New sentences and potty progress

Wesley is making new progress in the speech department. He's recently (as of yesterday morning) started stringing three words together to make a sentence. Yesterday he handed me his cup of milk and said "Thank you Mommy". First time he's ever thanked me for doing something. It was WONDERFUL! Now whenever I give him a graham cracker or pretty much anything he says "Thank you Mommy". I just love it. The kid has a good start on manners at 21 months old and I'm thrilled.

He's also saying "Bye bye doggie" when we leave the house and "We're home kitties!" when we drive into the driveway coming home. The latter phrase was one that my Mom would always say when I was a kid when we would come home from a long trip. I always say it now when we get home from going anywhere.


Bed head Wesley and his beloved "Doggie".
We are slowly introducing Wesley to the potty. He got a little Baby Bjorn potty seat last Christmas that has been sitting in his bathroom unused. He likes to go in there and sit on it, fully clothed, while I go the bathroom. He'll even hand out magazines while we sit. He gets real excited when I ask him if he wants to go sit on his potty. We do this several times a day. I figure one day soon we'll start taking his pants of and let him sit on his potty while I potty so he gets used to that. I'm really in no rush for the potty training, I figure he'll let me know when it's time. We have several potty DVD's that he likes to watch, Potty Power and Once Upon a Potty. He's getting there slowly.

Iced out

We had an interesting weekend. The storm that I mentioned in the last post became more of a nightmare than we ever imagined. Friday it sleeted and rained most of the day and put a nice coat of ice over everything. Including the power lines. So Friday night at 10 pm we lost our electricity. We assumed it would come back up at some point soon so we went to bed. Woke up Saturday to still no electricity and the house was down to 64 degrees which was still somewhat tolerable. Now at this point the sleet had stopped and it was snowing heavily. My wonderful parents live 5 miles away and offered to come get us with the four wheel drive (thanks guys!). We agreed and went over to their house with our overnight bags not knowing when or if our electricity would ever come back.

The last time something like this happened was three years ago and it was out for four day then. What's funny is we swore we would invest in a generator before this happened again. Uggg. Anyways, we packed up a dog and the tortoise and stayed with my folks Saturday night. We all were appreciative that we didn't have to sleep in a cold house. Sunday we went home to feed the horses and the house was down to 55 degrees. It actually wasn't as bad as we imagined seeing as the low Sat night was 19 degrees. My poor fish in my fish tank looked downright pitiful when we got home Sunday. Poor things were swimming upside down and sideways. I thought they were goners. I got a bucket and netted them into it and brought them back over to my folks house to thaw. Luckily they all made it once they warmed up. So at this point there was a dog, a tortoise and a bucket of fish at my parents house. The cat, cockatiels and big dog Sophie all had the ability to withstand colder temperatures in the house.

We had fun at my folks house. My sister and her husband came down for the weekend. We learned they are expecting their first child in November. We are ultra excited for them and excited for Wesley to have another cousin. Our babies are only going to be 6 weeks apart. Congrats guys!

Noni and a scowling Wesley

Papa and Wesley putting coins into some train thing.


Our electricity came back on Sunday evening. It's nice to be home with the lights and heat on. I got the fun task of throwing out the entire thawed contents of the fridge and freezer. It took me three large black trash bags and now the fridge is completely empty. Guess I get to go spend a small fortune and fill it back up again. Yea!

I'm glad that weekend is over. We ended up getting seven inches of snow and a ton of ice. Of course it is 60 degrees out now and the snow is all gone. We are now doing some serious research into generators. I guarantee we will have one before next fall. I will not be stuck with a toddler and newborn and no electricity, that scares me. Hope everyone had a nice weekend! Here are some ice pictures.

Random Stuff

Just some random things to say today.


• As you can see I've done some remodeling to the blog. It was time. I did most of this yesterday during nap time and when Hubby got home I excitedly told him what I did. He walked over, looked at it and kind of shrugged and said it looked fine. This means he didn't like it. He later said he liked the green background, he's a simple man. So today I went in search of better backgrounds and settled on this one. Trying to keep it simple. I'm still not thrilled but I'm still looking around.


• I also added a swimming spawn to the right column of the blog. I'm sure everyone is just dying to peek inside my uterus so here ya go! Enjoy!


• We are currently getting pummeled with a winter storm, which is quite strange for it almost being April. Ever since 11 this morning I've heard the wonderful tinkling sound of sleet against the windows. We are supposed to get up to 8 inches of snow by tomorrow evening. Cool.


• I woke up Tuesday and walked into the kitchen and just about passed out from the lovely smell of dead mouse. Apparently a little furry demon crawled into our wall and decided to drop dead. Since I don't believe in knocking holes in my walls to find dead little stinky creatures we are just going to deal until his rotting carcass neutralizes. The smell is already disappearing a little at a time so it shouldn't be long now. Nasty little cretins.


• I'm excited to say my friend Jessica finally started reading Twilight and she's totally hooked. Ha ha he ha he (evil laughter). Another one bites the dust.
  

Bring on the Muffin Top!

One of the joys of being pregnant is not being on my diet anymore. In fact the day I found out we were pregnant I walked downstairs and showed Sean the positive ept test and the second words out of my mouth were "I can eat bread again!". And I didn't stop with just bread. Yesterday I made these jems:

Strawberry cupcakes with meringue frosting and sprinkles


That's not even a stock photo, those are actual goodies. The little person inside of me made me do it. Oh Holy Muffin Top were they good! I love strawberry cupcakes, they are dreamy. I haven't made cupcakes in eons and Wesley had never had one, so he got his first cupcake last night. He attacked it with such vigor that by the time I went and got the camera he had already demolished it. I'm pretty certain Wesley is enjoying non-dieting Mommy better than strict dieting Mommy. And I'll just deal with the look the nurse gives me when I step on the scale at the Dr. office in 4 weeks.

Heartbeat

I had my 14 week prenatal appointment today. Everything is going great. We got to hear the heartbeat today, it was a strong 154 bpm. I took my sidekick Wesley along this time and he had fun making googly eyes at the people next to us in the waiting room. Everyone commented on what a laid back kid he is. He just sat next to me on the bench for the ten minutes we were in the waiting room eating his graham cracker. He's such a good kid, we really are lucky.

My next appointment at 18 weeks will be the ultrasound and hopefully we'll get to see the sex of the new baby. I'm excited. It will be the end of April. My intuition tells me its going to be a boy but who knows. I went back and looked at Wesley's heartbeat for the 14 week appointment and it was 178. There are old wives tales about heartbeat and gender and according to them this new one is a girl. Both the 8 week and 14 week bpm were 150 and 154. I really don't have a preference for the gender as long as he or she is healthy, that's all we ask. That's all that's new around here.

Progress!

Once again it has been a busy busy weekend. Friday my Mother came over for lunch and to see her grandson. She ended up staying for awhile and watching some college basketball. My mother is a college basketball nut fan. I have memories as a small child of her screaming and hollering at the television when a particular game got very close at the end. It's good to know not much changes with time. She was over here hollering when the game was nearly over and her team was barely winning. Wesley thought this was great! He decided he had permission to scream and holler at the top of his lungs, and did for nearly 10 minutes. He got so into it that he found his basketball and brought it in the living room to join in the fun. Maybe grandma will have a little fan to help her cheer on future basketball games.



Then yesterday we all went out and finished up the very last of the fencing project. We had corners to clean up and a few last U-nails to pound in to complete it. It is so satisfying to have that large of a project crossed off the list. While we were out there our neighbor came over to see how things were going. He's a single guy that owns a whole ton of "man toys". He's always out riding his 4 wheeler or moving dirt or tree limbs with his big tractors. While we were talking to him I decided to muster up the courage to ask him if he would mind bringing his big tractor with a blade on the back over and help us level out the hole were the pool was. He agreed (he's such a nice guy) and within 45 minutes the pool hole was leveled out and ready for planting grass. Sean and I were just amazed at how easy it was to do all that work if you have the right equipment. I'm so happy I asked him!



Since everything was fenced in we decided to release the miniature horses and goats into the new back yard and see their reaction. They have been in their small enclosure all winter and were dying to get out and run and munch on sweet sweet grasses. They pretty much went nuts and ran around the two acres for 20 minutes before settling in to munch away.



Who knew pine trees were tasty to goats?



I'll leave you with a fun video clip I titled "Freedom". Those little buggers can really run!

Second trimester here I come!

I am officially one third of the way through this pregnancy. Yahoo! I am so happy to report that last week, seemingly overnight, the morning sickness disappeared. After reading up on this it makes more sense. I guess around the 12th week your placenta takes over making the pregnancy hormones instead of your body. Which in turn pretty much removes that wonderful feeling of being sick. It is simply wonderful to not be curled up on the couch every evening feeling like I got run over by a tank. Simply wonderful. I actually have my energy somewhat back and poor Wesley doesn't look so concerned for me anymore. The kid really picks up on my feelings, he's a sensitive little guy.

This second pregnancy is already quite a bit different than the first. For one thing, the above mentioned sickness was 500 times more awful than with the first. Second thing is I already feel huge! I think I'm about the size now that I was at about 20 weeks with Wesley. It's strange to look down and already see a belly there and only be 13 weeks. I'm already in some of my smaller maternity tops. It makes me scared as to how large I'm going to get.

During the first go round I had some big problems with swelling. My feet and ankles were huge! So I've done my research and I'm bound and determined not to swell too much this time round. For one I'm going to make sure I drink plenty of water. I should be drinking 64-80 oz of water a day. 64 oz is equal to 2 quarts. So I fill up a two quart pitcher every morning and make sure I drink it all by the end of the way. This is a huge amount of water (I think). I have to drink a tall glass full every two hours to accomplish my goal every day. I'm finding it tough. The other thing to help swelling I've found online is to keep your potassium levels high. So I plan to eat a banana every day, which isn't too tough to do.

Overall it's been smooth sailing and I'm looking forward now to the second trimester.

Life is good....

....when you have your sticks and disgusting dog ball.

Fence Building

We have been busy little people lately. I've mentioned in previous blog posts that we are trying to fence in the back yard which consists of around two acres. About a month ago Sean put up the 250 feet of wrought iron fence that was left over from around our now non-existent pool. That went along the front of the enclosure, the part you'd see when you pull up to the house. So this past weekend we put up the fence along the back of the property. Sean pounded in 45 T-posts (by hand) and then put up the 4X4 corner posts and secured them in with concrete. Then Sunday we unrolled the field wire and tightened it with a come along. Yesterday (Sean took a day off of work) and we secured the fence to the T-posts.



Wesley kept himself busy out there while we worked. He would bring us tools and clips and imitate Sean whenever he could. He had a blast.



We used the Green Machine (tractor) to attach the come along to. It worked well.



At the end of the day Wesley would pack all the tools into the trunk of his buggy.



The yard is really looking good, I'm excited to have such a big item checked off the to do list! Now as Wesley gets older he can run and play in an enclosed area. I can picture him riding mini motorcycles around, having a blast. Not to mention the animals, the mini horses and goats are going to be in hog heaven.

Eating with the big kids

The transition out of the high chair has officially started. Wesley has been showing an interest in eating at the table with us so today I got the booster chair, that was kindly loaned to us, and strapped it to the chair. Then for dinner tonight he sat there looking like a big kid, eating his dinner with us. It was kind of sad not to see him in his high chair, but I suppose the next little one will be in it soon enough.

Wesley and Alex

I do believe my friend Jessica's little boy Alex is going to be good friends with Wesley for many years to come. They really are a hoot to watch together. It's like whatever one doesn't think of the other will. As they get older and wiser I think they might be quite the handful.

This evening Alex came over and since it was pretty late, we decided to let the boys take a bath together. And of course I needed to photograph it for future torment and embarrassment. So here they are, two silly toddlers in a tub:



I also felt you needed to hear what it is like to be around these two wild and crazy boys. So two weeks ago when we were on our way to the zoo, I shot a small video of them testing out their voices in the van. I don't think my ear drums will ever be the same. The funny thing here is that Wesley is always the instigator with the high pitch screaming matches. Enjoy.

A Joyful Twist of Events

I want a puppy. At least I think I want a puppy. This all stems from the loss of our beloved golden retriever, Cisco, last May (I can't believe we are coming up on the year mark). We were a happy three dog family. They all got along great together (for the most part) and since Cisco left us there seems to be a void. I see it when I look out the window into the dog yard and see Sophie moping around. She seems to be the hardest hit at loosing her constant play mate. I miss the steady flow of soggy tennis balls being dropped in my lap. I still get choked up thinking about how that doesn't happen anymore. Mostly I am saddened that Cisco never got to enjoy the constant attention and ball throwing he would have endured had he lived to see Wesley at this age.

Anyways, back to my puppy dreams. I go back and forth on this subject almost daily. I mean why would I want to bring a puppy into this house when I know fully well what puppies do. Puppies pee and poop everywhere, they eat anything and everything (including Wesley's prized toys) and they stink. I've always thought puppies stink, is it just me that thinks this? But then I think, oh puppies are cute....they grow fast, it would be a welcome addition to our family.

And then I get to talking with people (I shall not name names) that once the subject of a puppy is broached immediately say "Oh why don't you just have another baby?". This was funny the first time I heard it, but after the seventh person said it it started waring on me. It was hard. I couldn't tell these people that we are indeed trying and nothing seems to be happening. I want to scream it from the roof tops that for six long months we have been trying with no results. But I kept my mouth shut. You see, I decided if I wasn't having any luck getting pregnant then by God I was going to get a puppy. That I could control.

Early January came and I was stuck between wanting another golden retriever puppy or getting a miniature schnauzer puppy when....



.....much to my surprise......



....this happened......




Yeah, you saw that one coming a mile away didn't you? That's me trying to be all dramatic. We are so grateful and ecstatic that it happened. I know looking back that six months of trying is nothing, especially when some people try for years. It was just totally different than what we went through with Wesley (Mister one month wonder child).

I'm so excited Wesley is going to be a big bro! He'll have so much fun with a sibling.

Our little Skittle is 12 weeks old and due Sept. 25th.

Needless to say but there are absolutely no puppy plans in our near future.

Birthday wishes, allergies and escape horses

First off, Happy Birthday Grandpa Rich! Hope you had a great Birthday and we wish we were there to help you celebrate it! If it helps, we made a cake today and ate it in your honor. :)

I haven't been blogging very well this past week due to the severe onslaught of seasonal allergies. Spring is always the worst season and it caught me off guard this year being so early. The warm weather has sent these trees into a mad dash to pop out those flower buds. It really sucks. When the weather is beautiful I just want to throw open all the windows and feel the warm air but I'm forced to keep them shut and stay indoors until the worst of it is over. It's been so bad I can't even sleep much at night. I've been sleeping on the couch propped up on pillows so I can drain. Poor Sean would be up all night with my constant nose blowing otherwise. Did I mention it sucks?

I had a some what exciting evening. I looked out the window and saw three huge horses run by, heading for my miniature horse pen. Looks like the neighbors across the street have a tough time keeping their horses confined as this is now the second time they've escaped. So I set Wesley up with Elmo's World (the best make shift babysitter I could find) and ran out there to catch them. With a little bucket of feed I managed to get lead ropes around all three of their necks and started walking them down the drive way about the time the neighbors drove up. I forgot how big and strong full size horses are, I'll stick to my midget horses.

That's about all that is new. Since this is supposedly a blog about Wesley I will leave you with some pictures.

After every nap, he won't leave his room until he's grabbed as many of his stuffed "friends" as his little hands can hold.


He often crouches like this. His little hiney hovers about a quarter of an inch above the ground. I find it strange.



Such a cute little man. Maybe I'm biased.

The path ahead

Here is a video I shot at the zoo last week. I don't know why I'm posting it other than it's cute to see the Mister running around. I say "running" in the loosest form of the word as it's more of a "trot". He's still getting his running legs figured out. Sometimes he gets so much momentum built up that I doubt he could put on the brakes enough to keep from running head long into something. Such a silly little boy.

It starts

I'm so excited. Garage sale season is starting and I am like a kid in a candy store. I love finding kids toys for a fraction of their price new, it's so fulfilling. Sean is not so excited to fill our already full house even more full of other people's crap. Oh well, it will all get sold or given away once it is out grown.

Anyways, today I went to a church rummage sale and found many treasures. The biggest find was this:



As I've mentioned before, my child is a Sesame Street crazed kid who loves anything Sesame Street. These Elmo chairs are like $40 new and I doubt I would have spent that on something so hideous. BUT for a small donation I brought it home expecting my almost 20 month old to go nuts. Yep, not so much. Wesley has started being scared of certain toys. Mainly talking or jiggling toys so I didn't expect this homecoming. So I put it in the living room and assumed he would eventually warm up to it. He gave it a wide berth all day, never coming closer than 15 feet of it. He would point at it and say "Elmo chair" but that's about it.

Then this evening he took Hubby's hand and pulled him over to it and said "Daddy sit" and pointed to it. Of course Sean sat in it and showed him it would not, indeed, gobble him up.



Hubby read quite a few books while smashing sitting in the Elmo chair. Then just a little bit ago I came in from feeding the horses to find this new development.



He finally got over his fear and now sits in it without any problems. We are finding he is a very sensitive child. He really doesn't like being lifted in the air over Sean's head. He's somewhat fearful of new things, likes routines and comforting objects. I suppose he is very much like his parents in this aspect. I just hope he grows to not fear new things when he's older. I don't really know, as a parent, how to accomplish this other than just show him as many new and exciting things as possible. For now we are just excited he's sitting in his Elmo chair.

Our annual trip to the zoo

Since there isn't a whole ton of a lot to do around here, we found ourselves wanting to do our annual trip to the zoo early this year. The weather has been freakishly beautiful for early March (today is supposed to hit 86 degrees) and we were ready to exit the house. So yesterday Jessica and I loaded up our youngins and set off to the land of animals. Last time Wesley was at the zoo was his birthday last year when he turned one, he wasn't walking yet and therefore spent the entire time either in a stroller or in someones arms. This year he got to do some walking and running around and loved it! He still wasn't all that interested in the actual animals but would look when we pointed something out. He showed more interest in his graham cracker than the animals but I think the next trip to the zoo he'll be ready to take in all the sights.

Here he is in the rain forest jungle exhibit. The humidity was turned up extremely high in that building for obvious reasons and we were ready to vacate that exhibit then we reached the end of the trail.



Here are the three little ones parked in their vehicles rearing to go. The wagons were a God send. Very easy to get around and the kids enjoyed sitting in them when they weren't tearing around like crazy folk. It was an interesting experience getting two wagons and three car seats in a mini van. It was tight to say the least.



The petting zoo wasn't as big a hit as I had expected. I think he's used to seeing little horses and goats at home so this big shaggy sheep didn't interest him much.



All three kids liked checking out the huge grizzy bear exhibit. Little Abby, who is not even 11 months old, was walking around with the big boys most of the time. It's amazing seeing that little tiny gal walking around everywhere. No crawling for her anymore.



I thought this picture was just adorable. Alex went over and gave Wesley a hug. Not real sure Wesley is enjoying it but it still made a cute picture.



Last of all, here is Wes and I sitting on the gorilla sculpture (as we do every year).

He's learning

We've been teaching Wesley his 123's and he's picking them up pretty well. He can't get them all unless he's really focused with no distractions around him (which is rare), but we are proud of him being able to get the ones he does get. It's truly amazing how these little ones just pick stuff up.

Just call me the purple monster with red hair

Wow, it's March....when did that happen? I'm excited that February is gone, it's such a dreary month. I have exactly two months till I turn the big 3-0. That's sure creeping up as well. I thought I would share something that Wesley started doing, that literally, cracks me up. He has a series of Sesame Street books, all starting and focusing on a different letter of the alphabet. He loves the letter "L" for some strange reason and will carry that particular book around with him for large periods of the day. He likes this book because it has Ernie, I believe to be his favorite character, in the book. He often opens it up to this page:



He loves to point to Ernie and Bert and will yell their names. And then he likes to focus in on the purple girl monster with red hair.



He points to her and calls her "Mommy". Every. single. time. He's done this ever since I can remember. Good to know I'm a purple monster with red hair eh? Cracks us up.