Cookies for Santa

Luke was on sprinkle duty - and he took his job very seriously!

This was one of my favorite cookies that he decorated. I really liked his "pile" technique with the chocolate sprinkles.

After decorating quite a few cookies, he began to ask if he could "taste" the sprinkles.

Of course!

Before I knew it, he was using the 1/4 teaspoon to scoop sprinkles into his mouth.

Some for Luke...

...and some for the cookies...

(please note: we didn't give away any cookies to friends or family - all the slobbery sprinkles that landed on the cookies were consumed by us and Santa. Just in case you were curious!)

and now, to taste the fruits of our labor!

mmmmmm! Finger lickin' good!!

Potty Training

Will we be able to conquer this feat over the holidays?? I wouldn't hold my breath...

The other day, Luke tried on his big boy undies (yes, Nemo undies with socks and shoes but no pants). He wore them for about 2 hours accident free! I kept asking him over and over if he needed to go and sit on the potty. His answer was always a very huffy "NO mommy!!"

Then all of a sudden, he ran over to me and exclaimed "Mommy, I pooped!". As it turns out, "poop" was really just pee... he completely saturated himself! At that point, it was bath time, so he just stripped down and went for a dip in the tub.

This incident does not give me much confidence for potty training, but I'm still gonna give it a whirl.

Any tips are greatly appreciated!!

Cravings

- BBQ + country cooking sides (aka: mac'n cheese, fried okra, mashed potatoes, etc.)
- scrambled eggs!!
- pistachios
- Izze Sparkling Blackberry
- hamburgers (Five Guys, preferably)
- ham and biscuits

and NO SWEETS!

Notice a theme? MEAT and salty things! That pretty much covers it! :)

I'm currently 13 weeks preggo and my belly is already waaaaaaay poking out! I took my first "belly pic" when I was preggo with Luke at 16 weeks... and there was really no belly to photograph! On this pregnancy, the belly is lots bigger, lots earlier. Total bummer!

As with pregnancy number one, this time around I'm feeling great and not sick at all! I'm already 100% convinced that it will be another boy. I can just feel it!

So, there's a quick update on ME! :)

Expanding the Fam (and my belly)

Luke is excited to be a big brother!

I'm currently 11 weeks preggo... due June 27th (a month before Luke turns 3).

We are all so, so, so excited!!

Thanksgiving 2010

(a little catch up...)

Luke ate sweet potato casserole, more sweet potato casserole, one bite of turkey, a deviled egg, then more sweet potato casserole. :)

A Horse, a Dino Encyclopedia, and a Sous Chef

This past weekend we went to Braxton's birthday party and Luke got to ride a horse!! "Ga-maw" Bettie is gonna be so proud of her little grandson!

As soon as he saw the horses, Luke was super excited! He kept tugging at my leg as we stood in line saying "I wan go see horsey!". One by one as his friends took their turns, he'd say "I wan go see Owen Turner on da horsey"... then "I wan go see Lauren on da horsey"...

Finally, I was Luke's turn!!!

I picked him up to put him on the miniature horse and his tiny little fists grasped my shirt so tightly as he started furiously shaking his head and saying "don't want to!!". It was amazing how quickly he went from total excitement and anticipation... to complete fear when it was his turn.



So, rather than taking a ride, we settled for petting the little miniature horse.



Luke then started gesturing over to the BIG horse, saying "I wan go see DAT horsey!". So, we decided to see if Luke would take a ride with dad sitting on the BIG horsey. After another round of "no, don't want to!", I just handed Luke up to dad and he plopped him down on the saddle. As soon as Luke's little hiney hit the leather, he got the biggest smile on his face and yelled "I'M RIDIN THE HORSEY!!!"

It was sooooo cute and hilarious!



This weekend we also got a quick visit from Ms. Lolly and Mr. Eric!! They brought Luke an awesome Dinosaur Encyclopedia and he's totally into it.

It's like he's watching an IMAX movie as he "ooooooh's" and "aaaaaaah's" over all the dinos.

My final anecdote of the evening just a shout out to my little helper! He doesn't want to be left out of ANY action, so as we're making dinner, he goes into the bathroom, grabs his stool, and gets a better view of exactly what's going on. I like to think of him as my little sous chef. Or my little cheese eater.



He just munched away on cheese and grapes while mom and dad prepared tacos and quesadillas!



Two is such a fun age so far!! That's right... so far! :)

The Stool

The gray, plastic stool is by far Luke's favorite prop. He uses it ALL the time and takes it with him throughout the house.

In the past, the stool pretty much just stayed in the master bathroom and was used to reach the sink for brushing teeth in the morning. A few weeks ago, he took stool usage to a whole new level as he discovered how amazing it was to have an eight inch boost anywhere he wanted!

His first big discovery was that he could use the stool to reach ALL the light switches in the house!! For days, we were constantly turning off lights and fans in EVERY room!

The next big realization was putting the stool by mom and dad's bed and climbing up! He LOOOOOOOVES getting on the big bed! He is forever yelling "daddy... get on the bed!!! Right now!" and "mommy, c'mere!"

Finally, his latest stool trick occurs at mealtime. He brings his stool up next to his chair (we have bar height chairs) and climbs up. I'm not gonna lie, I hold my breath every time he gets to the top of the seat and turns around (dear lord, please don't let him lose his balance!) So far so good! He has mastered this latest trick and sits in his seat on his own... buckles the little straps on his own... big smiles all around!

It is also funny to watch him when he's looking for the stool. He just gets this look in his eye and you can tell that he has a plan in mind... he just needs his trusty stool to fully execute it. He will wander around asking "where my 'tool go?" with the most puzzled look on his face! So funny!

Halloween 2010

For some reason, even though this weekend was the official "Halloween weekend", I'm just kinda over it already. Maybe because we already endured Luke's Fall Festival at school, pumpkin patch/painting pumpkins at school, his class Halloween party, trick-or-treating at school, Tate Farms with the fam, trunk-r-treat at the Y, and a Halloween party at one of my co-workers homes. Don't get me wrong... I love Halloween... but enough is enough, right?

Even though I feel "Halloween-ed out", it was still another fun fall weekend! We carved pumpkins (finally!) this afternoon.

I tried to get Luke to touch the pumpkin goo in the middle of the pumpkin, but he decided that it would be good enough to just barely touch the goo that was still attached to the top of the pumpkin.

"EWWWWW!! YUCKY!!!"

I carved the first pumpkin, and Luke could not have been less interested in what I was doing. Once my pumpkin was complete and I handed the electric carver over to Andie, Luke immediately wanted to "sit in da wap" (sit in the lap) of dad and closely oversee his every move.

Here's the little stinker before we carved the third pumpkin.

Ok, now fast forward a few hours to "twick o tweet" time! Luke put on his costume (Russell from the movie "UP") for the third time... and for the third time we got tears and a series of "don't wike it! don't wike it! don't wike it!" as he tried to rip the handmade sash with all of the iron-on badges off of his body. Since this was the third time, I was a pro at getting a glo stick in his hand and escorting him outside asap to get his mind off of the sash (which you'd think was made of fire and nails).



Luke had a REALLY fun time "twick o tweeting" this year! Although he was super shy at people's doorsteps, he was very eager to go to the "neck house!" (next house). Once we hit all the houses on our little street, we headed back to our house to help dad and Mr. Mike (our neighbor) hand out candy. And by "help", I mean that Luke ate a sucker... then some M&Ms... then another sucker... then some gummi Starburst... etc. Big help!

This was the scene at our house:



Our pumpkins:



Luke doing what he does best:



HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

ps - since this is a post about Halloween, I should probably include a photo of our costumes as an ensemble! Luke's "Russell" costume on it's own isn't nearly as impressive as seeing Russell, Mr. Fredrickson, and the flying house from "UP" all together!!

Tate Farms

How do you sum up the pumpkin patch in three photos?

1 - pumpkins

2 - corn crib

3 - slide

'nuff said!

Smoothies are good!

("more please!")



Doggies are fun!



And wagon rides make me smile!

Fun with Friends

Luke has a best friend and his name is "Ander" (Andrew).



Over the past few weeks, we've gotten the chance to hang out with the Barnsby's a lot, so it is high time that I posted some pics from all the adventures that we've had!

The boys having fun at the Botanical Gardens:









A hug (with a running start) that got a little too aggressive for one party:





Me and the boys!



Picnic on the mountain:

(exploring with Ms. Kristen)



(feeding the fish... aka: kiddos eating lots of saltines)

Playing with Play-doh!

We always have so much fun with the Barnsby's and are happy that we live close enough to get to see those guys lots! Poor Luke is now lost without having "Ander" around. He'll just be in the middle of playing and say "Ander toming?" (Andrew coming?) or exclaim "Ander's turn!"

Although the boys have VERY different personalities... like, polar opposites... it is fun to see them being BFFs!