Playdates

Brayden has playdates with his friends and one of our favorite places to meet is Chuck E. Cheese, where a kid (and a parent) can be a kid!

Here a few pics of him shootin' hoops and playin' skeeball. He and I often battle it out on the skeeball board.

Time to go home ... which is always a task, but we eventually make it out ok. :)

Jordin's Birthday Bash

This was one of the most fun birthday parties! My friend Nichole has a daughter about 6 months younger than Brayden and her party had an American Idol theme. Complete with DJ, great food, kites, pinatas, etc, it was a great time. Nichole and I tease about Brayden being her son-in-law. Above is the grandmother-n-law. lol. It's too cute and the party was a great success. Here are a few pics. Happy Birthday Jordin!

Never Too Much 'No

As many of you know, this Winter we have had the most snow in Dallas on record! It snowed and snowed. Then snowed again and snowed a little bit more. Oh, did I say it snowed? ... lol. Just when everyone thought Spring was on the way, another cold front pushes through with precipitation clear through mid-March!

Well, needless to say, Brayden wasn't the least bit saddened by the weather. In the pictures above, he had run in the driveway without his hat. I was tellin' him to come back in, but he stood there and looked in the sky, mesmerized by the snow. We've had a great time building snowmen, baking cookies and drinking hot chocolate by the fireplace. Nope, there's never too much snow.

Here is the front of our house during one of the snowiest days. It was morning and there was about 4 inches on the ground with no reports of it letting up. By nightfall, there was close to a foot of "no" on the ground. :)

Brayden calls snow "no". He would wake me up in the morning and say, "Mommy, it's 'noing' in the grass outside." I'd bundle us both up so we could go outside and enjoy the "no". lol

He Can Get Out!

Soooo in January of 2010, in the funniest way, I found out Brayden can now get out of his CRIB!! One morning, I woke up and had a little face looking at me nose to nose around 6:00am.

After the initial shock, I immediately took him to his room, placed him back in his crib and asked him to show me how he got out. Turns out, he climbs over the side and lets his legs dangle over until his toes reach his toybox which sits directly next to his crib. ha! How clever! lmbo!!

Time to change over to his toddler bed ... :)

What's the Haps ...

As we know, little ones move from one thing to another pretty quickly, so I thought I'd keep you up to date on what Brayden was "into" in 2009.



"Emmmooo" is what he calls him. The Elmo era really began in 2008 and spilled over into 2009. He couldn't get enough of this lil' red fella. There is a DVD he has called "The Best of Elmo" and I tell ya, he could watch it over and over again and even repeat skits verbatim. There's one where Elmo is teaching the number 5 with a hip-hop theme so for a time when I said give me high five he would say "yo FIVE, no JIVE, yo FIVE" ... too funny! Yeah, Brayden, loved him some Elmo.


Now what kid doesn't have a Mike era. lol. Brayden's song of choice is "Beat it" and for MONTHS, "Beat It" was the cure-all and could trump any tantrum. He'd be hollerin' upset about somethin' then all we have to do is say, "want to listen to beat it?" and the tears slowly begin to disappear. The funniest part is when he starts to sing. He says (high voice) "beat iiitt", (low voice) "beat iiittt", (high voice) "beat iiitt", (low voice) "beat iiittt" ... "dooggonnitt", then kicks his leg like Mike. Way too funny ... :)


Then we moved into the age of Mickey (which was the theme of his birthday party this year). During Christmas there was a Mickey Mouse blow up fixture in the yard of one of our neighbors. It was Mickey sitting next to Minnie sitting inside a present. When Mickey stood up out of the present, Minnie went down in the present, and vice versa. Brayden seemed to think Mickey bumped his head when he went down in the present so ALL during the holidays he would say out the blue, "Mickey Mouse bumped he head" ... lol. If you didn't know the story, you wouldn't know what the heck he's talkin' about. lol. We would have to drive by this house at his request EVERY SINGLE NIGHT. lol Meeeska, Mouskaa, Mickkeyy Mouse!



These days all the characters on Yo Gabba Gabba are his very best friends. He makes references to Muno (my personal favorite), Foofa, Brobee, Plex, Toodee, and of course, DJ Lance Rock. Muno can dance his one-eyed tail off. ha! Brayden sings "Keep your hands to yaself" and "There's a party in my tummy, so yummy so yummy" ... :) For Christmas, he got a Yo Gabba Gabba jam box and a "best of" dvd. This is another that he can watch over and over again, trumping "The Best of Elmo". lol. This year I'm definitely taking him to see Yo Gabba Gabba live ... check it out if you have a little one (http://www.yogabbagabbalive.com/). I'm looking forward to it. ;)

Last, but not least, Brayden is already a basketball and football fanatic. Every week you can guarantee we're watching some kind of games. Brayden gets in front of the TV and says "GO BOY! GO BOY! He definitely loves sports and (if he so chooses) I can't wait to have a jersey on with "Simmons" on the back rooting him on at his games. :)

Fun in the Sun

Here are a few pictures I found on my camera we took of the kids playing in the backyard at my Mom's last May. (Brayden was about 18 months here.) Mom bought all of these water toys 'cause the boys love to play in water in the house. We hoped that by getting the water slides and water tables it would keep them out of the sinks and toilets on the inside, which it did. lol. Cousins JJ, Jordyn and b had major fun in the sun last summer.

Nap Time

Now look at my baby. He falls asleep with his arms propped behind his head like this often and I think it's so funny every time I see it. lol. When I stepped in to check on him during his nap time, I figured I'd snap a couple pics. He's definitely my little big boy. Night Night Brayden ... :)

Here are pics from nap time in Austin .... :)