Family Saturday

It was beautiful here today and should be again tomorrow!

Besides a silly string war, Chuck took his cars outside to play with. We made a road and a city for them.




He also had a car wash for his cars. The car wash actually occupied him for quite some time. We used bubble bath for the soap so I knew if he rubbed his eyes he would be ok!




We took Smith on his first walk. Dad hates walks but he was forced to go and pull the wagon. There is a vacant lot two lots away from us. Some older couple bought it because they didn't want someone building a two story house behind them and being able to see in their house. The lot is well taken care of and has a big boy swing and a baby swing. Is perfect for a game of football or even a picnic. We stopped on our walk and let Chuck swing. He had a blast. (Disregard the outfit.... I know it doesn't match !)




Also we worked on puzzles. Some puzzles are too easy for Chuck and then the others are too hard. He got a Dino puzzle for Christmas from my parents. Instead of doing the whole puzzle, I took just about 7 pieces out and let him put those in. He was so excited when he finished it because it was a big puzzle!








Tomorrow (if I can convince dad to get out of the house) we are going to go to a park that has a playground, some nature and bike trails (that supposedly has lots of frogs) and a lake for fishing. My plan is to take a picnic and enjoy the day outside.

No pics of Smith. It's not like he's that exciting right now! I will post one tomorrow!


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Family Time

Daddy is home for the weekend! And he stayed up when he got home from work today and worked on taxes so that he would be on our schedule while he was home!

Today Smith got some long sleeve clothes from our neighbors across the street. He has been wearing pajamas this whole time because any clothes we have in a 3 month size are all spring. I was hoping that the clothes situation would even out since Chuck was born 3 months later in the year but it is warmer in TX. Not so much. We were so excited to get to change into real clothes today!




This is as close to a smile as I could get with both boys!




I actually got to have a normal life today! I went and had coffee with one of the girls I have met. Her son is a month older than Chuck and her hubs is a cardio thoracic surgeon at Dr's hospital! I have worked with her a lot at school and volunteered with the medical alliance book sale for her. We are going to try and do that once a month and also walk some mornings after we drop the boys off. She also gave me the number of a highly sought after babysitter. Anyways, she had a meeting at 9 so it was perfect timing for Smith and I to head home for some eating.

Chuck had a good day at school. I went inside to pick him up and was helping him put away the toys he was playing with. He all of a sudden said that he loved me. He was so excited when he said it. I heard some teachers just melt when they heard him. Melted my heart too. I guess he doesn't feel totally neglected! He also told me today that "now we just need sister so we can all play together". I said "what if we try and have sister and we get another brother instead?". Chuck says "that ok too, mom".

I just started feeling like myself this week so don't get your hopes up people!

Chuck gets a stamp at music class every week so has been begging to work with stamps. I would have liked to get him the ones that are already inked and you just remove the top to use. I already had stamps from school so we used those. Of course I got them from dollar tree. I made Chuck a bag of about 7 stamps and a pad. Of course this must be supervised! Even with supervision, Chuck and dad ended up with at least 20 stamps up each arm. Chuck had so much fun with this though. This is probably good for helping to work on the pincer grip which is important to develop for handwriting (the grasping of something between thumb and first finger).




While going through my school stuff I found a bunch of cookie cutters (4 for $1). I traced the cookie cutters on paper and Chuck had to match the correct cookie cutter to the drawing. He loved working on this puzzle!







Tomorrow is supposed to be warm so hopefully lots of fresh air is in our future!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Chuck eating soup and carrots in his house Santa brought him.




Smith makes sure no one takes his food while he snoozes!




Smith is slowly getting on a schedule. He wakes up at 7. Naps from 9-11. Then naps again from about 1-4 or 2-5. The afternoons are a little iffy. Now if we could get his eating on some type of schedule!


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Help!

Today Dr. did not have to work. That meant I had help with bath and bedtime! An extra person to hold baby and bounce him is always great!!!

He gave me one hour ( can't have any more because I'm feeding a monster) to do whatever I wanted. Exercise, bathe, Target... Whatever. It was Mary hour! Well, folks... This is how much I love my family.... I mopped my floors!!! I told them that this is proof I love them! I also couldn't think of anything else on such short notice. I am freaky about the whole flu thing so take every opportunity to throw antibacterial stuff on anything!

Even though Dr. Is on a night schedule he wakes up when Chuck gets home for some playtime. Some days he gets 30 minutes, some days two hours, some days none because he's working our of town.

Today, we let daddy sleep a little while because of the time he got off this morning.

Chuck worked on some motor skills and practiced putting eggs together. This is a tough one. May want to start with just a few all the sane size and then add more of different sizes.




We also worked with playdoh. This is great for muscle development in the hands. All he needs is a few tools that came with the playdoh.



We also colored some Diego pics. Chuck has a tub for his drawing stuff. It's important to have different sized crayons and different types of drawing utensils.







Smith ate all day, every hour to be exact. On Friday I weighed him and the scale said he was 12.6. Surely he has hit 13 pounds now.



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Tornados

We had 80 degree weather yesterday and today a cold front came in ( now we are in the 60's). We have been under a tornado warning all evening.

Another tornado, by the name of Chuck, had a good day at school but I had to keep him occupied since it was rainy outside. Usually when it is warm, I open the back doors and let him enjoy himself outside. Our fence is 8 feet tall and the gates are so heavy I can barely open them so he is totally safe and on his own. Also, we have tons if windows that look into the backyard so I can see him from the kitchen/den, my bedroom, and the laundry room.

Since Dr. is working nights for the rest of his life (not really but it seems like it) I need to keep Chuck relatively calm for a little while once we get home.

Today, we investigated different parts of plants with our magnifying glass. We had an acorn, a weed with roots, a camellia bud, a camellia flower, a piece of bark, a stick, a green leaf and a brown leaf. We had located a worm but it got away. I reckon investigating bugs will be a different day. Chuck also has some pretty colored rocks we may look at or even different shapes of pasta. He is also still learning how to use a magnifying glass (you can get a pack of two ... One small one big.... At the dollar tree or they also have small packs in their party favor section.)







We then set up some cups and got our bag of balls (again a bag of 12 for $1). We tossed and bounced them into the cups. Today it actually turned into some counting and some patterns. You never know what is going to happen!










Smith enjoyed watching..... Who am I kidding. He enjoyed eating while all this was going on. The child LOVES to be held but did take a moment to soak in Mother Nature.




Things I have learned in the past two days- you can not sweep with one arm. You can not fold laundry with one arm. But, you can cook, a few things, with one arm.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Moody

No matter where I put him, this one would not sleep unless I held him. I gave in and had a nice nap on the couch too!











- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Buds

Chillin'-




Caught red handed-




Making jello jigglers- (yea,yea Halloween and Christmas ones... He will never figure it out!)




Snoozin'-




- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Other activities

Some other activities that Chuck does...

All of these activities I put in their own ziplock bag so they can be used over and over. Chuck just has to go pull out a bag. Those 2 gallon bags are the bomb. Also I use old wipe containers!

These sponges were a dollar from Dollar Tree. We haven't used they yet but will probably roll out some paper on the patio and will paint with them.



These lacing cards I found in the dollar bin at Target! Great for motor skills. Chuck enjoyed "sewing".



These are locks and keys. We started with one. He figured it out. Now we have challenged him with two locks and several keys. Sometimes he gets them unlocked, sometimes not. It depends on the amount of patience that day!



Of course we also work on transferring pasta, Rice Krispies, rice. I have put some tools from the dollar tree together for when we do this.







And of course we have the golf tees, hammer, and foam block. He has a lot of fun with that!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Well I did not get a shower or brush my teeth this weekend but both boys got baths each night and both are fed and I would say relatively happy.

Exhale. I love Mondays :)

Just to remind you, I blog from my phone and inner wren being mama so you will find a significant amount of typos :)

Well, today I decided to pull out all the stops and be power mommy. Dr. got home from work around breakfast time so I was able to get some breakfast cooked. That right there should be my success of the day.

I'm trying to do a lot more "Montessori" type things at home with Chuck. Also, a friend emailed me and asked me how I do it. Meaning how am I managing Chuck with little to no help most of the time. She, too, has a very active boy and was having a hard time keeping him busy since her husband has the same type schedule as our daddy.

So I decided I would share more of the activities we do because I also have a lot of friends with children this age.

Our first activity of the day was Mr. Potato head. Weird I know. I didn't realize how confusing and frustrating this can be for a child. We actually have three but have not worked out way up to that many. Without coaching, Chuck struggles with just one potato head. One thing that we haven't gotten yet is that our ears go above our arms. Once we are able to do one by ourself, we will do two at the same time. Walgreens actually has them for 5 bucks and they were buy 2 get 1 free.

So, yes, we have a bin of potato heads....



And this my friends is just a snapshot midday of what the den looked like. Dad has no idea what happens during the day because it is clean when he gets home or wakes up...,



Today I asked Chuck what he wanted for snack. He said circles. What? I have no idea what he was talking about but I got to it and fixed him a snack of circles! Grapes, cheese balls, string cheese cut in slices, and crackers with Nutella. Chuck thought I was pretty cool.


Have you ever tried these crackers? They are on the sweet side so are great with peanut butter, cream cheese, or Nutella.




Another thing we did was make what I call a treasure hunt bottle. I got a small bottle of water and collected things from around the house (rubber bands, beads, animal beads, cut ribbon, googly eyes, pompom balls,etc.). Chuck dropped these things into the bottle. After putting everything in, we glued the top on. You can shake it and look for different things. Some of our beads were animals so it was fun looking for the elephant, etc. chuck REALLY liked this activity!












Potty training has actually gone well. I still can't get him to put undies on. He is scared they will get wet. He only wet his diaper once today and once yesterday.

Some treats he got over the past two days was silly string. Ever since his Fall festival at school, silly string wars have been high on our list! They are a new tradition with Chucks cousins for Thanksgiving. He also couldn't wait for dad to wake up so we could play with silly string! Thank goodness the weather turned out warm!










Also, since he did so great with the potty, he got to go get ice cream. One time, I was feeding Smith and couldn't really go see why he was calling my name, and Chuck went #1 and #2 by himself in the potty!




He really is such a well behaved boy.

One funny thing he said this weekend was "mom, when you were little what was your name?" I told him my name and the next day asked him if he remembered. He said "your name Mary. You a princess when you little." Yes my child I was a princess, still am.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Yelling and back sleeping

We have a great thing going on at the Weber house.....
Smith is sleeping on his back!!!! He hasn't done this since he has been home. He is also snoozing in his bassinet so I think we might be getting somewhere!
Chuck on the other hand has decided he likes to scream, yell and talk really loud. I feel like we have to learn our social norms.... If he has inside voices at school, then we have them at home. That's why I don't take him to restaurants. He hasn't learned that we don't run and scream in restaurants.
So I handed Chuck his jacket and shoes and told him to go outside if he is going to scream. If he's inside there is no screaming allowed. We will see how long it takes him to understand the whole screaming in the house thing. It's kinda chilly outside!
Dad is home but is sleeping. Chuck is completely naked now because he refuses to put on big boy undies and now apparently all clothes. Also the naked boy just ran through the house screaming and woke Smith up so he is being sent back outside.... Clothes or no clothes.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone