A blast from the past

Happy (almost) Halloween! I thought it would be nice to recap previous Halloweens so everyone can see how much your little one(s) can change in a year! October 29, 2009-- 15 days away from having Adalyn. She was a "pumpkin" for her 1st Halloween!

Halloween 2010-- Adalyn was a few days away from being ONE and was a sweet Peppermint!

and my favorite part about her costume...

Halloween 2011-- Just a few days away from being TWO and she was Minnie Mouse! I have to say, I LOVE the way this costume turned out!! I had invisioned it in my head for so long that I started doubting my "costume putting together" skills. Once I got her dressed, I was in awe. I do believe she is the prettiest Minnie Mouse I have ever seen. Landon was like 6 or 7 weeks old at the time. I didn't have a costume for him but I did make him a onesie with a sock monkey on it. He stayed in his stroller pretty much the entire time.

and this was Landon that night once we got home... oh yikes, I do not miss that newborn stage.

Halloween 2013-- Adalyn is a few days away from being THREE and Landon is almost 14 months old! You will find out what they are dressing up as tomorrow. ;) I can't spoil it the night before! I hope everyone has a fun Halloween!!

Landon's 1st virus

I was afraid this would happen. Adalyn passed on her stomach bug to Landon. He threw up right before we were about to leave for work on Friday. Lynn was already there so we cleaned everything up and went on to work. He was acting fine and according to Lynn, ate fine all day. Saturday morning, he woke up really early. About 5:30. He had thrown up in his bed. Blah. It was everywhere. Disgusting. He continued to throw up on and off that morning and had 3 baths by the time it was 10 AM. He napped for right at an hour for his morning nap and took a 2 1/2 hour nap that afternoon. We decided to not give him any bottles since he had thrown up his milk earlier that morning. I know how I feel after throwing up. Puny and weak. I so wish he could communicate with us. It would make things so much easier when dealing with a sick child. Last weekend when Adalyn had it, it was nice because she could tell us exactly how she was feeling and would even tell us when she felt like she was going to throw up again. Landon is not eating a whole lot. Which is understandable since he's not feeling well. He is drinking his water all day long. He won't touch Pedialyte. Can't say that I blame him. The smell of it made my nose cringe. So since Friday, he has acted fine throughout the day. Just like Adalyn did. She threw up during the night and he is doing it in the morning. Then he plays like normal throughout the day. Landon and I stayed home from Church yesterday. I was able to clean and bake a little, but he wanted to be held a lot. He ate a great supper last night but we still did not give him his bedtime bottle. I told myself if he wakes up today (Monday) and hasn't thrown up or is acting different, then I'm giving him his bottle. Well don't ya know, he drank his bottle happily, threw his paci down and said, "Uh ohhhh" and watched Disney Jr. in my lap and was so content. As soon as I put him down to walk, he almost made it to the kitchen before he threw up. Ughh. I really thought he was over it! Guess not. So he had a bath before 7 AM this morning. He was fine after that so we went on to work. Talked to Lynn earlier today and she said he ate a good breakfast, but threw up not long after that. I am so over cleaning up throw up and smelling it!! Oh good grief. I called the doctor today just to see if there was something else we should be doing/trying and the nurse told me a stomach bug like this can hang around for 7-10 days! This is day 4. I want my sweet baby to feel better! I just hope it stops SOON!

Our Pumpkins

We got to take home 4 pumpkins from our visit to the pumpkin patch last Saturday. We, or I should say Adam, carved them Sunday afternoon. He did such a great job on them. I figured it was going to be a pain trying to keep Landon away from the knives and pumpkin guts, but he did not show any interest in what Adam was doing. Instead, he wanted to walk around and venture off to our neighbors yard. So, I put Adam on pumpkin duty while I chased the kids around. Our Pumpkin Family

Adam hard at work

Adalyn wanted to help, too!

Landon took one good look and decided it was not for him. Maybe next year!

The finished product!

Happy (almost) Halloween!

Pumpkin Patch

Saturday afternoon we took a trip to the Cedarwood Pumpkin Patch. They have so much to do and see there. The first time we went Adalyn was just 11 months old. Last year she was 23 months old and the newest member of our family was able to join us as well! Landon was just 4 weeks old and slept the entire time. I was looking forward to our visit this year. Adalyn is a few weeks away from being 3 and Landon is 13 months and they are both at really fun ages right now! Landon is all about exploring so I knew he would love being there. It was a beautiful day and thanks to a friend for passes, we got in free. :) Score! Our first stop was to see the animals. This, of course, was Adalyn's favorite.

We then played in the bed of corn.

It was so funny to watch Landon play in the bed of corn. He would try so hard to walk, but ended up like this the majority of the time...

After they played, we stopped for a quick photo! It's so hard to get both kids looking in the same direction, let alone smile for the camera. Landon was too busy picking apart the mum that was beside us.

We also came across a wagon and both kids were dying to get in it. They loved playing in it!

(I made their shirts, aren't they cute?!) Next, we rode a "train". More like barrels cut in half, attached together, with a John Deere tractor pulling it. It's actually a lot of fun! I had to ride it last year with Adalyn, but this year she was big enough to do it herself. So I rode with Landon. Looks like next year neither of my kids will need me to ride with them. :(

Next stop, these humongous slides! They were so fun! and fast!

Adam took Landon down once. He then decided he wanted to walk up them. He wasn't successful, but he tried pretty hard. We then played on a tire swing, and walked around looking at everything while we waited on they hay ride.

It started to get chilly so we bundled the kids up. Look at those beautiful blue eyes!!! I got Adalyn to stand still just long enough to get our picture taken. I do believe it's one of my favorites of us to date!

The hay ride finally came around and off we went to pick our pumpkins.

Adalyn had a good eye for good lookin' pumpkins. She made sure to pick a "daddy pumpkin, mommy pumpkin, an Adalyn pumpkin, and a Landon pumpkin." (in her words. adorable.) Landon just wandered from pumpkin to pumpkin. I had turned to talk to Adalyn when heard Adam laughing. He told me to look at Landon. He had fallen in between two pumpkins and was stuck. He couldn't get up. Just like any good mom, I didn't rush to get him. Instead, I told Adam to leave him and I got my camera out.

He didn't whine or anything. He just stayed there until one of us picked him up. Once we got our pumpkins and got back on the hay ride, Landon was really tired. He finally gave up and fell asleep in Adam's arms. We got back and put our stuff in the car. Landon was still dead to the world. Adam put him in his seat while Adalyn and I went and ordered some food. She still wasn't eating much due to getting over her virus, but she did say she wanted some pop corn. We finally got our food and hopped in the car to head home. We were all wore out. Adalyn ate her pop corn for about the first 5 minutes in to the car ride home, then she fell asleep. Adam and I ate and talked in peace and quite the rest of the way home. By the time we got home, they were still asleep. We got them in their pajama's and I put Adalyn in the recliner so I could warm up a bottle for Landon. 3 minutes go by and she had already fallen asleep. Both kids were in bed by 7:45. We had a long Saturday but it was so much fun! Can't wait till next year! You can read about our 1st trip to Cedarwood Pumpkin Patch here! Looks like I didn't blog about our visit last year... It probably had something to do with the fact that I had a 4 week old and I was very sleep deprived. ;)

Adalyn's 1st virus

Whew am I tired. Yesterday morning(Thursday) Adalyn opened our bedroom door at 5:30 just as my alarm was going off. Though before she did that, I could hear her coming on the hardwood and I heard an interesting sound. She opened the door, I heard the sound again. Yep, just what I had thought. She was throwing up. Adam and I jumped out of bed and turned on the lights to find puke all over the floor and poor Adalyn. I brought her into the bathroom again where she once again threw up. Bless her heart! Where in the world was this coming from?! My only thought is she picked up a bug from Church the night before. We cleaned everything up and she seemed just fine. She did have diarrhea a few times that morning, too, but besides that, she was acting like herself. Nancy was with the kids on Thursday and when I spoke to her at lunch, she said Adalyn was fine, just not really hungry. By the time I got home, she was still her same ol' self. We played outside, ate dinner, took a bath, played a little bit more, then the kids were in bed a little before 8. Fast forward to 1:00 AM Friday morning... I was in a dead sleep. I hadn't moved from the position I had started in at 9:30. I heard our door open and a soft, "Mommy" and as soon as I opened my eyes, Adalyn was standing by our bed throwing up. It made me so sad to see her feel like that. Though after her episode of throwing up, she had quite the energy. "Can I watch TV mommy?" "No, baby. You can't." "I threw up, mommy." "Yes, baby you did. But it's ok." (Cough-Cough with her hand over her mouth) She would say a few more things then cough-cough... She was fake coughing just to make sure we knew she "didn't feel good." It was sweet and funny all at the same time. I just let her do it and of course babied her. :) What mamma's do best, right? Adam cleaned up the mess in the room while I cleaned Adalyn up. She asked for some water then I brushed her teeth and got her a new shirt. We took the sheet off our bed and finally got settled back in. We let her sleep with us. No way would I send her back to her bed when she wasn't feeling good. I explained to her that when her stomach started hurting again to let me know so I could rush her to the bathroom. We decided to let her sleep on my side of the bed with me in the middle in hopes that she wouldn't throw up on our bed (again) the next time. It was about 30 minutes later and I hear "mommy" and then the throwing up started again! This time she was laying flat on her back and it went all over her. :( Yuck is all I could think about. We started the clean up process yet once again. During this entire time I couldn't help but to think back to my kid years and the times I would have my mom up in the middle of the night taking care of me. I took her to the bathroom to clean her up and as I was taking off her shirt, she said in a very concerned voice, "Oh no my cow shirt! Granna got this for me! Are we going to have to throw it away?" I laughed and told her of course not and that all we have to do is wash it. That girl is even concerned about her cows in the middle of the night. By this time it was after 2 AM when we finally got back in bed for the second time. Adam and Adalyn went right to sleep. Me on the other hand, it took me until about 4:00 to finally drift off into a good,deep sleep. Every time Adalyn moved I would pop up to make sure she wasn't about to throw up when all she was doing was moving in her sleep. My alarm went off at 5:45 and I made myself roll out of bed. Adalyn woke up around 6:50. She was feeling ok until about 7:10 when Adam and I were getting ready to walk out the door. We were all in the kitchen and she started throwing up again. Over, and Over, and Over. Ew. Adam took her to the bathroom to clean her up once again and I got on my hands and knees and cleaned up the nasty mess, mopped the floors, and Cloroxed everything that was splattered with puke. I have talked to Lynn numerous times today and she said Adalyn was doing just fine. Just a little tired. So i'm hoping this bug is over with! Adalyn has never really been sick like this before. She has never had an ear infection, has had the normal runny nose with the change of the seasons, some fevers here and there, but nothing like this! So, this is her first official virus. Bless her heart!

"I can't see my Play Set..."

This morning as Adalyn was sitting in the recliner with Adam drinking her milk and watching Disney Jr., she tried to turn her head to look at her swing set. She said, "I can't see my play set!" She was just in an awkward position where she wasn't able to see it. She then said, in a very serious voice, "I must need a bigger head." Adam and I laughed and laughed. I had Landon in my lap feeding himself his bottle and she walks over to him and said, "What ya doing freetie?" Translation- sweetie. She can't really say her "S's" and it's so cute trying to figure out what she is trying to say to us at times. This morning she was helping us fix breakfast and our lunch for the day. She scooted her chair up like she always does and decided she wanted to watch TV.

That kept her occupied for a while. In other news, Landon is learning new things just about everyday it seems. I feel like I always blog about Landon but with his age, it really is something new all the time. Besides the usual "Da da" "Ma ma" "Ba ba ba" talk, he can now tell us the sounds of 3 different animals! I forgot how exciting this was when they start doing things like this. Cow is "Mmmmmmm" Chicken is "Bah bah bah bah" and for an Elephant, he blows raspberries for the elephant sound. It is so cute. I love it. This morning while I was changing his diaper, I asked him what sound each of those animals make and he didn't miss a beat. Even though he does it quite a bit now, I still get so excited every time. Of course when Nancy got there we asked him to do it and wouldn't you know, the little stinker wouldn't. He finally said "Mmmmmmm" for cow though. After trying to get him to make his sounds, she gave him and Adalyn their sausage biscuits. Adalyn is a very picky eater but she will eat breakfast foods (bacon, sausage, biscuit) any time of the day. Looks like Landon will be the same way. He loves sausage and biscuits and really loves to eat sausage links, too. I took this picture of Landon the other day eating his sausage and biscuit.

(Don't you just love his Buzz Lightyear pajamas?) Nancy ended up telling me he ate the entire biscuit and half of his sausage. It's so weird to have a child who will eat pretty much anything we put on his tray. Adalyn was (and still is) the complete opposite. We had Tater Tot casserole the other night and he gobbled it up. Adalyn, on the other hand, wouldn't touch it.Anyway... I have this old, plastic headband that I have had for years that I use to pull my hair back while I do my make-up, etc. It had a pretty ribbon that covered it, but when two kids play with it, you no longer have a "pretty" little headband. For some reason, Landon has taken on a big interest in my now ugly, plastic headband. The past few times he has gotten his hands on it, he will bring it to me so I can put it on his head. After I do, he just walks all around the house. He will hardly keep a hat on, so please tell me why he will keep this headband on? Whenever it does fall off, he will come find me, shows me the headband in his hand, and in his own way "asks" me to put it back on all while he is trying to put it back on himself.

Isn't he so stylish? We were all playing in Adalyn's room the other day and she found a toy under her bed. It made noise so she gave it to Landon to play with. She originally placed it on the side of her bed. He saw her do this so once she took it down and gave it to him, he crawled up in her bed, stood up, and placed it in the same spot she did. I was pretty amazed and shocked. I think it's so neat when they start "getting" things. He would knock it off on purpose, laugh, crawl off the bed to get it, then bring it back and start the cycle all over again. It was sweet. Ok,that about sums it up! I think you are now caught up on my kids!

Zoo

While Adam and I were on Fall Break last week, we decided to take Adalyn to the Zoo on Friday. She had never been before and now that I'm thinking about it, I don't believe I have been either? Maybe as a young child, but I can't really remember. We left Landon at home with Lynn. We just wanted a day with Adalyn since we haven't done that in a while. And I'm actually kind of glad we just took her. Landon is at the age where he wants to walk and not really ride in a stroller for long periods of time. Adalyn is really at the best age since she can walk beside us and listen fairly well. She got way more out of it than Landon would at his age so we were thinking come Spring time, we would probably take both kids since he will be a bit older. There were a lot of people there with lots of crying babies. Just another reminder as to why we wanted to wait on bringing him! It was very enjoyable being with our almost 3 year old for the day. We made a few stops in Murfreesboro first then we were at the Zoo by 10:30. Adalyn was so excited and as soon as we entered the park, we saw Monkeys swinging from trees.

Prior to going to the Zoo, we were talking to Adalyn about the different animals we may see. We mentioned a Hippopotamus, so as soon as we got there, that's all she could ask for. Well, we didn't see one but she asked over and over about one. I think she just liked the way Hippopotamus sounded as she attempted to say it. It was quite comical. After the monkeys, we saw a few more animals which of course I can't remember what any of them were called. Some were cute, some were desperately ugly.

I took a ton of pictures of course, (are you surprised?)so these are just a few. We stopped and bought some popcorn then headed to see the Zebra's which were really cool.

You can't see them well in these pictures since they were on the back side of the field, but Adalyn and I took a train ride and we were able to see them up-close!

After the train ride, we continued on our walk looking at different animals. Adalyn wasn't very impressed with some until we came upon a "petting zoo". This petting zoo was full of goats. Right up this kids alley. She wasn't scared at all. They were walking freely around in their area and she walked right up to them and started petting them. Some mothers were freaking out about their child touching them. Oh please people. Get over it.

In the first picture, the goat was actually asleep believe it or not. Adalyn walked from goat to goat petting them and talking to them. She didn't want to leave the Petting Zoo but told her we were going to find Elephants so she perked right up. On our way to see the Elephants, we rode the carousel. She was so excited she just ran to an animal, then asked, "Momma, what did I pick?" It was a sea otter. Not the cutest thing, but she didn't care. She had a blast.

Next came the Elephants. I was in awe as we stood and watched them.

And this is what an Elephant sounds like...

Can't you hear her elephant sounds? After the elephants, we saw Giraffes. Adalyn informed us that their was a Daddy, Momma, and Baby Giraffe. They were beautiful animals.

After that, we went a played on the biggest playground I think I have ever seen. It was awesome.

She found a Hippo!

We played, and played, and played. Adam left us to go get our cooler out of the car for lunch. When he got back, we ate at a picnic table and gobbled all of our food. We were all starving. After lunch, we went back to the playground to play some more before we left. I knew all that running and climbing would wear Adalyn out. I was right. She whined (and whined) because she didn't want to leave and within 5 minutes of being in the car, she was passed out. On our way home, Adam basically begged to stop at Toot's to get some fried pickles. I love pickles. Adam hates them. But for whatever reason, he will eat fried pickle chips...not spears. So I called and ordered some and we went by and picked them up and stuffed our face on the way home. He acts like a little kid when it comes to Toots. I hear him talk about those pickles all the time. By the time we got home, it was around 3:45. Landon was excited to see us! Adam and I could have crashed on the couch but two little kids won't allow you to do that. :) So we played, ate dinner, baths, then bed!