Summer 2010

I know, it's well into fall but I wanted to finally post some pics and such about our summer.

The pool was a fun summer favorite. They were in our inflatable pool almost every day and on the weekends, we typically went down to my aunt’s house to swim in the big pool.
 
Alex is a pro and swims all over the place. He’ll even jump in from the edge. Over the 4th of July weekend, he jumped in and even went all the way under (without us catching him). Didn’t seem to phase him much. Now he'll do it more willingly, but only once or twice before he's back to "you catch me". Logan is also a little fish. He’ll jump in too, but not quite as dramatically as Alex. Nick on the other hand... Well, he has gone from not even getting in - to getting in but clinging to Grandma for dear life – to holding onto Grandma for dear life, but kicking his feet - to finally letting go of Grandma and swimming. We’re making progress. By the end of the summer he was more comfortable swimming on his own. He's even jumped in a few times too, although from a seated position on the edge of the pool - not standing. Of course, he prefers Grandma through all of this because I will just let him float until he swims to me – much more traumatizing for him :-)

Below is part of a post I started back in July but never finished. Wanted to post it now ...

The things these boys say now! You have to watch what you say because they will repeat you. And they pick out the most random things to repeat. They also point phrases you don’t realize you say quite as much as you do. For a while, whenever you’d ask Alex or Nick something (do you want to ...), they’d respond “yeah, ok, sure” or “sure, why not!”. Recently a big thing we hear a lot is “I said No!” and then a response from a brother (or us) “I said Yes!” and it goes one for a while, back and forth. Cute when it’s between them, not so cute when it’s a fight between us and them!

Meal times are still horrible, but I don’t expect that to change for a while. Logan has chicken fingers/nuggets/etc. for the last 3 or 4 nights in a row (at least) and some lunches too. Oh well, at least he’s eating. Alex can have a meal of only chips or french fries. I know, horrible mom, but at least he eats better at other meals that day! Nick is very particular about his food. Do not, under any circumstance, no matter how much you KNOW he is not going to eat something, take it off his plate. He will throw a fit if he doesn’t get it back – and he doesn’t care if you already ate it – cough it back up right now! A trade doesn’t usually work either. He wants the exact thing you just took. But, meals are only 1.5 ish hours a day, right?! Manageable... I guess...

We started potty training a little over the summer. We didn't push it too much The boys did good for a while, but it never really stuck. Logan has done the best so far, going both #1 and #2 on the potty multiple times. Nick did pretty good at sitting and reading a book, but rarely "did" anything. Alex would sit there, but didn't quite care if he went in the potty or his big boy underwear. But they looked so cute sitting on their chairs reading their books! I figure we'll get back to it soon enough...


This summer we also got to hang out with cousin Halas when he came up for his aunt's wedding. In this picture, we're problably introducing him to The Wizard of Oz.

This was a big favorite for a while. It amazes me how quickly their little brains absorb things. After seeing the movie only once, they were telling me so many of the little details! Now we've seen it so many times that they not only know the songs, but mimic the scarecrow and tin-man dances. Nick followed the chalk "yellow brick road" over and over one day for almost 15 minutes! Our patio isn't that big!

Here a few more of my favorite summer pictures. You can see even more pictures of our summer here. I also updated the side bar on the blog with more pictures.