I love New York!

Okay, so I don't really know if we love New York yet, but we have been here for over a month now, so I figured may as well update everyone on our new adventure.

Last cousin visit until the new cousins are born.

It has been an adventure for sure, when Vinnie flew in we decided to start the drive early and ended up staying the night in Burley and then we went and spent a day in Utah with my sisters. We were hoping that taking a day just hanging out would give our truck the time it needed to get ahead of us. Which up until the day we got to New York it was... and then somehow it ended up 3 days behind us. Luckily for us we do know 1 family here and they offered to let us stay until our stuff arrived. So we got to spend 3 nights on couches and beanbag chairs. Once our stuff finally got here, we had to wait until Vinnie got off work to unload. So we had to completely unload the truck into our teeny tiny apartment all in one night... needless to say we had a maze box mess for DAYS! I almost lost my mind because everytime I tried to make sense of what was here and clean something up, I just made a bigger mess somewhere else. At the end of it all, we ended up with a small Uhaul full of stuff that we had to put into storage. But we are finally settled now.

Our lovely maze

The boys room

Our kitchen/laundry room

Living room

Living Room

Our room

Our room

Since we got here we haven't been able to do a whole lot of adventuring, Vinnie went back to work the day after we got here so I was left with the boys in this place that seriously scares the heck out of me. I went from a place with ONE interstate and a few "highways" to a place where everything either a highway or byway or interstate or something... When Vinnie drove me to the apartment for the first time I was sure I would never leave the house again I was so confused. So the first few days we stuck really close to where we were staying. By week two I got a little more adventurous and we went looking for the Target that wasn't by our apartment or our friends house... only because we needed something for the house that it had and the other two didn't... and I'm proud to say we survived and DIDN'T get lost even once.

Other than that the only excitement we have is I got a job that works pretty great job with Vinnie's schedule and we went trunk or treating and trick or treating. We are looking forward to celebrating Coby's birthday tomorrow and Thanksgiving with friends next week! I promise eventually we will get out and adventure and I will be sure to share with everyone! Fingers crossed we will get to go to NYC during Christmas time so we can show the boys the HUGE tree, but that may have to wait until next year.

Pumpkin time

Halloween

2 1/2 years old

That smile!

Our little man had a check up today. Quite simiply the results of the appointment were exactly as we knew they would be. He is going to be a skinny little dude. He has gotten taller, but he hasn't gained any weight in the last 6 months. I say that knowing that he has been sick in the last two weeks and we have been testing some things with infant/toddler and his eating habits, so really he probably HAS gained weight, but has probably bounced all around with all the things going on in his life. In the last 6 months a lot has changed with our little man, we were able to get him into the infant/toddler program based on him being delayed with his speech. They have also identified that he has some sensory issues that are causing some of his issues with food and also his social issues. All of which are leading us to try many different new things to see how we can help him progress in all areas. He will also begin going to "school" twice a week for 4 hours to help with his speech. 

He is so silly.

Stats:

Height – 2’11 1/2” – 38th percentile

Weight – 27lbs - 27th percentile

Love this boy!

Likes:

Mimicing - he quite possibly thinks his big brother is the coolest person alive. If Lucas is doing something, Coby is too.
"Some" - as I mentioned his vocabulary is very limited, but all drinks to him are "some". If that's all we gave him, he would be a happy camper.
Outside - he'd live out there all day and all night if we'd let him. He hates getting dirty in every way, excpet for when he is outside. If he is outside bring on the dirt.
Hot dogs - this might be his absolute favorite thing in the world to eat... not the healthest thing in the world... but for him it's amazing!
Sesame Street Songs - he doesn't stop for many things, he is very mobile. But if we turn on his "songs" the kid will stop dead in his tracks and come running.

Loving his breakfast.

Dislikes:

People touching him - as mentioned before he has a sensory issue, so unless he wants to hold your hand, hug you, cuddle, ect, he gets very upset. 
Being dirty - he is the only kid I know that insists on having a napkin with EVERY meal, and once it's dirty he wants a new one. 
Eating - again with the sensory issue, we have been told that he can't tell how much food is actually in his mouth, so he will stuff and stuff and stuff his mouth until he can close his mouth. He also forgets that he likes different foods. So we have to convince him to try a bite. Once we can get him to do that he will pretty much eat anything. 

Zoo day!

Accomplishments:
Communicating - his words are coming along VERY VERY slowly, but with that struggle he has learned how to use noises and hand gestures to get most of his thoughts understood. It may not be where he "should" be, but we are so proud of the progress he has made. 
Staying in nursery all by himself - we have been taking his to nursery every Sunday and every Sunday either myself or Vinnie has had to stay, because he would freak out if we left (even though Lucas was with him), but within the last two months he has successfully gone to both hours of nursery without us 4 times.
Being comfortable with others - he has always been very aprehensive of people who weren't mommy or daddy, but he has FINALLY started to let other people approach him.

Brotherly love!

3 years

Birthday boy making funny faces!

Seriously!?! We have a 3 year old??? How on earth did that happen so fast? There are days with I look at Lucas and I see my newborn baby and then there are moments when I see a little grown up sitting there. I can’t believe how much he has changed and how his personality has become so distinct. He is to the point where he is having full conversations with people and even telling jokes. His favorite currently being the quote from the Lion King about “what’s a motto”. As you can see from his stats he is growing… very quickly. He is our big little dude for sure. It is getting to the point where I can’t carry him around for more than a few minutes because he is so long and heavy. He gets mistaken for a kindergartener more times than I want to admit.

Stats:

Height – 3’4 ½” – 96^th percentile

Weight – 43lbs – 99^th percentile

Surgery on his ears

Likes:

Superheroes – I’m pretty sure he knows more superheroes and more about them that I ever did before he was born.

Fruit – I think if we would let him just eat fruit all day long he would, it is always his favorite part of his meal.

Coloring – Whether it is with actual crayons or on an iPad or phone, this kid cannot get enough of coloring.

Games – He loves games, he got Candy Land for Christmas and Hi Ho Cherri-o for his birthday and he asks daily if we can play one of his games.

His friends – pretty much everyone he knows is his friend, and he gets so excited when they come over or we get to go see them.

Our goofball!

Dislikes:

Bedtime – He is still struggling with sleeping, he gets “afraid” of the cars outside the house. We use a white noise machine but he still gets freaked out most nights.

Mama leaving – We have had a lot of crazy things happen in our lives lately and has made it so I am not around as much, whether it was from recovering from surgery or working… and he does not like it a bit.

Water on his head – This one is a new one; he doesn’t like baths as much anymore because he can’t stand having water poured on his head.

 

He throws the best fits!

A lot has changed for Lucas since he was 2. This past year he finally got tubes put in to help with his ear infections, which has made a HUGE difference in his life. Minus one yucky bug that the whole family got he hasn’t gotten sick at all since his surgery. He also has gotten glasses since our last update. I noticed that he was doing funny things with his left eye when he was trying to focus on something. So we took him to see an eye doctor and he wasn’t using his left eye to see. So now he has the cutest little glasses and has to patch every so often to strengthen his eye. The doctor is hopeful that he will grow out of his glasses when he gets older.  Oh, we have also broken free of the pacifier! I'd like to take credit for that, but Vinnie was amazing and got him to finally give it up for good!

He loved going to the store and "talking" to Santa.