San Fran

Here are some photos of our trip in November.

Updates

I can't believe it's been 2 months since I last posted. Things have been pretty busy here, but I honestly don't know where the time goes.

Since our last post, Jeff and I stole some time away by ourselves (first vacation without Tyler) to San Francisco in November. We had never been there so we enjoyed all the tourist attractions, stayed in a lovely little boutique hotel, took naps every day and ate ridiculously priced food (although it was very tasty). I was surprised at how expensive everything was and a $14 bagel and cream cheese with juice on our last morning about put me over the edge. We enjoyed the city but were definitely ready to come home. Tyler, on the other hand, couldn't have been more thrilled to spend the time with Grammy and PopPop. He didn't even want me to get him out of bed the first morning back and was crying for Grammy. Guess I should be glad he wasn't upset, but a little bit of excitement at having us back would have helped the ego.

I was also made a partner at the law firm. I've known for a while, but I was sworn to secrecy until they made the big announcement at the firm Christmas party this week. I'm the first woman so we'll see how they react to a woman's perspective. It's a great group of guys so I have no doubts we'll all do just fine. I really like them and it's nice to see a group of people who like each other get to work together everyday. There's very little competition and we are all there to work for a common goal--not like many law firms I've seen.

And for the big news, we are expecting again in June! We had our first ultrasound and all is well so far. Tyler tells us he wants a "girl baby", but we'll be happy with either sex--we just hope for another baby who is as easy going as he is.

Amazing Cake!

Check out this amazing cake that my friend Kristin made for Tyler! She said she's not quitting her day job but I think it's fabulous. We appreciate all the effort and Tyler recognized it immediately as a "backhoe loader".

More Birthday Fun

Nothing better than a dirt pile to play in!


Werkley Landscape Truck--BEFORE toddler artists

Werkley Landscape Truck--AFTER toddler artists. I'd say it was worth the effort.

2nd Birthday

We had a little party on Sunday for Tyler's 2nd birthday. Several toddlers and a dirt pile! The kids had a blast and we knew the party was a success when Tyler woke up the next morning and said "Can we have a party?" He loved playing with the kids and of course digging in the dirt is always a favorite activity.

October Already

I can't believe it's October already. Is it possible Tyler's going to be 2 on the 16th? We've planned a little construction party for him, just a few kids and big piles of dirt. He loves 'helping daddy' and if Jeff is outside he has to follow to "help"--which often means he's in the dirt. Thankfully he listens well and really does want to help but I guess dirt is really distracting. He does pick up weeds, tries to use the broom to sweep out the garage, etc. but then sits down and digs. He's constantly asking for a real shovel (instead of plastic sand shovels) so Jeff gave finally gave him his very own metal trowel, which he thinks is a shovel for his size and handles with such care.

Next month, Jeff and I are taking our first vacation ALONE since Tyler was born. Neither of us has been to the west coast, so we decided to stay in the heart of San Francisco. There is so much to do there we are having trouble narrowing our choices. Frankly, I'm just excited to actually get to sleep in--really sleep until my body wakes up, instead of the usual 6am wake up to a child yelling "Mommy turn on the light".

Fun with Friends

My mom bought a pop up tunnel at a yard sale about a year ago, and it was the best $2 she ever spent. We have it set up in our living room (which we use for nothing other than this tunnel now) and Tyler goes through it 20 times a day.

He's also getting a big kick out of the sliding board at parks. You see him holding Emily's hand in this picture. He's always touching her and now constantly asking if we can go see Emily. It's starting early. . .

Longwood

We visited Longwood Gardens in Kennett Square, PA. Tyler had such a blast we are going to go again soon. Not sure why we haven't taken advantage of the tourist attraction before when it's only 15 minutes from my office. We were so excited watching Tyler enjoy the trees and gardens. They have specific areas for kids and a childrens garden where kids are encouraged to touch and play and the even provide towels for you. Tyler was soaked! We had to pry him away.

School Days

Tyler started school two mornings a week. We thought it was time he was around some additional kids and it gives Jeff some time to get work done uninterrupted. This first week has been rough. The first day he apparently had a really great morning with the other kids, but then near the end he got timid and sat by the door reading books by himself for a while. Then today he was extremely unhappy when I left and they said he didn't eat much of his lunch and he ran to Jeff and broke into tears when he saw daddy. The school (and everyone we know) keeps telling me it's normal and he's doing better than a lot of kids with the new surroundings, but I'm not sure my heart can take much more of this.

Vacation 2008

We just returned from another wonderful vacation with friends of ours and their little girl Emily. We went to the south side of Ocean City, NJ and loved it. The kids really enjoyed the beach and water. It ws pretty cold but Jeff was happy to jump waves. Tyler wasn't thrilled with the waves but he did like splashing his feet in the shallow water and digging in the sand. One afternoon he actually spent almost an hour scooping sand onto my legs and feet and then promptly crawled on my lap and curled up for a nap. We certainly tired out the kids each day. The weather was beautiful and we couldn't have asked for better company. We expected Emily and Tyler to be tired of each other after a week, but they seemed to really enjoy each other's company and liked to hold hands and walk everywhere together. They were also very good at giving hugs and kisses to each other and sharing toys.

Tyler had a word explosion this week. He now repeats the last three words or so of everything we say. And he started stringing sentences together--I asked him if he wanted to go to bed the other day and he responded with a very clear "I don't want to". He's pointing out things he sees as we go by--things I don't remember showing him or telling him about. He uses words constantly and says things like "night night bed" when he's tired, "Tyler's house" when we drive up our driveway (sounds like "lyler"), and "back to the house" when he was done at the beach. Our vacation condo was across from an empty lot with a construction Loader in it, so he loved looking out the sliding glass doors all day and yelling "loader". We also were near the beach comb tractor storage area and the fire house so he got to see (and tell us about) the tractors and fire engines too. He's certainly a healthy eater and doesn't turn his nose up at anything. He asks for his favorite foods by saying "cookies get please" and "more berries"--his new favorite food is strawberries. He loved his first taste of ice cream and ate a big slice of pizza on the boardwalk. His favorite breakfast food is SmartStart cereal and "waffles with srup"(syrup). Everything must be done by himself--I'm not allowed to feed him anything, he must have a fork, he puts on his own jacket and hat (and removes them when he wants--which doesn't work well for me), he gets his own snacks out of the cabinets at home, and has no interest in reading or playing with us unless it's on his terms (i.e. he asks us to play or brings us a book).

Chores

Tyler has been given his first chores around the house. He gets to feed the dogs in the morning and after we eat dinner. He loves helping Daddy and gets really upset if we have already done it. He walks over to the cabinet with the dog food, gets the dog bowl out and says "dog feed" repeatedly until we come over to help him scoop out the food. As you can see, we have a little problem making all the dog food get into the dog bowls, but he's always eager to help pick up the pieces he drops.

Birthday Fun

Tyler had a fun filled day at Emily's 2nd birthday party this past weekend. Despite relatively cool and gloomy weather the rain never came and we all enjoyed a great day. The theme was Sesame Street and everyone was to dress up in the color of their favorite Sesame Street character. Tyler currently loves cookie monster so blue it was. I had planned on royal blue because in my mind that was what color cookie is. However, when I did research (i.e. when I got around to pullnig out the cookie monster doll we have and putting it next to his shirt) I realized I was way off. He's actually a teal color. So, off to the store we went. I ended up matching perfectly and it worked out well because there were balloons at the party in all of the sesame street colors.











Elmo made an appearance and Tyler was in heaven. I thought he would be scared or tentative but he couldn't stop jumping and touching Elmo.

March for Babies

We completed the March of Dimes annual March for Babies recently. It was a nicely paced 5 mile walk around town. Friends of ours (Emily and her parents in the pic) had a baby girl at 24 weeks (15 weeks too soon!) and have been involved with March of Dimes since then. Thankfully Emily is fine but there are so many premies who aren't so lucky.

You notice Jeff and Bobby ready to go with strollers--but where are the kids?

We had over 20 people (and one dog) who walked on team Emily Grace and raised over 16,000 dollars. Kristin made camo t-shirts for all of us as "Emily's Envoy". It was a really fun day despite the cold and rainy weather.

Tunnel time

I can't figure out where the time has gone lately. We got some snow and ice on Friday so I worked from home, or tried to. Jeff went out plowing and I was home with Tyler. Generally he plays well by himself, and I set him up with various activities, but I guess having Mommy home was a real novelty because I wasn't able to complete anything for work. So, we put it all away and went out to play in the snow. Then we got out the pop-up tunnel and spent a good while crawling back and forth through it.