18 months

We are now at another major milestone with Lincoln. Eighteen months. Oh my goodness how did that go so fast? Seriously, he will always be our little (er, I guess he was never really that little) baby boy. Nothing will ever change that. In fact, I talked with an elderly patient of mine recently who was describing her family to me. She went on to talk about her children and when she got to the last of her bunch, she chuckled and said "you know, the last one always is our baby boy". Isn't that the truth? I still think of Lincoln as this little guy who graced our lives and made this family complete. 

Oh boy has he grown. Over the last 18 months, we have laughed (and cried) with the tremendous amount of love he brings to us. He's a handful, that is for sure. But all 4 of us are so grateful for his silly antics, his constant giggles, and heck, even his screams! 

I'm determined to make him a good husband someday :) he loves to help out around the house, like my little shadow as we go about our days. 

He unloads the dishwasher....

He does the laundry...  

He loves to help cook (but dislikes the dress up part)...

And much prefers to snack while we cook

The kid has moves too! A family friend laughed at the recent dance class, as Lincoln raced around to all the studios to get his groove on. She commented "his future wife is going to love you if he learns to dance". Too bad Ryan's response when I told him that Lincoln wants tap shoes: "not happening". End of that conversation. 

He snuggles with me and hands over flowers with the cutest smile on the block. Oh this boy melts my heart.

But let's be real....he has some qualities from his daddy too 😘

At 18 months, he is keeping us on our toes and exploring his surroundings. In fast motion!

* he eats.....fruit. I swear he would eat only fruit if we let him. Given the choice of a cookie or fruit, hands down he will choose fruit. 

* he adores his sisters, and this week, he has a thing for Sidney. Thankfully that preference switches regularly so neither ever feels left out. 

* his hair is getting longer and more curly. We can't bear to cut it because the humidity makes some ultra curls and it's just too much sweetness! So for now, it stays. Besides, he's working on his hockey hair :) 

* he loves to be outside. Every minute of every day. It's where he would stay if we had nothing else on the agenda. Playing in dirt, in the sand, pushing his truck, sitting in his car, whatever we are doing, just take it outside. 

* he babbles a lot. But only has a few words in his vocabulary. It seems to be growing, and through signs and pointing, he gets his needs met with minimal screaming. We went through a long week where he screamed for everything. Boy, that was no fun at all! Thankfully we got that under control and he now tries to tell us what he wants before screaming. Don't get me wrong, there's still some screaming, but not every time he opens his mouth!
* sleep isn't his forte, but since his tubes, it's definitely better. He still naps like a champ, sometimes 3-4 hours!
* he wears 18-24 mo clothes and size 3-4 diapers (we're in transition now).
* although he still faces backwards in the car, it won't be long and we will have to turn him around. He dislikes car rides and it's becoming a challenge.
* he still likes his blanket and pacifier, and I'm starting to wonder if we need to get rid of the paci. :( He doesn't use it at all during the school day, not even nap! How they get those kids to behave so well at school just blows our minds. The benefit of peers I guess.
* he has the biggest brown eyes on the planet, I swear. I love when little old ladies comment on his big eyes and adorable curls. One lady recently said "well if that doesn't get you, his bouncy cheeks sure will!". You got it; he's simply adorable!
* official stats coming tomorrow.....

slow down sweet baby boy, and never stop snuggling! 

Best buds

At any moment of our day, two of the three kids are playing together and best of friends. It can be Lincoln and Regan, Lincoln and Sidney or Regan and Sidney. It varies constantly. But these two, their favorite thing to do is make each other laugh. It can be making silly faces, tearing around the house, or making a mess of something. Whatever it is, they like to laugh. 

So on the video below, when Sidney tried to get Lincoln to be the caboose on the slide, he was simply laughing to hard to understand what she was asking! She finally gets him to sit in front of her and their laughing continues as they descend the slide. I can't help but watch this video over and over again, their care free laughing is contagious! I love that these three kiddos of ours have each other. 

Click below for the video. 

https://youtu.be/BsCYZCWFiV0

Books

Both of the girls had a love for books at this age, and Lincoln is no different. Regan happens to have a bookshelf in her room and recently he emptied that thing in less than 3 minutes. Ryan forgets that the girls did these things too, and it takes just a few moments to clean up his fun. And so, I let him have his fun. 

Click below to listen to him "read". I've been trying to catch him for weeks and finally managed to do so! I just love his sweet voice as he works to make sense of the story. 

http://youtu.be/uYANQeRRcYc

Life is full

Life is full speed around this place lately. After reading a recent article titled "Busy is a Sickness", I don't like to say "we are busy" (though we certainly are!), I prefer to say "our lives are full". So what is it, that is keeping our lives so full these days......

The big kids are wrapping up their winter/school activities, while knee deep into spring activities and gearing up for summer. I've said it since Regan was in Kindergarten, and I sense I will say it until they all graduate, these months of April/May are tough for us. It's an over-lap of activities and a complete wrap up of the school year. When it boils down to it, our lives are full. Very full! 

Regan is practicing hard with her new fastpitch softball team 3 days/week and getting ready to start a season full of games and tournaments. Meanwhile, she's also wrapping up a year of weekly choir practice with Angelica and will have a whiz-bang concert at the new Ordway in 2 weeks, with a little preview next week at a local Assisted Living Facility. She'd like to get back with her swim team for the summer too but I'm just not sure it's possible to add practices 3 days/week to her already full schedule. Sidney will finish her year long weekly dance class with a recital in 3 weeks and that darling little ballerina is so excited! She's back in the saddle of gymnastics and recently learned that she's mastered necessary skills to advance to the next level, which means it will be a summer of learning front handsprings....please pray for intact bones! Speaking of summer, she'll be getting back into the pool for weekly swimming lessons to perfect those strokes a little more. This last activity is not negotiable for our kiddos.

At school, Sidney will show off all that she has learned with a fun Kindergarten graduation/music program just days before the bell rings for the last time this year and she's rehearsing and singing all of her days away. Regan is currently immersed in the dreaded MCA's and we are all ready for them to be over. Sprinkle in some Earth Day events, a few play dates, too many birthday parties to count, and we've got ourselves a very full two months!

Lincoln is just going with the flow. The kid has no choice. A friend recently looked at me, toting him around to various activities and commented "when my two were little, we got to stay home! Kuddos to you for letting your girls stay in their activities". At this stage, he's happy to be on the go. Afterall, a two our Saturday morning softball practice means he and I get two full hours at the nearby playground. Sometimes I think he is so used to being on the go, that he'd be bored if we stayed home all day long.

Ryan's managing to host his own play dates, er, I mean Stanley Cup playoff parties with some great friends. Come on NHL, do we have to drag out the season until summer?! He'll head over to Wisconsin in May for a concert for one of his most favorite artists; he's pretty thankful we managed to squeeze in this trip between softball tournaments and dance recitals :)  

As for me?, I'm praying to get in a massage one of these days, I think I've earned it! But this life is full, and we wouldn't have it any other way. 

Spring has sprung

 The weather this weekend was simply perfect (for spring). It was a wee bit windy, but when it feels like 70 and the sun is shining down on our faces, it's perfect in our minds. Plus, when you factor in the fact that it was snowing (monstrous size snowflakes) on Friday morning, a little wind is nothing.
Saturday morning was a "divide and conquer" type of day. With two active young girls, we often find ourselves having to split up duties to get everyone where they need to be. This weekend, I took Regan to a 2 hour softball practice while Ryan went to gymnastics with Sidney. Given the glorious weather, it was an easy decision to tote Lincoln along. We hung out at a nearby park and he was giddy with delight! 

After a quick snooze in the swing (check out that drool!), he played to his hearts content. I couldn't believe his giggles, they wouldn't stop. It was hilarious and I finally turned on the video on my phone. Click HERE for a little clip. He played so hard for those 2 hours that he napped for 4 hours in the afternoon! FOUR hours! And we had to wake him up at 4:30pm or he may have slept longer. 

Sunday morning we headed to Lake Harriet for a stroll around the lake. Lincoln fought like crazy to leave the house (he just wanted to play outside), but was super excited when we arrived at our destination. We brought along his red car because we knew he'd sit in that much longer than in his stroller. The girls brought their scooters and had quite the lesson about public trails. Between the ducks, the airplanes and all of the dogs, Lincoln was in toddler heaven!

They have a pretty fun playground at Lake Harriet so we burned off some energy climbing around for an hour. See Sidney way way up there?....I may have just given grandma Jan a heart attack with this picture :) 

Here's to spring time fun! 

Disney on Ice

We took all 3 kids to Disney on Ice-Frozen edition this past week. This was a long time in the making, seeing as though tickets went on sale roughly 10 months ago and we snatched them up right away. Holy was that a long wait! Ryan got concerned that the girls wouldn't be interested in Frozen any longer (the whole "I'm too old for princesses") and then there's Lincoln's recent antics at Easter (here), making us all wonder how the night was going to unfold. 

Thankfully the girls were giddy with excitement when we told them (we are smart enough to know they didn't need to be told 10 months ago!), and once these folks came out, Lincoln was all eyes!

Oh my was he sweet. The lady sitting next to me was just giddy listening to all of his "ooohs" and "ahhhs" but more importantly, his squealing giggles were delightful! I was crying listening to his belly laughs when any animal character was on the ice. Gosh almighty did he love those things! 

Despite a spilled $16 icee and lots of squirming out of Lincoln, we both think it was a major successful family outing and we are so happy to have taken the entire family! 

Siblings

I just love that these 3 have each other. To love, to pick on, to cherish to bother. They really do love each other, despite a lot of bickering. Now that Lincoln is a full on toddler, he's joining his big sisters at the table when it's homework time. I love to see them around the table, talking (even bickering sometimes), because it means they are bonding. 

It's so wonderful to see them learning from each other too. Sidney's sight words are hanging on the wall and we make her recite them regularly. Lincoln recently started insisting on sitting in the chair, pointing to the words and babbling his own way through each of the words too. Simply adorable!

And since it's National Sibling day, I thought I'd give a quick shout out to my big brother....who together, I'm sure we put a few gray hairs on our parents' heads :) 

Easter fun

Easter is still one of my most favorite holidays. I love the meaning, I love the colors and I love spring weather. We have celebrated each and every Easter as a family in our own home too...bonus! It means absolutely no travel. And for that, we are all happy! 

The Easter Bunny did not disappoint, and showed up with treats and gifts for the kiddos. Sidney claimed she didn't sleep much overnight, as she was simply too excited! I don't believe the girl actually sleeps anymore. 

Regan is super excited to get her eyes on this book. She read a few pages, paused and said "wait!, this actually happened to real people!?", amazed that anyone could actually live through such disasters. Note: this book is in the elementary school age group...so I'm hopeful it's not scary for her!

As is typical, he was more interested in his "treat" than any of the gifts. 

Both girls got one of these talking birds....and talk they will do! Honestly, the thing repeats what we say and then sings when you pet her back. Wonder how long it takes for the batteries to wear out :) 

After a disastrous attempt at church we had our private egg hunt! A little bit about church before I push it to the back of my mind and hope to forget the experience forever. Ryan said "Lincoln in church is like oil and water" and then we all later agreed that if you look up the definition of the 'devil' you will see a picture of Lincoln in church...yes, it was that bad. Just ask those people around us, but give them a day to get their hearing back after listening to his high pitched screaming when we wouldn't let him lick the floors, climb the nearby stairs only to fall off of them, and on and on. Move him to the lobby you say?, that wasn't any better, just more screaming and a lot of stair climbing/falling. How about move him downstairs?...well there he stood next to a lovely new mom and stood watch as she breastfed her newborn with Ryan providing his supervision, which just made it all awkward. As if we needed a reminder why we don't regularly attend church with a 1 year old! 

Ok, I'm going to forget about our morning now. 

Our egg hunt was gg--rrr--ee--aaa-ttt!! Again, it takes a village, and I'm so in love with our village. 

The kids all scurried through the back yard in search of plastic eggs filled with money and candy. 

That bunny was clever, hiding those eggs both high and low. The girls were sweet to let Lincoln take the low-lying obvious eggs and they searched for the hidden ones. 

It took him a long while to catch on, but eventually he joined in the fun and realized those plastic eggs did not belong in the bark of a tree, beside the rocks, or setting in the empty window basket. 

Happy Easter from our family to yours! 

...later dudes! 

Easter prep

In true family fashion, we headed down to a nearby lake for the annual Easter egg hunt. This year, Regan was too old for the stated ages, and although we saw many kids who were older than her participate, she was happy to instead help Lincoln. Sidney's age division moved her up to the "big kid" area and her hunt was a real hunt....like in the woods sort of hunt! (More about those woods later).  She was pretty excited, and even though she walked away with just a fe in her basket, she said it was a fabulous day and can't wait for next year.
Score! 

Lincoln was surrounded by fellow 1 year olds in his area. Less of a hunt, and more of a 'just try to stand on the grass, bend over and pick up an egg', sort of deal. 

He was super cute, not really sure what to expect, and just staring at all of those colorful-jelly bean-filled eggs. 

Regan was a great helper to him, and it allowed me to catch some pretty cute shots of the 2 of them, working together to fill his basket. 

We got a good laugh out of a boy nearby (older than Lincoln), who choose to stomp on the eggs and crack them open letting the contents explode instead of picking them up. He ran faster than his dad could catch him and made for quite the sight! 

While we waited for the countdown, I was able to catch a few fun pictures of the kids in the woods. These woods would later prove deadly as we trampled through them to find Sidney/Ryan, me carrying Lincoln, tripping on a branch, and tumbling to the ground.
Yes, I bit the dust in front of probably 200 people. With Lincoln in my arms. 

Awesome. 

Looking back, I'm a bit surprised that no one offered help, seeing as though I had just fallen while holding a 1 year old! Evidently, I make falling look graceful and his lack of a real cry meant he was fine.  

Lincoln is one independent little boy. He walked a good 3/4 of a mile back around the lake to the parking lot, all while dragging his filled basket. We pleaded to let us carry him (again, there were 200+ people around us), but he was having none of that. And so, we let him walk. 

On the bright side, at least the parking lot was fairly empty by the time we were ready to leave. His bunny basket on the other hand....the thing was filthy!

Later in the day we colored eggs. Of course, Lincoln had to stand on his own chair, without help, while coloring his egg. That boy was content and happy to play in his orange food colored water for as long as we let him. 

Both of the girls love coloring eggs. We got creative this year and opted out of kit buying. Instead, we ventured into Pinterest land and found that we could use food coloring to create our own colors (their favorite...TEAL!) and later made a second batch of eggs and used crayons on the hot eggs which then melted into some fun colors. Cool!! 

Sweet Sidney continues to be our little animated child. She was so excited to be coloring eggs with her siblings and loved our Easter prep day! 

Tubes-round 2

Friday morning, before the sun rose, we headed to the Day Surgery center for Lincoln's second round of ear tubes. The girls had gone on a sleep-over, at a dear friend's house to avoid having a 5:30am wake up call. Not that what they got was much different....apparently they could be heard at about 6am chatting away. I was relieved to hear they did well, and enjoyed their sleepover (Sidney's very first night away from home without a parent!). 

I can't say enough about how grateful I am for good friends. You know, the kind you can trust your kids' lives with. The kind that offers to take your kids for a sleepover. The kind that treat your kids as their own, complete with 11pm tuck ins and hugs when you  "miss my  mommy". It takes a village, and we are forever thankful for our village. 

Ok, back to the tubes. We arrived at 6:20am (only 5 minutes late), and were able to keep Lincoln happy despite his completely empty stomach. The poor baby hadn't eaten anything since about 9pm the night prior. He let us know that he was unhappy, and that he, above anyone else, would be in charge. As if that is different any other day of the week!

After a quick wait in the lobby where he played catch with a friendly family nearby, we headed back to the pre-op room where our lovely nurse tried her darndest to convince Lincoln for a weigh-in. He wasn't having any of it, and so we did the next best thing. I held him and got weighed, and then got weighed without him and we did the math. Thank goodness it measured in grams ;) We tried getting him into those cute purple PJ's, but he fussed and whinned and we quickly removed them. Again, our dear nurse tried her best, offering white pants (shorter) but he politely shook his head in disagreement. She offered to let us get him dressed in just his own PJ's, but by then, he preferred to run around with nothing. And so, we obliged. I think what was really making him mad (other than being in a strange room with strangers coming in constantly and no one bringing food), was the fact that his ankle bracelet was uncomfortable. 

I volunteered to bring him back to the operating room when the time came. Let's be honest, we knew Lincoln would prefer it this way and we didn't want to make him more upset. The time came, and I gowned up, scooped him in my arms, and walked to the OR with yet another nurse. The team in the OR was fantastic, sensing his attitude when we walked in (keep in mind, Lincoln was still just wearing a diaper at this point). He clung to my arms and the entire room tried to help him relax and sang Itsy Bitsy Spider and Pat-A-Cake....the entire room! It was so cute. I had been warned that he wouldn't like the anesthesia mask, and Lincoln proved that. He screamed as I had to hold his arms until his body started to relax and he was taken from my arms and laid on the table. There was a brief moment where I heard his shallow breathing and got alarmed, questioning the anesthesiologist  who assured me he was fine and in good hands. I trusted him. I had to. Our ENT was ready to work and I was ushered out to the waiting room with Ryan. 

In less than 15 minutes, Dr. H appeared and we breathed a sigh of relief. He was finished and Lincoln had been moved to recovery. In another 15 minutes we were back to see him and helped him come out of his anesthesia. He was crabby and out of it and really really mad. As long as I held him while standing, he was happy. Within about 45 minutes, we dressed him and had our discharge paperwork in hand. Happy to have that behind us, we headed home to spend the day snuggling! Here's hoping these tubes do the trick and we can avoid more infections, keep fluid out of his ears, and start talking more! (on that note, he spent the entire afternoon saying "mama, mama, mama"!!).