March 3, 2007

Hello Everyone!  I am sorry that it has taken so long for me to update.   2007 has started out to be a little rough!  It started with Payton being sick, then I have been sick for over two weeks with bronchitis, and then in the middle of that our furnace broke!   So, after lots of asthma treatments for Payton, two trips to the doctor and 5 prescriptions for me, and $1,100 dollars to get our furnace fixed, I think we are starting to get on the road to recovery! 

It hasn't all been bad though.  In January we went up to Lake View, Iowa and celebrated X-Mas with the Schulte side of the family.  Payton got to ride in a tractor with his Grandpa and Uncle Jeremy hooked him up with lots of Iowa Hawkeye clothes.  In January, Payton and I also went to the Quad Cities to visit with his other Grandpa and Aunt Lindsey.  We even got to go see lots of family and friends that we don't get to see very often.   (We decided we need to do that more often!)  A couple of weeks ago we took Payton to Union Station and Science City here in KC.  They have a train exhibit that was a huge hit for Payton.  For Valentines Day, Grandma Joy got Payton tickets to see the Wiggles concert this week.  Payton loved it!  I don't think he blinked the entire show!  The only problem is everyday now he says he wants to go watch the Wiggles!  I will say, "Lets get ready for school" and his response is, "No school mommy.  Wiggles"!

We are a little bummed because we found out that our neighbors on both sides of us are moving.  (I am not really sure that says alot about us if our neighbors are all moving!!)  We are sad because one side has a boy Paytons age that he likes to play with and a new baby boy, and the other side has a baby boy.  I was thinking by next year we could have our own basketball team!  Hopefully the new people will have kids as well.

Payton has been doing great.  He is getting so smart!  He loves working on his puzzles.  (If we get him a new one, he has it mastered in a couple of minutes!)  I think I might have to start getting him a 100 piece puzzle and see what happens!  He also loves to 'read' his books.  He likes to practice the alphabet and counting.  Yesterday he counted to 14!  (He always forgets 6 and 8 though).  We about had heart attacks when he did it.  And I don't think it was a fluke because he did it all night.  Of course today when I try to get him to do it he starts to act silly and won't do it.  But it was still pretty amazing!

I am going to try and add some new pictures to the photo album tonight, so you will have to go and check them out.

Hope everyone is doing well!!

Happy Holidays!

Merry Christmas everyone!!  I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday.  We had a very nice Christmas.  (Except for the fact that Payton was sick the entire time!  More on that in a bit...)  I think Payton has gotten the hang of this presents thing!  He was trying to open up everybodys presents.  Even some that I had left under the tree that I need to mail to Iowa.  We all received some wonderful and thoughtful gifts from everybody.  Thank goodness for our play room, because I have no idea where I would put all of the toys if we didn't have it!  On Saturday the three of us celebrated with my mom, my sister and Kellen and had a great time.  I have a few pictures in the photo album, but I can never seem to remember to take very many.  Maybe I should put someone else in charge of being the photographer!  Since mom is still in an apartment we had it at our house.  So I took Friday off of work to prepare!  Mom's house at Christmas is always filled with homemade goodies, so I tried to do the same.  I made lots of cookies, fudge, chocolate covered pretzles and lots of food!!  

Monday morning (after Santa had came) we had Christmas at home with the three of us and later that day my mom and Justins sister, Kristin came over.  We had a big dinner and played with new stuff all day.  (And ate lots of cookies and candy, etc!!!)  Now tomorrow is back to work.   Justin is very happy that the holiday season is over.  He is now back to working normal hours.  It has been a long month for him.  Payton is also very happy to have daddy home more often.  Yesterday he was a daddy's boy and would not let Justin too far out of his sight. 

 

Saturday when we woke up Payton was sick with a really bad sore throat.  And he has had it since.  So needless to say he was not a happy boy most of the weekend.  He would perk up throughout the day (mostly because of new toys and all of the people coming and going) but nighttime has been pretty bad.  So today I took him to the doctor, along with every other child in Kansas apparently, to find out that it is not strep like we had thought.  So that is good news.  Basically it is just a virus and it just has to run its course. We are now on day four, so lets hope it is almost over. 

Our goal was to get mostly potty trained these 4 days that we were home, but with him being sick, that took a back seat.  He has been doing pretty well and is doing pretty good at day care, so hopefully it won't be too long now.  Kristin helped a lot with the potty training yesterday.  She works at a day care, so she has the hang of it! 

 

Payton has now moved up to a toddler bed.  I was a little apprehensive at first.  I had visions of him roaming the house at night.  But he loves his big bed.  He has not gotten out of it once!  The first night I thought it was just a fluke, but it has been over a week now and he is still doing great!  I will continue to keep my fingers crossed!

Payton is now 2 years old!!

Sunday was Paytons birthday!  I can not believe he is already two!  Payton had a lot of fun on his birthday.  He loves trains, so we did a Thomas the Train party.  Everything was Thomas!  Even his cake had a little train on it that moved around on a track.   Payton loves to act silly when other people are around, so he was having a blast showing off to everyone that was here!  My sister even came down from Iowa and my Grandma even flew up from Florida!   He was so exhausted by the end of the party, he could barely hold his head up.  But he was so good the entire night.

We got his 2 year pictures done on Saturday.  I really feel bad for the people working at the portrait studio!  He will be really good in the waiting room, and the minute we go in to the studio he has a complete meltdown!  For some reason he gets scared.  He loves to pose for the camera at home, but this is different. It happens every time, so I shouldn't be shocked.  We did get a couple of okay pictures, not the ones I had in mind, but they will work.  So be looking for them in the mail in a few weeks!

 

He moved up to the two year old room at day care a couple of weeks ago.  So now he is a "big boy".  They have projects to take home and even have show and tell once a week! 

 

He is growing up so fast.  He is starting to talk a lot more and put a couple of words together.  I can usually understand what he is telling me.  He is very good most of the time, but he does have his typical two-year old moments.  Luckily they don't last long and he forgets pretty easily why he was mad or frustrated.  We have started introducing the potty chair.  Nothing real serious yet, but just getting used to the idea. They do it at day care too, so that will help.  I think I will wait until after the holidays before I get to serious about training him. 

Hope everyone is doing well and staying warm and I will try to update this a little more often!

Halloween Fun!

Halloween was over a week ago, so this posting is a little late.  But better late then never, right??

Payton had a great time this Halloween.  As you can see by the pictures, he was a lion, again.  He was one last year as well, but that is what I get for waiting until less than two weeks before Halloween to buy a costume!

The Friday before Halloween we had a party at work for all of the kids.  There were over 100 kids there!  I went and picked up Payton and brought him to the party.  At first he was a little frightened by all of the people, but then once he figured this trick or treating thing out, he was okay!  Then on Halloween day they had a party at day care where they had snacks and got all dressed up in their costumes.  That night I took him trick or treating around our neighborhood while Justin stayed home and handed out candy.  Payton would dig through the baskets to find suckers!  Sometime if they didn't have any he would just say "no" and not take any.  At least we got him to say please and thank you everytime.

Update on other stuff:  We have finally got Justin a new car.  I really dislike car shopping.  It is not very fun when you have to buy a car in a limited amount of time.  At least mom was on vacation for a week, so we had her car to use.

Mom is now all settled in her apartment.  Lindsey came down this week with a truck-load of moms stuff.  We miss her here at our house, but she is pretty close, so we can see her often.  Hope everyone is doing great.  I just realized that Thanksgiving is less than two weeks away!  Where is the time going!

October 21

On Monday Justin was in a car accident.  Luckily he is okay and it was not his fault.  Another car was coming at him and failed to yield and turned in front if him.  But the car is totaled.  So it looks like we are going to need to go car shopping this weekend.  When I saw the car I was pretty shocked that he was not more hurt.  Both other than being pretty sore and having rug-burn type things on his hands due to the airbag, he is okay.

 

Things have been going great with mom living here.  She is really enjoying her job and we are loving having her here.  Every morning when Payton gets up he runs into her room to look for her!  It is pretty cute.  He even recognizes her car now, so when we get home at night if gets excited if he sees her car.  I think Justin has really enjoyed it as well.  Mom has already made him a pie and his favorite, her homemade vegetable soup.  It has been very nice having help with Payton as well.  Last Saturday Justin and I got to go out to dinner by ourselves!! 

School pictures

Payton just got his school pictures back.  He is so handsome!!

 

Busy.... Busy....

I haven't updated our blog in a while, but we have had a lot going on around here!  My mom has decided to move to Kansas City!  We are all so excited that we are going to have Grandma Joy so close!  She starts her new job on October 9, so she will be moving shortly.  Her house in Long Grove is on the market now and she has been very busy getting everything in line in order to move.  She will be staying with us for a little bit until she gets settled.  It will be nice to have inhouse help with Payton!  And Justin seems to think that she might make him a pie or two!!

The other main thing that has been going on around here is it has been determined that Payton has asthma.  We pretty much thought he did before, but now we have a treatment plan and can be proactive about it so hopefully we will not end up staying in the hospital again this winter.  He has an inhaler that he has to use daily throughout the cold months and then we use his nebulizer when he is sick or is wheezing.  (We were already using the neulizer, so that is nothing new to us).  The doctors say chances are he will outgrow it by the time he goes to school, especially since Justin or myself don't have a history of breathing problems.  But we just have to wait and see.