I have an almost 2 year old

I have been writing down things that Wyatt does on the white board in our kitchen.  (The white board I put up for my chore list thinking I would start doing more house cleaning...lol)  Just looking at what I needed to blog about made me realize how fast he is changing. 

One thing I wrote down was that he could fill in parts of "Jesus Loves Me" when we sing it and stop to let him sing the next part.  Well, he can do that, yes, but now he can do that with almost any song he has heard (even just once or twice) and can "sing" entire songs by himself.  He can sing the ABCs and Twinkle Twinkle Little Star all by himself.  He has gotten to where he will sing along with me now too, instead of only singing if I stop for him to take a turn.  That boy loves music!  One day awhile back he took the little wooden chair in his room, dragged it over in front of the chest of drawers, climbed up on the chair, and then pushed buttons on the cd player until his music started playing.  If he wants music he will go turn it on now, and he has learned songs that I don't even really know well because they play on his kids cds.  One he liked a couple of weeks ago was "Hot Cross Buns."  I know this song, but the cd had an extra bridge part that says, "If you have no daughters, if you have no daughters, if you have no daughters then give them to your sons."  Wyatt really liked this part and would sing "No daughters, no daughters, no daughters" when we were in the car.

Most of our car trips involve music now.  I got tired of having to sing the same songs over and over the entire trip so I put one of his kids cds in the car.  I still do a lot of singing, but can sometimes just "Put musak on" for him to listen to.  The funny thing is trying to figure out what song he is wanting to hear.  He doesn't know them by their titles, but will just say part of the words to the song or something that is in the song (like duck song, frog song, fish song, etc).  If he happens to say the beginning words I can usually figure it out, or if he says some words that happen to be the title (like Jesus Loves Me) then I'm good.  Occasionally though, I have no idea what song he is talking about.  I can do better if he has just heard the song and then he requests it again, because it is fresh on my mind.  Out of context though he asks for things like "the tree song" (it has been weeks and I still haven't figured that one out) or "cow and moon song" (Hey Diddle Diddle) or "Heart Where?" (I've got the joy joy joy joy down in my heart).  I'm so glad he loves music already.

A few weeks ago Wyatt's favorite song was probably "Jesus Loves Me."  We would sing it every night before bed.  He especially liked the "He is strong" part where he flexes his muscles.  Now he doesn't want Jesus Loves Me before bed anymore.  He usually requests "Jesus Loves the Little Children" which he calls "children of the world song."  Two weeks ago we went to a singing at North Tarrant church of Christ.  Wyatt seemed to enjoy the singing, sitting in Grandaddy's lap for quite awhile at the beginning.  He liked "Days of Elijah" because after it was over he asked to "sing song again."  His favorite for the night though, was "Shout Hallelujah."  Now for those of you who know how much I like that song, I didn't influence him in any way, he just loved the song!  He started to kind of try to sing with it towards the very end of the song, and then kept saying, "Shout Hallelujah" (I can't think how to phonetically write how he says hallelujah, but it is cute, and surprisingly close to the actual word) after each song.  Mr. Larry Watkins (who was trading off leading singing with his son Daniel) heard Wyatt saying that and thought it was pretty funny.  I thought he kept saying, "Shout Hallelujah" over and over because of all the attention he had received.  I was wrong though, he continued to say it over and over in the car on the way home and still requests to sing that song.  What can I say, he knows a good song when he hears it!

Wyatt loves to play with his Daddy.  After dinner each night Wyatt usually requests "Daddy fall down" so Justin will lay on the floor and wrestle with him.  They will play baseball too.  Justin will throw him the ball and if he hits it Wyatt will say, "Go go go," and run around the circle from living room to kitchen to study back to living room.   Then he will fall down onto his knees and say, "Safe!"  It is adorable.  One night Justin was playing his guitar for Wyatt to dance to.  For some reason all Wyatt's dancing also involves this running sequence.  Justin made up a song with words like "Wyatt is a silly goose, running around the house hanging loose."  Wyatt loved it, so anytime Justin picks up his guitar Wyatt will request the "silly goose song." 

I mentioned Wyatt climbing up on the chair to turn on his cd player.  Well, he climbs on everything.  He moves around the tall stools that go to our little kitchen "island" then climbs on them to get into trouble.  One day I heard he had done that while I was still finishing lunch at the table.  I waited a minute then went to check and he had pulled over the knife block, with several knives lying out on the cabinet.  That was terrifying!  I had recently moved it to a place where he couldn't come even close to reaching it standing on the ground, but he climbed on the stool then onto the cabinet in order to get to it.  I made a big deal out of it and told him how he can't touch the knives.  Since then he has gotten into all kinds of things in the kitchen - but he has not gone near those knives.  Hopefully it won't happen again - because the only places I could put it out of his reach would be equally out of my reach - and I use those knives all the time!  He keeps me on my toes.  He usually only climbs around in the kitchen when I am in there thankfully.  He usually likes to be in the same room as me.

Wyatt is pretty good at figuring out how to get things he wants.  One time I had left the fridge water dispenser unlocked and he was sticking a cup under there and getting sips of water.  I went ahead and locked it before it became a big mess.  He ran to the bathroom.  I assumed to go potty (he is pretty well potty trained now and goes without prompting most of the time at home).  Instead a moment later I heard the water turned on in the sink.  He had climbed up onto the toilet and leaned over to turn on the water at the sink to fill up his cup and get himself a drink.  It is kind of hard to know how to feel when you are proud of him for his problem solving skills and not wanting him to: 1.fall and get hurt or 2.make a mess.  He actually doesn't fall and get hurt very often - but making messes are his specialty.  He will even tell you "make a mess" as he makes one.  I spend lots of time laughing and wanting to pull out my hair both at the same time.

Oh, and really funny is to hear how often Wyatt says, "Be careful."  Anytime he is doing something that involves some kind of danger he says "Be careful."  This is actually a good alert to me.  I heard him say that from his room recently and when I went in there he had climbed up on top of his changing table.  I showed him he didn't need to be up there to reach the light switch (he likes to turn it off and on) so he hasn't really done it again.

Goodness, I can talk about Wyatt all day long.  I will quickly mention the other things I had notes about:
 - Wyatt stuffed a mini cornbread muffin in his mouth with the round part showing and then went around showing it to everyone in small group.  Justin thought it hilarious I found it embarrassing.
 - Wyatt says we are going to "make it rain" when we turn on the sprinkler.
 - Last Thursday was Wyatt's friend Parker's birthday.  I told Wyatt we were going to the zoo with Parker and Wyatt said, "I'm so excited!"
 - I said to Wyatt, "Your hands are cold."  Wyatt said, "My hands are cold!"

I'm so proud of my baby boy who is getting to be such a big boy!  Today he decided he wants to "Go to school" because we drove past the local elementary school and he wanted to go to the playground (we went to that playground yesterday afternoon).  I told him, we can't go right now because it is for the school, you have to go to school to play on the playground right now.  Well, he cried about how he wanted to go to school all the way home and again several times before nap.  Of course he doesn't know what that means - but I am no where near ready for him to actually go to school.  The time is flying already.  A week and a half and I will have a two year old on my hands!

It's a ....

The first news - It's a baby!

Still in bed - early morning happy news!

The news you've all been waiting for.  It's a GIRL!!!

Wyatt giving his baby sister a kiss.

The happy family.

 Justin wore a pink shirt this morning and I wore a gray shirt with a hot pink jacket.  When I saw what we were wearing I laughed and Justin joked that he should change into blue.  We went out to IHOP before the ultrasound (just like we did before my ultrasound with Wyatt).  They told me to drink a lot of water before hand - which I dutifully did.  Then we waited from our appointment time of 8:45 until almost 9:30 before they finally called us back.  I was pretty uncomfortable to say the least.  I was glad the tech let me use the ladies room first thing.  I still don't know why I was supposed to drink all that water.

The ultrasound place didn't have any printer paper - so we don't have any printed photos of the baby.  They did give us a cd with the entire report.  There aren't any really good shots that just look like a baby though.  Instead they are just pictures of various things they measure and check (heart, kidneys, bladder, placenta, etc).  According to the report on the cd the baby is measuring correctly for my estimated due date of March 8. (I'm currently 19 weeks and 4 days).

Wyatt has been calling the grandparents, aunts, and uncles letting them know that he is going to have a baby "sister."  He can even say her name - Helen Joy.  Helen was the name of Justin's maternal grandmother who passed away while his mom was pregnant with Justin.  Joy was the name of my Grandaddy's sister.  She never married or had any children of her own, and she passed away while I was in college.  We are very happy for the opportunity to use these special names for our sweet baby girl.

I can't wait to go shopping!  Justin is going to love that :)

Summer photos

Well, I did go ahead and get the photos off the camera to put on the computer.  I had taken more than I realized - so now for your viewing pleasure - Wyatt's summer fun.

Gianna and Theresa (Wyatt's 1st cousins once removed)

Blowing bubbles at Great Aunt Jan's house

Daddy got to go with us to NRH2O one Saturday.  They are hanging out in the wave pool when the waves are off.

The "orange slide" at NRH2O.  Wyatt loves the slides.

It was pretty cool this day, so  I wrapped Wyatt up in the towel when we got out out of the water.

Granny took Wyatt on his first carousel ride at Grapevine Mills mall.

He had fun, but got really dizzy.  I don't know why he looks so solemn in this picture.

This was the only halfway decent photo I got of them once the ride was going.

Wyatt's first baseball game this season.

Go Rangers!

We got to the game early - the turn out was better than it looks in these pictures.

Wyatt was ready to go play with the Rangers.

Playing peek-a-boo

Getting sleepy - but he didn't go to sleep until we got home from the game.

Swimming with Daddy down at the lake.

Driving the boat with Pawpaw

Not a good picture - but Wyatt was so cute carrying his fishing pole (that had no hook or anything on it).

The boat wouldn't start for us the second time we tried to go out - so the only fishing they got to do was off the dock.

At the mall Wyatt, Parker, and another little girl rode on this together.

Wyatt sure liked his motorcycle!

I let Wyatt "help cook".  He played with flour while I cooked dinner on the stove.

He had so much fun I didn't even really mind the huge mess he made.

22 Months

Wyatt is 22 months old now.  He weighs close to 30 pounds (about 28-29 on our scale) and is wearing 24 month and 2T clothing.  I haven't taken many pictures lately, so here is just a short list of some things he has done recently.

ABCs:  Wyatt used to call alphabet letters "Chicka Boom Boom" and numbers he calls "counting."  I just started teaching him the ABC song about a week or two ago, and now when he sees letters he says, "ABCs!" and is very excited about it.  He does this in books, in words on clothing, at the store when he sees signs, and most recently he showed J, our preacher, the ABCs on the bulletin.  He loves for me to sing the ABCs to him - but now he will also try and sing along with me.  He has the ending part ("now I know my ABCs, next time won't you sing with me") down pretty well, and he actually sang a good many of the letters all by himself in the car the other night.

Singing:  Wyatt loves to sing - or more accurately - he loves for me to sing.  He will often request songs.  The most often requested is the "frog song" (5 green and speckled frogs).  Others he requests include the "bear song" (one I learned from my Grandmother and Grandaddy growing up - it has a lot of verses and you need a leader and echo to sing it properly), the "fish song" (another one I learned from my Grandmother - down in the meadow in the itty bitty pool...), the "duck song" (I know two, 5 little ducks and 6 little ducks - both of which I sang at school), the "caterpillar song" (one I recently learned at Legacy about the fuzzy caterpillar that turns into a butterfly - only God can make the butterfly), and Jesus Loves Me (every night before bed we sing  the B-I-B-L-E and Jesus Loves Me). 

Musica:  Wyatt calls music, "musica." I knew Justin often called it by the Spanish word - but didn't realize how often until realizing that is Wyatt's word for music.  He will try and put our phones on the speaker docking station and tell us he wants "musica." 

Headphones: Wyatt loves to put on Daddy's headphones.  One morning Justin was working from home (until time to go to the baby appointment) and Wyatt sat in his lap just listening to the music on the headphones while Justin worked.  It was very sweet.

Bless you:  Wyatt always says "bless you" when I sneeze (he has for a long time now, but I don't think I've written it down here.)

Handsome:  One day after he got a bath at Granny and Grandaddy's house I was combing his hair as he watched in the mirror.  He said, "handsome" as he looked at himself.  That is what I always tell him after I comb his hair (which doesn't happen to often since he goes to bed right after bath time.  Usually only if it looks really bad or Sunday mornings do I get out the comb and wet it down.)

 Show Mama:  After Daddy gets Wyatt dressed he knows that the next thing to do is go "Show Mommy."  Justin always wants to double check that I approve his clothing choice (the time he gets Wyatt dressed the most often is Sunday mornings while I'm doing my makeup).  When I got him dressed this morning he wanted to go, "show Daddy."

Hugs:  Wyatt likes to give hugs and will request to "Hug baby" when he sees baby Molly (our friends' newest daughter).  He also hugs and kisses pictures of things (both books and actual photos).  We have a large canvas print from our wedding that is in our bedroom leaning up against the wall right now.  Wyatt loves to go give Daddy hugs and kisses on this picture.  Mama gets them too - but not as often as Daddy.

Go see friends:  Wyatt talks about people he likes and requests to see them when they aren't around.  Recently these people have included Uncle Will, Uncle Bret, Aunt Staci, Grandmother (my Grandmother - we went and visited them recently), Cordi, Pemberly, Reese, Brady, Ms. Shelby, Christine, and frequent requests to "Go to Parker's house."  He does love hanging out with friends!  He also wants to "Go to Granny's house" and "Go to Pawpaw's house."  I don't know how he picks which name to go with the house - but that is how he words his requests usually.

Zoo:  Wyatt has been requesting to "go see baby monkey" and " see baby giraffe" so we will hopefully be making a trip to the zoo to purchase our zoo pass for the year.  We haven't ever gotten one before, but I think he will really enjoy it this year.  Even better is that he has some friends who already have zoo passes, and one who is going to get a zoo pass soon too.  It is always double the fun with friends!

Pray:  Wyatt loves to pray.  We used to model prayers for him, then we would have him repeat after us, and now he can pray on his own.  A typical Wyatt prayer goes something like this, "Dear God thank you day (thank you for today), for Mama, for Daddy, for puppies, for friends.  Amen."  He now throws in various things to be thankful for that we haven't modeled previously.  When Staci and Will were over for dinner he said thank you for Staci when I put him down for bed that evening.  Last night he said thank you for books.  This was new, and especially funny because we went to the library yesterday and he picked out a book to check out, and then got to check out all Mama's books with the self scanner (they had a stool at each of them so the kids could reach - such a great idea!)  He thanks God for food during meal time.  A couple of weeks ago during church services he noticed that someone was praying, sat still, folded his hands, and started praying very quietly.   He was done quick - I don't remember what he prayed for that time - but it was so neat that he figured out that it was time to pray and he wanted to join in.  Now for him to learn that when other people are praying out loud you just pray along silently.

Okay, that is more than enough words for the second post in a row.  Maybe I'll get around to taking some photos for the next post (or at least posting pictures that we took and are just sitting on the cameras).

Cute things I don't want to forget

I was telling my Mom a story about Wyatt last night and she said - you need to write these things down.  I thought that was a good idea.

So here are some funny/cute things that have happened lately:

• Wyatt repeats everything!  This leads to some funny stuff being said.  I don't say anything bad, but sometimes he repeats things that just don't sound right coming from a 20 month old.
• Says, "Bless you" to me when I sneeze.  So sweet.
• Wants "kissies" when something hurts.  Particularly funny when he wants me to kiss his mouth (teething pain - I can't really kiss where that hurts) and his booty (diaper rash).
• Says, "Excuse me Major" sometimes when walking past the dog.
• Tried to feed his toys.  Yesterday he tried to feed his stuffed elephant some carrots (he would hold them up to the trunk and say, "Eat!"  He also tried to give his plastic whale his bottle.
• Gave himself timeout twice the other day.  The first time he had done something rude (smacked me or something).  I made him apologize and told him we don't do that.  He said, "Timeout?"  I told him if he wanted timeout to go ahead.  I sat in the living room while he went into his room and closed the door, then came back and minute or two later with a sheepish look.  I asked him if he was ready to be nice.  He smiled and said "Be nice" and went to playing.  He also gave himself timeout for being fussy.  I had asked him, "Do you need timeout" or "Do you need to go to your room?" because he was just fussing for no reason.  He said yes, and took himself to timeout.  Again, coming back a minute or two later ready to be happy.  So funny!
• Wyatt loves to visit the neighbors.  Actually, the only reason I have time to do this right now is because he is over at Ron and Gerri's house (our retired next door neighbors).  We were out in the backyard and they were out.  He went over to say hi, and I excused myself to go sit down on our porch (I'm not feeling great today).  Ron took Wyatt over in their yard to see Gerri, and after awhile he came and told me Wyatt was wanting to go inside.  So, I'm here and Wyatt is over there for a while.  We have the best neighbors!  
• More about the neighbors - when we come home from somewhere Wyatt will often start waving at someone's house and want to go say hi to them.  He knows the names of our next door neighbors and the across the street neighbor lady.  He will also want to go say hi to anyone he sees outside, whether we know them or not.
• Hunter got out Tuesday night - and Wednesday morning Wyatt and I went on a walk around the neighborhood looking for him.  I would say, "Hunter" every so often.  Wyatt copied me and would call out, "Hunter" and then "areyou?" which means "where are you."  He came up with the "where are you" part on his own.  All I did was call Hunter's name.
• Wyatt loves the pool.   I had a girls night last week while Justin and some of the other guys took the kids over to the "K's" house where they have a pool.  They got to swim and grill.  Through a suggestion of another dad Justin started letting Wyatt jump in the pool and go under the water, instead of catching him.  Wyatt would either grab onto Justin and pull himself up, or Justin would get him right away if he wasn't coming up by himself.  Wyatt apparently loved it!  He also got the jump off the diving board (Daddy caught him in that situation).  He would even jump and stick his legs out in the sitting position to jump in so he splashed more.  Almost like a cannonball! 
• We were all sitting around watching the Olympics after Justin's birthday dinner at my parent's house Tuesday.  Our friends have been staying with my folks for awhile, so they were there.  Wyatt loves to play with their two girls.  He was especially funny when he said "Run P," but she didn't realize what was going on and he tackled her (side swiped her from a sitting position down to the ground).  "P" is about to be in fourth grade I believe.  Wyatt frequently will say "Run" and someone's name and then go running at them.  He really liked running into P.  She also thought it was funny - so it worked out.
• We went to eat lunch with Justin and his group from work for his birthday.  While we were eating Wyatt snuck down from his chair before I realized it and started running around the room saying "Run away!"  He thought it was hilarious.  Thankfully there weren't very many people in that back room we were in.  I quickly grabbed him - but he sure did want to "run away" some more.
• He has been doing this for a long time, but I'm not sure I wrote it down anywhere.  When taking baths Wyatt likes to lay his head down touching the side of it to the edge of the water and say "Night-Night" then spring back up grinning.  He also likes to "swim" in the tub - sometimes after the water is all out - by laying on his belly and kind of splashing around.  He will tell me he is "swimming" when he does this.
• Wyatt will say, "I love you" whenever we tell him we love him.  Also did that with grandparents recently.  So sweet!

I'm sure there is more, but that is all I can think of for now.  I wrote this in two settings - and Wyatt is now up from his nap, so I'll end this here.  We sure do love our little cutie!

Exciting News

Well, it has been a long time since I wrote a post for the blog.  I have a good reason though - we are expecting baby #2.  I haven't been feeling well lately - and I use Wyatt's nap time as my nap time, so no blog posts.  Hopefully I will start feeling better soon.  I'm almost 9 weeks along now; the due date is around March 8.

We are very excited to be using Christy Martin as our midwife this time.  She is the midwife who ended up being there for Wyatt's birth (because my midwife was out of town) and I liked her a lot.  My first appointment is at the end of August.  I can't wait to hear that little heartbeat!

Summer Fun

Playing in the dog crate.

We are treating our house with DE (for the fleas the dogs brought in) and Wyatt sure had fun helping me spread it all around the living room before I vacuumed.

Love that face!

Making a mess is so much fun!

On the boat for Father's Day.

Wyatt likes to "jump" off the side of the boat to Daddy.

Happy Father's Day to Daddy and Pawpaw!

Wyatt loves "swimming"

We had a fun weekend trip to the lake to celebrate Father's Day.  We went tubing on Saturday (my first time ever).  It was funny - I rode first and had a great time.  Then Justin rode and first thing that happened was he broke one of the handles.  He finished his ride and David (my father-in-law) took his turn.  He managed to break the other handle.  They were creative and figured out a way to use a rope and the old grip cushions so I rode again using the new "handle."  Then Justin took another turn.  While he was riding the entire tube cover broke off - so we were done tubing for the weekend!   Now I know why they joke about Justin breaking things.

Parker and Wyatt enjoying some apples and peanut butter as a snack before we got in the water.

Wyatt loves "swimming."  I have an NRH2O pass so we go to the water park with my friend Christine and her little boy Parker once or twice a week.  At first Wyatt was pretty timid, but now he loves it!  We play in the various kid areas and he loves to do the water slides.  Sometimes he amuses himself by "jumping" in the water (he just falls down on his rear).  He thinks it is hilarious!  He also likes to splash and loves the slides.