milestones

it is kind of hard to believe, but we have made it past one of the most dreaded and difficult milestones with jay this week.  as most people know, he is/was the most pickiest eater.  he didn't really eat any food that we ate.  when we went anywhere, we would have to bring his food with us.  the bag got pretty full on the weekends when we wanted to go anywhere.  we even stopped the baby food at two years just because i got tired of buying it.  a normal day would consist of 

breakfast:  oatmeal 

snack:  kix, raisons, fruit loops or something we brought from the house to school

lunch:  applesauce and more kix

snack:  poptart, mandarin oranges, or something else we brought from the house

dinner:  more fruit loops

no meat was in his diet at all.  garrett convinced jay that on easter, the easter bunny would bring him a present and take his "baby food" away.  in turn, jay would have to eat big boy food.  it has not been too bad except that jay takes forever to eat dinner or any other meal.  he tries to make excuses like he has to go potty in the middle or he is still chewing a piece after of about 3 or 4 minutes.  as of this week, he has added about 20 foods to his diet, including meat.  there has been some threatening that the easter bunny would come back and take his gift, but jay will quickly eat something to keep it.

another milestone that jay has reached is being potty trained.  he wears big boy underwear all the time now (even at night!!).  this isn't to say that he doesn't have an occasional accident here and there.  for the most part, he tells us when he has to poop and if you just take him to the potty every 1 to 2 hours or so to pee, he will be fine and dry.  if he gets too busy or excited about doing something, jay won't tell you he has to go.  i dread going to school to see the bag of clothes tied to his bookbag every so often.  the worst are the accidents that he has pooped in and i have to clean them out.  i guess it just goes with the territory of potty training.  i'd rather do that then keep spending money on diapers and pull ups all the time.

last week i was out for spring break and kept jay out on that thursday.  we had a little fun of our own at the house.

playing with blocks

playing with tools

dying some easter eggs

the saturday of easter weekend, we went up to my grandmother's house to visit.  here's my favorite picture of jay playing with a car he got.

so nana doesn't know about jay riding on the back of noah's tricycle.

for some reason they had to put on their swimsuits from grammy.

easter sunday we got dressed and went to church.  here is my attempt at getting a picture, but he was too wiggly.

finally after church, jay opened his present from the easter bunny.  bye bye baby food, hello big boy food.

opening easter baskets from aunt kim and uncle chip as well as from grandma and grandpa on easter.

grandma and grandpa planned an easter egg hunt.  there was money involved.  jay loves money and even tells cashiers he needs money to put in his piggy bank.

last week jay made some binocular's at school in mrs. mary's class to look at the birds.  you never knew two toilet paper rolls stuck together and a string to put around his neck would make him so happy.  

today we went out to the park for a baby shower for nicolette and jeremy davis.  they flew in from florida this weekend.  jay enjoyed the slide until he peed in his pants and we had to change his shorts.  sorry for anyone else that goes on that playground.

here's the happy couple opening some presents.  they are expecting a boy in August.

now stay tuned in because in two weeks we find out what our little bundle of joy is.  will it be a girl?? or a boy??  who knows.  i'm 16 weeks right now, not wearing maternity clothes and not really showing.  i guess one day i'll pop out.

and 2 1/2 months later...

i know it has been a while and we have some catching up to do.  it's been hectic around here as well as pretty busy.  through the month of february, garrett finished up the basketball season with his boys and even had them over for a sleepover in march.  surprisingly, nothing was tore up and i don't think they moved from their positions in the floor of playing video games.  fortunately, jay and i were able to stay at my parents' house for the night.  the boys had the house to themselves; 6 boys and garrett with lots of food and video games.

the weekend of the superbowl, garrett and i found out we were pregnant with baby #2 (or #4 however you want to look at it).  we didn't say anything until the end of march, but everything looks healthy so far.  we are looking for a fall baby that is due october 13th.  i'm not looking forward to writing all the lesson plans though while i'm out.  that's the only bad part about my job, i can't just leave for sick leave, i have to really be prepared.  right now i'm currently 15 weeks along, no maternity clothes needed right now and hardly showing.  is this right about now?  i can't remember from jay.  i go for another doctor's appointment next friday and then we go on may 13th for an ultrasound.  hopefully we will be able to tell what we are having by then.  if you ask jay if he wants a baby brother or sister, he'll say sister.  so i guess we will be to wait and see. not only are we expecting, but garrett's brother chip and his wife kim are expecting as well in september. this should make it very interesting in the olin household come fall.

through the month of march, garrett also lost his grandma olin.  she had been sick for a while and lost the battle.  although it was a sad time, it was a burden lifted off of his parents.  they were going down there every other weekend to care for her.  now there are still some loose ends to tie up with assets and everything, but hopefully that will go smoothly.

garrett and i have both been pretty busy at work.  garrett's also starting to study for his exams he has to take to be a certified architect.  wish him luck!!  i think he said that there are 9 exams in all.  not fun!!

garrett turned 29 on april 5th and was treated to going to the Master's in augusta, georgia on his birthday.  my dad had gotten the tickets and took jeremy, garrett, and chip.  i think overall, they had a great time.  unfortunately, they didn't get to see too many golfers since it had rained the night before and they didn't want to come out for the practice round.

this past weekend, we had a sunday school easter egg hunt and picnic with almost everyone in our class. it was suppose to be at my parents' house, but with all the torrential rain that we've gotten in the past few weeks, we were unable to have it there.  it was just too wet even though it did end up being a beautiful afternoon.  fortunately, the church gym was open to house everyone.  there were kids galore with tons of balls and toys.  it ended up really fun and i think everyone had a blast.  there was no hiding eggs, but just eggs scattered everywhere on the floor.  but when you are two or three, you really don't care about finding hidden eggs, but finding what is inside those eggs.  jay loves candy and would eat it all day long if you let him.  here's some pictures from the event:

 if you look closely, you can see kids playing in the background

 jay gathering his eggs

 jay spent most of his time trying to figure out how to ride the scooter

 jay having fun with gavin and some of his friends

 and yes jay is pushing noah on a bike

little olivia puttering along with her basket

this week has been too short.  it is already thursday and my spring break is almost over.  i spent monday and tuesday cleaning the house and making meals for the families who have had babies recently.  yesterday, i picked jay up from school early and went to garrett's office to each lunch.  today, i ran some errands and kept jay home.  he's been a bit of a wild child today though.  it took  1 1/2 hours and some harsh convincing to finally fall asleep in bed for his nap.  who knows what we have in store this weekend, but we will soon see.

weekend round up

maybe the title is a little misleading, because i want to recap the past few weeks and weekends that we've had since the beginning of january.  we've been a pretty busy family with work and everything else, it's hard to make it to the computer all the time.  

the past few weekends we have enjoyed watching garrett and ned hurd coach a group of boys (13-14 years old) in basketball.  i didn't know how much jay really enjoyed it until this past thursday when garrett was going to practice, jay had a total meltdown and thought he was going to a game.  so far the team has won three and lost two.  not too bad!!!  they've got a good little team and hopefully they can win the rest of their games.  can't wait  until this thursday night when they have another game.  i think it is exciting for both me and nicole (ned's wife) to just go out and cheer for these guys.

on occasion, i've picked up a bundle of three at daycare when olivia's and owen's parents have to work late.  this past time i found out livvie really on likes her parents to pick up, but by the time we reached the house everyone was okay and ready to play.  i managed to take care of three little ones and cook homemade potato soup at the same time.  

last weekend peyton king celebrated her 2nd birthday at her house.  who knew that it would be such a wonderful weekend and we could even enjoy a little time outside.  

 jay's king of this castle.

 peyton digging into her cake.

 everyone helping peyton open her presents.  noah's waiting on the woody doll.

 she got her jessie!! and bullseye.  don't touch jessie or she'll have a meltdown.

 look what jay got!!  i think anything in a bag is exciting at this age.

recently this week, we've pulled out the playdoh to play with it.  jay loves to cut it with his scissors.  playdoh only comes out on rare occasions and only at the kitchen table.  

and lastly, we celebrated olivia's 2nd birthday yesterday at mcdonalds.  one of the mcdonalds in matthews has a play place for kids 3 and under.  it is such a perfect place to have a party and you don't have to worry about cleaning up your own house.

 noah belote

 jay, noah, lyla and sage walters

 chandler jenkins

 olivia eating her yummy cupcake.

 courtney and pressley tucker

 well the birthday girl didn't want to join the fun.

 olivia opening some of her gifts.

jay and daddy

icy dayz

yesterday was a snow day, today is an icy day; and i mean ice!!!  yesterday the snow was powdery and easy to walk in, but today was a disaster because freezing rain came down last night.  there is an inch of ice on top of all of the snow on the ground.  jay and i ventured out in it today anyway.  he enjoyed it and maybe more than yesterday when it was the fluffy white stuff.  we would slip and slide and both fell down in the middle of the road and as i was getting up heard him say "let's do it again".  that's my boy.  never gets hurt and always wants to do it again.  jay would walk around the porch in the back picking up big ice sheets and throwing them to the ground and watch them hit and shatter.  he would say "that's a big one".  nothing outside can get jay down and he wants to go out again this afternoon.  sorry no pictures because the camera is dead.  you can enjoy the ones from yesterday.  they look the same except jay had red pants on today.

oh and how to dress a two year old in the snow.  i keep hearing we don't have anything to go out in the snow.  jay is probably the most well dressed kid on the planet in the snow.  After the snow after Christmas, we had gone out shopping to return a couple of things.  we stopped into children's place and garrett and jay found a pair of boats.  we bought them way too big so he can wear them next year.  the rest of the clothes we had.  we layered jay in a pair of sweatpants that we stuffed in his boats with a pair of windpants over top.  on the top half of his body he has a long sleeve thermal, shortsleeve t-shirt of some sort, a hoodie and a puffy jacket.  on his head we put his most favorite carolina hat with both hoods.  and of course we can't forget the gloves or "mittens" as he calls them.  he's all decked out and ready to play in the snow or ice.  he could play for hours like this.

i think i'm over these snow days.  we are suppose to be starting exams and my first one is to be an eoc for my algebra II honors folks.  yikes!!  they will probably do well, but i need one more review day to make sure they are ready.  i'm afraid we will be out tomorrow again, i hope not because we already have two make up days to do already.  that's a bummer, but i'm had some great days with jay and yesterday with garrett as well.

snow dayz

today was a monday, turn snow day.  garrett worked from home for a little while so i got the chance to take jay outside for an hour and a half.  if he had his choice, it would have been much longer.  we did make it back outside for another hour in the afternoon, but it was much colder.

 jay and mommy

 sand shovels and buckets turned into snow buckets and shovels.  jay would take a few steps and take and scoop and put it in his bucket and then would do it again.  he had no interest in using the neighbors sled. 

 noah came out for a little while to join the fun, but he hated to fall in the snow.

 peyton and sara king also made their way out for a little fun.

 garrett preparing to throw snowballs at the king's house.

jay and peyton making snow castles!!

it's a wrap!!

2010 has ended and 2011 has begun. we ended the year off on a good note this last month. we convinced jay to give his pacifier to santa in return he would get presents. to our surprise, it worked like a charm. we haven't had any problems with it since. the key is, actually have a present ready at the house when they give it away.

we want to leave you with a couple of photos of this last month. it has been pretty busy visiting family and finishing up work for the month that i haven't had time to post anything since thanksgiving. that's what working full time will do to you.

christmas night and the day after snow started to fall and really accumulated. i think we had about 4 inches around our house or so. jay really liked walking in the snow, but we soon found out tennis shoes is not the way to go. his shoes and socks were all soaking wet. he definitely had a warm bath afterward.

at the beginning of the month, my dad and i took jay to the tree lighting in mint hill. garrett had practice with his basketball team and my mom had to work so dad and i thought it would be cool to go. we wanted cookies and hot chocolate, but there was way to many people there and jay was not going to wait on it.

christmas was great and full of presents. jay has most of the toy story gang and all three movies now. one night he even had to sleep with all the gang.

santa brought jay a tool set. he loves it and loves playing with the drill especially. one of the drills is from my grandmother that he got the night before.

as you can see, jay and noah enjoyed playing and "fixing" things in their new wagons. i think this was the highlight of christmas.

jay has power now!! (the batteries have already gone out once)

christmas eve, jay and noah helped make a mess and clean it up too at my parents house.

uncle chip and aunt kim gave a cool toy story car to jay. steering is a bit of a problem so he just goes around in circles in the yard.

also this month jay has grown fond of his jacket and "mittens". no it isn't cold in our house, this is just how he likes to play.

we hope your month has been great. we look forward to a great 2011 and hopefully will have some great things come our way this new year.