Happy Birthday, My Love!

I'm making a rare appearance on our blog to simply say, Happy Birthday, Sweetpea!

We began dating shortly after this day 10 years ago and it's easy to say that the last 10 years have been the most fun of my life.  The next 10, I bet, will be even better than these and I'm confident it will only get better from that day forward.  See, God has blessed us immensely already and the more we learn about His love and the more we learn about each other.. it's a tasty recipe for a wonderful life.

Thank you, honey, for being my friend and my love.  Here's to the next 10 years!

No post is complete without some photos, so enjoy!

Lisa and her dad, maybe a day old or so at the hospital.  Look at that cute round face!

Lisa and me in college at a game or something.

Likely my favorite picture of all time.  Hadn't been dating long, but we were at a church retreat, enjoying the view from atop a ropes course platform.  Even then, we knew how well we fit together.  I love you, Sweetpea!

Happy 3rd Birthday, Caleb!

Caleb is 3!!!!!!!!!!!!

Three years ago we got the most wonderful gift - becoming parents to the greatest boy we could ever imagine.  We always knew Caleb was special.  Don't all parents think that about their kids?  It's true.  Every kid is special.  But we get the privilege of raising Caleb and seeing him grow up.  We get a front row seat to see his cute personality, gifts and talents, and how wonderfully God created him.  He's very compassionate, nurturing with Nathan (sometimes), and very sensitive to others' feelings.  And it's nothing we've done.  He's just that way.  He fills our lives with joy, and makes us smile every night after we tuck him in and talk about all the funny or cute things he did that day. 

Caleb loves to read, sing, play outside, help me with dishes, help me sort socks, and help Daddy with anything.  He loves going to see friends.  He just started to sleep with his bear at bedtime.  He wakes up happy in the morning, but still wakes up crying after almost every nap.  He's learning how to share with Nathan, and also how to manipulate Nathan into playing with something else so he can play with the thing that he wants.  He likes routine.  It's hard to explain his delightful personality in words.  Sometimes David and I talk about how you can't describe how precious he is, you just have to experience it.  I can't convey that cute face he made the other day, or how it felt when he kissed my cheek and hugged my neck.  I can write down the things he says, but not the exact way he says it.

I can't believe how much I've forgotten already in these last three years.  It's really hard to remember Caleb as an infant.  And even when I look at pictures, it's hard to remember holding him and rocking him when he was like that.  Parenting is full of difficult phases, and many times parents look forward to the next phase of growing up.  But lately, I'm very thankful for "right now."  Because I know it'll be gone before I know it!  Man, my boys getting older sure makes me sappy!!!!  :)

We successfully navigated through the "terrible twos."  While, I'm sure he is on the more compliant side of the spectrum, we still had lots of battles.  I'm going to let him know that now that he is three, he has to go easy on me...I only have 9 more months until Nathan turns two! 

Here are some pics from his birthday party day.  :)

Caleb helped Daddy make birthday pancakes for breakfast.

Daddy made one in the shape of a 3 for Caleb!

Nathan liked them too.

Opening presents.

Thomas stuff - always a hit!

This might sound kind of lame, but one of the presents we gave Caleb was our old digital camera.  It was David's from college.  The display screen on the back is so small.  But it still works, and he loves it!  He took pictures of everything.  I'm thinking of occasionally doing some blog posts of Caleb's journeys documented with his pictures.  He has a great picture-taking stance that cracks us up.

He picked a Cars theme again.  :)

He loved everyone singing to him.

He actually blew out all the candles!  with 3+ tries  :)

Family pic.

Mmmm.

Taking more pictures.

Riding his new bike the next day.

Playing with his new 3D puzzle.  Hehe.  I'm pretty sure the makers of these glasses could have made them cooler, but they wanted to give parents a good laugh.  :)

My Would-be Tweets

I'm not on Twitter.  And even though I'm on Facebook, I don't update my status everyday with things going on.  But I do text David often throughout the day to tell him how things are going or what we're doing.  I was scanning through some old texts and laughing.  I thought, these could probably be my tweets...if anyone besides David cared to read them.  Although, I'm not sure what my tweets would really be because when you know other people are reading them, it changes things.  So here are a few from the last few weeks.  I just picked random ones, mostly funny ones about the kids.  (We also text boring logistical stuff and sweet lovey things, but I didn't think you would care to see those.)

(About raking leaves in the yard): I raked into a few big piles for you.  They'll probably all be blown away before to tomorrow though.  Or by Caleb "raking" them with his hockey stick. 

(The next morning after going to bed super late after a party.  We had leftover dessert.):  I've given up.  I already feel like crap.  Lemon layers for breakfast.

(After leaving Barnes and Noble): Caleb was so good in the store.  He loves books.  He got a Thomas the Train Valentine's book.  Nathan, on the other hand, pulls all of the books off the shelves.  It'll be fun to go to places like this in a year or so when Nathan has a longer attention span.

I think Caleb's in a pancake daze - he ate 4!

Oh my goodness!  Nathan just looked at the cow and said, "cah moo moo."

(After a huge storm) I just trudged through some water and fetched our trash can from around the corner. 

Snarf.  I don't think the spaghetti pie turned out good.  The noodles are overcooked and mushy.  :(  (Actually, it was overcooked, but still ok enough to eat.)

I just taught Nathan how to say "please" in sign language.  He's so cute!

Hahahaha!  Modern Family.  (I texted this to David while I was watching it and he was at church.  Our new favorite show.)

Caleb was awake when I went to get him this morning.  He was smiling.  I said, "What are you doing?"  He said, "I'm laying in a nest."  And sure enough, his blankies were circled in a nest and he was laying in the middle.

This morning Caleb was eating his "en-ga-lish" muffin, and he said, "this is so huger!" because one side was bigger than the other.  :)

(We were all super sick last week.  And I was the worst this day.)  Oh my gosh.  Everyone is miserable here.  Going on a wagon ride to hopefully break up the crying.  Just wish someone could pull me too.

Nathan just had the worst. poop. ever.  Black blueberry poop.  Looked like he was wearing black underwear.  And there were so many particles, I couldn't even get them all off with the 200 wipes I used.
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Hehehe.  Sorry to leave that as my last one and give you that lovely visual image.  :)

More funnies!

Wow, I don't think I've ever had this many posts in a row before.  But they boys have been doing so many cute things lately.

Funny things Caleb has said:

Caleb has read Charlie Brown's Christmas a ton this season.  He had a book with audio buttons on it, and he loved it!  Then David got a free Charlie Brown Christmas phone app, where you can manipulate the characters and flip the pages.  So yesterday, out of the blue, he sang the entire first verse of Hark the Herald Angels Sing, and ended with "Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown!"  Then he came over to me and said, "My own dog's gone commercial.  I just don't understand it."  hahaha!

He told Nathan that he was "not very happy" that he was touching the tv plug, and that Nathan needed to "go over here ad sit next to the wall."

He wanted me to go up in the playroom with him, but I asked if he would clean the books up downstairs first.  He said he couldn't.  I told him that I would finish cleaning the dishes, and he could clean up the books, and then we could go up together once it was all clean.  So he started cleaning up and said in the most exuberant voice, "Mommy, are you so very happy??!!"

In our one of our books, he called the chihuahua and "chi-wow-wow."  hehe.  And he knew it was funny!

And here is a short Nathan video.  He loves to roar when I ask him what the animals say.  He's also added the words book, baby, and blueberry (bu-ber) to his vocabulary.

New trick for bedtime and a video

I just thought I'd pass along a new trick that has worked for us with Caleb.  Recently, when we would tell him it's time for a nap or bed, he'd flop like a wet noodle on the floor and say, "I don't want to go to bed."  :(  Sad.  He eventually would, but I was tired of the coaxing and whining.  So now I set our microwave timer (or my phone if we are upstairs) and tell him, "Caleb, when you hear the beep, it's time to go to bed."  And it's truly magical.  When hears it, he hops up and gets ready to go!  And it doesn't matter if I set it for 10 minutes or 30 minutes away.  It works.  I can't guarantee it will work for everyone, but if you're dealing with the same thing as us, you might as well give it a try!  :)

And here is a video from our library time.  After all the songs and the story, they let the kids run under the parachute.  They love it!  Nathan even gets in there with the big kids!  He's the one crawling on the ground with the red sleeves, and Caleb is next to him with the olive green sweatshirt and blue pants.