Sadie Says

Sadie's catch phrase this weekend- "it's kinda easy" we have no idea where she picked it up but we hear it a lot at dinner time.

And the children have discovered Disney's Peter Pan. Sadie asked Daddy when he came home from work the other day "Daddy, can I fly to Neverland with Peter Pan and Wendy and Michael?" Caleb enjoys the crocodile that chases after Captain Hook.

The New Bed (Part I)

We had this crazy idea to get the kids bunk beds (Sadie needs something in the house to climb on now that the weather is cold). Unfortunately, they didn't send us all that we needed to build the entire set. So last night Andy and I put together the bottom bunk and moved Sadie's crib to the basement.
Tonight, with the kids back from G'ma's house (thoroughly worn out) we found a little problem at bedtime. Sadie was very excited to be in a big girl bed and Caleb was also looking forward to sleeping in the new bed. They both cried when asked to sleep in Caleb's toddler bed (that's still in it's usual spot). So we asked them if they wanted to share the new bed and this is what we got.

And I can happily report that by 8:30 they were passed out and at 10:30 (when we last checked on them) they were sleeping right next to each other. Sadie had turned herself around so that her head was right near her big brother.

We'll see how early they're up in the morning :-)

Sadie's 2nd Year

I realize I haven't been keeping up with this very well lately. I would say that I've been really busy but that isn't really an excuse. I have been fortunate to have had lots of photo session these past couple months so it looks like Jodi Walsh Photography will continue in 2009. I think it's more that I haven't felt like I have a lot to say. But since I did a big update on Caleb when he turned 3, it's only fair that I give you all the same update for Sadie.

Well, Sadie is very different from Caleb. We've been thinking of her as a 2 yr old since at least the beginning of summer. She's been talking non-stop since about 16 mos (which couldn't have been more different than Caleb not talking until he was almost 2). She's our active child with only 2 settings, moving and asleep but even asleep she moves all around but it's quieter.
We're convinced that she is either going to grow up to be an stunt woman or a physical comedienne since she has mastered the art of falling and takes great pride in falling and having people laugh at her. It's not unusual to see her sprawled on the floor grinning from ear to ear. We made the decision early that we weren't going to fuss over falls with both kids and taught them to say "ka-blooey" when they fell. Well, this might have back-fired with Sadie because she now loves to fall whether, jumping off the stairs, flopping on her diaper-padded rear, or doing belly smackers on the floor, she just laughs and jumps up ready to do it again.

She also loves dancing and music and will mimic (or try to mimic) dances that she sees on TV. She's recently discovered ballerinas and will try to ballerina twirl. At 2 she has mastered walking in high-heels (something I have yet to do). She loves dress up and has even gotten her big brother to play along.

She's the little mama, always trying to take care of everyone. Offering encouragement to Caleb on the potty, getting his milk for him, and often just patting him on the back when he needs it. We often hear her little voice asking "What's wrong?" when there's any indication that things aren't going well.

As I mentioned earlier, she started talking pretty early. She will say anything and understands so much. She has started picking up phrases from books. Not memorizing entire books like her brother but I've caught her a few times looking through Monster at the End of the Book saying "You turned the page."

Bear continues to be her faithful companion, joined sometimes by Baby and Daisy (a new doll from her birthday). She also loves the Little People and often talks to them and calls them her friends. She's been a little more hooked on TV than Caleb and will wake up asking to watch Sid the Science Kid, Mis Street (Sesame Street) or Jeopardy but she's never too upset when the answer is no.

Sadie, we're learning, has the makings of a social butterfly. Kids seem to be drawn to her, maybe it's that she follows them around until they just get used to her being there. I don't know. I think she's cute but I'm also a little biased. Most recently, she's charmed some little girls in Caleb's pre-school class. Picking up Caleb, I often hear the little girls saying good-bye to Sadie as we leave. I can't help but wonder how she's going to do next year when she's actually in pre-school. They might not be ready for her.

Other things we're learning about Sadie... she loves meat (meatloaf, spaghetti and meatballs, hamburgers, kielbasa and sausage- daddy's girl). She also loves her treats and often asks for a treat for finishing her treats. She doesn't seem to have the same pickiness that Caleb has or rather the treats are just more motivating to her than her brother.

Well, that's our little princess, even Caleb calls her his princess and we love her dearly and can't wait to see how she grows in 2009.

Thanksgiving 2008

Daddy: What are you thankful for, Caleb?
Caleb: My cornucopia.
Daddy: And what are you thankful for, Sadie?
Sadie: (after some discussion) My bear.

Hope you all have had a blessed Thanksgiving Day!

Caleb Potty Update!

I think we've finally had a break through! for the first time today, Caleb told me that he had to go potty and we're on day 3 with no accidents. the key is motivation. Caleb can be a challenge. in true stubborn fashion, basically from the day he was born, the child will not respond if you tell him he "has" to do anything. we've always had to find a way to outsmart him and convince him that he "wanted" to do whatever was asked. for some reason, i always forget this part of his personality and there can be lots of yelling and butting heads when we're both frustrated. this has been especially true of the potty. people have been telling me for months and months that things will just click, that he'll just get it one day. well, i've been working with him on this since March (?) and recently i've been wondering if he's ever going to get it. (i may even be jinxing myself by recording this update)

well, this week, i did 2 things. the first- i found this great little chore chart dry-erase board at Target with the days of the week and little magnet stars. very cute! a while ago Caleb really enjoyed earning stickers for going potty but we ran out of charts and it got forgotten (although both monkeys every now and then ask for a truck sticker). i thought this board might work- and save paper :-)
the second thing i did was offer Caleb the reward of computer time. i don't know what made me think of it or why i hadn't thought of it before but i offered that if he went all day with no accidents, he could have some time on the computer. he really liked that but i quickly discovered that waiting all day for the reward was a little too abstract for him. so adapting as always, i changed it up to if he puts something in the potty, he right away (or almost right away) will get 5 minutes on the computer.

i can't express how easy this has made things. this boy for a while has been refusing to even try to go and for some bizarre reason, if he knows that he has to actually go, he'll hide and refuse to sit. this usually happens in the morning and this morning, all i said was time to go potty and he happily went up, sat down, did his business and we were able to have a happy day in preschool with no accidents. yeah, and that's another relief. it's not good when the director expresses her disappointment in having potty problems when he was supposed to be completely trained before starting school.

well, i'm keeping my fingers crossed that we have turned a corner and that i won't have to fear the preschool director :-)

and of course, now i can think about getting sadie trained and we will return to a diaper free land once again :-)

Sadie's New Smile

yep, our little daredevil chipped her tooth at the grocery store on Saturday. we're still waiting to hear from dentist. just glad it's a baby tooth and not needing a trip to the ER :-)

Dress up Sadie

Sadie and her fur cape. She calls it her "kitty" :-)

Halloween 2008

Caleb- Superman and Sadie- Princess

Fall Fun

Saturday we visited the playground and ended up playing in the leaves with our friend Simon and then later that afternoon we took the kids to Shenot Farms to get some pumpkins. It was a great little trip. It's a small farm that's up in Wexford. They have a hayride that you take to the pumpkin patch (with a fresh apple from the orchard to snack on). Then you can walk around and choose your pumpkin. There's also a corn maze (we didn't try that out- it was almost closing time and didn't want to have to sleep in the cornfield :-)). They also had little samples of apple cider for you to try while out in the fields. Caleb's favorite part was trying to find the perfect sized pumpkin. He wanted to be able to carry it (which was quite a challenge). We had to settle for a pumpkin he could hold for about 2 minutes before letting it drop. Sadie's favorite part was the apple she got to snack on and the hayride. She also had some fun rolling pumpkins down the hill. I thought it was a little risky having a pumpkin patch on the side of a hill :-)

We got our pumpkins and also picked up some fresh cider and apple butter and other yummy stuff.

Now Caleb is very eager to "put a face on his pumpkin". Hopefully we'll get to that tomorrow :-)

hope you like the pics

update

It's been a while since I posted last. Life has thrown us for a loop starting right after Caleb's birthday. My step-mom, Mona (Grammie M to Caleb and Sadie) was taken to the hospital for testing after having some shortness of breath and what seemed like a respiratory infection. We discovered that week that she in fact had uterine cancer that had spread up into her lungs. It was a devastating diagnosis that sent all of us reeling and questioning "why is this happening?" It seemed like every day we were getting bad news, bits and pieces of hope were being chipped away. The only thing that seemed to keep us all together was the desire to be strong for each other and the tremendous outpouring of love, support and prayers for my step-mom, my dad and our family. It seemed like testing went on forever but finally the doctors came through with some hope for us. Mona had her first chemo treatment almost 2 weeks ago and has come through that well. She has several more treatments ahead of her, plus radiation and surgery but there is hope that she'll stay with us and that is a precious hope for our family. We're treasuring our time together, keeping faith that it won't be short and trusting God that he will continue to keep us in his care.

Caleb 2008

Another year has passed and Caleb is now 3 years old. No more a baby or even a toddler, he's our little boy and it's been so exciting to watch him grow and change and learn. Here are some things about Caleb...

Caleb has amazed us with his vocabulary and how quickly he jumped from making only animal sounds to speaking in sentences, reciting songs and even books. He loves singing and can often be heard up in his room singing "Take me out to the ballgame" or most recently "Rise and Shine and give God the glory" (a storybook that illustrates the song). He continues to love his books and now at naptime and bedtime brings at least 10 books into bed with him. Andy and I tried to limit the number of books but he would just go over to his shelf and take more, we decided to let him be. I don't know how many nights we've gone to check on him and found him asleep with a book on his chest. Once he can read, we'll really be in trouble. And speaking of reading, he's on his way. He can read STOP and even today pulled letters out of a puzzle and spelled STOP on the table. It's not going to take him long to pick it up. He also knows his numbers and happily counts to 20 when asked. And to think June of 2007, he wasn't really talking at all.

Caleb also continues to LOVE puzzles and I really wish we could find a small puzzle for him to do between with 50-75 pieces. He easily puts the 48 piece floor puzzles together and has even gone so far as to be able to use the picture on the box to figure out where a piece might go without actually connecting it to the other pieces. One good thing is that he never seems to get bored with his puzzles even though he's done them at least a hundred times. He still happily put them together and even likes it when Sadie hands him pieces.

Now we are trying to keep him from being too much of a bookworm. :-) He does love playing outside and with the recent addition of a sandbox to the backyard, he's always asking to go out. He loves digging in the sand and the dirt, looking for wiggle-worms, and running races aroudn the yard with Sadie. When we're out front, he is most often found riding in the Cozy Coupe and parking behing our car to get gas. It's been so fun seeing the kids play together outside and seeing Caleb beginning to pretend and make up games.

The big news this year is that Caleb is starting pre-school. He'll be going 2 mornings a week to a little pre-school in Shadyside. Yesterday was his first orientation day and tomorrow he goes for real. We're hoping that he gets some more opportunities to be with other kids and I'm looking forward to getting him more art opportunities. We'll see how this goes. He did like storytime yesterday and of course enjoyed exploring the new toys and puzzles in the classroom.

Now unfortunately potty-training has not been going so well. We've been working on this, it seems like forever, and seemed to be getting the hang of it in August. Then he started having stomach issues. I got tired of the huge messes and being confined to the house so I started putting him in pull-ups. That was a big mistake. Now his stomach seems to be settling a little but he no longer goes on the potty and I'm left with tons of accidents. We've been trying to watch his diet and had him tested for celiac and now we're just waiting for the results. I'm praying that the pre-school will continue to be understanding about all this while we get it straightened out.

Caleb is still a very picky eater and continues to vomit when trying new foods but we are seeing some improvements. Most recently he's been enjoying corn muffins and peanut butter bread. It's taking a lot of patience and is so challenging trying to decided when to be firm with him and when to let his eating go. But then again, I'm finding that with just about every aspect as these kids get older. I want to be consistant and yet it can be so hard to maintain the energy for being consistant. Then there's wanting to be firm but not so strict that you're constantly battling. Now I look back on the days when they were infants and think "my word, they were so easy."

I still feel so blessed to have this amazing little boy who says the sweetest things and has the most amazing smile. I'm looking forward to all the discoveries he'll be making this year and can't wait to watch him continue to grow.

The sweetest sound...

Caleb singing along with the songs on his toy radio.

Yummy Coffee

We ended our summer with one final trip across the street from my mom's to Barkley's, a little ice cream stand that we've been visiting for just about as long as I can remember and it's there that I get my favorite treat- a twist in a cup with rainbow sprinkles. What makes this so good is that they put a little bit of ice cream in the cup, then a scoop of sprinkles then more ice cream and finally sprinkles on the top. In my opinion this is the only way you can really enjoy this treat... but as always I'm off on my own little tangent.

Since we were headed back into Pittsburgh we thought we would stop and get this final treat, keeping the kids in their car seats. As Andy went out to get the treats, Caleb right away knew what was coming and announced that since we all finished our dinners, we could all have a special treat. There was no getting around giving the kids their own cups- they've started strongly objecting to the thought of sharing an ice cream with the 2 of them.

Andy brought back a paper bag full of treats and started slowly pulling out the items one by one, teasing the kids a bit. Caleb played along as we asked what each of the items were- is this a spoon and such. Then I thought I would keep the game going pulling out their styrofoam cup and saying, "hmm, is this coffee?" Caleb knew right away it was his ice cream and happily dug in. Sadie got her cup and we started enjoying our treat. Then, little Sadie pipes up "yummy, coffee" holding her spoon high and taking a big bite of ice cream.

The little ears hear everything and we never know when it's going to come back to us. :-)

BTW, we will be cleaning sprinkles out of the car and car seats for the rest of the year but they enjoyed their treats.

The First Camping Trip

Our summer came to a busy end this weekend as we celebrated Labor Day with our first camping trip. Now, I've considered myself to be a somewhat outdoorsy kind of girl. Growing up I was frequently covered in dirt, with my long hair hanging in messy tangles. Dad would take me hiking and fishing. With Mom and Joe, we spent many many many weekends camping in our pop-up camper all over western PA. Andy's a great sport about it but really prefers that the great outdoors stay out doors.

Mom and Joe wished to encourage Andy and I to go on our own adventures when we first got married so that Christmas they got us a tent, a camp stove, a light and camp chairs. Almost 8 years later the tent had remained happily fit in its bag, the stove in its box and we kind of lost track of the light between moving from Baltimore back to PA. (But the camp chairs have gotten lots of use :-)

But back to the real story.

We organized a little overnight camping trip to Keystone State Park (Derry, PA) about 45 min from Pittsburgh. One of the other families that went had a 2 yr old little boy so we thought since this would be a first time thing for all the kids we shouldn't do too much. I suggested the location knowing that my parents were only 10 min from the park should we run into problems with the kids. (So so so so so glad we went there)

Andy and I tried our best to plan and pack for the trip. We had a practice run on putting up the tent in the backyard so we wouldn't look like complete fools at the site and learned that a 7 person tent is very big. Yep, the tent barely fit in our backyard, not that the yard is small but when you factor in the swingset, sandbox and clothes line, you don't have a lot of space to work with. We went out in search of a sleeping bag for the Sadie-girl and ended up getting little blow-up beds for each of the kids (probably the biggest hit of the entire trip). And then began packing.

You would be surprised at how much stuff you need for two toddlers on an overnight trip-especially when you have no idea what to expect. We had the honda packed full and still had to borrow some things from my mom.

We got out to the site and began unloading. I took the kids to my mom's to pick up a cooler and the mountain pie irons while Andy set up the tent. They happily sent me back with what we needed (including the missing camp light) and some camp chairs. That's when we learned our first mistake. We packed up our little cooler with a few things and then left it sitting on the counter in the kitchen. I called my mom and she happily raided her fridge and brought us a few things to get us through the next day. (I was so glad they were only a few minutes away)

The rest of the evening went well. Our friends were so generous with their food and sharing with us. We cooked hot dogs on the fire and later made pizza mountain pies. The kids enjoyed PB sandwiches. After dinner the kids played a little while and toasted marshmellows for s'mores but then they were ready for bed. Caleb was so eager to sleep in his new bed, he insisted on putting on his pjs before it was even 8. We put the kids to bed and after some time they finally went to sleep. The adults played board games then and waited for the concert across the lake to end before going to sleep. The concert didn't seem to want to end. The band played until after midnight but we were too tired and decided to try to sleep with the loud music anyways. Andy joked, "I could have stayed home and listened to loud music like this" with the college students back on our block.

The music finally ended and then the real fun began.

It is amazing the noises you hear sleeping in a tent. It's not just the gentle hooting of an owl or hum of crickets. No way. I woke to her growling and snarling and the screeching of a small animal meeting a very painful demise and it sounded to be only a few yards away from our tent. Then there were the sounds of critters around the campsite. We had put all the food (including the trash in our car) but left out a couple of plastic coolers. Well, raccoons are not stupid animals and after a summer of scavenging campsites they have figured out how to open some coolers. (Our friends found their bread in the weeds above the campsite in the morning) I would love to say that I enjoyed hearing all these noises and slept peacefully but in the middle of the night I'm rarely capable of any rational thought so there was little sleeping on my part. Even after the noises of nature, I was kept awake but the kids where would take turns needing covered the rest of the night.

In the morning we discovered the pawprints from the visitors but still had plenty for breakfast. Then we had to begin the chore of packing up.

To top off the summer we spent Labor Day at Idlewild Park. It was a really nice day and the kids had a blast. Caleb climbed the big cargo net in Jumpin' Jungle with Andy and both Caleb and Sadie enjoyed playing in the ball pit. We lasted until 4:30 and then had enough. It was time to head for home. Caleb was passed out before we even left the parking lot.

pretending

the kids have started pretend playing. up until this point, i haven't really seen too much of this but over the past week and a half more and more games of pretend have developed. i think sadie might have started it- she's so determined to do anything the grown-ups do, from potty-training baby to taking her purse and going shopping in the cozy coupe. caleb has always been more of a realist and resistant to any suggestion that things aren't way the seem to be but he's started moving away from that.

friday grandma susie and pa-pa joe brought in a tugboat sandbox for in the back yard. this was a HUGE hit, especially with caleb. this addition to the backyard has meant tons of time playing outside (making potty training easier, since i'm not ready to venture out with him in underwear just yet). caleb has taken on the role of sea captain frequently sticking his head over the side and yelling "aye aye captain" and then jumping out into the yard and having me call out "man overboard" then he runs around the yard trying to stay away from the sharks that might eat him. he even started pretending that he was a shark trying to eat me. i would say "don't eat me shark, go eat some peanut butter" and he would fall on the ground laughing.

today, sadie has been little mama taking good care of her baby. she's finally discovering that baby should have a diaper and clothes on and made several attempts at putting one of her diapers on baby using caleb's changing table. i even had to let her use the baby powder (un-opened) because she knows that's what baby's need. it was really cute to watch and even caleb tried to join in. we almost had issues though. caleb doesn't have a baby and wanted sadie's but he accepted another smaller doll without too much protest.

potty training is continuing to go well. so far no accidents today :-) but we are becoming more concerned that he might be celiac and are looking into getting him tested.

sadie's other favorite toy (besides baby) is her cycle-bike. she can't quite use the pedals yet but cruises right along just using her feet to push. i've been having trouble chasing after her because she'll take off going up the sidewalk and giggling as i yell at her to turn back.

caleb can read STOP. i started telling him about red lights when we were in the car and then explained that i had to also stop at stop signs. i explained that stop said stop and he's progressed for pointing out the stop signs when we drive to also recognizing it in other places. while playing at the play kitchen he looked at the microwave and declared "s-t-o-p, spells stop" i thought it was pretty cool. he's also started putting together letters (from puzzles or refrigerator magnets) and asking me what they spell. hasn't made any real words yet but i'm impressed with this start.

we have a 3 yr check up for caleb next week. then it's get ready for the big birthday party.

Potty training successes!!!!

Yippee!! we have a little boy who is finally starting to get this whole going to the potty thing. we managed 3 trips to the potty today and one completely without me prompting and in time to make our deposit with no accidents!!! in case you can't tell, i'm thrilled after weeks of feeling like the boy was going to be stubborn and not interested. to be making progress with a couple weeks left before pre-school starts is a big deal and it's good because i think he's figuring out that me giving him juice all morning is what's making him have to go. he's started refusing to drink now. silly smartie pants who i can just barely keep one step in front of ;-)

well, just wanted to share that news! back to work.

Shore Pics!

so sorry

i know i've been away for quite some time. we had our beach trip to Ocean Beach, NJ and since getting back, i've been in potty training mode. yes, Caleb will be starting pre-school on his birthday, Sept 9, and they ask that the kids be potty trained.

**************a warning-- the following contains potty info that you may not want to here*************

this is proving to be quite the challenge. we have tried just about everything- m&m's as rewards, a sticker chart, just having him sit on the potty, spending entire days home in underwear, getting Sadie a potty so she can try it too... nothing has worked. yesterday, the kid spent almost the whole day in underwear and had only one accident. sounds great, right? wrong, he only went to the bathroom twice the entire day, once was the accident, twice was in the pull-up at naptime. i was shocked, he went from 3 until 9 without going at all. needless to say, the overnight diaper could not hold all that was in there.

i don't know what to do with him. right now, i'm thinking he can go to pre-school in underwear with instructions that they don't give him anything to eat or drink. it's only a couple of hours in the morning ;-)

ok, enough with the potty.

besides that, we've been all about the Olympics. the kids have really enjoyed seeing the various competitions. we've caught some gymnastics (recorded the trampoline event for sadie), lots of volleyball and swimming, some fencing and some running. the kids perk up anytime they hear the Olympic song intro... we might have to put that on a CD for in the car.

now we're working on planning the little man's 3rd b-day party. hard to believe it's already been 3yrs.

Zoo pics

another trip to the zoo this week to see the new baby elephant (Angelina) ! i didn't get too many pictures of her though- she was well protected by mama and a couple of zoo keepers. i also didn't get many pics of my kids (they no longer look at me at all when i have my camera going) but i did get some nice pics of the animals (if i do say so myself :-)

g'ma jody was visiting this week from NJ. we had lots of fun at the zoo. tried potty training some more and visited the toy library. lots of fun to hopefully tide g'ma over until we visit her at the beach.

Caleb's boo-boo 2008

Summer is in full swing and so begins the injuries. Fortunately this year hasn't required a trip to the ER, yet. Caleb kissed the pavement Saturday morning on a walk to the mailbox (the main mailbox at the end of the block). Caleb's explanation "I was running, so fast and I falled down." As you can see, his forehead was pretty scraped up and he got a scrape down the side of his nose too. Poor thing just didn't get his hands down first and I was a few yards away with Sadie so I couldn't grab him. But we got it cleaned up and after several boo-boo kisses the tears were gone and we were ready to play again.





Sadie also had to get in on the action though and for awhile was coming up to us asking for boo-boo kisses even though she hadn't gotten hurt.

That's all for now!

Finger Lakes, NY

Our first family vacation of Summer '08. We went up to the Finger Lakes area just outside of Rochester, NY for a long weekend. We stayed in a house on the lake with Granpapap and Grammie, and Sean, Emily and Claire. It was a nice big house with lots of space for the kids to run around in, which was a good thing- it ended up raining a good bit of the time there.

We drove up Thursday evening. The kids made the 5 hour trip well. We packed plenty of library books and that seemed to keep them busy. Sadie wasn't quite able to get at them herself and liked to flip through them quickly and then toss them on the floor so by the end of the drive we were almost constantly hearing her little voice yell "Book! Book!"

Friday morning, we got up and took a trip into Rochester to visit the Strong Museum
This is the National Museum of Play and it was great. The kids had a blast running around there and I don't think we even saw half of it. There was a huge Sesame Street area complete with games and puppets and all kinds of activities. There were areas with train tables and rice play and craft tables. There was a Clifford room that seemed to be the most entertaining for the kids. Then there was a whole other area for reading adventures. It was something else.

The kids were ready to crash after that so we came home for nap time.

Later in the evening we were able to convince Caleb to put on his life vest and go for a ride with Grammie and Grandpapap in the paddle boat. He's still very resistant to trying new things but is starting to understand the whole "if you do this, then you can do that" way of approaching things. He tolerated that vest and loved the boat ride.

Saturday was spent hanging out more at the house, skipping stones in the lake and going for boat rides. We couldn't get Caleb to wear water shoes so that left swimming out but he was happy to throw stones in the lake. Later in the afternoon, the grandparents managed to take all 3 grandkids out on the paddle boat. Caleb loved it. Sadie, not so much. She tolerated it but still looked pretty scared sitting in the back seat.

Grandpapap and Uncle Sean did some fly fishing and Grandpapap caught one and let Caleb help him reel it in. The kids were all excited to see the fish.

Then the kids got to feed the ducks. There happened to be two mama ducks with babies sticking around our part of the lake, so we got out some bread and the kids got to throw bread to the ducks after dinner. Caleb and Claire kept squealing and laughing watching the ducks devour the bread. Sadie couldn't understand why you would want to throw perfectly good bread away to the ducks- she preferred to eat it herself.

Sunday morning we had to pack up and leave pretty quickly. We did have time to play in the boats a little more and to get a quick family picture on the dock.

It was a fun weekend!

Busy, busy, busy

So it's been awhile since I last posted, as Aunt Judy reminded me yesterday :-) and a lot has been going on, which is why it's been awhile. Since the last post we've celebrated, Grandma Susie and Pa-pa Joe's 25th wedding anniversary (my mom and stepdad), spent a long weekend on a lake in the Finger Lakes area of NY, and most recently had a Rogers' family reunion up at Waldameer Park in Erie, PA.

In the midst of all of that we've begun "Adventures in Potty-training"- more on that in a later post.

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Now for the anniversary, that was something else.

And this is my recording of the events for those who couldn't attend and just to mark that day for those who were there.

It all started approx. 25 years, 1 month and 18 days ago when my mom and my step-dad, Joe, dropped my brother and me off at Grandma Rogers house so that they could elope. They didn't even get to be in a church with a preacher, just went to the magistrate's office and signed the papers. Later on, in the summer, there was a big reception/family reunion at the Bushes house in Derry. I only have a few memories of those times. I remember my brother Jason trying to go out the door with them, as a joke and at the party, I remember meeting all these new relatives and feeling awkward but still having a lot of fun with my cousins. It was a special having everyone together and because it was one of the last times we would have Grandpa Rogers with us.

I feel very lucky to have such a functional "dysfunctional" family. Any more you rarely hear about people staying committed to each other. I've seen enough Dr.Phil episodes to know that the statistics on remarriages after divorce are not very encouraging. And as Andy and approach our 8th year of marriage it's gotten me thinking about our parents' relationships. Once I used to think about my parent's being divorced a lot and I think I kind of let that define me. Now as I think about it, yes, my mother and father aren't together anymore but my mother and stepfather and father and stepmother have all been raising me together practically my entire life. I consider myself very lucky to have had not just 2 loving parents but 4 loving parents. To me, that's something very special.

So as I thought over all of this, it became very important to me to do something to celebrate this family mom and Joe have created. Fortunately, Jackie was all for it as well, not to mention Aunt Judy and Aunt Janet and all the rest of our family and friends who not only came out to celebrate but also continued to ask, "what can we bring?" and "how can we help?"

Jackie and I knew we wanted to have it be a surprise and to have it be some kind of a picnic. We had a lot of trouble figuring the details out beyond that. It continually fluctuated between a huge extravaganza to something a little more manageable (Jackie is still a college student and I have 2 toddlers running me ragged). I really wondered if this was really going to happen.

Then we got the idea to ask Aunt Janet if she would be willing (and able) to stand up for them so that they might be able to renew their wedding vows. (she will be taking over pastoral duties in July at her church up in Corry, PA) She was thrilled with the idea and slowly things began falling into place. Jackie thought it would be nice to have the ceremony out at Keystone State Park and then have a reception/party back at the house in Derry. We put together a list and sent out invitations. Then we started getting responses. It was so exciting to hear from all the family that wished us well and were happy to come. We couldn't have put this all together without all this help.

The remaining problem we had was how to get mom and Joe out of the house so that we could set things up. Jason helped by getting Joe involved working on a garage for his in-laws. That left mom. The only thing we could come up with was to take her shopping, so I had her take me out to JoAnns to get some fabric for a project for Sadie while the kids napped. Jackie and I kept in touch with our cell phones and mom was a little suspicious but had no idea what her daughters were really planning. Things went well and then I realized that I had to figure out some way to get her out to Keystone and to also get her fixed up (she had expected to spend the day playing with her grandkids and not going to a wedding so she wasn't what you might consider all dolled up :-) ) Fortunately, we were at a shopping center, of course, where anything and everything is available. I talked her into checking out a store that had clothes on sale. Then I talked her into buying a new top and me a pair of pants (I was actually getting them for her). The we had to stop into Walmart to pick up some party things and I couldn't help it. I had to give her some clue so I handed her the clothes and said, you need to change, you're going to a party. She was surprised and curious about what Jackie and I were concocting. After she changed I found out that we needed to kill some more time so I convinced her to get her hair done (Walmart happened to have a hair salon in store) then picked up a little make-up and she was ready to go.

We finished just in time and made the drive to Keystone, followed the red balloons to the ceremony area and as we drove by mom's first response was "There's Uncle Lynn?!!" Jackie got there right after us and we walked mom down near the lake. As we got closer, Jackie stopped mom and handed her the bouquet (every bride needs a bouquet) and slowly it started to set in what was happening. Family and friends were gathered around. Aunt Janet stood with a Bible under a white arch decorated with tulle and ivy and Joe was right there waiting for her. Of course, we all started crying, Mom, me, Jackie, Judy, Janet...basically every woman there was a little misty. Joe even got a little teary as it set in that he and Mom were actually getting re-married then and there.

Aunt Janet did a wonderful job leading the service even giving us a moment to respond to how mom and Joe as a couple affected our lives. We were all there as a testimony to how special they are to us and to each other.

After the ceremony, we shared stories of the surprise and took some pictures before revealing the final surprise - that there was a party going on at their house - and it was back to the house for more fun.

We ate good food, continued to share bits of the story of the day and swam in the pool as the sun went down. I think it turned out to be a very special day for mom and Joe and I continue to be amazed at how things came together. Thank you again to all of you who helped with this.

We love you Mom and Joe- happy 25th anniversary and we hope there are many, many more!

the zoo

We've had a busy week and it's only Wed. Monday was our first playground date with our Mops groups- Caleb's second time at the Children's Institute playground. they both loved it. the playground is handicapped accessible which means there are a lot of ramps to get places instead of steps. the kids had a blast. Sadie gave me a scare and yet again, demonstrated her fearless spirit by climbing up a metal, curved ladder that was almost as tall as i was. they both enjoyed following their friend, Simon around and racing down the slide.

Yesterday we took a trip to the zoo, again with Simon and another friend from our small group. this was my first excursion to the zoo with the kids on my own. it was a little crazy and it helped that i had friends with me to help keep track of my two. Caleb was so excited when i told him we were going to the zoo- he happily squealed "we're going to the zoo to see the animamals" (that's not a typo- that's how the boy says animals). then it was "we're going to see the monkeys and Alice the Camel" (as in the song). Actually, we learned at the zoo that the camel's real name is Molly but i'm getting off track. the kids really enjoyed being able to get in and out of the stroller. they'd get out to look at the animals and then climb back in to ride to the next group. Caleb was very good at staying with me and riding in the stroller when areas got too crowded. his favorite spot was the monkey house. i think he would have been happy to sit on the ground and watch them climb and jump and swing- squealing and giggling the entire time. he also liked the polar bears. they were really active, swimming and walking around. Sadie's favorite part was the tube slide. they have a little picnic area with a playground that has a rope climb up to a tube slide. Caleb liked climbing up the incline on all fours and then walking down the stairs. Sadie, however, preferred to power her way up, standing and not holding onto anything and then would slide down the tube slide. she loved looking through the tube to see me at the bottom and saying "hi mommy."

we also had the surprise of seeing cousin Claire with Aunt Emily. they had just got to the zoo and we were working on finding our way out so we didn't get to visit much but we'll see them next weekend.

this morning, we were at the Toy Lending Library (i had to volunteer) and again the kids really enjoyed playing.

tomorrow it's off to the doctors for a check of their ears (make sure the ear infections have cleared up). Sadie's been out of sorts so i'm wondering if she's teething or if her ears are still bothering her. we'll see.

that's all for now

New Things

the monkeys have achieved new things today!! today for the first time Caleb and Sadie walked to the playground- there and back. this was a big step for Caleb who prefers to ride in his stroller over walking any day.

over the weekend, Sadie mastered climbing the ladder to the slide and today she also mastered climbing up the rope ladder at the playground. i was very impressed with her. she seems to love finding new physical challenges and mastering them. each time she made it to the top, we had to clap and cheer for her. even Caleb cheered on his little sister.

you'd think that such a busy morning would wear them out but while Sadie is happily sleeping upstairs, Caleb is singing and dancing in the kitchen. it could be a loooong afternoon.

Poison Control

With 2 kids under 3 yrs old, I think it was inevitable that we would have to make a call to poison control eventually. Yesterday was the day for it.

I was putting away some clothes in my room while Caleb and Sadie were playing in his room. Sadie came into my room a couple of times but didn't seem interested in what I was doing so she left pretty quick. I was just about finished when she came into my room a final time and I noticed that her mouth was green and she was chewing on something. I ran over to see that she had found a tube of paint and had been chewing on it. I took her into the bathroom, grabbed a washcloth and started trying to wipe out her mouth. She cleaned up fairly quickly and certainly didn't seem upset by the situation. I examined the tube more closely. It was kid friendly water color paint and I couldn't figure out how she had gotten anything out. The tube still appeared to be closed. Then I looked in the box where I had these extra art supplies and discovered that it was empty. I went back to Caleb's room and discovered another paint tube on the floor and this one had a big squirt of green paint oozing out the bottom along with tons of teeth marks. This tube was oil paint and I started getting concerned.

After talking with Andy briefly, we thought it would be best to check with poison control. Oil paints can have some nasty stuff in them to create the pigment.

I called and talked to a really nice woman who assured me, after getting the details, that Sadie would be fine. Neither one of us thought that she could have eaten more than a toothpaste sized amount and after giving the woman the ingredients she was sure that Sadie would be alright.

And for the concerned grandparents and relatives, I've made sure that my paints are either put up out of their reach or they've been pitched. No more paint eating for Sadie.

What I heard this morning

sometime around 7 (didn't have my glasses to see the time) we heard caleb come out of his room. he's been coming out and then going downstairs to play so one of us has to get up and watch him. this morning, he was just sitting outside his door. andy got up to check on him and this is what i heard...

andy- "Caleb, are you alright?"
caleb- "Yes, I found my belly button"


another funny note-

caleb has been calling us "sir daddy and sir mommy" thanks to a Bob the Builder book. it's kind of cute and a little weird but that's our boy :-)

Caleb and Sadie Book Picks!!

Hi there. As most of you probably know, we love reading in this family. So as part of our encouragement for others, we thought we would start recommending great, fun, read-together books. I'm starting out the recommendations tonight, while the monkeys sleep, but hopefully Caleb and Sadie will be able to offer their on thoughts on their books in the future.

Sadie's Picks:

Jazz Baby by Lisa Wheeler and R. Gregory Christie
It's a cute little rhyming book with fun illustrations about a family putting baby to bed. We found this book in the library way back in January and we borrow it just about every visit. It's fun to read and easy to memorize (which can be really helpful when you need a distraction without having a book- reciting books from memory has saved us in the middle of the night and on long car trips).

Monkey and Me by Emily Gravett
Another rhyming book with animals! Yeah! We just found this last week and almost immediately Sadie started requesting "monkey". This story is a really quick read (great for bedtime) and the kids love saying the animal names when we read it. I love the illustrations and at the end we practice being quiet and saying "ssshh" because the little girl is sleeping.

Caleb's Picks:

I Ain't Gonna Paint No More! by Karen Beaumont and David Caltrow
Alright, as a mother who happens to also be an artist, I love this book almost as much as Caleb! I think it's hysterical- from the words to the illustrations. This book was also recently discovered at the library and Caleb has already started singing it all the time (we walked through Target today singing it together). It's to the tune of It Ain't Gonna Rain No More and of course, it's about a little boy getting in trouble with his paints. My opinion on this book may change when Caleb discovers paint but right now, I think it's too cute and funny to put down.


Alright, that's all I have for you tonight! Hope you enjoy these as much as we have.

Sadie Baby

just a couple of cute updates...

we were doing a little GF (gluten free) shopping at Whole Foods this morning- Caleb in the basket of the cart and Sadie walking. i was trying to get her to keep up with us calling her name, she was admiring the ice cream cases. Caleb decided to help and as i pushed the cart, he started calling out very loudly, "Saaaaa-diieeeee baaaaa-byyyyy." it was very cute.

we've been noticing Sadie is trying to sing songs. she's really been working on Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star and it's so cute to hear. she doesn't quite have all the words but you pick them up here and there. she's also tried ABC's. i have to try to get in on video but more and more she doesn't like to perform.

At the Doctor's again and again and again

once again, it appears that our house has contracted some kind of disease. this all started two weeks ago, at the end of G'ma J from NJ's visit. Caleb developed a fever, 102 fever and it freaked me out a little bit. i'm just not used to my kids being sick like that. for them, a high fever is 101 and that is pretty rare. there didn't seem to be other symptoms and the fever wouldn't go down even with tylenol. and of course, this all happened after the dr's office closed. we made some calls later that night and the nurse recommended we get him seen on Sat. so we did. the verdict was a cold and we started seeing the coughing and runny nose hit.

a few days later, Sadie started with the fever and the coughing. her coughing was so bad one night that we didn't get any sleep. i thought i would call the dr's and ask if she was old enough for a little bit of cough medicine. they told me to bring her in. so back to the dr's we went and again they said it's just a cold. (that was last thursday)

Caleb's cold seemed to be getting better. we didn't really have any fever and he was sleeping through the night. then yesterday...

we were playing outside in the sun and i happened to notice that Caleb was shivering. it was almost lunch time so i brought him in and checked his temp. 102. i couldn't believe it. so i gave him some motrin and put them both down for a nap. at 1:30 he woke up fussy, and i discovered that he had gotten sick in his bed. his eyes were open but he was limp and not really responding to me. this scared me. i checked his temp and he was up to 103 (this was just an hour or so after getting the dose of medicine). i was scared. i called andy and then called the dr's. they wanted to see him but couldn't get to him until 3. so we sat and watched Cars- him simultaneously shivering and burning up to the touch. we got to the dr's and the poor thing fell asleep on the floor of the waiting area while waiting to be called back. then when we were shown into a room, he fell asleep again waiting for the dr to come in. i think after the 2 little naps the fever medicine started to kick in and actually bring down the fever a bit.

he perked up a little for the doctor and once again, we were told it was a cold.

last night we brought him home and he slept for a good 3 hours. he was very pleasant when he got up but soon the fever was back. it was a long night with not a lot of sleeping. andy and i took turns sitting with him but he didn't really sleep much. then this morning the fever was up again, this time to 104. fortunately, we were already scheduled to be at the dr's for Sadie's 18 mos checkup. so Caleb got checked out as well. part of me wonders if there's some kind of spell or something on the dr's office, that as soon as a sick child steps into the waiting area, their symptoms begin to fade and are almost completely gone by the time they are actually seen by the dr. then of course, the parent is left looking like a paranoid hypochondriac. that is what i felt a little like today. i was actually happy when they took his temp and saw it was 103 (yesterday the highest they got was 99).

well, as both kids were checked, we learned that Sadie actually has another nasty ear infection and over night Caleb seems to have developed one as well. they still feel that the fever was caused by the cold.

so we're home now and with new medicine. Caleb was much more cheerful this afternoon and has taken a really good nap.

we have follow-up appts in 3 weeks- hopefully we won't have to be back before then.

zoo trip

this is several weeks old but i've been playing around with these pics from the zoo. we went with our church at the beginning of april. caleb loved it! he was so excited to see all the different animals. sadie loved being able to walk around, and did walk around by herself for the most part. i had lots of fun taking pics of the animals. here's some that i thought turned out nice.

Carnegie Museum Trip

We went to the museum with Grammie M and Granpapa a couple weeks ago. It was a really nice evening. We had a quick dinner here, then walked over to the museum. It was great for the kids. The museum was almost empty so we kind of had the run of the place. I had been hoping to show Caleb the new T-Rex but that area still isn't open yet. The kids still had fun running around and looking at the other dinosaurs though. It had been a while since the grandparents had been to the museum so I think they liked seeing all the changes.

After the dinosaurs, we went up to the animal exhibits (a favorite part to see). Both my dad and I remember coming to the museum as college students to draw from the animals. Caleb loved checking out the animals and was even able to name the Jaguar- I was impressed because I can get the various spotted big cats mixed up sometimes. Sadie seemed to just love running around, carrying bear and climbing on whatever things she could find.

But they did get tired and we made our way back home. The monkeys happily went to bed and we're still hearing Caleb talk about the museum with Grammie M and Grandpapa and the dinosaurs.

Potatoes and Teapots

Sadie

While fixing lunch this afternoon, I happened to look down to see Sadie chewing on a raw potato that she had dug out. She hadn't gotten too much of it, just some nice teeth marks. Later she saw it sitting on the counter and said "apple" so I guess that's why she tried to eat it.

Caleb

This evening, Andy took Caleb and Sadie for a walk in Squirrel Hill while I worked out. They did a bit of window shopping while they were walking around. At one store Caleb looked in the window and saw "a soccer ball for tea" referring to the black and white spotted teapot.

Caleb and the Guitar

Just had to post this real quick this afternoon. Caleb and Sadie really love my guitar and today Caleb got it from my room and I found him sitting on the futon playing and singing Old MacDonald. Of course, I grabbed the camera and got to record his next number "the Wheels on the Bus." It was a more interpretive version in that he sang the first verse in his room, went to Sadie's room to sing "the babies on the bus..." and then finished with singing "the mommies on the bus..." in my room. I think you'll see his guitar style shows a little bit of an Eric Clapton influence :-)

Anyways, sorry if this is a little long but i thought it would be a great video should he ever become a famous musician :-)

have a wacky wednesday!

dress up girl

just had to post these. this evening sadie wanted to be all dressed up so as you can see, she has her scarf, her party hat and her purse and she's ready for a night on the town :-)

her nose is scratched up from a fall yesterday on the sidewalk. plus, she's getting some molars in, so she's not been the happiest sadie-girl but hopefully it'll all pass soon.

Sadie Singing (kind of)

Caleb took a longer nap this afternoon so that allowed for Sadie and I to have a little more time. We've been doing lots of singing in this house lately. They both love music and we've discovered that a silly song goes along way in getting a 2 yr old to do things he doesn't really want to do (like put on shoes or a coat). We make up lots of songs but we've also been working on the classics, like "If You're Happy and You Know It" Sadie has started picking up on it and loves to play along.

Hope you like the video!

Sadie's Talking

Thought I should put up an update on Sadie's talking. She's been babbling almost non-stop and sounding very much like an Ewok but she has mastered a few more words.

Kitty is one of her favorites. She loves Polli and squeals "kitty" when she sees her. She also has started trying to call Polli. She clicks her tongue and pats her leg just like we do. It's so cute to see. Polli seems to tolerate her a bit more than she did with Caleb. Sadie also likes getting right in Polli's face to just say "hi" to her. Also pretty cute to watch.

She's also started saying "read"- guess where she learned that from :-) yes, we have another reader on our hands. More and more she's able to sit for stories and loves bringing books to you to read.

Caleb Video

It's been awhile since I put up video clips... mostly because I haven't been using that camera very much. Here's a clip from February of Caleb "reading" Mike Mulligan and his Steam Shovel. I've mentioned that we've noticed that he's memorized some books. Well, here's what got it all started. I don't have the whole thing recorded because I didn't have that much space and Sadie was also competing to be in the video.

It's been wild seeing how amazing his memory is. With borrowing books from the library, I've noticed he has most of the story memorized by the third or fourth time reading through (depending on how long the book is). It's been really nice because he can kind of sit and "read" to himself- not that we get out of reading the boy stories. He could definitely be the poster-child for the "read to your child" movement.

Caleb Cooking

since Caleb is not so much into eating, we've decided to try to encourage him in helping us prepare the food with hope that he might be more interested in eating it then. the eating hasn't really changed but he does seem to really like helping in the kitchen. it started a few weeks ago, i can't even remember what i was making, but i had Caleb come in to help. we pulled up one of the chairs from the dining room and he stood there and helped. he wasn't too into actually doing anything but loved being able to see all that was going on. a few days later, i was getting supper ready and on his own, he pulled the chair to the doorway of the kitchen. i brought it in the rest of the way and he jumped up to help peel and cut potatoes. again, he was hesitant to actually touch anything but we counted the pieces of potatoes and he put the last piece in the pot.

now this is becoming a common thing and sometimes i have to say no to him. last friday, i was making chicken nuggets and he wanted to help but i thought having him so close to hot oil was not the best idea. he seemed to take it well- no tantrum or anything and was content to help set the table.

this morning we had a special treat. pancakes! we never have pancakes on a tuesday morning but when Caleb got us all up at 6:15 we had time to kill. andy started stirring them up in the kitchen and Caleb was right there to help. i walked in with Sadie to here Caleb saying "i'm mixin' mommie." andy even let him try flipping a pancake and he was good at that. we did learn that the stove is hot (just a small burn on the pointer) but we survived and it didn't keep us from enjoying the yummy pancakes. :-)

Some Funny Stuff

We have a new worry with Sadie. we've been noticing that she really loves putting things around her neck. it started out with the teddy bear ears, Caleb's sunglasses, then we saw her walk around with Mr. Potato-head's eyeglasses. they all get put around the back of her neck like you would wear a scarf. of course, noticing this, i pulled out some fun, fuzzy yarn and knitted her a little curly-cue scarf. she ignores it. lately, we've started to get more concerned about this because she's started wrapping things like yarn, electric cords and phone cords around her neck. mostly they end up on her shoulders, but i am concerned that she's going to end up strangling herself - so i'm really keeping my eye on her.

she's such a little momma though. she's taken on the job of caring for caleb (not that he can't take care of himself). she'll bring him his sippy cup, sits next to him when he plays and hands him toys or puzzle pieces. she even brought him pieces of his breakfast the other day. she loves her baby and carries her around and pats her on the back. it's so fun to watch.

it's been interesting to see that about this age, caleb became fascinated with cars and she's become so interested in her baby. she still plays with caleb's cars but definitely favors the baby.

caleb continues to amaze us with his memory. he's been able to memorize a new picture book in only a couple of days and we've figured out that he doesn't need to rely on pictures to spark his memory. we returned I Stink to the library weeks ago and he still will randomly start reciting it. he's got Mike Mulligan and his Steam Shovel memorized, and has been working on the Cat in the Hat. i guess that's not really accurate. he's not setting out to memorize them. it seems to just come to him. it's wild and very exciting not to mention helpful to have him be able to sit and "read" to himself.

we've also been having fun conversations with him. if he's not interested in doing something he says "that's not a good thing".

oh well, can't remember any more right now and oscars are starting

What A Trip!

Well, we did it! Caleb, Sadie and i made our first trip across the state to visit the NJ grandparents without Andy. it almost went really well :-) many have questioned my sanity and asked "why would you do this?" and i really didn't think it would be that difficult. in all honesty, the actual car ride out wasn't difficult at all- a little hectic keeping one eye on Caleb while chasing after Sadie crawling away at the Wendy's in Breezewood -but we were able to eat and then had a nice visit with the Groshes so the trip really wasn't bad.

the fun began saturday night....

Sadie ate too much (or that's what we originally thought) and got sick twice in about an hour so she had to sleep with me for the night. she was thoughtful in getting sick at about 11 pm when we were all just going to bed, instead of doing it in the middle of the night. then Caleb got sick in the morning. we kept them home from church but still thought they had just eaten too much- we were trying to be positive. then Caleb got sick after dinner and the fever started and we realized, they had picked up some kind of stomach bug. monday and tuesday were spent cleaning up messes, nursing fevers, making trips to CVS and figuring out if we needed to see a doctor. (these kids never get sick like this) by wednesday, Caleb and Sadie were much better but i came down with it and i had been planning on driving home on thursday. that was not going to happen. wednesday evening, Andy called and the wonderful husband he is, bought a bus ticket and rode out overnight to drive us all home thursday. (oh and g'ma came down with it wednesday night and was sick all thursday).

it was not the trip i had planned and i still feel so bad. i had intended to go out because at the last minute, Andy's mom was not able to come out here to visit for her break. this meant that she probably wouldn't see the monkeys until April. i had hoped to give her a nice visit and help out but it didn't quite turn out that way. oh well. it's made quite the story...

more sadie words

just a quick note- today she started blowing kisses and said nite-nite to daddy.

we've also started calling her bootsie. broke out her rain boots from christmas and she loves them. insisted on wearing them all afternoon even though she can only take about 2 steps in them before she falls down.

Development update

oh, i had one more thing to update on Caleb. kind of a milestone in learning. at dinner the other night, he saw a picture of himself and declares "that's me" first time, we've heard him use "me" to refer to himself so that was pretty cool.

and he has memorized I Stink but that's nothing new. what we were impressed with was that while looking at the book, he started pointing to the words and asking Andy what they were. we're thinking that he might be making the connection that the groups of letters are words and those words tell the story. seems like a good first step towards reading so that's exciting.

alright- that's enough

Naps and Super Bowls!

First off- Congrats to the NY Giants and their Super Bowl win!! while i will always be a die hard steeler fan (who has very limited interest in football if there is no black and gold on the field) i had to help my husband cheer on his team. he grew up just down the highway from Giant Stadium so how can you blame him. i tried to get Caleb to join in rooting for the Giants but he only cries out "go Steelers". G'ma Jody was even good enough to indulge me and mail us a Giant's shirt for Caleb to surprise daddy. well, the boy refused to wear it. Sadie, however, happily put it on for a bit on Friday (long enough for me to get a picture). then, it was still out in the living room yesterday morning so she insisted that she wear it over her pjs- all morning. so maybe Andy will get a Giants fan out of one of them. :-)

We're happy to report 2 successful days of napping and a much happier Caleb. ever since the cold a few weeks ago, he's been really resistant to napping and i don't know what to do with him. i put him in bed, he gets out and plays. i put him back in bed, he screams and cries. this goes on for the 2 hours or so that he used to sleep. then i give up and try to remain patient with the cranky toddler for the rest of the afternoon/evening. naptime went like this yesterday but fortunately i had Andy to help out. after we had enough, i decided to try one final strategy. i put him in bed (had my book with me) and sat down on the futon and read to myself without saying anything to him and only glancing up to give him the "i mean business" look when he seemed to be trying to sneak out of bed. he made 2 attempts to get out and then gave up and went to sleep.

We planned on using that same strategy again today but we didn't need to. Andy took him up, read stories and put him in bed. he went right to sleep. it was wonderful! i'm hoping that now he'll be used to that routine again and naptime will be easier this week. i need their naptime just as much as they need their naptimes!

Update- colds

It looks like we've finally made it to the nastiness of of 2 toddlers with colds.

Today Caleb and Sadie both napped at the same time!!! Yeah!!! This is the first nap Caleb has taken in 2 weeks- 2 very very long weeks full of the terrible twos.

Today was probably the worst- we had our first venture out into public that we were not able to complete due to tantrums. Caleb was not happy at all this morning and when Sadie didn't nap, I had the brilliant idea *sarcasm alert* to try to do some grocery shopping. Well, Caleb had a fit getting ready to go, had a fit in the car driving over, had a fit getting out of the car, had a fit walking through the parking lot to the store and had a fit once inside the store (these were all separate fits about different things- not just one "i don't want to go anywhere" fit). When he continued to flip out in the store, I said that's enough, I'm not going to be the one with the screaming 2 yr old trying to buy groceries and driving everyone else crazy. So I had to carry both Sadie and Caleb out of the store (with the diaper bag) and back to the car. All the time, Caleb had another fit because he didn't want to leave the store. Yes, as I put him in his car seat, the whole time with he was yelling "Wanna go shopping." In the car, he calmed down long enough to ask if we could go shopping and I explained that we're not allowed to go into stores carrying on like that. Of course, that set him off again.

At home, he proceeded to have several more fits but finally calmed down enough to eat some lunch while I put Sadie down for her nap. She must have thought we were a couple of nuts all morning, with Caleb screaming and me choosing to ignore his behavior. After lunch, I was actually able to read stories and put him down without any more fits. That meant that Sadie was able to stay asleep. I put Caleb in bed, turned on his CD player and when I checked later, he was sound asleep.

This is all thanks to him finally being able to breath well enough to suck his thumb- a very happy thing. We'll see how tomorrow goes.

Monkey Woman

Well, Sadie is living up to the nick-name Monkey Woman more than i would have expected. her favorite thing to do is climb on things (the rocking chair, the toy box, the leg rest of the recliner). her favorite food is bananas (which she has started calling "nana") and most recently she has started walking around the house saying "oooh oohh, eeeh eeeh." now for the record, we have not taught her that monkeys say oooh ooh or eeh eeh and Caleb hasn't even talked about monkeys. she apparently started this on her own. so it would seem that we do have a little monkey on our hands.

The Walsh Christmas Marathon 2007

Caleb's Backhoe

Sadie's new sweater (g'ma Jody made it)

A gift for you

okay, so i'm finally getting around to writing a thorough account of our Christmas travels. (warning: i will try to keep this short but i make no promises. some of you may just want to skip this post all together and i'll post a slide show for those who would prefer to see the illustrated version) :-)

we had 4 Christmas's this year. that just happens when you have 3 sets of grandparents that all want to spend time with the grandkids. and we wanted to have our own Christmas now that Caleb and Sadie are more aware of what's going on. check out my previous post to hear about our family Christmas the Sat before Christmas.

New Jersey Christmas

we left on Sunday (the 23rd) to drive out to NJ to spend Christmas with Andy's parents and sister. andy drove the entire trip through rain, pouring rain and fog. it was not a fun drive but we made it in time for dinner with the family.

Monday was Christmas eve and was our first family gathering of the week. the Walshes came over for dinner and some presents. this included andy's uncles (Brian and Mike) and Uncle Time, Aunt Judy and their sons Matt and Nick. the kids didn't quite know what to make of all these men in the house but they were happy knowing that mommy, daddy or grandma was near by. it was a nice evening of visiting and catching up. the kids got story books from Tim and Judy and that was perfect. i think i read Corduroy at least 5 times in just that evening, fortunately it's both a favorite book for me and andy.

we didn't make it to Christmas eve service but we're thankful to have been able to get the kids to sleep with little problems (as they get older i'm sure it will be more difficult to get them to sleep on Christmas eve).

Christmas morning started some time after 8. Caleb decided to sleep in so it was quite amusing to see all the adults downstairs eagerly waiting for the 2yr old to wake up for Christmas. Then it was a blur of packages and wrapping paper and gift bags with tissue paper. The big hit with Caleb was his kid's CD player and the different CDs he got for it. i think Sadie's favorite was her sweater that g'ma knitted and the blanket Betsy made for her.

we enjoyed a relaxing Christmas day and in the evening went out to visit some more family for dessert. it was very low-key so the kids did really well even though they were surrounded by new faces. the next day we had Christmas with the great-grandparents. it was nice to be able to visit them without all the craziness of Christmas day excitement.

the rest of the week continued to be pretty relaxing with some more time with family and just enjoying our gifts. andy and i were able to shoot down to Trenton to visit a friend of andy's from Hopkins. it was a nice chance for us to get away a little without the kids. then on Saturday, andy and papa took Caleb to the NJ children's museum. Caleb made us all laugh when we mentioned the museum and he said "oh dinosaurs." he has a really good memory (we went to the carnegie and saw dinosaurs with Aunt Lindsay earlier in dec). And Sunday we drove home stopping to visit the Groshes in Mt. Joy, PA on the way.

Christmas with the Bushes

on new year's eve we packed up the kids to head out for another Christmas. we decided to spend new year's eve with g'ma Suzie and papa Joe. it was another nice low-key celebration for us. after having dinner, we opened our gifts. Caleb loved his new backhoe (i think it scared Sadie a little). it moves and makes sounds and it didn't take long before the kids figured out which button played music and would press that and dance. Sadie got a pretty little anklet id (i had one similar when i was a baby). she also got a vacuum cleaner that was a big hit. the kids and grown-ups had lots of fun but Andy and i were the only ones who stayed awake for the new year :-)

the next morning we decided to do some visiting while we waited for Aunt Jackie and Chris to come out. we stopped over at gr-g'ma Roger's and visited with her and Aunt Judy and Heather. i don't remember g'ma ever having a Christmas tree that big- it was so nice and pretty (thanks Heather). after g'ma's we went to stop in at grammie m's and grandpapap (that's what Caleb's been calling my dad). it was a nice little visit but we had to get home- snow was coming.

we got back to my mom's and soon Aunt Jackie arrived so we could have one last Christmas. they got Caleb his first sleeping bag (Lightening McQueen). then we packed up and went back home.

Christmas at Camp

our last Christmas was just over the weekend at my dad's camp in Crossfork, PA. we drove out to Derry, Friday morning so we could ride up with my dad. he took pity on us after having spent so much time driving in the past couple of weeks. but this was quite a drive. 4 adults and 2 kids in car seats in the van plus all our bags and gifts and food. and Caleb and i both get carsick. everyone did really well though. Andy sat between the kids and kept them happy and quickly helped Caleb when he started looking a little sick. i sat up front (the only place where i won't get sick on the windy roads).

at camp, Caleb and Sadie shared a bedroom up stairs- Caleb slept on the futon in his sleeping bag and loved it. Sadie had the pack-n-play and tolerated it. they had lots of fun playing with toys and with grammie and grandpapap.

Saturday morning was our "Christmas" morning. the kids got up and opened their stockings and had a big breakfast while waiting for Uncle Sean, Aunt Emily and Claire to come over. when they arrived, once again it was a blur of presents and wrapping paper. Caleb was a good helper, passing out presents. Sadie happily tried to model all the clothes she opened up. it was a really nice morning. later in the afternoon, we had a dinner of venison and pork and sauer kraut (not all together). i'm thinking that not many people have deer meat for Christmas dinner but ours was so good.

the kids enjoyed playing with their toys the rest of the afternoon. and Sunday morning we got up and then packed up all the gifts and stuff to take back home. Uncle Jason and Aunt Lindsay helped by bringing their truck so we were able to have them transport somethings back to Derry.

so i guess that's it. we've now spent almost a week out of our suitcases and i've managed to get most of the laundry under control. we even got the cat back (she stayed at g'ma Suzie's and Papa Joe's through all of this).

we hope you all have had an enjoyable Christmas. we are so thankful not only for the generosity of our family but also for the blessing we have in such a large, loving family and we look forward to many more Christmas's together.