Night Night Prayers

Every night we say "night night prayers" before Ben goes to bed. Last night Matt was in the middle of praying and Ben started saying "tank oooo mama, tank oooo dada." He was telling God thank you for Mommy and Daddy. We both were about to melt. It is the first time he has ever done something like that!! It was awesome. It is all the thanks you need as a parent! So sweet!

Picky Picky Eater

After years of working with parents of picky eaters and telling them that it is ok if their child is a picky eater, I am having to eat my own words! Ben is a very very picky eater. He likes what he likes and wants nothing to do with anything else. I am having to follow my own advice when it comes to picky eaters! I have gone to some of my dietitian friends for advice on what to do because I didn't trust myself. I have a greater empathy for the parents that I work with. He has texture issues that I think make him so picky. He is starting to try some new foods but if it at all has a strange texture he will not touch it.

I thought I would run down a list of foods that Ben will eat:

• Chicken nuggets - He LOVES them and would eat them 24/7 if we would let him. He only likes Tyson chicken nuggets at home.
• Hot dogs (most of the time - he will be picky about them and he doesn't like turkey dogs)
• Taco meat - this is the only red meat he will eat. It must have taco seasoning. This is his absolute favorite meal. He could make himself sick off of tacos! And he likes chips and salsa to go along with it.
• Peanut butter & Jelly - He takes after me and loves it!
• Cheese & things made with cheese (grilled cheese, cheese quesildilla, etc.)
• Pizza - who doesn't like pizza?
• Crackers, bread, rolls, chips, etc. - He is a cracker man
• Fruit - he does love fruit so I give him fruit all the time!
• Vegetables - NO!!!!! He won't touch them! Except french fries which I don't even count as a vegetable although USDA does.
• Sweets - he will eat any sweet we put in front of him!

That is pretty much it. Not very much. It drives me crazy. Oh well what can we do. He eats what he likes!

Here are some old pictures of Ben eating his favorite meal of tacos! I love these pictures. It is probably because mealtime at our house can be such a battle. There is lots of crying and screaming (and not just Ben). In these pictures he is so happy eating which we don't see very often!

Favorite books & New Friend

In the past several months Ben has really gotten into books. He loves to read and to have someone read to him. I think it is great because I love to read and I have made Matt become a reader! He has 2 books that are probably his absolute favorites.

The first is Richard Scarry's Biggest and Best Storybook Ever. This book is awesome! It is full of fun pictures that little boys love. He sits and "reads" it for hours. We have started a find and seek game where we can name an object and he will look through the book for it. He is really good at finding the smallest objects. I think one of the reasons I like this book so much is because I remember it from when I was little. It was my brother's favorite book as well. I remember us sitting and looking at it over and over.

His other favorite book is I Love Trains (shocking I know a book about trains). We have probably read this book 1,000 times. It is really short and we now have it memorized but he loves it!

Here is a picture of us reading last night! So much fun!

I also wanted to introduce you to Ben's new stuffed puppy friend. You may remember Brown Puppy that I blogged about a while back. We don't go anywhere without Brown Puppy still! The lady that gave Ben Brown Puppy gave him a new puppy for Christmas this year. It is an Alaskan Husky so we named him Palin. At first Ben could have cared less about Palin because it was still just all about Brown Puppy but he has slowly warmed up to Palin. So he now carries around 2 puppies by the tail at all times. And at night when he goes to sleep it is with an arm full of puppies!

Poor Little Boy!

Sorry it has been a while!! Last week was so cold we didn't really do anything interesting to write about. Really we didn't! We only left the house for work and school and that was very different from our normal busy life. We also worked on a big project that I will update you on soon.

Yesterday afternoon Ben woke up from his nap with a limp. He had a limp for about 4 days around Christmas and we didn't know why but it went away so we didn't think anything of it. Now I have figured it out... he is getting his foot stuck through the slats in his crib and hurting it somehow. It isn't swollen but it obviously hurts him. This morning he couldn't put any weight on it. He was having to scoot around the house and use furniture to prop on. He kept lifting up his foot and saying "uh oh." It was so cute but sad. I felt really bad for the little guy. I set him up with a pillow to prop it on and let him watch cartoons and that seemed to help (or maybe it was the Tylenol). He is able to put some weight on it now and seems to be doing better. We are going to have to figure something out to keep this from happening again. Any suggestions?

Here is the little invalid!

GeoCashing

So something new that we have started doing is GeoCashing. If you haven't heard of it don't worry I hadn't either until a couple of weeks ago. My dad got a handheld GPS for Christmas and so that got this all started. There is a website you can go to and get coordinates for hidden "treasures." People just place containers all over with stuff inside that you can use GPS to find. It is like a treasure hunt and is fun to do. Here are some pictures from our GeoCashing adventures. I don't have a picture of the one in Auburn at the art museum but you get the idea.

So our first experience was the most interesting. We were at my grandmother's house in LaFayette and we went to a grave yard at night. Slightly scary. Plus there were hunters all around so there were gunshots. Here is Matt sticking his hand down in some snake hole looking for it. CRAZY!!! We didn't find it. It was to dark!

Ben, my dad and I went last Friday to the greenway near our house. There were a couple that we were looking for and we found them both! Ben loved looking in the woods. I think he is going to be an outdoorsy guy! Not good since neither of his parent love the outdoors. Oh well! Note in the last picture Ben is using the GPS. He actually has a pretty good sense of direction for a little guy!

I thought this day would never come!

I know this sounds bad but I have been so looking forward for Ben to gain more and more independence. And finally it is happening! He is starting to clean up after himself! He puts his toys away after he is done with them (sometimes). He cleans up trash compulsively - I love this one because he is always picking up after me and taking it and throwing it away! It is awesome! We have a little guy with a servant's heart which I love. It is my goal for Ben and any other children we are blessed with to be super independent little people so I am so excited to see this starting to happen in him. After almost 2 years of doing everything for the little guy it is great to finally see his independence come through (although we knew from the start he was going to be an independent, strong willed little guy!)

Some other fun new things he is doing:

• Finally he is starting to like to brush his teeth. For the past year it has been screaming every night when we try to brush them. So it is nice to brush without tears!
• He came up to me today and just kissed me for no reason! It just melted my heart. He is also giving more hugs for no reason.
• His vocabulary is expanding daily. Most of you know I have been worried about him being behind in his speech but over the last couple of weeks it has just taken off. He is babbling all the time and saying more and more words every day. I think he is up to about 50 words or so. He has also starting putting a couple of them together.
• Sleeping is still an issue with Ben. From day 1 he has been a bad sleeper. People ask me all the time how I get him to sleep through the night and I don't. STILL!! I think I live in a state of sleep deprivation! Oh well. He is waking up a couple of times a week and wanting to play from 2-4 am or so. So I am working on adjusting naps to try to help with this. We have actually slept through the "night" for the past 2 nights (9 pm - 5:30 am) YEA!!
• Just an update. We are now down to paci only when sleeping. This is a big change for us!
• Ben has learned a new form of greeting - the fist pump. He will fist pump you when he first meets you. So cute!

Here are some pictures from the last couple of days.

Play date with his friend Anna! They always have so much fun!

One of Ben's favorite things to do is to play with daddy's iphone! He knows how to work that thing and can do just about anything on it!

Today was a super rainy day so I had to get creative with things to do. We made lots of pictures with our new art supplies and played with play dough! Lots of fun!

Passport

We are getting ready for our big trip in May already! Today we went and got Ben's passport. It takes an act of congress to get a minor a passport (not really but both parents have to appear in person and sign away their lives!) Even with all that we managed to get it done. I think it is kind of cool that a 22 month old has a passport! I had to share his super cute passport picture! Note I will not be sharing my not so cute picture! We can't wait to hit the wonderful warm waters of the Caribbean!

First Post of 2009!!

I hope everyone is having a great start to 2009! We have had a good few days getting back in the routine of things. It is nice to be back home and doing normal things. Matt was able to be off New Years Day which was awesome! He never gets that day off so it was nice to have him here! We had a great time hanging out with friends on New Years Eve!

I thought I would start off the blog this year looking ahead for the year. You can look back at the blog to see what all happened in 2008. Every year Matt & I pick something that is going to be our "thing" for the year. It is something that we want to learn how to do that year. I guess it is our quest at continual learning. In the past Matt has learned Spanish, how to play the guitar, and how to do balloon animals. Last year he learned all about landscaping and we now have the best landscaped yard on the street! Last year was my year to learn photography. I started but still have a lot more to learn. So yesterday we picked our "thing" for the year. Matt is going to learn woodworking. We have a huge project we are undertaking in our upstairs bonus room. Matt is going to build a huge set of built in cabinets! It is going to be great! I am going to continue to work on photography and also learn about decorating cakes. I want to do an awesome cake for Ben's 2nd birthday since Amanda our cake lady is not here this year. We have also made it our "thing" to read through the Bible during the year. We are going to do it together. It will be a first for us and we figure it is about time. We will keep you updated on how it is going!

We discussed with Ben last night what his "thing" was going to be. Since he is not talking too much yet we pretty much decided for him. He is going to work on talking! And then also learning his colors, letters, and numbers. Oh and potty training! He has a bunch to do in the next 12 months! I am so excited to see what all he is going to learn. He amazes me every day with all he learns!

We have some fun things planned for 2009! We are going on a Caribbean cruise in May for 7 nights! Fun! We are also going to the beach in August again this year. We will also probably make a trip or 2 up to NC to see Andrew and Kelly again. We also are going to head down to Mobile to visit Brad and LeeAnn! Matt is studying to take his BCOP test in October. It is going to be tough but he can do it! So much to look forward to in 2009! We can't wait to see what else the Lord has in store for us!