so sweet

Last night I went out with Christa and Alicia, woo-hoo!  I said all my goodbyes to everyone and hugs and kisses and I love yous.  As I'm walking out Ryan says, "I-L-o-v-e-Y-o-u!"  It was so cool and unexpected, he's never spelled like that before.  I truly felt loved!  I love you too, my Little Man! 

loved it

I've been babysitting our neighbor-friends, Max and Grant, some recently.  Usually only once or twice a week, but it adds up.  Ryan's so funny, he'll say he doesn't want to play with the little kids, but of course once he gets in there, he has a great time.  He asked me a couple days ago if he could have some of his friends over.  I told him I'd work on it and see what we could come up with for Thursday since it was supposed to be a warm and sunny day.  We are waterlogged here. 

So we had Jacob, Georgia, and Sam over yesterday.  It was wonderful!!  They played together sooo well.  I just got to sit and watch them have fun.  The three boys played soccer for quite awhile, which just made Ryan's day.  Georgia and Abs played babies and watched the game from the sidelines.  They also played monkey in the middle, ring around the rosy, and all sorts of run around like crazy things.  I can't believe how well they all got along.  They planned and talked and came up with the games all on their own. 

The afternoon was originally planned for Ryan's benefit, but it was a great day for me too.  We've had a CRAZY busy December trying to do Christmas parties and class plays and Christmas cards and teacher gifts and baking goodies and all sorts of stuff, on top of everyday living.  I'm working hard to keep perspective and enjoy it all, but I will admit I am exhausted.  So a couple hours of watching kids laugh and play and be happy was just what I needed!  I love our neighbors! 

no cooties here

Uh-oh, watch out Daddy!  Abby had her first kiss today!  Mommy and Chloe were at Ryan's school for the Christmas party, so Abby rode home from preschool with Ms. Alyson and Dylan [and Seth too who happened to have today off for parent conferences].  They went back to Alyson's house for peanut butter & honey sandwiches and clementines.  After playing for a bit, Dylan had to go down for his nap; he's a younger man, only two years old.  Apparently Abby asked to say good night, so Ms. Alyson brought over a stool.  She stood up on the stool next to Dylan's crib, and Ms. Alyson prompted Dylan to give Abby a hug and a kiss on the cheek good night.  They both completely ignored the "on the cheek" part and gave each other a big ole' kiss on the lips!  So there ya go, I guess it was bound to happen eventually! 

good question, Buddy

Ryan and I were talking about numbers yesterday.  He said the biggest number he knew was 1,999.  And then he realized 2,000 was higher and then we talked about all the thousands, and then the millions, billions, and trillions.  He asked me what the biggest number I knew was and I said infinity.  I explained to him that infinity basically means forever and higher then anyone could count and the numbers never stop.  His response: "Oh, is God still thinking of new numbers?"  I thought that was a great, very insightful question!  I love the way his little brain works so hard to try to make sense of everything! 

Chloe, 15months

Our sweet Chloe-Chlo-Chlo is 15months old!  Or at least she was a week ago; we're just observing the event today with a checkup to Dr. Bowman :)  Our Itty Bitty weighed in at 19lbs, 6.5oz.  I was shocked she hasn't hit 20lbs yet.  But Dr. Bowman was very happy with her weight.  Albeit at the very bottom, she is soundly on the weight charts now.  She was 30" long with an 18" head.  Dr. Bowman was very excited about her physical progress.  She's not worried at all that she's not actually walking yet, but she was very happy about her standing and pulling up and cruising along the chairs, woo-hoo!  Like her sister, she appears to be a wheezer.  Her ears looked great, her chest was clear, but alas she just has a bit of a wet, gunky wheeze and cough.  Sounds like someone else we know and love :) 

Chloe has eight teeth up front and three molars in the back.  Her fourth molar is on its way in and oh boy does it look painful!  It's all swollen and big and ouchy looking, poor baby.  The molars would explain the recent fussiness; Chloe has not enjoyed getting any of her eleven teeth.  When she's not busy with erupting teeth, she's a super sweet, laid back little one.  She's very observant, both Abby's preschool teacher and the doctor today commented on how aware she was.  She loves to laugh at her siblings.  She's a pretty good eater, loves to drink milk and smoothies, sleeps great - all night and three-ish hours in the afternoon.  She babbles a lot, but doesn't say any words on a consistent basis yet.  She points at everything with her one little crooked pointer finger.  She claps and blows kisses.  She can wave, but that's so a couple months ago, she's too cool for that anymore.  She loves to put things in and out, in and out, in and out.  She's into the fine details of everything.  She sucks her left thumb and is still very attached to her pink elephant.  Mommy's her favorite person in the whole world which I'm totally okay with :)  Her favorite foods are cheese, quesadillas, chicken, pureed veggies, applesauce.  She's got a dramatic flair to her; if you tell her no, she'll turn her head and pout and give you the most pitiful eyes ever.

I love you my sweetest littlest Love!

 

to compare:
Chloe at 15m: 19lbs, 6oz, 30" tall, 18" head
Abby at 15m:  20lbs, 5oz, 31" tall, 18 3/4" head

dreams

I don't often remember my dreams, but last night I did.  I dreamt that Chloe stood up and walked across the room, woo-hoo!  Since Ryan and I were running ahead of schedule this morning, I took a minute while he was eating his breakfast to ask him if he knew what dreams were.  We talked about dreams and how your mind pretends things while you sleep and sometimes you remember when you wake up.  So I told him that I had dreamt last night about Chloe walking.  He then told me that he had dreamt last night also.  He was at the tennis courts for the neighborhood Halloween party.  He was wearing his bat costume and then he started flying.  It was so great to listen to him talk about his dream. 

Anyways, it was just a really neat conversation.  I felt like we were actually talking, there was no agenda, no plan, no pulling teeth to get information, it just flowed naturally.  We were bonding, you know?!  So often I feel like I have to ask leading questions, and he usually gets silly or distracted and gives one word answers.  Which is fine, he is a six year old boy after all.  But, I don't know, this conversation was just special and really nice :)  

Up!

I think Chloe has her first real word!  She babbles a lot, although I've yet to be convinced that she knows what she's saying.  But last night in the bathtub, she had me pretty confident that she was saying "Up" and that she knew exactly what she meant.  She's getting pretty good at pulling all the way up to a standing position, and as scary as it was for Mommy, the edge of the tub is a perfect height.  She pulled up over and over.  And several times I swear that she said "Up" as she did it.  Then she grabbed the pink elephant squirt toy as it floated by, set him up on the edge, and once again said "Up."  I think we may just have a first real word on our hands!  Yay, Chloe!

the keys to my car

Move over Adele and "Boomer has it."  After a good year and a half plus, Abby has finally found a new favorite song, hooray!  She is all about "the keys to my car" song, which Mommy just so happens to love also, so it works perfectly.  At least for now, I'm sure I'll burn out on it before she does :) 

fyi: "the keys to my car" is more commonly known as "Don't Let Me Be Lonely" by The Band Perry. 

Makes my heart happy

Today while driving to church, Ryan asked "there are some people that don't go to church?"  We said something along the lines of well yeah that's true.  He replied with "why not? Church is good."  How awesome is that?!  Especially from Ryan.  He really loves being in UpStreet, the elementary age environment.  It's leaps and bounds better then leaving an upset, crying Ryan in the 4s room downstairs.  There were times I questioned whether we needed to find a new church or not it was so hard.  He'd start getting upset Saturday night just thinking about it.  I love that he finally loves church!  Hooray!

SIX!

Time's gotten away from me and my blog again.  hmm.  I seem to go in spurts and I have certainly not been in a blogging sort of mood recently apparently.  Sorry. 

There's a lot I have missed blogging about this summer ... Destin in May and again over Labor Day didn't make the blog.  An awesome week long OBX 4th of July trip didn't make the blog.  Neither did a trip to Laura's new place in Tampa along with a visit to Disney.  But we did them all!  And they were all a blast!  There's plenty of pictures on my picasa page to remember all the good times.  And hey a picture's worth a thousand words, right?! 

But I really do want to blog about my first born, my only son, my Bug-Man, my kindergartner, my Little Man, my Bud, my SIX year old!  I've attempted and saved a few drafts without luck.  I think between Ryan being in kindergarten [how did that happen?!  I still miss him and tear up at the bus stop in the mornings!], and Chloe growing up so fast [as much as we are done and as hard as the baby stage is, it's still weird knowing we're moving on from this phase.  I need some friends or sibs to have some babies so I can live vicariously.  it's fun to love on babies and then give them back.], I'm all out of whack.  It's hard on this Mama sometimes, this growing up stuff.  It's crazy how much I love them and how I just want to hold them and hug them and keep them my babies forever!  But alas, I can't, so time to focus on all the exciting things that do come with age.  And speaking of age, back to Ryan's SIXth birthday.  [Did you like how I tied that back around?  It wasn't even entirely intentional.].

Ryan's birthday fell on a Sunday this year, so we celebrated at school on Friday.  The girls and I surprised him by being mystery reader for his class and bringing in a new book, Danny and the Dinosaur's Birthday Party.  When I searched for birthday and dinosaur, this book kept coming up.  Danny and the Dinosaur is special to us since Grandma has an old copy of the book and loves to read it to them.  So this book was perfect, even more so when I realized that Danny turns six in the book.  It was fun to bring in a new book to read to the class.  I also had little dinosaur figures that we gave to all Ryan's classmates.  He was soo sweet, he even pulled out a couple for his teacher and parapro.  After the reading, we stayed and ate lunch in the cafeteria with Ryan.  Unknown to us, our new neighbors Georgia and family were also there, so that was fun.  [and hey, we had a photographer :)].  We also sat across from Benjamin's family.  Abby and Benjamin have been in preschool together both years.  When we sat down, Benjamin saw us first and was so excited, "there's Abby from my preschool!"  Small world.  Or a bubble, depends on how you look at it.  And since it was Friday, Ryan had ice cream with his lunch, yumm!  I also brought a couple of dinosaur cookies to celebrate. 

 

Saturday morning we had a soccer game.  I must say I was pretty distracted this game.  Lots of family in town!  It was great having Grandma, Auntie Sarah, Uncle Christian, Maxim, Uncle Jason, and Amber cheering our Dragons on.  But Ryan wasn't distracted; he won the medal for the day's value: paying attention.  Yup, Coach's kid won the medal on week two :)  He had a great game and the assistant really wanted to give it to him when he heard it was Ryan's birthday weekend.  Coleson had pretty much decided on another kid, but when the game ended and they asked if anyone remembered the value, Ryan was the only one.  No favoritism there, seems like he really did deserve it!  Great job, Buddy!  Ryan loves soccer.  He has great energy and is always right there in the game hustling, hustling. 

 

After the game it was party time!!  We packed up and headed towards the birthday party playground.  This is the fourth year we've partied there, but hey, it's a perfect place!  We had a dinosaur birthday banner and dinosaur tracks for the sidewalk.  We colored and cut lots of footprints between the sidewalk decor and the goodie bags.  The weather was perfect.  All the kids seemed to have lots of fun running and playing and eating pizza.  We had dinosaur cupcakes and dinosaur cookies.  As always, the merry go round was a huge hit with the little people.  Thanks to everyone who turned out to celebrate our little man! 

Off to the corn maze after the party.  While we always end up exhausted after a long day, the corn maze has turned into a fun tradition.  The big three cousins led the way [why do we always answer the questions wrong?!].  The corn was awesome this year, super tall and green, there are a few benefits to all the rain this summer!  The kids were so cute holding hands.  Poor Maxim was in the middle and would get pulled from side to side whenever we hit a fork in the road and Ryan & Abby would disagree about which way to go.  Chloe did great in the Snugli and enjoyed laughing as the others would run by.  We also checked out the corn crib and horse tire swings and jumpy pillows.  And then back to Nana's for a big family dinner.  Thanks Jim for a delicious meal and hosting all of us!  Presents and cake and celebrating Auntie Sarah too.  Sorry you have to share your special day with Ryan!  [well not your actual day, but the celebrations.].  Happy birthday too, Auntie Sarah :)

Sunday morning, birthday morning!  It was Pajama Day on Upstreet at church.  It sounds like they had lots of fun and played lots of cool sleepover games.  On our way home, we stopped at QT for birthday snacks. Ryan picked out gummy worms, Abby Skittles, Daddy coffee, and Mommy & Daddy shared donut holes.  More presents back home with Mommy and Daddy.  Grandma and Grandpa came over with more too and ate lunch and cupcakes with us.  We then enjoyed some downtime while Ryan built and built and built with his Legos.  We bought him one of those plastic storage things with three drawers and moved the lego table up to his room.  He's really enjoyed organizing all his Legos and building lots of fun creations.  We had a family dinner at IHOP to celebrate the birthday boy.  The kids love pancakes for dinner and we love that kids eat free. 

On Monday Ryan came home with a happy birthday hat from school.  I couldn't get anything else out of him about that though, I don't think they really did much more to celebrate.  But since he had the hat on, the busdriver had everyone sing to him on the way home.  Our busdriver is awesome!  Monday afternoon Ryan had his six year checkup.  As the nurse said, he's a square: 45lbs and 45ins.  Right on average in both categories.  Which means they are still predicating 5'10", 160lbs.  It'll be interesting to see if that's accurate or if he has one of those crazy high school growth spurts.  Everything looked great at the checkup.  He had his iron checked, blood pressure, hearing & vision, a flu mist.  All sorts of things, but no shots, yay!  The girls and I all got flu shots though; Chloe did great, Abby not such a big fan.  On a whim, we drove into Alpharetta after the appointment.  We were almost there anyways, and I knew Coleson would be a little late that night.  While we were driving to the appointment, Grandpa had called to tell us there were some scarecrows up.  We had a great time wandering around downtown Alpharetta checking them out.  There were lots and lots of them on every street light and corner and wherever they could lean them.  Ryan liked the Lego man of course.  We saw an astronaut and Abby was ecstatic.  She's been all about astronauts recently.  She really wants to be one when she grows up, pretty cool in my opinion!  Of course she also wants Chloe and I to be astronauts with her.  She has big dreams, but she's still my Mama's girl and I like that. 

What a day, what a week, what a celebration.  I love you, love you, love you Mr. Ryan Hazen!  I just can't wrap my brain around you being six already.  You're so amazing and smart and independent and handsome and sweet and caring.  You're an amazing big brother and your sisters both adore you.  I'm so proud of you and the fine young man you are growing into.  Even if I do miss you terribly while you are off conquering the world, or at least kindergarten :)  Happy, happy sixth birthday Buddy!!