My Days.

It's 2 PM. The boys are both napping. Well, Parker is napping, and Caden is deciding whether give in to the sleep or continue kicking the wall with his feet. I just realized that I haven't eaten yet today. I did, however, get a shower before now, and so I'll count today a good day. A few of my friends have been documenting their everyday life with pictures. I thought, what a cute idea, and decided to start trying it today. Plus, with this being one of our last months in the townhouse I thought it would be a way to remember life here in Utah. So, as I said, it's now 2 PM and I'm done. Waaaaaay too much work.

Lets see. My morning started at the break of dawn (5:34 AM) due to Parker talking to himself in his crib. What the heck happened to my 13 hours of sleep baby?!? Teething?? I put him in bed next to me and tried to sleep through it, but couldn't and open my eyes to him with his neck cracked in my direction smiling ear to ear. Nice. Then Caden joins the fun. I'm met with our typical breakfast battle. Me trying to get Caden to eat healthy, and Caden vehemently denying me. This time it was over strawberries. I know the kid likes strawberries. He eats them all the time. But today he wanted to be stubborn. Unfortunately for him, he has yet to realize who he got that stubbornness from. Our morning ritual is eat breakfast, and then go for a long walk/run, stopping by the park at the end. I tried to get him to eat by saying he'd stay home if he didn't eat breakfast. All the while thinking, "that is the stupidest threat in the world, because you know you want to go work out and if he does eat you are the one that suffers." Well, I continued my threat, because I'm, well, stubborn. He held strong, throwing a huge tantrum, clenching his teeth, covering his mouth, shaking his head, and eventually his entire body. He is GOOD. I'm sure his two year old friends would be super impressed. I kept trying to coax, finally leaving him at the table praying he'd cave. 45 minutes later the dang strawberries were still sitting on the plate uneaten. I tried tactic number two, "Ohhh, I love strawberries. See me eat them. Daddy loves strawberries too." Stupid Supernanny needs to give me something more than that. Caden could careless if I like strawberries. It only means he is one strawberry closer to the park. He pushed the plate away and held strong. To wrap up, he did not eat strawberries, but he did not eat anything, and came with us. Thankfully, the stroller ride was uneventful today.

We got home an hour later, and imgaine this, Caden was hungry. I told him he had to eat one big bit of strawberry before he could have anything else to eat. Another tantrum. I was not about to be a pushover, so I held the strawberry out, and just waited. He finally looks down at the ground and slowly paces forward, avoiding all eye contact with me, takes a bit, and then peeks up at me. I gave him a "congratulations on making a good decision hug." It was a proud moment. Clearly though, I am still figuring out the proper way to deal with a picky eater. Whatever proper means... This may not have been a true victory, so we'll call it a draw.

Parker took nap number one of the day. Caden did Pilates with me. Then it was time to clean the bathrooms which is always a fun challenge when Caden wants to assist in the toilet cleaning. AH! We survived and finished P's nap time by playing trucks.
Lunch time. Caden decided on spiral noodles. He wanted to help me cook them which is a typical occurrence here. I put him up on the counter, turned on the stove, and he dumped in the salt. Too bad he put the entire shaker in the water clumping all the salt together. Anyway, we waited for the bubbles, and then watched the noodles cook. Riveting, I know. For some reason he loves it. When the noodles were finished I turned around to drain them. I warned Caden to be careful, and he repeated it. I never worry about him near the stove. The kids very first word was hot. He gets the consequence. Well, today while I faced the other direction for 30 seconds, he also turned around and accidentally let his foot drag over the burner. He starts screaming. I rip his charred sock off and put ice on his foot. He was disgusted with his "yucky" sock. He eats. I work on my never ending pile of laundry. I actually do not mind laundry, but I HATE that it is in my kitchen. That's like the dumbest place ever to put laundry. My kitchen floor is covered in dirty clothes and baskets, and my couches are covered in clean clothes. I get another load going, and get Parker up. I make his bottle with one hand, the other holding Parker, and all the while Caden is hanging around my knees begging for more milk. The begging turns to screaming and I'm chanting "be patient, be patient." Those words were mostly for myself.

We play Pengaloo. It's supposed to be a match game, but every turn is "my turn," followed by knocking all the penguins over and laughing. Boys. Hyper boys. Time to change Caden's diaper. He fights me. I feel like I'm like wrestling a pig down to hog tie them at a rodeo. I'm seriously sweating by the end of it.

Outfit number two for Parker the drool king. Because this is supposed to be my day of pictures I go to document Parker getting changed which quickly turns into Parker getting attacked by a placemat. Thank you, Caden."Hug baby Parka."And Parker is still not dressed; Everything takes so much longer than it should...

Blah, blah, blah...read some books...comfort crying baby...practice learning shapes...more mom stuff...We end up not only learning shapes, but also having a nice lesson on sharing. Every toy Parker holds Caden rips from his death grip to simply put in a pile by his leg because why, oh why would he actual want to play with a lame "baby toy". Of course sweet little Parker just adores his big brother and smiles even when he's stealing all his toys.
Caden decides to go to his room to get more books, but made a little detour. He decide it would be a superb idea to dump his glass of water out and turn my family room floor into his very own slip and slide. AWESOME. He's drenched in water. Head to Toe. I wish I could say things like this were a rarity.

I need some laughter so I turn on Caden's new favorite song from Glee, Gold Digger, and watch him dance. He shrugs his shoulders, bounces his knees, and even does a little snake move with his hand. Nothing in the world is better than that.

Now here I sit, in the peaceful silence thinking, I'm exhausted but these really are good days. And even if they aren't all good days, they are all my days.

Caden turned two. He loves Toy Story so what else could we do but throw him a big Toy Story bash. My favorite moment of the night was when we sang to him. He kept scanning everyone with this, "Wow, they are singin' to me" look. Only one minor glitch blowing out the candles. He decided to inhale instead of exhale. Whoops.This was my favorite moment number 2: He opened Woody and Bullseye. It was like all the dreams he'd ever had came true. He just sat there and kissed Woody. Happy Birthday Caden. You will probably never know how much joy, love, and entertainment you've brought into our family.

Monterey Bay Aquarium

You could look at this amazingness...OR this eyecatcher...But no...you find the one thing that is not even related to the aquarium and play on it, "choo-choo train." A worker walked by and said, "I will never look at that equipment the same." The Monterey Bay Aquarium was so neat. It's kind of magical to experience a world you were never really meant to be a part of. Mesmerized. Even Parker was loving the bright fish and followed them all of the tank with his eyes.

We spent the morning at the aquarium and then had the melt down of all melt downs so we headed to lunch at Bubba Gumps. YUM! We were in heaven. Bry shoveled in a whole 16 shrimp.

Caden's mildly obsessed with "moto-cycles" and demanded to get on the Harley Davidson display. Look at that face! He thought he was pretty bad!

Personally my favorite part was the touchy feely display. I was loving me some sea cuccumber. Caden was hesitant at first, but then decided he liked all of it...including the taste of the salt water. Yuck.

Carmel-by-the-Sea

Beautiful, blue water.

Warm, sandy beach.

Breeze, perfect for kite flying.

Quaint restaurants and shops.

Art and dog fanatics everywhere.

Bry's parents took us to Carmel to celebrate Bryan's graduation. It was a trip we will never forget! I made sure to document every moment. 5,000 pictures worth.

When we got to the beach Caden's first words were, "Ohhh, big sandbox." He was in Heaven running across the beach, chasing down dogs, climbing trees, and trying to build sand castles. The water, however, was not on his favorites list.HUGE strides were made this trip: Paul played in the sand. Pretty sure last time we went to the ocean he locked himself in his car in the parking lot and listened to Dr. Laura. Must be Caden's magic touch (the two year old tantrum).We spent two glorious days at the beach. We also got to explore town, and Bryan and I even got to go on a fancy date. We had the best gnocchi I've had in my entire life.

Trying to muster a smile through the alligators tears. Apparently the back of the stroller is like a torture chamber. Caden was quite attatched to Bumpa and Gamma Jo-ene. Probably because of the cheese balls. :)

And then we headed to Monterey...