Harrison's Birthday Weekend

Harrison had a fun birthday weekend. For his real birthday on Friday he got BBQ for dinner along with a small personal cake. On Saturday he had a party at home with a few friends, and then on Sunday he played in the sleet!

Both of his grandmothers came to visit, so he had a constant audience.

Getting ready for his party

We had a small party at the house with just a few friends, the same ones who have been to his first two parties.

Hunter and Harrison

Shane and Harrison

Opening a present from Barrett

Ohh! A Butterfly Garden! Thank you Aunt Allison and Uncle Richard!

Shane's Mom is trying to show Harrison how to play the recorder they got him...apparently Harrison thinks it's a flute.

Mmmm...cupcakes!

My Birthday Boy!

Dad and his mini-me

Seems like it is getting harder and harder to get a picture of the four of us with everyone voluntarily looking at the camera

We let Barrett try a bit of cupcake. He sure did like it!

On Sunday it was really cold and sleeted for a bit, which Harrison loved. He has been looking for an excuse to wear his Thomas raincoat, handed down from his cousin Charlie, and loved playing outside in the cold, wet weather.




Ready for action!



Mark braved the sleet with Harrison. I just love this picture of the two of them!

Big Boy Bed

The weekend after he turned three, we set up Harrison's new room. He was looking a little big for his crib, and seemed to be doing just fine without the side on it, so it was time!

We got a bed and nightstand to match the dresser he already has. He kept his bookshelf and rocking chair and we moved the other chair out of his room.

He had fun going with us to IKEA to pick up the furniture. He likes to ride on the flatbed dolly thing that you have to use to pick up all of the boxes. He also had fun going with Mark to pick out his new mattress. It didn't even take too long to assemble the bed and nightstand and remove the crib and chair, but would have taken even less time without his help...he was very excited about the whole process and wanted to be right in the middle of it.

His sheets have bugs all over them and the colors in them match his green walls really well. We got a couple of sets of the wall decals that match the sheets and now one whole wall is covered in bugs. He loves it! He tells us the bugs are "playing tag" or "getting their friends". It is really pretty cute. I am sure once it is warmer and we can order the caterpillars for his butterfly habitat that Aunt Allison and Uncle Richard got him for his birthday, he will insist that they live in his bug room.

We also got a clock that changes color when it's time to get up for the morning or from his nap. It is seriously one of the best inventions EVER! We'll hear him wake up in the morning, and some days as soon as the clock changes to yellow (which means he can get up) we'll hear his feet hit the floor and hear him run out of his room. Other days he just stays in there playing with all of his animals on his bed.

He now loves to play in his room and even told me he wanted to stay in and do that instead of going to school one day last week. So, overall this new room thing has been a big hit! I still need to make curtains that match his new colors and put a few other things on the walls, but he doesn't seem to care that part isn't quite finished. Here are a few pictures:


Chillin on his new bed as soon as everything was set up that afternoon.



Hanging onto his cirb aquarium for dear life. He is probably the only kid who will go off to middle school with a crib aquarium still attached to his bed!!

10 months old

10 months old!

Where has the time gone? How is my little baby now 10 months old? On one hand, it seems like he's been a part of our family forever. On the other hand, it seems like just yesterday we were bringing him home from the hospital. He's doing so many fun things now and even Harrison likes to watch Barrett learn new stuff.


At the beginning of February Barrett decided he could climb the steps. I was helping Harrison with the potty in the hall downstairs and turned around to find Barrett a few steps up and grinning ear-to-ear. Lesson learned. Don't turn your back on that little guy! Now wants to crawl up the steps every chance he gets. If we don't put the gate across he never fails to make a break for the stairs and start his way on up them. He can easily climb the entire way and arches his back and gets mad at you if you stop him and bring him back down.

His top front gums have been really swollen and it's looked like teeth would be coming through any day now for over a month. Finally this week his right one came through, and it looks like his left one should be through this week. Poor guy isn't enjoying the teething thing too much so I hope he gets a break for a bit after these two pop through.

Barrett loves cars, and makes little noises when he zooms them back and forth on the ground or up on the shelves in our living room where he likes to stand and play. Thankfully we seem to have some sort of toy cars in practically every room in this house so he's pretty happy to play with them wherever he finds them.

This is one of Barrett's favorite spots to play.



He loves to stand here and zoom cars back and forth on these shelves.



For about a month now he's been pretty good at signing "all done" when he's finished eating in his high chair. If he starts to fidget or throw his food on the ground we'll ask if he's all done and then he'll sign it. If only he would sign it before he decides to decorate the ground with a smattering of sweet potatoes, corn, peas, toast, etc. And when he's finished with his milk (meaning he's drained the sippy cup, becuase 90% of the time he just chugs it) he doesn't just set it back down on his tray. Noooo, he has to spike it down on the ground as hard as he can. I guess that's his way of signing "more". Gotta work on that one.

He's also started waving, and it's SO cute! I know I'm biased, but it really is. He just started doing that in the last couple of weeks, and also is trying to say "hi" sometimes when he waves. I promise to get a good video of it posted soon!

Barrett is still a really fast crawler, but is spending more time cruising along the furniture standing up. He will also push his highchair or a kitchen chair a few steps in front of him. He's tried pushing the little shopping cart we have upstairs, but it still moves too quickly for him and he ends up falling down when doing that.

I am sure soon enough he'll be walking and I'll wish for my sweet little baby back. But for now, we are just enjoying watching him learn new fun things every day!

Happy Birthday Harrison!

I don't know that I ever thought I'd actually have a three-year old. Time is going by so quickly. He seems to be so much more grown up than he was even a few short months ago!

I'll do an update soon with all of the cool things Harrison can do. I'm just too darn tired to do it tonight. He and Barrett wear me out! 

I did feel compelled to post a few pictures of him on his actual birthday. We made a couple of cakes and some cupcakes today and Harrison had fun "helping". He loves to try the batter!

He loves to get on the counter while I'm baking.

This afternoon we played outside because it was a beautiful day. He sure makes it look fun to be three.

Playing in the front yard today.

Stink Eye to you!

After cake and a long, happy, birthday day.

The Potty

Harrison is officially potty trained!

We did a week-long potty training between Christmas and New Year's. If you want me to be honest, we were dreading it. We've had a little potty, a second little potty, and a potty seat for sometime now. None of them were appealing enough to Harrison to get him excited about using them, so we had kind of let things go hoping he'd show some interest on his own.

However, since that didn't happen and he's supposed to be PT by the time he turns three for school, we decided to go ahead and just get after it.

The first few days were kind of painful, as he was pretty resistant to the idea of the potty. He spent a lot of time in the living room watching a show sitting on his little potty waiting for something to happen. That worked...kind of, but wasn't the happiest about it. But, somewhere along the line things clicked.

We shipped him off to school that next week in underwear and he did great! He's only had a couple of accidents and those were the first couple of weeks.
Now he's an old pro and loves wearing underwear. He reminds me that the stinky diapers belong to Barrett :-)

I am sure that some day he will hate me for this picture but I just couldn't resist!