Swimming Swimming

In prep for a summer of fun, I signed Noah up for his first real swim lessons. I chose a local swim club that I had heard rave reviews. The rules of the guppy swim class. 5 days a week for two weeks. No parents in the pool. No refunds. After day two, I realized why.

Noah was so out of his comfort zone, and I just sat and watched from my front row seat in the observation room as my little man struggled with learning to listen in a new and scary environment without Momma. By the end of the first week, the tears were gone, and my hero, Mr. Rudy, had succeded in getting Noah to tolerate floating on his back.

He went from "no no no swimming today" to being the first in line to enter the pool area, yellow chip in hand. By the end of the session, Noah got an award sheet full of smiley faces having completed all the skills for the guppy class: comfortable in water, puts face in water, breath control - bubbles, glides, kicks with barbells, row-row arms, back floats independently, rolls over, turns and climbs out of the pool, retrieves.

Noah and Mr. Rudy. Mr. Rudy was so patient and so calm even with a class full of crying toddlers. I love Mr. Rudy.

High five for a job well done. After every activity, Mr. Rudy asks the kids for a high five. And, he always gets one... tears and all.

Using barbells to kick, kick, kick across the pool.

1,2,3... time to blow bubbles.

I am so proud of my sweet little boy. He did so great, and even ended up enjoying himself by the end. I think it was such a great learning experience for him, and I am pretty impressed at how well he handled it.

Happy Birthday Darren

Dear D,

Today is your birthday, and amazingly enough you are spending it at the "happiest place on Earth."  The very same place that circa 1984, you vehemently proclaimed to Mom and Dad, "why do we have to go to a stupid place like this?"

I am pretty sure you would rather be doing activities like this...

And this...

But, I guess things change we you've got a house full of girls. Well, at least some of the time.

I know how super excited you are to have yet another post on the Internet full of pictures of you, but in the wise words of our big sis... you do not have a blog and you still haven't set up the computer Dad gave your for Christmas.  So, onto the birthday wishes!

Happy Birthday Darren!

Thanks for being such a great big brother.  Well, except for that time in 2nd grade, when I got an F on my math test, and I ripped up the test paper and threw it in the trash, and you pulled it out, taped it back together and showed it to Mom.  I'm sure my payback of writing "Darren wuz here" in lipstick on the bathroom sink made us somewhat even.  I do remember a time when Mom left you home to babysit for me, and you initiated a game of "Barbie has a BBQ at the lake" complete with tiny crumpled toilet paper burgers and duck decoy pencil sharpeners floating in the tub.  I am pretty sure your pencil sharpeners never worked the same after that.  I do have you to thank for my love of rap music. Whodini.  Run DMC.  LL Cool J.  Dean was pretty impressed when we started dating, and I knew all the songs on NWA - Straight Outta Compton.  I love that I made you the best rap mix ever, and when your customers ask you where you got it, you smile and say, "my little sister."  I can't tell you how happy I was when Dean got the "big bro stamp of approval," since previous boyfriends did not fair quite as well.  You, of course, were the cool guy growing up, and I was so proud to have you as my big brother.  I loved following your baseball career mostly so I could secretly crush on all your cute friends.  Nowadays when anyone tells me they love to fish, I am pretty proud to tell them that my big brother is a charter boat captain.  However, the conversation usually deteriorates from there since I don't think I've been fishing with you since that time in the paddle boat at Mr. Eddie's lake back in 2000.  You think you could hook a sister up with a trip.  You have such a loud, fun personality, and every time I am around you, you always make me laugh.  You make Noah laugh too, and I love to see you take the extra effort to engage him and make him notice you.  He can't help but pay attention to his Uncle D.  I love your West Texas hunting trips that include at stop over at our house. I love your cooking, and I wish I was around more often to try your dishes.  Your pork tenderloin spaghetti... mmmmm.  I still owe you a phone call for the next time I pick up some fish from HEB.  I love you Darren, and I hope you have an awesome birthday.

1980s - Waiting for the Easter Bunny/Santa Claus/Tooth Fairy

1996 -  Congratulations hug on the night you and Sarah got engaged.

1996 - Cracking me up for Mardi Gras.

1995 -  Care and I headed out for homecoming.  Did you not own a shirt in the 90s?

2009 - With Noah at Christmas.

2006 - Stuck between two sisters.

2009 - D and Cole.

Our Backyard Just Got Super-Duper Fun

Sometime before the free swing set, we got a free sandbox. (Thanks Lisa!) 

And sometime between the free swingset and the free sandbox, I bit the bullet and ordered a backyard play castle.

Here's a little tip.  WD40.  It saves you a lot of time and brute strength when putting together these plastic play structures. 

Noah loved the castle and kept referring to it as the Magic Kingdom.

He was really excited about the slide coming out of the back.  I hate to tell him that he is going to outgrow this way quicker than we thought.

Noah is a fan of doors being closed.  Daddy may have to come up with some way to close this from the inside.  Fingers are bound to get smashed otherwise.

Oh yes.  This is turning out to be one fun backyard.  Anyone want to come over and play?

Want Night-Night Please

Naps are officially a thing of the past.  It's been about nine days since he's actually slept during the day.  I will spare you the boring diatribe about how it happened, but I will say that true to form, every afternoon he says, "want milk... want music."  And, every afternoon, I put him down for about 45 minutes.  In the last nine days, he stays quiet for as long as his Baby Einstein playlist and then is ready to get up.  His bedtime has been anywhere from 5:30-6:00 PM, which is bad news for Daddy, but good news for Momma time in the evenings.  6:00 PM is really pushing it too.  Last night around 5:30 PM, he looked at Dean and said, "want night-night, please..." which brings us to the reason for this post.

Want.  Four little letters that are spoken at least 1,000 times a day lately.  Note to our speech therapist. W-A-N-T.  We got this.  So far today, in no particular order:

Want jellybeans.

Want Wonder Pets.

Want lollipop.

Want outside.
Want bubbles.
Want Momma come in.
Want music.

Want draw something. 

Want Wonder Pets.

Want apple juice.

Want numbers.

Want chocolate milk.

Want Old McDonald.

Want hot dog.

Want Wonder Pets.

Noah has also been throwing around these phrases to help bridge the gap when I don't quite understand the words following the want:

No not this one.

No. No. No.

Want that one.

At this point, I am so happy that he finally has some functional language, but I can see where this want, want, want has the potential to wear me out during the day.  Especially the part about the Wonder Pets.  Have you seen this show?  I am so not convinced. 

There's a Little Girl in our Neighborhood

If you've met Noah, you know that he likes to move.  Constantly.  He's not necessarily daring, but he likes to move and things in constant motion definitely have great appeal.  So, he has most of his OT's stumped as to why he doesn't like to swing.  And, the thing about it is, is that he used to like to swing.  He used to like to swing a lot.  And, lately he has been wanting to try it again, but only on Momma's lap.  I am hoping that our new swing set in the backyard may encourage him to try it out solo on the basis of familiarity alone.  So far, he's gotten as far as this. 

And, during our playdate at the park this week, things started to look pretty promising.  This was right after Momma scooted out from under Noah and off of the swing, and Noah was none to happy about it. 

However, it is amazing what peer pressure can do for a kid.

And, I think having his best bud M helped a ton.

Never underestimate the power of a boy trying to impress a cute girl. 

We love you little Miss M.

Old McDonald's Farm

Tonight during bath time, Noah kept saying, "Want Old McDonald."  Want Old McDonald."  A little background - He wasn't really asking for the song to be sung, but more like the game on my IPhone to be played which he has requested over 150 times today.  I've created a monster.  So, since IPhones and bathtime don't really mix, he had to make do with singing only.  So, off I went...

Me: "Old McDonald had a farm"

Noah: "EIEIO"

Me: "And on this farm he had a "

Noah: "A what?"

Me: "A what?"

Noah: "A what? A what?"

Me: "A what?"

(Sometimes this goes on a bit longer, but I'll spare you the redundancy.)

Noah: "A red wolf."

Me (smiling): "EIEIO.  With a"

Noah: "Ruff, ruff here. And a ruff, ruff there."

You get the gist.  I love that he thinks wolves say ruff ruff because they look like dogs.  I am happy to report that the other animals that Noah envisioned on Old McDonald's farm were sea lions that went "ROAR," parrots that went "parrot, parrot, parrot," crawfish that went "pinch, pinch," and a turtle that says nothing.  Aside from the crawfish, pretty sure that is one farm I don't want to visit.

The Easter Bunny 2010

Noah loved looking at old pictures him and the Easter Bunny, so I asked him if he wanted to go see him, and Noah said, "uhhhh huuh."  So, off we went to the mall, and we before could get in line to wait our turn with EB, Noah was already saying, "unhh unhh, unhh unhh."  So, suffice it to say, there will be no Easter Bunny picture for 2010.  Despite Noah's wishy washy feelings toward the EB, the bunny still showed Noah some love on Easter morning.  And, he must have been paying close attention lately because Noah's Easter basket was filled with a ton of his favorite things.  Jelly beans, Easter eggs filled with chocolate, a Woody doll from Toy Story, some new ELMO pajamas and a bathing suit (don't know if Noah was too psyched about this one, but I hope he will be when swimming lessons start in a couple weeks).

Toy Story 2 is a hit in our house, and Noah loved his Woody doll from the EB.

Opening every egg to see what goodies are inside.

Yay, Easter!

Our Backyard Just Got Super Fun

I was included on a random, mass email from a lady in one of my mom's group who was looking to get rid of a backyard swing set as soon as possible.  I emailed her back, "we'll take it."  And, sent Dean to pick it up yesterday afternoon from the nice couple standing in their backyard staring at a large pile of wood that would soon be their new, bigger, and better play set.  Dean arrived home late afternoon with cast off after giving it a quick run through the car wash.  Noah was super excited.

Noah couldn't wait for Daddy to put it together.  He sort of got in the way during the assembly process, so I had to corral him in the house.

And, Daddy luckily got it together in time for a quick test run just before dark.

Today, despite the so-so weather, Noah spent a lot of time outside breaking in his new play set.  Here it is.

And, if these faces are any indication, I think my impulse to give this play set a new home where spot on.

Even Daddy said that all the hard work getting this thing in our backyard was so worth it.

Easter's On Its Way

This morning I got Noah all dressed in his new Easter shirt for his school Easter party.  He looked so cute that I had to get a picture, so I grabbed my camera, but the battery was dead.  Bummer.  Left to rely on my trusty IPhone, I knew that I had only one shot to get it right.  We walked out the front door, and I told Noah to sit right on the C on the doormat.  He did, and then in my best Luciano Pavarotti voice, I gave him a "La, La, Laaaa!"  This is what I got.  And, I love it... ritz cracker teeth and all.  Wishing everyone a Happy Easter weekend!