My Sam @ 2.5

A week or so ago, I walked into Sam's room to put some toys away and found Sam, laying on the floor on his stomach without a shirt on, looking at a book. And it struck me that he has hit the half year mark. He's on the downhill slope to turning 3 now...and I'm amazed by how his personality has emerged in the last 6 months. I could just eat him up sometimes. And another thing that struck me when I saw him was that this is so "him" right now. He loves to look at books and watch TV laying on his stomach. I don't know why (probably because Tyler never did this), but I think it's so stinking cute to see him laying there like that. And, he would be shirtless most of the time if possible. Luckily, he still has a hard time getting most of his shirts off by himself, but occasionally he can do it!

So I grabbed my camera in an effort to capture my Sam at 2 1/2 years old. And now I shall try to capture this age in words...

At 2 1/2, he:
-is talking better and better every day. I love to hear him talk.

-calls them 'candy beans' instead of jelly beans. And I never bother to correct him because I think it's darling. :) Candy beans they are, in our house!

-still has a deep scraggly sounding voice. I am used to it, but others are not and when they hear him talk (like at a grocery store or something), people often tell me how deep his voice is.

-is stubborn.

-but oh so very sweet.

-loves 'chillin out' by laying on his stomach on the floor and watching a show

-is the master of saying 'no'. (remember that stubborn thing? yeah) Seriously, he has more ways of telling me no than I can count. Some of which include: uh uh, no way, no sir, and the latest is "never again". Pronounced more like 'newo agin'. "Sam, do you want to come and eat some dinner?" Looking at you right in the eyes, he replies "Newo agin!". Fun.

-loves to go to nursery at church. A year ago, I truly thought it was not possible.

-seems to be very coordinated and loves to play ball of every kind.

-is becoming quite the jokester and his favorite thing to do is tell me something he knows is silly and then quickly say "Je kidden" and then he laughs at himself. Another thing that I love to death.

-is happiest with a drink and some sort of food in his tummy promptly upon waking.

-looks up to Tyler and thinks he's hilarious. Tyler of course plays on this and eats it up. He loves making Sam laugh hysterically.

-puts his finger on his chin and says "hmmmm?" when he's trying to make a decision.

-is learning his colors and shapes and getting better at them every day.

-still loves sleeping in his Santa Claus jammies best of all.

-asks me for snacks approximately 57 times per day. And usually it's no more than 2 minutes after we've finished a meal. (I tell him no approximately 55 times per day, in case you were wondering)

-is a breakfast eating machine. He's so/so at lunch, and not-so-much a dinner guy. I don't know how he survives on so little.

-eats between 2-3 bowls of cereal per morning or 2 bowls of oatmeal (if I'm feeling generous and give them to him). I am convinced he's starving in the morning since he rarely eats any dinner before he goes to bed. Plain old Rice Krispies ("wy tippies") are the hands down favorite right now.

-still loves his blue blanket and packs it around and sleeps with it. He's also started sleeping with about 14 other stuffed animals per night.

-melts my heart when he tells me "I yuv you. You my befwen." He's one of my best friends too. :) (remember that he's stubborn AND sweet, right?)

-spends a lot of time 'treasure hunting' and I'm thinking this little development just happens at this age??? I remember Tyler figuring this out at the same age. Seriously, he's diggin' all the time these days!

-makes me laugh EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. And usually several times. :)

Seriously, all the stubbornness and meanness and screaming and hitting aside, I love this boy to pieces! :) He does so many fun and cute things every day to very much outweigh the challenges he's given me (although I'm not sure about it making up for all the gray hair I am discovering lately! What is the deal with that? I totally blame him!). I am once again convinced that 2 is my favorite age. Seriously, I love it and I love him and I only get him at this age for 6 more months. Sniff!

All on a Fat Tuesday

WARNING: This post contains many, many pictures. But what post doesn't? OK, are you sick of Mardi Gras pictures yet? Well, we're almost done. These are the last ones and then we'll move on to something else. Thanks for sticking with me. :)

So, on Mardi Gras...aka Fat Tuesday, we actually got up early and said good bye to Garrett's parents and sent them home on the airplane. Not exactly a fun way to start the day! So since we were up and at it already, we decided to head out for the day's parades. We have usually stayed in Metairie for Fat Tuesday, but decided to venture Uptown for the 'real deal' this year. It was fun to be there and to say we've done it now.
So, of course we had our ladder box with us. Maybe this will help it make a little more sense... The way it works is you drill holes in the bottom of the wooden box and bolt it to a ladder at the top. There are wheels at the top of the box so when you fold the ladder up to go home or to bring it the parade route, you can hold onto it by the steps and roll it on the ground to make it easier, so you're not carrying it. It has a bar to keep the kids from falling out and the steps of the ladder are on the back side so an adult can stand on the ladder steps behind the kids to keep an eye on them and help them catch some goods. It also has a hook on each side to hang beads on or hang bags to put your beads in. Very nifty! I know, I know, it probably still doesn't make sense. You kind of have to see them in person to really get it. :)
So the fun thing about Fat Tuesday is the costumes. Everyone (well, almost everyone...) dresses up in crazy costumes. I feel silly even posting these pictures, because they don't even come close to really capturing it. Some of the costumes are out of this world! A lot of costumes this year had something to do with a flying pig in a Saints jersey. So the pictures above are just a couple of the costumes I saw in close proximity to me. (Like I mentioned before, Mardi Gras always makes me wish I could really 'capture' it in pictures, but I don't think I ever will!)
And even my good friend Lora brought out the gold stretchy pants for the occasion. We, on the other hand, did not dress up. :(


The first parade of the day was Rex. This is another Super Krewe and it's one of the oldest (if not the oldest) parade that rolls during Mardi Gras. It's very much a status thing if you are a member of Rex. So, the picture above is the king of Rex for the year. Notice all the beads draping from the trees and power lines. Another thing I wish I had better pictures of. With so many parades throughout the week, by Fat Tuesday, the beads are heavy in the trees, as they get caught there instead of hitting their intended recipient (and pretty much stay there the rest of the year).
All of my pictures from Fat Tuesday were from Rex.









And for the past few years, we have perfected the shout of "Throw me somethin', Mister!" which is THE call of calls to get some loot. Tyler has it down pat. I love it.
And here I am in my "position". I stood on the ladder behind the boys for pretty much all of the parades. It was a better way to watch parades than any other year. And I gotta say, I became quite the pro at catching stuffed animals, beads, and all those treasures/junk. I think I could make a living doing it!

And now onto the loot itself:

Here it is (most of it), in all its glory. I didn't even begin to count up how many toys, beads, cups, and doubloons we got. But it was a lot! And now, of course, I have no idea what to do with it all. And the boys wanted a picture with their favorite treasures this year...
Sam's was a Saints football. And thanks to my friend Alicia for helping me catch it! He hasn't put it down since then. He is always asking me where it is and packing it around. It was definitely a good catch!
Tyler's Orpheus train...Orpheus has a signature train float that it pretty amazing. And we caught a stuffed version. And of course, Tyler thought that was pretty swell.
And we can't forget these 'rhinoceroses' that are actually dinosaurs. But Sam cannot be convinced that they are anything but rhinoceroses. And he has slept with them every night since then. He has even woken up in the night calling for me to help him find one that's somewhere in his crib. Yeah, I have to make myself not think about the fact that he sleeps with Mardi Gras stuff every night...yikes!
And my favs--from Muses. Their throws often have some sort of shoe on them and I scored quite a few this year. This is just a picture of two of them. I usually have one or two things I'll hang on to each year and these are the ones for me. I loved their parade and I loved their throws, they were super fun!
And we can't forget the doubloons (coins). They have been played with a lot since then as well. And they are each different for whatever parade they came from.
And I thought I'd throw in a picture of my Mardi Gras flower arrangement. Very festive, eh? Thanks to my hubby!
And to wrap it all up, this is how we all felt the day after...exhausted! But still packing around the prized football, even while crashed out on the floor. It was a fun year! And as usual, we were pretty 'Mardi Gras'd out' by the time it was over. Until next year!!!

And now I'm officially done re-capping Mardi Gras. Now all the other things I need to post...oy!

Mardi Gras--The Night Parades

I can't think of any other time in my life I've been to a parade at night until I moved to New Orleans. The fact that the parades during Mardi Gras season are mostly at night makes it all the more unique. It adds to the charm in my opinion. So, with Grandma & Grandpa in tow, we headed out to some parades when the rain finally let up. Since it had rained previously, there was some re-scheduling, which meant that the first night was hosting 3 parades instead of 2....and it was FREEZING cold. And I am one who can definitely handle the cold just fine, but believe me, it was really really cold. So we did our best to bundle up the boys and be prepared as much as possible and the lifesaver ended up being the pair of hand warmers we scored at WalMart that day--the very last pair they had. I don't think we would have lasted much more than one parade if it weren't for those. They saved the boys, for sure.

Annnnd, this year we finally broke down and got us a ladder box. It made me question why in the world we hadn't done this before. It is, hands down, the best way to watch a parade with kids. And you get thrown SO much stuff because the riders on the floats can see you. It was great!
So, the first night of parades we watched Hermes, D'Etat, and Muses. It was getting really late towards the end of Muses and we headed home with about 5 floats left. I was amazed that the boys held out as long as they did. They were all great parades, but Muses was probably my favorite this year and D'Etat comes in a close second. And ya know what, not one picture of any of them. It was way too cold to be thinking about catching beads, balancing on the ladder, keeping the boys warm, and taking pictures. So the only pictures from that night are these first 3...
And, on Lundi Gras we headed Uptown once again to see Proteus and Orpheus. It was still cold, but not nearly as frigid as the first night. Here is a better shot of our ladder box...since I have a hard time explaining it to anyone who I tell about it. I was able to get a few more pictures this night...

(Tyler was climbing up the ladder to get into the seat in this picture. And then usually an adult is standing on the ladder steps behind the kids.)

One of the main things I really like about the night time parades Uptown are the flambeaux torches. I'm sure it's entirely dangerous, but I think it's really cool to have the parade route lit up by them. These first pictures are from Proteus.

(this picture above is actually from Orpheus, but somehow posted out of order)

After Proteus, was Orpheus. Orpheus is one of the four "Super Krewes" and it was HUGE. The floats were enormous and it was really quite amazing. And I got very few pictures (I think every Mardi Gras leaves me thinking that I wish I could get better pictures--but with the kids and beads, it's just hard to do!!). Orpheus is Harry Connick Jr.'s krewe and there are always some big names riding in it and it's signature symbol is the harp (I think that's what it is, anyways). You can see it on top of the flambeaux torches.

There's Mr. Harry Connick Jr. himself...

And this float housed the LSU 2009 College World Series championship baseball team. And then I missed Sean Peyton and the Lombardi Trophy--yeah, I missed it...I was just putting my camera away and he was on the other side of the float anyways. Boo. But I did see him and see him hold up the trophy, if that counts. I'll just have that mental image to hold on to I suppose. And we also saw the Imagination Movers--no picture of that either. And there were some more big names as well, and I forget who they were and of course, I got no pictures. But we had a ton of fun and went home exhausted and unfortunately had to get ready to send Grandma & Grandpa home on the airplane the next morning... We made it out to parades on Fat Tuesday as well, so more to come soon!