Birthday boy

Holy cow, we have a lot of catching up to do for the birthday boy.  Only one picture on this post; I hope to post more of the party tomorrow.

Brady turned 3 on Nov. 22.  We celebrated his birthday with a gymnastics party on Sunday, Nov. 20th at Catts Gymnastics in Wamego.  That was a BLAST.  All the kids and the adults had fun.  Some of the adults even joined in the action by jumping into the foam pit, running around, and playing "crack the egg" on the trampoline.  See, now you're going to come back tomorrow just to see the pictures!

At three years of age Brady is 35.5 inches tall and weighs 30.5 pounds.  9% percentile for height and 37% percentile for weight.  It appears he's going to be a small kid, but there's nothing wrong with that.

Brady goes to sleep about 8:00 every night.  We read books to him for 10-20 minutes and then he puts himself to sleep in his bed (or plays around in his room for a few minutes).  He usually wakes up around 7:00 in the morning.  He's enjoying daycare and all of his friends there.  He's kind of sweet on a little girl there by the name of Tinley.  Tinley is known to save her yogurt for Brady in the mornings, which is just adorable. 

He's a pretty good eater, although if he had his way he would eat toast, cheese and fruit all the time.  He'll try almost anything once, but after that it just depends.  He is definitely 3 because he is asserting his independence and testing our limits ALL THE TIME.  We get lots of practice on patience, manners, and spend quite a few minutes in time out.  Some days we have no discipline problems and other days it feels like he's in time out all day long.  3 is fun!

Brady is very, very active.  He loves to run around and jump and throw balls and kick balls.  He really likes to climb up on things, i.e. furniture, and then jump out as far as he can.  He thinks that is great! He can climb up stairs just like a grown-up now by alternating his lead leg.

He loves to sing.  Much to the joy of his parents, one of his favorite songs is the K-State fight song.  He doesn't sing it perfect, but it's pretty close.  He sings several other songs, including the alphabet song; the Itsy Bitsy Spider; Row, Row, Row Your Boat; and a bunch of other nursery rhymes.  He can count to 6 by himself (and then he skips to 11). 

He loves to read.  A lot.  He'll sometimes "read" to us or to Brenna by picking out one of his favorite books and going over the parts he likes best.  He's still in love with Cars stuff and he's big on the Toy Story characters as well.  I'm sure I've missed some things, but those are at least the brief highlights of 3-year-old Brady.

While we were gone

Why such a long delay in blog posts?  In case you weren't one of the 50 million people I talked to, we got to spend 5 glorious days in Cancun last week over Thanksgiving.  Perfect weather, blue skies, sandy beach, daily workout, lots of food, etc.  I could go on and on, but I'll restrain myself. 

It's really, really touch sitting on the beach and looking at this every day.

 These guys hung out by the pool.  And by the miniature golf course.  They really like to sun themselves, apparently.

Playtime at the park

So maybe these pictures are almost a month old (Nov. 5).  I don't care!  Better late than never, right?

So, back on Nov. 5th, my good buddy Shelby and I took Brady to the park on a brisk Saturday morning.  The sun was shining and it was warm enough to play, which is all that really matters.  We headed to City Park because it has all kinds of fun stuff and a very squishy, bouncy, soft surface on which to play.

Heading down the slide.

Brady and Shelby racing.  Who's winning?

 Look at the balance on that kid!

 And who doesn't love to swing?

Daddy on TV

You're about to get an overload of blogging, because this momma has a lot of catching up to do.  

First up is video of Brady recognizing Daddy on the TV. It took me awhile to catch this on video, but I wised up and started the camera when Brian first comes on TV, which is when Brady recognizes him.  It's pretty cute.  I don't think Brady quite understands that Daddy can't hear him, but we're getting there.

Sleeping

I couldn't resist getting a couple of pictures of Brenna sleeping.  Now that she's mastered the art of rolling over she sleeps on her stomach. Every night.  All the time.  We typically put her down and she rolls her head to the side and sticks her thumb in her mouth and goes right to sleep.  Or she rolls onto her tummy and then starts sucking on her thumb and sleeping.  And the blanket in these pictures--that's her blankie!  She loves that blanket.

 And right after I snapped the first picture she opened those little eyes!

Stylin' girl

I just had to post some pictures of Brenna rockin her leopard print shirt this week.  She can be quite the stylish little girl. 

And this is what happens when Mom tries to snap a picture of Brady kissing on his sister.  Close, but never could get it.  This mom needs a newer, faster, fancier digital camera!

Pumpkins

I almost forgot to post these.  After Spooktacular on Sunday we headed home and the boys carved pumpkins while Mom & Brenna made supper.  Brady was a very big help this year.

Taking off the top and looking at the guts hanging off.

 Reaching into the pumpking to scoop out some guts.

 The finished products all lit up on the porch.  Don't worry, there is a fourth pumpkin for Brenna.  However, Brenna's pumpkin had very, very thick skin so we did not cut into it. 

Trick or Treat

In front of one of the big legos at Lego Quest 2011 (our church's Halloween alternative). 

 One of the games at Lego Quest.  Clearly designed for older kids, but that did not stop Brady.  He wasn't going to shy away from any game involving racing cars.

 Playing with legos. 

 Into the neighborhood for some trick-or-treating.

 He knew exactly what to do this year.

 And he wanted to EAT when he got home.  We let him have 2 pieces of candy before going to bed.  His first pick was a Reese's (definitely taking after Mom with that pick.  Really, is there any better combo than that of peanut butter and chocolate?  Me thinks not.).  His second pick was a Twizzlers (taking after Dad with that one, so he clearly belongs to both of us!).

 And a picture of our little ladyburg.  Sorry for the blurry pic, but I took it with my camera and that hand just doesn't stop moving much these days.

It was a crazy, hectic night, but a fun time was had by all.  Or at least by all of the kids.  As a parent, I really vote that Halloween should be the last Saturday of the month because working all day and then rushing home to feed the kids and then get them out to trick-or-treat before it's pitch black outside is just way too much for October 31st in Kansas.  Then again, pretty sure my vote doesn't count for changing that!

Hope everybody enjoyed Halloween.  The next holiday up is Veterans Day (at least for some of you) and then it's Thanksgiving.  Happy November!