the Bear is TWO!

TWO years? Say it ain't so.  How has 2 years gone by since we first met this sweet boy?

Barrett is filling out the guesses we made that he would continue to be an active and very talkative boy.  He doesn't slow down, always on the go, imagination always on high, and says SO many words.    We always get remarks from people- "WOW, he talks SO much and so clearly!". He is putting sentences together (as many as 6 words together in a sentence...that actually makes SENSE!) and repeats everything we say.  We laugh all the time at what he comes up with.  We have conversations like adults with him, it's pretty hilarious...and convenient.  We find him playing and talking to his toys like we talk to them ("Be careful!" "You go timeout" etc), and he bosses everyone around-especially Jax.  

Favorite Toys: cars/trucks, his toy kitchen and"making food", balls, his "laptop", foam bath letters, Elmo, toy animals, coloring, and his Power Wheels which I'm sure he will love even more come Spring/Summer!

Favorite Books: The "Bear" Series (The Bear Wants More, Bear's New Friend, Bear Snores On), Goodnight Moon, Sesame Street In Your Neighborhood, Chicka Chicka Boom Boom

Favorite Show: Bubble Guppies, (hands down his fav), Sesame Street, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Daniel Tiger

Favorite song: "Sugar" by Maroon 5, "Old McDonald", and anything on Pandora Nursery Rhymes (starting to like DMB :) )

Favorite food: Snacks. Give him all the crackers, cheerios/kix (mixed together in a bowl please), grapes, oranges, pretzels.  He'd much rather eat a "snack" than a meal.  But also really loves potstickers, fruit, salmon, mac & cheese, spaghetti, veggie straws, and will eat just about anything and everything.

Sleep: Goes to bed at 9 pm(read books and rock with Mom first) and sleeps until 8 ish.  Once he wakes up, he rolls around and talks for awhile before he's ready to actually get up and out.

Naps: Started skipping a nap about 1-2 times per week the month of January before he turned two.  I think it's a combo of not getting enough energy out like being outside all the time in the Summer and sleeping so well at night.  If he doesn't fall asleep, he at least gets quiet time in his crib to roll around and talk and read.  If he does nap, he usually sleeps for about 2 hours. The day after he skips a nap or was at the sitter the day before, he will sometimes takes a 3 hr nap.

Others: 

LOVES to learn.  He actively seeks out opportunities for us to teach him things.  He can count to 20 (sometimes he skips around once he gets past 12 lol, but has correctly counted to 20 numerous times) and counts anything and everything.  Knows every single letter of the alphabet and recognizes his name and Mommy and Daddy and Jax if written out.  He can spit off any letter so quickly if you show him one.  He also sings the alphabet song all the time (his own version haha), and says his letters all day long.  Knows all his shapes and colors too!

He is so compassionate.  When someone gets hurt, he is the first one to run up and put his hand on you and say "you ok?', kiss your boo-boo, and give you a hug.  He has to make sure you're ok before he walks away.

LOVES hugs ("huggies").  He needs one anytime he gets hurt or he will just randomly ask for one multiple times a day ("I needa huggie").  It's the very very best.  He will give you a kiss at the drop of a hat too.

Loves to swim.  He's been in lessons for almost a year now and absolutely loves the water.  He kicks and pulls and will reach out really far and jump/"swim" to you.  He blows bubbles and will float on a back for a little bit.  

Pees on the potty before bath/bedtime and randomly asks to as well, but not actively potty training. 

Has all his teeth except 2 yr molars.

2 year stats:

32 lbs 3 oz

36.5 in

Things he says:

"I'm ok!" 

(every. single. time. he falls down or hits his head on something)

"Come on Mommy, follow me!"

"More Cheerio Kix Mommy please right now?"

"Where my Daddy/Mommy/Jackson Dog go?"

"I go see my Granny/Grandma/Papa"

"A huggie Mommy. A kissy too.  Fank you Mommy"

"Fank you!" and "Pwease"

(He says please for everything and says thank you every single time you hand him something.  It's the sweetest thing ever)

"Whoopsie daisy!"

"Be patient!"

"Haha! Funny goose"

"Yes sir" and "yeah ma'am"

"What?" when he can't hear what you said

Says "Bwess you (name)" if someone sneezes

"'Scuse me" if something is in his way

"Go bye-bye daddy car"

"Hold on Mommy, Bear coming!"

Says "Hi!" to everyone when we are out in a store.  Will say hi and wave and smile :).

Knows his name if you say "what's your name?"

"Paci, arrree you?"
"Hold on Mommy, I go see my Daddy real quick"
"It my birthday now! I wanna have a cake"

We LOVE you so so so much, our little Bear.  Life is just so much sweeter with you in it and we are so thankful for you every single day!

starting 2016 with a bang

Why not start 2016 off with a move to a different city?  We had talked back and forth a few times about moving back home over the course of the last couple years.  Our last conversation was that we would move back by the time Barrett was 5 years old and ready for school.  But then we had a conversation the weekend after Christmas and decided the time was now.  Not gonna lie, it was hard for me to wrap my brain around it.  I love living here.  I love the friends I've made, the gym I teach at and the relationships made through that, Costco, and so many other things that this big city has to offer.  But for Matt, he goes to work M-F and then has weekends off.  He doesn't have those days off during the week like I do to make relationships and ties to this city.  So I totally get it, and I'm totally supportive of moving home, and it's happening...quickly!

We met with our realtor the week after we had our conversation to see what her thoughts were.  We wanted to see when she thought would be a good time to sell.  To our surprise, she said that right now would be best.  Right now?! Apparently it's been a really great selling Winter, and since demand is high but supply is low, we would probably sell fairly quickly and get a good offer.  She wanted to get us on before the Spring selling season started.  So I spent a week and a half getting things packed in boxes and the house cleaned, organized, and ready to show!

Our house listed on Thursday evening (1/21), and we had a showing already scheduled for the next day just hours after we listed.  WHAT?! My anxiety was sky-high.  I couldn't believe it.  I wanted the whole process to go slowly so I could ease my brain into it, but that didn't happen. We had another one pop up for Saturday, and two for Sunday!  We got some great feedback from the showings, but no offers yet.  It was a slow next week of no showings, which was nerve-wrecking, but a request popped up Thursday evening for Friday morning (who ended up being the ones who put in an offer!), and one for Sunday evening.  Showing your home is quite exhausting.  Making sure it's in tip top shape every single time you leave the house just in case one pops up.  One of our showings only gave us an hour notice!  We had to get Jax up to our mom's houses so he wouldn't be stressed with the showings and then lug Barrett out of the house somewhere for an hour while it showed.  Our first showing, Jax was still home, so I took both boys to Petsmart for the evening to look at all the animals and walk around :).

We had been looking at houses in Lafayette, but weren't sure if we'd be able to time it out right.  We had no clue how quickly we'd sell and where we would live if we sold before we bought.  It was quite stressful.  We found a house we really liked, but when we went up to see it we found out it had an accepted offer on it placed the day before.  Boo!  We saw a couple others, but didn't love them.  We saw a few more, and found another we really liked.  A house we wanted to see had an offer pending that popped up that morning, so it was out.  Man, houses are flying!  We saw the one we liked and ended up loving it even more.  It was definitely my #1.  We saw a few more houses through the week/weekend and found another one that we both really liked.  We got more info on it, and received info that it had a pending offer as of the day before even though it'd been on the market for 3 months! Grr. This was just frustrating.  So we were back to the other house we loved.  We were still looking for other homes, because this one already had an offer on it but it was confintgent on the buyers selling their home.  Our realtor advised us that we should sell our home first, then make an offer if we still wanted it.

Once we were noticing the trend of how quickly houses were going, we knew we had to jump on this one.  It was such a perfect match for us.  Close to the interstate but out in the woods by the creek, close to our moms, beautiful area, gorgeous house we could grow in to, community park/pool, etc.  We got pre-approved with our bank just in case.  But now we just had to wait on an offer for our house and hope that no one else put another offer on this home.

We went back up to look at some houses on Saturday, and that evening got a call as we were driving around looking at other houses that we....had an offer!! Woohoo!!  It ended up being a great offer, nearly our asking price, and we said YES!  We were SO excited! Our house sold in 9 days! (8.5 to be exact :) )  Next step...put an offer on the other house!

We scheduled a second showing for Sunday morning to go see it one more time.  We got the call it was approved and had to leave church early.  We headed up north with Barrett.  About 15 minutes into the drive, he got sick all over the backseat :(.  Great timing, bud.  We got him all cleaned up and continued our trek (with a naked baby in the back haha).  We made it to the showing 15 minutes before it was over and took another look around.  We still loved it and felt like it was the right move.  We met at the park nearby and went over our offer with our realtor and sent it off! We set the deadline to that night by 9 pm so we could hear back before they could get anymore offers (they had multiple showings that weekend), but they said they couldn't get back until the next day by 1 pm.  Ugh.  We unhappily agreed and just waited.  We were so nervous!  And annoyed that they may have just been waiting on more offers to come in.

Matt came home on his lunch break so we could receive the response together.  1 o'clock hit and still nothing,  We got an email at 1:06 pm. Boo.  But at least it was a counter offer! They barely budged on the price, but we made a plan, wrote a counter, and sent it right back.  We gave them until the next day (Tuesday) at noon, but although we fully expected them to take the whole time they wrote a counter back that night around 8 pm!  We looked it over and decided if we really wanted to house we needed to go for it.  We sent back and accepted offer that night! Woohoo!!

So now we wait for appraisals and inspections on both homes.  Cross fingers for good news both ways!  The plan is to close on both homes AND move on the same day.  Yikes!

Christmas Festivities

Christmas and everything leading up to it was so much fun and so special.  We started with a night of cookie making and decorating with Granny!  Barrett would've much rather eaten the cookies and sprinkles than decorate them....maybe next year :).  He did help to frost a couple and liked being able to do the sprinkles all by himself.  And doing a taste test of course!

The next weekend, we went to Sullivan Hardware store for the Sullivan Santa Express with our friends (including Barrett's buddy Nolan).  The boys LOVED it!  It was little boy heaven.  A sand table while we waited, a ride on a train, a visit to Santa (which they weren't exactly thrilled about), and train tables and coloring while they waited for him.  Watching Barrett see Santa was hilarious.  He wasn't sure about him, but ended up giving him a high five and a hug. He was just not a fan of sitting on his lap.  Luckily, we managed to get a couple pictures :).

Mommy and Bear had an ornament decorating party...

Christmas started the weekend before at Grandma's house.  It is always so nice to be them, especially to watch Barrett and his cousins play together! Everytime we get together is even more fun than the last time.  B and Abby had a fun jumping on the bed session that night :).  The kiddos loved opening their gifts, but we only had a little time before the littlest needed a rest break.  B's favorite toy was a big dump truck! He pushed it all over the house.  All weekend long.  He loved putting the wrapping paper and any other trash in it and pushing it around.  Grandma definitely spoils her kids and grandkids!

On sunday we all went to church together and then had a yummy breakfast at Christo's.  I think Bear out-ate everyone.  After breakfast we went to my aunt's house for our family Christmas! I just love getting together with everyone.  We always have so much fun!  It's crazy to see how big all the kids are getting and so fun to see the next generation of little ones growing up.  Bear loved the "bowling alley" in the basement and the kitchen in the toy room.  But his favorite place is always the center of all the action :).

We had our little family Christmas Eve on Christmas Eve Eve so we could get everything in we wanted to over the holiday and not be rushing.  It ended up making the holiday seem to last forever which was so awesome.  We started off the evening by driving through the Reynold's Christmas Light display.  Bear was entranced.  He stared out the window and pointed out the train and tree and animals in lights.  After the lights we went for a family dinner to City BBQ! It was soooo good.  B gobbled up his pulled chicken, sweet potato, green beans, and french fries.  We headed home and got our pi's on, let him open up 1 gift (the mini Keurig, toaster, and mixer were a HIT! And little did he know it would go right along with his gift from Granny the next day.)  We set cookies out for Santa and carrots for the reindeer and read our books ('twas the night before Christmas and Bear Stays Up for Christmas) and put the bear to bed.

Santa's elves worked hard to put together B's big gift-a power wheels dune racer!  We were torn on whether to get it for him this year or next, but he LOVEs and has so much fun on our neighbors jeep that we decided this coming Spring and Summer would be perfect for it.  And he could use it for more years this way.  

Christmas morning we got up with Bear and showed him the little video clips we made on the Kringle app showing Santa eating cookies, leaving gifts, and checking his list.  He loved it!  Matt carried him downstairs and set him down to see the tree.  I think it was a combo of being overwhelmed, tired, and still having a cold that made his reaction not what we expecting haha.  He cried and kept saying "no" to the tree.  We coaxed him over by telling him to come see how Santa ate his cookies.  That reeled him right in! He wanted to check that out since it involved food.  (All the rest of the day and any other time you show him Santa he right off the bat says "cookies? mouth?" I think that's the only thing he understood about Christmas this year).

Once he saw the power wheels, he said "tractor!".  He climbed in next to BrownBear and we let him drive it back and forth in the living room.  He was in heaven!  That afternoon, both grandmas came down.  We took the dune racer outside and let him drive around the yard.  It was SO cute! While he napped, Matt and Granny put together his kitchen.  It was another big hit with him! He played with it all day and hasn't stopped playing with it since.  We went to Christmas Eve candlelight service and then came home and had an incredible filet dinner!

 

The next day (Christmas day, but the day after Christmas for us :) ), we drove to Ohio and spent the day with Papa and Ann.  We opened gifts and Bear was spoiled once again with a new balance bike! I figured by next Summer he'd be able to try it, but we put his elbow and knee pads on and let him have at it.  He knew exactly what to do! This Summer is going to be so FUN! Afterwards, we went out for a hibachi lunch.  B loved watching the fire and the chef cooking the food.  It was so yummy and fun to be together.

A very Merry Christmas indeed :)