Adventures of a Toddler.

In the life of a Toddler, aka Tyler, life is very exciting. There are all these new toys, bugs, and even rocks to explore. On a typical day of a certain Toddler, aka Tyler, it begins with eating then going outside, eating some more, sleeping, waking up, eating, going outside, eating again, and if parents allow going outside again, having a bath, cuddling, then going to bed. The next day starts and the same routine begins.

Lately all Tyler wants to do is play outside. He loves to explore all the different rocks in our backyard and see how many he can stick in his mouth before mommy discovers them. When I give him the special tone of voice. He opens his mouth and all these rocks come out. One day I was not watching him closely enough. He was playing in a rock pile with a little cup. He scooped a cup of dirt into his mouth and when I finally looked at him, he smiled at me with this black smile. I immediately ran over to him where he started spitting out mud and smiling. I don't know what it is but I have issues with eating dirt. I wanted to vomit. So I grabbed him and took him to the sink at the same time gagging my self. Then I proceeded to wash out his mouth and kept gagging at the same time. It was so gross! He just kept spitting out the dirt and thought it was fun to play with the water. Hopefully this incidence does not repeat itself because I don't think I could take hold myself together.

Its been so fun to see Tyler explore everything outside. It is almost like you can see his thoughts how he discovers and learns new things. I love it!
Tyler loves chalk. Unfortunately he brougt it into the house and drew on the piano bench, the wall, and a chair before we caught him .

Tyler is helping Grandma do the weeding.

Tyler has now been known as the handyman. He loves to try and fix things with his screwdriver and hammer.

Our new Car!

I can't believe this day has finally come. We are the owners of a minivan! Ahhhhhh!
Eric has been tired of me complaining and fussing about how much I could not stand the looks of a minivan. I like the looks of an SUV, but not the mileage that they get and Eric flat out refused to get an SUV. I grew up with a van. I even obtained my drivers license with a van, but I just felt like I was getting older if I had to get one. And, we only have one child right now. Of course, we also have two dogs and we travel quite a bit. After realizing that our PT Cruiser was getting too small for our family and I was getting tired of Tyler kicking me on the shoulder from the back seat, I started considering that it was probably time to upgrade to a larger car. Then after some coaxing from Eric, a great credit score, and a nice tax return, a great financing deal from our bank, and an unbelievable deal from the car dealership, somehow everything fell into place and I finally gave in.

So this is what we got. 2008 Dodge Grand Caravan SXT, Certified with 34,000 miles. It has the works with Stow and Go, power sliding doors, etc, etc, and it does not look like the older models of vans. I have to admit that it is pretty nice and drives gorgeously. Can't wait to see how Tyler likes it. He actually might get mad that he can't kick me anymore.

Little Gracie

I just got home from work and Eric told me to look at the Gledhill's blog, because it was not good.
I don't know if you really care, but I feel that I have gotten to know this family and little Gracie through the last 10 months, so I feel the need to blog about her.

I found out that the family will say goodbye to Little Gracie tomorrow. Her bleeding won't stop and her heart will never beat on it own. The family has decided to donate her organs so they really won't be with her after she passes, just for a moment, then she will go into surgery so that other lives might be saved.

How does a parent comprehend this? I can't even imagine what that family is going through. I would feel so lost and just heartbroken without my Tyler. I am so thankful for being a parent. I absolutely love Tyler. I am also so thankful for knowing that my family will be together forever. I know that during this difficult time, that is something this family is also very grateful for. Please say a little prayer for this family through this hard time.
http://thegledhillfamily.blogspot.com/

Visiting Family videos

Ty and his red wagon

At the end of the day, Ty was still running like crazy.

Visiting Family Part 1

This last week I realized that I a big gap in my work schedule so I took Ty and we headed south to see my parents and grandparents. Eric had a big test to study for so he stayed home. WE MISSED HIM!.

I have had a really hard time lately with having most of my family 4 hours away. It is just far enough away that it is hard to take the trip often with a little guy and with our busy lives. I have really wanted to see my grandparents while they are still alive. I really want Ty to get to know them and call them Grandma and Grandpa.

Ty was so cute and opened up to everyone he met. He was not his typical shy self. He ransacked my parents house, getting into drawers, pouring sugar all over the floor and just being his self.

We had such a great time visiting with My grandmother on her farm. She has downsized her farm to only 2 acres, but it is enough for one woman to take care of. She has lots of ducks, chickens, and other animals. I loved staying with my grandparent in the summer when I was a kid. We had to work, but we always found some kind of magical adventure to go on. I miss that time. I want Ty to see what a wonderful and fun place it is to visit and this time was not a disappointment.

Tyler loved riding the tractor that I rode when I was a baby, looking at the turtles, dragging his red wagon all over the farm, climbing and crawling through fencing, and just running everywhere. The moment we got into the car to leave, Tyler fell asleep.
Ty was not tall enough to use the pedals on the tractor, but he figured out how to still drive it.

Ty just loved crawling through this rolled up fencing.

Ty's special red wagon.

Grandma loves turtles. She has a hot house just for a lot of her desert and box turtles, then another hot house for water turtles and more turtles inside her own house. Did I mention that Grandma is Treasurer of the Turtle Club.Grandma and her pet Emu, Abby. Abby will sit and let you pet her.

My grandparents used to run a Cactus Nursery. They had 13 acres and their farm was lined with cactus hot houses. We used to help with the seeds and weeding. Now my grandma has sold most of her land and torn most of the hot houses down. This is the glass hot house that had all the succulents in them. I used to go in this building when I wanted to feel peace. It is still there and I still feel peace when I am in it. I love all the different succulents that my grandmother grows there.

It is always a wonderful adventure when visiting my grandmother.

Please pray for Gracie.

A while back I came across a blog about the Gledhill family with a baby named Gracie who had a rare heart defect. When I first read their blog, Gracie was only weeks old. Now Gracie is 11 months old. She and her family has gone through so much in her life. She has had the wonderful experience of going home to her family, but now she is very critical. Over this last week, Gracie's heart began to fail and within days she was put on a transplant list and had a transplant. Now here new heart is failing. This is such a strong family and the mother is so great and blogging what is happening. She is asking for prayers now for little Gracie and I thought I should pass on the message. It brings me to tears to think that a child has had to go through so much in such a short period of time and my life is a piece of cake compared to hers. So I ask you to pray for little Gracie that she is comforted through this hard time and feels no pain.
http://thegledhillfamily.blogspot.com/

Kelly's New Toy.

This last week Eric came home with a big surprise for me. A sewing machine. I was looking a one online and decided on a cheaper simpler one, but when Eric gets looking he can't stop until we have what he is searching for. This sewing machine is a Pfaff 1471. It is the same kind of machine that his mom has and she has had it for years. Pfaff is a German maker and they make really durable machines, but they are soooo expensive. I was not sure about this machine at first because I do not sew a lot and I just wanted a nice machine that wouldn't break down and make do until I had the time to really get into sewing, say in 6 years when Eric graduates. To my surprise this sewing machine is awesome. It is programmed with over 100 stitches and you can also program your own like your name. It also comes with different attachments or foots. I have been playing with it and get so excited when I sew a new stitch. For an older machine it runs like a new one. We also got it for a killer deal on ebay because the person selling it happened to live 15 min away and so far we have not seen a machine sell as low. I now have all these new projects to sew and try to sew a quilt that does not include yarn ties.There are a lot of fun embroidery stitches.

There are compartments that hold the foots, needles, bobbins, etc.

Some of the fun stitches I played with.

Ty's New Toy.

For Christmas, Tyler received a table and chair set from Ikea. We thought is was a good prep for Nursery since we did not think he could sit still for one minute to eat his food. He definitely surprised us. After purchasing it, we noticed that Ty would have a serious tantrum at every meal when he ate in his highchair and for a couple of meals, he refused to eat at all. So we decided to let him eat his meals at his table and low and behold, he loved it. Since then, he will not sit in his highchair, but runs to his big boy chair for every meal. He also sits in it to watch TV. His favorite thing to do is rearrange furniture. He can spend hours a day just picking up his chairs and placing them in other rooms or in different orders. He now loves to do this at church which can be a little bit of a problem when people are in his way.

Christmas in the Central Valley

Christmas this year was spent at my parent's house and with family in Fresno. We started the day with waking up and opening gifts with my parents. Tyler was a cook. He saw one toy and refused to open another gift until we bribed him enough and most of the time we just opened his gifts for him then he became interested after once he saw the new toy.
We next headed to Fresno for a wonderful formal lunch at my aunt and uncle's house. We had fun talking with everyone, but most of the time Ty refused to sit in his chair, so he crawled under the table and played with the dogs.
Next we headed to our other grandparents house to visit some more family and eat some more delicious food. We opened up more gifts. Santa must have thought Ty was a very good boy, because he was especially blessed with a lot of fun toys. It was a wonderful day and in the end the gifts were not what was so special on this day, but the time we spent with our family.
Ty's great-grandmother in her silky new dress.

Christmas Snow Vacation.

Our family spent the first part of our Christmas vacation at Eric's parent's house. We had a relaxing and fun time. We ate great food and spent a day in the snow up at Big Trees.
A nice family let us borrow a saucer for Ty to ride around the parking lot. He loved it! We must get one of these!


Daddy and Ty look so cute and so cold.

On our way back to the car, Ty finally got into the snow mood and played in the snow.


We also met a very nice snowman.