Brendan Sings a Song

I realized that I haven't posted anything in awhile. Though we're busy as always, we haven't had much new to report over the last month or so. Brendan is still growing like crazy and he has recently developed full sentences. It's pretty amazing to be able to hold full conversations. We love it! With full sentences, came the chance to finally fully participate in songs. Though they still remain rather tuneless, we can at least tell what he's singing now. Here is Brendan's performance of Twinkle, Twinkle:

A Treat for Brendan

We are so proud of our boy. We have been working on potty training for the last couple of weeks. And though we can't say it's been going smoothly, we are definitely making progress. As a reward for all of his hard work, I decided at the last minute to take him to the Sesame Street Live show: Elmo's Healthy Heroes. Daddy had to work, so for some extra help, we were gladly joined by Brendan's NaNa and BawBaw. I was a little worried about how he would react to the characters going into the show. You see, Brendan has a very big fear of anyone dressed up. Especially the larger-than-life mascot kind. But I was hopeful that because he knows the characters of Sesame Street so well that we could be ok. So we got tickets as far away from the stage as possible, just so they weren't as frightening. But thankfully, all the worrying was for nothing. He had a blast!

The premise of the show was that Super Grover had lost his "superness" and he needed help getting it back. So Elmo, and a few of the other Sesame Street gang, became super heroes themselves to try and figure out how to make Grover super again. In their quest they learned a lot about exercise, nutrition, sleep/energy, and hygiene--which ended up being the things they needed to make Super Grover "super" again. It was a great lesson for any 2-year-old and it was awesome to see how much he took out if it. When we left the arena, Brendan was jabbering most of the way home about how he had lost his "superness." And all the things he needed to do to get his "superness" back. He even remembered most of the things that had been discussed in the show. It was awesome!

Some of the other highlights:

1-NaNa and BawBaw bought Brendan his own light-up Elmo wand. This was great when the lights went off at the start of the show. As soon as it was unwrapped and handed to him he started waving it around and casting spells. The first spell out of his mouth...."Harry POTTER" (Yes, he is my child too).

2) During the intermission, Brendan really wanted to see Oscar. It was the one character that had not been presented yet. And apparently, his favorite of the day. So NaNa convinced him to use his magic wand to make Oscar come out. So he made up a new spell, "Harry OSCAR!" And he was shocked to see that his spell had worked. Oscar was the next character to walk on stage! The surprise on his face was the kind that only a trusting child can have. It was precious. (By the way, we did know that Oscar would be first to perform after the intermission. We weren't going to disappoint him, if we could help it).

3) Brendan tried cotton candy for the first time. He liked it for a bit, but it was a little too sweet to eat the whole thing. He kept wanting to feed it to Mommy. He thought it was funny when she'd put a huge puff in her mouth.

Waving "bye-bye" as we left our house to go to the show:

Brendan poses with Elmo:

In our seats, before the show. BawBaw, Brendan, and NaNa (This shot took about 15 tries. I finally had to put Brendan's puppy on my head to get him to look my direction. He couldn't take his eyes off the stage.)

At the stage before the show:

"Harry OSCAR" worked!!!!

Cotton Candy:

The Weather Outside is Frightful

We got our second real snow of this winter this past week and boy was it a doozie! We supposedly received 9-inches, which for St. Louis, is A LOT! Mandy had some work drama as she was supposed to work at 5 am that morning, with already about 7-8 inches on the ground from the overnight snow. She got up, made her way in to work, only to find that the truck was stuck somewhere on the highway. She, and another brave work associate, waited for almost 2 hours before getting the all-clear from the distribution center to go home: the truck would come the next morning instead. So...with work finished at 7 am, she headed home to her soon-to-be waking family. Brendan was all too excited about the snow, and after a rushed breakfast, we all went out to enjoy it. It was so deep! Brendan insisted on making a snowman, but this was not a good snowball packing snow. So to keep the disappointed tears from flowing, Mommy made our own little mini-snowman. We searched the yard for things that could serve as eyes, mouth, and ears. It turned out pretty cute, and as Brendan has never made a snowman before, he didn't really know there should be a much bigger version than that sitting in our yard :)



All bundled up:

Oops! Brendan fell down and got a face full of snow. He wasn't too happy, if you couldn't tell:

Our snowman:

This shows you the scale of our snowman:

Tasting the snow...this took a lot of coaxing after the face-full he had received earlier. He wasn't to keen to get his face that near the snow again:

Brendan Bow Hunts!

Christmas 2010

It's hard to believe that another Christmas has already come and gone. This year was extra fun because Brendan is starting to understand more. He also gets so much more excited about things these days. We spent the weeks leading up to Christmas doing some prep-work. We had many discussions about why we celebrate this particular holiday and he can now look at a manger scene and will tell you who is: baby Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Brendan was also taught about many of the stories and legends that surround Christmas through many family movies, storybooks, and songs. He can tell you about Santa, reindeer (including Rudolph), elves, and Frosty the Snowman, just to name a few.

As with most children, when you bring up the subject of Christmas, Brendan will respond with: "Presents!" He was too funny Christmas morning. Because of Mandy closing on Christmas Eve, and the snow we received that night, we were unable to make it to the Zervas family gathering further south. Though so sad to miss that evening's festivities, we were really glad to be able to get Brendan to bed early that night. Before tucking in, we have a few traditions of our own that had to be completed. We went outside in the snow and layed down reindeer food: to attract the reindeer to come to our house first. We left out cookies and milk for Santa. And read The Night Before Christmas.

Even with the early bedtime, Brendan still slept until past 10 am on Christmas morning. We were lying in bed awake when he finally rose. He climbed out of bed (which he does every morning now--the big boy!) and you could hear him run into the living room. He then said, "Presents. Presents." and ran into our room. I asked him, "Did Santa come?" and he replied with "Presents. Presents." I then asked him if Santa ate the cookies we left for him. After a puzzled look he ran into the dining room to check. I could hear him getting upset as he said repeatedly "Cookies gone. Cookies gone." I got up and hurried into the dining room to find him very distraught, tears welling up in his eyes, because the cookies had been taken. I reassured him that Santa must have eaten the cookies and his face lit up. To further prove that he was ok he followed up by saying with a big smile: "And drank the milk, drank the milk." Phew! Crisis averted.

Present time was enjoyable as Brendan is VERY skilled at gift unwrapping. Though we were very surprised at his favorite gifts this year. He received a new wagon, a toy computer, Toy Story dress-up clothes, a big boy potty (which he sat on to open most of his presents), another hockey puck, and much more. But his favorite toys, that we were hard-pressed to tear him away from, were two of the most inexpensive things he received: his Hot Wheels cars ($5.00) and his toy binoculars ($1.50). Figures, doesn't it?

Daddy and Brendan laying out the 'reindeer food':

Our Christmas tree on Christmas morning:

Brendan showing off one of his new Hot Wheels:

Dressed up as Woody from Toy Story:

Playing with his new "noculars.":

Chillin' with his new guitar:

After all the gifts were opened, breakfast was eaten, and some toys were opened and played with, we headed off to the Pelhank's. As is tradition, Grandpa Pelhank outdid himself and made far too much food. And we stuffed ourselves silly. We were blessed with a short visit from our nephew, Jaxon. Those boys are so cute together. Great Grandpa Pelhank was even there for the excitement. We headed home that evening and crashed pretty early. It had been a long Christmas day.

Uncle Danny shows Brendan how to use his new chain saw. Safety first (except that Danny is cutting Brendan's arm off):

Jaxon and Brendan pose for the camera with a little bribery of M&Ms:

Ba-Baw Deh-Dank with his grandsons:

The next day was time for our second Christmas with the Coles. We headed out as soon as little man woke. And we arrived in time to have an excellent breakfast feast. We followed that up with gifts. Brendan was pretty pleased that he got to play Santa and hand them out. We got a little rest, Brendan even got a short nap, then more of the family arrived. Another feast, and...(can you believe it?)...more gifts. Cookies, sweets, a game, and off we went. Back home to officially end Christmas 2010. It was such a joy, but I gotta say, I'm so glad it's over. The holidays truely are exhausting.

Happy Holidays Everyone!

Santa Brendan:

Uncle Shane being a "block"-head. Ha ha:

Our happy family:

No, that's not lipstick: it's a Lil' Smokies mustache:





Brendan and Aunt Jess are lions...ROAR!: