Hattie's 1st Birthday Party

This past Saturday, the boys and I along with mamaw traveled to Athens for Hattie's birthday party. She is the daughter of my cousin Barbara and she turned 1. They went all out with an adorable pumpkin party. We left papa and daddy home to continue harvesting. The boys had a great time playing with balloons, taking pictures inside the big pumpkin, decorating pumpkins, playing in the sand table, watching Hattie open her presents, roasting hot dogs, and eating cupcakes. It was a gorgeous day and we are so glad that we were able to help her celebrate!

            He was so proud of his decorated pumpkin!

                                       Birthday girl with Great Grandma D

I just wanted a cute picture with my boys and this is what happened! Oh well, it still turned out pretty cute!

Helping with Harvest

Bryce loves to help with harvest. It is his favorite time. He waits all year for this. Daddy also loves helping with harvest, and rushes home from work so that he can help haul in wagons for papa. I love looking out my kitchen windows seeing Bryce doing what he loves. He is definitely our little farmer. Blaine loves riding in the combine with papa but is not quite as interested in helping papa everyday like Bryce is. He has more fun playing in the basement with Bianca and Karina.

Tanner's Orchard

This past Monday, I had a random day off from watching the Swanson girls so I decided to take the boys to Tanner's Orchard for the morning. It was a gorgeous day to be outside and the boys had a blast of course. It is so much cheaper to go during the week than on the weekends. It only cost $3 for Bryce to get into the play area. Blaine and I were free. If we went on a Saturday or Sunday it would have cost us $8 per person no matter what age. We brought our lunch and had a picnic in the van which the boys thought was pretty cool! While we were eating lunch, Bryce kept saying, "This good idea mommy, thank you for bringing us here. We having so much fun." He was just so appreciative, it was very sweet. Their favorite areas included the combine, (of course) the fire truck, the blue tractor, putt putt golf, and mining for gold. They always seemed to be going in different directions so I do not have many pictures as I was trying to keep my eye on each one. The other good thing about going during the week and getting there right when it opened was the fact that we pretty much had the area to ourselves. I just love spending each day with these two little cuties!

23 Weeks!

This picture was taken last week as I am now 24 weeks pregnant. Past the halfway mark, yeah!!!I am feeling pretty good lately and I can feel my stomach muscles expanding if that makes any sense at all. My belly button has popped out again just like with the boys and it sticks out far! You can totally see it if I wear any type of shirt. It also gets bumped quite often and gets sore. The boys are starting to notice my belly getting bigger and Bryce made the comment the other day. "You're cheeks (he was touching my chest) and belly are getting big!" Shane and I laughed pretty hard at that one!

Our Little Farmer

This is why papa has a hard time getting much done around our house when the boys are around. Bryce always talks him into a tractor ride or golfcart ride. This time, Bryce got to steer all by himself and they even went down the road. He was in heaven!

When Bryce went to Ag Day in Billtown he loved the obstacle course that they had there, and he wanted daddy to make him one at home. I think daddy did a great job!

A Little Bryce Update

If you don't want to read about poop, you might want to skip this post. It's amazing since becoming parents, how much Shane and I talk about poop in our daily lives. If you follow my blog you know that we have had problems with Bryce and his bowel movements since he was 6 months old. His body would literally hold his poop in and he would become stiff and cry in pain. This has been an ongoing problem in which we have tried several things to prevent this. We had tried caro syrup, benefiber, a variety of prescription medications, miralax, essential oils, massage, an insane number of enemas, and we have even had him x-rayed a few times to make sure something wasn't wrong inside of him. We have been keeping a daily stool log on our fridge for a year. We even go to a specialist once a month in Peoria. His belly has always been very bloated because of backed up bowel and gas. He has been peeing on the potty since he turned 3, but he refused to poop in the potty till about a month ago. He would only poop in his underwear or sometimes his diaper at night. This has been stressful and very messy to say the least. I know there are some kids out there who are potty trained overnight when they are 15 months old, well good for them. Bryce is definitely not like that. It has made me feel like a bad mommy and has prevented him from spending the night at grandparents houses in fear of him making a mess. It's one thing if I have to clean it up, but it's no fun for someone else. It has also been stressful taking him places and one of the reasons he didn't start preschool this past August. I was beginning to think he will never poop on the potty. Well, all our fears and stresses were finally put aside when he started pooping on the potty about 3 weeks ago. We told him that he couldn't help papa with harvest until he did it. I know this sounds mean, but we have tried everything we could think of with this kid. And this is what finally clicked. He has started doing it on his own, and has even done it in a variety of public places as well. He does it like he has been doing it for years, thank the Lord! Anyway, sorry about the long post and rambling, but someday I will look back on this post and laugh at everything we went though with this one, I hope!

This was taken at his last doctor visit when he got to tell the doctor that he is finally pooping on the potty! He was so excited! Look at that smile! He got a few extra suckers this time!

Girls Night

I was lucky enough this past week to enjoy some girl time, which doesn't happen nearly enough. On Thursday night I went to a Dixie Chicks concert with Jenn, Kim, and Amanda. 16 years ago, the four of us went to see them and we were able to get tickets again this time. We had so much fun together! And then on Friday night I met Kim and Brooke at Brooke's apartment to have a craft night. The three of us get together every few months and have a blast together. How lucky I am to have such great girls in my life!