Becoming a mother makes you paranoid.

Two weeks ago Quincy rode the bus to school for the first time....

Prior to him riding the bus we had walked to school and I showed him where the buses stopped and instructed him that he was to follow the other kids to the cafeteria where his teacher would come and get him.

He was super excited.

I wrangled all three boys out the door at 8:05 in the morning and we walked a short half block across the street to his bus stop on the corner. We waited and a few more minutes before a grandmother came out with her granddaughter. They were waiting a ways back from the corner we were standing on, next to a telephone poll. After a minute or so she walked a couple of steps towards us and asked, "Are you guys waiting for the Hogan Cedars Bus?" "Yes," I replied. "It meets over here in the morning and drops at the corner in the afternoon."

Oh. Good to know. I felt  like I was navigating through the whole riding the bus thing without really knowing exactly where we were supposed to be since the papers I'd received in the mail simply said at the corner of 7th.

So there I was, relying on a complete stranger to teach me the ins and outs of our bus stop.

Two other kids showed up.

5 minutes after standing by our stop I watched as 2 buses drove past. The stranger reassured us those were not our bus, but that they went to the same school. The reason for separate buses was that they don't want kids to have to cross the street. It made sense, but seemed unnecessary that there would be so many buses driving through the same neighborhoods.

Whatever. I guess there isn't a shortage of drivers and buses here??

Finally about 10 minutes later "our" bus showed up. The other two kids got on and I reluctantly walked Quincy to the bus steps. The number on the side was NOT the one on his route information, but the stranger lady assured me it was the right driver, just wrong bus. As I held Q's hand I kissed him and hesitantly said, "Is this the bus to Hogan Cedars? My son's a kindergartner."

The bus driver smiled at me and said, "Yep. My name is Wendy" and turning to Q asked, "What's your name?" After he responded she asked if he could sit next to Aiden (apparently another kindergartner) on the front seat of the bus. Then the doors closed and I waved at him and swallowed a little lump in my throat.

After walking back to the house with the little boys I had to reassure myself several times that he would be okay. I had to convince myself that he'd be alright and get to school just fine, even if it was the wrong bus number. After all, it was the first day of buses, and surely they just made a mistake with the number. I text Tyler about the situation and he responded with, "What?!? He's probably down in Portland somewhere!" I text back to tell him "not funny". But still I couldn't shake that uneasiness of not knowing EXACTLY where my little Q was.

Turns out everything was just fine. He made it school. Got to his class and had a fabulous day.

I'm sure it's only the first of many goodbyes and growing up stages. I can't bare to think about sending him to college and off on a mission, and even giving him away to a wife. It all sounds terribly scary, and yet joyous at the same time. I hope and pray that he'll (and that I will be as well) be ready for each new phase of his growing up life experiences.

Braxton is 2 Months old!

Braxton is growing like a weed. He turned 2 months old last Saturday, April 10th. Where has the time gone? We all love our Mr. B! And what's not to love? He's oh-so-cute, happy most all the time, hardly cries, listens to you when you talk, smiles in response to the stories you tell him, eats well, sleeps well..... there isn't much to complain about in the baby brother department here.

Braxton had his 2 month Dr. appt today. Besides getting those nasty 3 shots... he handled it like a pro! In fact, even AFTER getting the 3 shots he was STILL the happiest baby. Granted he slept for most of today, but still...he hasn't spent the entire day crying like most babies do after shots.

His 2 month stats are as follows:

Weight : 14 lbs 0 oz (92%)
Height: 23 inches long (51%)

Yeah... so our little baby is quite the chunk now.... but at lest he's healthy right?

Some of the best things about turning 2 months old are:

Loosing all that fuzzy baby hair resulting in the "old man hair-do".

Getting these chubby, oh-so-kissable cheeks.

Watching Braxton take time to appreciate the little things in life.

Getting to wash all those rolls, which are increasing in depth.

Seeing him 'sleep like a baby'.
He is now sleeping from about 10:30PM-4:30 or 5:00AM. (Whoo hoo!!)

Hearing him tell us stories through little 'a-goo' noises.

Watching his face go from something very serious...

... to this wonderful, heart melting smile!

Having a little 2 month old baby is wonderful. We can't get enough of our little Braxton!

I know we've been LONG over-due for a blog post....and especially with the kind of news we have to share...

I just wanted to document that Quincy is officially POTTY TRAINED!!!!!

I seriously had my doubts about this day actually arriving.... and to tell you the truth there were moments when I was undoubtedly ready to throw in the towel. BUT I stuck it out and after one hard core week of 24/7 lock down in Potty Boot Camp, our home, we have finally achieved some success!

Quincy has now been accident free for about 4 days. This is totally monumental. Whoever thought we'd be diaper free if we only put in one weeks worth of time?

Not to say it was all fun and games... the first few days were horrible for me and I kept asking myself, "Is he really learning anything?" We had 5 accidents in the first day... and seeing as how we only had three pairs of underwear you can imagine the amount of times I was doing laundry just to keep this kid in some dry clean underwear! On day 2 I demanded that Tyler take us to the store and we buy at least 7 pairs!

Quincy got to pick out the kind of underwear he wanted... which as no surprise to us, he chose some race car ones. He LOVES them! This was motivation for him to keep his underwear dry because he didn't want to pee on his race cars.

Now that we're into the second week, he is at a point in time where he tells us when he needs to pee and poop. Though we still have some timing issues with the whole pooping thing. He's not always in time to get from that point of where he knows it's coming to it actually getting it out in the toilet. But seriously, there are no complaints from me. He has been dry every day and I have even braved him sleeping in underwear for his nap! He woke up one afternoon and I was sure his bed would be wet, but it wasn't. He then said to me, "Mom I need to pee." I thought this was his way of admitting that he had already gone, but he then informed me, " No Mom, I need to go pee in the toilet!" So we got him down from his bed and he actually peed in the toilet.

Our next BIG adventure is peeing in public restrooms. He sort of has this phobia of peeing in 'strange' public toilets. He is overly concerned about the toilets not having lids. He thinks they are not toilets unless they have a lid on the back. He is also a little terrified of the loud flushing noise they make. So we just keep practicing, walking into lots of public restrooms and explaining that they aren't 'scary'. I think he'll eventually be okay. After all, we're only on week 2 of being potty trained.

I love Quincy's ability to learn and adapt to new situations. We are so proud of him.

We're also excited about being 'diaper free' .......at least until February... when we'll be buying three times the amount of diapers that we were buying last month.

Oh well, it's still exciting!!

Oh and lastly, as a side note... I have pictures from my camera that need to be blogged about, but we haven't had access to internet from our home( all my blogging stuff has to be done from an actual computer-- not Tyler's iphone, so we've had to use the apt. internet in the office)... and with all that Potty Boot Camp, it left little time for blogging. So rest assurred, we will be posting things as soon as we can.... now that we're able to venture out of the house!

Quincy's Big Boy Updates:

Just recently we had to buy Quincy some more clothes. Although the weather has been beautiful, its that time of the year where we enjoy cool mornings and evenings with warm afternoons in between. Quincy is now wearing 3T clothes! Perhaps with the exception that his pants are more like 2T... he's got Tyler's little behind.

I have sort of been slacking on taking pictures... mostly because we've been so busy, but this day Quincy let me have at it. He was even WANTING me to take his picture, which of course is a rare occasion. After commanding me to take his picture he would stand in a spot and pose like this:

This is Quincy's face he makes when he thinks he's being funny.

And here he is being mischievous while taking brochures off the tables at the doctor's office.

Quincy's Latest:

**He is now sleeping in a "big boy bed" -- I thought it might be a difficult and slow transition for him to say his goodbyes to his crib, but it was nothing of the sort. After sleeping several nights in his twin bed, I asked him if we could give his crib to baby Pipa since he was sleeping in a big boy bed. He very matter of factly answered, "Yeah I give my crib to Pipa. I big boy"

**He is successfully brushing his teeth by himself, with very little supervision. He even understands how to brush all the different parts of his mouth. This is a huge step from eating the toothpaste.

**Nursery has become one of his favorite parts of church.

**He has learned how to put his shoes on by himself-- and is constantly reminding us he wants to "do like big boy". This can make getting ready to leave a Much longer process.

**Quincy eats, brushes his teeth, and colors right handed. He throws balls left handed (and very precisely might I add).

** Stickers are a big motivator in our home right now. Quincy is easily bribed into doing lots of things for a sticker or two. It doesn't even really matter what kind they are. Often we find stickers in our pockets, on our clothes, shoes, between the sheets and other random places.

**Quincy is FINALLY starting to venture out in his palate for different foods. His latest favorites and newest taste testing foods include: cooked broccoli, cooked carrots, vanilla yogurt, soy nuts, raspberries, blackberries, apples, oranges, tomatoes (though he's still not too hot on swallowing them yet- I blame Tyler), ice cream --he didn't used to like the coldness on his teeth, Swedish pancakes, waffles, string cheese.... and the list goes on.

** Quincy knows all of his letters in the alphabet, capital letters and almost all the lower case letters. He is even starting to learn some of the sounds to the letters. He sometimes remembers the 's', 't', and 'c' sounds. He will often fill in the blanks for books that we read when we leave out a word. It's amazing what his little sponge like brain has picked up on.

** Quincy learned his first bad phrase from Grandpa Loren, who absentmindedly said out loud "What the Hell?" After which Quincy immediately repeated "What the Hell?" I think he's since forgotten, but Grandpa was warned to be extra careful in what he lets slip out. Another potty word he repeated was stupid.

** Quincy has learned nearly all his body parts. From head, shoulders, knees, and toes to elbows, ankles, wrists and forehead. In addition to learning body parts he's picked up on some embarrassing habits. For instance, he has learned what and where "boobies" are. He knows that we all have boobies, but girls and boys boobies are different from each other. Mostly in the sense that girls' are bigger. In church one Sunday while sitting on my mom's lap during sacrament mtg. he said out loud, "Grammie have big boobies" while rubbing his hand over them. It was embarrassing and I think only the people behind us heard. We had to later explain that we don't touch other people's chests, only our own.

** Quincy apparently has learned his left and right hand. If you ask him to do something with either hand he will obediently do so with the correct hand. We still don't know how he learned this.

** Quincy has learned lots of new animals including, rhinoceroses, hippopotamus, giraffe, alligator, and many others.

** Quincy has taken to hanging from the bar on the trampoline, though he's extremely freaked out to actually venture to the top of it.

** Quincy apparently knows the Nike Swoosh. As he can recognize it anywhere.

** He is finally able to jump off of two feet at the same time.

** Quincy is also picking up on more Portuguese phrases that Tyler's been trying to teach him. Seeing as how he repeats everything, it's the ideal time to teach him.

There are probably more things that I have forgotten, but this at least sums up some of what he's been up to lately. We are so proud of him. He constantly amazes us with the things he's learning.

Toys for Big Boys

About two and half weeks ago my parents went to California to visit my sister Emy and her new husband Gil. While they were down there they visited an old family friend of ours. She has some grandson's that are older than Quincy and was generous enough to send my parents home with some new toys for Quincy. These are some pictures of his remote control race car track.

"Ladies and Gentlemen-- Start your Engines!"

The Famous ramp.

The Bridge that explodes when you drive past it.

Side view of the ramp.

I think that Tyler, Scott, and Karter had more fun with it than Quincy (seeing as how it's designed for age 8+), but it didn't take Quincy long at all to figure out how to join in the race car party.

Don't mind the red Kool Aid mustache, he had just drank some red juice... and I didn't have time to wipe his mouth before I took the picture.

Catch Phrase

Just wanted to record our son's latest favorite phrases:

* Mine! * -- I think this is something he's picked up from the little nursery girls, who are defensively yelling it at the little boys who are trying to steal their dollies.

* I do myself. * -- This is what we're told throughout each day. Occasionally he says "I need help you" (When we ask him, "Do you need help?" he gets confused when asking for us to help him. Instead of saying "I need you to help me", he says "I need help you". Close enough right?)

* No! * -- If we ask him any thing, more often than not this is the first response. It's funny when we ask if he would like something he really wants and replies with a *no*.

He's acquiring quite the 2 year old attitude if I don't say so myself. Still, he has his moments where he's sweet.


This morning when I came to get him out of his crib I started feeling sick and had to wake Tyler up to change his diaper. I was standing in his doorway, to assure him I wasn't going to leave him trapped in his crib, and holding my stomach. He looked at me and said "Mama's tummy has owyee." To which I couldn't help but smile, despite feeling nauseous, and said "Yes, Mama's tummy hurts." He smiled at me really big and said.... "I kiss it better." My heart just melted. He did kiss it and you know what? For about 5 seconds it DID feel better.

Something else he said today, our little parrot that he is, was when he found a tack on the floor and I told him to give it Dad because it was dangerous. He ran to the kitchen yelling "This dangerous." We really have to watch what we say because he repeats almost anything. I love my little soon to be 2 year old. I can't believe how big he's getting.

Hot cross Buns

Well the 'pre-potty training' is still going on around here, though quite unsuccessfully I might add.

(Look at these cute buns)

We've been trying to keep Quincy motivated about his new friendship with the potty chair. He's still reluctant to get to attached. We did, however, get him to sit on it for 15 or 20 minutes straight a few weeks ago. Of course he can't sit unless he has something to look at... so we read him some books to keep him distracted.

I think I'm the one who's more anxious for potty training. Tyler tries to keep reminding me "he's not even 2 Kati." I know, I know.... I just want to get it over with already. I think if I were home every day we'd be working on it morning, noon, and night. Perhaps if we got him in the habit of sitting on it 3 times a day, it would start a nice little routine.

Tyler is not this motivated... the thought of having to do this 'routine' exhausts him. So for the meantime, we're still trying to break the habit of him pooping under the crib.


Oh and as a side note... we gave him this water bottle to drink while he was practicing sitting on the potty. We figured that maybe if he drank enough he might actually feel the need to go while he was sitting.... nope, no such luck.
*Sigh* Someday.



***Note: one of my biggest dreams came true just a few short hours after I posted this. Quincy actually POOPED in his potty. It wasn't very much, but just enough to get him excited about doing the deed in his potty chair. He proudly helped me carry the container to the toilet to flush it goodbye. Eureka! I hope this little bit of success continues on during the next few weeks. Baby steps right? Oh and I apologize to all of you who don't have kids and probably think it's totally weird that I'm getting so excited about him pooping in the potty. You will understand some day. :o)

Quincy is officially big enough to....

... ride his four wheeler.

Which is ironic because he got this for his 1st Birthday. At the time he didn't really know what to do with it and we spent quite some time with out backs hunched over running behind him with it. But no more!

Now he is big enough to ride by himself!

It's that Time of the year....

Quincy's been avoiding it for quite some time, but he was due for another round of shots. I always hate taking him to these appointments because I feel bad when they stab him with all those needles. This time around he needed to get 3 shots. He got his DT&P, Hepetitis A, and Flu shot. We went to the Health Distict and they did great.

Quincy did fine.... he didn't even cry until she had already jabbed in the needle and began pushing the fluid into his leg. Luckily she was quick and so despite the immediate panic, tears, and struggle Quincy put forth... she was done before he knew what was happening. As soon as it started it was over. She gave him two stickers, and wouldn't ya know it..... he stopped crying! It was amazing... I've never seen him put a stop to those tears so quickly!

He was such a brave little boy!

At last the time has come... 15 month update

I was feeling a little down reading Katie Stacey's blog when she reported Savannah saying actual words like shoe, for instance. Then I would get to spend the rest of my day feeling frustrated when the only "words" Quincy would say were "dada" and other sorts of jibberish.

Well, I feel a little better now because Quincy is finally feeling comfortable enough to try new sounds and words. He can now say bubble *bubah*, cracker *gakah*, circle *gircle*, hot *haaa*,car *gar*, go, up, dog, out there, dada, mama, and yuck *ykkk*. I told Tyler, despite not being able to say any really important words for communicating, I'm not sure how bubble is useful in getting what he wants, we are excited for this new stage in his life. We look forward to him saying lots more and I'm sure along with all those new words he will also be saying embarrassing things like we both did as children. Either way, we are so happy!

Quincy can also climb on the couches by himself... he is very well balanced. He gives hugs and kisses... which is VERY cute! He knows what it means when we say *ouch*; If he hurts one of us we say *ouch* and tell him to kiss it better. He does and says *Mmmwah* while he kisses you. It's super cute. He also kisses characters in his books, other kids-- mostly girls-- and his toys and stuffed animals.

We are so proud of Quincy he a great son and we are amazed by everything he accomplishes each day!