Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day...a little late ;-) Justin sent me flowers on Sunday that were delivered to our house. That made my day and was a nice surprise.

On Saturday Brendan and I made sugar cookies. I usually hate making sugar cookies because they are a lot of work and I'd rather eat a chocolate chip cookie any day over a sugar cookie. But my sister gave me a sugar cookie icing recipe that makes the cookies totally worth eating. We cheated and used some premade dough. Maybe next time I'll make some dough from scratch. I've got the icing down. One step at a time.

Sunday morning I made Brendan heart pancakes. These pancakes were totally picture worthy and I was pretty proud of this accomplishment. I even made pancake batter from scratch!!! Watch out Betty Crocker!
Um, yes my child is wearing BIG BOY UNDERWEAR! He is totally potty trained! Can I get an amen?!?! And this is usually what we look like in the morning. Just keeping it real.
When I was growing up my mom had traditions for each holiday. Every year on Valentine's Day she made a red velvet cake. It came once a year and was so yummy. I remember all of them and am working on some traditions of our own. I bought this bucket when Brendan turned 1 for Valentine's Day. I've decided to use it every year after and put little Valentine treats in it. I put some candy, books, color wonder stuff, and lacing cards in it this year. See that Splat book, those are great!!! Cute illustrations, story lines...we love reading about Splat.
I bought this sucker with a pair of lips on the end just to give myself a laugh. Even funnier though (Justin saw this but I missed it) was when Marley stole the sucker and he had the lips sticking out of his mouth!
I used to hate Valentine's Day. I called it Obligation Day. I still think it's way overrated, but it is fun to do some heart stuff with Brendan and make the guys in my life feel special. No, I didn't forget about Justin. He enjoyed his gifts too!

A day at the museum

Friday afternoon Brendan and I met some friends at the Lied Children's Museum. I love that place. We took Brendan last February about this time and he had fun, but this year was even more fun now that he is older. He was really into all the imaginative play things they had. I'm thinking we might need to get a membership here so we can go often. It was THAT fun!

Brendan and his buddy Ryan played with these dress up costumes for a while. They had a great big stage with a stage curtain that opened and closed.
Brendan, the performer. He would come out of the curtains and say "I'm Mickey Mouse!".
The water/bubble area was really fun too. I'm glad this was one of the last places Brendan played in because his sleeves got sooooo wet!
Brendan made a big wall bubble.
Shopping at Smiths. He got some eggs and loaded up on ice cream. I think he likes dairy!
This area would have so been my favorite as a kid. A real working cash register complete with fake money...it doesn't get better than that!
This picture is from last year's trip to the museum. I thought it would be fun to see how much Brendan has changed.
Sometimes I look at Brendan in pictures and feel like I'm getting glimpse of what he will look like all grown up. This is one of those pictures. I can't believe how old he looks!
This plane was Brendan's favorite place to play (maybe because we've been on them so much). I didn't think I'd ever get him out of here. He drove the plane, loaded it up with luggage, and sat as a passenger. I think he played every role possible on a plane.


Putting some antifreeze in the car.

The little builders section was very cool. They didn't have this section last year, but it was definitely a cool place to play. Brendan did everything from painting (can't wait to put those skills to use some day), drove a car, loaded up some bricks, used a pully system, and used a hammer and screwdriver



This was such a fun day! Brendan will be so excited to go again especially since we will be taking Grams and J.J. with us!!!

Potty Training

Hmmm...I don't know where he got the idea of using his "laptop" on the toilet. Crazy kid!

I have been dreading potty training for a long time. I had visions of wet carpet, really dirty underwear, and pulling my hair out from frustration yet trying to smile the whole time. I even bought a book on potty training that I have yet to read. I have to say it isn't as bad as I had thought. Here are some lessons learned in potty training.

• While getting potty stuff (seat, undies, wipes, etc) when Brendan turned 2 and having those things around for him to get used to was a good idea, waiting until he was 3 to actually start potty training was the best decision I could have made.
• Buying that complex Dora sticker chart was a waste of money. Brendan didn't need 7 stickers each time he went on the potty (one for pulling down pants, flushing, washing hands, you get the idea as to why there were so many stickers for ONE visit to the potty). One Valentine conversation heart made him just as happy and was just as effective.
• Don't underestimate the value of character underwear. Brendan LOVES Thomas and is excited to wear those babies everyday.
• Public restrooms are really gross and should be avoided at all cost.
• Portable Clorox wipes and just about any other type of sanitizing wipe is a must for the above mentioned problem. I need to invest in some more potty stuff apparently.
• Potty parties at Chuck E. Cheese seem to be a really good incentive.
• Kids don't pee constantly as I was afraid of. They can go for a while before using the potty so no stress there!

We're not totally there yet, but Brendan's made some great progress. I've heard this can take a while and my goal is for Brendan to be completely done with this by August. That's when he'll hopefully be starting at this school. Sometimes I catch myself in a panic mode when I think about Brendan being in school!!! On one hand I've been waiting for this and on the other I can't believe he's that big. What will I be like when he goes to kindergarten!!! Sniff, sniff.

Mighty B's Madagascar Party

Friday night we had Brendan's play group friends over for a little birthday party. I decided last minute to have them over and I'm so glad they all came!

We had pizza, veggies, hot artichoke dip (thanks to my new Pioneer Woman cookbook from Aunt Benny), peanut m&m's and of course ice cream and cake. It was all yummy and I probably gained 5 pounds in one night!
I found some Madagascar birthday stuff online. It was all really cute. Brendan has been obsessed with Madagascar since we watched Merry Madagascar no less than 10 times during in December. Then we moved on to Madagascar 2: Escape to Africa. I hear there is a Madagascar 3 in the making so I'm sure Brendan will be super excited to see that one too!
This cake was $22!!! Score!!! Smith's grocery did a great job.
We were singing happy birthday to Brendan. It looks like he was thinking about his birthday wish.

One of Brendan's buddies, Gavin. His mom and I taught first grade together for 3 years at Alamo.
Brendan loves the triplets. It was so cute watching him talk to them and try to give them their toys.
Cutie pie, Emily. She is one of the triplets too and is only 1 of 3 girls in our play group. When we first started getting together we all had boys. Since then we've added 3 little girls.
Emily's brothers, Nathan and Luke.
These little party blowers were a big hit! Brendan and Hayes give them a try.
Present time! Brendan got some great Cars stuff, Thomas birthday train, and a batcopter! He loved it all. We have some really great friends!
Somehow all the boys ended up wrestling and in a dog pile in the middle of the floor. Oh yes, they are all very much boy.

These are all of Brendan's play group friends since he was six months old. It's been so much fun to watch them grow up together and all of us moms are amazed at how big they are now. We've celebrated almost all birthdays and holidays together so yes, these boys know each other well. Brendan's party was so fun!
(Adam-he had a long ride home so he was dressed in his jammies ready to hit the road, Brendan, Ethan-brother to the triplets, Hayes, and Gavin)

Happy 3rd Birthday Brendan

I can't believe my baby is 3! Justin and I were reminiscing last night about what were doing three years earlier. It was the night before I going to be induced and we went to eat dinner at Olive Garden. It was sort of our last hurrah before Brendan came. If I could go back and pick another restaurant to eat my "last dinner" I would pick a thousand other places before the Olive Garden! I remember stopping at the grocery store on our way home and the checker said "when are you due?". I told her today and she said, "shouldn't you be at home? aren't you afraid you're water will break like any second?". It was kind of funny and I was only wishing that would happen. Now, here we are parents to a little man. It's hard to remember the sleepless nights, bouncy seats, high chairs, bottles, and binkies. Yes, it does go by all too quickly.

Brendan woke up this morning to this. Pretty good way to start a birthday I think.

Then we had a little celebration at Brendan's daycare. Calvin (on left) and Brendan are exactly 1 year and 1 day apart. Calvin turned 2 on Jan. 31st and Brendan turned 3 today. Karen also has a birthday today so we sang happy birthday to all three and had cupcakes and presents.

Then off we went to Red Robin for a birthday dinner. Brendan had some mac n' cheese and this great sundae for dessert. Yummy! He ate A LOT of it all by himself. I even had the Red Robin people sing to him which greatly embarrassed him. He hid behind his daddy. I think he must get his shyness from me.

A mouth full of ice cream! Yum!!!

And to end the day a little more playtime with the new train table. He really didn't want to leave it this morning to go to Karen's house, but we were able to drag him away. Brendan told me "I love my train table and my milk loves it too". Well, if even the milk loves the train table we must have done good!

I'm going to have to glue these tracks to the table before we have a big disaster on our hands.

A special surprise was on our front porch tonight. Brendan has been talking about having a Madagascar cake since Christmas (we watched Merry Madagascar countless times). Madagascar party stuff is impossible to find in stores so I ordered some online...and our stuff came one day early!!! These are the little goody boxes we are going to have. They will have Madagascar stickers, a pair of binnoculars, a stuffed lion, animal finger puppet, party blower, and fruit snacks inside. They were too cute not to buy. We had such a fun day today and we still have the party on Friday. I can't wait!