A Bike Ride

Payton got this REALLY COOL bike from her Mae Mae & Papa Bob for her birthday in April. It's interesting -- she is really into books, puzzles, books, talking, coloring, books, art projects and of course, books. She hasn't shown much interest in 'physical' activities -- maybe that's why my 2 1/2 year old is still not walking up and down the stairs (she prefers to crawl!). But, she took an interest in the bike tonight -- on our walk to find 'natures', as she calls it.

Now, tell me you don't just want to SQUEEZE those cheeks and give her lots of kisses -- it's the glasses, isn't it??

FREEZIE pops -- AGAIN!

Another batch of freezer pops -- we LOVE these this summer! We made RED ones and ORANGE ones earlier - it's a fun summer treat to not only eat them, but to make them together.

Fun @ Playgroup!

This past week, we were invited to a playgroup with some fellow blogging mommies: Christine invited us to her house (she hasn't shared her blog address with us yet) and we played with William & baby Tori, Kerry and her boys: Jacob & Brett. Amy and Hailey were sick at home, so they weren't able to join us :(


We started the day with donut holes from Dunkin Donuts, went right to ice cream (pretend, of course) and then outside and a picnic. Payton & William playing at the sand table (we want one of those TOO!)

This last picture is Payton play farm with Jacob -- we had a really fun day!

ABC's

Wordless Wednesday

The female-toddler-version of Harry Potter

Take Me Out To the Ballgame!!

This summer, we've gone to a total of 4 Kane County Cougars minor league baseball games. Let me tell you -- if you are looking for some good family-friendly fun -- try a minor league baseball game in your area! We watched fireworks after every game, good ball park food (plus, we sneak some snacks in there sometimes) and in-between inning fun! Payton LOVES to go to the ballgames!!!



Here, we rode the tram to the game -- this time, we went with a group from my work -- we rent out one of the picnic decks at work and we can bring friends & family to the game -- we brought Grammy & Papa Bill, Brian and Trina & the daycare-family.


Holly, Bradley & Jeffrey with their new Cougar shirts!


Best Buddies!!


Payton did NOT want to get her picture take with "Ozzie" the Cougar, but afterwards, she told everyone, "I got my picture taken with Ozzie -- see!" "I like Ozzie"


After the game (9:30PM!) and fireworks (10PM) , the 'big' kids went to run the bases . Payton orginially said she didn't want to go, but then once she saw the kids down there, she changed her mind -- imagine that! So, we had to wait in a long line of kids and finally got to the front of the line...


Running around the bases....what fun!

Fun at Ka-Ka's House

Payton lovingly refers to her daycare provider as "Ka-Ka". Please know, that this is a term of endearment and nothing else. When Payton was learning to speak, we encouraged her to say each person's first letters: "Buh-Buh" for Bradley (which for a time, he was referred to as 'Bubba'), "Huh-Huh" for Holly, "Juh-Juh" for Jeffrey, "S-S" for Mister Scott, and "Ka-Ka" for Miss Karen. Well, of course "Ka-Ka" was the only name that stuck!!

Payton LOVES to go to "Ka-Ka's" house and misses those kids SO much when they were on vacation or when we stay home on my days off. Here are some photos from Miss Karen's house -- look how much fun they have while I'm away at work!


WOW! Those glasses are really big!


















Payton and Jeffrey measuring, mixing and baking...yummy cookies, I'm sure! Miss Karen is known around here for her WONDERFUL, YUMMY, OUT OF THIS WORLD cookies!

p-p-popcorn!

Look at this COOL popcorn maker we just bought! Well, okay -- our church officially bought it for church events, but we ordered it on Ebay and had to just try it out to make sure it worked, right? It was VERY fun to pop some popcorn at our mom's group last week...the kids (and adults) LOVED the yummy popcorn!

a new vacuum?

We are in dire need of a new vacuum (well, okay I think we are at least!). I have been cleaning more than I usually do, since our house has been on the market since March -- I feel like I am CONSTANTLY cleaning and our vacuum doesn't seem to be able to keep up with me!

Well, this blog mod*mom is giving away a Dyson pink vacuum -- check it out! (Maybe I'll win!!)

our new favorite sport...

Aaron has taken up the game of golf and is dedicating himself to learning all there is to learn about being a good player. From previous posts, you can see Payton is enjoying learning right alongside her daddy!


We borrowed a toddler golf club from Jeffrey and Payton took a liking to her 'own' golf club!

Lions & Tigers & Bears -- OH MY!

Well, okay, there aren't any tigers or bears, but somehow a pack of lions have entered our house! Not sure where they came from or how they entered, but for some reason they are here and we're not sure how to get rid of them.

The suspense is killing you all, isn't it?

Payton has woke up for the past 2 days from her nap and/or in the morning talking about the 'lions'. On Monday, she woke up crying and screaming about, "get the lions out of here", "get them out of my bed". She was actually shaking when I picked her up out of bed!

She doesn't talk about them during the day and the babysitter said she doesn't talk about them there...so, I guess the lions are only at our house, when she closes her eyes. I am racking my brain trying to think of where she saw or heard about lions, but I can't think of anything. The only thing I suspect may be a Diego episode or something -- you know, he's the animal rescuer and all!

Tonight, when we put Payton to bed and were saying our prayers, she said, "Jesus protect me from lions"...yes, she DID say that! Poor thing...I hope it doesn't get worse...she hasn't woken up in the middle of the night...yet.

If you can't beat 'em....join 'em!

Well, it's been raining now for 3 days straight and we decided we were SICK and TIRED of staying in the house...so, we joined the rain outside and had some good fun!

Baking Queen

On these rainy days, we like to BAKE! Our favorite is chocolate cookies bars. I am a 'lazy' baker and don't really like to make the cookie version, so we mix it all up and throw it into a pan and bake away. This time, I let Payton do some of the measuring, so I wan't 100% sure how much of each ingredient we actually used...Aaron was a bit nervous. (for those of you who know me, you know that I don't really 'measure' when I'm cooking or baking...I'm just not wired that way). Well, they turned out just fine and we've been enjoying eating them all weekend!




Payton's favorite thing to do -- lick the beater!




We did make cut-out cookies too -- I found a VERY EASY recipe...we really had a good time!

Dreamers

So, do you think dreams and dreaming, in general, are genetic? Aaron says that he doesn't dream much and I dream CONSTANTLY, even though I don't remember all of them. When I dream, I am often active -- just this week, I woke up Aaron by hitting him in the face. Okay, it wasn't on purpose -- I was dreaming that a rat was chasing me and when he rolled over and bumped into me, I thought it was the rat in my dream and I went off and whacked him! Then, as he was attempting to wake me up, I opened my eyes and saw our ceiling fan turning around and I thought it was a VERY LARGE spider falling down on me -- so, of course I screamed -- wouldn't you if a GIANT spider was coming toward your face? When I finally fully woke up, I heard Aaron say, "okay, I'll just be over here" and he curled up in his corner of our king-sized bed!

One of my most vivid dreams was when I was still in high school and my grandmother passed away. I dreamt that we froze her in a large ice block and she was 'sitting' next to me on the couch and she kept falling over on me...not sure what that meant?

Last night, we were checking on Payton before we went to bed and we saw her grabbing at things in the air and sort-of moaning....maybe she's dreaming of spiders too? We have heard her talking in her sleep before and moaning and whimpering too. So, that just makes me think about dreams and if they could possibly hereditary? What do you think?

CONTESTS

One of my blogging friends, Amy -- who actually got me hooked on blogging, blogs here and here and here and she has a 'secret' blog...haven't really had time to find that one! She blogs at this cool site where they review lots of infant/toddler/kid products and they run contests ALL the time -- this time, Mums the Wurd is running a contest for some cool toddler ware from SuperMomz -- check it out if you want! I'm just trying to win! :)

pictures...

Pictures from the weekend.....a hair cut -- YES, we FINALLY sat still and didn't cry when we got our hair cut -- a HUGH milestone in Payton's life!

On Sunday, when we got "kicked" out of our house, we walked to the Baskin Robbins. Payton started with this little blue number,

tried a little bit of daddy's,

and ended up with my BELOVED chocolate & peanut butter!

My 2 cents...

Okay, we were kicked out of our house this weekend -- twice, in fact! For very good reasons -- we are still in the process of selling our house and we hadn't had a showing in almost 3 weeks, until this weekend. So, we were more than thrilled to have a showing this weekend. The first one on Saturday went well. Then, today, we received a phone call to show the house again from 4-5PM today, Sunday. So, Aaron & I packed up Payton and headed out in the sweltering heat -- went to the local Baskin Robbins, had some ice cream (pictures will be posted tomorrow), and then to the park. We ended up staying out until 6PM playing at the park and sweating profusely! When we got home, I inspected the house to see if they showed up, I stated, "I think they were a no-show"...THEN, the doorbell rang at 6PM!! TWO hours after they said they would show up! Did they not read the etiquette book on When buying a house:

1. Thou shalt not enter into a house in which prospective buyer, knows in advance, that they will not be able to afford the taxes (this one makes Aaron and I FURIOUS!)

2. Thou shalt attempt to call 1 day in advance to house showing (instead of 2 hours prior to desired showing time).

3. Thou shalt not enter into house during nap time.

4. Thou shalt not show up 2 hours late to a house showing that was set up the morning of said showing, on a day of 90+ degree weather with no relief in sight, without a courtesy phone call to tell current owners that possible prospective buyer is running late...


But, we smiled, said "give us 5 minutes to leave out the back door" and we walked around the block, parked our butts across the street (out of view) and waited for them to leave. Now, we pray that they will put an offer on our house and then all the above will be negated...

A Family Weekend

This weekend (Saturday) is our 6th wedding anniversary! We attempted to coordinate a babysitter, so we could go into the city and see a play and go to a fancy dinner, but it never worked out -- so, we decided to have a "family weekend" and make it a "family anniversary".

A friend of mine from work, gave me 2 tickets to our local minor league baseball game and we had a BLAST last night! Payton was so enthralled with the between-inning entertainment, the Zooperstars -- they were very funny -- Payton continues to talk about the characters today! We stayed for night skydivers -- Payton calls them, "the men with the kites" -- she LOVED seeing them floating in the sky and coming, "down, down, down to the grass". It was definitely fun to watch. Then, we stayed for the fireworks and didn't get home and in bed until 11pm!!! Thankfully, we all slept in until 8:30AM this morning!

Tonight, will be family date night....not sure what we're going to do yet. It has been a lovely start to our anniversary weekend, even if Aaron and I don't get any alone time.

the drama continues...

We continue on the potty training front. Payton has been doing really well if I let her run around naked -- she tells me before she has to go and runs into the bathroom and goes! We give each other a high '5' and then she gets 2 M&M's. We were trying the chocolate chips, but then she found my dark chocolate Hersey's kisses and wanted one of those "shiny" ones when she went potty. One day, she got 4 of those kisses!! (I know, horrible, HORRIBLE mother giving her child so much chocolate, especially dark chocolate -- but, that's supposed to be healthy, isn't it?)

I put those kisses away -- those are mommy's "special" treats (I DIE for dark chocolate!). So, I found some M&M's and we've been going with those now for the past week. Payton watches me go potty and says, "good job mommy, you get a chocolate treat". So, I go and get myself a little treat -- I have to model the reward system, right? She gets SO upset if she can't go to the bathroom. She'll sit on the potty and try and try, then will say, "my butt's not working" and get upset. She REALLY wants those chocolates! I try to down play it -- I don't want her to somehow start having some issues with going potty....pressure to get chocolate! But, she'll still say to her daddy when he gets home from work, "Daddy, my butt wasn't working today"......poor thing...

I've been getting some advice from some friends....'let her run around naked', 'use a sticker chart', 'have her wear big girl underwear under her diaper, so she feels wet', 'have a potty in every room of your house'....even, 'Dr. Phil has a potty training program -- check it out!" WHAT? Dr. Phil? Why in the world would he have a potty training program???? I haven't really looked into yet......I'm sticking with the M&M's right now. We'll consult Dr. Phil when we're ck it'.closer to the age of three!

The Summer of Freezies....

So, this summer, (especially the past couple of weeks) has been ONE HOT and HUMID season! We're staying inside a lot (getting boring) and making lots of freezer pops. This time, we choose orange and enjoyed the first tasting! It's so fun to make your own treats -- it makes it that more enjoyable to eat them!

Fruity Flies

We've had this little problem at our house this week...little tiny fruit flies -- EVERYWHERE! I don't know where they are coming from. I have cleaned the countertops a billion times each day, thrown away all slightly ripe fruit, taken out the garbage and kept the garbage disposal clean. So, I looked up getting rid of fruit flies and tried a couple of the techniques. Last night we had the vinegar/beer in a bowl with holes poked in saran wrap, the wine bottle (luckily, we got to drink the wine first!), and the banana peel in the oven. Last night there was NO luck on the collection of the fruit flies...I thought it was all a hoax. This morning, I woke up and found 7 fruit flies in the vinegar/beer bowl -- they crawled in the holes poked in the saran wrap and then couldn't get out!! I know, very inhumane of me, but I need to get rid of these peskly little flies. What if we had a house showing and all these little flies were everywhere -- how embarrassing! It looks like the flies are gathering around the bowl -- now, how can I get more of them to get in there and die?

PILLOW PARTY!

Today, at mom's group the girls had a little pillow party! :)

A little Tiger in our future?

Aaron has taken a renewed interest in the game of golf. He has ordered new clubs, new wedges, new driver, everything-that-you-need-to-play-the-game-of-golf. He has even checked out books about golf and a video at the library -- he's been practicing a lot in the house! Payton has taken a liking to daddy's golf clubs, "you play golf?" she asks him, then when he hits the little plastic ball, she asks, "What you doed?" It's quite cute. Here she is practicing...



Then, of course, I took a video of her hitting the ball around...

Multi-Lingual

I took 4 years of Spanish in high school and have kept some of my bi-lingual abilities, but mainly for work -- I can speak enough Spanish to do a swallow evaluation or a speech therapy session -- I am a speech therapist. My co-workers always ask me to translate for them, but I can't really do phyical or occupational Spanish!! Aaron took French in high school, and from what I've heard, he was/is able to converse with French-speaking family members. He is more of an introvert when it comes to speaking, so I am not priviledged enough to be spoken to in French. I have taught Payton to count in Spanish and have encouraged Aaron to teach her how to count to 10 in French....so, here it goes:

(note: please know that no one was hurt in the recording of this video...even though it may seem like it at the end...)

IBC

I was "surfing the internet" and found a link to this mom's blog: WhyMommy and she is a young mom with breast cancer: inflammatory breast cancer -- read this and pass it along to all the women you know in your life!

Lip Stick Party...

So, today I had a friend come over, actually a friend and a Mary Kay Cosmetic Consultant, and my mom and I had a "lip party" while Payton took a nap. It was a BLAST -- we pampered our lips with lip exfoliant (who knew they had such a thing?) and tried on different lip liners, lip sticks, lip glosses and took each one off and tried another set. It was great to play 'dress up' as adults.

Once Payton woke up, she wanted to join in the fun. This is her version of a "lip party" -- with mommy's sample lip liner....

Pool Party

This past Sunday, our church Lord of Life Church hosted a FREE pool party -- Payton had a BLAST! She was really swimming around and trying to keep up with Jeffrey. She only swallowed water a couple of times, but that didn't stop her!


pool party