Back to School

Year two of preschool has begun!

We had a bit of a rough start today. Just as Dave walked out the door to head to the airport for a two day business trip, and just as I started nursing Lauren, Mason woke up an hour early and was very upset after wetting the bed. I should have predicted this would happen since I changed his sheets yesterday. He only has accidents on fresh sheets. I'm tempted never to change his sheets again.

So I had to put the hungry, crying baby down to help Mason clean up and get the sheets in the laundry room. Then I tried to get Mason in the bath so he wouldn't smell like a potty on his first day of school, but he wouldn't have it. I had to settle for wiping him down with a wet cloth. Finally, I got everything done and was able to nurse Lauren.

After eating Mason's favorite pumpkin muffins we made yesterday for back-to-school breakfast, and a few pictures, we were off.

For the first two days of school, parents are to walk in with their child, so once we arrived, we all headed inside. Mason is definitely familiar with his school since it's at our church and he was in the 2-year-old room last year. We also visited the classroom during open house last week, so he had no problem this morning. We hung up his bookbag in his cubby, I let him work a puzzle with Lauren, and after a quick kiss for Mommy and sister, I left my 'baby' at school.

Last year, I made it back to the car and proceeded to blubber like a little girl. Since I was pregnant at the time, I blamed it on that. This year, no tears whatsoever. I'm excited about the fun Mason is going to have and all the one-on-one time I get to spend with Lauren.

Not long after I got home from dropping Mason off though, Lauren decided to take a morning nap. So much for one-on-one time with her. No matter - I enjoyed my first quiet morning since the last school year instead. Well, as quiet as it can be with wet bed sheets in the washing machine that is.

Happy Birthday Grandmama!

Make a Smilebox postcard

A Brave, New Boy

Mason is almost 3 1/2 now, and it seems like he's grown up so much in just the past couple of months. There are so many things that he used to be afraid of that he's completely turned around and loves.

One of the most notable things is the car wash. He used to totally freak out when we went through one (which was only a couple of times with him in the car based on his reaction). Dave even had to take him out of the car seat to comfort him once. It got to the point where he would say "I don't want to go to the car wash" whenever we just passed by one. But the other day, Dave decided to try it with him again and this time, he thought it was fun. Now he says "The car's so dirty, we need a car wash" whenever we drive by one.

Another big one is public bathrooms. This used to be a major problem - especially on vacation. (See a previous post about our trip to North Myrtle Beach back in April for an example.) For a long time, the only place I could get him to pee when we weren't at home was outside in the grass. We've stopped in many a grassy area over the last few months. (Thank goodness he's a boy.) But now, in just the last couple of weeks, he's had no problems wherever we've gone. We just got back from a weekend trip to Georgia, and this time, the trip was no problem whatsoever.

He's even gotten much better at tolerating loud noises. (This is probably a main reason the public bathroom issue is resolved - those potties can be loud.) Usually when I get out the coffee grinder in the morning, he goes running with his hands over his ears when he sees it. But yesterday, he actually got up on the step stool so he could see inside while I was grinding the beans. I can even get him to do some vacuuming for me now!

I got a little teary eyed the other day when I let Mason go off to play on his own at Plaza Fiesta, and he had a grand old time. I've never seen him so willing to play at a place like that without Dave or me. He's even going down the big slides by himself. It wasn't that long ago that he started going down the slide on our own swingset.

Mason will be off to 3-year-old preschool soon. This year, he'll be at school three mornings a week. At least I don't have to worry about him being scared.

Tub Trouble

Saturday night, Mason had a bit of trouble during bath time. He was trying to get both feet into something they shouldn't be in, all while standing up in the water-filled tub. So of course he slipped face first onto the side of the tub which resulted in a gash on the chin.

For the record, Dave was in charge of bath time while I was getting the kids clothes and rooms ready for bedtime. However, I don't blame him for not paying close enough attention. Bath time is usually a bit crazy, especially when you have to watch the baby who is doing everything she can to climb in the tub and the kid who is doing everything he can to empty the contents of the tub onto the floor.

At first, we didn't think much of Mason's injury. It wasn't gushing blood and Mason wasn't complaining too much. Once we did see some blood on the towel, we got Mason out of the tub and took a closer look. Although the cut was probably only a couple centimeters long, it looked pretty deep, so we opted to head to the Urgent Care which was closing in about 20 minutes. Mason became most upset when we tried to cover his injury with a Bandaid.

I stayed home with Lauren while the boys went off for the chin repair, so I don't know details about what happened there. However, Dave said Mason did really well. They wrapped him what looked like a burrito wrapper to keep his hands away from his face while the doctor super glued his gash together. (Thank God the regular stitches weren't required.) Dave tried keeping Mason calm by blowing up latex glove balloons. The doctor said it should heal beautifully with no scarring.

After a quick stop at the Harris Teeter for some blueberries to reward Mason for a job well done (my favorite part of the whole story), they were back. I was expecting Dave to be carrying Mason in the house since by this time it was way past bedtime, but Mason was all keyed up and excited to show me his blueberries and tell me what happened at the doctor's office. He rested well that night and by the next day seemed no worse for the wear.

If I could get Mason to cooperate, I'd take a picture of his chin just to document the occasion, but he's not too keen on showing off his injury.

Back Porch Cafe

This afternoon while Lauren was napping, I decided to treat myself and make a pot of coffee. (I figured I was justified since I skipped having morning coffee.) Mason has recently enjoyed sips of our iced coffee on the rare occasions that we've had it, so he asked if he could have some cold.

Now, I usually don't let him have his own cup of coffee - in fact I've never done that before - but today I was looking for something fun and different to do while Lauren was sleeping. So I made a cup of hot coffee with a little milk for myself and made a cup of cold milk with a little coffee for Mason. Then we took our cups and a game of Chutes and Ladders out on our spiffy new refurbished back porch (more on that later) and pretended we were at Starbucks.

We enjoyed our little game together. Each time I said , "It's your turn", he would say, "Nope, not yet. It's coffee time!" and take a sip, then he would proceed to spin the spinner. I told him he would make his father proud.

Here he is enjoying our game. He was proud that he won.



In this picture you an see a little preview of the redo of the screen porch we've been working on for several weeks. Dave has done a lot of work and we're almost finished. We just love it, and now we spend a lot more time out there. I think we've had all of our meals out there the last couple of days. The last step will be to paint the floor, and as soon as it's done, I'll post a better description and some more pictures.

One Down, Fourteen to Go

Mason's last day of his first year of preschool was last week. It was funny to think back on how I cried after dropping him off for his first day, when I almost wanted to cry because it was his last day! He really liked school and learned a lot - mostly social skills which is exactly what we were hoping for. Selfishly, I will miss those two mornings a week. I had them to myself for the first few weeks. Then along came Lauren, and I was able to spend that time to just focus on her (or take a nap).

To commemorate the school year, his teachers came up with what I thought was a great idea: a personalized photo album with pictures of various events throughout the year. There are pictures of Mason at Halloween, Christmas, pancake and pajama day, Easter, and even his birthday. He also got a t-shirt with hand-painted bumblebees - one for each kid in the class labeled with their names - which says: We'll always 'bee' friends. Too cute.

Here's the first and last day pictures. You can tell a little bit about how much he's grown in 9 months...

Mason will be going back to the same preschool next year, but he'll move up to three days a week instead of just two. I suspect after a long summer break, I won't be crying when I drop him off on the first day.

A Week in Pictures

Mason has found new entertainment with the couch cushions in our living room. He likes to make "pillow forts". Last Saturday, Lauren got in on the fun.

Lauren's 7-month picture with Winnie the Pooh

Lauren's first wagon ride

Yesterday we joined the MOMS Club for our annual strawberry picking outing. Mason was able to really take part for the first time. Since I was taking care of Lauren most of the time (where I learned it's not so hard to nurse a baby standing up in a strawberry field) he picked all his berries all by himself.

Mason and his berries. They were half eaten by the time we got home.

3 Year Check-Up

With Daddy home with the baby during his lunch hour, I took Mason for his yearly visit with Dr. Smoak today. I was a little worried about how he'd do since he's only been once in the last year, and of course there would be a vaccination involved. However, I was pleasantly surprised. The hardest part was getting him to stand still while the nurse measured his height. He measured 38lbs and 38inches - a perfect square according to the nurse. He's 90th percentile for weight and 50-75th percentile for height.

The vaccination came at the end of the appointment. I debated with myself how much to tell him about it ahead of time because I didn't want him to be scared to go to the doctor's office, but I also didn't want him to be caught too off guard. I'm pretty sure he doesn't remember getting any vaccinations since it's been almost a year since his last one. If he did, he didn't let on. I did finally tell him a bit about it before the nurse came in, and he seemed fine. He sat nicely on my lap and only teared up a little bit afterwards. He said, "Mommy that hurt" but quickly felt better when I told him Dr. Smoak gave great suckers to everyone who gets shots. He jumped down and said "I want a blue one to match my shirt." So that's exactly what he got.

Easter Weekend

Thanks to beautiful weather, we had a very nice Easter weekend. Saturday we joined the neighbor kids for the annual HOA Easter egg hunt. Mason had lots of egg hunting practice last week, so by Saturday he was a pro. He cleaned up!

Sunday morning we went to a very lovely church service. I was proud of Mason for sitting very nicely up front during the children's message. (See Lauren's previous baptism blog for the reason why.)

After church, Mason worked out in the yard with Dave. He loved pretending to be Handy Manny with his goggles, hammer, and crowbar while helping his Daddy remove the old screen from our back porch. (We're preparing to re-screen it.)

This week is spring break for Mason. I'm working hard to think up fun activities to keep us all happy this week. The weekend can't come soon enough.

Three Years Ago Yesterday...

... I became a mother. It was the hardest but most wonderful experience I will ever have in my life.

We checked into the hospital at 6:00am on April 6, 2006 - a little anxious because of the low fluid and irregular heartbeat that was diagnosed at the midwife's office the afternoon before. After settling in and getting hooked up to the unwanted but necessary monitors and IV, the process began and I was induced. We sat, we paced, we danced, we rocked, we bounced, but as of 3:00 that afternoon, I was still 5-6cm dilated - just the same as I was when I walked in the doors that morning. I planned to do this with no pain medication, and I had been experiencing what I would later call pretty tough, but tolerable pain. To move things along, we reluctantly agreed to let midwife Tina break my water, and the REAL fun began. After almost three hours of the some of the most excruciating pain in my life (a close second to the kidney stone of 2008) my beautiful son was born at 5:55pm. Memories of that pain quickly faded away.

He needed just a little oxygen to help him get started, but Mason was a very healthy baby despite the potential complications that worried us. The irregular heartbeat disappeared by the time we went home on April 8.

These are just a few of my favorite pictures of his first few months.

His whole life, and even before his birth, Mason has been a very active little boy. Not content sit still, he's always on the move and constantly wants someone to play with him. From his mother, he gets his single dimple, his love of puzzles, and his picky eating habits (with me it's fruit, with him it's vegetables). Everything else about him is all from his Daddy. He loves letters and numbers, has a great knack for remembering things, and can make himself burp whenever he wants to. He's stubborn to a fault, learns very quickly, and loves playing on the computer. He likes to rough-house, has a great sense of humor, and loves his baby sister.

He probably isn't the easiest kid in the world, but I would never change him. He is such a blessing. Happy Birthday, Buddy!