Officially Two...and Terrible?

Nate just had his two year visit with the pediatrician-he's 28 pounds and 35 inches long. Thankfully, no shots today! Now he doesn't need to go back for another year. The doctor said he's growing and acting normal for his age, including the "eating a ton one minute" and "just wanting a cereal bar" the next. And of course the "terrible tantrums". He's made sure that I'm aware that he isn't happy about situations for sure :)

And now I'm bummed to go back to past posts where I boasted about Nate not climbing out of his bed. *sigh* Not the case now, sadly. The last week, during both his naptime and bedtime, he has climbed out of bed and opened his door. Oh he's very amused and excited with his new discovery. At first we tried just putting him back in his bed over and over, but that got to be too much of a game for him-he'd laugh as we would chase him back in his room. Rather than playing that game for hours to see who would win, we decided we needed to do something more aggressive. I had hoped the "passive" way was going to work but decided a harsher way would teach him to stay in his room and bed faster. We began to lock him in there. He always intially cries/screams for at least a few minutes but does eventually fall asleep. If he's extremely tired he won't try to get out of bed, but otherwise always does and ends up falling asleep on the floor by the door. At night, once he's asleep, we put him back in his bed. If he does actually take his nap, I let him be-too scared to take the risk of waking him up and having that be the end of the nap! I'm keeping my fingers crossed that this phase doesn't last much longer. We did try to move the bar higher but he was able to get over it. At this point we would rather not put the crib side back up-I'd be too afraid he's try and climb over it and injure himself.

I guess there's always some adjustments we're making! Always learning and adapting. He continues to be more verbal every week-always new words and actions. We're having great weather right now so Nate has gotten the chance to enjoy his birthday gifts-especially the tricycle! Gosh I can't even imagine life without it, he loves riding it all around.

After a long day I'm off to catch some TV now that Nate is sleeping. Aaah, peace! The simple things today make us happy!

Happy Birthday!

Today is Nate's second birthday! I'm so happy we got it off to a good start (more on that in another post next week!) Nate slept reasonably well, I made him one of his favorite breakfasts-french toast-then we went off to another park to celebrate his special day with our friends. We had a blast! The weather was a little chilly but beautiful and we were so happy to see and play with so many friends. This time mommy made him vanilla/sprinkle confetti cupcakes.





Afterwards we came home and I made him some macaroni and cheese-another favorite. Then the little man proceeded to take a nap without making a peep! Pooped out from the morning fun. Once he woke up, we took a walk to feed ducks (one of his favorite animals) and we went and played at our neighborhood park. We got home and he spent a long time in the backyard riding around on his tricycle. Soon we will be leaving to take him out to NYPD-a good pizza joint for dinner (a favorite food since he was a year old!) He has a few more goodies and cards to open there yet. Then it's back home to spend some quality time with his daddy before he hits the sheets for the evening. It has been his kind of day for sure!

More next week after he visits his pediatrician for his two year visit. Happy Valentines Day!

Nathan's Disney Birthday Party!

We had such a great time at Tumbleweed Park with our families yesterday celebrating punkin's 2nd birthday! It had been calling for rain so I was hoping it wouldn't rain on our parade...and luckily it didn't and the weather was superb! It was such a nice sunny and breezy morning for playtime and celebration. I got to the park early with my parents to set up, we had pizza and salad for lunch (Nate's favorite), had a awesome chocolate chip cookie from a local cakery, opened gifts and of course spent a ton of time playing on the playground. Nate was so happy to have his family around (especially when everyone serended him with Happy Birthday-he was in awe!) and blew out his candles on his own! He happily played with his new toys as he received them, especially his new tricycle that mommy and daddy got him. It was a good thing we decided to build it ahead of time to let him use it at the park-he was cruising! I would say the only negative about the party was how fast it went-and it felt like Josh and I didn't get to socialize with anyone, not longer than a few seconds anyway. Guess that's how those kinds of things go though.



We got home and I tried putting Nate down for his nap, which he didn't take. I almost didn't think he would with all the excitement. However, since about December now there's one weekend day where he doesn't nap for whatever reason and during the week there's also 1-2 days at least where he doesn't take his nap either. I'm curious to know why since we don't really stray from our "sleepy time" routine. Maybe he is just slowly moving towards not napping, not needing all the sleep. He goes to bed around 7:30-8pm, depending on his nap (or if he doesn't take one at all it's usually 7pm). He acts like he still needs it though so I don't know! One of those things that makes you go hmmm.

Nate's actual birthday is this coming Thursday. We're looking forward to a little party with our friends at a different park that morning-again hoping it doesn't rain!-and plan to take him out for some good pizza that night. Otherwise I'm sure we'll just spend more time outside,hopefully, since that's his favorite place to be.

I think I'm going to start potty training sooner than I thought-he mimics me going potty now, and by surprise he actually went pee in his! It scared the daylights out of him though, now when I've tried to get him back on it he shakes his head. Hmmmm.

Time to get in a run while the weather is good out. I'm doing good on my resolution to work out 4-5 days a week, and just this past week I've started to use My Fitness Pal (a great online tool!) to keep check on my calorie intake. It's been a little bit of a wake up call to see the calories in different foods! I'm not so much restricting the kinds of foods I eat-like carbs or sweets-but at least trying to make sure I don't go over a certain calorie amount. I hope I continue to find motivation to keep it up!

Have a great week!