6/28 - More pics from vacation

Here are the pictures that I took at my dad's house when I went to go pick up the boys. Eli likes all the stuffed animals and skeletons. Here he was playing with a duck and a ram's head skull.

Eli wanting to take a picture with me so he can look on the screen. This is one of the few pictures where he doesn't have his cheesy smile.

Aiden then decided he wanted to get in on the picture action and came over. The boys were so happy to see me and I was very happy to see them as well.

Nana came over one morning and played legos with Eli. Eli really liked the animals to push around. Aiden didn't really want to build anything for me but I hear he has some building skills.

Aiden had a good time watching Super Why or Mickey Mouse Clubhouse (his 2 favorite shows).

Eli has an obsession with Ring Around The Rosy song.  Whenever he hears that tune, he starts dancing around and tries to yell "ashes, ashes." It too cute. You can see the sequence of pictures of Eli doing his dance and having some fun. He actually found this red ball that plays different tunes and he started dancing when his song played.

I really have no words for this new facial expression he has started doing. It's pretty funny to watch but I have no idea why he does it.

There haven't been many pictures of Aiden. I'm not sure if he was just in the "toy room" (the room where I sleep at that has tons of toys in it from my sisters' boys) or if he was not doing anything I found interesting with the camera. I did take Aiden to the movies as I mentioned in a post before. He loved it. He really like his big bowl of popcorn. You can see in this first picture that he was telling Bronco "no" and wouldn't let him get near his popcorn.

I did make him share with Eli and then they fought over seats for a few minutes until they both settled down. You can see in the first picture that Aiden is on his potty and in the second picture he's on the steps because Eli kicked him off. 

Popcorn wasn't enough of a snack for Eli so I gave him some Combos. I looked over at him and that little booger had 3 combos stacked on top of each other.

We tried to get some pictures of Nana and the boys so she could have a new Facebook picture but you never know if kids will actually participate in pictures.

We then tried to get both boys to take a picture with Nana. That was a real task. Although I cut part of her head off, it's the best picture.

 Little Aiden and Nana. They have a special bond but I'm hoping she'll have one with Eli too eventually.

Eskimo kisses.

Aiden mastered a puzzle at Nana's house and she brought it over with her so he could show me. He loves this puzzle and does it really well and doesn't need any help.

I asked the boys to give Papa some final kisses before we left. Eli happily followed directions (he pretty fond of papa). I think it helped that Papa probably had mango left over on his mustache. :)

Aiden wanted to give Papa some loving.

Aiden didn't want to get his picture taken with Eli and Papa. He was pouting but Eli's face cracks me. It looks like he is wondering why Aiden doesn't want his picture taken.

This next one is the best one I got of all of them.

We are adjusting to life back at home. These pictures were taken on Sunday. The boys were enjoying a banana in the morning.

Eli is just starting to eat bananas with the peel still on it. This picture makes me smile. He so concerned that his banana ran out.

Now he's happy again because I took more peel off.

And finally, here is Aiden enjoying his banana.

We are getting settled back in to a routine and we are having fun and enjoying each other. The break has been great for all of us. I am so blessed.

6/25 - Eli to the ER; Aiden sees Cars 2

I forgot to include this in the last post. When I got to the boys on Wednesday night, I could see right away Eli had a serious problem. My parents had told me he had a diaper rash (which is unusual) but when I saw his bottom on Wednesday night, I knew it was much worse. In fact, it looked very similar to something Eli had when he was 1 month old: staph infection. I called our insurance company and she sent an authorization for us to go to All Children's Hospital on Thursday morning. I took him right after breakfast. Here he is playing with coloring pages on a computer. This hospital is awesome!! We were in and out in about an hour. It appears he does have a staph infection and they have him some strong antibiotics in case it was MRSA. He also has topical stuff we have to put on. By this evening, it was starting to look much better.

Another big even that happened yesterday was that Aiden and I went to see Cars 2. We went to the opening show (10am) on the opening day. I thought it would be much busier than it was. I think he was most excited because I told him he could have popcorn.

I was a littler nervous to take him in the theater because it's so big. He was in awe. We found a seat and it ends up he doesn't weigh enough to hold the seat down! haha I had to go get this booster seat thing that helped the seat stay down. He wasn't impressed with the previews because he just wanted to watch McQueen but the popcorn bought me some time. I took him potty right before the movie started. The lights turned down (I told him that is how he would know when the movie would start) and he was pretty excited. He got a little bored at the very end. I was impressed with him. I thought he would definitely say it was too loud and/or have to go potty. The plot was a little hard to follow for a 3 yr old but he wants to come see it again with daddy. He loved his huge tub of popcorn and we got it refilled before we left.

It was a great success and now he is waiting until daddy comes home to see it again. I'm wondering if he can handle watching it at the IMAX theater yet.

6/25 - The Boys' Vacation

Even though Greece was cancelled for me, my mom and dad decided they would still watch the boys so I could get a break. Here are some pictures that were taken throughout the week. Ms. Susan (my dad's girlfriend), brought over some legos that the boys loved playing with. I think they spent a whole day just building things. I heard Aiden made some pretty tall structures but Eli was really good at knocking them over.

They even ventured out to the beach one day and met my sister and her 3 boys out there. Eli loved the water as predicted and Aiden just wanted to build sandcastles and not get in the water. Aiden was excited to be able to play with his cousins. Susan is holding Eli in the picture below. Below that, Scottie and his girlfriend are building sandcastles with Aiden.

Here is a picture of Eli just fooling around on the floor. He's become quite addicted to the paci (as he says, "papico"). His world is going to come to an soon when that is taken away. I normally only let him keep it in his crib but he's all out wack and even goes in to this room to get it out of the crib. 

The group (my mom, Susan, my sister, my dad, my 2 boys, and my sister's 3 boys) all went to Border's for a special  Cars event. It seems like they all had fun and ran around. 

My mom took Aiden for a few days and he stayed at her place while my dad had Eli. I know Aiden and my mom had fun and it looks like Eli and my dad had fun too. Papa bought Eli a pool so they got to hang out in that, which Eli loved. It will be great because know we'll have a little pool we can always use at papa's house.

Here is Eli eating some of his yogurt for lunch. Neither of the boys were good eaters while I was gone and it took Aiden a couple days to poop. However, Aiden is almost fully potty trained. When I dropped them off last Thursday, Aiden had done one day with no pull ups on and my parents continued the trend. He only had one, maybe two, accidents the whole time. It was impressive. He was evening waking up from naps and night-night time dry.

The boys liked Susan's dog I heard. Although Aiden looks scared of it, he likes dogs.

All the boys met over at Great Grandma Hagans a couple of times. I tried not to freak when I saw the pictures of the boys eating cupcakes and popsicles on the table. I also almost had a heart attack when my mom told me she took Aiden to McDonalds and he ate all his french fries, had an entire soda and wanted more, and ate only one chicken nugget. Aiden (and Eli) usually get chicken nuggets, apple slices, and chocolate milk so you can see why I was a little shocked. I make him eat at least 2 nuggets before he can drink most of his milk too. Thankfully, my friend Stephanie was with me and reminded me to relax because he was on vacation. Below are Graham and Aiden, they are so cute.

 I bet my boys were pretty excited to get cupcakes!!

The boys had a great time and it was good bonding for everyone I think. I've also included 2 pictures below with my friend Stephanie. She went to St. Augustine with me for a night so that I could get away and feel like I had a vacation. It was fun.

I'll be posting pictures very soon of the last couple days. Back to the grind now ....

6/17 - Boys visiting St. Pete

By Sunday, we knew the Greece trip was off and I was sad. I skipped church (hey, don't judge me) for the first time in a long time and just spent the entire day at home with the boys. I didn't feel like going anywhere or doing anything. In the morning, the boys played outside and rode bikes until they got too hot. Eli was being so safe and wanted to wear a helmet.

Eli tried to convince me to take the Coke car out but I didn't give in. We were all so hot and Eli just gets frustrated with it because he can't pedal it and when he tries to walk with it, his shoes come off.

Aiden had fun riding his new bike around. He's been doing really good at potty training but this picture was taken right after he had an accident which is why he's holding his pants. The crouch was all wet and his socks were soaked too.

We changed him and he continued to play. They love to play on this race car track that I've just left set up in the garage. Once Brad comes home and uses his bike though, we'll loose some play space in the garage.

The boys were in daycare Mon thru Wed this week so I don't have many pictures to share. Here are a few pictures of them wrestling one night. I don't mind the wrestling some but I don't want them to turn in to boys who have to wrestle (especially rough) all the time. They were both having fun but I just have to remind Aiden to be gentle (he tries to sit on Eli) and Eli to not bite (he likes to open his mouth while wrestling with Aiden).

I gave the boys fish sticks to eat during the week and they both wanted BBQ sauce, ketchup, and mustard to dip them in. I'm sure Brad is pretty happy about the BBQ sauce thing but I think I might get some tarter sauce soon.

Eli had fun in the bath as usual. He was rolling all around and blowing bubbles.

I included this picture because Eli is starting to break the gum on his bottom incisor teeth. His upper ones are already in, or coming in I should say.

On Wednesday, I had lunch with my old gymnastics coach from club, Mary. It was so much fun to catch up with her. We are gonna get together next week too. On Wednesday late afternoon, I got the boys and we left for St. Pete. Even though the trip to Greece was cancelled my dad and mom were nice enough to still offer to take the boys for a bit. We got there Wed night and had fun playing together on Thursday.

The boys were so happy to see papa and nana. Eli hadn't eaten well for me the past few meals but papa got him to eat. Eli saw he was eating cereal and went to go sit on his lap and wanted his cereal. It was too cute. This first picture is after Eli just got a bite full from papa; as you can see, he likes the cheerios and fruit.

I love this second picture. Eli looks so content and happy and papa looks like he's enjoying little Eli. Needless to say, Eli helped papa finish his cereal. Oh that's right, so did Aiden. He came over and asked for bites too.

Aiden and nana played trains for a bit with the travel and go thomas stuff we have.

I wanted to take a picture of Eli but he insisted on coming over and sitting on my lap so I took a picture of both of us. In my new camera, there is a screen that we can see and that's what Eli is staring at. He thinks he looks handsome apparently.

Once nana come over on Thursday morning, we went to the store. Aiden had $10 to spend (money from great grandma Hagan and aunt Pat). He was so careful in how he spent it. Thankfully my mom was there so her and Eli roamed around because it took Aiden forever to pick out what he wanted. He wasn't sure if he wanted more travel track or engines. The whole thing reminded me when my Aunt Becky took me to a theme park and I took forever to figure out how I wanted to spend the money I had. I remember thinking it was such a hard choice. Aiden picked out two trains and we went and scanned the prices. I told him he could take the one bigger train or he could get two of the smaller engines but that he didn't have enough money for both. He ended up choosing the one big one (Diesel 10 engine). He was pretty excited. While he picked that out, nana found Eli a slinky. Eli loves it. He played with it all on the store and even in the van on the way home.

For Aiden's birthday, nana and papa got him the games Chutes and Ladders. They played it once I put Eli down for nap. It didn't take Aiden long to get the hang of it. The more he plays, the more he'll like. He eventually just wanted to spin the spinner and move his man all up and down the slides and ladders just to play. It was cute.

 

I left St. Pete yesterday late afternoon and headed back up to Jax. It's was so weird leaving the boys. Even was even more odd to come home (with toys everywhere) and not have the boys here. It was a little lonely kinda. I've been on the run all day today. I did get to sleep in some. Pouncer woke me up at 6am (that's normal for him but it doesn't make it any less irritating) but after a few pets, he laid back down. I rolled around from 6:45 to 8:15am. It was great but at the same time, I haven't slept in until 7am in ages so it made me feel really lazy. Part of me was thinking I should get up because I can't get used to that since it won't happen again for a while. I'm not exactly sure what I am going to do tomorrow besides get new brakes at 8am. I'm a little lost without having to do something. My parents are so awesome for watching the boys and I know the boys are exciting to spend some time with nana and papa. I'm off to go do something although not sure what .....