Fall Colors

Today we went to pick out our mums. When we got home, noah posed for some fall pictures by the scarecrow and pumpkins.

Pumpkin time!

Today we went to Pickin' Patch Farm in Avon. Noah went on a tractor hay ride and got to pick his very own pumpking out in the field!
Then he rode in a wagon to pick out his favorite gords and baby pumpkins. We did this last year and Noah had so much fun, we had to do it again. I think this will be a yearly ritual. After noah got to drink the best yummy apple cider out of a cute plastic pumpkin-shaped cup and eat some homemade orange nut bread.
Then we went to see the largest tree in Connecticut; a sycamore tree in Avon that is hundreds of years old.





When we got home, Noah got to help carve his very first jack-o-lantern! He had so much fun chosing the face he wanted daddy to cut, help scoop out the seeds, and watch the candle glow inside!

Forts!

After a meeting at mops the other day, I decided to take some good advice from a wise mom, Liz Abramson, about simple fun play. We went home and made a fort in the dining room with a sheet stretched over dining room chairs. Noah was so excited! We had lunch underneath and then even took an afternoon snooze!


Then, daddy got the idea a few days later to pull out the big guns.. and make a fort out of his camping tent!

We have had so much fun play fort inside the house!

Boys will be boys....

noah, being a boy, is obsessed with poops. he has to check his out every time he poops.. and it is hard to change a dirty diaper when he is struggling to sit up and take a view of it.
so yesterday we were going for a walk with paris attached to the stroller. paris stops to take a poop and of course noah has to watch, all impressed that dogs poop too. (he is repeating elmo in elmo potty video that everyone poops. so he was telling me, like I did not know this, that dogs poop too.)
so then paris was done and had a little doggie turd hanging on to his back end as he was walking. noah explaims, "EWWW, POOPY!! YUCKY!! paris needs a diaper on!!!"
I almost peed my pants laughing.

Noah is 32 months old!

Four more months until he turns 3!

OH my goodness....how did that happen? It seems like just yesterday he was a little itty bitty baby!

Two funny things happened yesterday that I want to write about. The first, noah and I were reading one of his library books (which he now pronounces library and not "eh-tay-tay"). It was an alphabet book, with big and little letters. I was showing him how some upper case letters look like lower case letters, like C and c and then some do not, like the letter A and a. So when we got to letter F, Noah exclaimed: "OH NO!! E's broken!! E's broken!!!"... He pointed to the bottom part of the letter F, where there is no "foot" like the letter E has. How smart is he to notice that?
The other funny thing was last night I was getting ready to catch some sleep for work. Noah wanted to cuddle in bed with me. I asked him to sing "rock a bye" to me like how I sing it to him each night. So he sat up by the head of my bed and sang, "rock a bye mommy, on the tree top... when the wind blows... the cradle with drop..." It was so funny and yet so sweet and endearing of him. What a sweet little guy I have!!

As summer ends....

As the summer winds to an end, I am sad thinking of the things we did not get to do. Last summer and the year before, noah and I walked every day with his stoller, all around the neighborhood. We became an icon of the neighborhood, people have told us. I remember this time last summer becoming nostalgic that it would soon turn cold and told noah he would have to start wearing a jacket and socks and shoes when we went out. then in the spring, the first warm day in april, we were outside and so excited! now it is the end of august, the summer has FLOWN by and we only walked 3 times. I guess as he gets older, activites change. walking was our activity and that was great. but I am realizing things change. it is great to have those first memories, but we cannot always recreate them. and in the vain attempts to do so, we become disappointed.
We also did not play outside in the front and back like we used to. his water and sand table sat for most of the summer. same with the bubbles and side walk chalk, bikes and buckets. the front yard tree swing is covered in fallen leaves.
but this summer we created new memories. Many carousel visits all through CT and RI. Trips the different parks and zoos. Vacations on the beach, theme parks to ride roller coasters, visits to see Thomas and ride a train and go to car-washes to see robot arms helping... his favorites. Trips to the library and mall. He enjoyed art and music class at gymboree and began going to the ymca while I exercised. he likes to play with "different friends at the Ymca". He even asked me to leave so he could stay and play! He loves to search for snakes and bugs with daddy and pick tomatoes from the garden.
so I guess I am learning in my new stages of motherhood that it is ok to have different schedules each summer and things cannot be recreated some times. I look forward to what we will learn and discover next summer.

My day...

My day while noah has a cold.
It was pretty bad so I had to give in and give him some medicine. but afterwards, he was so WIRED on the medicine! he was going nuts all over the house, things he never does. he unrolled all of the TP, I know, a lot of kids do it, but noah never has. he unrolled it all the way out into his bedroom! in the bathroom was more all thrown into the toilet and then an even bigger pile on the floor!
then he pulled out every single tissue in the new box and layed in it and rolled all around, naked (as he is potty training so he has been half naked all summer). I guess it felt soft.
then I hear this slurping sound. Noah is on the ground on all fours drinking out of paris' water bowl!!!
then he got into my cabinets and pulled out all the pots and pans and dropped my pyrex dishes!! thank goodness nothing broke. this was done in a matter of minutes, when I was doing the dishes, then doing laundry. things I could always do with him "alone" upstairs.
then he let out a big yawn and said, "I am so tired right now. I need a nap."
where did this kid come from??

My day, while potty training a 2 1/2 year old.
All before lunch Noah kept saying he wanted a diaper on.. diaper on, diaper on... like a broken record. so I had to stop lunch preparation and tell him he does not need a diaper, just go on the potty. (we have been watching the "once upon a potty video" too. by the way, it is cute, but it says, "IT'S NOT A HAT, NOT FOR THE CAT, NOT A BIRD BATH..." in the song. so now noah puts his potty on his head.. and says "it's a hat".. like come on noah, we did the potty is a hat 6 months ago. then he tells me he is going to go poopy on the floor. (he has had 2 accidents with solid poops on the floor and we try not to make a big deal out of it. well, it has been such not big deal it seems that he likes the idea now. ) and on saturday, joe took a shower and forgot to put a diaper on him. noah ran into the bathroom and told joe he pooped. sure enough there was a big ol' turd on noah's bedroom floor. so today noah kept saying he was going to go poppy on the floor. I said, "no, dogs do that and you are not a dog. dogs don't know how to use the potty and that is why they go on the ground outside. you DO know how to use the potty, you are a big boy, you can use the potty. " so what does he start doing? barking. yes, barking. so as lunch sat out now for 30 min, we go upstairs and try the toilet instead of the potty. he uses the step stool to climb up and sits and sits. I read him books and I swear his butt is going to rip open with how wide he is straddling the toilet. he wants down. so now we sit on the bathroom floor, reading books. as the lunch is still sitting out. he runs to his room to get himself a diaper. I have to discourage him. I think he was actually going to diaper himself! we go downstairs to the potty and he starts screaming he wants a diaper on! so I finally give in and he gets the diaper on, stands up and pushes so hard and informs me "it is a big poopy, a BIG poopy." so we walk upstairs and change him 5 seconds later. lunch is now out for a hour. I lay on the floor, feeling so exhausted and defeated. 10 more min pass and I look over at him and say, "noah, do you even care that I am lying on the floor" "no, I am reading", he says. so we go and eat lunch. after he wakes up and so do I, (I had to sleep for work) and I am telling joe about my day( and he is careful not to critisize me.) noah runs in to inform us that he just did poops. we just look at each other, expecting to find another turd on the carpet, bark bark.. but he did infact push out a little tiny poop. but he was so excited and he got 2 chocolate m&ms... something else I swore I would never do, reward him with food. but it works I guess.

noah was teasing me that he was going to poop on the rug and I just sat and smiled. and he said "Nooooo, not on the floor.. that is for the dog." then I had to say, "no , dogs don't go on the floor. they go outside. if they go on the floor, they get in trouble." it is so funny now taking him into public restrooms. thankfully I was alone with him yesterday grocery shopping. I had to pee so I brought him in with me. he asks, "momma have to poopy? BIG poopy?" "No noah, just pee pee." "yes, mommy pee pee". when he passes gas he says, "huh?! what was that noise? noisy poops?"
he is so funny and honest at this stage.