Terrible Twos...Turning to Terrific Threes?

Well, we can dream, right??  I would love, love, love to think that the terrible twos were indeed turning into the terrific threes, but I hear otherwise from all kinds of parents lately.  "Oh, you think two is bad?  Just wait until three!!"  Eek.  But we will take what we can get for now...and it's slowly getting better, for the most part.  Unless you count potty training.  I'm pretty sure Reid is on the thirteen year plan.  But hopefully, we'll get there.

He is more open to certain things.  I've realized a lot of it is how you present it (yes, the teacher thing has definitely helped me out!) or just what mood he's in.  We've been trying to get him to wear these adorable dinosaur slippers for months.  But when we called them monster feet, he was on board!  Or, maybe it was just a good stall tactic before bath time.  He's gotten awfully good at stalling...for everying!  (Yes, Mom...I know...it's payback, right?)  Don't you love the outfit??

He enjoys helping us a lot lately.  It has to be HIS idea, of course, but he has definitely gotten more open to the idea when we ask, too.  Sometimes, I'd rather him not be helping (such as when I am getting breakables out of the dishwasher--it's like he's attracted to all the glass and plates!).  But other times, it's perfect--like when he was helping Jason do yard work.  He was pretty good at helping put the weeds into the bucket!

He is getting slightly better at eating fruits and vegetables.  I can now coerce him to eat strawberries, mandarin oranges, and broccoli (thank you, cousins!!).  Dessert is often used as a bribe.  It's funny, though, because he still doesn't like some of the things most kids would die for...such as this mini Drumstick.  Look at that face!  He does like plain ice cream, and has been talking about ice cream cones (then again, he is kind of obsessed with naming solid shapes recently) so I thought for sure he'd love this.  Wrong!

He loves Cars 2 and I finally found a cute Finn McMissile shirt for him on Amazon.  Not surprisingly, he wants to wear it every. single. day.  Maybe I should've ordered seven--one for each day of the week.  He just recently rediscovered his glowy seahorse that he absolutely loved as a baby.  It was really sweet because when he picked it up, he got this nostalgic look on his face and kind of hugged it.  

This video was too funny not to share.  Reid loves balls...soccer, baseball, basketball, football...you name it.  He has a decent throwing arm, but he really can't catch yet.  At all.

Our little guy is definitely growing up.  We are thankful that he seems to be turning the corner on some things, and looking forward to many more good things to come.  Parenting is most definitely a humbling experience, but we couldn't think of a more rewarding job. 

Spring Break

 Spring is officially here...or is it??  Today, it's very windy and was a whoppin' 38 degrees when we woke up!  It was a long walk to church since our "dirt lot" was closed due to yesterday's rain.  Fortunately, Spring Break had lovely weather.  We decided to start it off with a much-needed trip to the Asian market on Legacy...which of course means that we have to have lunch at Umeko.  Salmon sashimi and sushi roll, anyone?  On to the Asian market, where we stocked up on the goods to make bahn mi, our new favorite recipe for a Vietnamese sandwich, for when Laura came.  I also had to make laksa and send the goodies home with her so she could make it, too.

Aunt Lala and the cousins arrived on Monday afternoon.  I was so excited to see them!!  I had gotten Reid so pumped up that he almost couldn't take a nap ;)  They arrived and got settled, and once Reid was awake, we took off to go to the boys' favorite park from last summer.  But much to our dismay, the playground was completely taken apart as they'd begun renovations.  It was a bummer, but the good news is that it should be totally renovated, including covered areas by the splash pad, by this summer.  So instead, we headed down the tollway to another neat playground in Plano.  They boys ran around and played for about 15 minutes, Ben asking to explore down a sidewalk trail.  But it was Reid and Alex who took off into the woods for a spur of the moment hike.  Playground?  Who needs it??  Hiking? Yes, please!  So off we went, through the mud and all.  The boys had so much fun that we ended up hiking Tuesday and Wednesday, too, at their request! 

After a fun-filled afternoon of hiking and playing in the backyard, it was time for a traditional bath picture, or ten.  I never did get all of them looking and smiling, but the ones we snapped were priceless!

 No, that's not anything gross in the bath water.  I found bath fizzies at the store and thought it'd be fun for the boys.  We went from yellow water (yes, it totally looked like pee) to green water to purple water.  Great fun!

It was so cute the second morning when I went in Reid's room...usually he will say, "Hi Mommy!" or "See Daddy!", but this time he was jumping to get out of bed and yelling, "COUSINS!  COUSINS!!  SEE COUSINS!!"  I could barely convince him to go potty and wash his face before he was bolting down the stairs to see them.  We attempted to go to the Grapevine aquarium (and Legoland was just across the mall) to use the buy one get one free coupons I'd gotten at school.  "Madhouse" doesn't really begin to describe it, so we opted out after seeing the line to get in, which was at least a 2 1/2 hour wait.  No thanks!  We walked around some to see if there was anything else fun to do.  There was a very cute carousel, so we all paid and hopped on to take a ride.  I think Reid and Alex enjoyed the Disney-like teacup more than anyone! 

 Then it was on to Cici's Pizza for free kids' lunches (more coupons from school) and fun at the video games.  Reid loved the claw machine (maybe it reminded him of that scene in his new favorite movie, Toy Story) and carried his five "treasures" all around.  Home for nap time, then we went to Town Lake Park in McKinney to feed the ducks.  Of course, we ended up veering off the pavement onto an unpaved trail to hike before having to herd everyone home for dinner.

On Wednesday, when we asked the boys what they wanted to do, we weren't surprised at all when "hike!" was the answer once again.  We packed the boys some sandwiches and grabbed Subway for ourselves, then it was back to Arbor Hills park in Plano.  This time, we bypassed the playground and went straight for the hiking.  I was a little worried Reid would poop out pretty fast at the rate we were going, but he went strong for two hours.  The boys were so funny--they even took turns on picking the trails, yelling, "This way!!" Our little hikers in front of a pretty red bud tree:

 My little Energizer bunny ran out of steam quite suddenly and fell behind everyone.  It seemed like everyone was beginning to run out of steam, so it seemed to be time for lunch.  We were looking for a nice, big rock or something we could sit on, but nothing was quite right for us adults.  As we searched, everyone got a little more whiny.  I even had to pick Reid up and carry him for awhile, several times.  Then we stumbled upon the most perfect lunch spot...the beautiful lookout (complete with covered area and a bench) where you could see all around the entire park, and even way down into Plano.  It's still hard to believe this park, with its streams, hills, valleys, plains, and woods, is in the middle of a suburban city.

Everyone was pretty tired after all that hiking (even Laura and me!), so it was a pretty quiet ride home.  We were surprised that no one fell asleep in the car.  Laura was kind enough to stay an extra night so that Jason and I could go to the Muse concert.  A sub of his had gotten us tickets, so we met everyone at American Airlines Center, enjoyed a nice meal at Victory Tavern, and headed over to the concert.  I'd never been in a suite before, so that was neat, too.  We had a great view of the light show during the concert, as well!  The opening act, Screaming Sarah, was about as good as the name sounds (bad!).  But Muse put on a great concert!

In the meantime, Laura managed to coerce two of the three boys into the funny little mustaches I'd gotten for them (Reid was not on board)...which was perfect with Ben's Darth Vader mustache shirt. 

 

Aunt Lala (who is beginning to turn into "Aunt Lowa") and the boys had to leave on Thursday morning, all too soon.  I was so glad they could come up and we could enjoy our Spring Break together.  Laura and I had great sister time together, the boys had fun playing and hiking together, and we adults enjoyed some yummy food together.  Laura introduced us to truffle oil and made a wild mushroom pizza one night (it was so good that I already made it last night!)  Makes me want summer to come that much sooner so we can all visit each other and play again!  And, hopefully, Reid will be able to share a little bit better by then ;)

First Scooter

Little man has been quite the sleepy head lately.  Most mornings, I've had to wake him up (eek!)...must be payback, right Mom?  I have never, ever been a morning person, but mornings now aren't quite as bad as they used to be, probably because I pretty much turn into a (snoozing) pumpkin by 10pm.  Naptimes have been a different story, however, and he averages one a weekend, now.  Right now, we can hear the squeals and giggles from downstairs.  And yes, he will be even wilder later...quite the opposite of what you would think ;)

 Lucky us...we happened upon a dumpster miracle on Sunday afternoon.  After church, we had stopped at the grocery store to buy a couple of things for bahn mi that I'd forgotten (I know...you're shocked that I forgot something, aren't you??).  On the way out of the parking lot, I swore I saw a scooter and a "lean back" trike at the dry cleaner's dumpster.  We circled back, and sure enough there was a little Reid-sized toddler scooter and trike!  His legs aren't quite long enough to reach the trike pedals on the convertible trike just yet, so I had been wanting him to try one before we actually spend money to go buy one.  He was more excited about the scooter, so we went to Wal-Mart and got him a little helmet last Sunday.  We kind of ran out of time because we took him to Towne Lake park to feed the ducks, but he was more interested in hiking one of the little trails in the woods.  He literally ran the whole trail, which was about a mile, so Jason and I got a decent little walk in, too!  But by the time we did that and fed the ducks, it was nearing his dinner time.  The scooter had to wait until Tuesday afternoon.

The video will not post for some reason, but it was really cute to watch him.  He was a little bit impatient as I adjusted the helmet for the first time, but begrudgingly wore it when I said, "No helmet, no scooter!"  I've never been a fan of Spiderman (or any Marvel stuff, for that matter).  Nothing personal against them/it, but let's just say that I've had SO many bad kids at school in the past who love Spiderman that it's kind of ruined for me. But who can pass up a gently used freebie?  A little Lysol, and we were good to go. Right off the bat he fell several times, but hopped right back up, yelling, "More!  More!"

The really funny part was when he decided he couldn't go fast enough.  "Mommy, help!  Go fast!!"  So I gave it a little whirl and kind of teetered behind him.  My thinking?  If it broke the free scooter, no loss.  Reid squealed with delight while I worked muscles that haven't been used in years.  But I have to lean down so far that it's not exactly ideal for my back.  We had fun, though!

I also discovered that corduroys were not exactly the appropriate attire for his ride.  These were my favorite little cargo pants of his, but the knees were worn down within five minutes.  I can see we will have many ripped knee jeans in our future :)  Reid also tried out the Harley trike, but it was a little more difficult for him and he didn't really get the part where you have to push the pedals, not have Mommy push you the whole time.