January

Wow. We have had such a big month of change, it's been incredible.

Nate's a full time walker, Simon is pretty much potty trained and they are happily sharing a room. That's big stuff! Matt is also well entrenched in his new job and is doing really well. He is waiting to hear back on a big project bid that he led the way on, fingers crossed!

Here are a few other things that have been going on:

Nate is learning to communicate and interact in new ways. He loves to give big open-mouth, sloppy kisses:



He also loves to do the movements to the Wheels on the Bus. Well, he does one movement, but that's ok.



Simon is still obsessed with Buzz Lightyear...

 ...and anything having to do with space and rockets. We watched a live launch on NASA's website on Wednesday and he was really into it:

He is desperate to watch Star Wars, he even carried one of the DVDs around with him and has toy lightsabers. We are going to wait a couple more years to show him the movies, but he's already trying to convince us to change our minds.

Otherwise, we have just been having fun together. I got a beautiful Kitchenaid Stand Mixer from Grandpa for Christmas, and Simon and I have been baking together a lot. We've made cupcakes, muffins, whole wheat bread and popovers, to name a few:

We have been doing crafts, taking "selfies" and playing together.

Dinnertime with Nate

Dinner with Nate is funny--he is a serious eater, so you must have food for him on his tray at all times or he freaks out. But he also likes to play sometimes. Here are a couple of videos of recent mealtimes with Nate.

Chowing on some chicken chili--seriously, he eats almost anything we give him. Except cucumbers. 

Playing peekaboo!

The video Nate will hate us for when he's older

I was waiting to get this video ever since Nate started walking full time...it's similar to one I took of Simon when he started walking...sorry older Nate!

Simon and the potty--update

I just needed to share the email we got from Simon's teacher this afternoon:

Simon has been doing great today! He has been going to the bathroom every half hour and has had no accidents. I sensed a little resistance towards me asking him to go use he toilet. So, I went ahead and used a timer to tell him when to go. I begin by asking him if he wanted to go now or in one minute. He always says one minute. So, I am having him push the button on the timer and hold onto it u til it beeps. When it beeps he willingly goes over to the bathroom and goes potty. I have also been prepping him during our transitions going in and outside that he will be expected to go. He has been very accepting of that as we create a new routine for him. During circle time before lunch he said he had to go potty and went on his own.

When he does go potty he is able to go into the restroom and go independently. The first time I helped him get on the potty, but since have not needed to. He is very independent in there and even asks for privacy, so we close the door for him. He has yet to have a BM today, but says he has done it in his potty at home. When he does go here will will be helping clean up after. 

Colleen

Updates

No pictures or videos...just a few updates.

First...we have finally moved Nate fully into the room with Simon. He is even going to bed in there and we have adjusted Simon's bedtime routine to limit how much we disturb Nate when putting him to bed. And so far, so good! Nate seems to be sleeping better and it's really nice to have access to our own room in the evening and not worry about waking Nate up when we head in to sleep. I don't think either of us can believe that it took 14 months, but, hey, here we are now.

Next...Nate is walking full time! He's an adorable little zombie baby with his stiff-legged walk and falls quite a bit, but he's definitely a toddler now. He spent much of the weekend just pacing around, walking for the sake of walking.

And finally...Simon is on his way to potty-trained, finally! We did an intensive three day training with him this past weekend and he did wonderfully. He has been in underwear all three days (except for nights, which will still be a while) and while there have been some accidents, of course, there have been way more successes. Tomorrow he will head to school in underwear, so best of luck to them as they work to get him to use the potty there. We are hoping it goes relatively smoothly and we can officially only have one kid in diapers.

that's it, just a few big updates from around here!

Nate wanders

Nate spent quite a bit of time just wandering around this evening. He put on a hat, was wearing his jammies and at one point he had a microphone in his hand as part of the ensemble. The whole thing was pretty ridiculously cute. Here's a minute or so of it and a couple of pictures.

Swimming

As I mentioned last week, Simon started lessons with a smaller group, and should be making some real progress with his swimming. Check him out: this week he practiced floating on his back, kicking, reaching with his arms and big jumps:

Nate started his own class this week since he was a little sick last weekend--he is actually in a class at the same time as Simon's, with a parent of course.

At the beginning, he looked like this:

Then he started to warm up to it...

And we ended up here:

Finally, a couple of cute videos of Nate and Matt swimming:

Water Walk and Young Jedis

A few videos for your enjoyment...


Part one of Nate's "Water Walk"



And part two




Simon and Nate face the ultimate battle of good vs evil

Simon stuff

Just a couple of Simon things to share:

He started big boy swim lessons today! It's three 3-year olds with a teacher and no parents in the pool with them. He did so well! I think it's probably good that he can't swim off since he can't actually swim on his own yet. But he blew bubbles, and kicked and got a ride on the teachers back, it was very cute:

And this afternoon he and I were watching Ratatouille after baking some cupcakes, and I said I was chilly. He decided to be my human blanket, it was very cute:

Grandpa's visit and New Year's Eve

Grandpa came out to visit a couple of days after Christmas and stayed through the new year. We had a lot of fun....here are some of the highlights:

We exchanged more Christmas gifts, of course, including an awesome space shuttle from Grandpa!

One cool gift Aunt Karyn gave Simon was a paint-your-own truck...

Simon got out for some fun while Nate napped:

We went out to brunch, where Nate was so hungry he tried to eat the table:

We went to the movies, as I already talked about here, but a couple of people took naps in the backseat on the way...

We played around the house, both boys really enjoyed jumping all over Grandpa.

Grandpa and Dad took the boys to the Aquarium when I wasn't feeling wonderful one afternoon, and they had a lot of fun:

And finally, we celebrated the New Year! The boys did not stay up until midnight...and to be honest, the adults almost didn't make it either.

Simon liked the big box of finery I brought home...

As did Nate, who checked it all out, a few pieces at a time.

Overall, a great trip! Thanks to Grandpa for the visit and all of our great gifts, we really appreciate everything! And to Aunt Karyn for trekking up a second time that week!

Happy 2013!