Daily smiles

 

Talking beans

Christopher is a child who has always liked to eat. You don't need to tell him to stop playing because it's lunchtime! But right now I am standing in the kitchen, listening to him in his high chair, making two beans talk to each other. Seriously. He ate much of his lunch but has several beans remaining on his plate along with some hummus. Perhaps he has become attached to said beans and will not consume them today. They are the fortunate ones. He is also including himself in the conversation saying, "Beans, go in hummus please. Okay." Quite a conversation. How will it end? The suspense is killing me.

Buds

The more and more Christopher talks, the bigger a boy he seems to me. He has been having a blast at school and really seems to like his teachers. Here he is holding an apple he made there the other day.

Other than school, we've just been going about our normal life with a two year-old. One of Christopher's favorite things to do right now is to play with playdough. We even went against one of my preschool teacher pet peeves and mixed the colors the other day! Here he is hard at work making a purple/green playdough cow.

By far the most fun thing Chris is up to these days is talking! He is jabbering up a storm, telling us all how it is. I have mentioned in the past how he likes to say "yes" to everything, even when he doesn't mean it. Well, now he has added "okay" to that so his answer to everything is either "yes, okay" or "no, okay." He's even singing some songs which is so cute to hear. For example, he was singing one of Daddy's favorites last night, "Hot Cross Buns." His rendition goes like this: "Hot cross buns/ Hot cross buns/ One penny/ Two penny/ Hot cross buns." Buds has had the sniffles this weekend and a yucky cough but hopefully he will be back to his usual self this week!

My child just said "Yay! Awesome!" with absolutely no prompting from me. He's just playing across the room, by himself.

Baking

In honor of Kay's birthday, Christopher decided to bake her some pumpkin bread. Here is is mixing the pumpkin ingredients together all by himself. As we were making the batter, Chris kept smelling it and saying "Mmmmmm" (with emphasis!). This is a boy who likes to bake and is passionate about food! Kasey was very happy since more ingredients than usual fell on the floor. The kitchen was a bit messier than usual but I believe it's better that way. Chris also made a homemade card for Kay which we will deliver along with the bread later. He truly hopes she enjoys it!

New cousin

Christopher (and his mommy and daddy) would like to congratulate Daddy's cousin Ian and his wife Melissa on the birth of their son! Best wishes to the new parents and we're looking forward to the future Jets/Patriots rivalry between CJ and the new baby Woglom!

Funnies

At dinner tonight, Chris says...

"Mommy wears purple. Daddy wears blue. More toe-ta-toes pease." 

More grandparents!

Christopher is one lucky boy... not long after Grandpa T and Nancy left Kansas, Grandma and Grandpa Woglom came to see him. They came in on Friday and stayed for the weekend. On Saturday, Daddy took us all out for breakfast at First Watch (as close as Kansas can come to a diner... I guess) where Chris devoured a very large chocolate chip pancake. After breakfast, we made it over to the Overland Park Arboretum. CJ got to play with rocks and dump trucks; what more could a little boy want?

He also enjoyed running up and down the arbor tunnel!

 

On Sunday, Christopher took his grandparents to Deanna Rose and showed them all the animals there. Even though we were just there last Sunday, Chris was super excited to see his cow, goat, and chicken friends. He also got to feed the turkeys, goats, and fish this time! Very fun. Most importantly, Chris was able to share in the celebration of the Jets big victory over the Patriots. We had a lovely visit and look forward to seeing Grandpa Eric and Grandma Jan again soon!

Grandpa T and Nancy's Visit

The past few days brought Grandpa T and Nancy to Kansas to visit. Of course, they were here to visit Christopher, but we also had a nice time with them! We refer to my father as "Grandpa T" but Chris wanted to make it easy on himself and simply called him "T." It was so cute because our little man always wanted T to go where he was going. When he would wake up from nap, he would ask for T. The two of them wrestled in the back yard, kicked the ball around, and even watched Thomas together. We were very busy with our guests this weekend. T came to watch Mommy race in a women's triathlon on Saturday which he enjoyed a lot. We also took them to Deanna Rose, Lawrence, Cabela's, and Ernie Miller Nature Center. One shocking event, however, was on Monday when we went to Fritz's (you know, the restaurant where the trains bring the food to your table?). Chris was very excited to go and was fine while we were waiting for our food. But when the train came and the tray was lowered down to the table, CJ freaked out. He started crying, grabbing onto me, and shaking. It was so bad that we had to go outside and we ended up bringing our food home to eat. So much for that! (And sorry, Grandpa Eric and Grandma Jan, but I don't think we'll be taking you there this weekend). Otherwise, our visit was lovely! Here are some more pics to enjoy...

 

First day update

The first day of school was a success! Although Chris was too excited to sleep at school, he had a wonderful day playing with trains, books, playdough, water and many other things. When I came in to pick him up, he was eating his snack (slowly!) and listening to Ms. Michele read a story. He actually cried when he had to leave because he wanted to play more with the toys. I guess that's a good problem to have! Good job, buds, on your first day of school!

First day of school!

I am entering this post as I feed myself (and only myself) lunch. Christopher is off at his first day of Children's Day Out which they should really rename Mommy's Day Out as I have already accomplished more things by 12 noon than I usually do. We have been preparing our little man for his big day for a couple weeks now, but we weren't sure how he would react when I dropped him off. He met his teachers last week and saw his classroom which, as you might imagine, has trains for him to play with. So as we waited for the teachers to open the classroom door, Chris was saying (repeatedly) "Play choo-choos! Play choo-choos!" We entered the first room (which is where they take a nap) and dropped off his backpack and lunch box (sniffle, sniffle). Then we made up his bed and left his Thomas pillow and little Piggy for when he takes his nap. At that point, Chris noticed Ms. Michele and gave her a nice smile and wave. After washing his hands at the "magic sink," Chris barely stuck around for a hug and kiss from Mommy and then took off in search of the trains. There were no tears on his part (that I know of!) and no real tears on my part (although I came close). I am so proud of my big boy and we'll see how his day went in a couple hours! I'm going to go tend to my other child now (Kasey) and get her a bath and a pedicure. Here is one more picture of our big boy with his Thomas backpack...

Overheard, Part 2

Christopher got pancakes for breakfast this morning. As he was about to put a piece of pancake into his mouth, he paused, looked at it, looked at me and said...

"Chocolate chips, please."

He's totally our child!

Overheard

As we were putting on our shoes, getting ready to go to the trail for a run this morning, the following conversation occurred...

Mommy: "Look Chris, Mommy has her gray shoes with pink on. And your shoes are blue today."

Chris: "Kasey has orange shoes on!"

Omaha Pics

As promised...

Omaha

We were impressed by yet another midwest city this weekend when we took Christopher just a bit north of here to Omaha, Nebraska. Our main purpose was to go to the Omaha Zoo, which we kept hearing good things about from people here, but we discovered much more over the two days we were there. On Friday and Saturday night, we went out to dinner in a beautiful neighborhood of the city called The Old Market. The food was good both nights and it was a very nice area to walk around, full of cafes and art galleries. Chris was especially excited to see the balloon maker on Saturday who made him a penguin balloon. And speaking of penguins, this was CJ's favorite animal in the entire zoo! We spent much of Saturday wandering around the animal exhibits seeing giraffes, zebras, butterflies, tigers, polar bears, monkeys, a baby gorilla (so cute!), and many more. But overall, Chris loved the penguins. In fact, any animal exhibit that had water fascinated our little man. First he would tell the animal to swim if it wasn't already, and then he would say "Chris swim, Chris swim." I'm pretty sure if we had a wetsuit and some swimmies, we could have left him with the penguins all day long! Here is some video of him watching his favorite birds.

We also got to ride a very cool zoo train that took us past the antelope, cheetahs, rhinos, and elephants. After that, Chris and Olivia were set on riding the carousel and they got seats right next to each other! That day was very fun and the next day, we all went to the botanical gardens which were absolutely beautiful! Of course the highlight was the train garden which was this elaborate set up of model trains. Chris could have stayed there all day. Roses, smozes! Give the boy trains and he's happy! He did look for bees among the flowers, one of his favorite activities. And he ran through the corn maze in the children's garden with absolute excitement! Brian and I had to stand on opposite ends because he would go through the maze so fast, we couldn't even keep up with him. We had a lovely time this weekend and will definitely make it back to Omaha soon (especially since Chris keeps saying "Omaha" every time we get in the car, even if we're just going to the grocery store!). Pictures will follow soon.

Cute video

Funny stuff...

Sentences

The top three sentences of the day, courtesy of Christopher (no words added by Mommy)...

"Daddy love grapes so much."

"Kay come over, Mommy go out."

"Mommy fly on plane Chicago."

Friends

Today, Christopher's friend Maddie came over to play. Although CJ was having some sharing issues (i.e.--he would invite Maddie over to play at the train table and then throw a fit because she was there), the two of them had a nice time together (and their moms got to visit!). Anyway, Kasey and Maddie bonded and here are a couple cute pics of them...

Recent activities

Here are some photo accounts of what little Christopher has been up to recently... Since neither of his parents have any handyman abilities, Chris has taken it upon himself to work on his drill and screwdriver skills at the workbench.
To show that he is truly a renaissance man, he also has been working on his dusting skills. Who will be the lucky lady to get this guy in the future?

Christopher enjoys spending his evenings with Daddy. In these particular pictures, they boys are reading a book about caring for your aquarium... seriously.

Yesterday, Christopher's friends Lucy and Emily brought their moms over to play with us. Emily has a new baby brother named Connor who joined us as well. We brought the bouncy seat out for him to sit in but the only one who sat in it was the boy who is now double the seat's weight limit!
The weather finally cooled down a bit today and we spent the afternoon outside. Here is Christopher riding a little bike that belonged to me when I was his age. He's really starting to get into bikes! Let's see... swimming, check; biking, check; running, double check. Hmmmmm, what's the minimum age for triathlons?

Christopher is full of funny comments these days. He's talking a ton, sentences are emerging... and he hears everything we say. So I was in the kitchen yesterday and he was in the living room looking at the coffee table. Well, more specifically, he was examining the scratch on the coffee table that has been there since he was born. CJ never passes up an opportunity to point out this scratch (or any other scratch in the house, lord help us). He was looking at the scratch and then (to no one in particular) says, "Scratch! Oh...my...goodness." I couldn't stop laughing!

So the picture situation should be resolved soon. I have been taking them, it's just a matter of getting them on here so stay tuned with that...