Happy 3rd Birthday Braden!

A few weeks ago Braden turned 3! So hard to believe that my baby is all grown up. We wanted to make his day extra special so he would know how important he is to us and how thankful we are for him, so the night before his big day, Austin and I snuck in his room and filled his floor with 30 some balloons so that he would wake up to a big surprise. Surprised he was...here he is with some of his balloons...
The night before his birthday we had decorated our den with lots of streamers. If you know Braden, you know how obsessed he is with car washes so he was so excited to see the streamers and he kept saying "you made a car wash momma." We spent lots of time driving cars through the car wash the rest of the day.
Braden has been so into imaginative play lately. It has been so much fun watching his imagination take off these past few months as he pretends to be a fireman or a cook or a race car driver. His favorite though is anything that has to do with building. Whenever Austin has a project around the house, Braden is right behind him with a pen or a paint stick or a spoon pretending that it is a saw or hammer and that he is helping Austin. He will even want to wear his belt and pretends it is a tool belt. His imagination is huge! So we thought it would fun to get him his own tool bench. Here he is testing it out...
After lots of projects on the tool bench, I made Braden pancakes (birthday tradition) in the shape of a 3. I tried to get pictures, but he ate the pancakes before I could get to it. During Asher's morning nap we watched the movie Cars (Braden's favorite), followed by lunch at Wendy's...again Braden's choice. After lunch, I took the boys to Monkey's Treehouse for a day of fun. After Daddy got home, we opened a few more presents, followed by a dinner of meatloaf and boxed SpongeBob Macaroni which Braden had requests just the day before. We finished the night with cake which I did not make b/c I still do not have a kitchen :) Here is the cake -

So I decided to video the whole cake event which means I have no pictures of Braden blowing out his candles...oh well! Here is Boo eating his cake in his underwear!
A little family picture (minus Asher who had gone to bed before the cake had even been blown out) -

Okay and this is for me more then anyone else, but here is sweet Braden in years past...

First Birthday -
Second Birthday -

Third Birthday - Hope your day was special sweet boy!! We love you so very much!

Missing this already...

I was in the car this afternoon on my way to a baby shower when I heard the words to this familiar song by Trace Adkins. I'm normally not a huge country fan, but the words to this song literally made me stop and think and with tear filled eyes, I found myself reminiscing back through days gone by and found myself longing for more time with my children, more time with my husband and more time to just be content. It's so easy sometimes in the chaos of days that seem so mundane to forget how quickly this season of my life is passing. Oh Lord how I pray I will cherish these moments with my family, as each moment is a gift from You!!! Here are the sweet words that made me so emotional today...

You're gonna miss this
You're gonna want this back
You're gonna wish these days
Hadn't gone by so fast

These are some good times
So take a good look around
You may not know it now
But you're gonna miss this

Zoo Day

At 7am this morning, a big truck arrived at my house and delivered our new stainless steel refrigerator...hooray!!!! As you can see it was enjoyed by all this morning!

Since they were working on my kitchen AGAIN today, I decided it was a good zoo day, so we met some friends at the zoo and spent the whole morning there. It was a great day and both boys did really good! I truly cherish these days with my little guys and am so thankful that I can be home with them to enjoy them as they enjoy their summer. Here are some pictures of our day...

Asher, asleep in the car on the way to the zoo -
Braden and his buddies -
Sweet Asher -
Eating lunch...now this picture may be deceiving b/c although everything looks peaceful here, it was quite chaotic getting to this point. Let's just say I had two hot, hungry, whiny kids and after two spilled cups of fruit (who knew grapes could roll so far) and a spilled cup of milk (all by me), the boys finally got to eat. Some lady even came up to me at one point and said, "honey are you doing this all by yourself?" Apparently I looked really desperate :)

Petting the goats -

Tired, hot and ready for naps -

And then to add to the chaos...

Austin left for Chicago at 7:30am yesterday morning for a 24 hour trip and by 8am, Braden was vomiting! Good timing huh? Especially considering that the shady floors guys showed up at 8:30am and asked me to leave the house until noon. That obviously wasn't an option so I asked them to come back next week which means more days without a kitchen. Apparently Braden picked up some kind of stomach bug b/c he was sick all day yesterday and did not leave the couch until 4:30pm when he finally started to perk up a bit. Let's just say we watched a lot of movies yesterday (thank goodness for television) and Asher and I did who knows what for endless hours yesterday while Braden laid on the couch. Let's just say Asher used his paci a lot more liberally then I would care to admit. It was not a fun day being stuck inside ALL day with one sick child and one who was super ancy and desperately wanted to go outside. I love my kids but I was so thankful when 8pm rolled around and I could finally collapse on the couch. Here is poor Braden at his worst. It really is so hard seeing your kids so sick.
Here is to hoping the rest of us stay healthy!

Chaotic Days

Let me just preface this post by saying that we have not had kitchen floors for 2 months now and as of Monday, we have no kitchen. By no kitchen I mean nothing...just a bare room with lots of dust and wide open electrical sockets...good for the kiddos if you know what I mean :) Here are the boys testing out the new kitchen -


So where is everything that used to be in my kitchen you ask...in my foyer of course!!!! Cozy huh?
And despite all the chaos, here is Asher practicing his pulling up skills on Tyson...
And here is Braden before the demolition began...he was practicing good safety by wearing his hard hat while using his tools to take apart the cabinets.

So yesterday morning, I get a phone call from our contractor and he tells me that they are going to lay the hardwood floors today and that I need to get out of the house in one hour and that it would be to my best interest to stay out all day long since it would be super loud and dusty. So I spend the next 30 minutes packing up my whole house so that I'd have all the food/sleeping supplies to get me through the day with two small kids. We get in the car, make a quick stop at the library and then start driving to my dad's house...all is going well until Braden throws up in the car. Perfect huh? So after pulling over and cleaning him up, I made the decision to go back home b/c I didn't want to take a chance of getting my dad sick...although looking back I now realize that Braden was just car sick from reading in a hot car on windy back roads. Anyway, I'm driving home, Asher is crying b/c he was supposed to eat 30 minutes ago, Braden is crying b/c he doesn't want the windows down and I'm about to throw up myself from the smell in my car. So we get home to a VERY loud house...between the saws and the nail guns, I can barely hear myself talk. I put a movie on for Braden, feed Asher and start to face the fact that I am stuck in this house with two shady floor guys, two small children and a house that is so loud that there is no way anyone is gonna nap. Oh, not to mention that every time the saws turn on, Braden starts crying b/c he is scared of the loud noise the saws make. Thankfully at this point, the rain has stopped so we head outside to a super muddy backyard and spend the rest of the afternoon outside. By 2:30pm, I'm starting to realize that I'm gonna have to try for naps even though it's pretty unrealistic considering the noise factor. I get Asher down for a nap by 3pm, just as they are finishing my floors, get Braden down by 3:30pm, head outside to clean up the rest of my horrid smelling car, come back inside to make a sandwich, take one bite and I hear Asher screaming from his crib. Apparently, he only wanted a 40 minute nap today...sweet considering that I'm exhausted and so need a break. Anyway...let's just say I've seen better days. It's just been a stressful few days having no kitchen sink, no stove, no dishwasher and no cabinets and not to mention a house that looks like a bomb went off in it. On a side note, we've been eating out every night since there aren't many options when you don't have a stove. So tonight after a fairly chaotic dinner with two little ones at California Pizza Kitchen, we decided to wander through Whole Foods. While I was getting some fresh almond butter, I look over to see Taylor Swift and her lovely body guard filling up a little mason jar with fresh peanut butter. You gotta love celebrity spotting in Nashville! Anyway...here is to better days despite a very chaotic house and a somewhat stressed momma!

Cute pics -

So here are some cute pics of my sweet soon to be 9 month old baby Asher...so hard for me to believe that he is that old already! He is so close to crawling, is babbling away saying "mama" and "baba" and still loves to laugh and smile, especially at his big brother. He is still a little guy, weighing in at only 16 lbs 12 oz and although he is not a huge liquids guy, he seems to love to eat. He will try almost any table food I put in front of him, although most of it still slides out his mouth and ends up on the floor. Asher still loves to be held and although he is crazy squirmy when I am holding him, he loves to cuddle right before naps and bed. I could rock him forever when he's got his head on my shoulder and I can feel his sweet breath and little eyelashes on my cheek. Here are some pictures of my happy baby. I took these the other day when Braden was still napping.

And what has this guy been up to?
...a whole lot of anything that has to do with water. Since it's so hot these days, Braden and I spend a lot of time in the baby pool, running through the sprinkler, watering, watering, watering anything and everything, playing in buckets of water, oh and painting the fences with what you ask...water of course!!! We try to get outside while Asher naps and then when it's so hot we can barely stand it, we come inside and cuddle on the couch and watch Bob the Builder. The other thing Braden spends much of his day doing is talking about his birthday. In fact if you ask him how old he is going to be next month, he gets this huge smile on his face and says, "almost six!" Ha...I love the things that come out of a 3 yr old's mouth. Every day he tells me about how it's almost his birthday and how we are going to eat chocolate cake and go to Bounce U for his party. He really cannot wait...and quite honestly, I'm pretty excited too! I love the spirit and excitement of a 3 yr old...it really is so sweet! I'll leave you with some pictures of my boys together...for the moment, they get along great...I know the dynamics are about to change once Asher starts crawling. Until that time, I'll enjoy them the way they are -

Naked hugs before bath time -
This is how I get my laundry put away -
And Braden lathering up Asher's head for the 800th time in the bathtub -
Apparently Asher likes it -

Summer

School ended the week before last so now it's me and the boys home together all summer. I'm actually really glad to have Braden home with me all summer. I mean sure there are going to be days when I'm gonna miss having some down time while he was in school and Asher was napping and I'm sure there are gonna be long days when it's way too hot to be outside and it's way too boring to be inside all day, but overall I'm so happy to have Braden home with me all summer. I'm sure there will be lots of pool days, hose days, sprinkler days, popsicle days, ice cream days, park days and who knows what else. I'm looking forward to it. In fact just the other morning while Asher was napping, Braden and I sat outside in his little play house, eating popsicles and talking about pizza, hamburgers and snakes. I mean does it get any better then that! Toward the end of our conversation, Braden came over and sat in my lap and we finished our popsicles with him sitting snuggled in my lap. I love my conversations with this little guy and I love, love, love that my nearly 3 yr old still wants to sit in my lap!!!! Braden is pretty pumped about summer too...in fact, a few mornings ago when I went in to get him up out of bed, he walked to the window, opened up his curtains, looked outside and said, "It's summer. Yeah! Now we can go to the pool!" So since now it's officially summer in Braden's mind, let the pool days begin.

Here are two pictures of Braden's first day of school. -
This was such a hard day for me back in September. Braden felt like such a little baby to me and I was sad not to spend every day with him like I had for the past two years. Mother's Day out turned out to be a wonderful experience for both of us and Braden loved his class and his friends this year. On his last day, I dressed him in the exact same outfit he started school with and it's crazy how much he grew and changed in just a few short months. Here he is this past week after school -
Here he is showing me his ceramic car he painted me at school. I love these little art projects he brings home...they are so precious to me. Now I understand why my parents never got rid of any of the artwork I did as a kid.
And here is little Asher...happy as always...ready to get this summer stuff started (although it was cold on Braden's last day of school so I had to pull out a little fall jacket for Asher).
Happy Summer!!!