Pottying Like It's 2012

We haven't really tried too hard to potty train Joshua yet, because he is not two yet and I don't want to start something I can't commit to when the baby arrives. But we do give him the option of whether he wants to go at every diaper change or anytime he seems like he might have to go. Usually, he does choose to go and he almost always is successful when he tries. Here he is, happily sitting on his potty before bed.

Double Ogg Dare

Today was a busy day for us. First, Jason took Joshua to an art class that the Olathe Parents as Teachers put on. Joshua isn't super into art yet. He doesn't really like to draw or use crayons. He seemed to reasonably enjoy the new experience though, and he got to paint, which we haven't done at home yet. He came home with his first ever art projects and some free art supplies, so we consider it a success.

Next, we met our friends, the Hansons, out at Shawnee Mission Park for "The Double Ogg Dare" festival. It was a gorgeous day and the festival had a lot of fun activities for families and kids. I would like to go again next year when I am not super pregnant because they had an orienteering introduction I think would be fun, but I wasn't sure a hike through a field was in the cards for me. Above, is Jason and the kids on the hayride from the parking lot to the Ogg part of the park.
Joshua really liked the animal booth, which had an owl and some snakes, but he really is pretty thrilled with sticks. Clara also had a good time. She had her first picnic lunch and also got some backpack time with Jason. I really need to find her some shoes that fit since now that she walks, she wants to go get sticks with Joshua. It is hard to find shoes suitable for walking in such a tiny size, but I am going to have to look into that. Overall, we had a really good time and it makes me want to go to the park more. Joshua isn't huge on playgrounds, but he really likes sticks and rocks, so I think it would be fun.

Happy 34 to Me

Today was my birthday. Since I am 39 weeks pregnant, we could have the baby at any time, but so far she seems content where she is, so we got to celebrate. Our friend, Jason Keeler, offered to watch the kids for a little bit and we took him up on his offer so we could go out for a birthday dinner for me somewhere that isn't kid-friendly. I decided to try Bonefish Grill as I had always wanted to try it and I like seafood. The food was very enjoyable and I would definitely go back there to eat. After dinner, we went back home, and I got to have cake time with the kids. Jason got me a strawberry champagne cake, which was delicious. I always wanted to try that kind of cake, so it was a great surprise. For my birthday, Jason is getting me a new cell phone, though I don't yet have it since it requires me to help pick it, but I am really excited about it since my current phone is awful and barely functions because it is so old, so I will be glad to have a new one. It was a really nice birthday that I enjoyed. And, as an added bonus, the baby dropped last week so I can breathe. I am actually more comfortable than I have been at any other time this trimester so I feel great, which is a nice way to spend a birthday.

Hobo Kids

We recently ordered a new ottoman for our living room, and today it arrived.  After removing it from the box, I realized this had the potential for a classic kids-in-box scenario.  I showed it to Joshua, and he immediately wanted to get in.  Clara was happy to hold on to the edge and do her little bounce/dance thing she does.  But I put her inside, and she was even happier.  This is why parents sometimes wonder why they bother buying toys when things like this bring the kids just as much joy as an expensive toy.

Box Seats

It's been great for us that Mom and Ron live so much closer to us now.  Joshua and Clara often spend time at their house, but until now they haven't had the ability to go anywhere with them without us, as they didn't have car seats in their car.  So recently they ordered car seats, and the seats arrived today.  The boxes are uniquely shaped with a ledge, and as we were on our way out, Joshua decided to sit on one of them, since it looked like a chair to him.  Clara seemed to feel left out, so I put her on the other one.  Here are our two adorable kids on improvised seats.

Sink Shower

Giving Clara a bath is a little challenging because she doesn't like sitting in water much. But she is fine with water being sprayed on her. Since she is still small, I tend to still bathe her in the sink and use the sprayer to wash her. She likes this a reasonable amount. Here she is as we finish up her "bath".

10 Months

Today Clara turned ten months old. She is getting to be a very big girl. She can walk for many steps at this point, though sometimes she still prefers to crawl. She likes solid foods a lot more and really likes peas, puffs, and mandarin oranges the best. She isn't sold on meat and, like everyone in our family, loves rolls and bread. She likes to climb a lot, especially our slide and any stairs she can get to. She likes moving a lot so this month's pictures were hard to get.

Finally First Tooth

Clara's first tooth has been close to breaking through for quite awhile now.  We've been able to see it just below the skin for a couple weeks.  Yesterday it finally broke through.  Here she is with her first tooth.

Later, Sooners

No one likes the Oklahoma Sooners.  Well, I guess some people like them, because they do have fans, but no one I know likes them, and I'd like to keep it that way.  Pretty much everybody I know is anti-Sooner.   Today K-State had a huge game in Norman. K-State was undefeated coming into the game and is ranked #15, but Oklahoma is #6 and has only lost three games at home since Bob Stoops became the coach in 1999.  K-State was going to need some things to go their way and play a nearly perfect game, and they did!  Collin Klein was great, John Hubert did his thing, K-State won the turnover battle 3-0, and they came out on top, 24-19.  Joanna is in town, so we had her as well as Julie and Andrew over to watch the game.  K-State's season is off to a great start, and I'm excited to see how far this team can go.

Gasoline Starkiss

Joanna is in town for the weekend, and she was desperately needing some niece and nephew time, and we were wanting to see her.  So she came over tonight, and we all hung out for awhile and then went out to eat at Fronteras.  During dinner we learned that her apartment in Manhattan did not burn down, which was good news.  After dinner we went to Dairy Queen where we determined that DQ considers red, white, and blue to be a "rainbow" color scheme.  Good to know.     

Cat Water

We have a bowl of water on the floor in the kitchen area for the pets to drink.  Alex, being a cat, is finicky, and so he doesn't like to drink from the same bowl that the dogs use.  One day we noticed him meowing in the kitchen.  Wondering if he was thirsty, we filled up a pint glass with water and put it on the counter.  He quickly went right up to it and started lapping away.  It seemed to make him so happy to have his own "bowl", so now we try to keep a glass of water on the counter so he can have fresh water when he's downstairs.  Here he laps the water with his little pink kitty tongue.

A Pumpkin Treat

Today, when I was at the store, I got Joshua a pumpkin treat-container since we plan to take him trick-or-treating this year to a couple houses. Little did I know that the container would end up being a big treat. He noticed it in my room tonight and was really excited about it, to the point where I couldn't get him to look away to pose for this picture. He thinks it's awesome because in his mind it's a ball that can hold balls inside it, and what could be better than that? He also likes that it has eyes. I didn't really plan to break it out until Halloween night, but it is so fun for him that it is now in the playroom.

High-Tech Dinner

There have been a couple times where I've been to a restaurant and the wait staff takes your order on iPads, and one restaurant even had their wine list on an iPad.  But today I was the most technologically-advanced restaurant experience I've ever had.  While on a layover at the Minneapolis airport, I ate at a sushi restaurant called Shoyu.  Nearly the entire experience is based off of the iPad.  Every seat has an iPad, and when you sit down a waitress doesn't even come to your table.  You first enter your flight information so it can give you updates during your stay.  You then peruse the menu, which provides you nice descriptions and large photos of every item.  You order your food and drinks through the app.  While you're waiting you can browse the internet or play games, and eventually the wait staff will bring you your order.  You also pay by sliding your credit card through a device next to the iPad, and your receipt is e-mailed to you at an address you provide.  They're obviously not going for the touchy feely friendly experience, but instead a high-tech, efficient, streamlined experience, which for a restaurant in the airport was perfectly fine with me.  I really enjoyed my time there, and I would definitely go back.

Thirty-Five

Today I turned thirty-five.  This was somewhat surprising to me, because I'm pretty sure I'm nowhere near that old.  That's how old other people are, like older people I work with, or retiring athletes, or other types of people.  Not me.  I guess I floated through my early thirties not paying that much attention to what exact number my age was, and then it was suddenly 35.  Sigh...  Anyway, at least the birthday itself was good.  As we've previously mentioned, there's a book that Meghan borrowed from the library that Joshua really likes me to read to him, so they got me a copy to have for our own.  I also got a Sporting Kansas City shirt that I'd been wanting, as well as some gift certificates to places I like to go.  Meghan also made me my favorite cake, a tres leches cake.  Despite the disappointment of my new age, it was a really good day, mostly thanks to our family birthday time.    

We Have a Walker

Clara has been standing more and more lately, and recently she's started to try to walk.  It's hard to decide when exactly a child's first steps are, but at least by today we're making it official.  It's easier for her to walk if she has something in her hands, so I gave her Joshua's phone and then tried to snap a picture of her walking.  This one is a little blurry, but it shows her moving her left leg forward as she walks.  She's still walking no more than a few steps at a time, but I'm sure it won't be long before she'll be walking everywhere.

Tilden Time

We used to see our friends the Tildens on a semi-regular basis, but since we've had the kids it's been harder to make it happen.  Today though we were able to go over there.  We had a fun time hanging out with them.  Donna made her excellent lasagna, and Steve and I bored our wives by comparing notes on our new Galaxy S III phones.  The Tildens have five kids, so there were plenty of toys around for Joshua and Clara to enjoy.  Here Clara generously shares some of her germs while practicing standing.

InfantSEE

InfantSEE is a public health program where participating optometrists provide comprehensive eye exams for infants under the age of one.  It's a free service, so there's really no reason not to take advantage of it.  We did it for Joshua, and we definitely wanted to do it for Clara too, so today I took her in for her appointment.  He eyes checked out fine, although they said the hemangioma on her eyelid is slightly affecting her vision.  We knew it could be addressed by a topical medication but hadn't yet done it, as we were initially told it was purely cosmetic.  Now that we know it actually is having other effects, we'll fill the perscription and start applying it.  Here Clara and I wait in the exam room for the optometrist to arrive. 

Drawing

 

Joshua has had crayons for quite some time, but he doesn't really like to draw. They were pretty kid friendly and you don't have to press hard, but for some reason he just didn't like them. He did love taking them out and putting them in the box, but that's about it. So I decided to try some colored pencils. These have been much more of a hit, though his favorite part is still taking them out and putting them in the box. But now, before he starts that process, he does usually choose to draw for a short awhile, so that's a good way to help him develop his fine motor skills. So far he can draw lines and has also recently started to enjoy his magnadoodle more, which is great because it's a lot of effort to keep the coloring on the paper for me. He doesn't seem to really get that concept yet. Luckily crayon washes.

Chillin' with G.G.

My grandparents are in town for a few days and are staying with Mom and Ron.  Today was the day that Mom usually watches Joshua and Clara, and I didn't have to go into work until noon, so I dropped them off.  It'd been awhile since my grandparents had seen the kids, so they were very excited to see how much they've changed and to hang out with them.  Here my grandma engages with each kid in their favorite way: Clara gets held and Joshua gets to play a game of catch.  Later in the day, Meghan and I, along with Julie and Andrew, joined everyone for dinner with my cousin Al, who is stationed at Ft. Leavenworth for a year.  I also was able to go over there for a few hours last night.  I don't often get to see my grandparents, so I was excited to have the opportunity and wanted to take full advantage of it. 

Joshua Knieval

Joshua could accurately be described as a daredevil.  He's always excited to find new things that are fun to do, and sometimes those end up being a little on the dangerous side.  We have a cylindrical ottoman-like thing (I'm not really sure what it is.  It's a microfiber cylinder with a lid in which you can store things.  What is that even called?).  Recently he realized that if you turn it on its side, it rolls.  So he enjoyed pushing it around the room.  It didn't take too long for him to realize that he could roll his body over it.  Then he realized he could get a little bit of a running start and make it go faster, sending him to the ground once it rolled him to the other side.  Now it's in his rotation of fun things to do each day.  We just remind him to stay on the carpet, and otherwise it's actually safer than it looks.  Here he is in action.  He's actually moving quite fast in the first one, even though it appears from the picture that he's just balancing.  I didn't have my good fast-shooting camera, so these are from two different rolls, but they pretty accurately depict what happens.

Book Time

Jason usually gets home about thirty minutes before dinner is ready. The kids are always really happy to see him and it gives them a short amount of playtime before we eat. Joshua usually has preferences on how to spend this time, most often involving a ball. But today he chose a book. For the first time, I have been using the library for books for him. Now that he is a little more interested in reading books rather than throwing them, I feel the books have a fighting chance of not being damaged, though I still wouldn't leave him with a library book unsupervised. And this month I have been trying to read him books about families, with the idea being that we will talk about a new baby as close as possible to my due date. I don't think he'll really get it, but it's the best we can do to prepare him in an age-appropriate way. Anyway, normally I am more of a book buyer, but I don't necessarily want to buy a bunch of books on one topic so the library is great for this type of thing. His favorite of the bunch so far is a book about a daddy bear and his child and the things they do together. He loves the illustrations and the text is just right for him. Clara was also happy to get in on the action, but I think she chose to climb the couch instead pretty quickly since her attention span is a little shorter than Joshua's.

Sleeping While Drinking

We usually try to give Clara a sippy cup of formula right before her nap (which is right after lunch) and a bottle right before bed.  Although she's tired at both of those times, she usually has no problem drinking her tasty Similac beverage.  Today after lunch we gave her the sippy cup, and she started drinking away.  I was cleaning up after lunch and realized Clara was being exceptionally quiet (the kind of thing that parents quickly learn to notice), and I looked over and she had fallen asleep while drinking.  We woke her up, and she barely finished the rest, and we took her up for her nap.  I feel like that too some days.    

More Like the Miami Tropical Depressions

As Jason Keeler's gift to me and the others in his wedding party last year, we went to a K-State game together.  It was a ton of fun, so we decided to do it again this year.  One of the few things I can be thankful to Ron Prince for was an upgrade to our schedule, so we have a home-and-home series last year and this year with the University of Miami Hurricanes, who although they're not what they once were, are still part of college football royalty.  We beat them last year in Coral Gables, so this year the game's in Manhattan, and that's the game we chose to attend. 

It was a beautiful day, and Jason, Nick, Tony, and I left KC at 6:45am to make our way to Manhattan.  We had a little bit of time to tailgate before the early kickoff, and fortunately Joanna and Kirk were able to stop by on their way into the stadium.  The game itself was good, though not all that exciting, but in the best way possible.  We got off to an early lead, and cruised to a 52-13 victory with Collin Klein leading the way, and with a bonus preview of the future as Daniel Sams blazed his way to a couple touchdowns.  And as always, Bill Snyder is a genius.  We ate at a great Jamaican restaurant, Little Grill, after the game, and then drove home.  It was a lot of fun, and it's probably something we'll try to do every year going forward.    

Nine Years

Today Jason and I celebrated our ninth anniversary. Peg and Ron babysat for us and we were able to go see a matinee and go to a dinner. We saw "Hope Springs" and it was reasonably enjoyable, which is definitely considered a success for me since I am not a movie person. Jason chose our dinner location. I don't handle surprise well, but I managed to let him not tell me until we were going there that we were going to try Piropos, an Argentine restaurant up north in Briarcliff Village. I was excited because I had heard it was good and we don't often go that far north so I was really curious about the area too. I also wasn't sure what to expect from Argentine food. I wasn't sure if it would be more European inspired, which is how it was in Colombia, or if it would be more what you would think of as typical Latino cuisine, more like a less spicy Mexican restaurant. It was definitely more like Colombian fare and was really delicious. The beef I had was especially perfect and Jason's roasted red pepper risotto was also incredible. They gave us a free dessert as well, which was a banana cake. Normally I don't like banana breads or cakes or bars or anything like that, but this was really excellent. It wasn't too banana-y and not too moist or dense, which together are my main issues with banana bread. It was a really great meal that also had a great view of downtown Kansas City and a fun afternoon and evening to spend together and be alone without kids. Although it doesn't feel like we are newly married anymore, I am not sure it really seems like nine years. I can't believe how fast it has gone.

Spider Girl

Joshua is known for his desire and ability to climb everything in sight.  Clara doesn't have quite the same propensity, but today she surprised me by not only attempting to climb up the slide, but succeeding.  I was happy to see her set a goal for herself and then accomplish it.

The Return of John

My guys group doesn't get to meet all that often anymore due to our schedules, but four of the five of us have at least been able to meet most times.  One of the guys, John, hasn't been able to join us for over a year, so we were all excited tonight when he said he could make it.  We went to our traditional Buffalo Wild Wings location and had great food as always, but it was good to have John back.

Pouring

Today I gave Joshua some cups with water in them so he could practice pouring. I also tried a small pitcher, but that ended up being too big for him and he couldn't get it at a good angle, so we stuck with the cups. He really enjoyed this activity, though it was not exactly no-mess. By the end he was doing a really good job keeping the water in the cups, though, so I think he made good progress and had a lot of fun too. Once he ran out of water a couple times, I told him we were done for today and he was definitely disappointed. This will be another good thing to have him work on while I start dinner before Jason gets home. That is always a challenging time because he prefers to stand right next to me, where I am most likely to be chopping something with a very large and sharp knife. I am not a mom who has a lot of rules in my house, but "No standing where you can easily get hurt by a knife" is definitely one of them, so it can be a hard time of day and activities he can do in his booster at the table and be happy with are great.

Manual Labor Day

With the baby's birth rapidly approaching, I have a huge list of things I'm trying to get done soon, as I know my free time will go down even more once the baby arrives.  Today is Labor Day, so I have the day off.  I'm taking advantage of the extra time to get a lot of my tasks done.  Most of the ones today are outdoor tasks.  In addition to mowing the whole yard, I needed to trim the trees and bushes that border the sidewalk leading up to our house.  Having a full afternoon allowed me to get a lot of things done.  By the way, apparently I have more muscular arms than I thought, or maybe the shadows are creating an optical illusion, because those don't look like my arms.

Bags Instead of Babies

Today, since my Bible study was cancelled because of the holiday, we decided to go out to the Legends to do some shopping. The kids need some fall clothes and Carter's, which is probably my favorite place to shop for the first year, was having a big sale. We found a lot of clothes for Clara, some for Joshua, and also got Joshua some fall shoes (he hasn't worn socks all summer and neither have I, but at some point we'll have to start wearing close-toed shoes again and he didn't have a pair that fit). This worked out well because Joshua can still wear some of his fall clothes from last year so he doesn't need as much and I prefer other stores for him anyhow.

Side rant - I don't know what it is with Carter's and onesies. I don't even like onesies for Clara or any baby, though I can deal with a few in an infant's wardrobe. Maybe under a dress or jumper, but even then I prefer shirts. But certainly once you turn one, those shouldn't be a thing. I am not buying Joshua any outfit with a onesie and, since he is still in baby sizes, a lot of Carter's stuff has onesies still. It mystifies me. Who are these people who like onesies for babies? What do they like about them? And do they still buy them when their kids are two? I just think they are a huge pain to get on and off and they even make Clara look fat (and not in a cute baby way either) and she is super thin, so I think they are universally unflattering. Ugh - make more shirts, Carter's! And their clothing is very roomy so without an unprecedented growth spurt, it could be a year or more before Joshua hits 2T in that brand and that's when I think the onesies finally go away. And for Clara it may be soon that we don't shop there anymore too, though at least they have cute dresses for the summer for girls (they have them for the winter too, but I didn't see matching leggings so not sure how a dress would work for the winter) -rant over

Anyway, the trip went very well and the kids did great. At the end they got a little restless, so Joshua ran a bit with Jason and I carried Clara, but they did well in the stroller most of the time. And by the end it was easier to carry Clara than the bags anyhow, so it worked out well. We went out to dinner afterwards. We need a lot of room at the table and can't do booths since we need two high chairs and it was getting late so we didn't want to wait, so we decided to drive a bit to avoid Legends crowds. We ended up eating at a new-to-us Mexican restaurant in Shawnee called Ixtapa that didn't have a wait and the salsa was excellent and the food was quite good, so a very good afternoon/evening overall.

Holiday Weekend BBQ

To take advantage of the long weekend, we decided to grill tonight and Christine was able to join us. The steaks turned out very well (Joshua even ate some and he is usually a big meat avoider) and we had a good time hearing about Christine's recent trip and other updates. It was also K-State's first game, which they won. Everyone was wearing K-State purple except me, even though Christine's outfit was a complete coincidence.