Just Life

It seems both kids are in very fun yet very tough stages.  Matthew's language is developing like crazy all while his independent streak keeps on growing and he's a classic toddler whose emotions know no bounds (yet).  When he's happy he's over the moon and can melt the coldest of hearts but when he's unhappy, hell hath no fury like a toddler scorned.  He's also decided Catherine isn't all that bad and enjoys getting a reaction out of her.  Here he is reading to her:

 And giving headbumps:

He's now just as excited about her "crawling" as we are and is trying to help:

 

His imaginative play is also taking off (hence our coat tree "tree" of earlier).  He's taken to pretend cooking, setting up stories with his farm animals and more.  He had a whole lot to tell me during bath the other night:

As well as sometimes often doing head scratching things like running in circles for no reason or this:

 

Catherine's also still mostly grins and spends much of her day vocalizing and a combination of rocking on her hands and knees and seal flopping around the house, or being super cute after bath:
 

She's also at the stage where her wild hand gestures during dinner make her the dogs' best friend.

It's also been fun watching her inch toward pulling herself up and starting to climb on James and I's legs. 

 

And last but not least, from the photographic genius that is my son, a wildebeest, I think.  I took Matthew antique-ing in our quest for an armoire but he was more interested in visiting (and photographing) the dead animals.   Good times.

Cameras, Diaper, Kittens, Dads and Fishing (aka Stream of Consciousness to the extreme)

Camera 1. Me 0. I was in denial about my nice camera, but as it stands about 75% of the time, I get shots that are completely black. I'll have the camera guys look at it soon but in the meantime I've finally given in and switched cameras. My second favorite camera takes great outdoor shots but the flash is a bit slow, and toggling between movies/stills is a pain which makes it harder to capture this guy:

Matthew ran (streaked?) by tonight to celebrate after the potty. I hope this isn't the equivalent of yelling "insurmountable lead" for toddlers, but Matthew's completely diaper-free! Hooray!

Because of Matthew's non-stop energy it's just easier to get pics of him lying down and he definitely loves to lie down and give Catherine hugs. Somehow they still turn into action pics.

Catherine wasn't having any of it and pushed him away:

"Who me? *curtsy* Why I'd never push my brother away"

P.S. Thanks to Amma for the adorable tights. They were perfect for our chilly fall weather today!

And now for the stream of consciousness portion of the evening. I took this video of Catherine when Iris came by, then Catherine started "talking" about it:

Which reminded me of the line of this song where he talks about the little girl talking about her kittens, that makes me cry pretty much every time it's on the radio (thank you pregancy hormones) becaues I can only imagine that I wanted to talk about kittens non-stop instead of fish when dad was trying to get me to fish.

Which reminded me of these great pictures my dad scanned in for me a while ago and how I hope Catherine has awesome memories like this with James:

Which reminded me of another thing that made me cry this week, which was this list for dad's and daughters.

Which mostly just makes me so thankful that Catherine has such a great dad. Even though we'll likely outsource teaching her to fish to Uncle Matt and the great uncles, I know she and James will have their own special memories and activities. I think he's already trying to get her interested in football on Sundays :-)

It's only fair

Since I sometimes post embarrassing things about my kids here, its only fair I share one of my greatest parenting/teaching failures. I am the worst artist on the face of the planet. Matthew often asks me to draw for him. Houses - triangle on top of square, check. Birds - curved V, check. Horse - crap. Somehow this is what I came up with, and I'm pretty certain it'll give Matthew nightmares in the future. Today he seemed at least amused with it:

Catherine meanwhile, has just been hanging out and being cute:

Though sometimes big brother needs to get in on the action:

And hanging out after bath in her duck towel:

And speaking of hanging out, this has been hanging out on my camera for a while. Matthew LOVES to help cook and his favorite task is to add a pinch of salt to anything or stir, but for pizza his favorite task is sprinkling toppings. Well, his favorite self-appointed task is eating the raw dough covered with pesto, but eventually he gets around to the toppings:

And here's one of he and daddy playing with the bubbles during his first bubble bath. I heard boisterous laughter and had to go check it out:

And last but not least, here's a video that's been gathering dust from the Pozun's last visit. Aunt Sharon sent Matthew this dinosaur pull toy as a big brother gift and he loves it!

Sad Pilgrims, Supermodels and Rocking Out

Kids are funny. Especially when they are learning to dress themselves and end up looking like a modern pilgrim.

(I have no idea what the pout is for, but probably was a result of my wanting to take his picture instead of heading outside to go see the "gucks" "wocks" "panes" and to go "spash" as fast as possible.)

As much as Catherine reminds me a lot of Matthew as a baby, she's definitely all girl. Look at this cutie with her supermodel poses. I'm ready now to lock her up until she's 30.

Well, maybe she's goofy and nerdy like the rest of us and I won't have to worry too much!

And last but not least, 2 videos of our little rocks star. Last week Matthew got an awesome big brother gift from some good friends in Cheyenne. He LOVES it! He tested Papa's memory of all the nursery rhymes and insisted Papa sing along over and over. Then Matthew added some new moves to his awkward white man dance, twirling and waving his arms like he's a bronc rider. Hilarity ensues.

And most recently Matthew added the rolled eyes and shaking head as he rocked out to Old MacDonald with Daddy.

Not a bad day

Happy 1 week birthday Catherine! It's been an exciting week. She's already quite the social butterfly and went to big brother's playgroup and had her first play date this week. Granted, she sleeps through most of these things but still, it's a start.  

James worked from home today so instead of being stuck in traffic this morning he got extra baby snuggles

and big brother crawling-climbing-kicking-elbowing over in the cutest way to say hi to Catherine.

Matthew also thought it was a good time to give momma's (thankfully decaf) coffee a try:

Amidst the craziness of yesterday, we tested out our gorgeous new sling I got at our baby shower.  Catherine approved by immediately falling asleep:

Matthew's learning a lot about baby care and is in a very intense mimicking phase.  He's a little frustrated as he still can't figure out how to get the nursing pads to stay in his shirt like momma but he certainly likes to try.  (I promise grandmas he has other shirts but now that I do laundry eighty billion more times a day the clean shirt at the top of the pile always seems to be this one!)

And last but not least, some pics of Catherine waking up (in B&W because my camera/flash/lighting turned her an alien color that made it less cute!)

Happy Friday everyone!  We're just anxiously awaiting the arrival of amma and papa tomorrow! 

Maternity "Shoot"

"Shoot" i.e. a synonym for "damn!" may be the best word to describe our photo attempts. I figured since my days are numbered, PLUS I was "dressed up" for work AND Matthew had a new shirt to model from Grandma Sheryl I'd try some DIY photo attempts of me and him and the baby belly with the help of the self-timer. Matthew insisted on helping hit the button for every shot and hilarity ensued, but very few decent pics resulted. Here's the results fit to share:

As Matthew saw me back up against the wall he insisting he stand in the corner. He found the self-timer hilarious and was intent on getting himself "set" for the shot just like mommy instead of standing anywhere near me:



I finally got smart and tackled him!


My helper! (Soon I'll have a whole album of shots like these!)

Matthew gives the baby kisses:

Rushing to check the camera:

Another well tackled snugglebear with no belly in sight!

Standard cheesy maternity pose waiting on Matthew as he insisted on pushing the buttons. (The other 95 shots he took were pretty much close-ups of his own sleeve).


Story break:


My little goober:

And last but not least an attempt at a family shot:

And on an unrelated but amusing note, while I was making dinner and still had the camera handy, Matthew discovered the simple joy of the motorboat.

And some bonus profile shots because I kinda regret the lack of pregnancy photos when I was carrying Matthew and decided to suck it up and take some of my crazy largeness.



And after some very scientific googling on Old Wive's Tales, here's what the conventional wisdom says about the gender of the baby. Hopefully we'll get our real result soon enough:

Carrying High - Girl
Low Heartrate - Boy
Salty cravings - Boy
Cold Feet - Boy (though admittedly it's been winter here my entire pregnancy so I'm not sure this one is fair)
Ring over belly swings in circles - Boy

Video Fun!

First, Aunt Jean sent us an adorable toothbrush holder. Matthew thinks its awesome! Thanks Aunt Jean!

And more leftovers from Easter. Here was Matthew's first egg:

And here's (a rather long video) where the egg project devolved into awesome experimentation:

And the fun of putting away his Easter loot after our egg hunt:

Easter weekend Videos

It's getting harder to video Matthew as he never, ever stops moving. EVER. However, we took a few last weekend and of those he managed to be in the scene for at least a few. Here he is being all boy and driving the playground equipment:



And here he is a little confused as he listened to the Arapaho creation story at the Historic Trails Museum as told by William C'Hair.



He loved the museum. Here's a compilation of him exploring 3 exhibits. First, he and daddy rode in the covered wagon as they forded the river. Then Matthew set out a camp and demonstrated the forces that most likely created the most hardship for the settlers (toddlers!) and finished up with his favorite activity of all - sending telegraphs. The interactive was a really cool way to explain telegraphs to a texting generation, but most important to Matthew it made a lot of noise, had lights and moved!



And finally, here's the little dude unpacking his Play-doh fun from the Easter bunny:


And this picture was part of a very unsuccessful and blurry movie as Matthew was headed off to check out the fish/ducks. He looks so grown-up and corporate-like holding his "coffee" cup with one hand while in his dress up outfit I had to share it.

More blessed than we deserve

Matthew's very generous grandparents and uncles have showered our house with fun things again. From new books and ducks, to puzzles, singing cards and tractors Matthew has had a great week. We are very fortunate to have so many people looking out for this handsome kid. He got this John Deere from Uncle Matt's Woot obsession and couldn't wait to start playing. He even insisted on putting it together . . .

But eventually he let Daddy help a little.

Even though we are positive it is not put together correctly right now (curse you Uncle Matt!) Matthew loves it and unlike his other riding toy, he can actually go forward on this one. We were hoping to take it outside because it's spring, but of course spring here means something a little different than back east and we woke up to a few inches of snow this morning so cruising around our tiny living room will have to do for now.

And here he is playing with daddy, only to take a break to check out his new favorite duck. He now insists on a high five pretty much every time he catches a ball.

And here he is giving his bath toys their baths. James ran out of body parts for Matthew to wash on his own body so they started washing the monsters.

In good spirits at least

So, the past month's timeline went something like week 1 and 2, cold/cough, week 3, double ear infection, week 4 improvement but tugging on ear - just fluid according to the pediatrician, week 5, cold/cough recurring double ear infection.

On the upside, Matthew has learned to cope really well. He still sleeps well (except waking early), naps okay and for the most part his demeanor ranges from adorable to moderately cranky with a serious case of the whines. In the words of his pediatrician on Monday while looking in his ears "I'd expect him to be a lot more cranky with these." Here he is earlier this week playing with daddy and showing off his favorite words: more and beez (please).

Miscellaneous

Last weekend we ventured into our first play area. The weather was crappy, Matthew needed to run and the museums were already closed and well, I had a massive sinus headache and to be at least partially honest, baby Watson wanted ice cream :-) Mr. Big Brother also didn't seem to mind tagging along for this occasion and enjoying his fair share.

He was a little unsure of the play tunnels at first, but after watching an older girl climb up and then go down the slide he was ready to go. He'd watch her go in the tunnel then run around and watch her come down he slide and laugh hysterically. She then very helpfully pushed him up a tunnel to a landing bubble where he could hang out while the older kids climbed circles around him and he could make faces at us. He thought it was hilarious and watching him definitely was hilarious . . . until it was time to go and my pregnant self had to climb the tunnels to retrieve an unwilling to leave on his own toddler. I'm not sure whose brilliant idea it was to only have one way in and one way out but I was not impressed.

Yesterday it warmed up and we headed outside to try out our new sidewalk chalk. Matthew was quite intrigued, though it took him some time to figure out he could draw a lot more sitting and kneeling instead of crouching.

Today as I was cleaning out my cupboards I found an errant bag of yogurt melts from oh, probably a year ago and offered them up as snack. Matthew was super excited about them as a snack but even more excited when he realized they have very similar properties to chalk, super delicious chalk:

And last but not least, my favorite joy of toddlerhood is just that my son is weird. He does weird, inexplicable, hilarious things all day long. The other day when we were skyping he decided to do this weird walk for grandpa, then delivered a repeat performance the next day for grandma since the boy will do anything for a laugh:

When he's not walking around in some weird fashion, he's busy doing things like lining up his animals (trains, blocks, whatever) talking to them in some loud screeching code and then destroying them or growling and wearing my shoes around. I'd love to know what he's thinking and how his brain is working but also would be afraid to really find out :-) In the meantime he and I are hopefully headed out on a road trip tomorrow afternoon. Should be an interesting time as always.