Evening out at the museum...

The Children's Museum has a sweet "Monsoon Monday" deal where it's only $2 between 4pm and 8pm. I had heard that it would likely be crazy busy, but fortunately it wasn't so bad. The first 1/2 hour we were there was really pretty quiet actually...and then it got busier as the evening went out, and parents were probably getting out of work to bring their kiddos. However, it was never too crazy...at least compared to my Children's Museum days in Boston where I'd be bringing camp loads of kids. :)

The dinosaur outside the museum is rather ferocious looking. Ezra however looked at it and in his dreamy voice exclaimed, "puppy".


Firetrucks are very cool.


And so are motorcycles.


Josiah and I liked the padded room for toddlers probably the best!




Although, I did spend about 20 minutes walking in and out of this hollow train.


These big kids thought I was just a baby...until they saw my DDR moves!

Around home...

As of the past month or so, Ezra says "hat" while touching his head. We then walk around the house looking for a hat that he finds suitable for wearing, put it on his head, and continue on with our day. I love how his little personality is really starting to come out.

Lately, he's been a hat and sunglasses kind of guy...and I think it's rather cute.


"Bubbles" is another favorite word. I really need to make or buy a new bubbles solution soon because even though the bottle says "non-toxic"...they look quite toxic to me. And of course the bubble wand needs to be right on (or just inside) your lips to blow the best bubbles.






"Oh, and in case you haven't heard....I don't need any help getting in the dryer."


"I'm going to teach my friend Josiah how to do it too..."

Monsooooons!

Monsoon season is in full-force here. I think 4 of the 5 days last week, we got a good rain right at about 5pm. I love how it rolls in like clock work. I feel like this is especially exciting because for the past two years we've hardly had a monsoon season at all.

I was super excited to get pictures of Ezra dancing in the rain. BUT, our new camera is clearly more exciting than anything else in the world. Including water falling from the sky in large quantities. So...instead I present to you this play by play of me trying to get photos...

Happy 4th of July!

Ryanhood played their annual show at the Hilton El Conquistador again this year. Ezra and I played in the pool all afternoon. Ate a yummy dinner at the hotel. Then, took our place on the lawn for the show to begin.

I guess I should back up a little. At home, Ezra LOVES to wear Ryan's headphones. We often turn music on when he has them on and he totally rocks out. So, his ear protectors for concerts have also served as a really fun thing to wear, even though they don't play music...he just loves wearing them...he will wear them for hours at a time. In fact, he wore them throughout dinner at the hotel and someone asked if he has sensitive ears. :)

Well, fast forward now with me to the concert. Ezra wore his ear protectors with a smug little grin as if to say, "I look so cool" for the entire opening act. He left them on for the first Ryanhood song, and then pulled them off and realized, "Wait a minute, I can hear better without these things on. That's not how it works at home. At home, I put headphones on and I get loud music. Something is wrong here and I am not falling for this trick." And thus the ear protectors remained off the rest of the show. Our great plan totally worked against us. Hmmf.

Ezra with his ear protection tossed aside...


Kristin (Rachel's friend), Rachel, Ray, and Mary...


Lori and Sara...


The screen in the photo above behind Lori and Sara was where they displayed the laser light show (no fireworks since the state is on fire). How was the laser light show you ask? It was about as cool as it sounds.

Me and my favorite little guy...


Ryanhood!

the world at my finger tips...

A friend asked me the other day, "Is Ezra a climber?" To be honest, it never occurred to me that some kids aren't climbers. Ezra climbs into everything, on everything, up everything...

His new recent finds are top shelves. It doesn't matter what cupboard, he always clears off the top shelf enough to lay down on it. And, he'll just lay there for a while totally pleased with himself. Sadly, we always think to take a photo when he is on his way out. Oh well. It's fun to just sit and stare at him and not worry about taking photos sometimes.

on a lighter note...

Yesterday I spent the afternoon hanging out with a friend and her 3 boys. I was telling Ryan about how the fart and butt jokes were in full-swing. So quite naturally, we stayed up in bed last night laughing and practicing making fart noises with our armpits. He was definitely wayy better at it than me. I see lots of laughter about armpit farts among father and son ahead...

flu...boo...

Thursday evening I put Ezra to bed in our room. A few hours later when I went to go to sleep, I walked into our room and was overwhelmed by the smell of vomit. The poor dude had been sick and throwing up for who knows how long... That continued for the next many hours...and we finally got to sleep around 6:30am. That was after:

5 changes of bedding
3 pajama changes for me
2 baths + 3 sponge baths to try to finish getting the vomit out of his hair
...oh, and my favorite moment when we were playing outside in the sandbox (amazing how kids can still play while sick!..childlife 101 I suppose) and he so perfectly projectile vomited right into his sand pail. It was awesome.

By Friday night he was back to himself.

Then Monday the cycle started again...this time for Ryan.

People told me to be careful to not got sick. Who are they kidding, I'm superwoman...I never get sick.

Except for this morning. doh!

parenting

The week Ryan left for China, I found myself in an unusual (to us) predicament where I needed a babysitter several times throughout the week.

1. I wanted to go to Ryan's show and knew that it was important to him as well, so Ryan's stepmom watched Ezra for the evening.

2. I went to church and felt socially obligated to put him in the nursery. (not by anyone in particular, just overall culturally.)

3. I needed to attend a class to maintain my child life certification, so my friend watched Ezra.

4. I took my friend's granddaughter-in-law maternity shopping, and she insisted on watching Ezra while we were gone.

FOUR times in one week. I dare say he has been without one of us less than 12 times in his life, so 4 times in one week was A LOT. I know to some that is nothing, especially if both parents have to work. But for Ezra (and me) it was a lot. It was not ideal...and I think both of us were stressed because of it. On top of that, Ryan was gone, which was hard for Ezra to understand that he would also be coming back...to him, he was just gone. And I think that made me having to leave him even harder, him not knowing if I'd be returning since clearly Ryan had not yet returned.

This experience was the cherry on top for me to realize that Ezra needs us. It is good that he needs us. He has healthy attachment with us. And, I want to continue to foster that and let him know he can trust us.

I had started writing this article for Uncommon Childhood before this experience of leaving him with babysitters, and then finished it after returning from Michigan. While we were in Michigan Ezra wanted me to hold him 99% of the time he was held. I think this was because of our previous week in which he wasn't sure if I'd be leaving or staying. It was very clear to me that he needed to be reassured I wasn't going anywhere.

I feel like there are social pressures all around me telling me that I need to leave him with people so he gets used to it. But, deep down, I just can't agree with that. For us, it just doesn't feel right.

So out of all that, came this article that I wrote for Uncommon Childhood last week.

And, this past Sunday I found that the church has a "cry room" where Ezra can play while we listen to the sermon...so perfect for us.

Birds!

Just over a year ago Ezra and I spent the night at our friend Megan's house. We were graciously gifted with getting to sleep in her daughter Ellen's room. And, I was uberly in love with her wall hanging of birds on branches.

I kept the image stashed away in the back of my noggin', and then about 5 months later came across this tutorial and knew it was meant to be. And then about another 5 months later I finally started sewing. I used all scrap fabric for the birds, and found the branches in our yard, making it practically free to create. And then about 3 months later I finally hung the birds...and a month later I am now blogging about it.

Ezra helped stuff the birds... (he looks soo young!!)






I love the simplicity of the birds.


and their contrasting tummies...


ta da! (not the best of photos...sorry)...but I love that Ezra's room is finally starting to piece together.

jammin'

I met Sara and Julian on a "mama meet-up" hike several months back. (Mama meet-up is a playgroup that has formed out of the birth center mom and baby group now that our babies are too mobile.) They are from Germany and only in Tucson for 6 months while her boyfriend (Ben) is doing research. Sara plays the banjo and badminton. Those two things alone were enough to make me want to get to know her more.

I told Ryan that I wanted to have them over for dinner...and time flew by...and we never did.

Recently I told Ryan how I was bummed we never had them over, and I was sure they had probably left by now.

Then two weeks ago we listened to this sermon, titled The Unexpected Adventure of Eating with Strangers. It was wonderful, and once again made me wish I had invited Sara, Ben and Julian over for dinner.

Well, just two days after listening to that sermon I went to a mama meet-up pool playdate and who was there but Sara and Julian!! I was so excited to find out that they were still in town. I invited them over for dinner that coming weekend (since they only had 2 weekends left before leaving, I was super excited that they were free!)...and it was wonderful.

Despite Ezra wanting everything that Julian was playing with, and practicing his dinosaur scream in Julian's face...the boys played. We chatted. Sara and Ryan jammed. First on banjo, and then on mandolin. Turns out that Sara used to play the violin which is strung like the mandolin so Ryan suggested she try it and she loved it. They were sight-reading all sorts of celtic bluegrass songs together...it was a really fun evening.

I'm sad we waited so long to get together, but soo glad we finally did it. And, I look forward to many more "adventures eating with strangers".

Mystery Solved

I drove the big green van to pick up Ryan when he returned from China. Inside the van was a large box that I assumed was from the last Ryanhood tour and just not cleaned out of the van yet.

When Ryan got in the van he asked about the box, and I responded by saying (with too much confidence), "Its from your tour in April...the van was never cleaned out". He didn't buy it and opened the box to find instructions for building a playhouse. Then we noticed the box was addressed to Ezra Green, but no indication of who it was from. We were totally confused. Where did this box come from? How did it get in our (locked) van? And, who was it from?

I considered posting on facebook to see if anyone had a clue to our puzzle. But not having internet stopped me from doing that.

I also thought about calling the company that made it to see if they could tell me whose name was used for billing.

Once Ryan got online, he saw an email from Cameron saying that he had stopped by our house while we were both gone and saw the box on our porch and put it in the van for safe keeping. That solved part of the mystery, but we still had no idea who it was from!

About a week later, our friends Katie and Steve from NYC came over with their daughter Emily, and said, "did you ever receive a package from us?" Wow, that was easier to solve that we expected...but I can't even tell you how confused we were for so many days. It was kind of fun to have a secret package.

Ezra loves it! Thanks Katie, Steve, and Emily!



And here is sweet Emily!! (Ezra wanted to make sure he had fresh breath for her...)

Re-thinking Perfect

I just read this blog post, and it was exactly what I needed to read today.

I hope it will bring the same sense of "it's all going to be okay" to your day as well. :)

childproofing...

The other night Cameron invited us over for dinner and swimming where he was house sitting. He told me to go ahead and childproof as much as I needed to. So, I glanced around the living room and thought, "doesn't look like anything is breakable" and proceeded to let Ezra run free. Good thing for Ryan. He had his eye on Ezra who of course went straight to the corner where there were 2 axes, 3 machetes, and a fireplace shovel all within his reach. Oops...I guess I missed those things. Really, I am a responsible mom.

Full House

I love that our house is small. My favorite part is that we use every single room of our house every single day. Some rooms serving multiple purposes.

The day after I returned home from my month-long stay in Michigan, our friend, Liz, and god daughter, Charlene, flew in for a short visit. My niece Haleigh also flew back to AZ with me. So in that first week back at home we had me, Ryan, and Ezra sleeping in one bedroom. Liz and Charlene in the other bedroom. And Haleigh in the living room. It was a full house indeed.

Last time we saw Charlene she was almost 3. Now, she is 4 and a half. It's amazing how much kids change in such a short period of time. She is confident, full of ideas, lots of energy, and no longer takes naps.



She wanted to make a craft project to give to Ryan when we picked him up that evening (from his return from China). It started out as a rubberband/cardboard guitar (as seen on left)...


...and ended up being a shrine of everything in our "junk drawer", including "pencil top Jesus"... (I feel like using "junk" and "Jesus" in the same sentence is probably not kosher, please forgive me)...


We spent a morning at the zoo. However, even at 9:30am it was way too hot to look around at the animals that were also suffering from the heat, so we spent most of our time at the splash park in the zoo. I think it may be one of my new favorite summer activities in Tucson.





Ezra is soo happy to have Ryan home. And Ryan is soo happy that Ezra remembers all of their old games that they play together. Here is the game where Ezra tucks his arms inside of Ryan's arms so he is trapped...and then Ryan kisses him which makes Ezra laugh super hard.


Ezra and Charlene spent lots of time in the kiddie pool...


Haleigh taught Liz how to play volleyball (under the shade of the patio)...


And when everyone else needed to nap, Charlene and I had a felt pizza party in the living room.

Switched At Birth

No, I was not switched at birth, despite my brother frequently telling me stories that I was. And, no Ezra nor Ryan were switched at birth to my knowledge.

HOWEVER, there is a new TV show called Switched At Birth on ABC Family (impressed with my up-to-date pop culture knowledge??)...and Ryanhood's song Helpless Hopeless will be played on the show tomorrow (Monday, June 27) night. I believe it's on at 9pm PT, not sure about other time zones.

We are going to try to invite ourselves over to someone's house with cable TV so that we can tune in ourselves. :)