20 Months!

I was a bad mom last month and didn't post about our silly little monkey, so this post will be full of all things Reed for the past two months.  He's growing like a weed and becoming even more of a little boy instead of a baby.  Tear.

Stats:
Height: 35 inches
Weight: Who knows!?!?  We didn't bring a scale with us!

At 20 Months:

• Reed is all kinds of talkative.  Just a few weeks ago he started putting sentences together, such as, "I need to see da baby", after meeting Baby Thatcher for the first time and wanting to see him again.  
• Sleep is crazy for Reed right now.  Lately, due to having guests and being out of town, Reed has slept with us WAY too much.  I believe this is causing his I-don't-want-to-go-to-sleep-tonight-without-you phase that is killing us.  Not only is he going through this phase, but he is also going through I'm-going-to-wake-up-in-the-middle-of-the-night-and-not-go-back-to-sleep-until-you-get-me phase.  Phew, that's a long and probably the hardest of the two to manage.  It seems like he's 3 weeks old again.  I say so young because he's literally been a good sleeper since early on.  We're hoping that some developmental milestone is around the corner that is causing all this craziness at night.
• In order to avoid Reed hysterically crying after he falls, we say "safe" and do the umpire motion for it.  It had caught on early in his 19th month when he fell while walking on the sidewalk and said "safe" to himself.  Too cute!
• He learned to stick out his tongue.  Thanks Karlie for teaching him!
• He now has his top two 2 year molars in.  These came in early in his 19th month.  His bottom two are cutting through now.....maybe this is waking him up at night.  Hmmm??
• He tries his very best to put his socks on himself but he hasn't mastered it yet.  He has, however, mastered taking them off.  It's almost pointless to put them on him at night because I know that he is going to take them off.  The left one always comes off first too and it might even be the only one he takes off.
• His favorite songs right now are the Zoom, Zoom song from storytime, Itsy Bitsy Spider (for which he can do the motions) and 5 Little Monkeys Swinging in a Tree.
• He often quips "wha happened" if slingbox freezes or a DVD stops playing or just when he feels something might be wrong.
• He went through a phase recently where he always, always pushed up his left sleeve at night before he went to sleep.  Not sure what this is about.
• He's learned to make a sad face by sticking his lips out.  He's so pitiful.
• He says "uh oh" and "oh me" a lot.
• He has grasped the concept of hot, not sure about cold yet.  He touched the slightly warm radiator last month and he said "hot".  Now when we say food is hot and even after it has cooled down, he will say "hot, burn".  Today, the sun blinded him through the bus window and he said "hot, burn, eyes".  The lights are also "hot".
• He is pretty much a pro at drinking from a cup, but he gets way too excited to let him do it for too long.  He always ends up spilling it.
• While laying next to his bed trying to get him to go to sleep, he patted me and said "night, night".
• I've started asking him to help me a little by getting him to throw his diaper away.  He now gets very upset if I don't let him do it.  He says "diaper trash" while I am changing him and then he says "tanks" when I give it to him.  Sweet boy!
• We are working on our manners.  He uses "pease", "tanks" and "excuse me" pretty well.  He burped while talking to Aunt Patti on skype yesterday and he said "excuse me" unprompted.  He also says "sah-ee" (sorry) but at the wrong time.  I bumped into him while getting him ready for bed and he said "sah-ee".  Chris was in front of the cabinet door that he was trying to open and he said "sah-ee".  On Monday of this week, he added something else to it by saying "sah-ee cha-ee".
• He is constantly asking "where is.......daddy, mommy, sock, mickey, goofy etc?"  Just last night after he woke up at 1 am I brought him to our bed (I know, not helping the cause) and Chris was in the bathroom, he said "look......where's daddy".  Just last week, the first thing he said after waking up was "where's bagel?"
• Just this month he started calling me "mommy".  Up until now I have been "mom".  Mommy sounds so much sweeter!
• His favorite way to say goodbye these days is "bye guys".  Not sure where he learned this.
• One morning he was eating his bagel and he said that it looked like a "saurus" and then a "frog".
• We are working on learning our shapes.  His favorites have to be the triangle and diamond.  He often requests that we make them with our hands.  On our road trip this weekend, he spotted diamonds everywhere, from the stained glass window in the hotel lobby to the headboard of the bed.
• He almost refuses to eat any vegetables these days, even green beans, which were once his favorite.  What to do, what to do?!?!
• He now requests "more" of whatever he wants by saying "more cookies", "more berries", etc.
• After being sick for so long, he now says "sick" to try to get out of things.  Just a couple days after his sickness, he was in his chair eating breakfast and he said "sick".  I, being way too paranoid, ran to the bathroom with him.  He then laughed at me.  Little stinker.  He even made gagging sounds the other day while shopping and saying "sick".  I have started just to ignore him.  I hope he stops crying wolf soon.
• He often requests that you "fix" something if he wants you to make it work, like turning a toy on, or if he breaks something or something isn't as he thinks it should be.
• He's been walking around our house lately saying "hop goes da bunny", at least that's what I think he's saying.  He tries to do his best bunny hop while saying it as well.  
• What seems to be his most complicated word yet, professor, which he says as "fesser".  No we aren't sending our kid to school just yet, there is a professor on Mickey Mouse Clubhouse.
• He now says "hold you" when he wants to be held.  Too precious for words!

Phew!  That's a lot about our little one.  I am sure I am missing something!  He is such a precious little boy who can drive us bananas (did you read about the sleeping issue?) and make us feel like the luckiest parents in the world.  He is always surprising us with the things that he says or remembers.  We love our little guy and can't wait to see what the next month holds for him!

20 Months!

Silly Boy!

Such a big boy!

Reading one of his favorite books, Each Peach Pear Plum.  The Jack and Jill in the book are always changed to Jack and Claire!

The boy sure does know how to put an outfit together!

Bath!

The second stop on our mini-tour of the UK countryside landed us in Bath, which was established in 43 AD by the Romans as a spa resort.  They built baths and a temple around naturally occurring hot springs.  Bath is located at the bottom of the Avon valley and the hills that can be seen from the valley are dotted with homes, which is really a beautiful sight.  The River Avon also runs through Bath.  This place was our kind of town, a little bit modern with lots of good shopping, water running through it (always a plus in our book), lots of parks to lounge in, and beautiful scenery.  I definitely want to go back to Bath.

Bath Abbey, founded in the 7th century.

Another view of Bath Abbey.

Great Bath.  The bottom portion is all that is left of this part of the ruins.   The green color of the water is due to it being exposed to sunlight increasing the growth of algae, so it would have been much more posh when the Romans used it as a spa when it was covered.  You wouldn't want to bathe in it now, lol!  The pool is lined with 45 sheets of lead and is filled with hot spa water from the natural hot spring.

Sacred Spring, where hot water rises here at a rate of 240,000 gallons per day at a temperature of approximately 115º F.

Chris and Reed relaxing by the Great Bath.

Cheese!!

 A portion of the temple courtyard.

A portion of the East Baths where there were heated rooms, swimming pools and changing rooms.

The cold plunge pool, you know, if you needed something besides some hot tub time, lol!

The street Chris wishes I shopped on.

Here you can see a portion of the park near the river as well as the hills beyond it where there are many homes.

So beautiful!!

Looking in the other direction.

One of the many streets of Bath that we walked down.

After leaving Bath, we made our way to Chipping Campden in the Cotswolds.  The scenery was absolutely gorgeous.  You will see a lot more of it in my next post.  Until then, enjoy this pic!

Rocks!

Sorry for my absence from the blog recently.  Last week I was busy preparing for our 4-day weekend adventure that took us to see Stonehenge, the Roman Baths, and the beautiful Cotswolds.

We started our day off on Friday with an hour drive to Stonehenge.  Can I just say that our kid has never been more excited to be in the car?!?  And this continued throughout the weekend, even after driving over 400 miles.  He was such a pro at riding around and never ceased to stop what he was enjoying doing when we would say that it was time to go "ride in da car", which is how he says it.  I think riding in the car was his favorite part of the trip.  He got zonked out every time the car started moving after he had checked out the scenery for a little bit.

Super comfy, even with the blazing sun on him!

There were beautiful fields of these flowers everywhere.  Anyone know what they are?

We arrived at Stonehenge at the perfect time for missing the crowds.  When we exited the Stonehenge park the ticket line was WAY longer than before and would not have been fun with a 19 month old.  Phew!

The stones were a pretty impressive sight.  We told Reed that we were going to see rocks and this certainly put a hop in his step.  He was a little disappointed when we got closer and he realized that he couldn't touch them.

Stonehenge!  So cool to finally see it in person instead of just seeing pictures.    Stonehenge was completed in approximately 2280 and 1830 BC.  Wow!

One of the station stones.   It is suggested that the station stones, four in total when Stonehenge was erected, were survey markers.

A little closer.

And up close and personal.  If you look closely through the center of the stones you can see the other station stone.

Another view of Stonehenge.  Please forgive all the pictures that look the same.  I thought it would be best to provide a panoramic view of Stonehenge.

Our Fam, too bad our photographer didn't get much of Stonehenge in the picture!

This is the remnants of the first Stonehenge, which was a roughly circular enclosure of about 360 feet in diameter, defined by a ditch.  The ditch was originally dug using picks of red deer-antler and shovels made from cattle shoulder blades.  Info courtesy of the Stonehenge English Heritage Guidebook.  I certainly didn't remember all this myself, lol!

Reed loved looking at the "sheeps".

Here you can see the other station stone that has since fallen down.

Our silly boy at Stonehenge.

The Heel Stone, which is located in the Avenue, the original entrance to Stonehenge.

Here you can see the fallen slaughter stone as it has come to be known.  While early visitors thought that it was evidence of sacrifice, it is now known that it once stood upright and was flanked by additional stones.

I do believe that Stonehenge is a must-see for visitors to the United Kingdom.  While it does take about an hour or so drive to get there, it is worth it if you have time to see Stonehenge as well as the other surrounding areas.

After leaving Stonehenge, we made our way to the town of Bath which we loved.  I'll post about it tomorrow.  Until then, I leave you with this hilarious road sign that we saw on our drive from Stonehenge to Bath.

It's not too often you see this sign on the side of the road.

Happy Anniversary!

Today marks six years of wedded bliss for me and Chris!!  It is crazy to think that it really has been six years since I married the man of my dreams.  He is such a great husband and father!  He works tirelessly to provide for our family and provides amazing opportunities for us like the one we are experiencing now.  I don't have the words to express just how much I love him and I believe that's okay with him because he loves me just the same!  I love you, Babe!  Thanks for all the smiles!  I look forward to many, many, many, many more years of bliss with you!

Welcome Baby Aidan!

Our friends Luke and Abbey recently welcomed their baby girl, Aidan Bell Fuszard, into the world!  She arrived on April 7th to the very proud parents.  She is a beautiful baby girl and I am sure Chris has already put her on the list of Reed's future girlfriends, lol!  We can't wait to meet her!!

Welcome Baby Thatcher!

Reed's best buddy, Brick, is now a big brother to Thatcher Davis Bruner.  Thatcher arrived on April 1st!   We can't wait to meet the little guy in June.  Congrats to Bo, Kelly and Brick on the arrival of Thatcher!  He is absolutely precious!

Proof!

I knew that I would eventually have to buy something wedding related.  I thought a tea towel would be a perfectly British thing to purchase, so I have been looking in every store we go in for the perfect option.  Nothing with their faces on it but something adorable to commemorate the event and the fact that we are here while all the craziness is happening.  While out on a little shopping trip yesterday, I decided to go in Cath Kidston for the first time because their Royal Wedding window was too cute to pass up.  I was super excited to find that the Royal Wedding specific tea towel that they were selling was just what I was looking for!  So, I bought it!

Isn't it adorable?  I am hoping I can make it work somewhere in my house, obviously not hanging up like this though, lol!

I love the special tag they've made for the event.  I've even seen special t-shirts that say "thanks for the day off".

Okay, so this isn't proof that we attended the Royal Wedding (still no invite yet), but it is proof that we were here, although anyone could probably purchase these off the internet, lol!  That's not the proof that I am talking about in this post.  I am talking about proof that I was actually in the same spot as Kate Middleton yesterday, but unfortunately, it was at a different time.  Ugh, how did I not know that she was there?!?!  I could totally skip being in all the crowds next week, although I would miss seeing the dress in person, oh, and I would love to see William in person, but I could totally consider skipping if I had seen her in person on the street.  Oh well, better luck next time!

Unfortunately, I am not having any luck getting the picture to post here right now, so you have to follow the link to the article by clicking here.

Yes, that is the store where I purchased the tea towel yesterday right behind Kate!  It would have been total hilarity if that had been me pushing Reed behind her, haha!

Just a simple London weekend!

We had originally planned to visit fellow HBSers, The Crowells, this past weekend in the town north of London that they call home, but after all the sickness that we've been dealing with we thought it would be better for them if we didn't potentially expose them to the same thing.  We are hoping to get together with them another weekend very soon!

In lieu of our planned activities, we had brunch at Tom's Kitchen in Chelsea, where we had an amazing waffle and pancake, let Reed play at the playground, and then made our way to Westminster Abbey for a tour.  It really is so beautiful inside!  I can't wait to see it on TV decorated for the wedding that is happening next Friday.  After seeing the Abbey, we strolled through St. James' Park, grabbed a quick lunch and then did some shopping.

Yesterday we checked out Old Spitafields Market.  Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures there, but I highly recommend it.  I seriously need to check it out on Thursdays for the antique market!  We got a glimpse of the London Marathon yesterday as well.  It would appear that we are globetrotting to be a part of all the marathons with us seeing the Paris marathon last weekend, lol!

Reed doing a little dance outside Westminster Abbey.  He had a few spectators.

Reed thought it was hilarious to sit down like me.

We made a point to walk by the US Embassy on our walk to the shopping street.  Hopefully we will never need to go in, but it is nice to know that it's there.

Run, runners, run!

Paris Part Trois

Our third day in Paris started with breakfast at our hotel, proceeded by walking through Jardin du Luxembourg, which is another beautiful garden, getting up close and personal with Notre Dame Cathedral, and walking through the Latin Quarter and St. Germain districts.  These are the areas that we would probably try to stay in when we go back.  There is just so much more going on there.  Lauren had to leave out a little earlier than us, so Chris, Reed and I walked up Champs-Élysées again since I had missed it the day before.  We made our way back to hotel to grab our bags and go to the train station.  And that, my friends, is our first trip to Paris!

Beautiful Jardin du Luxembourg

I want these flowers up the walkway at my house.  Unfortunately, I was informed that I would have to plant news flowers each season.  That doesn't sound like a good idea to me.

Cool building and more flowers inside the garden.

And a fountain.  So pretty.

Another cool fountain on our way to Notre Dame, unfortunately, it was littered with trash.

A view of the Seine with one of the two islands where Paris was originally founded on the right.

Notre Dame

This place is crazy big!

One of the entrances.  So cool!

Notre Dame

Another view of the Seine with the Eiffel Tower and one of Paris's many bridges.

Apparently the Paris Marathon was held the Sunday we left Paris.  Maybe that's why hotel rooms at reasonable prices were hard to come by?!??!

Arc de Triomphe again!

Our Hotel

Overall, we enjoyed our trip to Paris!  I can't say that it's my most favorite place I've ever visited.  It might even be one of those cities where once you've seen it, you don't really have to see it again.  That could be the fact that I was sick one of the days talking though.  Needless to say, we were super excited to be heading home to London where they speak English.  I really enjoy listening to people speaking French, while some do not, but it is somewhat uncomfortable to not be able to communicate very well.  That English to French book could have come in handy had I remembered it.  Next time, next time.  I think I will certainly go back to Paris in the future, but I will have to make sure to research restaurants and bring my translation book!  Oh, and hopefully not get sick again, lol!

So, where are we headed next?  Our next trip that is booked is to Scotland when my parents and brother are here in May, although we have a few long weekends coming up that we hope to be traveling out of town.  Keep checking back for more of our London-based adventures!