an evening with dad

Last weekend, Gabe took Henry downtown as there were lots of family events going on, including a family entrance to the College Football Hall of Fame for 5 bucks. That's pretty cheap. I wanted to go, but have been overcome with sickness that I can not for the life of me get rid of. So Gabe took Henry so I could have a night to rest. He got to get a balloon animal, and make a kite. And of course, do fun things at the museum like turn the mascot pages, throw a football, and "ditz" it (kick it!).



Sign him up for Irish d-line now. Except he's so tall and skinny, he's much better suited for basketball. Luckily, that is still his favorite sport.

He came home, marched up the stairs, in one hand was a balloon dog and in the other hand a bag of chocolates for mommy. He walked right over, big smile on is face, handed the chocolates to me, and seemed like such a big boy. I find my self saying that a lot lately. I'm so proud.

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henry, henry quite contrary

how does your garden grow?

These pictures are from a couple of planting experiences with Henry. When he was feeling bad a few weeks ago, we waited until some moments he was feeling good and went out and did some planting. Henry choose his seeds at the store. Knowing that green beans are pretty easy (at least, I think?) I put him right in front of the green beans, so he picked that off the shelf. He also picked pumpkins, and some red flower bulbs.

surveying the land

digging the holes

planting the green bean seeds

he really loved putting exactly 3 or 4 in the hole (I can't remember how many we counted to) At one point, one hole had too many and he moved home seeds.

We also made a project on one of the rainy days, and Henry scribbled on his signs. They didn't make it through the rain, but he liked doing the project

Watering the seeds

He really loves to water plants. He waters some plants outside everyday. When the water runs out, he knows right where to go for more. Somedays, we water our pants too. Then, he runs around with no bottoms on, which makes him squeal!

We're growing the pumpkins inside to start with, and they are doing great! We'll move them outside soon. The green beans have just sprouted, but some of the leaves have already spots or are dried up. So I'm not sure how they'll do. One of his flower bulbs is doing great. One is doing ok, and the other two, not so much. So we'll see how his first garden ends up. As for our garden? Our basil and tomatoes and peppers got bitten by frost and are dead. All of our other herbs are doing great, and we've already started to use some of them. We'll have to replant this weekend. And we started lettuce in a pot this year as something new, and it is really taking off! I'm looking forward to a delicious salad of home-grown lettuce, tomatoes and peppers. In about 80 days. :)

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Happy Mama's Day

Yesterday was Mother's Day and I was greeted in the morning with a great big "Hap Ma Mama!" from Henry! By the way, he's been calling Gabe Da-dee for awhile, but I've been trying to hang on to mama for as long as I can. Sometimes, he'll slip a Ma-mee in there, but for the most part, I'm still mama, which is just fine with me.

We had a wonderful day. Church in the morning, followed by a delicious brunch and a family nap! Since I've been sick the past weekend, and Henry the week and a half before, we've had someone in the house sick for two weeks straight. So a nap was definitely in order. And said sickness definitely rained on my fun plans for the weekend - College Football Hall of Fame on Friday, planting on Saturday and bike riding on Sunday. Turns out, the weather didn't cooperate either. So, we ran some errands instead on Sunday since that didn't take much energy and then I played outside with Henry while Gabe cooked a delicious dinner. Even though it wasn't a day too much out of the ordinary, I was lucky to be able to spend time playing with my Henry and enjoying being a mom. And I've been really thankful to Gabe whose been running the house these last few days - just call him Mr. Mom. I'm saving up a special bike ride on a new trail in a couple of weeks. No pictures with Henry yesterday makes me sad - but I'll take some with him soon.

Thought I'd take some time to update Henry's new accomplishments:

Henry's been adding so many new words to his vocabulary lately! He's definitely a pro at the two word combos, and he's adding in some three words too. "Uh-oh choo-choo" is a current favorite, whether a train has had an accident or something else! He loves making hot soup and saying hot soup. I'm not sure if he really knows what hot soup is, but he says "hot soup dinner" every night. And then just eats our regular dinner anyways. Some of his first sentences have been "I do that/this", "I don't want that", "I love dada and mama". He's been working on his letters, and can name quite a few correctly most of the time. His favorite color is blue, he always chooses blue when given a color choice, and actually he calls almost every other color blue too. But, he can correctly point to something that is blue, and we're working on adding yellow and purple, which he can say. Mostly sticking with red, yellow, blue and green though since most of his toys and art supplies are those colors. He recently used a spoon all by himself to eat a whole bowl of yogurt, and is getting better at stabbing with a fork, but still needs help to press hard enough to get the food on the fork. This morning, he marched and clapped at the same time to some music. His favorite toys are still trains for sure, and he still loves books. He even says "more books" when we go to the library, which he loves to do. We've had a few issues with temper lately, mostly when he was sick and he's doing much better now, but still some things set him off. Gabe and I are trying to remember to give him choices as much as we can, and that really seems to help. At the park, he can do the slide all by himself, which makes him seem like a big boy.

It's hard to believe that he'll be 21 months fairly soon and then only three months till my baby is 2 - and that is unbelievable to me. It really seems like we just celebrated his one year birthday and moved. In my mind, I feel like he is 15 months, just with more vocabulary. I'm proud of his accomplishments and growth for sure, but has anyone found the magic potion to keep them little yet?

Coming up soon - gardening, pictures from Gabe's adventure with Henry to the College Football Hall of Fame.

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Saturday night cars

Me, as Gabe brought me a drink: "thank you hon-day"

Gabe: "you're welcome, Toyota."

Followed by lots of laughter. (I was trying to say honey, and read the word Sunday at the same time, so hence the combination of the two.)

Oh, it's a crazy Saturday night here at the Brown house!

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here, fishy fishy fishy

Uncle Bryan and Grandpa introduced Henry to fishing. They practiced on the driveway, in the pool, and then took him to a dock to try his hand at the real (or should I say "reel") thing.

Carefully reeling in.

Fishing off the dock

After all that hard work, he caught a fish! Two fish, to be exact. He's touching it here, but immediately after catching the fish and touching it, he shivered and didn't like touching the slimy fish. And the second fish he caught, he started shaking his head no before it even got off the line.

Don't worry Henry, we won't make you touch the fish if you don't want to.

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Trains Galore!

When we went to Florida, my mom had seen an ad for A Day Out with Thomas, which was coming to the railroad museum in her city. Since we were so close (like literally 8 min away) we decided to take advantage of the fun! Henry really was in 7th heaven playing with trains, seeing a big Thomas train, and riding big and small trains.



He rode the little train three times! I admit, I was a bit nervous - parents weren't allowed to ride, and there were no straps to keep him in the seat. I hated to say no to something he wanted to go on so badly, and made sure the driver would stop if he started to stand up. He was by far the littlest one every time, but he rode it like a champ! Can you see him? He's the little one in the blue car with the orange shirt and blue cap.

It took a lot of concentration to remember to hang on, since every time he went by us he didn't wave or anything. But he definitely asked for more!
There was even an unused part of the tracks that he could walk on and pretend to be a train. At least that's what I like to think he was doing. It made for some cute pictures, that's for sure!



He even got his first tattoo! Who did he choose, but Henry of course! He really liked looking at the train on his arm for the next few days, and even remembered to tell dada about the choo-choo on his arm when he got home. Although that took a little translation to get the message across.
Riding the rails with Grandma and Uncle Bryan - choo-choo!


Enjoying his Engineer certificate on mama's lap on the train on the way back.
And at the end of the day, a celebratory lunch at home! Definitely a fun day working on the railroad :)

And yes, I know that every single post this month has to do with our trip to Florida, with the exception of Easter. But it's just been normal everyday stuff here at home, not nearly as interesting. I'll have to snap some more photos soon!

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a day at the beach

Henry loves the beach! He found some birds to chase after

a good hole to play in

and he even enjoyed digging in the sand. Which is surprising because he doesn't like the sand tray at home and we hesitated on building a sand box this summer. But he really enjoyed it, plopped right down, and dug in. So maybe we'll reconsider!

Cool shades, dude. :)

He discovered that Florida beaches are FULL of shells, all ready to be picked up by little boys and collected in a bucket. We even brought some shells home to show Daddy.

But the most fun thing at the beach? More fun than holes or birds or sand or shells? THE WAVES!




Henry sure does love the water, and the cold water at the beach was no exception. We only stuck our toes in, but he loved splashing the water, jumping in the waves, and squealing with delight! I'm really excited because Henry's love of the beach means that this summer, we can try the dunes. He's definitely ready to become a beach bum this summer!

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