little man of the house

Tyson is out of town this week, which always makes me dread bedtime. I hate trying to figure out how to get two kids to go to sleep. Anyway, tonight Coleson was ready for bed long before Landon was. So, I told Landon he needed to play quietly while I nursed Coleson to sleep. He sat down for quite a while next to us with a fun new puzzle book he got for his birthday from Gretchen. Then he put that away, including all the pieces, which is somewhat rare for him as we usually battle over cleaning up, and ran to the kitchen. Pretty soon he ran back to ask me if a few different things could be recycled. Then I heard the water running in the sink. Turns out, he was in the kitchen tidying up (!!!) by putting the recyclables in the bin and rinsing off the dishes. Um, hi, did you just turn three or twenty-three? I was so amazed! I thanked him a couple times over and told him that I was proud of how responsible he is becoming. Now, if I can just get him to do this every night . . .

Landon's 3rd Birthday

Landon had his third birthday on Thursday. My little guy is already three. He is turning in to such a wonderful little boy.

He is smart and funny, athletic and daring, affectionate and sweet. He cracks me up at least once a day and is constantly asking questions about everything. When he learns a new word he tries to use it in conversation and he listens so closely to everything we talk about, even when we think he isn't paying attention. He is incredibly social, but enjoys spending time at home doing his own thing too.

I am so proud to be his mama and I'm looking forward to many more wonderful birthday celebrations to come.

(Beautiful pictures by Chelsea.)

walking boy!

I finally got a good video of Coleson walking. It took a few attempts, and it's still sideways (darn camera) but I got one. So, tilt your head to the side and enjoy!

it was gonna be great

I got on here tonight all excited to do a post about Coleson's new-found walking ability. Then I downloaded the video I took of it the other night and realized that it's not a good video at all. He barely walks in it, Tyson and Landon are chatting away in the background about random stuff, and it's sideways. So, the post was gonna be great. It really was. And I'm saving it for when I have a decent video that actually shows off my little guy. Because that's what mamas do.

dinner

I love reuben sandwiches, but I have never attempted to make one. It's usually something I order in restaurants, but when I stumbled across a recipe for reubens in one of my crock pot cook books I couldn't resist trying it. I put about five ingredients in the pot just after breakfast, and come dinner time all I do is add cheese, a little 1000 island dressing, and bread? Um, yes please! Ok, so I also added homemade sweet potato fries to round out the meal, but those are super-easy too. Anyway, the sandwiches turned out so good! I was very pleased with myself. I wolfed mine down, and looked over at Tyson across the table with a big, proud grin on my face. I mean, really, these things were better than I've had in many restaurants. I asked, "Did you like the sandwich?" To which he replies over his half-eaten sandwich, "Eh. I don't really like reubens." GASP! Of course I took it as a total insult to my cooking ability, which is not how he meant it at all, but still. At least he came up later and told me how he loves it that I try new things with my cooking. Don't you hate it when someone totally bursts your bubble like that?

Happy Halloween!

I know it's a little late, but Happy Halloween! We celebrated by doing a bit of trick-or-treating around our neighborhood and my in-laws' neighborhood, and Landon definitely got more than enough candy. At first he wasn't so sure about the whole wear-a-costume-and-knock-on-doors thing, but then he realized that he got candy when he did it and there was no turning back. It helped that a slightly older friend of his trick-or-treated through our neighborhood with us, and she REALLY understood how the whole thing worked. Coleson had no idea why in the world we had him dressed in an annoying thing with a tight hood and walked around outside in the cold, but it made for cute pictures at least. Overall, it was fun and Landon has yet to gorge himself on candy so it was a success!

A knight and his loyal puppy, heading out to get some candy. (Yes, Coleson can stand on his own and is walking a bit, but that's another post.)

Tuckered out at the end of the night, taking a break on Grammy and Papa's steps.

I hope your Halloween was just as fun!