Potluck Halloween Fun

This is probably the last year we'll be able to get away with no official Halloween costume or trick-or-treating, but we still managed to have some Halloween fun.

Thanks to his Auntie Jennifer in Houston, Grayson at least sported a cool glow-in-the-dark skeleton shirt (which matches his big cousin Blayne as a bonus!) for dress-up day at school.

This afternoon he spent some time in the toddler room for their "harvest" party. Since Gray goes to a church daycare, they don't officially celebrate Halloween. At any rate, he got to dress up and have a cupcake snack and that's really all he cared about.

Grayson with the pumpkin he painted at Auntie Emily and Uncle Levi's house (oh, and that skeleton bear he's holding is his new friend Boneses. He was also a gift from Jennifer and they are now inseparable.)

As many of you know, I'm a big fan of "fun" socks (aka holiday or patterned socks....I know, random right?) Anyway, these are the socks my mom surprised me with this week and Grayson received his fun striped socks last Halloween from our good friends Mark & Agatha in St. Louis. He wore them last year and was surprisingly still able to fit in them this year. So adorable!

And finally, I'll close with this random picture because it really doesn't get any cuter that that folks!

Coast to Coast(ers)

As we were driving home from Houston today, I was in my sixth hour of trying to entertain Grayson in his car seat and getting toward the bottom of the bag of toys when I realized we likely have the world's most-travelled set of coasters.

You see, our son is in L.O.V.E with a set of rubber coasters we bought for about $3 nearly five years ago. They are round and come in three colors - black, white and red. If you've been to our house or on a trip with us, you likely know exactly what I'm talking about.

He likes to bend them and stack them and chew on them and so on. They are probably the closest thing he has to a "lovey" or sentimental item. They've gone with us to the Outer Banks of North Carolina, in the car across three states to Mississippi, on many a roadtrip to Houston and pretty much everywhere in between.

He's been infatuated with these coasters since he could roll over and grab them and I'm amazed that they still continue to entertain him even to this day.

I love them because they are lightweight and easy to take anywhere, but they are also a silent toy that does not require batteries (whohoo!).

I'm curious to see how long this will last. I really thought once he started walking he would care less about the coasters, but now he's discovered new ways to play with them. He can take them in and out of cabinets and his toy truck with storage in the seat, or he can put them in the mailbox of his Learning House like they are a letter.

Now that he's mobile, we find random coasters all over the house. I'm beginning to wonder if he'll have to have a couple of coasters in his kindergarden backpack or, worse yet, in his stuff for college. At least he'll have a place to set his beer.

Hello again

I'm back from my work trip and love coming home to my boys (and Roxy, of course). Both Michael and Grayson survived taking care of one another without too many bumps and bruises.

I must brag on my husband for a minute because he tackled a mound of dirty dishes, grocery shopping and keeping up with his weekly trash/recycling chores all while I was gone. They even managed to work in a Sunday afternoon drive in Blauhai (Mike's classic BMW that rarely escapes our garage).

Grayson picked up some new skills as well, including a love of Cheezits, pointing out mama and dada in pictures, and my favorite, learning how to blow kisses. What a difference 2.5 days makes.

Brief Hiatus

Before you obsessively check and recheck this blog over the next few days (you know who you are peeps), I wanted to give you a heads up that I will be taking a brief blogging break.

I'm headed to a conference this morning for work and will not return until Tuesday evening. It will be an intense couple of days since my employer hosts the conference and I know I won't hardly have time to sleep, let alone blog.

I'll try to post a few Twitter updates which will show up in the margin, but can't make any promises.

Say a little prayer for Michael as he holds down the fort. He's a great daddy, but I know playing the single parent role is tough.

Bite Me

There have been some new developments with Grayson's biting phase. I don't want to jinx anything, but I think we may have made some progress over the last day or so.

Yesterday he bit one of his teachers and he bit me for the first time last night while we were playing. I took my mother-in-law's advice and immediately bit his pinky fingernail back (apparently this technique worked on Michael as a child, so we see where the biting genes originate...but I digress). My bite wasn't very hard, but definitely got his attention.

After the look of betrayal and the crocodile tears, he got this far-away look and began tapping his teeth like he was putting two and two together. I think he was actually figuring out that his teeth can be linked to pain.

I was anxious to see how long the biting ceased, and it turns out he had a bite-free day at school today. Maybe he learned a lesson, or maybe it was a coincidence. It's still too soon to tell for sure, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Big Kid for the Day

Grayson spent the entire day in the toddler room at school. He ate at a table instead of a highchair, took one nap instead of two and slept on a cot instead of in a crib. A lot of changes for one day!

Luckily, he handled all of them well. He loved playing with all the kids and new toys, and surprisingly went to sleep about two minutes after hitting the cot for naptime. I cannot believe they actually got him to stay on a cot, but I think it helped that he was tired from not having a morning nap.

He did take a catnap during the car ride home, so I think he was worn out from trying to hang with the big kids.

He loved the new room so much that instead of running to me when I came to pick him up, he walked over and said hi, then returned to the block shelf. I began walking toward the door thinking that would prompt him to follow, but instead he just waved and said, "bye, bye." He would have been content playing there all night.

Guess it's not cool to be clingy with mom when your big kid friends are watching. I'll try to remember that in the future.

Surely not my kid

Over the last few days Grayson has refused to take his afternoon nap. I'd be fine with him moving to one nap a day but he is so cranky and fussy in the evening, I know he still needs more sleep.

On top of that, when we went to pick Gray up today one of his teachers said, Well, he refused to take his afternoon nap, but the good news is he didn't bite anyone today.

To which I replied, What?! My kid is the class biter?!

This was the first we'd heard about Grayson biting other kids. Since he's still in the nursery room, he's the biggest kid in class and preys on innocent immobile babies doing tummy time. Apparently he takes their hands and sticks them in his mouth. Chomp!

Needless to say, it must have happened multiple times for him to get a reputation as a biter. I can't believe we're just now hearing about this.

Maybe this will motivate the center director to move him up to the one-year-old class. So far, we've been waiting on a spot to open up, but I hope the transition happens before Grayson's bully ways are solidified. I have a feeling he'll get knocked around and put in his place in the next room since he'll be the small kid.

As much as I don't want him to be the bully, I don't particularly want him to get bullied either. This parenting stuff is really tricky...