...Long Time!

Wow, its been a LONG time - hopefully you haven't given up on me! :) So much has happened since my last update, not even sure where to begin....

Well, its winter and you know that time of year always brings on the bugs and we weren't lucky enough to dodge them - not with Owen in daycare! Owen was sick a few weekends ago - and was sent home early from school on Thursday (2/11)and had to be home Friday (2/12) too - he was sick through the weekend and only toward the end of that next week did he show ANY interest in food at all (that's a true sign my son is sick - when he doesn't eat - otherwise - he LOVES his dinner!) he had a fever and awful cough and runny nose and eyes. All he wanted to do was just watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and chill out with mama and papa. Uncle stayed with him on Fri for half a day while I went to work, he said Owen just wasn't his normal self. When i got home from work around noon, his temp was about 101 and he needed a nap BAD! He took 3 hr naps all during his sickness - it was so hard to see him not feeling good :(
And to top it all off, last week, Owen had pink eye for the first time! I took him to school on Mon last week (2/23) and noticed (once i got there) that his eyes were really red, upon checking them out a little further I saw some crustiness - and sure enough when 10 o'clock rolled around and we could take him to Prime Care - he has pink eye in both eyes, poor little guy! :( but he was SUCH a trooper through all of his sicknesses, for as awful as he had been feeling, he really didn't complain or act grouchy and he slept through the nights too! He's always been a trooper though! He's a lot like his papa - he just rolls with the punches, and just keeps on goin and doesn't let stuff bug him!

Some of Owen's favorite things lately:

He loves his bubble baths!

Drawing is also one of his favorite pass times, check out how the kid holds his crayon, such a big boy! Fish are his favorite things to draw and he loves to have either mama or papa draw fish for him too - 'mama fish' or 'papa fish' he says and hands us a crayon...

Bubble Time! He pushes over a chair from the table and exclaims 'Bubbles, bubbles!' then he climbs up on the chair and I turn the water on and give him a spoon or small bowl and he scoops water and bubbles out of one side of the sink and into the other...

He also LOVES his dinner! here he is eating one of his favorites...SPAGHETTI!!!

In other children news - baby girl is gonna be here in just over 1 week, so crazy to think she'll be here so soon! I'm just not sure I'm ready for all the changes that will come with a newborn! I'm sure everything will just fall into place, but my worrying mind just won't stop wandering - will Owen be ok with it all? will I remember what I did with Owen, so that she turns out just as sweet and easy going and sleeps as well as he does? what if i create a non-sleeping monster? (I think I've just been so sleep deprived for so long that I just want to see an end in sight!), will i be able to love another child as much as I love my little man? will i ever have a free moment to myself? haha! I know I'm worrying over nothing, but all this unknown is just driving me nuts (but yet still not ready for her to be here!).

Here's a more recent belly pic (2/19 actually, so maybe not that recent, geez this time around I don't really have many belly pics, unlike w/ Owen where I took a new series of pics every week!)

and here is her little bedroom (without the rug, we just bought one when we went out to celebrate our 6 year anniversary - yes shopping at Lowe's is now a romantic excursion for us!)


More on our anniversary...yes,a s of Feb 28, Scott and I have been married SIX years now! WOW, how does time fly so fast?! Uncle Tick and Aunt Katy watched Owen this past Sat night and Scott and I went to Lowe's, then we explored what will be our new hometown - Hamilton (we have an offer in that has been accepted and are just waiting for closing on over 15 acres of land that we have plans to build on in the next three years or so) - After driving around the Hamilton countryside, we ventured to Allegan and ended up at the Grill Room (or Grill House, can't remember what its called)and had a great dinner together! And we were home by 9pm - times definitely have changed! :)

I'm sure I'm forgetting something I had wanted to write, but at this point, I'm just glad to have something to post!! One last picture before I call it a wrap....

This past week we had some nice sunshine, so we decided to get bundled up and build a snowman. Owen was more interested in knocking it over! but he still had a great time!

18 Months

I can't believe my little man is 18 months old (...er actually almost 19 as procrastination got the best of me)

So what is Owen up to these days?

• Loves building with blocks – makes tall towers
• Loves to try to figure out how things work – figured out how to unscrew the toothpaste top when getting ready for bed the other night!
• Loves to throw a ball - puts his hand/arm way behind his head then launches is!
• Is amazing at putting together puzzles - he has one with about 8 different shapes and colors - and can find the right places for each piece immediately
• Loves to draw - every time he sees me write something, he says draw draw draw and he gets so into it - concentrates so hard - puts his head down and makes small little marks then goes crazy with big marks and circles

Here he is drawing with Papa...

• The kid loves music - loves dancing, stomping, clapping (even claps to the beat) - he especially loves piano music
• When you start saying the alphabet, he'll shout out 'X' then start laughing!
• He's definitely testing his ground and asserting his independence, we've started counting to three with him after we tell him not to do something - but once we say one - he'll say two and by then we're laughing too hard to be upset with him (kinda defeats the purpose of trying to teach him anything, so we're exploring other options! :))
• Loves to be a 'helper' if he won't do something and you preface it with, 'can you be a helper' he'll almost always comply
• He'll push a chair in under the table
• Throws away his own trash
• Likes to help put away laundry
• Lately this 'helperness' has come in handy for all the times there is something on the floor that big old pregnant mama doesn't feel like bending over to pick up
• His vocab is amazing - our guess is he can say well over 100 words
• Favorite words lately are big truck, oh my my, bite (when he wants a bite of whatever we are eating), frog, juice, more, ni night, mickey, hello when the phone rings, etc. he is starting to put words together more an more every day air-go mama - is there you go mama - he'll say this when he brings me something
• Started saying love you "La Ya" on Dec 18, the sweetest thing EVER!
• Is saying words with multiple syllables – umbrella, applesauce, octopus, horseshoe
• Loves to give high fives and 'knuckles'
• Tells us when he's tired by saing ni-night
• His likely answer to most questions is 'yah' with a little Norweigan twist - so - we call him Hans for fun
• Eats very well with a fork and/or spoon
• Has a bit of a mullet
• Discovered ketchup recently and will eat it with his hands
• Enjoys climbing on to everything
• Only recently would he let who ever is with him, out of his sight - but now we can go into the other room and leave him to play for a few minutes and he doesn't have to follow us
• Over Christmas break, he started giving kisses and hugs on command or just when he wants some lovin!

Here he is giving some lovin to his mama and sitting on his favorite perch (his little sister)...

• Loves mickey mouse - got some jammies for christmas and cries soemtimes when he has to take them off - or prefers to carry them with him everywhere
• Loves to read, can sit forever reading and can name most of the things in his favorite books

Here he is being pretty serious about his truck book....

Until mama interrupted him and told him to say cheese (what a goober)...

• Loves trucks - "big truck, wow" is a common phrase. He shouts it out in the car and practically scares you! He loves to stand with me in the parking lot at daycare every morning and stare at the highway and watch big trucks go by!
• The highlight of his Christmas vacation was when we had a freezer delivered and he was in absolute awe of the delivery truck in the driveway, and literally stood in one spot at our front window, starting at the truck the entire time it was there (about 30 min or so by the time they got the freezer downstairs) and point and say big truck - Scott and I think maybe we should just pay someone to park their truck in the driveway a few times a week for some cheap entertainment?!
• Recently got a potty chair, is not terribly interested, he put his juice and toy in the bowl and pushed it into the other room like it was a truck when we first showed it to him. He will sit on it - and he does love to say potty so that is some interest at least and when soemone is in the bathroom he has to announce 'papa potty' or 'mama potty'. When he goes poop he does announce it, so thats a start too.
• Our bed time routine is a bath every other night and just a 'clean up' in the sink on the off nights, the highlight for him is brushing his teeth.
• He still takes a bottle every night (but we transitioned to a 'baby' slow flow bottle and only like 2 oz or so - hoping that would turn him off to his 'ba' (yeah, not so much) - bedtime ritual begins around 7 every night and he is in bed and usually sleeping by 730/745. He sleeps til 715 on week days and around 8 or 830 on weekends (last sunday he slept until 930!)
• Still can't sleep without froggy! BUT WE FOUND A BACKUP! Grandma scored one on Ebay recently! (thanks Grandma!!)
• Wears 18-24 mo old clothes, and some 2T
• Is in size 4 diapers
• At his 18 mo appt - he was 28 lbs 14 oz - 80th percentile / 33" tall - 75th percentile / 51.3 cm head circumfrence - 97th+ percentile - he has been off the charts here at every other appointment

And of course what milestone update would be complete without a Froggy Buddy picture or two?

I haven't done one since he turned one - since I figured taking one every month at this point was getting a little ridiculous - my plan after 18 mo is to do one every year....

So this time around the photo op didn't go quite as well as it had in the past (and if you recall, Owen was requiring more distractions in order to pose with the last few pics we took - remember the 11 mo and one year pics? Yes those are both a '20 questions game' and a pair of tongs in his hand...

Well this time around, here he is without any distractions....

Yeah, dind't work so well...round two was a couple nights later where I bribed him with some food (yes his mouth is full and he is in mid-chew when this pic was snapped)....


Well thats it for now! Hope to post soon about baby girl's new bedroom! :)

New Years Resolutions!?

Well – I haven’t really made any official resolutions for the New Year (who has the time?!) – so thankfully one of them wasn’t keeping my blog up to date because I’d have failed miserably already!! ha!  Really the only resolution I have is to stress less and just enjoy life!  All too often I feel like there is just too much to do and I tend to focus less on the things that really matter most in life (like family and friends!)….I recently read this amazing post and it just put things into perspective for me so much! Time really does fly and I know some day I am gonna miss this crazy time in my life – so why not enjoy it now! 

So speaking of time flying – it has been almost TWO whole months since my last post – really….wherever does the time go?!?  And the ‘Most Wonderful Time of the Year' has come and gone! so what have we been up to?!

Well over the Holidays – we managed to stay pretty busy…we usually have  four ‘events’ to attend – since Scott’s family is all within a few mile radius of each other – we have a party with both his mom and dad’s side of the fam and then of course we have our immediate family ‘Christmas Celebration’ with both Scott’s fam and my fam…

This year – the 'Kole' Extended Family Christmas the weekend before Christmas and we celebrated it at the clubhouse where Scott’s grandparents live – we had lots of food and fun!  Here are some pics to commemorate those moments…

watching great grandma and grandpas train…. 

playing some dominoes

The next event of the season was just spending some time Christmas morn together with w/ scott and owen…Owen had a lot of fun opening seeing what Santa had brought him…(I think he may have liked his Mickey wrapping paper more than the gifts!)

First we opened up our stockings….

 

 

then we headed downstairs by the tree…

Owen was in awe of this big package wrapped up in Mickey (Icky) paper! 

He got a new big boy bike – and loves to sit on it (hasn’t quite figured out the pedaling thing yet)

One of my favorite gifts was from Owen (with the help of my wonderful husband , of course) – it was one of our coolers with a bow on the outside (very intriguing to me when I spotted it the night before and I was SO tempted to just take a quick peek!)

Inside the cooler was this note and then some of our tupperware inside, each with a gift card for one of my favorite restaurants/places (panera, Logans, Starbucks, Fat Burrito)…Also inside was a new Camel Bak water bottle and a bag of jelly bellies (my pregnancy craving!) What a sweet, thoughtful gift!

After opening gifts, my mom, trav, and katy came over for breakfast.  Nathan and Teresa joined us a little later, because they got stuck waiting for snow to get cleared before they could make it safely! 

Here are uncle tick and owen hanging out in owen’s tent reading a quick book before we ate…

Here is the spread downstairs – wow we must have been good this year! ….

Papa and Owen…

 

Gran got Owen some Mickey Jammies for Christmas, he was just so in love with them – and most days when I get him ready for school and he has them on, he either won’t let me take them off or if he does, then he has to take them with him…crazy boy!

Gran, Tick, and Katy

This year, we didn’t even get a fam pic, what were we thinking?

In fact we didn’t get many pics at all!  (since I’m usually the designated picture taker, you can always tell when I am either overwhelmed – or in this case, not feeling so hot…oh well!)

After gifts and fun – it was time for a nap for Mr Owen – afterwards, we  headed to mom and dad Kole’s for our Christmas celebration.

Owen had such a good time with his cousins. and he loves the choo choo train that grandma has - he no joke - must have pushed that thing around and around the circle that goes around the house about 50+ times - even when it was an hour past his bed time, he was still going strong!

 

Grandma is always very good at making sure we get some good ‘family’ pics in….

 

And Owen of course is making a break for it in this one!

Baby Girl (who now has a name – but its a secret, you won’t find out until she’s born) must have been good this year too – cuz she made out like a bandit!

Owen took a liking to climbing up on his gifts…

(here’s what was inside – another big boy bike, but this one has a handle on the back that we can push him with, he loves it – thinks its a choo choo, asks to ‘choo choo’ all the time – it has a little bell on the handle, and he says ‘ding’ every time he rings it!)

Gettin cousin D! 

Kenz and her new doll Kenz and Owen helping Grandpa open up a gift!  

What a fun day! 

The day after Christmas we had the 'VI' Christmas celebration (Scott’s mom’s side of the fam)

Here is Owen getting ready to go…

 

Opening up some gifts… 

Chillin out with mom, cuz he was getting tired… 

Reading a Santa book with Grandma

The rest of the week - Scott and I were both were off of work (we had off from Christmas Eve through the New year) so that was nice to spend some time together just the three of us and also get some stuff done around the house….

I will say, we’re definitely getting old though, we only managed to stay up until only about 1130 on NYE! 

During the rest of the week, Scott and I worked in the nursery, as it was our goal to get it complete over break.  And we succeeded!  Scott took everything out (the room was an office and Murphy’s bedroom prior to being baby' girl’s nursery) which included taking down desk shelving , puttying the walls, painting walls and trim, putting up new blinds, cleaning floors, installing new switches, ceiling fan, vent covers, and outlets. WOW!  The furniture was delivered this past week and now we just need to get it put together and get her 'stuff' washed and in the room and then decorate! 

Can't believe she’ll be here so soon!! Just had an appt the first week of Jan, measured right on track.  plus, I only gained three lbs since the last month's appt, and that included holiday indulgences! I also made a decision to schedule a C-section for her birth and she will officially be here on March 11! 

Well enough of my babbling, I’ll try not to go so long in between posts anymore!! Stay tuned for an 18 month post on Mr. Owen coming VERY SOON!

Santa Claus is Coming to Town!

I actually attempted to post this on Sunday night, but had some issues with Live Writer (the program I use to write my blogs) So after messing with it a couple of days and giving up, I just copied and pasted into blogger and had to upload all the pics individually, anyway, just had to give that little update - since otherwise some of this post won't make sense when I refer to the days, etc that we did things...Plus, I didn't want you all to think I was a slacker or anything and didn't post for so long! :)

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Owen was very excited when we told him we were taking him downtown to ‘See Santa’ – for the Santa Parade last weekend. He was so in awe of everything, he loved the lights and the crazy Santa hats everyone wore – he was just entranced and I think this picture says it all…



He was a little freaked out by the hot air balloon flame – he yelled out ‘hot’ and buried his face in papas shoulder – and didn’t care too much for the loud semi horns either. But all in all it was a great time – he saw horses, ate some tootsie rolls, and even saw Santa at the end of the parade!
We also took Owen downtown this weekend to see Santa – he was excited once again, until he actually laid eyes on him, then he grabbed his papa and freaked out. But he did let papa sit down with him next to Santa – that was about as close as he was going to let himself get. But by the end of the visit with Santa, Owen had kind of warmed up – even gave Santa ‘five’. This picture taken before that point, the look on his face says, uh, no thanks, not so much!



In other news, I was away at a conference last week Wed-Fri and when I got home, I discovered Scott had been VERY busy! He moved all the furniture downstairs, including setting up the computer, tv, etc, and had set up the storage shelves in the play room that we bought at our trip to IKEA earlier in the year – what a surprise to come home to! And since we had the first snowfall of the year – he also had the garage all cleared for me to be able to park my car inside (we have a one stall garage, and my husband, what with being a man an all, had quite the extensive collection of ‘stuff’ preventing me from parking there before) What an awesome hubby! I feel like we are definitely getting closer to making room for baby girl!
It was nice to be gone for awhile, but good to be home!! When I picked up Owen from daycare – he was obsessed with the “no” (snow) and told me all about it the whole way home. So, I took him out ‘sledding’ (if you want to call it that) today – he got all bundled up in snowpants, his little boots, hat, mittens, and coat – and I pulled him around the front yard for about a half hour in his little sled! He had such a good time!

Lately, we have also been trying to get a good family picture of the three of us for Christmas cards, here are a few attempts …

way too into this cool snowman to look at the camera…



This was at Tim and Emily’s house (cuz we haven’t even gotten to the ‘tree going up’ point yet) – and as you can see, someone was not interested…



What a little goober boy we have….Here are a few more of his antics…

sly face…(notice the cheerio on his chin)



he makes this ‘ducka ducka’ sound and pulls goofy faces all the time – here he is doing that tonight when he was getting ready for bed… (also sporting a fine mohawk)