Cookies!

I decided I must be feeling better when, on Friday, I offered to make sugar cookies with Kalin! We were playing with play-doh and he cut out a star and said "It's little star! Star cookie?". And I responded with "Would you like to make some star cookies?". He was, of course, very excited about this. We made the dough together but since it needed to chill for 3 hours we weren't able to make cookies until after his nap. I actually cheated a bit and made most of them while he was napping but left plenty of dough for him to play with when he got up. We had lots of fun and he loved playing with the dough and mushing it in his hands. Don't worry, the cookies he made are the ones that just Kasey, Kalin and I will eat!

Adventures in Potty Training

Potty training has been going pretty well so far. He no longer cries when I try to sit him on his potty and he has actually gone to sit down on his own when he knew he needed to go. We’re trying out the method of letting him walk around without a diaper or pull-up. It certainly helps me to know when he’s going so we can get him on the potty. It’s caused a few messes but nothing I can’t handle.

One day, I was standing in the kitchen making his lunch and he had been standing behind me playing with his fridge magnets. All of a sudden I felt this warm stream of liquid hit the back of my ankle and I yelped and jumped. It was quite a shock! I was able to get him to his potty so he could finish. I’m sure we’ll have more experiences like that in the future!

His current reward for going in his potty is an M&M. After going he’ll ask for his “special treat”. He was really into it this past Friday morning – so much so that he ended up with 6 M&M’s before it was even 9:30! I’m thinking I may need to find another reward for the morning hours!

Grampie's Visit

My dad visited us on Mother's Day weekend. He drove down to pick my mom up from my sister's house. My mom had been down for a couple of weeks to help Bekah out with Hailee and Hannah since this is a busy time of year for her. Kalin and I had gone with Bekah and the girls a couple weeks before this to pick my mom up from the airport. Kalin saw my mom from inside the car and started waving and yelling "Grammie! Grammie!". It was so funny and I wished I had some video of it. So I made sure to have the camera out when my dad came for a visit. At this point it had been about a month since he had seen his Grampie. He was used to seeing him at least every other week when we lived up north and I knew that he missed both his Grammie and Grampie. Here's the video from that meeting! He was so excited to see his Grampie!

Kalin Update

I figured I should give a Kalin update since my last post was just a generic family update.

1. Kalin's verbal skills continue to grow and mature every day. He speaks in full sentences now (albeit grammatically incorrect ones) and will often times string several sentences together in order to fully explain something to us or tell us a story.

2. One of the most common phrases coming out of his mouth is "I do it myself".

3. He asks questions such as: "What's dog doing?", "What's tree doing?", "What's newt doing?". And he asks these questions about EVERYTHING!! It sometimes gets very tiring and taxing for my uncreative brain as I'm desperately trying not to say "I don't know" too often. But really, what would your response be when he asks "What's lake doing?" I've started turning the question back over to him and asking him what he thinks the object is doing. Such a curious little mind! I'm pretty sure after we've exhausted the "what" questions we'll be moving on to the infamous "why" questions.

4. He loves giving kisses and hugs. He'll even give them to people he doesn't really know! I was preparing him to meet a couple of my friends from high school whom I haven't seen in years so I was showing him pictures from their blogs so he would recognize them. We got to my friend, Janelle's house just as Jamie pulled in - as soon as I had him out of the car he went running down the driveway straight into Jamie's arms and gave her a big kiss. When our friend, Janelle, came out of her house to greet us he leaned forward and gave her a big kiss as well!

5. He likes to say things are "real spicy". It started with soda. We let him have a little sip and he made a really funny face then said, "It's real spicy. I like it!". Many things have now been deemed "real spicy" by him - most of which are not spicy at all. I think sometimes he just means flavorful.

6. He enjoys fishing for compliments. He's basically just copying things we've said to him in the past but he'll say them to himself then look at us and wait for us to agree. He'll say things like: "Good digging, Kalin!", "Thank you, baby boy.", or my personal favorite is when he calls himself squawky boy.

7. We've started potty-training and he is officially in pull-ups now. It's off to a slow start but I think he's starting to get used to sitting on the toilet. The goal is to have him potty-trained (hopefully completely but I might living in a fantasy world) by the time the new baby comes along. Only having one in diapers would be super nice.

8. With Kalin being almost 2 1/2 now we've definitely seen an increase in tantrums. Here's an amusing story from just a couple days ago that I e-mailed to my family because I thought they would enjoy it.

So Kalin was throwing a MAJOR tantrum this evening. Over what, we’re not really sure. I was wracking my brain trying to figure out not only what may have caused it but what the root of the problem was. But nothing Kasey and I could do was apparently the “right” thing in Kalin’s eyes. After having him sit in a chair and telling him he was going to sit there until he calmed down then trying to ignore him (which works a lot of time) he was still riled up so I finally just picked him up and took him to his bedroom – hoping the change in scenery would get him to calm down so we could talk. I sat him on his bed and he started asking for his ba’s (pacifiers) and saying he was sleepy (this was at about 5:15 and I had just gotten him up at 4:30). I finally decided that maybe he did just need to lay down for awhile so I gave him his pacifiers and tucked him in and, by his request, prayed like we normally do before naptime and bedtime. I told Kasey I’d only let him stay up there for about 15 minutes since I really didn’t want him sleeping anymore. Kasey went back up to get him about 15 minutes later and Kalin was sitting up in bed. When he saw Kasey he said, “I all done crying now. I put ba’s away. I’m real happy!”

Just an amusing story from today. The tantrum part isn’t so amusing but I liked that after 15 minutes of some alone time and relaxing he was a completely different boy and I also liked the fact that he understood that we needed him to stop crying and calm down.

Kalin is full of surprises every day and he makes us laugh a lot.

I'm Back!

So, it's been about 4 months since my last post and I'm not even sure I have any followers left but I've decided that I should update. The first major update, which I'm sure everybody who reads this already knows, is that we've moved!! In March, Kasey accepted a job at Cal Baptist in Riverside doing the same job he was doing at Bethany. We moved at the beginning of April. We didn't have a place in Riverside at the time that we moved but Kasey's parents were gracious enough to let us (and about half of our stuff!) stay with them while we searched for a place to live. The search only took a couple days and we were able to move in by the end of that week. Hooray! Huge THANKS to all those who helped us move - both up north and down south (and especially to those who helped in both places!).

We're still working on getting fully settled in - there's still some boxes sitting around and we're still working on making the house feel like a home.

The second major update is that I'm pregnant! Baby Martin #2 is due at the end of November. We are currently 13 weeks along and I'm hoping that morning sickness is finally letting up for good. I think it will be much easier to finish getting our house put together once I'm feeling good and have more energy.