Myann milestones

Myann has been learning and showing us what all she knows pretty regularly. We have been quite impressed by her lately. Tonight on tv a show was counting and after they got to 8, Myann yelled out 9. Plus she has been counting 1-2-3 so daddy throws her in the air. This was how daddy taught Shane to count to 20 by 18 months, so Myann will get there soon enough. She seems to have learned left from right and will give you the appropriate foot when asked. She seems to be learning her colors and can normally distinguish between red and blue. She still loves to boss the puppies around and tonight went outside clapping and saying "puppies come in." Myann is a bit bossy, so I think she loves having someone to boss around. She has also been putting 2 and 3 word phrases together, though examples escape me right now. Today she also brought daddy the letter B and said B goes bah. Extra time with daddy while I work seems to be paying off.

She is also learning to chime in on songs and the alphabet when she knows what's next. She can do P and X. Plus she is really trying to repeat her night time prayers. She is loving the itsy bitsy spider right now and can do all the motions.

These are pics of Myann trying to "dress" herself.





As a work count down, I have 2 more inspectional work days left and then I am done. I will still have to work part-time writing and finishing things up, but I am really almost done. I can't believe it is happening. Woohooo!

What a weekend!

So we had a weekend of sick kids and that was a first. We have been pretty lucky with healthy kids and this past weekend was rough. Myann woke up Saturday afternoon from her nap with a high fever and just layed around. Picture to come. So Shane and I went ahead with our plans to go to my friend Erin's birthday party. Shane and I enjoyed our time, Shane played really hard. As soon as we got home he threw up all over the driveway. I thought he just got too worked up at the party or ate too much junk. Well in the middle of the night he came to our room running a high fever. I gave him medicine, juice and put him back to bed. He did not get out of bed until 5pm Sunday evening. He slept the entire day, minus the few interruptions by us to give him more medicine and juice. At 5pm he was still warm, but had his energy back and was doing superhero moves all over the living room, which included jumping off the couch. Great since Myann copies everything he does, so she promptly tried to jump off her self, I caught her and put her down a little softer. Not that she didn't try again.

Funny things kids say

So Shane is always one to make us laugh with the funny things he says. Tonight was no exception. As I was getting ready for bed, Shane made a point of telling me that his peepee was getting very big. I said ok, glad to know. Then he said I eat vegetables and they make my peepee grow bigger and bigger. I guess men are destined to be obsessed with their penis size, but who knew it would start so young. But heck, I'm all for it if it will encourage him to eat vegetables for the rest of his life.

Myann was entertaining us tonight by trying to dress herself. Of course that means draping it around her neck. But she is so adorable when she does it, because she concentrates so hard on getting as many articles of clothing on as possible.

Myann using Maddox as a pillow. He is sooooo tolerant of her.


Shane with the flowers he helped me plant. Though he had no interest in being in the picture.

Thankful

So it has been a rough 6 weeks for us, lots of unexpected and downright annoying expenses came up. But they were just that, annoying, expensive things that needed and could be fixed. It has reminded me how blessed we are that we and our kids are healthy and happy right now. I am almost 28 weeks pregnant and this time in Myann's pregnancy, I was going into the hospital for my second bleeding episode and the beginning of my very strict bedrest. Right now, baby boy and I are healthy and this pregnancy is going as well as could be hoped. And my kids, how lucky are we to have two of the most wonderful kids ever made, not biased at all. And they have been blessed with tremendous health. I probably shouldn't say this out loud, since it will likely jinx us, but we have never even been to the emergency room for either of them. God has really blessed us and I am trying to instill that thankfulness into our kids when we say our prayers every night.

Baby boy's birthday will be...

September 15th. We set the date today. Of course that assumes that all goes well and I don't have contractions sooner. And still no name picked out and I am not even hopeful that we are close. Brian and I are on opposite ends of the spectrum for names. SO check back later for updates on that front. We may let Shane pick, since we can't decide.

My kids and their words

So Shane has always been a gifted speaker, we knew that. Myann seemed to be a little slower going in the speaking. However, we have learned that she may seem slow compared to Shane, but she is probably right about average. At least until today, maybe Myann isn't so average after all. We were reading our books before bed and she didn't seem to be paying attention, since it was Shane's ocean animals book. Shane of course is taking in every new ocean animal name, then we get to Albatross. Myann immediately repeats "Albatross". Clear as day, about as well as she says puppy. I did a double take. Of course I made a huge deal and squealed with delight so she kept saying it over and over. But really, she won't say cracker, but she'll say albatross. How many of you even know what an albatross is. I didn't until I read Shane's book.

As for Shane, he is CRAZY for superheros right now. I bought him more underoos yesterday and when I showed him the packages, you'd thought I bought him a new car. He was thrilled. He promptly ripped the packages open and has been wearing his superman shirt and underwear ever since. Tomorrow hopefully I can convince him to wear a different pair, since 3 days is exceeding the decency quota. He had all his new boxer briefs lined up along the fireplace hearth and insisted Brian and I keep looking at all his new underwear. Who knew underwear could make a 3 year olds day like that. He is convinced that his superhero underoos give him special powers, so he can't take them off or else he'll loose his powers. This is the real mystery, how does Shane know what a superhero is in the first place? He has seen part of a spiderman movie one time, never a superman or batman, nor transformers. And he doesn't watch those types of cartoons. He must have learned it from being around Austin, our best guess. Popi and Grammy sent him some sketcher sandles with superheros this weekend and again, he said they give him special powers, so he hasn't wanted to take them off. Oh brother, we are entering that stage where he will only wear certain things.

Brian was home with Myann for part of today while I worked and he said she was quite sad about Grandpa Jo leaving. She went to the chair where he sat asking for Papa and looked all around the chair for him.

Myann on ravioli

Ok, so this is an older picture, but I have been printing out pictures this morning and came across this one. It is amazing what food can do to a pretty girl's face. She is down right scary looking. The photo was taken March 15, 2008. She does love her ravioli, though I can't recall why she felt the need to paint her face with it. We quickly cleaned her off because I was afraid it might irritate her skin.

Grandpa Jo in town

So this morning Grandpa Jo arrived. The kids were excited to see him. Bob is working in Calgary for a few weeks, so he came down for a quick weekend. To make the most of the short trip, I hurried us out the door to the newly opened mini water park, Southside Aquatic Facility. It is nothing spectacular, but close by and inexpensive. The kids had fun. They even have one large waterslide that Shane could not get enough of. Brian took him down a couple times and I took him down twice. Now maneuvering my big old belly in a tube with Shane on my lap was no small feat, but we survived. Myann even went down once with Brian, but she didn't seem to have an opinion one way or another.

Back at work

So far I had to work a couple days this week and will be working full time for the next 2 weeks. Shane is in school full time at St. Al's and Myann is split between our babysitter Tina and my friend Kelly. Myann had a lot of fun with Kelly and her son, Zack. I was so relieved and afraid that she would make Kelly dread the coming week. Apparently Myann loved her husband, Jim. That's Myann, she loves her men! Shane is enjoying school and even gets to go to the preK room for a few hours every day. Shane has been refusing naps at school, so rather than him disturbing all the others kids with his incessant talking, they are putting him with the older kids who don't nap. He seems to like going with the "big kids", but evenings around here have been a bit rough, with day after day of no napping. We are shooting for earlier bed times, but since it doesn't get dark until 10 pm around here, he isn't really motivated.

So far so good. The first 2 days weren't bad, maybe because I know this is the last inspection and I can enjoy it for what it is. Hard to believe I will be quitting work soon, I still don't think the reality has sunk in that I won't be working at all. I hope I can pull it off. I really admire my friends who can do day after day with the kids with no breaks. I will at least get some breaks since Shane will still do school two days per week and Myann will even go one day per week next Fall.

Also, I added one of my favorite pictures ever of the kids in the bath that Tina took. They are so adorable!

Fergie keeps me sane!

So I love listening to Fergie in the car. I literally crank the music and dance my annoyances away. I know what you're thinking, her music isn't really kid friendly, but fortunately most of the naughty lyrics are hard to understand so Shane doesn't seem to pick up on it. Mind you, he always asks for his music, Veggie Tales, but I tell him that it is mommy's turn when I just need to sing and dance. I must be a sight for passersby - jamming in my minivan with the base pumping, but I don't really care. I think Myann likes Fergie too because she moves her feet to the beat.

Myann has been pretty funny the past few days, last night she was taunting her brother by running off with the separates of his pj's. As he would grab the shirt, she would grab the pants and take off running saying "my pants". Shane would chase her down and grab the pants, dropping the shirt, so Myann would pick up the shirt and run off saying "My shirt". This went on for a good 10 minutes until I convinced Shane to just put them on and then she couldn't run off with it. It was pretty fun. Today Myann tried to shoplift at Costco. I picked up a few pairs of new Pjs for her, well she likes to "dress" herself, which consists of wrapping things around her neck since she hasn't mastered pulling them over her head. Well today, she had the 3 pairs wrapped around her the whole time in the store. At checkout, it took some coaxing, but I wrangled them away from her and put them on the conveyor to pay. Those familar with Costco know that I go one way and my cart with Myann goes the other. While waiting, Myann managed to grab a pair of pj's back and wrapped them around her neck and bypass the cashier. I was busy paying and didn't notice. As were are done checking out, the cashier notices she is wearing an unpaid for item. He caught it, we paid and all was well. But she seemed quite impressed with herself.

Happy Saturday!!!

Yeeaaa!!! Daddy (Brian) came home today. He has only been gone a few days, but he was gone most of last week too, so we are excited to have him home for a few solid weeks. I am thrilled, the kids have been so excited to see him today, that my clingy kids have left me alone to spend time with him. And Brian went with me to Walmart, since it was right by the airport - this is a milestone and even Brian said he thinks the last time he grocery shopped with me was over 4 years ago in Houston.

Normal day for us, Shane woke up and pooped in the potty again, great start to the day. Then he worked on his puzzle. For those who don't know, Shane is nuts about puzzles. So nuts that for Christmas he got about 20 new ones. We are just now working our way through the last of them. Next we had popcorn and a movie so I could relax for a bit, I know kind of odd for the morning, but sometimes you do what you gotta do to stay sane.

This afternoon Shane has been out on his new scooter, not super new because it was a Christmas gift from the Cross family, but we just put it together a month ago since I didn't think he was ready yet. He has proved me wrong and quickly mastered the scooter and loves to ride, complete with his helmet, he ALWAYS wears his helmet!!! He is kind of anal about wearing his helmet when he rides his bike or scooter, good for us, just a surprise, I thought kids hated wearing helmets. Now Shane is outside making tea in his kitchen, he loves making food and tells me that he can't wait to grow up so he can cook with me. Let me tell you, I look forward to that day as well and pray it actually happens. Other things that Shane can't wait to do when he grows up - drink coffee, eat nuts (though we tell him that he may always be allergic), become a working man (awesome that he already has his dad's fierce work ethic), and drive his truck to work.

As for Myann, she is regularly saying "I Love you" and getting better about remembering her please and thank yous. She also knows most of her main body parts and loves to sing her version of the ABCs. She also doesn't let Shane push her around. He got so frustrated with her the other day that he said he wanted her to go back in my belly. I told him that she was a bit too big for that, plus there was another baby in there. He said his baby brother could come out and put Myann back in. Right now Myann is attempting to say watermelon, it is super cute since she sounds like she has marbles in her mouth when she does it.

Oh yea, one more thing I need to remember, today at Walmart Shane was talking to a lady in line with her dog and she told him the dog's name, Shane asked her what her name was. She told him and then he said "My name is Shane, nice to meet you." We were so proud, he is coming along well in the manners department.

Where the heck are we living?

So snow yesterday and now today we had hail that came down so fast, that it looked like it snowed. Literally within 2 minutes, the ground was covered an inch thick with white large pea size pellets. I am beginning to think we are in for a crazy summer.

As for the day, Shane and Myann finished swim lessons tonight. Shane is doing really well and even did the giant waterslide all by himself. Mind you, I heard him clunking the whole way down and was quite concerned, but once he came out he said he wanted to do it again. He is in the Pike class for beginners and will have to do this class again until he masters the concepts a little more. Myann also did the water slide, with me of course. I think I might retire her from classes for the summer. Getting two through a night of lessons is exhausting.

Who knew it snowed in June!!!

Well it is almost midJune and we had snow this morning at our house. I thought it seemed pretty cold when I took the puppies out this morning, so I checked the weather. It said 40 degrees, but feels like 32. Within minutes, I noticed it was sleeting. Then the sleet turned into large white snowflakes. We were in shock. Even Shane started running around yelling that it was snowing. It did finally warm up to the high 40s later in the day, but come on...Snow in JUNE!!! Everyone has told us that this is very unusual. Seems fitting, since Brian and I always bring unusual weather to the new places we move.


And I have to also talk about what my cute Myann has been doing. She started saying Shane last week and now she walks around when he is at school saying Shane trying to look for him. She also used to point at Shane's baby pictures on the wall and would call them baby, but now she calls hers baby and she points and says Shane for his pictures. She really loves her big brother. Also, she has become my snugglebug at bed time. After we read books, she lays on me and I sing her songs. She wraps her arms around me and rubs as I sing, it is so wonderful. Right now she likes Kumbayah and Mary Had a Little Lamb. I may need to come up with some new songs soon, but she really seems to like those.

Pregnancy - 6 months

Ok so I thought I would post a few pics of the pregnant me.  I am horrible about taking pictures of my pregnant belly, so I made Brian take a few pictures tonight.  I am a little over 25 weeks along and have gained 30 lbs.  SO I am expecting a 20 lb. baby, that seems reasonable right.  My doctor said I must have a slow metabolism when I am pregnant, I like that theory better than the one that I a eating waaaayyy too much.  Dr. Smetana - love her!  Brian insists that those statements are why she was so highly recommended to me.  And as for the kids, Shane is super excited and asks to hug and kiss my belly daily.  He also talks to him often.  He felt him kick the other day and got super excited.  Of course when I tell him the baby is kicking me, he yells at my belly, "Stop kicking my mommy, she'll cry if you hurt her."  Myann loves to rub her belly when she sees mine, but doesn't seem to have a clue that her world is about to change.  The only clue that maybe she has some idea is that she insists I read one book every night and it is a book about a family expecting a new baby and they already have a big brother and sister and the baby is a boy.  A perfect book for our situation.  So maybe she knows more than we realize.

Weekend Update

As the weekend comes to an end, I sit here watching Myann spin herself in circles until she gets so dizzy she falls down. Gotta love a girl using her brains... In actuality, Myann has been talking much more these days. She is still infamous for identifying everything as "that". But she is getting better about repeating the correct word when you force her to. Like today at a birthday party she even managed to almost say raspberry. She has been saying her version of blueberry for a while and she definitely knows "cheese". She also regularly terrorizes the puppies by laying on them and then telling them "no" and to "stop it" when they dare get up to avoid her.


Shane has continued to do well pooping on the potty, with only one poopy diaper in 4 days. He is all about the presents he gets when he poops, so that has been motivating. But that is all I will say on the matter, since Brian said I have been talking about poop way too much these past few days.

As for what else has been going on...Thursday night I damaged the good ol' minivan pretty bad, but I was on my way to see Sex and the City and determined to be in a good mood, just ignored it. Seeing how everything Brian and I do these days seems to cost thousands of dollars, I just decided oh well. And by the way, I enjoyed the movie, I cried a lot, but I blame that more on the hormones than the actual movie. Brian got home Friday from Banff and he said he actually saw bears on the side of the road. You know you're not in Texas anymore when you see bears as opposed to cattle on the side of the road. I would have hated to get a flat tire there. Friday night was mommy game night at my house and my team rocked Cranium. Jen wants a rematch and I am all for it. And to think I didn't believe my brain still worked. We had a lot of fun and those kind of nights really keep me sane. Saturday was "butt cold" pardon my dirty mouth. It was insane, we awoke to 40 degrees and raining. I was seriously thinking I wouldn't be surprised to see snow. So I had to call my family in the south and at least hear that they were as miserably hot as I was miserably cold. I layed in front of the fire as long as I could until the need for finishing my errands outdid how cold I was. Brian and I watched a movie once the kids were in bed, We Own the Night, which was not very good, now I know why it didn't last long at the theaters.

Shane pooped in the potty!!!!

The sun was shining on the Johansen household today. After a long talk last night about the potty and how pullups really were still baby diapers and he wasn't really a big boy until he pooped on the potty, he seemed interested. Then he really wanted to wear his new new underwear, which are boxer briefs like daddy wears, but I said not until he pooped on the potty because mommy was not going to throw these away like I do the regular underwear - I refuse to rinse poop out of underwear, so it gets trashed. Anyway, we also talked about how his friend James was a big boy and only wearing underwear all the time, never pullups. So I told him to tell me when he woke up and needed to poop. Myann of course woke up early this morning with a cold, and I was dealing with the morning routine of puppies when I heard Shane yell out that he was ready to poop. He has never done this before, so I got quite excited. I got Myann in her high chair with milk and kenneled the puppies so I could focus on Shane. When I got to his room, the clean smell informed me that he hadn't pooped, normally going to Shane's room in the morning is like entering a dead zone where it certainly smells like something died. So I grabbed him and downstairs we went to the potty. Up on the potty he went and of course assuming it would be a while, I ran out to get him books and a drink. I didn't get halfway down the hall before I heard him yell out that he had done it. Honestly I didn't believe him, since he has said that before after a toot, but I looked, and he had. I think I screamed with joy. We were so excited that I left him sitting there to start making the phone calls. We called daddy, but he didn't answer, so then we called my mom. Shane told her and then quickly asked her to send his present, she had promised him a few days before that if he'd poop in the potty, she would mail him a special gift. Needless to say, Shane never forgets a promise of a gift, so he'll be watching the mail everyday now. We were both beaming. I could tell he was quite proud of himself, and I was thrilled. He must have telepathically read the blog from the day before and knew mommy really needed this. SO I will get pics up ASAP, not pics of the poop, I do have some sense of what is inappropriate, though you can't tell since I have written about poop for 2 days now. I will post pics of the proud boy. Let's pray this happens again tomorrow.  And the pics are Myann with her hair done by Tina, our babysitter.  Tina does Myann's hair way better than I do.  The crazy hair is Myann after her nap, I couldn't resist how crazy it looked. 

Done with poop

I'm sure all moms feel this way, but I am so done with poop!!!! Today was filled with it more than usual. With 2 kids, neither of which poop on the potty, and 2 puppies who are learning to poop outside, I am all pooped out. Even outside, I am cleaning puppy poop all day, since we don't want an accumulation since the kids play outside. Call it my science background, but I am ultra paranoid about cleaning up after it. If it hits the carpet, I shampoo the carpet, if it is outside, I scoop it up so the kids or dogs don't step in it. Anyway, this weekend we are working overtime on Shane, I have to get that kid pooping on the potty. He is almost fully pee trained, he does great, just refuses to poop. And Brian is having a tough work week in Banff, note the sarcasm, so I am all alone in the poop fest this week.
Ok, so enough poop. One of the reasons I started this blog was to better capture all the funny things my kids say and do. So here are a few stories before I forget. Today, bad mom that I am forgot to buckle Shane in his car seat. As we are driving down the road, Shane screams, "Mom stop now, I am not buckled in!" I would have stopped, but the highway isn't the best place, so I told him to do the top and we'd make it to the next stop. He then asks if there was a policeman around because he was going to take me to jail. This comes from a scenario a long time ago when Shane was refusing to buckle in and I explained the importance of seatbelts and that mommies and daddies get in big trouble if their kids are not buckled in. And Shane is doing awesome in swimming lessons. He is in the beginner class at the YMCA, and jumped in the pool all by himself today, normally he has to have arms to jump into.



Myann is actually talking a lot these days. Not nearly as verbose as her brother at this age, but she is doing quite well. Yesterday at My Gym she announced Swings when they brought them out and that was a first. The puppies have greatly expanded her vocabulary, she is quick to say no, down, stop, hey, puppies, ruff ruff, and she loves to call them by piercing her lips and making that dog calling sound.

Oh yes and Myann had her 18 month appt yesterday. She is still a bit on the petite side, but she is getting bigger. She was 21.7 lbs and 29.5 inches. 10% on both, which is an improvement from 5% percentile on weight before. We have FINALLY quit nursing, so I assume she will start gaining more weight on whole milk now. She has been taking milk from a cup pretty well for the past couple weeks, so this has been huge. Everyone has heard me groan that I thought she would never quit nursing since she refused milk from a cup.

And now to brag, tomorrow I am getting to spoil myself a bit. I have a massage scheduled, hair cut, and Sex in the City movie with my friend Sandra. I am counting down the hours. I have been getting monthly massages this pregnancy, since lugging two kids around is taking a toll on my back. I am really enjoying this and may have a hard time giving it up.