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Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Recent Toddler Approved Projects

This year I have been blessed to team up with a really creative crew of blogging friends and launch THREE e-books!

My friend Cathy from the UK who blogs at NurtureStore spearheaded the three collaborative projects and I have learned so much about marketing from her. Now I just need to find time to put everything I learned into practice.

Here are the three e-books if you feel like checking them out. Our most recent one launched earlier this week and is all about science & math!


Fizz, Pop, Bang! Playful Science and Math Activities



Three to Five: Playful Preschool



Zero to Two: The Book of Play



Ryan Turns 2!

Ryan had a pretty awesome birthday. We kicked it off the night before by blowing up balloons and decorating his bedroom door.

On Monday morning he slept in until 8am (love that kid!) and then I woke him up singing "Happy Birthday." He loved the signs everyone made for him and we went downstairs and I made him birthday pancakes in the shape of a 2! We put a candle on it and sprinkles and he was in heaven. He kept sayinng, "I'm two" and "It's my birthday!"


After we dropped Andrew off at school we got the house ready for a little Halloween get together with the friends that I visit teach from church and their kids. We spent the morning cleaning up, making food for the party, playing with toys, and reading books!

The friends arrived for lunch around 12:30pm and we dived right into food. I made mummy hot dogs for the kids and pizza and salad for the moms. The kids liked my ghost cheese sticks too. I was also a huge fan of the sugar cookie bars. The night before they didn't taste good at all, but the next day they were delicious.



During the party the kids mostly played while the grown ups chatted. I did have a few crafts ready to go for the kids who were interested in crafting. It was cute to see how everything turned out.

After the party we picked Andrew up and just played at the house and did Ryan's favorite things--- play trains and jump on the trampoline.

Kevin ended up getting home early compared to normal (5:30pm) so we packed the kids into the car quickly and tried to drive the 40 minutes to the Clayton Valley Pumpkin Farm super fast before it got dark. It was practically dark when we got there at 6:30, but they were really nice and still let us play in the play area for 15 minutes AND they didn't make us pay. Highlight of the day!

Dried bean sensory pit!


Hay bale tunnels!


Picking pumpkins



Afterwards we stopped at Cold Stone for some birthday ice cream and then we drove home. The little dude finished his ice cream in the car and by the time we got home he was covered head to toe in stickiness!


Ryan loved chatting with Grandma Julie & Grandpa Kim as well as Grandma Shari before he went to bed. He only got to open two presents on his birthday because his big day was so packed, so on Tuesday he opened all of them and LOVED them... as did the big kids!


On Tuesday he had his two year old well-child visit and it went really well! I can't seem to find the paper with his stats on them but he is close to 29 pounds and is in the 79% for weight and then is in the 98% for height... though I can't remember how tall he is. The doctor says going from her measurements he's going to be a tall one (6' 2 or 6' 4)! Should be fun to see how things turn out.

We sure LOVE Ryan!

Some things about Ryan right now are...


  • He wears size 5 diapers and size 2-3T clothes
  • He loves dogs, trains, and trucks.
  • He is obsessed with jumping on our trampoline but only wants to jump if one of the other kids will jump with him... he is also really good at persuading people to do what he wants
  • He loves to copy any and everything the big kids say (good and bad). He currently keeps saying, "you're dumb" when he is mad... thanks to the big kids. :(
  • Ryan is a great little talker and we can understand probably 90% of what he says. He is so happy and such a sweetheart! My favorite thing is says is, "I love you mami" and "Come too?" He never wants to be left out of doing anything. It is adorable! He definitely thinks he is bigger than he is.
  • Ryan gives the best hugs and tuba kisses.
  • Ryan loves to have mama help him with everything instead of letting the big kids help him. I am relishing everyone moment of it right now because this kid is such a snuggle bug.
  • Ryan goes to bed between 7-7:30pm and wakes up anytime between 7-8am. He also usually takes one 2 hour nap during the day... but sometimes he just gets to be flexible and skip it since we have stuff to do.
  • Every night Ryan sleeps with his special "dog dog" that is dirty and gross along with trains and a cozy blue blanket made for him by my Aunt Viki. He also uses a sound machine for white noise.
  • Ryan loves reading!

Here's Catie at age 2 (and stats here) and Andrew at age 2, just for fun.

We are so grateful to have adorable Ryan in our family!