanted to touch it. After seeing how this was going to go, I had to get out the video camera and capture a couple of moments of the torture of this poor moth...
3, 4, Go!
I know I have mentioned it before but Alex is absolutely fearless. This was once again proven yesterday when he decided to take leaps off the couch onto piles of blankets and pillows. We are working on counting so he tries to count a lot. Sometimes it is 1, 2, 3 and other times it could be 6, 7, 8. Yesterday during the couch jumps it was 3, 4, go!
He did this several times until he decided to jump off the other side of the couch and jumped forward rather than sideways. He head hit the ottoman with a big thud and he just froze for a second. Matt hit the nail on the head when he said it looked like a cartoon the way he just froze with his head on the ottoman. But it didn't take long for the tears to start and now he has a nice mark across his nose. He is lucky he didn't break that little nose the way he hit!
If you ask him what happened he says "I fall, go boom!" and hits his hands together for dramatic effect. Doesn't really act like it was any big deal at all.
He did this several times until he decided to jump off the other side of the couch and jumped forward rather than sideways. He head hit the ottoman with a big thud and he just froze for a second. Matt hit the nail on the head when he said it looked like a cartoon the way he just froze with his head on the ottoman. But it didn't take long for the tears to start and now he has a nice mark across his nose. He is lucky he didn't break that little nose the way he hit!
If you ask him what happened he says "I fall, go boom!" and hits his hands together for dramatic effect. Doesn't really act like it was any big deal at all.
Fun Times Playing Like a Big Boy...
It seems like every day Alex gets bigger and can do more things like a big boy. A couple of weeks ago after dinner Matt had the great idea to go to the city park to play for a little bit. Alex just thought he was the biggest thing climbing on the playground and going down the slides. Of course when he saw Reagan go down the big slide, he had to try it too and our fearless child loved it.
And then last night he was outside playing with Nana, Poppy and Reagan and saw Reagan riding her skateboard. He thought he was plenty big to ride and after getting his helmet on, he sat right down and rode down the sidewalk smiling the entire time.
And then last night he was outside playing with Nana, Poppy and Reagan and saw Reagan riding her skateboard. He thought he was plenty big to ride and after getting his helmet on, he sat right down and rode down the sidewalk smiling the entire time.
Wednesday, July 3, 2013
First Trip to the Movies...
On Sunday Matt mentioned going to see the new Monsters University movie at the theater. He humored me when I suggested taking Alex with us rather than dropping him off with a grandparent. So off we all went to the movies. We went to Movie Tavern where you can order food during the movie and had lunch while the movie played.
Much to our surprise, Alex did fantastic! He sat in my lap the whole time, completely locked in to the movie. At different parts he would react with a little jump if it was scary, a laugh at the funny parts, clapping when the characters clapped and even threw in a roar when the monsters were practicing their roars.
Right at the end he started pointing at Mike (the little green monster) and calling him "one eye" and would turn to me and say "big eye momma!". It was really cute. When the credits started rolling and the lights came back on, he looked at Matt and said "more daddy!". So I guess he liked it! Monday night we put in Monsters Inc at home and he once again, watched and enjoyed it. Wanting us to start it over when it ended.
Guess we can add movies to the list of family activities now!
Much to our surprise, Alex did fantastic! He sat in my lap the whole time, completely locked in to the movie. At different parts he would react with a little jump if it was scary, a laugh at the funny parts, clapping when the characters clapped and even threw in a roar when the monsters were practicing their roars.
Right at the end he started pointing at Mike (the little green monster) and calling him "one eye" and would turn to me and say "big eye momma!". It was really cute. When the credits started rolling and the lights came back on, he looked at Matt and said "more daddy!". So I guess he liked it! Monday night we put in Monsters Inc at home and he once again, watched and enjoyed it. Wanting us to start it over when it ended.
Guess we can add movies to the list of family activities now!
We Are Moving...TWICE!
Normally my blog posts are about our kids but over the next 6 months I will be posting several updates to our newest adventure...moving and building a new home.
A little background on how we got into this adventure...
About 2 1/2 years ago Matt and I realized we would eventually need to get a bigger house. After Alex joined the family, it became even more apparent we would need to do so sooner rather than later. We just have run out of space. People laugh when they see our house and how much stuff is crammed into it but then add on the fact that we have rented not one, but two storage buildings in town to hold the stuff that won't fit in our house. We have a 2 car garage and yet both of our cars stay in the driveway because they won't fit in the garage. It was time to get more space!
But we had one major hurdle to over come - we were very picky in what we wanted in a house. We have looked at various houses over the past 2+ years and never found one we were willing to buy. Until we came across 1015 Binderton. Based on the pictures on lbar we could tell it had potential. So we email the listing agent in March about it and find out they had just gotten an offer and most likely would have a contract on it very soon. We decided to not even take a look and chance falling in love with a house that is no longer available. 6 weeks later I get an email from that agent that it appeared the financing was going to fall through and would we be interested in looking at it and being a back up offer. We were, so we went and looked, fell in love with the location (in a cul-de-sac, backing up to the Elementary school, in a very nice, quiet neighborhood), it had my big garden tub in the master bath, it had Matt's unfinished basement, and a nice yard. So we made an offer, ended up having a contract on it contingent on the sale of our house and put our house on the market.
3 weeks later the sellers got an offer with no contingency and we had no offers on our house so we were forced to release it and decide where to go from there. We had said all along, if we lost Binderton we would take our house off the market but having gone through that stress and heart break we wondered if it wouldn't be better to sell ours and rent something until we found a house we like and at that point be ready to make a cash offer and not deal with the contingency again.
8 days later we got a contract on our house. Then the idea of building a new home with Ball Homes came into discussion. We found a lot that is in a dead end street with empty lots beside it, we can build the exact floor plan we want, with a basement and all the upgrades we want (my big tub and a stand up shower for one) and spend more than $20,000 less than we were going to spend on Binderton. So on June 22nd we signed a contract with Ball Homes to build a McCormick II on lot 38 in Gleneagles - future home of 117 Shepherds Trace.
We are beyond excited and the excitement grows every day as Matt and I talked through each step of the process. Everyone keeps telling me that if our marriage can survive building, it can survive anything but I have a good feeling we won't be put to that test. We have already picked out all the options for the house - brick, siding, shingles, door colors, carpet, vinyl, cabinets, counters, etc. and haven't even slightly disagreed. We are just enjoying every exciting step of this process.
I will continue to post updates as the house progresses but as of today, our tentative time line is:
Selections Appointment - next Wednesday, July 10. This is when we make all our picks official.
Break ground about 2 weeks after selections
Close on the finished house 150 days after breaking ground - which at this point looks to be on about the 23rd of December. Should be a fun Christmas this year. :)
Now you wonder about my mention of moving twice. As exciting as building our new house is, we have one hiccup. We are aiming to close before the end of the year but are scheduled to close on our house we are selling on August 20th. That leaves us a little more than 4 months with no where to go. So the search for a short term rental is on! I will update you on that once we find one as well...
First picture of many...our lot....
A little background on how we got into this adventure...
About 2 1/2 years ago Matt and I realized we would eventually need to get a bigger house. After Alex joined the family, it became even more apparent we would need to do so sooner rather than later. We just have run out of space. People laugh when they see our house and how much stuff is crammed into it but then add on the fact that we have rented not one, but two storage buildings in town to hold the stuff that won't fit in our house. We have a 2 car garage and yet both of our cars stay in the driveway because they won't fit in the garage. It was time to get more space!
But we had one major hurdle to over come - we were very picky in what we wanted in a house. We have looked at various houses over the past 2+ years and never found one we were willing to buy. Until we came across 1015 Binderton. Based on the pictures on lbar we could tell it had potential. So we email the listing agent in March about it and find out they had just gotten an offer and most likely would have a contract on it very soon. We decided to not even take a look and chance falling in love with a house that is no longer available. 6 weeks later I get an email from that agent that it appeared the financing was going to fall through and would we be interested in looking at it and being a back up offer. We were, so we went and looked, fell in love with the location (in a cul-de-sac, backing up to the Elementary school, in a very nice, quiet neighborhood), it had my big garden tub in the master bath, it had Matt's unfinished basement, and a nice yard. So we made an offer, ended up having a contract on it contingent on the sale of our house and put our house on the market.
3 weeks later the sellers got an offer with no contingency and we had no offers on our house so we were forced to release it and decide where to go from there. We had said all along, if we lost Binderton we would take our house off the market but having gone through that stress and heart break we wondered if it wouldn't be better to sell ours and rent something until we found a house we like and at that point be ready to make a cash offer and not deal with the contingency again.
8 days later we got a contract on our house. Then the idea of building a new home with Ball Homes came into discussion. We found a lot that is in a dead end street with empty lots beside it, we can build the exact floor plan we want, with a basement and all the upgrades we want (my big tub and a stand up shower for one) and spend more than $20,000 less than we were going to spend on Binderton. So on June 22nd we signed a contract with Ball Homes to build a McCormick II on lot 38 in Gleneagles - future home of 117 Shepherds Trace.
We are beyond excited and the excitement grows every day as Matt and I talked through each step of the process. Everyone keeps telling me that if our marriage can survive building, it can survive anything but I have a good feeling we won't be put to that test. We have already picked out all the options for the house - brick, siding, shingles, door colors, carpet, vinyl, cabinets, counters, etc. and haven't even slightly disagreed. We are just enjoying every exciting step of this process.
I will continue to post updates as the house progresses but as of today, our tentative time line is:
Selections Appointment - next Wednesday, July 10. This is when we make all our picks official.
Break ground about 2 weeks after selections
Close on the finished house 150 days after breaking ground - which at this point looks to be on about the 23rd of December. Should be a fun Christmas this year. :)
Now you wonder about my mention of moving twice. As exciting as building our new house is, we have one hiccup. We are aiming to close before the end of the year but are scheduled to close on our house we are selling on August 20th. That leaves us a little more than 4 months with no where to go. So the search for a short term rental is on! I will update you on that once we find one as well...
First picture of many...our lot....
Tuesday, July 2, 2013
A Mother's Sacrifice....
Before I had Alex, I thought I knew what people meant when they talked about the sacrifice of a parent. I figured it meant time, patience, sleep, love, and so much more. And all of that is true but in my opinion, none of that is sacrifice. Those are all things I am more than willing to give to both of our kids.
However, recently I have learned the true meaning of a parent's sacrifice. Not too long ago Alex got into the pantry and found the stash of candy we keep in there. Of all the many things in that bucket he came out with the one package I would have never guessed. A little purple package of Cadbury chocolate eggs. Mommy's chocolate eggs. The only candy you can buy once a year. The only candy I crave and therefore ration as best as I can after Easter. But when those big blue eyes looked up at me and he said "mommy peas..." I was a goner. And that is when I learned the true meaning of sacrifice.
It continues just about every night when he decides the food on my plate is so much better than the exact same food on his plate and insists on eating mine. But if he tries something he doesn't like, before I can stop him, he spits it right back out, onto my plate, into the food I am eating. That is also sacrifice.
And I am sure over the years to come I will find many more examples of the "true" meaning of sacrifice as a mother...
However, recently I have learned the true meaning of a parent's sacrifice. Not too long ago Alex got into the pantry and found the stash of candy we keep in there. Of all the many things in that bucket he came out with the one package I would have never guessed. A little purple package of Cadbury chocolate eggs. Mommy's chocolate eggs. The only candy you can buy once a year. The only candy I crave and therefore ration as best as I can after Easter. But when those big blue eyes looked up at me and he said "mommy peas..." I was a goner. And that is when I learned the true meaning of sacrifice.
It continues just about every night when he decides the food on my plate is so much better than the exact same food on his plate and insists on eating mine. But if he tries something he doesn't like, before I can stop him, he spits it right back out, onto my plate, into the food I am eating. That is also sacrifice.
And I am sure over the years to come I will find many more examples of the "true" meaning of sacrifice as a mother...
Pig Champion!!
It never seems to amaze me how many random things our family can get into and this summer has been no different. I randomly picked up a book about the Woodford County Fair about a month ago and on the way to Lexington found a couple of things for our kids to do during the fair. I signed Alex up for the Cutest Baby Contest but due to an infection and tonsillitis he wasn't able to go to the fair at all.
Reagan however participated in and won the event I signed her up for - the Greased Pig Contest! She competed with about 15 kids in her 8-10 year old division and was crowned the champion when she was the first to be able to grab the pig by both back legs. We were so proud! :) Unfortunately due to the baby boy being sick, him and daddy had to stay home and watch a replay from the video I took. I would post it as well but I think it is too big of a file.
However, what made us even more proud was the way she handled herself after the match was over when there was some confusion and a little boy was announced as the winner. Even though we all thought she had won, she never said a word about it. She came out of the ring with a smile on her face and said she had a lot of fun and couldn't wait to do it again next year. When they made an announcement that they had messed up and called her back in as the winner she was of course thrilled. She won a trophy with a pig on it and $50. We made sure she knew how great she acted and how important it is to be a good sport in situations like that.
Here is our Greased Pig Champion!!
Reagan however participated in and won the event I signed her up for - the Greased Pig Contest! She competed with about 15 kids in her 8-10 year old division and was crowned the champion when she was the first to be able to grab the pig by both back legs. We were so proud! :) Unfortunately due to the baby boy being sick, him and daddy had to stay home and watch a replay from the video I took. I would post it as well but I think it is too big of a file.
However, what made us even more proud was the way she handled herself after the match was over when there was some confusion and a little boy was announced as the winner. Even though we all thought she had won, she never said a word about it. She came out of the ring with a smile on her face and said she had a lot of fun and couldn't wait to do it again next year. When they made an announcement that they had messed up and called her back in as the winner she was of course thrilled. She won a trophy with a pig on it and $50. We made sure she knew how great she acted and how important it is to be a good sport in situations like that.
Here is our Greased Pig Champion!!
Our Little Man Turned 2!!
As usual I am late on updating the blog but I will forever hold tight to the saying, "better late than never." :)
On the 23rd we celebrated our little munchkin's 2nd birthday. I feel like a broken record saying "I can't believe he is already 2" but I honestly don't know where the last 2 years have gone. I remember the day he was born like it was just yesterday. But the past 2 years have been a blast, watching him grow and develop into the outgoing little boy that he is. Recently he has become quite the chatter box and is using sentences, amazing us daily with his vocabulary and knowledge.
We celebrated his big 2nd birthday with Batman and our family. No huge party this year. Mommy decided to keep it low key and it was perfect. Just inviting family and couple of close friends the guest list was still over 30 but we still had a wonderful time. Everyone came over to the house (for the last birthday party in the house, more on that in a different post) and we grilled out burgers and hot dogs.
Alex had been sick all week but thankfully he felt good enough to enjoy his party on Sunday. His cake was fabulous. Created by my friend Cassie:
After a few tries and help from mommy, he figured out how to blow out the candles and thought it was pretty cool.
Presents were a huge hit this year. He jumped right in, ripping paper and diving into bags to see what all they held. The looks of amazement on his face were priceless.
We did quickly realize that he didn't quite get he concept of "open all the gifts first, and then go back and play with them". He wanted every gift opened and out of the box immediately. He had to check it out and see what it did before he would move on to the next one. It was quite entertaining and very time consuming but he was enjoying all his gifts so I had a hard time making him stop. One of the biggest distractions were the box of gummies that Mamaw and Paw had put on the front of his gift. We had to stop several times to open up a pack of gummies and eat them.
After all the presents had been opened we went outside to watch for the reveal of the last gift from Nana and Poppy...
Notice our matching shirts in the previous picture? :)
And then he had to check out the big gift. I liked this picture because you can see his cape really good too.
After checking it out, he finally got in. One push on the pedal and discovering what it did, he thought it was fantastic. It is hard to see the smile in the picture because of his hat, but it was huge. He hasn't quite mastered steering but absolutely loves driving his truck. Every time we go through the garage, he points at the trucks and says "mines!". That gift was definitely a hit!
Now we have a nice family collection of blue Ford trucks!
Birthday fun continued the next day at Sandy's when he got to celebrate with his friends. I took them pizza and ice cream for lunch and Sandy gave him a piece of cake with a candle. He really started to enjoy the birthday fun and now whenever you mention a birthday, he moves his head back and forth and sings "happy, happy, birthday".
Here is a video of the fun at Sandy's:
On the 23rd we celebrated our little munchkin's 2nd birthday. I feel like a broken record saying "I can't believe he is already 2" but I honestly don't know where the last 2 years have gone. I remember the day he was born like it was just yesterday. But the past 2 years have been a blast, watching him grow and develop into the outgoing little boy that he is. Recently he has become quite the chatter box and is using sentences, amazing us daily with his vocabulary and knowledge.
We celebrated his big 2nd birthday with Batman and our family. No huge party this year. Mommy decided to keep it low key and it was perfect. Just inviting family and couple of close friends the guest list was still over 30 but we still had a wonderful time. Everyone came over to the house (for the last birthday party in the house, more on that in a different post) and we grilled out burgers and hot dogs.
Alex had been sick all week but thankfully he felt good enough to enjoy his party on Sunday. His cake was fabulous. Created by my friend Cassie:
After a few tries and help from mommy, he figured out how to blow out the candles and thought it was pretty cool.
Presents were a huge hit this year. He jumped right in, ripping paper and diving into bags to see what all they held. The looks of amazement on his face were priceless.
We did quickly realize that he didn't quite get he concept of "open all the gifts first, and then go back and play with them". He wanted every gift opened and out of the box immediately. He had to check it out and see what it did before he would move on to the next one. It was quite entertaining and very time consuming but he was enjoying all his gifts so I had a hard time making him stop. One of the biggest distractions were the box of gummies that Mamaw and Paw had put on the front of his gift. We had to stop several times to open up a pack of gummies and eat them.
After all the presents had been opened we went outside to watch for the reveal of the last gift from Nana and Poppy...
Notice our matching shirts in the previous picture? :)
And then he had to check out the big gift. I liked this picture because you can see his cape really good too.
After checking it out, he finally got in. One push on the pedal and discovering what it did, he thought it was fantastic. It is hard to see the smile in the picture because of his hat, but it was huge. He hasn't quite mastered steering but absolutely loves driving his truck. Every time we go through the garage, he points at the trucks and says "mines!". That gift was definitely a hit!
Now we have a nice family collection of blue Ford trucks!
Birthday fun continued the next day at Sandy's when he got to celebrate with his friends. I took them pizza and ice cream for lunch and Sandy gave him a piece of cake with a candle. He really started to enjoy the birthday fun and now whenever you mention a birthday, he moves his head back and forth and sings "happy, happy, birthday".
Here is a video of the fun at Sandy's:
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