Catch up, and Easter!!

Hello!

I'm so sorry it's been so long since our last post. We have had so much fun these past few weeks and have truly enjoyed the warmer weather!! Oliver LOVES to be outside, so we have been making up for some lost time over the crazy winter we had. However, the poor guy has AWFUL allergies and is now recovering from his 5th ear infection :( I do see tubes for his ears in the near future, but hopefully they will bring him much needed relief.

We had a great end of March and a great Easter weekend back home with our family. We spent all day today outside, just realizing we were great about lathering Oliver in sunscreen, but not ourselves... We had a BBQ at the park with some great friends, ice cream with more great friends, and then spent the rest of the day doing yard work.

Here are some pics to sum up our past few weeks. Enjoy :)


No fear... (of injury or discipline...)


Oliver LOVES ice cream, and I don't typically enjoy sharing ice cream, only with my little man.


Open gym! We go to the gym where we take swimming lessons on Friday mornings, they setup all the gymnastic equipment so the kiddos can play on it. Oliver LOVES the trampoline, it got a little dangerous so I put him on the "safe mat." He ran all over it trying to jump... it was fun :)


One of the many toys to play on


Of all the equipment (swings, trampolines, moon walks, etc.) Oliver finds the cones the most enjoyable, I can see he is going to be creative with a slight edge for perfection, ha!


Swimming lessons, this is the only part he enjoys. Sitting outside of the water pouring water on Daddy, this and jumping in. Either way we enjoy it.


Just driving the 'benz, this kid has style.


Wagon rides with favorite friends are the BEST!


We think he's simply the cutest little boy with his blonde curls and his big boy tie :)



My new Mickey Mouse from the Easter Bunny who visited Grammie and Poppie's :)


My boys


Easter Egg Hunt! (One of three...)


Checking out the loot


Looking at the turkeys with Grammie. Oliver can now say "turkey" and "gobble gobble." (Colors and numbers may be important, but the fact that he can name different animals and their sounds might get him into Harvard :)! )


Ornery!


Worn out, but still needed his favorite friends to sleep with on the way home.


We really enjoyed getting to see so many of our friends and family this Easter holiday. We do have lots more pictures, but they are on our other camera so will not get edited for awhile, so for those of you who were there, look for the pics in your email sometime soon.

Lots of love, peace and warm weather!
God bless,
Cole, Ashley, Oliver, Buddy and Mickey

February in review, lunch dates with Cole/Daddy, playing in the leaves, and more!

Wow!

I just realized I hadn't updated our blog in over 2/3 weeks, so, I decided, this one will be done with mostly pictures. Good news! I did get my camera back and fixed, so on to more photos!



Waiting to ride the carousel at the mall! He is always so excited to see this when we're walking around.


However, he decided he likes it much better from afar, we ended up getting off before it started, the animals were a little too scary.


Story time with daddy. Oliver decided he was tired of sitting in daddy's lap, so he pulled up his little wagon and decided it was way cooler to be read to in a wagon :)


This picture could have so many sentimental quotations under it :) This boy loves his daddy, and everything about him, that is for sure.


Coloring with Emersyn. SOrry for the blurriness, this was one of the last pictures before we sent the camera to get it fixed. (In case you're wondering, Oliver is no longer allowed to carry mommy's camera around.)


Love talking on the phone!! (Although, I'm pretty sure he was just listening to a dial tone here, he may have been talking to Grammie...)


Oliver now LOVES to share breakfast time with 2 (if not more) of his blankies, Buddy, and Bear... we even ventured to the store the other day with both Buddy and Bear, amazingly it went very well. :)


We met Cole for lunch at one of our most favorite restaurants, (now open on the Plaza!), Ingredient. We first fell in love with this restaurant in Lawrence, and now there are two in the KC area!! I think Oliver's going to be a fan as well.


Oliver wasn't up for being held for picture with daddy, so this will do, and I really love Cole's expression :)


I love their expressions!! They understand each other :)


Oliver "helping" me rake. We're getting ready to plant our garden!! I'm super excited, so be checking for the updates on our progress. We'll be planting a garden, starting a compost, AND re-landscaping, woo hoo!


We had fun :)


Phew!

God bless :) Don't forget Daylight Saving's Time this Sunday!!!
Love, Cole, Ashley, and Oliver :)

Broken camera :(

Sorry I've not posted in two weeks now. My camera is broken :(

I guess I could still blog a little update on how the Winblad household is surviving these great Kansas winter days...

Lets see, Oliver is getting too big boy-ish for my liking. He's increased his vocabulary in the past two weeks to about 15-20 words now. He LOVES Mickey Mouse even more, which sometimes becomes a problem as he was given 2 Mickey coloring books for Valentine's Day and now during reading time he has to have ALL Mickey books (coloring books included) before he will sit at peace and read others. I love that he is a sharp kiddo, but sometimes I wish I could hand him one Mickey book and he would happily sit and read it, but nope, all 15 Mickey books are out at one time :)

We FINALLY started to download our home movies, that we've not downloaded in over a year, so look forward to some pretty funny videos of our "daredevil."

Work's going really well, I love it more everyday; Cole's been pretty steadily busy, not overkill as he was for about 2-3 months there for awhile.

Can't think of much else to say here, sorry, not a very exciting post, but wanted to keep it going. Oh, Oliver decided to play with my new camera... it's now sitting in a Nikon "repair shop" in some other state, but good news is... whatever is "wrong" with it, it's covered under the warranty, so will hopefully be back soon, woo hoo!

Love to all and God bless :)
Cole, Ashley, and Oliver

OH! UPDATE! Oliver has been falling asleep in his crib for one week now with no cries (other than the initial cry of realization that I'm not standing over his crib, but by the time I've shut the door and walked down the hall he's usually done crying and asleep!!) We could never let him "cry it out." Mainly for 2 reasons, 1: we're push-overs and 2. he's stubborn. So, I decided last week to try it, we read, prayed, and I rocked him for a couple minutes just holding him and then placed him in his crib. No cries, he was asleep within 2-3 minutes, so I've done it everynight since.. no cries and no struggles! Yay! I'm so glad I wasted so much money on all these sleep books, and never took any advice out of any of them, so for all you new mommies, let me know, they're free of charge - you can add them to your, I'm sure already growing, library :)


Oliver and Bella waiting "patiently" for Cole/Daddy to come home from work...

Mickey, ice cream, laundry basket adventures, and Valentine's!!

First I'll start off with how I found our little guy when he woke on Saturday morning. TO those of you who do not know, I work a few hours in the urgent care on Friday nights, allowing the boys to hang out and have a "boys night" once a week. In doing this, Cole gets Oliver ready for bed, bath, books, and PJs. Well.... when he woke on Saturday morning, the first thing I noticed were his pajamas...



Please know, I am not at all making fun, or criticizing, just simply making not the difference between mommy and daddy :)

Next, Oliver has found the knife honer and has decided it is his very own sword. Yes, I do understand that as a parent I should not allow him to walk around, for the possibility of injury, however, I'm pretty sure running around with a stick has the same "risks." :) He has been known to charge at either Cole or I with this, acting like a strong fighting knight that he really is :)



Now, for those who know us,you know of our weekly trip to Mi Ranchito, the BEST Mexican in KC (per our opinion, no, I am not asking for yours :) ) This is a treat for us, as we are typically eating salad, veggies, fruit, fish, the rest of the week, we tell ourselves it's okay to ruin our entire week of eating for one night of pure eating pleasure. On this night Oliver was treated to a bowl of ice cream from our waitress. (When did adults stop being cute enough for free ice cream?)


He LOVED it!

Laundry day has become a much loved activity for Oliver. I was putting away the rest of the laundry, came into the living room to find no Oliver and no laundry basket. I walked past his room and found this...


I obviously had to get a picture and still laugh when thinking about him taking the laundry basket out of the living room, pushing it into his room, putting as many of his books in that would fit, then climbing in to read in his new "pirate ship."

As many of you know, we have an open pantry in our kitchen. This has become one of Oliver's favorite "activities," which really okay with me b/c it allows me to get supper started, sometimes completely finished, or other kitchen duties finished. Now, know, this only happens when Daddy's not home, as it REALLY bothers daddy (he's always been the neater one...) So, I had to snap a shot, and clean up knowing Cole would walk in any moment :)




Now for Valentines! He had his first Valentine's Day party at his daycare on Thursday, and made out very well. Many of the kids brought little Valentine's Day treats thaty they shared and stored in their little "cat" valentine's day treat holders they made. His most favorite Valentine came from Grammie and Poppie (a Mickey Mouse INSULATED cup!!) (only grandparents can know exactly what a grandchild wants... his new favorite friend on a cup, and insulated so it stays cold ALL the time! -our child has become somewhat picky and likes his water best with ice...) We got to exchange Valentines treats with our most favorite friend Emersyn - and play with some other friends this day as well. We've had a very fun week and look forward to our Valentine's Day together as a family tomorrow. Again, we are so happy to share our little guy with you and give you a glimpse into what our very blessed/crazy life is like, week to week. Enjoy the following pictures of Oliver and his Valentine's Day treats from friends and Grammie and Poppie. Oliver asked if he could go to bed early tonight so mommy and daddy can have a dinner/movie night at home! We were hesitant, but agreed in the end. (What a great kid!)


MICKEY!!


So many Valentine's treats!!


Mom, I tried to put his Valentine card up on the wall, however, he "protested" b/c he knows it's from you guys & has been carrying it around since he opened it :)


Oliver's Valentines "holder" he made at daycare, just looking through his Valentine's from his friends :)

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!
XOXOXO

January, in review

Well, I am not only still in disbelief that it is 2010, but now, that January is completely over. Time flies, and I feel like I can never catch up!!

January was a very fun month for us! Cole and I were able to go away for a weekend for our anniversary, the first time since well before Oliver was born; thanks to Grammie and Poppie (whom came to watch an (of course) angelic Oliver). Then, well, lets just say it was fun and eventful :)

Oliver is feeling much better, we had a scare over the weekend after a doctor telling us he may have chickenpox...... I know what you're all thinking, "Who gets chickenpox anymore?" ESPECIALLY my son?!?!?! But, with relief, the rash went away 24 hours later, so I'm still left wondering what in the world it was, but then again, I'm always worrying about something, so might as well be about Oliver :)

What Oliver is up to now: Pointing to body parts: head, eyes, ears, nose, mouth, hair, foot. His favorite is "eyes," although I think I've already bragged about this one in my last post... He LOVES his Bibles or "Boble", he has 3 of his own and has now found mine. It's kind of strange how he knows that the four different bibles, 3 of them Children's - 2 of these being board book/picture bibles; 1 my actual bible; are all bibles. Once he finds them he does not want to put them down, which then usually turns into a major event in our household... Maybe we have a preacher on our hands?

Oliver has been quite a little pistol lately. Testing the waters with he can/can't get away with. Needless to say, my mom just reminds me, (I think a little too often) that I was her "most difficult child." Hmmm, I think that what she's REALLY trying to say is, "Oh, I'm sorry Oliver's acting up, but man, am I enjoying just sitting on the bleachers waiting to give him a cookie the next time I see him..." Ah, how the miraculous change of parenthood to grand-parenthood happens IMMEDIATELY once a grandchild is born. Anyhoo, Oliver's not been sleeping very well, since he has had this ear infection, causing his very tired parents to put him in bed with them in the middle of the night... yes, I know what Freud would say, but weren't his kids irreversibly screwed up??? I do love to cuddle with my little cuddlebug at night, but lately it's been not so much as a cuddle, as a swift kick in the back, face, arm... whatever body part he can reach with his little tae-kwon-do legs. Which, brings me to another point, Oliver's new thing is running around the house "ninja-kicking." We have NO idea where he picked this up, but for now it's rather comical... that is of course, until he ninja-kicks another little kid; we of course will then turn our heads and say, "Wow, he's never done that before..." like all perfect parents :)

Happy Groundhog day!!!

"Just got my blog updated"

The reason this title is in quotes is because when I asked Cole what the title of my first blog should be, these were his exact words, in a partial-supportive/partial-sarcastic answer :)

Since this is the first post, I should probably update my oh-so many readers about what is going on in the lives of the OP Winblad's.

Well, the three of us have been enjoying passing around coughs, runny noses, congestion, and other pleasant cold symptoms for the past week. I have a feeling Oliver brought this home to share from daycare last week, but it has since mixed with the bugs I get to dance around with all day at work (strep, flu, etc.) and has formed a bug that has gone on to not only invade our ability to breath out of our noses, but also the ability to sleep, taste, think coherently, etc.

Other than this, Oliver has added many new words to his vocabulary. "Up" after he has taken about 3 bites of whatever meal we are eating and decides it is time to get get "up" and play; "out" again, used in conjunction with "up" when wanting to get out of eating and into playing instead. (I may have a bit of a sarcastic tone here, but it has come in handy some). "Eyes" when he points to our eyes, and when I say "point" I use that term loosely to actually mean poke our eyes out, and his own :) "BuBye" this is, yes, as cute as can be.

Something NEW I discovered he can do is sign language. The other day when I went to pick him up after he got done telling me "up" a few many times, I asked if he was all done and I noticed he stuck his hands in the air and started moving them back and forth. I, of course, just brushed it off as I have the smartest son, whom will soon be entering Princeton; until the following day it dawned on me that although I have chosen not to teach him sign language, and actual words instead, he does go to daycare three days a week with 5 other kids. Although, I'm sure he taught the other kids this and has since moved on to teaching mommy a few new tricks.

Cole and I are enjoying the minimal time we get to spend together before going to bed, yes, around 9:00pm every night. Although, again, I use the term "spending time together" loosely as we are both sitting in the living room, on separate couches, on our own computers, not talking... aw, the beauties of parenthood :)

Well, I really am going to head to bed now, praying Oliver sleeps longer than three hours this evening. He has been doing really well, sleeping for 10-12 hours at night, but since the cough has settled in, he spends most of his nights coughing :(
Peace, love, and Sudafed