The little things...

It's the little things I sometimes forget to take the time to appreciate. Xander is getting SO big, every day he says or does some new amazing thing, I feel like I can't keep up.

For example the conversation we had yesterday as we pulled into the grocery store...

Xander, "Store! Store mom!"
Me, "Yes, we're at the grocery store, we just need to run in really quick and get some eggs and dog food."
Xander, "And Cars Fruit Snacks and Juice boxes"

So now he's making grocery requests! I pretty much can't believe how big he's gotten. I know I've probably said it a hundred times, but it really does go by too fast...

Here's a couple good pictures from the past few weeks:

Xander licking his first beater! (whip cream)


Playing at grandma's...


He LOVES his cars slippers, I think this is just the cutest picture...


He spends pretty much all of his time playing with cars...

His favorite cars are:
"mamblance" or the ambulance aka the ghost busters car,
"backsi" or taxi
"light queen" or lightening macqueen (from cars) - who also goes to bed with him every night

I love the way he says things it's too adorable.

Other current favorite activities include begging me to turn on a videos I found on you-tube. He loves to watch fire trucks, garbage trucks and monster trucks. They actually have several videos of nothing but garbage trucks driving up and down street picking up trash. He'll ask me over and over, "Monster trucks crash again mom, please!" he loves to watch compilation videos of nothing but monster trucks crashing over and over.

So I thought I'd share one of his favorite videos with you, it's called "Lots and Lots of Firetrucks", watch at your own risk, this song gets stuck in my head and drives me nuts...

Art & Crafts - Shapes Scarecrow

This was an easy and fun craft that's great for a little one learning shapes. Xander of course also had a ball gluing the scarecrow together. I just put a little glue on a paper plate and let him apply it with a craft stick. He loved putting the shapes in the correct places, circles for eyes, triangle for the nose, rectangle body and discussing where things go: where the eyes go, where the hands go, etc. And it turned out pretty cute too I think...


Shapes Scarecrow

Note: this Craft does take some prep on mom's part...

First you need to cut out shapes for your little one to glue together...


Rectangle body, arms, hands and hair Triangle nose and hat, Circles for head, eyes, buttons, and a half circle for a mouth.

Next have your little one glue the body and head to a piece of construction paper...


Then have him decorate the body and head, placing the shapes in the correct places, hair, nose, eyes, mouth, hat, buttons, etc...



And here's the finished product hanging on our fridge...

Art & Crafts - Fall Leaf Art

Our Arts & Crafts project for this week was Fall Leaf Art. This was a lot of fun because we started by heading to the park to collect leaves. Xander had a ball picking out different shapes, sizes and colors of fall leaves. We brought them home and the next afternoon we made our Fall Leaf pictures...

So the first step mommy had to help with because, yes, Xander can color very well, but this was a bit too complicated for a two year old...

Step 1 - Lay an assortment of leaves out on a piece of copy paper...



Step 2 - Cover the leaves with another sheet of copy paper and paper clip together. Color over each of the leaves with red, yellow, orange and green crayons, making sure to get the impressions of the veins and stems of the leaves...





Step 3 - Have your little one paint over the paper with water color paints, making sure to cover the entire page with paint...





Step 4 - When dry glue to a piece of construction paper to create a picture frame effect...



And that's it! Fall leaf art!



Here's Xander's hanging on the fridge...



Xander had a great time painting, naming the colors and discussing the shapes of all the different leaves, I think this turned out to be a easy and fun fall project.

Art & Crafts - Spiders!

I've been waiting a LONG time for Xander to be old enough to do arts and crafts with me. I love little projects and I'm so excited to share this with him. I started this week with making spiders. It was a 2 day project. We counted and practiced colors, and he learned to be REALLY responsible when painting. I was pretty proud of how well he did.

Day 1 we painted the "bodies" black and let them dry over night...

Day 1 Supplies -


Day 2 we glued on eyes and little puff balls for decoration and put on our pipe cleaner legs...

Day 2 Supplies -


We counted 2 eyes, and 8 legs...


Xander had a great time counting the legs and telling me the different colors of the legs and balls we put on the spiders...




The finished spiders!


Xander couldn't wait to show daddy his spider when he got home from work. It was so cute to see him so proud of what he had made.

Balloon Fiesta 2010 Take 1...

We were lucky enough to get VIP parking, free tickets and dinner at the Balloon fiesta this year, thanks to Chris' job! So off we headed Saturday evening, Xander was VERY excited to see the "Ba - oons" aka balloons. I think he actually remembers them from last year, is that crazy?

Well it didn't exactly work out as planned, it was too windy and we never got to see any balloons. And the food tent was packed, not a place to sit. So we decided to skip it and got turkey legs, nachos and pretzels. This is the only picture I got, Xander eating nachos:

Even though we didn't see any balloons we had a great time chatting with Chris' wonderful boss and co-worker who came along with us. We all finished the night by treating ourselves to ice cream, cinnamon almonds, slushies and kettle corn. Everyone was stuffed and happy!

Note: I call this Balloon Fiesta 2010 Take 1, because mom and I are trying for Take 2 Thursday morning! It's the special shapes rodeo and we are keeping our fingers crossed for good weather, hopefully Xander can finally see some balloons fly!

The Fair!

Yesterday Chris and I took Xander to the New Mexicio State Fair for the first time. He had an awesome time. There were so many great things for little kids. First we went to the barn with all the baby animals, piglets, baby goats, puppies, they were all too cute. Unfortunately it was packed full of people and Xander wouldn't get out of his stroller for this part. But I still got a couple good pictures of him looking at the animals. He liked looking at the Chickens the best. He kept asking to go back to the Chickens, it was too cute. And the way he says Chickens is so precious he says it so perfect, I love his little voice.






Next we headed to a little section with games and tractors. He had a great time running around with all the kids collecting the different things for the game.






He had the most fun sitting on the big tractor and riding the little ones. He wasn't quite big enough to ride the little tractors, so I pushed him. I REALLY want to find out if I can buy one of these for Xander next summer, they were too cute and he was so excited to get to drive his own little tractor.

Potty Training!!

It's Official he did it, Xander is potty trained! Chris and I are SO proud!

It took 7 days and ALOT of discipline, including me not leaving the house for a couple of days AT ALL

After day 1 I was convinced we were NOT ready, he peed in his pants like 10 times and only went in the potty once! I was about ready to give in after cleaning up pee all day, BUT after a little encouragement and ALOT of great advice, from a wonderful friend and fellow mom of toddlers, I renewed my efforts and Day 2 turned out 10 times better. Each day we had more successes and fewer accidents until yesterday when we had only one minor accident.

It's amazing what you can do when you really put the time, effort, PATIENCE and discipline into it. Now every time you sit him on the potty he can pee on command! haha We still are working towards our first successful poop, so I guess we aren't totally done until we cross that hurdle, but at least he not peeing all over the place anymore! haha To me that's success.

We did the "Potty Training in a day" method, which actually took about 7 days to get no accidents, but I have to say it works!
It's based on a system of rewards for success and ALOT of repitition. The first couple days I had tons of rewards set up for successful attempts at the potty. well it turns out Xander really doesn't care about stickers, candy, anything, except for matchbox cars. That kid will do ANYTHING for a new car or truck. Since they are only 88 cents at smiths I went and grabbed 5 and starting day 2 they sat on the bathroom counter taunting him. By the end of day 3 he had earned all the cars. And by Friday when Chris came home from work he dragged him into the bathroom to show Daddy that he could go in the potty.

So I decided I needed a couple pictures for this post and headed to the bathroom this morning to take a couple shots of the potty, and of course Xander followed and posed for pictures haha

The Spray Park!!!

This week we discovered an awesome new way to beat the summer heat, the Manzno Mesa Sprayground!! We went with a really great group of moms and little ones.

Xander had a blast!

He was still a bit wary of the water spraying at his face or on his head but he had a great time splashing and sticking his hands in the sprayers -- I think next time we will bring a bucket and a rubber ducky. He ended up spending most of the time chasing after other kid's toys, which is to be expected --

I definitely think this will be a great summer spot for many years to come. Even the big kids seemed to love it. And it wasn't crowded at all! Best part? It's cheap! Gotta love cheap, good clean fun!

A few pictures I snapped...

The Big Two

The weekend celebration in pictures. Starting with his "actual" birthday at the Albquerque Aquarium and Botanic Gardens and ending with Xander's big second birthday party at our house...



He LOVED the fish... running from tank to tank yelling "fish mom! fish!"







He HAD to pet all the ant's




He tried to ride this one




Chris and I sang him Happy Birthday w/a cupcake on his "actual" birthday (the party was the following day)




The Truck Cake I made


Blowing out the candle


He got the hang of opening presents really quick


"ROARRRR!!!"




"Chooo! Choo!!"

I think he had a pretty awesome birthday.

Chris and I were so proud of him, he really is such a blessing!