Our Trip to Houston--Part 2

OK, so once more, these pix are slightly backwards, but I always forget to upload them the other way, so oh, well, read the captions.

This is about our trip to Houston, specifically our visit with AJ's parents.
We arrived Wed. with the snow, and Thursday night we did Christmas with them (see bottom pix). Then Friday afternoon we all got in the rented van (Carla's van was in the shop, and there was no way we'd all fit in Jim's car, so we decided to rent one for the weekend) and drove to Denton. Chris's (AJ's brother) graduation was the next afternoon, so we wanted to get there in time for dinner with him, and for it not to be too late for Josh...we accomplished the dinner with Chris part, and had dinner at a brewery in Louisville. It was a really fun restaurant...made much more fun if you didn't have a grumpy tired two-year-old. He wasn't too bad, though, and ate some and charmed waitresses and stuff...and then went to bed as soon as we went back to the hotel, with the rest of us not too far behind.

The next day, we got up, had a fairly leisurely breakfast at the hotel, then went to Chris's apt. for a few min. before dropping him off for the ceremony practice or whatever it was. After we dropped him off, we went and got Josh's hair cut (needed desperately, not the best cut ever, though), and stopped to get a grad balloon filled and a subway lunch for Josh to eat, then headed to the auditorium. Josh did so well, he ate his lunch, played a few min., waved his sign when Chris came in, and then settled in my lap. When Chris got his diploma, Josh revived long enough for us to all yell and scream and he waved his sign again, then went to sleep...and slept through the rest of the ceremony, including people screaming and even fog horns and stuff all around us!! He didn't wake up till I carried him out into the windy weather after it was all over!! I was very proud of him! Then we went and snacked at Chris's apt. till Kara got there after her final and we all went out for dinner again. Then we drove home...Josh greatly amused Chris and Kara, and I'm pretty sure that though neither of them are really baby people, he's charmed them completely! He really took to Chris, especially! He loves his aunts and uncles! We stopped halfway through Dallas for gas and I got Josh changed to his PJ's and he went to sleep and slept the whole way home...yay Josh!

That sums up the whole weekend pretty much...we had fun, but of course it wasn't long enough for us. We never seem to have enough time to spend places. We really enjoyed spending time with Carla and Jim and getting to see Chris and Kara, even if it wasn't for very long!!

Chris is the one walking by the older guy


Josh completely passed out on me
Josh having his lunch at the beginning of the ceremony
Chris walking off with his diploma
"Hey, I know you!"
Sleepy Josh waiting to wave his sign for Uncle Chris
The grads
Christmas presents...he got an airport set from Nana and Grandpa and loves it!
Also loves his Melmo stocking
And his firetruck
"How do I get these stupid strings off??"
A bow for Daddy...
...and a bow for Josh
Carla and Jim got this blanket from AJ's old sq. in Germany for Christmas...I think they liked it
Josh helping Nana open her gift
In front of the "Christmas Piano"--Kara forbade her parents to get a tree before she finished school and came home to help pick it out.
CHEESE!!
He love the Papason chair...used to take naps there when he was much littler

Daddy rocking Josh

Time out

I would like to take time out from my catching up to post about how brilliant my son is. This evening he brought his "colors" book to AJ for him to read. He hasn't even looked at this book in weeks, if not months, to my knowledge, but thought it was the book for him today. It's basically a board book with a picture of something on each page, and the word under it and the color of both objects on the facing pages written above. For example, a picture of a pink flower on one page and a picture of a girl with a pink dress on the other page, with Pink on the top, and "flower" and "dress" written below the respective pics. OK, so AJ went through the book and was asking him what things were, and what color they were rather than reading it to him. Josh knew what pretty much every picture was (sometimes using alternate words rather than the ones listed, for example: "clothes" instead of "dress"), and knew most of the colors! The ones he didn't know, he'd guess at, saying white for a grey bird with some white on his chest, since he mostly only knows the more basic colors like yellow, blue, red, green, white, etc.

That's all I really wanted to say...just to brag on my smart little boy a little and let you all know what he's up to learning-wise. He also knows his numbers from 1-10, and also 17...b/c of his daddy's plane (C-17), and he's working on being able to sing "Twinkle, twinkle, Little Star," "ABC's," "Happy Birthday," "5 Little Ducks," and "No More Monkeys Jumping on the Bed." He is just absolutely brilliant and picks things up constantly, and even has 2-yr.-old logic working in his little head...not always the same logic as us adults, but still so fun to see him reason things out according to how his brain works and the things he knows. He also figured out how to put his train track together today, for the first time, and spent at least 30 min. at it! It was fun to watch the different directions and pieces he used for the track!

Anyway, now you know how brilliant he is...or at least have one more instance of it, if you already knew...as almost everyone should!

SNOW!!!

In Houston, TX...can you believe it! We couldn't!! We left Charleston the morning of the 10th wearing short sleeves and carrying our coats, since we had heard there was supposed to be some colder weather in Houston. When the pilot on the plane told us there was a chance of snow, I laughed, thinking he was joking! Nope! When we landed that afternoon it was 36 degrees...in HOUSTON! IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DAY!! Very crazy! Then it kept getting colder and started snowing early evening/late afternoon. Nuts! These were all taken by AJ while I was out getting my hair cut...unfortunately I missed seeing Josh play in the Houston Snow...sad. But I called AJ on my way to the beauty shop and told him to bundle Josh up and get out the camera so I didn't miss it all!! So enjoy our snowy "Christmas" pictures!

The deck behind AJ's parents' house
I believe that's a banana tree covered in snow
AJ's dad's car...covered in snow...there seems to be a theme here!
Pretty falling snow!
back yard shots, I believe...could be front yard, though...
Josh playing in the front yard in the snow
AJ's parents' house with the Christmas lights in the snow
Josh and his Grandpa watching the amazing snow!
Posing...
Grandpa taking pix...while Josh is once again posing
Earlier in the evening
Snow
Cutest snow boy ever...and he loves it! I'm not sure if he's yelling or trying to catch snow in his mouth here...
scraping through the snow...an hour or two later, you couldn't see these tracks at all!
The deck again
Josh's cute little footprints
I think he had a ton of fun!

Now, let me explain, for those of you who aren't from Houston, and haven't lived there...snow is a BIG DEAL! We've had ice storms, flurries that didn't stick or last more than a few min., "winter mix", and LOTS of rain...but in my memory (I moved there when I was 6, so in 20 years), there has never been real snowflakes falling and sticking...it was always ice or sleet or something...these were real, big, fluffy type snowflakes! It was pretty amazing, and a wonderful start to our very fun week with our families in Houston!

Catch up...or is it Ketchup??

Nope, definitely catch up! I am SO behind in my posts...after Thanksgiving things just kind of got busy and I got lazier about making time to do this. However, I'm going to steal my friend Vonda's idea for catching up and post in order of stuff after Thanksgiving. Just so you know...

Starting with our Christmas tree decorating!

These are somewhat out of order, and also not really finished, but we'll have to live with that since blogspot is not letting me reorganize these pix for some reason, and also wouldn't let me add anymore...I'll add more to another post. This will get the jist across.

Josh really wanted to hang ALL his ornaments up high with Daddy on the top of the ladder...big shocker there...
He got tired halfway through...poor Josh!

This is right at the beginning

First ornament

Josh "helping" or being helped by Daddy

Drinking VERY CAREFULLY out of the big boy mug from Germany. We had eggnog and sang carols after we finished decorating the tree. It was fun, and Josh loves Jingle Bells!

The dog didn't get any eggnog

Family shot with our Christmas market mugs we collected from Germany the past few years

Another shot...

Me hanging the angel and Josh...well, helping?? Not really sure what he thought he was doing here

Putting the angel on top

Earlier...look at these cool balls, Mom...and 1.5 seconds later smashed on the carpet...that's why the vacuum is out in the background, incidentally...AJ also smashed one!

AJ eating in preparation for the decorating...and telling Gus "no, you can't eat my food!"

Mom, I'm done

Two-year-olds...

They get into everything. Everyone knows this, but there are times you learn something you thought was out of reach, no longer is, the hard way. Such as tonight...

We put Josh to bed...I put baby Vick's on him, since he's still getting over his cold and was coughing a lot, and thought it might help some. He always wants to do it himself, but I don't let him, because I'm afraid he'll get it in his eyes or mouth or something. I keep in on his dresser when he's got a cold for easy access.

Josh had gotten up once or twice, as has become normal, and I went up to put him back in bed once. After that, AJ and I were watching Star Wars and I fell asleep, since I was exhausted. Next thing I know, AJ's gone and Josh is upstairs crying and AJ's yelling about something...

So I go upstairs to find AJ finishing cleaning up Josh and various objects in his room after he's not only pulled all his toys and books off the shelves, but found a way to reach the Vick's and unscrew the lid, pull the vapor plug in thingy out of the wall, and smear that and half the other things in his room, including himself (face, hair, etc.) with the Vick's. Also including his binky...

So he's freaking out, since he's exhausted and in trouble for all these things he's done that he knew he wasn't allowed to do, and crying hysterically while AJ is trying to clean up and is understandably angry with him. I sat down and calmed him down eventually, and started wiping him down (again, I'm pretty sure AJ had already done it at least once, but that stuff is GREASY!!). Then AJ came back in and discovered that Josh also had it all over his binky, so he took that away, since that's dangerous, and decided that he couldn't have it back. Not sure if this is the decision I would have come to, but I respect his decisions and I backed him up. And we were planning to put all the binkies away later this week, after he was over this cold...

But all I could think of was that this was the last little bit of baby I had left of him, and I wasn't ready to do it tonight, especially with such a negative situation surrounding it. I hated to think that Josh would have that memory of his last time with his binky and I wanted him to be prepared and ready and for me to be ready...seems like whenever we wean him off something, it's all of a sudden, and I'm NEVER ready!! Same with nursing him...it was a sudden thing, and there wasn't a lot of choice for me in the matter. Not that it wasn't a good decision, it was, and I know we'll get over this and I'm probably making a much bigger deal out of this than I should, but I just wasn't ready, and wanted him to be happy and healthy and all before we took his security away from him.

OK, I also would like to clarify that while I have these thoughts, I 100% back up my husband in his decision...we do things together, and we don't go behind the other's back to give in to Josh (at least not knowingly) or argue about things like that, unless they're a dangerous situation for Josh. That's how we parent, and I agree with him. But I'm still sad...

Anyway, that's the story of tonight...lesson: never leave anything anywhere he might be able to reach when left alone for more than 2 minutes, if you don't want him to be able to get into it. I guess he's gonna need another bath in the morning...the kid stinks of Vick's sooo bad...and his hair is all greasy and stuff. OK, all done whining about this. I guess we're done with binkies...

I did have to sing him to sleep pretty much, because he was slightly hysterical after we put him back to bed...it was very sad to see him be almost asleep and then sit up to look for his binky. Then he'd remember and lay back down...sometimes he put his fingers in his mouth for a min or so and suck on them, but it just wasn't right, so he'd take them back out and toss and turn for another min. or two. But he did finally fall asleep, so hopefully this will be ok. I'd say I'll just give him back his bink tomorrow and take it back when we're ready after he's all well (I don't think AJ meant he was taking them away forever, just for tonight...), but we've done the first night without it tonight, and I don't really want to mess that up, either. So I guess we'll pack up the binkies tomorrow. Why do I plan anything...??? I should know better by now.