Auntie

Caden is in L-U-V with his A-U-N-T-I-E. 

 When she comes around, the kiddo and the pups flock to her.  She's the favorite over this chica.  Who can blame 'em, huh??

...And he got a big nasty gash on his head and has a runny nose and cough this week.  Not quite as sad of a situation as this picture paints it to be :).

18 Months

I can’t believe Caden is 18 months old today. I used to think my mom was weird for saying she “couldn’t’ love us any more if she tried,” or “loved us more every day.” Or, when we were sick she’d say she wished she could be sick for us, and I’d think “ya right!!” Well, now I get it. I’d do anything for Caden and couldn’t possibly love him more. If you ask me, he’s the cream of the crop and we are blessed to have him!

Caden Wesley, I love you to pieces, from the top of your head to the tip of your toes. I love it all. I love everything about you. You mean the world to daddy and I and we couldn’t be more proud of you.

I love your head. Your handsome blonde hair. How we’ve had to cut it 7 times already, it grows so fast. If you were a girl you’d have hair down to your bottom. The way you always have five or six cuts, scrapes, bruises or bumps on it. I love your eyes. They are so sparkly blue. Everyone always tells me you smile with your eyes. They twinkle and are full of life. I love your nose. The way you always want a Kleenex to blow your own nose. The way you crinkle up your nose when you taste something you don’t like. The way you smell stuff and say “MMMM” or “Yummmm”. I love your ears. How you love to have them cleaned with a q-tip. How you turn your head sideways in the tub and dip them in the water. I love your mouth. Your cute little lips. The way you are getting so many big teeth. The way you brush your teeth all by yourself. The way you stick your lips out and blow for anything that’s hot or has air coming out of it. The way you holler. The way you laugh. Your big smile. I love your tummy. How you are so ticklish. How you show me your belly button. How you ‘swim’ on your belly in the tub. How your teeny waste still fits in size 12 month pants. I love your legs. The way you run so fast. March lopsided lifting only one foot. The way you climb. The way you kick. How tall you are. I love your feet. How ticklish you are. The way you hold them up and say “teekateekateekah” wanting me to tickle them. The way you hold them up for me to smell when we take your socks off. How they look like little blocks of cheese. How they are so big….size 7. See? From the tip of your toes back up to the top of your head, we love you to pieces.

We just love it all, Mr. Caden. You are the light of our lives. You’ve made us laugh more, cry more, run more, enjoy more, be thankful more, and love more than we ever knew possible in the last 18 months. Keep it coming, wild man, we can’t wait to see what’s ahead.

Last Week of April

Well, April is here and gone.  We had a lovely week to end the month.  There was (some) nicer weather, and Caden and I got lots of time together.  It was lovely indeed.  Here's a few pics.

Caden and Adrianna (7 weeks apart).  Katina and Adrianna
came over with their Mom, Danell (my cousin) to play.
These two were all about the hugs.

And we were all about trying to get a pic of it :).  They were
pretty cute together.  CW is just a bit bigger than her, haha.

You can't tell really well in this pic, but it was so windy Friday
afternoon, that our tree in the back had petals coming off of
it like crazy.  It looked liked snow.  It was so pretty!

Daddy and him were mowing....and ran out of gas.  Caden
was pretty sure he could fix the mower so they could keep
mowing.

This is him looking back at me as I'm warning him he is NOT
to touch the mower without Daddy there.  If nothing else,
he looks like a cool dude, right :)??



Yesterday we had a picnic on the patio for lunch.  CW
loved it.  He ate better than usual.  Maybe eating
on the patio is the trick :)


Hmmm...what else about this week??  We are working on getting our retaining wall done in the back, and I'm getting excited....it will look great! Yard projects are keeping Jared busy, alway, it seems.  Our dear friends Ron & Megan had a beautiful, healthy baby girl Gianna on Tuesday.  What a sweet little blessing she is!  We got to go visit her on Thursday.  We went out with Rathe's and Jakub's to celebrate Rathe's 30th Birthday Friday, and had a good time as always.  And, hey, us crazy cats stayed out until 10:30, haha.  My lovely Krissy took Caden's 18 mos pics yesterday, so I'm excited to see those.  Today we're just trying to get caught up and ready for the week.  Caden 'dinked' around in his crib/battled a nap for 1.5 hours today, so I guess he's taking a late nap.  But guess who won that battle?  This mama did....don't mess with CW's naps.......I'm kind of a stickler about those :).

Easter....it was a lovely day for us :)

Caden taking a ride on Great-Grandma James' walker.  He loved it!!

Playing with Great-Grandma.  It was so cute....he'd try to get the
shapes in the right spot, and if he couldn't get it right, he'd hand
them to grandma and be so impressed when she found the right shape :)

I love this pic.  Cuddling with Grandma.  He almost fell asleep he
got so cuddly and cozy.  He loves Grandma!

It was SO much fun to have Uncle Ken & Aunt Alice here.
I don't know if I've gotten to celebrate a holiday with them before!

The Meyer's....minus Jaime and Brian, who were in Beatrice
at his family's Easter.

Could play in the rocks all day with Grandad and dad.

Cuteness.

My 2 seconds to brag....I made these Krispie treats for
Easter, and was mighty proud of how cute they turned out.

Attempting to get a family pic.  Hey look, it's me in a pic...the mommy!  Haha.

Getting a treat out of an Easter egg he found on the hunt.  He was
mildly under-whelmed at the whole Easter Egg hunt.  Didn't understand why
I kept pointing out eggs to him & waited for him to get them.....why
didn't I just pick them up myself, and what was the big deal???  Haha.

Trying to get a pic with Great-Grandpa.  He loves him so....he
stole his hat and then kept hugging him....still a cute pic
if you ask me.

Playing cards with Great-Grandpa.  .....And his darn bink.....

April Showers........they'll hopefully really bring May flowers :).

Well, April just started it seems and now it's almost done.  Craziness.  We've had a lovely April, hope you have as well.  I'm sorry it's been a couple weeks since I posted, and almost a month since I posted pics.  Not sure how that happened.  At any rate, I'm finally posting now. 

Caden is changing and changing.  He is starting to say more and more 'words.'  By that I mean, most may not understand much of what he's saying/doing, but we do :).  He has certain things he says for certain things, and it's great.  It seems like in the last week it's really started happening more.  He says "crackers" clear as day (probably because that's all he'd eat if he'd have it his way).  He calls all buses and trucks "cars."  And when I tell them they are trucks, he says "No, cars."  It works.  He says tractor.  He says keys.  Everything he says has the "k" sound with it.  It's cute.  He has his molars on top and bottom in back, and he can chew up lots more and much better.  One of these days his nervous nelly mommy will quit cutting up his food into teeny tiny bits.

We have read the same book every night before bed and naps for the last month.  I mean every time.  And not just the same book, the same page.  Yep, 1 page in 1 book is what CW insists on every time.  It's a hoot.  It's a page that shows different kinds of trucks/semis, and we have to point at each one and I say what it is.  Sometimes he lives on the edge and decides he needs to point at each one and I say what they are.  And if he's REALLY  feeling like living on the edge, he will point at each and 'say' what each one is.  (Can you sense I'm making fun of my Type A little man :)).

He loves a dance party.  He's pretty specific about those too.  Sometimes I'm supposed to clap and Jared dances to the music, sometimes we both are supposed to clap, and sometimes we are both to dance/do both.  It's pretty strict.  And it has to be the right music.  Sometimes CW leaves the room for a minute, but if you do something dumb like quit your job for the dance party (i.e. quit dancing), Caden will make sure and get you back on track when he gets back in the room.  Ah, how I love him.  He's too much sometimes.

We are anxious for nice weather, complete with trips to the zoo and parks.

Looks major league-like to me, don't you think?  Look at that form!  Ha.

Cuddling with Grandpa.  I've never seen him stay so still for so long.

Went to visit Great Grandpa D to see his new carpet :).

CW making sure the carpet is nice.

We took advantage of the 1 warm day...broke out the shorts.  (That's our diagnosed
'morbidly obses' dog walking with him).  He is currently 23.5 pounds
and should be around 15.  Eeks. Better do more CW chasing.

Leslie came to visit Allie all the way from Texas, and they hung out with us some :)

Cute little butters in his shorts.

The dogs get lots of love.  They get hugs before every nap and bedtime.
Not sure if the feelings are mutual, but it's pretty cute :).

So, I was putting makeup on and happy that Caden was quietly watching
TV.  Ha.  I came around the corner to find him like this.  He'd opened the
dishwasher, climbed on the lid to get a bowl of soggy Rice Krispies off
the counter from earlier, grabbed a spoon from the dishwasher, and was
having a snack when I found him.  It was 2 minutes alone, seriously.  Oh, Caden!

We went to Katina's 5th birthday party.  Not sure how she's 5!!  Seems
like she was just CW's age.  Caden had a blast.  Can you see his face?
He's laughing SO hard.  What a stud!

When in doubt, grab your clothes hamper and crawl in it to chillax.  Makes sense.

Here he's going "Ymmmm!"  It's hillarious.

Getting REALLY serious about coloring Easter cards to be sent out.

It got intense.  And then he got over it.  And Mommy had
15 more cards she wanted him to color.  Oh well.

We walked to Target and bought CW a Cars Movie set of cars.
All in an effort to make our morbidly obese dog less that way.

Caden getting his Easter basket when he got up Saturday morning (since
Sunday was so busy).  Momma bunny was good to him.  Coloring book,
stickers, sunglasses, Toy Story 3, new Veggie Tales, new PJ's, and
a little Easter chick that 'tweeted,' and a Cars Booboo.
 He loved it.  I went overboard, I know.

In his favorite place, the back yard.

This was the funniest & cutest thing I've seen.  He rode with Jared
while he mowed.  Jared told him he had to wear earplugs, and his
sunglasses to protect his eyes.  And he did.  And he was serious. 

Makes my heart melt.



Caden's first worm!!  We won't go into details about how Uncle B had
actually chopped it in half with a shovel already, and how Caden
threw it to it's death on the brick patio right after this pic.  Ha.



There you ahve it.  That's our April in a nutshell.  Here's to May flowers!!  I'll post Easter pics soon. 

Makes it all worth it.

Caden was outside playing yesterday every minute that he was awake, I do believe.  One of the many things I love about our yard is that he can just walk down 1 step out of our kitchen and go running and playing so easily!!  And, it's fenced in so he can't escape.  Well anyway, I stepped inside the kitchen yesterday to get him a refill on his sippy (or something like that.....I lose track :)), and Caden was running in the yard.  I was keeping an eye on him, and he ran up the hill to the back of the yard where we have 2 big trees he likes to "hide" between.  I saw him playing back there, and suddenly he bent down & picked something up.  He came running so fast, down the hill, across the patio, and up the step into the kitchen.

"I know," I told him, "Mommy's getting your sippy!"  Then I realized he was handing me something.  I looked down, and in his precious little hand was a little white flower that must've blown into our yard from the neighbors'.  It was a tiny little thing, but he was smiling so big and was so proud.  And this Mommy might have got a little teary-eyed :).  It was absolutely so sweet!!  Then he gave me a hug and ran back outside. 

That little sweetie pie had found that flower on the ground, and instantly got excited and brought it right to me, so proud.  He knew I'd love it :).  And I did.  And it might be completely wilted and not such a "pretty flower" anymore today, but I'm keeping it and treasuring it. 

Makes it all worth it, that's for sure :).

LOVE THAT BOY!!! 

P.S. CW, keep up the flowers for the ladies, thing, it'll score some big points for you down the road :).  Haha.  Love, Mom

Mr. Particular

Caden is Mr. Particular indeed.  He knows how he wants things and makes sure whoever he's with "gets the memo," too.  When we go to sit down outside, he'll pat the ground/chair/stairs, whatever, to show me where he wants to sit.  It's pretty cute, always right next to him :). 

And then, there's the binks.  Oh, the binks....(side note....not sure how this kid will ever lose his addiciton to the binks, but anyhoo....) we are very particular about the binks.  He's been funny about the binks since he was really little.  We have video of him crawling around, and every time he sees a binkie, he spits the one in his mouth out for the next one he sees.  We used to scatter them in a little trail as he crawled along, and it made for some cheap entertainment, watching him go after one bink at a time.  Well anyway, these days he knows his binks are (for the most part) only in his crib.  We are trying to have him have the binkies less and less, although we are not fighting it as hard as we should at this point probably.  So every so often during the day he decides that he really needs a binkie, and runs to his bedroom door, waits for someone to open the door, and runs in and gets a binkie out of his crib.  In the morning, when I go in to get him, he is always sitting there with all the binks we left in the crib with him.  Then he knows I'll only let 1 come out with him, to have while we watch a show, so he'll sit there and stare at them, trying to decide which one he wants.  I didn't know binks could be so different.  It's seriously like he's taste-testing them all.  And it's the same story at night.....when we go in to do his bedtime, he stands by his crib and takes each bink out, one at a time, "taste-tests" them, and puts each back 'til he finds the right one.  It cracks me up.  Apparently they each have a secret flavor I'm unaware of.  Haha.

And then, there's bedtime.  He is so sweet, and of course, so particular about saying "Night-night" to anyone and everyone who is here.  This includes the dogs.  Both dogs.  Individually getting "Night night" greetings from Caden.  When you tell him it's time to go to bed, he'll get his blankie, binkie, and sippy, and start waving.  Just recently, he's very specific about whom he's waving too, and it cracks us up.  The other night Jared was holding Barley as Caden was saying "goodnight" to Jared.  Jared kept responding to Caden saying "Night" back to him, and Caden started shaking his head "No." We realized it was because he was saying "Night" to Barley after Jared, and when Jared kept responding to him, Caden was trying to say "No you goofballs I already said goodnight to Dad, I'm saying goodnight to Barley now!!"  Anyway, it was funny.  Once we figured that out he said "Yes" and smiled and moved on to saying "Night" to Milo, who we had to hunt down in the spare bedroom. 

Caden couldn't be more thrilled about the weather!  He's a ball of fire the second his little velveeta block feet hit the back steps onto the patio, and doesn't stop laughing/running/smiling until his mean, awful parents make him come inside and eat or go to bed, or something crazy like that.  Ha. 

I think we will definitely get out money's worth out of the good 'ol sunshine this year, and I think winter will be quite a traumatic transition for this sweet baby boy!