Road Ready

Well, we decided over Memorial Day weekend that we would start Cade on driving lessons. After all, what are we supposed to do, be his chauffeur until he's sixteen? I don't think so.

As you can see, he's already mastered lesson #1: Looking good while driving.

Since he's not a girl, we can skip lesson #2: Applying makeup while driving, and go straight to lesson #3: Simultaneously eating and talking on your cell phone while driving. Add in one more, lesson #4: Changing 5 lanes of traffic to exit while changing the radio station, and he should be ready for Dallas traffic!

Ryland's still a little young for driving we decided, so he's going to have to keep hitching rides.

Wildcats and Watermelon

Cute picture alert!!!


Is he adorable or what? I was working on getting a good picture in his "Born to be a Wildcat" onesie for ACU Today (ACU's alumni magazine.) Although I'm not going to use this one since you can't see the onesie, I just had to post it! In other Ryland news, he got his first tooth today! It's so weird to me since Cade was almost 11 months before his first tooth. We thought he was going to be gumming his first birthday cake! Ryland, however, is on a quest to be different from his brother, and this is just one of the ways. He hasn't been too fussy, but I knew a tooth had to be close because every time I pick him up, he just sinks his gums into my shoulder and stays that way until I pull him off. Fortunately, it doesn't hurt!

This is Cade's first experience this summer with watermelon. Last summer he liked it some days and not others. Today he ate about half of the watermelon. Chris had cut smaller pieces of the watermelon for him, but check out the size of the piece he picked up! Lately when he eats something good, he turns to us and asks us, "Like ick, momma? Like ick, dadda?"

This kiddo keeps reminding me that I have to be careful now that I have a mockingbird for a son. You would think this wouldn't be too hard since I really don't use bad language. But it's amazing the little things you do when you're not thinking about whether anyone's paying attention. Not surprisingly, it usually occurs when I'm driving. Recently I was pulling out of a parking lot, and I wanted to get going to make the green light at the next intersection. The cadillac in the lane I needed was creeping along. "Come on, old people!" Okay, I'm not always nice when I drive. "MOMO PEOPLE!!!" came echoing from the backseat. Just what I need to teach my son, how to be rude to the elderly. So the next time I was in bad traffic, I told myself I wasn't going to say anything. We were stuck on 75 (it took us over 30 minutes to go 3 miles) and I was a little frustrated, but holding my tongue. Then I realized that Cade was imitating the exasperated sighs I was doing! Just a little thing, and yet he's catching every bit of it. I better go around doing nothing but singing praise songs...or maybe I'll just keep repeating, "Yes, Mommy. Whatever you say, Mommy!"

Have you tried...?

Two of my friends have now tagged me with this. It's called "Have you tried..." and you list your favorite new products. So if you're reading this, then Tag! You have to do it now.

Have you tried:

1. Dove Energy Glow Lotion
I love the idea of a no-cancer tan, but I hate the fact that I can smell it on myself constantly, plus everything I had tried gives my semi-sensitive skin these weird rashy bumps. A week into using Dove's new version, I don't smell it all day long, no bumps, and I no longer blind anyone with my white legs!

2. Mr. Clean Magic Eraser Mop
Magic Eraser is the only thing that gets my vinyl flooring completely clean, but this used to require 45 minutes on my hands and knees. I was ecstatic to find a new mop version! It almost makes me not want to change my flooring anymore...almost.

That's actually all I can think of right now. What have you got?

Take Two

Whew!
I've been trying to figure out the formatting to get my pictures where I want them, and I'm a little frustrated. My narrative gets a little shorter each time I write this...



This was going to be Ryland's first pool experience, but our friends didn't heat their pool as promised and it was COOOOOOLD! Cade will play with the hose in 50 degree weather if you'll let him, but even he wasn't trying to get in!




For some reason, Cade really wanted to put Ryland in his lap today. I set them up and just had to get a picture! Are they cute or what?

We managed to hold on the all of our stuff this week. That's a victory, I guess. Not much else of interest to talk about!

ROBBED!

Yes, robbed. As in, a man in our garage stealing our stuff. As in, Chris walks into our garage to see a man drop my bike and go running out. He then discovered our car had been rummaged through (nothing important in there, so nothing was gone, thankfully,) and his bike was gone.

We feel violated.

It was pretty scary actually. You never think you're going to just walk in on a total stranger in a part of your house. Chris yelled this horrifying yell (it reminded me of the time he dreamed he was fighting a demon. Yeah, SCARY) to scare him off and anyone else who might still be lurking in the garage, but luckily no one else was in there. The guy must have been working with someone else though, because he only had a few minutes and he was trying to steal two bikes.

So the full story. Ryland was already in bed, and Chris and Cade and I were in the backyard. It was starting to get dark (but still daylight) and I went in to draw Cade a bath. He was all muddy from "helping" Daddy work on the sprinkler system, which is also why the garage door was open. Chris had been going in and out using different tools. Anyway, Chris stopped for just long enough to strip Cade down, walk back to bathroom with him and tell me he was going to the gym. He then headed out to the garage. I had just put Cade in the bath when I heard that horrific yell I referenced earlier. Although I know full well that you are not supposed to leave a two year old in the bathtub by himself, I decided it was more important in that moment to find out if my husband was being attacked or something, so I went running out to the garage. I was hoping he was just scaring off some unfriendly dog, but unfortunately, it was worse than that.

We're extremely lucky, really, that only one item was stolen and the guys weren't violent at all. We've learned a valuable lesson to keep our garage door shut at ALL times, even if you're only leaving for a minute. And in case you're wondering, Cade was fine. I immediately went back to him when I found out that Chris was okay. He was painting on the wall with soap and hadn't even realized I was gone.

NEVER NEVER NEVER LEAVE ANYTHING OPEN!!!

Okay, got that off my chest.

Ah Boo Dit Doo!

Cade has a pretty good understandable vocabulary...most of the time. He's at that point that whenever he combines too many words (usually three or more together) it turns into gibberish. Recently I was playing with Ryland, saying, "I'm going to get you!" and blowing rasberries on his tummy. Cade was watching and giggling, and would say "Cade! Cade!" for me to blow a rasberry on his tummy. Then he said, "Mama! Mama!" He lifted my shirt, slowly and dramatically said "Ah boo DIT doo!!!" and more or less spit on me. He thought it was a great game, though, and after awhile he started doing real rasberries on both me and Ryland.
Today I was looking at a safari book with Cade. We came across a picture of a cape buffalo, and I said, "Look, buffalo!" He said, "bubbabo" or something close. I added, "Cape buffalo" and Cade said, "Cade...bubble juice." At least they were real words!