Let Go Mommy!

Tonight we went to a 1st birthday party for one of friends little boys. The family has an in ground pool and I forgot our swim suits. Bummer! Luckily they have three boys under the age of three so they were able to let us barrow a suit, life jacket and diaper for Ayden. He was very reluctant to wear the life jacket and then did not want to get into the water with out me. We spent a lot of time on the stairs! Finally, my friend Stacy was able to get him in the water with her. After that he was getting a little more comfortable! He was playing on the stairs and leaned back to far and found out he could float with the life jacket! He was very content playing there for a while and I would hold on to him so he didn't roll to his front. Finally he started yelling "let go mommy!" "Ayden float myself!" We have only been 2 for 3 days but we have learned a few new words... "myself", and "I do it". This could be a fun year!

We were very proud of Ayden tonight though! He did a great job in the big pool with out me! I was very proud of him for floating on this back (something he normally will not do) and he was practicing putting his face in the water! He did so great! Even though he is in the independent stage and it is not always easy for a mom to hear those words he is doing lots of first these days! I am so excited to watch him grow and grow!

Happy Birthday Ayden!!!

Wow! Two years ago we welcomed such a perfect little baby boy into our family! We had no idea how he would change us and our family and I couldn't imagine life with out him!

I love this energetic, loveable, sweet, talkative, funny, little boy!!!

Here are a few of my favorite pictures from the year!

Baking Birthday Cake!

I LOVE. LOVE. LOVE baking with kids! It started when I used to babysit and now I have been having Ayden help me around the kitchen more and more this summer! It makes baking so much more fun! Ayden loves to "dunk" (dump) everything in. He gets so excited when we push the chair over to the counter.

Today he helped me bake his birthday cake and cupcakes! He was a great helper! I even showed him how to lick the beaters! Yum :) Then he put the cupcake liners on the pan! I always remember helping my dad do that! Here are some pictures from this morning! You have to wait till after his party to see the finished product: The Tractor Cake!!! :)

Do They Look Alike?!?

When ever we go anywhere we always hear how much Ahnie looks like her brother. So, I decided to take a picture of Ahnie that is very close to one of my favorite pictures of Ayden. Both sporting the same hawkeye shirt!



So what do you think?!? Do they look alike?

Sunday Morning Photo Shoot

I love Sunday mornings when I get to dress the kids up to go to church! I love the outfits the two kids wore today and had to take pictures! This might be the first time I got both of them looking and smiling at the same time! :) Ayden loves Ahnie's outfit too the few times I have put it on her he always comments and says "Ahnie cute!" So sweet!

I LOVE these two kiddos!!!

Sturgis Falls!

Sturgis Falls is our town's summer celebration. It is always filled with lots of music, food venders, walking, seeing lots of people, parades, rides and just a fun weekend spent outside with family and friends. I used to always feel like it was the one weekend I was reminded I was not from Cedar Falls. I can say now it is a weekend I look forward to and get excited about seeing friends and spending the time with my family!

This year Brett had a baseball tournament so we was not able to join in the fun. We were bummed but I tried not to let it stop us going down for the fun! Thanks to our friends the Hoffert's I was able to pack up the two kids and get them to the parade. Ayden and Madi were in Ahh through the whole thing!! I don't think they moved except to ask for more snacks :) TT sat with Matt and loved to watch everything going on! Ahnie slept...surprise surprise! I can't wait for the days that she is up and alert for all these fun things too but for now I enjoyed cuddling her on my lap as the parade went by! Then we headed home for naps.







After naps Brett's sister, Kelly and her hubby Mike came to town and we headed down for more Sturgis fun! Mike had a blast running around with Ayden and Kelly enjoyed pushing Ahnie in the stroller and I enjoyed spending time with both of them! Mike was so great with Ayden and really made the afternoon fun! We got some pop corn and headed to the rides first. Mike got Ayden some tickets and he got to go on his first ride, the big fish! He was to little to ride on anything else so we got to ride twice! Ayden loved it! Then we headed up to the kids tent and Mike and Ayden checked out the chalk and legos while I waited in line for the balloon guy. Kelly got to spend some good cuddling time with Ahnie while we all waited. Once we got up to the balloon guy Ayden wanted a deer hat. When we ask for this we realized the guy making the balloons was deaf. So when he was done I told Ayden to say thank you with his hands and he did. It was so cool that the sign language he learned as a baby is still helping him communicate to people. I was very proud of him to remember how to do it!

3 Day Potty Training: Day 3

We are at day 3! Wow it was an intense 3 days and I am sad to say that we are back in diapers... This morning started out just like every other morning. We tried when we got up and nothing came so we kept letting him know to let us know when he needed to go. About 1 1/2 hours after he woke up we had the first accident. Not a whole lot of warning and he didn't try to stop it or get to the potty. Then we had a poopy accident and this time he ran to the potty but didn't make it. By this point I was frustrated and I could tell Ayden was just not having it! At one point I was laying on the couch worn out and he was laying by the door saying he wanted to go to the office with Daddy. (We have not been out of the house in 3 days!!!) I wanted to get out too! But we sat down and decided we would try the rest of the day or at least till naps. After Brett left for work I decided we needed something fun so we made our first fort and he loved it! But all of a sudden another accident. I was bummed!! We went on with our morning and got to nap time. I thought for a while during naps and I decided that after naps we would put a diaper back on. When he woke up I sat him down and told him how proud I was of him and told him how well he did these last few days but told him we were going to put the potty away and try again another time. He said no! and that he wanted his Thomas pants on! So we decided to try one more time! We went outside to play for a while and then over to our neighbors house. We then had our final accident. After this I asked if we could go put a diaper on and he said ok! So we were finally back in diapers by 5 PM.

Ayden worked so hard and I am very proud of him! All week I have been looking at him and realizing how big he is getting! This approach has you spending so much one on one time with your child. I had so much fun with him! It showed me how much I can really include him in! He cooked with me, helped with laundry, took the dog out to go potty, color, build things, work on his colors and counting, play games, play baseball, pretend and just be silly! It has showed me how much time I loose by being on the computer or watching TV or getting things done around the house while he is awake. I have learned I need to be more intentional about spending time with my kids and involving them in things I need to get done.

I have spent a lot of today thinking about the last 3 days and how I did and how Ayden did. I have decided that this was a great approach to potty training but Ayden just was not ready. She recommends you wait 30 days before trying again....I don't know when we will try again but I can say we will try this 3 Day Potty Training when I feel that he is ready again. I loved that it was centered around my child and that it was so positive!! I also like that its all or nothing! I don't want to spend weeks/months working on potty training. I can honestly said we put our all in it for 3 days and now can walk away for a while and come back with our full energy again. I did not want to give out her website or recommend it until I had put in the 3 days and I would say that if you are looking for a potty training approach then check out her site. It obviously doesn't work for every child right away but I do really like all that I read from her and if I wanted I could have emailed her to get suggestions from the author herself.

Her website is 3daypottytraining.com! Good luck!

3 Day Potty Training: Day 2

Today started off much better than yesterday! Brett got up with Ayden and he tried to go potty right away. Nothing happened so I laid in bed listening to Brett say every couple of minutes "Ayden tell Daddy when you have to go potty." About 1 1/2 hours after this Ayden said "potty" and they ran to the bathroom, and there was his first sticker/M&M! I decided to get up after all the cheering coming from the bathroom :) We went on with our morning and after breakfast I looked over at Ayden and I could tell he was working on something... I rushed him to the bathroom but it was too late. Bummer! Then we were playing in the kitchen and Ayden asked for an M&M and I said you have to go potty first...he started to make his potty noise and ran to the bathroom! Sticker #2/M&M!! And that was our morning! We spent the rest of the morning outside and playing inside and nothing happened. Finally it was nap time.

After nap time I tired to get Ayden to go potty and he was not very interested. I could tell he went in his pull up before I could get him in the bathroom... So we cuddled a little and let him wake up. Our friend Madi came over to play and we tried a few times to go potty and we got nothing. So I decided we needed to start drinking something to get him going. He had some water then a juice box. While we were making dinner Ayden was playing under the kitchen table and all of a sudden we hear "Potty!" We rushed him to the potty but it was too late... Then we had another poop accident. I was getting a little frustrated after having such a great morning. We decided it was bath time and as I was filling the bath another accident... I was determined to get him to go on the potty again before bed! We tried a few more times and finally we got it!

So Day 2 ended with 3 stickers and 4 accidents (2 being poops). We have not gotten a poop in the potty so we are shooting for that tomorrow! It is a 3 day training so we will see what Day 3 brings!

I will say that I really like that I feel like he is really learning about going potty. On day 1 he was having accidents right and left! I think that happened because in a diaper you can go potty anytime anywhere. Today he was able to hold it longer and when he went he really went! I do think we are making progress and I am so proud of my BIG BOY!!! We went from 12 accidents to 4 today! Thats a huge improvement! Can't wait to see what tomorrow brings!!!

3 Day Potty Training: Day 1

Today we started potty training with Ayden! Potty training was always the part of kids that I never looked forward to. I always have thought it ment many weeks/months of accidents and making progress and then regressing. To say the least, I was not looking forward to potty training Ayden... A few months ago I was reading a friend from college's blog and she blogged about this 3 day potty training. It sounded like it worked pretty well for them so I checked out the website. I really like that it was only 3 days (who doesn't have 3 days to commit to potty training) and it was also a very positive approach that centered around your child and teaching them how it feels when you have to go potty though accidents. So we decided this was going to be what we do but I needed to wait till after we had Ahnie and give Ayden time to adjust to our new family of four. Then he started getting really bad diaper rashes and every time he would poop it would burn his bottom and he would scream and cry when I needed to change him. I finally decided that we have to try potty training and if it is too soon we would stop and try again later but we had to try something! So here we are! :)

We spent the last two weeks talking about going potty in the big potty! We went and bought a potty seat and some big boy under ware. After he went to bed I made a sticker chart for him and had a few surprises ready for him when he got up. We got up like normal and during breakfast we talked about our big first day of potty training. We spent most of the morning in our under ware in the kitchen (easier to clean the accidents)! We spend time having snacks and juice boxes (a new treat) and lot of time coloring! We also made some jello and he helped me do little chores around the house. Brett took the day off to take care of Ahnie so I could focus my attention to Ayden. This is one big part of her potty training process. It was so great to spend some quality time with just Ayden, that hasn't happened very often since Ahnie has been born.

Well, this morning was a good morning but long! Until nap he had 10 accidents and had not gone potty on the potty yet. The main thing that you do is constantly ask your child if their under ware is dry and praise them when it is and tell them constantly to tell you when you have to go potty. The idea is they don't know what it feels like yet so they have to learn. When they start to go you scoup them up and try to get them to the potty. He went though phases of having big accidents then he started telling me a lot he had to go but barely sit down then his accidents would only get his under ware a little wet. Then nap time. For naps and bed we decided we would use pull ups.

After naps I was a little unsure if this was really going to work. We had a few more accidents and then after dinner at 7:00 he started to have an accident and looked at us and said potty! I scooped him up and ran him to the potty and we sat and sat and he finally went! Brett and I were so exited! I wish I had a camera going to see our reactions. Ayden finally got to put a sticker on his chart after 12 X's and got an M&M. Brett was so excited he went to get everyone 4 queens. We stayed home and called both "MeMa's" (Grandma) to tell them the exciting news!

Then it was bed time... We put the pull ups back on and put him to bed. He kept coming out and would tell us he had to go potty. Finally he went again!!! So we had 12 accidents and 2 stickers on day one! I can honestly said I was up and down all day about how it was going but at the end of the day he seems to have learned a little. I am excited to see what day 2 has in store for us!

Funny Quotes From Today...

This morning Emily, Madi and Elliot came to play. Ayden and Madi were sliding (as in Baseball slides). Ayden does this constantly and always yells "SAFE". Well Madi told Emily to slide and she did. Ayden quickly yelled "OUT!" He has never called anyone out before...I guess Emily needs to work on her slides a little bit.

After naps we went to the waterpark. As we were pulling in Ayden yelled from the back seat. "Watch out daddy, cars!"

When we got into the water Ayden was not very excited. We kept trying to take him to different spots that he might like to play. We went to the hippos and as he was hanging on very tight he was saying "Other kids turn, Other kids turn!"

Gone Fishing....

A few weeks ago we went fishing with our good friends the Hofferts! Once we got all of our stuff to the fishing site at George Wyth the dad's showed the kids how to bait a hook. After the first few catches were made the kids were more excited by the golf clubs and the water. By the end of the night we had retrieved both the golf clubs and balls from the water and both Ayden and Madison were soaking wet! We then enjoyed some yummy burgers and hotdogs on the grill and headed home. It was a great night!!!! I love summer nights where we do something as a family outside with good friends!!



Best Buddies!!!


Eating our yummy dinner!!


Touching Daddy's BIG catch! Look at Madison in the corner cheering Ayden on!


Learning how to bait a hook.


Ahnie enjoying sitting outside...poor girl sleeps though all the fun!