Tinkerbell Invitation

My niece, Ashlie, is a Valentines baby. And she has red hair to match the red holiday and since Valentines Day is right around the corner, so she asked me to make her invitations. She told me she wanted tinkerbell invitations. So I can up with these!

I am happy with the way they turned out. Ashlie is very girly and loves bling so I knew these invites would be so her! Hope she loves them!

Basketball Hoop!

Kyle and I have been discussing getting Kayden a basketball hoop for a few weeks. We thought about getting one of those mini toddler ones, but ultimately decided on a mid-size adjustable one.

We gave it to him tonight to congratulate him on moving up to a toddler bed! He did so well last night in his new bed and we are so proud if him for it! He loves his new found freedom at night! He got up several times to use the bathroom, but after about a half hour of getting up for various reason he wore tired and went to sleep, not to be heard from again until 7:00 this morning!

Kayden loves the basketball hoop and is so excited when he makes a basket. He shouts, "two points!" It's very fun watching him get excited over stuff. We just love it!

Big Boy Bed.....Yikes

Ok....so not ready for this...but tonight Kyle and Kayden decided it was time for a big boy bed, well, it's a makeshift one for now, until we can get Kayden's train bed that he's been asking for made.

It was a spur of the moment decision, I am not sure how it came about. I was sitting on the couch minding my own business when Kayden ran downstairs telling me he wants to show me something. I go upstairs and Kayden is rambling on about getting a big boy bed...tonight. Kayden was all excited about it!

Wish me luck tonight, I am predicting a rough one ahead of us. Yikes.

Banana Muffins

You see, I always seem to have over ripe bananas sitting on my my counter and Kyle is always asking me what I am going to do with them. I always have the best intentions of making banana bread, or banana cake, or banana muffins, but I never get around to it. So today I finally did! Kayden loves to help in the kitchen so to get him away from the tv and doing something else I took the opportunity to finally use the over ripened banana sitting on my counter to make banana muffins. Kayden was so excited to help and he did most of the work himself! I measured everything and he dumped it in and even stirred it all. Here are the action pictures of us, or maybe I should say him, making them!

Valentines Day Craft!

Today we went out to my moms house to do a Valentines craft with the kids. I saw this great idea on Pinterest using hearts and gluing them to a cone to make heart trees. All of the kids did fantastic and only one got burnt from the hot glue gun. :(

Ashlie and Katie each invited a friend or two, and with Charlie and the boys we had a total of eight kids! Luckily we did it in shifts which worked out really well!

The kids all had fun and their projects turned out cute!

Birthday Party

Kayden met a friend in gymnastics named Natalie. Her and Kayden loved playing and hanging out with each other, so well that last summer Natalie started talking about inviting Kayden to her birthday party, which wasn't until January!

Well, now that January is finally here, she held true to what she said and invited Kayden to her party. They had it at a local frozen yogurt shop called Menchies. Kayden, of course, loved it, as did I! :)

Here are some pictures of the kids and Kayden playing at the party and writing on the chalkboard wall they have there!


After the party we went to Costco for lunch and to grab a few things. Kyle and I were chatting when Kayden reached over and put his hands over Kyle's mouth and. hushed him! Too funny!

Build-A-Bear.....or Doggy

We were fortunate enough to have a great friend get Kayden a Build-A-Bear gift certificate for Christmas.

We were able to take him today and he had fun!

Don't let his sad face fool you, he was having fun (just didn't want his picture taken), but didn't really "get" what Build-A-Bear was about. He wanted to take the sample dog home, didn't want to fill one, but once his doggy was filled Kayden began to understand what it was all about.

After we got him stuffed, he got a bath, then it was time to fill out his birth certificate, this is where Kayden named him Doggy Blue.

It was a very fun experience! Kayden had fun looking around at all the accessories and different animals. And he liked watching Doggy Blue get stuffed! It was way too cute to watch Kayden get so excited.

Lowes Kids Workshop

Every other Saturday Lowes (home improvement store) holds free kids workshops. They provide all the necessary supplies and directions. Kyle has taken Kayden once before, but this time I was able to go too! It was fun to watch Kayden get so excited to operate a hammer! I know, kinda crazy to hand a three year old a hammer, but hey, my fingers in weren't in danger, kyle's were! Haha!

This week's project was a "mystery" Kit. When we got there we found out if was a Chuck E. Roller. Essentially it was a skee ball kit with Chuck E. Cheese as the theme!

Kayden wasn't happy about it. He kept saying, "I want to build a bird house." Once it was built and he understood what it was, he was happy!

And this will be the closest he EVER gets to a going to Chuck E. Cheese!

Big Helper

Kayden has always been a big helper, helping dad in the garage or fixing something around the house, helping me vacuum or sort laundry, he's always so eager and willing to help. And I love that about him.

Today I was fixing dinner and he asked if he could help. Of course I said yes. So I lifted him up and had him sit on the counter.

Now, I know it's probably not the best idea to hand a three year old a knife, even if it's only a butter knife, but I felt comfortable with me standing next to him and all.

He did the whole thing, cut the cheese...sticks (haha), dipped them in milk then into the bread crumbs and finally lining them up nicely on the cookie sheet!

He was so proud of himself! And I was proud of him too! He's getting way too big too fast. First preschool and next culinary school? Who knows! :)

First Day of Preschool

Well....it's been a while, huh?  I have been having trouble uploading pictures to the blog, so unfortunately this post will not include pictures, and explains why I haven't updated the blog since Halloween.  Sorry 'bout that.  Hopefully I will get it fixed soon. 

Maybe I should back up first.  We hope everyone has had a great Christmas and New Year.  We really enjoyed our holiday here.  Kayden was a lot of fun to watch this year at Christmas.  He got excited with each and every present.  It was a lot of fun to watch and I look forward to each and every Christmas from this point forward.

This was the first year that we allowed Kayden to stay up until midnight on New Years eve.  We had a family poker game here and had a lot of fun.  The kids ran around and played and the adults had fun playing a friendly game of poker.  Right before midnight we went outside and the big boys blew up some fireworks!  Kayden didn't think that was so fun, but the rest of us enjoyed them.  Even as midnight came and went, and 1:00 a.m. came around, Kayden still didn't want to go to bed.  This kid needs very little sleep to survive, I tell ya.

So, now onto the topic of this blog post.  Kayden started preschool today.  We have been going, the last few months, off and on to a mommy and me preschool class and he has loved it, but today was his first day of "real" preschool, where he spent the whole two hours with his new teacher, Miss Christie and his classmates. 

It was a rather difficult morning for me.  I hated leaving him there.  Hated not knowing how he was feeling and what he was doing.  When I leave him with Nini or Auntie or Grammie I know that he will be well taken care of, but when I drop him off at school there are rules and restrictions preventing teachers from consoling and comforting children when they are upset, so I worry about him.  Kayden has a hard exterior shell, but needs and craves comfort when he is sad or upset or needs me.  It was, and is, hard for me to think about.

Kyle, thankfully, took the day off work to be there for me and to see Kayden off to his first day of preschool and I was really grateful and happy he was there.  It would have been really unbearable without him there.

Kayden did really well when we dropped him off.  He was uncertain about it, but he didn't cry, throw a fit or follow us out the door.  We found his name on the table and he sat in his seat.  We told him good bye and off we went.  I left him there....for two hours.....by himself. 

And for the next two hours Kyle and I enjoyed a tour of the Federal Way Community Center (which is where Kayden goes to preschool).  I have been there many times, but never had a tour and I have to say, it's rather nice.  After that we enjoyed each other company while drinking a Starbucks coffee and chatting to each other.

Kyle and I got to class a few minutes before class was over and as we were waiting in the hallway Kayden caught a glimpse of Kyle through the window.  He pointed and said to the whole class, "that's my daddy!"  Kayden lost a bit of focus after that.  He was ready for class to be over.  He did well sitting in circle time until class was dismissed, but he definitely lost focus.  It was cute to see him get excited.

When we went into the classroom to get him, I asked the teacher how it went and she said well until about a half hour before class was over, where he went into use the bathroom and started crying hysterically for mommy.  Thankfully Miss Christie was able to distract him and bring him back to the activities they were working on, and he did well after that.

I am excited and proud of Kayden for entering this new phase in life and doing it rather well.  I can only hope that Wednesday goes better and there will be no crying, on either of our parts.  I won't be able to handle him crying as I walk out the door.  I won't have my better half there to hold my hand and be strong for me. 

And that's about all for now.  I hope to have the picture problem fixed soon.  I really don't like taking such a long break from blogging!

Ok, I was able to upload some pictured from my phone.