Hannah recently discovered her reflection in mirrors and random electronics & appliances. It's pretty humorous. And, FYI, she has started dressing herself (headbands and all). I am officially the most laid-back and gracious mom in the universe.

I think it's safe to say that Nathan enjoyed SuperBowl. He kept standing over the table saying, "whoa! look at all that food!". Ha ha ha.

This was our pre-game entertainment :o) Not sure why Nathan is wearing pajamas? Or a bow? I guess he's our "free spirit".

http://youtu.be/hEEmjc0aWz0

I love that he quasi-tackles her and then jumps up saying "Let's go Hannah!" like she's just sittin around wasting time.

Then as I'm putting him to bed we have the following dialogue --

Nathan: What's going to happen to all that food?

me: Gma & Gpa will take some. Aunt Katie will take some. We will keep some.

****long pause****

me: Is there something special you want to keep?

Nathan: Ummm....just the crunchies. And probably some of that dipping sauce.

me: Oh you want some puppy chow?

Nathan: Yeah!

me: And the cheese sticks and marinara sauce?

Nathan: Yeah!

me: Sure. No problem :o)

Can anyone guess what Hannah's new favorite food is?

I seriously thought she was going to turn into a blueberry at lunch today. And why did I have her in a white shirt? NO CLUE! Why do they even make white shirts for toddlers?????!??!!!!

Nathan's Happy Birthday!

We had a wonderful weekend (last weekend) celebrating Nathan's 3rd birthday. Check out all the fun: The "party" at the Illinois Children's Museum. Not only did Gma & Gpa Bob and Uncle Matt came all the way from STL but Macy and family joined us too!

The balloons. A favorite in our house. The presents. This one is pretty lengthy but I wanted to share with those who weren't able to join us. It really is "wonderful" :o)

We are sick...again :o( We are very fortunate to have so many loving family members in the area who are willing to help. I really do believe that it takes a village to raise a child and we are so blessed to have our own Heckman Village right here in town. Love you Uncle Adam and Aunt Katie!!!!!! Thanks for all your help this week.

Sometimes they actually play nice together! Which means (drumroll........) few minutes of peace for Mommy :o) But do I do something practical like laundry or make the beds? Nope....I grab my camera and capture the moment :o) That other stuff can wait.

Well, Hannah has really taken to the potty. She goes on "her" potty, the "elmo" potty and any big potty regardless if we are at home or on the road. Woo hoo! I have no fears about taking her to run errands with me or go out to eat. The only issue is that she is still scared of her poop. For the longest time she refused to go on the potty and would do her #2 after we put her down for nap or bedtime. We are slowly making progress in that department. Some days we try to talk her through it and I'm not sure if I am potty training my daughter or coaching her through labor. "You can do it! Push! Keep going! Push!" Nathan actually had a completely dry night last night. Awesome! At this rate we only have 968 more loads of peepee laundry to go until everyone can sleep on their sheets more than one time!

Happy Thanksgiving, Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

We had a WONDERFUL holiday season! Even though the babies were sick almost the entire month of December and I was down and out for over 2 weeks we made it work :o) We spent tons of time with family and made many great memories. Nick was off work two weeks around Thanksgiving and two weeks over Christmas so this was actually our first week back to "normal". The weather cooperated so we were able to make two trips to STL and the babies had a blast with Gma Bob, Gpa Bob and Uncle Matt. And, of course, Aunt Margie made her annual trek to cental IL and we got some quality time with her :o)

Just for the record --- the butterfly princess attire is actually a present for Hannah but Nathan was the first one to model it for us! Just another picture to tuck away until he's 16 or 17 years old...

Day #3

Things are going well!!!! She went potty half as many times today as Monday which tells me she is getting control of her bladder. AND she told me twice that she needed to potty! Of course, she refused to go on the potty and then had an accident 5 minutes later but hey, we're making steps in the right direction. OH ---- and she slept great again last night. She was up at 10:30 (dry!), went potty, and went right back to bed for the rest of the night! Woo Hoo!

Day #2

Hello again!!!! We had fewer "successes" but also fewer accidents so I for one am going to count that as improvement :o) She even went #2 on the potty before bed. AND ---- she slept through the rest of the night last night until 7:15am. SWEET! AND --- we went to Maroa and she didn't have an accident in the car. Hallelujah. I admit I lost my cool a couple times today. I turned to my potty training book by John Rosemond and got a refresher: do NOT micromanage. let the child own the process - just make it easy for her to do so. do NOT micromanage. stay the course. do not give up when things get messy. do NOT micromanage. If you've never met me (welcome to my blog!) and FYI I have been known in some circles to be a micromanager. Some clasify it as OCD, some call it anal. Either way most of my life I was determined that MY way was always the best way and everyone should do all things MY way. And do it exactly as I would do ever step along the way. Nick has been a good influence on me for the last 9 1/2 years but it was definitely Nathan who taught me to let others do things their own way. Seriously, I would try to convince, persuade, influence, convert everyone I ever met to "my way". And then I had a child who turned two. Have you ever tried to convince your child NOT to wear his favorite shirt because it didn't match the pants you want him to wear? Or try to persuade him to watch The Lion King instead of having to watch Finding Nemo for the 963rd time? Or influence him to let you do the carseat buckle because you can do it like 8 times faster? Ha! Yea - you've tried but you have not been successful. When you have kids you learn very quickly that you cannot control all things in life. And...it doesn't REALLY matter that Nathan wears socks with sandals and stripes shirts with plaid pants. He gets himself dressed everyday and I have those 5 minutes to make coffee :o) Just because I can do it faster or "better" doesn't mean that Nathan - and now Hannah - can't do it themselves. So I will continue to pump Hannah full of milk and water and let her master the potty herself. I will not follow her around the house with a towel and mop trying to prevent messes. I will let her have accidents because in life that is the best way to learn - right? Learn from your mistakes. And looking on the bright side: if it takes really long I may just get a new couch out of the deal! :o)

Day #1

Well I am tired. Hannah did a great job today and Nick was a huge help, but potty training is tough business. Nick and I went for the "pre terrible twos training" timeline again since it seemed to work with Nathan. Hannah has been saying potty and also signing it (we used sign language with her too - just like Nathan) so that was really the only cue I needed. We've had her own potty and little undies ready to go for weeks so it was just a matter of what time would work best for Nick and I. Needless to say we had several accidents. I did my best to stay calm and cool and just re-direct her to sit on the potty. That went well until late afternoon. She had a shorter nap than usual which meant she was tired and cranky and this new "challenge" was starting to get on her nerves. Of course, that meant it was harder for me to keep her on the potty and that led to increased frustration on my part. And, then we had company stop by so I felt like there was an audience for our "ugliest" part of the day :o( I know Gammy Gam and Katie weren't judging me but I got really defensive all of a sudden! Sorry girls. You know I love you though! There were several funny (if you think pee and poop can be funny) moments. You know those mini scarecrow guys that are used to decorate around the house? Yeah...she definitely went dog-at-fire-hydrant-style. I look over and she is squating with one leg in the air peeing all over it! OMG!!!! And there were two different times that she actually sat down on the potty herself and went #1 but it sprayed all over the floor. Hmm....I thought only boys needed the pee guard? What up with that???? And I was going to run to Wal-Mart during her nap but Nick reminded me that it didn't work out so well for him last time. I totally forgot about this but day #1 with Nathan I went somewhere? during his nap and Nick got stuck cleaning poop off of Nathan, his sheets, bed, walls - you name it! LOL!!!!! So as I was writing this Hannah woke up. It had been 3 hours since she went to bed and she was still dry. Holy smokes! I got her up and she went in the potty - twice!!!!!!!!!!! OMG!!!!!!!!! Who knows what the rest of the week has in store for us but I'd say we are off to a pretty good start.

Potty training has begun....stay tuned.........it may get interesting around here.....

We've got the beat, we've got the beat, we've got the beat!

Happy Halloween!

Is this the coolest homemade costume or what??? Gammy Gam Linda provided the shirt - with screenprinted fireman logos - and the helmet. I worked on the cardboard truck a little bit at a time for the past few weeks with Nick and Adam pitching in ideas along the way.

Here's some video from the costume parade at Nathan's school. That's right...he's going to Kids 'N' Fitness North again. We decided it was time to mix up our routine a bit so we enrolled him in the MWF program. We are especially excited because his first teacher, Miss Julie, moved up to the 2-3 year-old room and he gets to be with her again! It's such a great situation because he gets to play with new friends, new toys, do projects, etc. He and Hannah get a little break from each other and of course, Mommy gets a little break too. I can get all my "chores" done during Hannah's naptime MWF and actually focus on the two of them Tues, Thurs and the weekends. Plus Hannah and I can run errands (so much easier with only one baby!) which takes some pressure off Nick. An added bonus: Nathan actually takes a nap during naptime at school. Amazing...peer pressure even affects two-year-olds. Who would have thought? And here's Princess Hannah. What a perfect little kitty :o)

Except sometimes she got fed up with her ears. And she wasn't quite sure about that tail the first go around... My master plan was to have Nathan be a fireman and Hannah would be a dalmation puppy. Well, if you asked him, he was a "fire truck" and ever since we watched Aunt Katie's cat (Jack) Hannah has been walking around the house meow-ing. At the last minute I thought I should switch her costume so she looked similar to how she sounded. If I asked her "are you a kitty cat?" she would scream "yea!". And then Nathan would yell "no Hannie you are NOT a kitty cat. Jack is a kitty cat." I'll try and catch that on video if I can sometime. So long for now....

Play-doh

Hannah played with play-doh for the first time this morning! She had so much fun that she decided to play with the brown play-doh out in the yard. Yes - it is EXACTLY what you are thinking. Dog poop. I'm just living the dream....

Fun at the mall

So the other day both babies were bonkers and by 8am I was almost out of my mind. I immediately packed up and we headed for the mall. I knew the play area would be empty that early and I could let the monkeys run free:

3rd trip to the pumpkin patch!

We tried a new one today in Warrensburg :o) Nathan was pimped out and ready to go...

And then later this afternoon Hannah created this masterpiece in the kitchen while I was in the restroom. Seriously how can a kid do this in like 90 seconds????

Pumpkin Patch

Today we met Macy & Garrick at a pumpkin patch about 20 minutes away. As you can see it was a TON of FUN. I actually took the babies last week to scope it out so Nathan immediately grabbed Macy's hand and went to "show her around". So cute...

Here we have some pumpkins...

And of course your litter of farm cats taking a nap on the bench...

These are the corn boxes (like a sandbox)

Nathan cruised around most of the day in their red car...

And of course, the corn maze...

It was chilly today but we were bundled up :o)

These are from our trip last week:

Hannah passed out on the way home! LOL!

That afternoon we painted a couple of the pumpkins we purchased. It was Hannah's first time with paint so instead of taking any chanced I just stripped her down.

Back online!

HELLO FRIENDS AND FAMILY!!!!!!!!! My very charming father-in-law sent me a message yesterday morning to let me know that today would mark 90 days since my last post. I suppose it's about time I get back in the habit huh? Well we had a GREAT summer. I thought about sharing updates every time I took pictures but the time just flew past me. Some weeks were blissful and I selfishly wanted to soak up the quiet moments doing nothing. Other weeks were spent banging my head against a wall. Not really, but it sure seemed like it at the time. Those days my nerves were just shot and the last thing I wanted to do was look at video and pics of the babies. Sometimes you just need a break - right? Anyway...I did compile some highlights of the last 3 months for your viewing pleasure. We went to the zoo. We spent lots of time in the water.

We made several trips to STL to stay with MawMaw and PawPaw Bob.

Playing washers & horseshoes was a favorite while we were there.

H loved hiding behind PawPaw's chair.

We said lots of prayers. Mostly because we are so grateful but also because of Nathan's commitment to the moment. We rode some bikes.

Do they look like twins or what? Someone asked me that for the first time this summer...

We made a trip to visit Great Grandma Carter :o) Not only was it wonderful to visit with her, but I got to see my babies playing with toys and in spaces that I did as a child. I cherish the memories of running up and down the stairs in Moo's kitchen and climbing on the porch of the "old building". It doesn't get much more heartwarming than that...

We went to the Maroa Freedom Festival, the Illinois State Fair, MooMoo's Fall Picnic, the Apple 'N' Pork Festival, and the Maroa Fall Festival. This summer the babies had their first corn dog, apple fritter, funnel cake and much, much more! Hannah even rode a pony and drove a tractor :o) Here's an example of a typical "event" at our house. These kids have practically no interest in kids toys. They would rather do whatever I'm doing around the house. Sometimes it can be very helpful. Sometimes not. But it's always entertaining. So that about wraps it up. I will try to do a better job of staying up to date. Wish me luck.