Week of April 20

Sunday - Easter Sunday!  We had a great day at church.  We had breakfast at the church and an easter egg hunt before Sunday School.  Liam wasn't so sure about the egg hunt, but he seemed to still have a good time just being outside.

After church we went to Caleb's parent's house for lunch.  They also had an egg hunt there.  

Caleb and Bert hid the eggs so they were in crazy places.  I had Liam get all of the ones in the window sills.  He did a really good job picking them up.  The hardest part was getting him to let go of the eggs into his bucket.  

Ready to go in his Easter bucket!

 Trying to get him to let go of his egg so we could go find more

 Ezra needed a bit of a boost to get that egg

Liam getting the eggs in the window sill

Hanging out with Aunt Christa

 He got a hotwheels car from his grandparents!

Caleb's mom puts coins in the eggs instead of candy.  After the egg hunt we were all walking to the back of the house and Caleb and Nehemiah were walking next to each other.  Nehemiah had his bucket of eggs (which was full since he was the only one who really understood collecting as many eggs as possible) and Caleb was carrying Liam's bucket.  Nehemiah asked Caleb if they could switch buckets because his was too heavy.  Caleb happily did so.  :-) So Nehemiah ended up with Liam's 9 eggs and Liam got Nehemiah's 30 (or so) eggs. Liam certainly made out on that deal.  ;-)  Liam got to add $14.87 to his piggy bank!

On Tuesday Liam and I went to Mexico to get some grocery shopping done. Liam made lots of new "friends" at Aldi.  I'm pretty sure everyone who was shopping in that store came up to say hi to him.   While we were in Mexico we decided to stop by Caleb's Aunt Rachel's house.  She ended up not being home, but Liam made a new friend (who didn't talk to him and weird him out) in front of her house.  

We had a pretty uneventful rest of the week.  Liam had an exceptionally crabby week.  Between learning to crawl, still working on getting that first tooth, and possibly going through a growth spurt, he is just out of sorts.  Naps were almost non-existent all week until Friday and Saturday when he slept 12 hours both nights and napped for a total of 5 hours throughout the day.  Wednesday was a particularly rough day as far as naps were concerned.  Caleb fought him all morning trying to get a nap and I fought him all afternoon.  I got so desperate that I even got out the pacifier that he had so wonderfully gone 2 whole weeks without.  And guess what?  He didn't want it!  I even gave him one of his favorites and as soon as I put it in he pulled it out and just looked at it like he does when I put a hat or sunglasses on him.  Although I was sad that it didn't work to put him to sleep, I was very glad that he didn't want it.  He finally fell asleep nursing at 5:30...and I was planning on being at church by 6, but I let him sleep until the last minute before we would be late for church at 6:30.

Liam has a baby Batman that is "Little People" brand. That was a present from his Aunt Christa before he was even born.  Well he likes to hold on to Batman.  On our way to Caleb's parents on Sunday I had to end up taking Batman away because Liam was making him "fly" instead of taking a nap.  I knew that he had Batman while we we inside Caleb's parent's house.   About Tuesday I realized that I hadn't seen Batman.  I search the diaper bag and everywhere I could think of and he was nowhere to be found.  I texted Caleb's mom and she said that she hadn't seen him but she would look around some more.  I ended up finding Batman in a gift bag of Easter goodies from Liam's great grandma Connie.  So Liam had Batman the rest of Tuesday into Thursday.  We were leaving to go to a Bible study at Karisha's house Thursday evening and I grabbed Batman and Liam's stuffed horse (another favorite of his).  I remembered having Batman in my hand when I locked the front door.  When we got out of the van in Columbia I couldn't find Batman.  I figured he had fallen under the seat or something, even though I couldn't see him, so I didn't think much about it.  After we got home I searched the diaper bag, my purse, the van (twice) and could not find Batman.  I felt so bad because I knew that it was my fault that Batman was lost.  I looked online and found out that Batman and Joker (we still have Joker but Liam isn't as much of a fan) were sold together for $10.  I didn't really want to spend that.  I did find a pack of 7 superheroes, including Batman for $20.  Obviously that's a much better deal but I really didn't want to spend $20!  Those toys at Target go on sale frequently, so I figured I would just keep an eye out for a sale.  I thought through everywhere Batman could possibly be and the only places were he either fell out of my hand as I got into the van here at home and someone walking by spotted Batman and picked him up, OR he fell out of the van when we got to Columbia and I didn't notice him, possibly because he rolled under the van.  Matt and Karisha live in a pretty busy apartment complex and we had parked across the parking lot from where they live.  I figured since there are always people out walking around that someone would have found poor Batman and taken him home by this point.  Thus, there was no hope of finding Batman.  Fast forward to the following Monday (I know that I'm getting ahead of myself in this weekly update but I can't help myself) and Karisha called me all excited and told me that when her husband Matt went to take the trash out HE FOUND BATMAN IN THE PARKING LOT!!!  He wasn't even looking for him, he just happened upon him and asked Karisha if Liam was missing one.  Batman seems to have gotten in some sort of a scuffle, but he is safe and sound.  Liam is anxiously awaiting the next time we see Karisha to get his Batman back and this mom is going to try to do a better job at keeping tabs on Batman.  Maybe after the sixth kid I'll be better at not having so many mom fails.  (Caleb, I'm exaggerating about the six kids.)
Karisha sent Liam a picture of his Batman:

Liam was excited!

Caleb and Liam went on a walk this week and picked me some pretty dogwood flowers.  They are now happily living with the random purple flowers I picked growing in our yard that I suspect might be weeds and the tulips that bloomed in our backyard.

On Saturday Caleb went out looking for yard sales.  He came across one and got new book for Liam and an abacus that is Melissa and Doug brand!  He paid $1 total for both.  Liam was excited about the abacus, but it kept falling over and hitting him on the head.  After about the fifth time I took it away and put it up in the closet in the pile of Liam's birthday presents.  I'll wrap it up and let him have it in a few months.  :-)

On Friday Caleb had noticed that our refrigerator was colder than it should be.  On Saturday when he got up most of the stuff in the fridge was now frozen.  He was trying to figure out what was wrong and Liam tried to help by hammering the fridge.  Caleb cleaned the coils in the back and it seems to be leveled out a little bit better. 

 My handyman duo.

More pictures this week:

Liam "begging" to go to bed early.  I happily let him.

 Helping dad get his big boy car seat ready to go into the van!  Liam officially upgraded this week!  I forgot to get a picture of him in it and I'm not about to take him outside just to get one.

 Trying to drink his bottle from the wrong end.

 Plaid pants?  :-)  I was anticipating comments from his father about them but didn't get any.  They were a little tight across the rump and he couldn't crawl in them. 

 More selfie practice...except it made him go cross eyed. 

 Begging for honeycomb

 Caleb gave this bottle to Liam.  What is it?  Diluted pickle juice. 

 Liam liked it but I didn't want him drinking too much of it.  I dont think he even got half of an ounce.

 I ordered a thirty one bag for my sister.  It was in a plastic bag next to the couch.  Liam found it, pulled it out of the plastic bag and rolled around the living room with it.

 Rolling with it.

 So some days this week Liam wouldn't stop crying for anything. (I tried bribing him with batman on the days when batman wasn't out gallivanting)  So when I start to get frustrated with him because absolutely nothing will calm him I try to do something that gives me a chuckle.  This was the result of that effort on Thursday.  I posted one to facebook but had three that were hard to choose from.

 Waiting in the window for dad to get home from work.

 

Sad faces because he came home late.  :-(

 Liam has been generously giving out kisses to anyone and everyone.  And I mean kisses that make it seem like he's trying to eat your face off.  He is especially generous to his dad.  The other morning Liam gave Caleb a kiss and spit up at the same time.  I snapped a pic before I went and got a rag.  :-)

 Caleb got Liam's swing hung up this week!  He drilled some holes into the old laundry line post thingy in the back yard.

 Liam absolutely loved it!

 His disappointed face when Aunt Amy didn't answer his facetime call.

 Liam got some new toys this week!  A (rinsed out) old chip bag and water bottles with rice and beans in them (with the caps superglued on).  He will play with these for a long time.

 The other side of the chip bag

 Caleb was trying to teach Liam to eat his fruit puffs.  Liam made some funny faces

He finally enjoyed them.

Well....there's another week in the books!  Can we slow time down a little bit please?

Week of April 13

Saturday before - So I don't know what got into me last week to post my blog before Saturday was even over.  Anyway, after I posted my blog we ended up going for a walk.  I've been scouting out the good sidewalks in Centralia for walks.  We came across a rough patch and Liam kind of face planted into the tray on his stroller, so Caleb got him out and gave him a ride on his shoulders.

Then a little later I laid him down in the stroller to prevent any further injuries and I looked down and saw this.  Caleb went to take the hat off of his head and Liam's eyes were sleepy looking.  

Monday - Caleb went to go see a movie with Brad from church.  It was the new Captain America movie.  (snore)

Liam also got an package from his St Louis grandparents!  His favorite part was the envelope.

Liam helped me sort through the stash of bandanas I took from Christa.  Liam was picking out his favorites for a bandana quilt.

Tuesday - Caleb took Liam to church with him for the morning (which means he got nothing done) and I went to Target to get some shopping done.  Overall it was a successful trip.  At first I thought I had hit the jackpot with my total only being $25.99 since I had also gotten a box of diapers but after further inspection of my receipt later on I noticed that I wasn't charged for the diapers.  On my way home from Columbia that day I stopped back by Target so I could pay for them.  I also noticed that I was double charged for my syrup.  I'm avoiding that cashier from now on.  I always dread when I have to go through her line anyway.  But still, if you take the double charged syrup into consideration, I saved twice as much as I spent on the first trip! 

Thursday -  I went back to Columbia because the Parable Christian book store is going out of business and they were having their first sale.  That place was insane.  I've worked a fair share of black Fridays at Target and this was worse.  The store is not big at all and there were so many people in there that it was almost impossible to get around.  Really their sales weren't even that great.  I went with the intent of checking out their sales on the "What's in the Bible" DVDs but they were only a dollar cheaper than I can get them on Amazon.  I texted Caleb to see if he wanted me to still get some.  He said to get one or two, so naturally I bought three.  A lot of their sale signs were also very deceiving.  Oh well.  After that I went and hung out at Karisha's for the rest of the day.  We were having  Bible study at her place that night and I knew that if I went back home to Centralia that afternoon that Little Bit would only nap in the van and not get a good nap in.  I was able to get him to take a 2 hour nap at her apartment that afternoon. 

Friday -  Liam had been trying to crawl for the past week or so and when I took his clothes off of him to start getting him ready for bed he hopped up on those knees and started crawling across the living room!  He's been on the go ever since.

Saturday - Caleb finished up working on a new dvd cabinet.  It will eventually have doors on it to keep tiny hands out.

He also made a shelf that goes behind the couch.  I took the coffee table upstairs because Liam kept rolling into it and hitting his head on it.   Now we have this shelf so we can set a glass or something on it if we need to.

I made some boxes similar to Liam's toy boxes that we could keep our board games in since Liam had better access to our board games in the end table next to the couch now that the coffee table is gone (it's just one thing after another!)

I meant to take a before and after picture of our set up in the living room and forgot to.  I did find this picture of Liam playing with his Easter Basket and it gives you an idea.

And here's what it looks like now:

Although when I was looking at the picture I chuckled to myself and how organized everything was since I decided to clean up that space for a picture.  Please don't be led astray.   This is what the rest of our living room looks like. 

I have a tiny 8 month old tornado and have had several other things going on today that took precedence over cleaning up the living room.  And if you are wondering about the trash on the floor (the reciprocating saw box and empty water bottle), Liam prefers to play with our trash over his toys most days.

 While Caleb was outside working on the furniture he asked me to make him banana pudding.  I had been planning on it anyway because he had kept mentioning banana pudding.  There was a recipe on the side of the Nilla Wafer box but I wanted to make sure that I was making my momma's recipe (it turns out its basically the same thing though).  My dad sent me the recipe and I got to cooking.  The only problem is that I am not a good cook.  I didn't let the pudding get thick enough on the stove and when we went to eat it, it was more like banana soup.  I couldn't even thicken it up because it was in a dish with vanilla wafers and banana slices (and it had that egg white meringue stuff on top that I was finally able to get figured out for the first time in my life!)  I felt defeated yet again, but Caleb had the genius idea of sticking it in the freezer.  It's a delicious frozen dessert!

Liam was successful in going the entire week pacifier free!  I think it's safe to say that we have that behind us now.  He still sucks on his thumb occasionally, but it's not a real regular thing.

I really thought Liam was getting his first tooth this week.  He was fussy and you could tell something was hurting him.  I thought his gums felt a little different but no tooth ever popped through and Lori and Christa both said they didn't feel anything on his gums.  I'm not convinced that it wasn't his teeth bothering him though.  They may just be taking a long time to finally come through.  Every time he got fussy he was better shortly after giving him teething tablets.

Liam turned 8 months old this week.  Here are some attempted pictures.  I'll probably try to snap a few more soon.

 He had to get a talking-to from his dad about rearranging blocks.

His faces crack me up.

Liam will always find a way to wherever his Batman is.

Here are some more pictures from the week:

Liam has a mirror that came with his play mat.  I think it really accentuates my better features.

 

Peeking out the window.  His favorite thing to do!  Sometimes he even catches a glimpse of the mailman! 

 Sometimes both boys won't sit still and look happy when I try to take their picture.

 That's better.  They are both precious.

 And since I can't wait until next week to show you some Easter pictures, here are a few!

 Egg hunting at church

 Our family picture courtesy of Sara Brown.  :-)