Hilarity

Definition = 1. Extreme amusement especially expressed by laughter. 2. Boisterous merriment.

What do you get when you put five cousins ages one, six, four, five, and two on a pool float?

Pure hilarity.

Will ~ 2 years old

Back in April, Will turned 2 years old. 2??!!! How is it possible? On one hand, he seems so big. But on the other, he will probably end up being the baby of the family so I'm sure I baby him more than I should. But I am totally OK with that.  :)   I know the days are flying by.

I still can't quite put my finger on just one or two words to describe Will. He is truly a mixture of so many things right now. He can be loud, he can be quiet. He will run all over the place, and then he will sit and look through books forever. He is social and happy and at the same time, he can be sensitive, particular and dramatic.

His most unique (and exhausting) characteristic at the moment is that he is our escape artist. Wherever we are, he is on the run looking for a way out. I'm guessing this is part of his explorer personality. Oh my...it is exhausting, and I'm not sure if I've ever seen anything like it. We have already had a Search Party Rescue at church. I fear "Will the mother of the lost boy, Will, please come to the front of the store?" pages will be in my future.

And part of that explorer personality comes a lot of climbing and getting into things. Some of his favorites to hide are toothbrushes, computer mouse, hairbrushes, and my chapstick. We find all of those items in all kinds of places in our house. 

He continues to be a great eater and current favorites are: milk (top of the list!), strawberries, blackberries, mandarin oranges, turkey dogs with di, di, di (ketchup), chips & salsa (cracks us up), chicken & rice casserole, cheese, cheeseburger (cut up tiny with di, di di), bananas, spaghetti, rice, and bagels with cream cheese spread. He still does not care for yogurt or ice cream.

In a recent post, I mentioned that we have started speech therapy for Will. We had been wondering if he would need it for a few months but just waited to see if his speech picked up on its own. Didn't seem to be happening, so we were off to see some of our favorite people. He is going twice a month to see Ms. Kendra (who we all love), and she works at the clinic managed by the physical therapist that worked with Tate for 2+ years. Like old family! :) He is also seeing an ECI speech therapist twice a month. It can be a tiring process, but I'm incredibly thankful for the help.

With a significant speech delay comes a lot of frustration for Will and for us. It's hard to know what he wants, and because of that, he has definitely perfected the temper tantrum. :) It's a test of patience for all of us. But we are making some progress on adding words and signs to communicate what he wants.  It's slow progress, but it is progress.

One of his more dramatic moves that makes all of us laugh, is when he is mad/frustrated or even if he sees something go wrong on a cartoon. He puts his hand to his head with a very sad "ooooooooo." It is pretty cute...and I'm just glad to see him so empathetic. :) 

Will is still the best cuddler at night. Even at 2 years old, I still rock him in the glider and sing each night before bed. He will put his head on your shoulder and rock. I will be doing that as long as he lets me!

The last few months, Will has become quite attached to his Daddy. If Wade is at home, he usually wants to be right beside him. He screams (loudly) when Wade gets home each day. And they have developed a little ritual of Will feeding Wade M&Ms. Wonder who started that? :) And he continues to LOVE his big brother. He gets so excited to see Tate and thinks going into his bedroom is the most fun thing ever.

In fact most of the time Will sees someone he is excited to see or arrives somewhere he is happy about, he bounds into the room with a scream. A high-pitched scream. I have seen quite a few people get quite startled by it.  :)  When Will is excited or happy, he lets everyone know!  

Will is still our resident TV addict. We have to be pretty careful about how much he watches because he is happy to watch episode after episode of Sesame Street, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Super Why, or Little Einsteins. He loves them all. One of his favorite toys right now is his alphabet puzzle he got for his birthday. And he really knows about half of the letters already. He also loves reading books, playing with the car garage and ramps, the ball popper, playing (or climbing) in the water table outside, any kind of slide, his Cozy Coupe car, or really doing anything outside.

I love this boy with all of his hugs, giggles, smiles, screams, big blue eyes, jibber jabber, and tantrums. All of them together make our Sweet Will. Can't wait to see what year 3 brings!
Here he is stylin on his actual birthday before going to church.  I love the GQ model pose. 

And this is at his family birthday party as we sang Happy Birthday. Will loves a good singalong!

Happy Father's Day

He plays.

He laughs.

He disciplines.

He cooks.

 

He encourages.

He reads.

He gives zerberts.

He listens.

He prays.

He respects.

He cleans.

He plays some more.

He loves.

My boys are incredibly blessed to have a Dad who does all of these things without hesitation. 

They love him. I love him.

Happy Father's Day, Wade!

Spring Sports Wrap-Up

The Spring was a busy season with a lot of sports going on. I'm trying to prepare myself that there is a good possibility that sports will be a significant part of my future. This boy LOVES sports. He loves to play them, and he loves to watch them. Any of them...football, basketball, baseball, car racing, tennis, whatever. A babysitter told us recently that Tate sat down and watched a men's volleyball game on TV for 30 minutes. Clearly that is not my line of DNA that he has.

This Spring, Tate played soccer again. He was quite excited about the team name, Tornadoes. He loved going to practices and games...the fact that on Game Day he got to put Gatorade in his water bottle made it even cooler. What I realized about Tate is that he has no problem at all being assertive and aggressive in the game. He will run with the pack, get to the ball, etc. The hard part he is realizing that once you get to the ball, you don't have time to set up a perfect kick. The ball is usually long gone by then.  :)  But it didn't stop him from trying.

The part he really enjoyed this season was getting a chance to play goalie. He did great staying in the game, watching the ball, and stopping several goals.

This is a look you will see from Tate often if you're outside on a bright, sunny day. His makeshift sunglasses. The downside of having big light blue eyes.

I also realized this year that this kid has got a serious competitive nature. This league doesn't take score during the games. But if you ask Tate, he knew the score every single game. So he was quick to celebrate and quick to be disappointed. We had quite a few talks about being a good sport.  :)

It was a fun season!

The end of preschool was also the end of the basketball TOT program. He did this for two years right after Thursdays at preschool. It is a great program, and Tate absolutely loved it and learned a lot. Such a great way to practice good listening, focusing, learning, playing a sport, and having fun. They had the end-of-year performance at a local high school gym. We were so proud of Tate as he did GREAT! Such a difference compared to when he started at three. His dribbling and ball handling were so good!

I have no idea what's going on here.  :)

And at the end of April, Tate did his first Dirty Scurry Mud Run. Why anyone would want to run through a mud obstacle course is beyond me, but he did it. Back in the fall, he did his first-ever 1-mile fun run and really liked it. So he had been asking to do another one and heard about the kinds with the mud. So we signed him up for this charity kid's mud run that supported our local children's hospital. Our family has benefited from the incredible care at the hospital and were happy to contribute.  He was excited to see his preschool buddy, Zach, at the race as well.

It's tough being the little brother and watching all of the fun from the stroller. :)

I'm not sure if we prepped him quite enough beforehand. I think he was a little shocked with how muddy it really was. And he was definitely on the younger end of the kids there. I think that part was a little intimidating as there were some moments of almost getting run over. But he finished the race and says he wants to do it again next year.

When else do your parents encourage you to clean off in the big water puddles?