Morning People We Are Not

I have never been a morning person. Ever. My mom and I have some horror stories we could tell about our mornings together growing up.... Mornings that involved her physically dragging me into the bathroom and closing the door (where I would turn the shower on and curl up on the bath mat to go to sleep again). Any roommate I have ever had can vouch for the fact I had an obsession with my snooze bar (sorry to those of you who had to live with that!). I STILL hate mornings. But now I have to worry about getting my own kids up and around in the morning. And it looks like my mom was right when she said, "One day you're going to have a child just like you!" It's the ultimate payback, I guess.

Chase is impossible to get up in the morning. When I have him during the week we have to leave the house by 7am, and it takes him at least 45 minutes to get ready. It's ridiculous. When I go in there at 6:15 to gently wake him up he yanks the covers up over his head and yells things like, "Leave me alone!" or "It's still dark outside!" or "I'm tired!" or "You're not my friend!" And then I spend the next 45 minutes yelling things like, "Chase, hurry up!" or "Brush your teeth!" or "Stop entertaining your sister and EAT!" or "Apparently you're going to go to daycare in your PJ's today.... Get your shoes on!"

So I decided the kid needed to be introduced to the alarm clock. I talked to him about how he's getting bigger, and grown-ups use an alarm clock in the morning, and isn't that cool? Ha. Anyway, he seemed to think it was cool so I put his clock radio on a loud country station and set it for 6:00, figuring it would give him some time to slowly wake up on his own. I set out his clothes and told him when he was ready in the morning to put them on.

The next morning I got out of the shower at 6:15 and thought, "OK... moment of truth!" I was looking forward to hearing that country music blaring, but when I walked out of the bathroom I heard nothing. Huh. That's weird. I walked down the hall toward his room and it was completely dark. I looked at the clock and saw that familiar blinking dot I know so well.

My 4-year-old found the snooze button.

I said, "Chase, what happened?" and he barked at me, "I turned it OFF, MOM!"

Now, I will say... things have gotten better. He no longer hits the snooze (after I explained he could just lay in bed and listen to the music for awhile), but he still doesn't get up on his own. I taught him how to read the clock, and he knows he has three jobs to do before 7:00, and must do them in this order: clothes, teeth, breakfast. He lives for breakfast, so it seems to be a good incentive to hurry up and get those other two things done so he can eat.

I'm trying to train him now so I don't have to drag him into the bathroom every morning like my mom had to. Ha! We'll see how that plan works out....

Fun at the Park

We had a playdate at the park with Chase's friend Ryan today! The kids had tons of fun kicking a soccer ball around and playing on the swings:

I also took Chloe over to the little playset just to see how she would do and the girl was fearless... climbing all over the thing on her own and even trying to walk down the slide (we had a couple close calls)! I snapped some cute photos of her playing:

There are more photos in our Photo Album if you're interested!

Kickball!

Chase started kickball, and he LOVES it!  I am so impressed the game is able to hold his attention.  He works so hard and listens so well.  When I picked him up from daycare for his second practice he screamed out, "YAY!!!!  I LOVE KICKBALL!"  The next day when I picked him up he said he was excited for another kickball practice.  When I told him we don't practice every day he burst into tears.  Here are some photos from his first practice.  There are more in our Photo Album if you're interested:

Chloe just runs around looking cute and making people laugh the whole time (and she's super good at that, too):

Sprinkler Park

OK, OK.... I need to be better about updating the blog, I know. I have a few posts to catch up on, so I'll take baby steps!

"Today" (I'm cheating... I'm backdating this post about 3 weeks) we went to the sprinkler park with our friends Erin (my friend) and Nathan (Chase's friend).  That's the beautiful thing about living in Texas... you can still run around in sprinklers in mid-September.  Anyway, the kids had a lot of fun.  Erin took all the pictures and she has had technical difficulties getting them all to me, but I'll go ahead and post the couple I have and hopefully I can update with more later.

I totally don't know what the boys are doing in this photo, but it's pretty cute!  Click on the photo to get a better look:

Fall in Texas is fabulous!

San Antonio Visit

I just got this picture from my aunt, so I had to post it! I went to San Antonio a week and a half ago to help my friend Katie move, and to visit with my aunt and uncle! We had a lot of fun. They took me to dinner on the river walk and we did a lot of catching up. We hadn't seen each other in 8 years! Crazy. We had a great time and will definitely see each other more often now that they live closer.

The rest of my weekend was spent helping Katie move. Now, usually moving isn't a fun process, but we had a really good time! I friend who can make moving fun is a true friend indeed!

Look Who's Walking!

Go, Chloe!!

Random Update Time!

It's been awhile since I've posted, so it's time for some random updating!

I'll start with Chloe. She is now eating "people food" and LOVES it. She rarely turns anything away.  Her favorite foods are yogurt and Cheerios (if they are anywhere around her she will beg for them), but she loves just about everything else I give her, too. We experiment with the spoon sometimes and she has lots of fun with that, too:

Chase also LOVES to feed her. He wants to share all his food with her (and she doesn't mind)! It's so cute:

She took her first steps a couple weeks ago, on her 13 month "birthday" (July 30th). She hasn't done a lot of venturing out on her own since then, but she'll take a couple steps here and there if you prompt her. She says "Uh, oh," "Night Night" (occasionally), "Mama" and "Dada," and she's working on "All done." "Uh oh" is by far my favorite!

Chase has been enjoying daycare and had lots of fun during "Pirate Week!"

Today he got a wonderful surprise. Grandma made him an amazing quilt and pillowcase set. I cried when I got it, and Chase loved it, too!

Both kids took swim lessons this summer.  I had a video to show you but for some reason it doesn't play all the way through.  It must be corrupt or something.  Bummer!  Chloe LOVES the water.  Chase took awhile to get comfortable, but by the end he was almost swimming on his own!

I feel like I've been all over the place this summer.  Besides the trips to New York and Idaho I blogged about, I spent several weekends in Houston visiting my dear friend Katie (before she moved to San Antonio), saw friends Don and Julie in Austin, went to a Theatre Educators conference in Waco, and saw my aunt and uncle in San Antonio (while I was there helping Katie move)!  When I wasn't traveling I spent quality time with new friends and took up running (well, training to become a runner... we'll see how that goes)!  It's been a great summer, but now it's time to get back to the "real world."  I go back to school Monday!  I'm ready.