Monday, April 27, 2009

Weekend road trip

We had a great visit at my parent's house this past weekend. Reese and Mason spent the majority of time outdoors as usual. I think Reese may be just as in love with CeeCee's horses as Mason. Mason was able to ride the horses all by himself this weekend, with CeeCee standing as much as 15-20 feet away while she videotaped him reigning and kicking the horses to go. Of course, now we can't get the video to upload so we have no evidence of it. I do have a lot of pictures of them playing in the little pool so that will have to do for now. I have to admit that I was so excited to finally put Reese's first swimsuit on, this adorable ladybug suit that was handed down to us by a total stranger. I couldn't have picked out a better suit myself. Enjoy!


Wednesday, April 22, 2009

My most embarrassing parenting moment to date

I'm sure there will be many more mortifying moments as a parent, but in 3.5 years, this is at the top of the list. This afternoon, I thought it would be fun to plug in an old wall phone upstairs that we NEVER use and let mason play with it. I figured since we haven't called anyone on it in about 8 years there would be no redial issue so what's the harm? Well Mason pushed a whole bunch of numbers and said he was talking to the lady, but when I checked there was no one there. So then we actually called grandma and grandpa and Mason "talked" to them for a couple of minutes then said goodbye. Then he pushed a whole lot more buttons and said again he was talking to the lady. 

So I check again and say hello, only to have this response...
"This is Allen 911, this is the 2nd phone call we have received from the house and there was no response when we tried to call back, is everything ok?" So my response was a huge gasp followed by apologizing profusely and blaming it on Mason, what any good parent would do, right? So then we go downstairs, and was still shaking a bit from being so embarrassed only to have the door bell ring...

and there was a very nice Allen police officer at the door wanting to know if everything was ok. He was even nice enough to park down the street and walk up to the door to make sure we were ok. So then my embarrassment was beyond words. Well, I did manage to come up with a few, once again apologizing and pointing fingers ( I think I actually, physically pointed my finger at my child). He was very nice though and I greatly appreciated that because he could have gone the really annoyed and irritated route, but he didn't. PSA - don't let your kids play with phones with pre-programmed 911 buttons (which in our case was the C button, how was I supposed to know???)

Sunday, April 19, 2009

Sister see, sister do

Not a whole lot of new information to report since the last post. Mason seems to be completely potty-trained at night now as we have not had any incidents since the pull-ups were retired. He also apparently had a growth spurt because now not only can he reach the pedals on his bicycle, he can actually propel it down the street by himself, he's just not that good at steering and braking yet. 

Reese has the slowest moving tooth ever. She has been working on one of her top teeth for about a month now and it still hasn't formally introduced itself yet. Even without that top tooth in, she can still leave a mark with those 2 bottom teeth when she bites, which is what she has starting doing lately for fun. She seems to have a special affinity for my big toe. Her other new trait that cracks us up...she laughs at herself when she toots. Hilarious!

Here's just a few pics of them playing recently. Of course, Reese wants to do everything Mason does, and playing at the chalkboard is no exception. I thought she had spit up this afternoon only to realize she had been eating some of the chalk. 




Monday, April 13, 2009

Check-ups & pull-ups

We were a little late, but we finally had Reese's 12 month check-up today. She was sick last week and then before that we were waiting to see how her new iron supplement would fare. So drumroll please....
Weight: 18 lbs, 12.9 ounces (10th percentile)
Height: 29 inches (37th percentile)
Head: 18 1/4 cm (87th percentile)
After trying a higher strength iron-only supplement, Reese's anemia is now in the very bottom of the normal range. Due to the fact that her iron levels are finally normal only with iron fortified formula and an iron supplement, we will be continuing formula until she is 15 months and holding off on milk. She still doesn't eat enough table foods to maintain her iron levels so we will just be on formula a tad bit longer. That also means that my baby, who is no longer a baby, gets to be my baby for a few more months too.  

So, if anyone has any unwanted Enfamil coupons lying around, feel free to send them my way :)

Update on Mason, he likes silly string. He especially likes it when Daddy pretends to be sneezing on him with it. He also likes to spray the dogs, but they aren't a big fan of the silly string.

We are in the process of marking off another big milestone for Mason. We are 2 for 2 with no pull-ups at night. We are so proud of him!

Friday, April 10, 2009

Prerequisite bluebonnet pictures in Texas

I have to admit, these are the first bluebonnet pictures I have ever taken and I have lived in Texas all my life. I guess it was well worth the wait since this is the bluebonnet season since having both my precious babies.

They were never looking at the camera at the same time. That's typical.
She wasn't quite so sure of the bluebonnets (or the little bees buzzing around).
I love this expression!
He is usually a little more photogenic that this, but in his defense, it was bright out today.
 I think it was a record, about 34 pictures in about 1 minute and then we were gone. Can't wait until next year!



Sunday, April 5, 2009

Cow cake explained

A friend asked why I chose a cow cake for Reese so I'll take a few minutes to explain. Right now, she only has one word that she says without us prompting and that is "brother" which actually comes out as "bubba or butter" in a slow voice. So cute. Back to the cow. That was her first animal sound she had and it started about 2 or 3 weeks ago. Anytime she sees a cow anywhere in books or on TV she points and says "moo" which doesn't really sound like "moo" but we know that's what it is. I just thought it would be adorable to see her pointing and moo-ing at the cow cake, and it was.

The Not-Birthday Party

In honor of Reese turning one last week, we had a small gathering to celebrate her birthday, but it wasn't a party. For several reasons, we chose not to do the big first birthday party celebration like we did for Mason. Instead, it was just close family, a small cake for her and just a couple of gifts for Reese to open (Mason took care of that). 

For the first time, we were able to capture 4 generations on my mom's side. From left to right, my mom, my grandmother (Guda), myself, and of course my kiddos. My mom has a picture at home that has 5 generations of women on my mom's side that includes my sister and I when we were about 1, my mom, my grandmother, my great-grandmother, and my great-great grandmother.  It's a really neat picture to look back at and see now knowing how it felt getting 4 generations together. 


I do believe Reese had the cutest cake ever. I just called a local cafe where we always eat on Friday afternoon asking if she could make a cow cake for Reese. She couldn't but gave me the name of a new bakery across the street. So I called her, Michelle Ramirez at Hands on Design, and just asked if she could make me a cow cake for a little girl for her first birthday. That was all I asked for and she did the rest. It was so cute! 




Apparently, she prefers to eat her cake with a fork. That's where the damage was done.

At least she did poke around with her finger some, but she was more interested in just playing with the cow and saying "moo".
This was the messiest she got after the cake. I so wanted one of those pictures where the baby was covered from head to toe in icing, but neither one of my kids got the memo.

This was the after shot. See, not much damage done. In fact, we ended up eating the half she didn't touch since we didn't want it to go to waste. It tasted as good as it looked too.

Friday, April 3, 2009

Picture Overload

If you're not interested in seeing a lot of family pictures, then I would avoid this post. We took Mason and Reese for family pictures today since we don't have any formal pics of us all as a family since she was born. Since she is now 1 year old, we thought it was time. 

I have to admit, that as an anti-bow mama (and since she doesn't have hair), I had fun picking out her very first bows and I think she looks adorable with them. I can't believe they stayed with no hair and all.

So, here are some of our favorites.












As every mother would say, I have the cutest kids in the world!