Practice Camping

Arthur has been off the hook for taking Tyler on the annual father/son camp out. Tyler really would not have fared well and frankly, I don't think Arthur would have fared very well, either. So, we had decided to wait a few years until we were confident both of them would be able to survive the night without killing each other!

Well, Tyler is almost 5 and has really matured quite a bit in the last few years. Arthur is almost 33 and has also really matured as a father! So, we decided to do a trial run in the back yard to see how they would do. Since the safety of the home was just steps away, Dylan was included in this test as well!

Arthur got home from work really late, so there was not much time to do any official camping activities. Once the tent was set up, it was already dark and time for bed. The kids got their jammies on and loaded up with their trail mix snack. They snuggled into their sleeping bags and then watched Bolt on the portable DVD player. These kids really are spoiled when it comes to "roughing it"!

Despite the constant dog howling, thunder/bombing (not sure what this is), and psycho bird noises we have in our neighborhood, the boys were sound asleep by 10:15. They woke up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed at 6:15 in the morning. Although Arthur did not sleep very well, they all had a great night together. As soon as Dylan woke up, he sat up and said, "That was fun camping, Daddy!"

Major props to Arthur for being such a great dad!

Flashlights are clearly only to be used as Lightsabers
Once all the Storm Troopers had been slayed, the boys could nestle safely into their sleeping bags
Enjoying the movie and snack

Easter Hunt

I kept my promise from last year and did not give into the temptation of attending the local Egg Hunt sponsored by the city. Even though the money spent does support a good cause, I just couldn't put the kids through another disappointing egg hunt. So, a few of us decided to get together and plan our own Egg Hunt that would guarantee each child a certain number of eggs per child. Even though the logistics of egg division was a little tricky, it was definitely worth the work!

The bigger kids had to really hunt for their eggs in the lower level of our yard. The Dads really did a good job of hiding them, but then had the task of helping find some of the harder ones.

On the top level, the younger kids had it easy!
Dylan and JulieDylan and Tanner
At one point during the hunt, we looked over and saw buddies Dylan and Tanner enjoying the candy from their eggs together. Those sneaky boys!
After the hunt, we had all the kids gather for a picture (thank you Nicole - I stole this from your blog) and lunch

Nudie Days

Well we have officially started potty training Dylan all over again. After multiple accidents and his constant refusal to tell me when he needs to go, I am at my wits end. So, Arthur suggested we do nudie mode. With Tyler, it was really easy because we just stayed inside for a month while I let him run around naked most of the day. Now that our lives are a bit more busy, I obviously can't keep Dylan nude all day. He has to wear clothing! But, Arthur is right. I think it is the only way. So, Dylan will be nude when we are home.

And I had major progress today! He had just finished 2 cups of milk, so I knew he was primed and ready to go. We were working on letters, and he was shaking and wiggling a ton. But, I didn't ask him if he needed to go. I just sat as if I had no idea he was holding it. The letter-learning took a major downward turn as he was so distracted with holding his bladder. After 10 minutes of wiggle jiggles, I really thought an accident would happen. I mean how long could he put it off? Finally, after 5 unsuccessful attempts at locating the letter K, he had had enough. He looked at me and said, "Mommy, I need to go poo-poo!"

A big "WOO HOO" came out of my mouth! I was so happy to hear those words come out of his mouth! I have learned that there is a big difference between being potty trained and just having a strong bladder. I am really hoping that this will be the trick for him. I just don't want to have to show up at elementary school every 3 hours to take him to the restroom!

P.S. I know it has been a while since I have posted pictures. I do have some stuff to post - I just haven't gotten to it. So, hopefully in the next week I will get some more "fun" posts up here!

Overheard Today...

In order to get the humor in this, you must understand 2 things:

1. Arthur has a brother named Aaron
and
2. Dylan and I run with my friend, Jennifer, once a week.


Me: We are going to run a few errands today.
Dylan: We going to see Uncle Aaron??
Me: No, when I said "run some errands", I meant to say was that we need to go to Target.
Dylan: Then we going running with Jennifer?


Poor kid was so confused.

A Bit of Progress

Well the Progress Charts have been filled in! The Disneyland trip is planned and the boys are so proud of themselves. But, there is still a lot of work to do.

I have to say that I am most impressed with Tyler's swimming. Wearing his goggles has helped him to not be afraid to put his face in the water and now he is having so much more fun. He is trusting the instructors and relaxing a bit. I still am not convinced that he will actually learn to swim this year, but I am just happy that the fear is starting to dissipate.

Dylan, on the other hand, is still a huge work in progress. Yesterday, we had 2 BAD accidents (on the carpet) and just now, he woke up from his nap with wet pants - which ultimately means I have to change his sheets and do a load of laundry. I am not sure where to go with him. Part of me just wants to do what I was doing before and take him to the bathroom regularly on my own. We were doing so well and were accident-free for months! The other part wonders if this will just contribute to his inability to recognize or communicate to me when he needs to go.

Oh the joys of parenting!

Goggles, Wet Pants and Progress Charts

So, I have finally given up. All the bribing in the world has stopped working. Goodbye Jamba Juice rewards, sticker rewards on the shirt are useless, and candy is out of the question. My boys have gotten LAZY!!!

Let's start with Dylan. After Dylan showed interest in potty training at 22 months, I was determined not to give into the temptation to start. But after conversations with a few of my friends, I felt it was a good idea to strike while the iron was hot, and attempt potty training at 25 months. I gave it 1 week. I convinced myself that he would fail, and then I would be off the hook for at least another 6 months. Well, that stinker of a perfect child didn't have a single accident the entire week. So, we kept it up. After 1 month, there were only a handful of accidents and life was GREAT!! He was doing both jobs, telling me when he needed to go and only needed a Pull Up for sleeping time. I said goodbye to our diapers and was proud to say that I had 2 potty trained children!

Well that all changed about 3 months ago. Dylan became LAZY! The kid has amazing control, so he would just hold it for hours on end. By the time an accident was probably inevitable, we would be going out the door, and I would just take him on my own. Then he would hold it again up until nap time, when I would take him on my own again. He didn't have to come tell me anymore when he needed to go and started to just rely on me to take him every 3 hours or so. Well, as is the case with life, our schedules began to change and life got busy. Not to mention, I became pregnant and was out of commission for a few months. The accidents started to pour into our life (quite literally, I might add). The kid refused to tell me when he needed to go. Wet pant after wet pant and I had had enough. I started to reward him with stickers for every time he would go in the toilet, but his lazy habit was still more overpowering. Wet pants ruled over stickers on his shirt.

Now let's switch to Tyler: As most of you know, this is our stubborn child. We started swim lessons last summer and I was just happy that he was getting in the water without screaming at me. This year, I want to see PROGRESS!! So, I decided that he needed to wear goggles to help him learn to not be afraid to put his face in the water. We practiced wearing them at home and in the bath. When lessons started, I bribed him with a Jamba Juice if he would wear his goggles. No go. The next lesson, I bribed him with a special lunch to McDonald's. No go. I decided I would not let his refusal to wear the goggles get to me. He would just miss out on special treats. Well, apparently he didn't care about Jamba Juice or McDonald's. Sure, he would pout when we would go directly home after lessons, but after a few minutes, he would be happily playing with his trains forgetting the entire incident. And this really started to bug me! How was I going to get him to wear those goggles??

I know, I know - I am the last mom to use progress charts. It seems just too easy and would my kids really care about putting a sticker on a piece of paper?? I doubted the effectiveness. But, I was desperate! So, I put together 2 charts for the boys. Tyler would get 1 sticker for every time that he wore his goggles to swim class. Dylan would get 1 sticker for every time he TOLD me that he had to go the bathroom. If they made it through the entire chart, a picture of Mickey Mouse signified a trip to Disneyland with Daddy!

Well, as I figured, Tyler had no interest in the chart. 2 more lessons passed without goggles. Dylan, on the other hand, embraced the idea. At least once a day, he would tell me needed to go to the bathroom. And you know, as much as I can't stand the sibling rivalry that is present in our home, it actually has worked to encourage Tyler! He started to get jealous and wanted to see stickers on his chart. Currently, Dylan has 7 of his 12 slots filled and Tyler has 2 out of 5! I am a true believer in progress charts now! Looks like Arthur is going to have to find time in his busy life for trip to Disneyland soon!

100 DAYS??

I really hate that babystrology baby counter on my blog. I am thinking I need to remove it because it is just not helping things.

100 days left?? Are you kidding me? That is eternity! How is my belly so huge already?

Bad Words

This morning, Dylan and I were in the car on the way home from our morning run. Dylan never wants to go home when we are out and about. So, I am trying to find a way to avoid the mild crying fit (it is Dylan after all) every time we go up the road to our house. Today, I tried to get him excited about going home to play with his toys. Here is the conversation we had:

Dylan: Mommy, we going home?
Me: Yes, but you will get to play with your balls and trucks!
Dylan: No go home! (crying begins)
Me: It's ok because we will have to pick up Tyler from school soon. So, we will get to ride in the car again! For now, you get to play with your toys or read books if you want!
Dylan: Me watch tv??
Me: No, we'll play with toys and read books instead. That is much more fun.
Dylan: Mommy, don't say that bad word!
Me: I said a bad word?
Dylan: Yes, you said "no watch tv" and that is a bad word. Mommy, No Say That Bad Word!

Since I use that phrase very often during the day, I'll probably have to prepare myself for lots of soap in my mouth!

Spoiled by the Grandparents

Last week, Arthur was at Game Developer Conference in San Francisco. He spent the week schmoozing with representatives from different game companies learning about all the newest technology trends in game making. So, I took the boys to visit their grandparents.

The timing was perfect. The town where my parents live was celebrating the grand opening of a much needed bridge across the river. It was an opportunity to take advantage of the beautiful scenery and get outside with the kids.

As I uploaded these pictures, I realized that I am not good at covering all the events. We got to spend quality time with Arthur's grandparents, parents and brothers, as well as my parents, my sister and her 3 boys. I don't have pictures to show all these people, but the boys were so happy. There were some tears shed on the car ride home when they realized that it would be a long time till we would get to have so much fun with family again.

3 of the 5 boy cousins squished onto Grandpa's chair:

At dinner with Arthur's family, the boys decided that they would only look at the camera while making funny faces:

Crossing the new bridge. This is 5 minutes from my parents house. You can see the dam in the distance. Thankfully, the boys are too young to make jokes using the word "dam"!

This is the other side of the bridge. If you look closely, you can see a famous prison on the left bank of the river. This is also 5 minutes from my parents house, but surprisingly, the town is extremely safe to live in. I am not sure why the prisoners get to live in such a prime and beautiful location, though!

Dim Sum with Arthur's family. Arthur's grandparents were here and I wish I got a picture with them.

After filling our bellies at Dim Sum, the kids entertained themselves by jumping off an art sculpture at the nearby college campus (Grandpa's workplace):

When we got to the campus, Grandma and Grandpa Shek were sad to realize that it was Spring Break already and the Student Union was closed. Of course, they couldn't back down on the promised ice cream treat for the boys! So, we headed to Leatherby's for a late afternoon snack!

Sports Blitz

Our city has a Sports Blitz class for kids ages 4-6. Tyler had a blast learning a little bit about soccer, t-ball, and flag football. Of course, his favorite part of class was anytime he got to run!

Here are a few pictures from their last day of class:

All the boys listening intently to Coach Andy:

Well maybe one of them got a little distracted by the photographer:

And he is off!

Nice Form:

Score!

Random Crazy

I haven't posted in FOREVER and finally got around to downloading the pictures from one of the cameras to our computer. These pictures have no order or relationship with each other, but I just wanted to post them:

I can't seem to get Tyler to wear his goggles during his swim lessons, but he sure has fun wearing them around the house. Here he is practicing his range of emotions at lunch time:

I came home from jogging one morning to find that Tyler had constructed this "Rocket Launcher" all by himself using Tinker Toys. It is quite impressive considering the poor kid doesn't have any play guns, and had to use his own creativity!

I have to say that with his hair pulled back like this, Dylan resembles Roger Federer:

This day, the boys decided they wanted to be twins in every way possible:

I will try to be better at posting. Plus, my other camera is full of pictures. The problem is that it doesn't want to turn on. I need to enlist Arthur's help in getting the pictures off of it.

Baby #3 is a...

By the way, we found out last week that the baby to be born in 144 days (dang babystrology baby-counter) will be a BOY!

P.S. We are accepting name* suggestions.

*The names Jarman and Sherma will be omitted from consideration

Portraits

Our good friend, Nancy, took some great pictures of us before the holidays. Our intention was to use one of them for our Christmas cards. Unfortunately, we got too busy and lazy to send one out this year. Please don't take us off your card list for next year! We promise to get them out next year!

Anyways, there were so many good ones. Here is a sample of my personal favorites:

Love Affair with a Garage

As Valentine's Day is upon us, I thought I would share a love story. But, this is not your ordinary love story. It is the story of the love between a little boy and a garage:

It all started a few years ago while visiting my parent's house. Even at 12 months , Tyler was extremely interested in being able to open and close the garage. He would beg to be granted the right to push the button at all hours of the day. Unlike the one at our house, my parents had a "newer" garage - the kind that runs up and down on a track and has windows. Our garage door at home was an old wooden door that simply lifted up and stuck outside of our garage. It had no windows and was apparently not too interesting for Tyler. Sure, he enjoyed pushing the button, but he would not beg at all hours to watch the garage open and close.

The nursery leaders at church told us about how he would sit for long periods of time in front of the "Little People House" that had a garage door. He would stare at it, and move his little cars in and out of that garage slowly opening and closing the door with such concentration!

I searched stores for a toy that had a garage door, so that he would have as much enjoyment at home, but was not able to find a single one. Unfortunately, the "Little People House" had been updated years ago and did not have the movable garage door anymore. I was even tempted to purchase one on Ebay, but the prices were just too crazy to justify it. Besides, this was just a phase, right?

Fast forward 3 years, and Tyler still is obsessed with garages. When we drive up and down our street, he likes to tell me which houses have opened or closed doors. If one is moving, he will scream until I stop the car and allow him to watch it.

A few weeks ago, our old garage door completely broke. This was an answer to Tyler's little prayers as we now could upgrade to a newer model. There is a whole new level of excitement over our garage! I cannot tell you how many times a day Tyler will ask me questions like, "So Mom, how do you like our new garage?" or he'll say, "Do you know that our new garage has windows?" or "Do you think the light on the garage will turn on soon?". This happens at least 3-4 times a day! When we are getting ready to go somewhere, Tyler will schedule whether it is his or Dylan's turn to open or close the garage. But, when we are in the car on our way home, he always lets Dylan close it. This is because he can run inside the house and watch the door close from our front window!

I am not sure how long this affair will continue, but I wanted to make sure that we don't forget Tyler's first true love.

Happy Valentine's Day, Tyler. I will let you open and close that door as much as you want on February 14th!


***Oh yes, and as I pulled up our blog to post this,Tyler asked me to click on the picture of Arthur with the Sparkler's (from the post below). Once the picture enlarged, he whispered in my ear, "Do you see the garage in the picture, Mom?"