Bye Bye Paci

Levi has been pacifier free for 4 days and nights now!! And he's learned to climb out of his crib, so will be moving to a "big boy" bed very soon. He's growing up too quickly.

Ty took Levi on a trip to Minnesota for Ty's cousin's wedding. When they got home, we told Levi that he left his paci on the airplane. It took him a few minutes to realize that his paci was gone forever (which was heartbreaking to watch), and he cried pretty hard for a few minutes, but then he quit suddenly and went to sleep. He asked for it once each of the next 2 days, then quit asking for it! He's such a laid back kiddo.

I LOVE the age Levi is right now. Here are a few things I want to remember about him at age 2:

• I love how he wants to do everything by himself. He always says, "No help help." He wants to walk down stairs with no help and tries to buckle his seat belt like his big brother. 
• I love how he is extremely polite. He almost always says "thank you" after you give him anything. 
• He's such a smart kid - he's working pretty hard on his numbers (but he conveniently always skips the number 2), knows most of the ABC song, and is getting more consistent with his colors. He's light years ahead of where Colt was at this point (probably since he's the 2nd kid), so it makes us think he's a genius :) 
• I love how sweet Levi is to Tatum. He is protective of her when other kids try to look at her in the carseat. He frequently lays on the floor to play with her and daily smothers her with hugs and kisses.

But, I gotta say, as much as I love this kid, he not always peaches and cream. Like right now, he must have known I was going to write this post, b/c he is standing at his bedroom door screaming, an hour after his bedtime, asserting his newfound-crib-escaping freedom. Ah, the ups and downs of life with a 2-year-old. 

Our intro to ShowBiz

It's been over a year ago, but Levi was filmed for a commercial. Since that's blog-worthy around our house, I thought it was about time to mention it. A friend from church is a producer and was filming a commercial for a new baby skin care company. He needed babies in Levi's age range, so we volunteered. I'm always up for exposing my kids to new opportunities, even at 10 months of age! 

The premise of the commercial was that most skin care products have toxic chemicals in them, but this new company has all natural and organic ingredients. Levi was with his friend, Skylyn, in the bathtub scene. They played with toys and soapy bubbles and had lots of fun! 

Levi had a chemical symbol drawn on him, since he was being washed with "toxic" soap in the bathtub.

Here's the little cutie! 

It turned out that the commercial was never released in full form because some big dogs in the  skincare arena were upset that the bottles used in the commercial looked very similar to theirs. Litigation always ties things up. Fortunately, we were given a copy on DVD for our family to look at, and for Levi to watch one day. He really was a natural! He kept walking to the front of the bathtub and would flirt with the camera :) It was a really fun experience, and I think I was pretty laid back as the mom of the superstar. 

Marble painting and other random acts

The goody bag we gave at Levi's b-day party included the following marble painting kit. My boys have been loving painting with it, almost daily. 

 Just squirt some paint on the paper in an aluminum pan (or a shoebox works too). Add marbles. And ROLL! 

Levi's finished work of art.

We also have this game called the Stomp Rocket that the boys love. You can kinda see the tail end of the blue and white rocket at the top of the picture.

On a recent date night, Ty was talking on the pay phone, while purusing his iphone. Can you tell we have really hot date nights by shopping at the Children's Place? 

Tatum rolled over for the first time yesterday! Colt saw it happen. We tried repeatedly today to coax her into rolling over again, but she was over it already. 

In more birthday news...

We also had a big birthday bash for Levi and his friend Will (who's 12 days older) at the church gym. It was a great place for a bunch of 2 year olds to run around and play while the parents could hang out and visit. 

I love this picture because Levi was having trouble blowing out his candle from so far away, and all the kids (and I) were making mouth-blowing faces to help him out. 

My Dad and Jennifer drove in from Abilene for the party.

Nana and Bang Bang also came! Their first picture with all FOUR of their grandkids :) 

Aunt Chez and Eliza were celebrating in style. 

These are a few pictures I took of Tatum at 4 months. She's a real sweetheart!! Such a content and laid back baby. She's also a big girl- 95% for height and 90% for weight. 

I thought I'd try to get some portrait type pictures of Levi for his 2nd birthday, but, since he's 2, that was pretty much out of the question. 

You'll have to settle for these instead :) I think I like them better because they show his spunky personality. Notice the four CandyLand men in his right hand. He takes them out of the game box daily and carries them around. 

Sometimes he wants things his own way. Imagine that. 

Do we have a lefty on our hands? 

My Thirty First

This year my birthday fell on a weekend, which I love. If you were to ask me these days to describe my ideal day, it would include spending it with my family. Not that relaxing on a beach is off the list, but it would be so much better if Ty and my kids were there too. Since this year's birthday fell on a Saturday, it was a perfect day for us to all hang out! 

Tatum is in the Beco baby carrier on my back, incase you are wondering :) 

We ate breakfast at Matt's El Rancho on their amazing patio. Well, it's amazing when you have children there. The boys played at the koi fish pond and threw leaves at the birds while Ty and I actually were able to sit down for an entire meal. Then we packed up our crew and headed to the greenbelt. For the last 2 years, anytime the weather is nice, there are cars lined up a mile long at the greenbelt near our home. We were all curious to see what all the fuss was about, and since our kids are finally at an age to "hike" we hit the trail. It was great weather and so fun to see our boys enjoying God's beautiful creation.  

We headed home after our hike so the kids could nap and I went out shopping ALONE - ah! That's a gift in and of itself :) Then we braved the SXSW traffic and drove downtown to eat dinner at a great Italian place. We topped off the day with a trip to Delish, my favorite cupcake bakery. We all thoroughly enjoyed ourselves there, as you can see for yourself...

A finger is apparently as good as the Mexican Vanilla cupcake to Tatum.

Tough guy

All in all, this was a great way to celebrate the end of 30 great years and the beginning of #31! Thanks, guys, for making it so much fun!

Simple Mom Spring Clean challenge, Week 1

I've been thinking for a while that I'd like to really clean out our master closet. After 2 1/2 years, it really needed it! One of the blogs I follow, Simple Mom, recently issued a challenge for a 6 week Spring Cleaning. I initially wasn't interested, but when I saw that the first week of the challenge was the Master Closet, I took the plunge. Check out the first challenge at: http://simplemom.net/closet-before-and-after/

So here is our closet before:

And AFTER:

I have more shoes than I thought! I had to buy another shoe organizer to fit them all. 

I organized the belts, scarves, head bands, and hats.

Between the 2 of us, we were able to donate several bags of clothing to our church's outreach ministry. I organized my clothes by casual, dressy, cardigans, pants, dresses and clothes-I-can-wear-again-after-I-stop-nursing, so things are easy to find for now!

Here's our bathroom drawer before:

And after: 

I got rid of tons of stuff and placed all the samples in places where I'll actually use them! 

This was a great project to start off Spring Cleaning. Do you have any areas of your home you plan to tackle? 

March (Birthday) Madness!

March is a month full of birthdays around our house! Levi, Nana, myself, Aunt Alethea, future Aunt Amy, and cousins Stephen and Grant all share aquamarine as their gemstone color (yeah, that's random. I know). 

Levi has been WAY into Mickey Mouse lately, so we threw him a Mickey party, done right. 

Donald's Cheese and Quackers

Minnie's Fruit Pop Garden

Mickey's Garden Veggies

We also had Pluto's Hot Dogs and Goofy's Chocolate Milk. Levi makes us sing the "Hot Dog" song from the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse show at naptime and bedtime, as well as the theme song from the show. He loves to name all of the characters on the show, so this was the perfect birthday dinner for him. 

And what party is complete without a Mickey cake? Not Levi's, that for sure!

Daddy sporting his Mickey Mouse party hat, and who is that.... Minnie Mouse?!

Oh, that's just Tatum. She does make a cute Minnie Mouse!

Colt proceeded to open all of Levi's presents. Levi didn't seem to mind though - he just wanted to play with each gift after Colt opened them up. 

Messy boy! I'm pretty sure he didn't get this messy on his first birthday! 

We love you, Levi! You bring so much joy into our lives!