No more pull-ups!

We are so proud of Gavin!!  I never thought the day would come but we are now wearing underwear to bed.  He got really into the links rewards incentive again and the main thing we were giving out links for was if he woke up dry to encourage him to go potty before bed each night since this used to be quite the struggle.  He got really into this and has been waking up dry most of the time over the past week.  Then on Wednesday he really wanted to wear his underwear to bed.  I was hoping to wait until the weekend just in case he did have an accident but decided to let him try since he really wanted to but was a little nervous for how the night would go.  Around 11:30 I heard him cry out on the monitor and thought oh no, he wet the bed.  So then I checked the video monitor and saw that he was out of bed so I jumped out of bed and snuck into the hallway to see what was going on and was shocked to see that he got out of bed and went to the bathroom all by himself, went potty and then got right back into bed and went to sleep.  I just could not believe it because he usually won’t even leave his room even if he is awake until we come get him.  He’s been wearing underwear to bed for the last 4 nights and has only had one little accident and even gets up in the morning by himself and will go potty and then crawl back in bed until it’s time for him to get up.  For a reward he got brand new superhero undies which he loves and we are so happy to be done with the pull-ups!

Update - so I totally jinked myself by writing this post because afterwards he woke up wet 2 nights in a row :(.  We then tried a few nights of waking him up in the middle of the night and having him go potty which worked out pretty well except that then it got to the point where if we heard him make any sort of sound we felt like we had to run into his room to get him to the potty before he had an accident.  So we decided to go back to the pull-ups because at least then he was waking up dry and we wouldn't have to remake his bed if he did have an accident so still a work in progress. At least we know he can do it!

Swings

We found a park near our house that has swings and until about 11 they are in the shade so to get out of the house for a little bit even in this awful heat we headed over and the boys had a blast.  Afterwards we went on a little hike around the path and Gavin found all sorts of fun things but it just go too hot so we had to head home.  Looking forward to the cooler weather when we can do more things like this and stay longer.

Elmo, Elmo

Outings

We have been busy and I have been able to go on lots of outings with the boys this week.  I've tried to go somewhere with them each morning to break up the day a little bit since we can't do too much outside due to this awful heat.  On Sunday we were wanting to get out of the house a little so we headed down to Crown Center to check out their free dinosaur exhibit.  We spent about an hour there and both boys had fun playing with the dinosaurs and exploring.  We even lucked out and got our lunch for free because the computers weren’t working at the restaurant we stopped by!  Monday morning the boys and I headed to Deanna Rose Farmstead.  I’ve always heard how nice this place is but we have never been and luckily we got there right when it opened so it wasn’t too hot yet.  The boys loved seeing all the animals and playing on the playground and we even stopped by the ice cream parlor for a yummy snack before heading home.  We’ll definitely be heading back with Dad sometime when it’s a little cooler.  Tuesday we headed to the children’s museum for some more fun and exploring.  Both boys loved the water room and Gavin even made a new friend building a big tower with the blocks and then we had a quick picnic lunch before heading home.  Today we headed to the library for story time.  It was so fun.  We sang songs, played with a parachute and colored pictures.  The boys loved it and they got to check out their first book.  Gavin a dinosaur book and Wyatt a book about farm animals.  Tomorrow we were going to try to go to the zoo but since it’s supposed to have a high of 106 I think that might be out!  Below are some fun pictures from our adventures.

4th of July!

Happy 4th of July!  The boys had so much fun dressing up for the 4th.  We headed to Parkville this year for their parade and lucked out and got a seat in the shade so it really only started to get hot towards the very end and at that point I think both boys were ready to go.  Gavin had eaten way too much candy and Wyatt passed out in the car about instantly.  We were going to try and head to the pool that afternoon but both boys ended up taking pretty long naps so we just hung out at home and played.  We were even going to let Gavin stay up and watch some of the firecworks from our front porch but as we were doing a puzzle around his normal bedtime he kept saying that he was tired so he ended up going to bed and missing them and amazingly both boys slept right through all the noise of our neighboors letting them off. 

Sabbatical

Summer is here and we have been busy! I am so lucky to work for a company that allows employees to take a sabbatical after 7 years. I actually reached my 7 years last summer but had to wait 6 months after maternity leave with Wyatt and decided I’d have more fun during the summer than taking it right away in the winter. I started my sabbatical on the 11th with my community service. I volunteered with Harvesters a local food bank doing the food drop off program where I rode around with a driver each morning and picked up donated food from different restaurants and then after we collected all of the food we drove to different shelters to drop it off. It was an amazing experience and everyone was so appreciative of the food we brought. I really hope I get to do it again someday. The next week Jess came to visit and the boys loved playing with her. We had lots of fun shopping, going to a movie and laying out by the pool but I managed to get the worst sun burn just before our trip. Thankfully it did fade after a few days.

We also finally replaced the carpet/linoleum in our master bathroom with tile. I just love how it turned out and makes the room look so much bigger.

On the 22nd Ryan and I left for Cabo for five days. His parents came down and watched the boys and we were a little nervous since this was the first time we’ve ever left both of them for more than one night but they did great and we owe Ryan’s parents big time!!! Cabo was amazing. We stayed at Pueblo Bonita Sunset at my parents timeshare and it was incredible. We both agreed that we definitely will be going back someday and maybe even with the kids. I couldn’t believe how many families were there! I definitely did not get to go on that kind of a vacation when I was little ;). Ryan and I truly enjoyed some quiet time together getting to sit and actually eat our meals, actually getting to sleep uninterrupted all night, sleep in and lounge by the pool all day with drinks in hand. So relaxing but by the end of the trip we were definitely ready to get home and see our boys.

Pool by our room

Sky pool at the very top.  Great view of the ocean.

Marina. Getting ready for our sunset cruise.

 Lunch on the beach.  Was amazing!

The arch and lovers beach.

This is my last week off and I get to play stay at home mom :). We have lots of fun outings planned and so far I am loving it. Friday is the big 3-0 and back to work on Monday. Not sure I’m ready to end this amazing month and head back to the real world.

Elmo and Superheroes

Not sure what it is with Elmo but little kids just love him. Wyatt is 16 months and already in love. I actually didn’t even know that he knew who he was until the other day when we were at the doctor and he pointed to an elmo sticker on the scale and said Elmo. I was shocked! Since then he loves looking at all of our Elmo books and pointing out every elmo he can find and playing with Gavin’s sing and dance Elmo. It is so cute.

As for Gavin move aside dinosaurs and hello superheroes! It all started when they had superhero day at school. We didn’t have anything superhero related so I ran to Walmart quick and got him some spiderman jammies and he loved them and wanted to wear them every day. I think part of it was just that he got to wear jammies to school but he still randomly asks if it’s going to be superhero day. He also has a new friend at school that really likes spiderman so that helped. So now instead of wanting to wear dinosaur shirts everyday (although they are still the backup) he wants to wear either Spiderman or the Avengers and now pretends that he is either spiderman or Venon when playing each night. This is Gavin shooting me with his web shooters :).