A Fun Haircut??

Tonight we brought Henry to a new hair-cut place in Bloomington called Cookie Cutters. Instead of chairs there are different fun things to sit in like cars, planes and even a tractor. Henry of course immediately ran to the tractor for his haircut. He also got to choose a DVD to watch during his cut-he chose Barney. And when he got fidgety the hairdresser blew bubbles for him. As you can tell from the pics, he was still not that thrilled to get his hair cut, he kept pushing the lady's hand away. It was a fun experience but I think we'll probably stick to the salon where he's gotten all of his past haircuts....granted I didn't cry after this one (!), but it cost $16 versus the $10 we usually pay. He was very proud of the balloon and lollipop that he got when his haircut was done!

Tractor Pull

(Note everyone covering their ears around us-how miserable!)

So I wish I understood this better, it would make for an easier post, but after attending I still really don't. Ok we took Henry to the McLean County Fair on Wednesday night and met our friends Brandon and Charlie at the tractor pull event. Never having been to something like this before I assumed it would be a bunch of tractors pulling things (what, I don't know!). However, I quickly learned that the tractors pull nothing. It's cars, ATV's and pick-up trucks that pull this trailor with a sliding weight on it as far as they can. Then someone comes and measures the distance of the pull and then finally come the tractors to smooth out the dirt roadway for the next puller. Really I couldn't concentrate on the details because the cars/trucks that were doing the pulling were so loud that it made my ears ring and then itch. We didn't stay long at the event mostly because of the noise...I didn't think it was the place for small developing toddler ears. We did get to visit the rest of the fair and Henry got to see the livestock-there were cows, sheep, goats and gigantic pigs. He was really fascinated with the animals, but a little leary of the huge pigs and their giant noses that protruded from their pens. It was definitely an experience to remember!

Henry's Visit To The Dairy Farm

This morning Henry and I went to a local dairy farm that I heard of through the grapevine. It turned out to be this darling family-owned business that specializes in making different varieties of cheese. The owner is a retired teacher and she was great with Henry. She gave us a tour and Henry got to see the baby cows and feed a calve her bottle. He also fed the older cows hay, and got to sit on a tractor and a riding mower which he loved. He also loved petting the cows but was mostly fascinated with a cat we found in the barn! We watched the cheese being made...that's really interesting, we saw the early stages when the curds are forming and are separating from the whey. It's weird that cheese is moldy old milk. I bought a few varieties of cheese from their store including some cheese curds that sound gross, but are really tasty. By the way, the cows that Henry is petting in these pictures are just newborns...1 and 2 weeks old. Ahh, can you even imagine having a baby that big???

Our New Bathroom

Our new 1/2 bath is finished! (I know, how many pictures can I take of one, tiny bathroom?!) Patrick completely made this bathroom from scratch! It's located off of our kitchen in what used to be our back entrance. The wall that the sink/toilet are on used to be our back door (replaced by the french doors in the dining room). Every time the toilet flushes or I turn on the faucet, I'm amazed that it works! Patrick did a great job. The only detail left is painting the trim white. But it's perfectly usable and I am SO thankful to have a 1st floor bath.

Happy Birthday Henry!

Henry spotted the cupcakes for his party and since it was his birthday, we let him eat one right after breakfast--he loved it!

Patrick made this tractor cake! He baked the cake, cut it out and dyed the frosting all himself!
Henry blowing out his candles...he asked for "more" after they were originally blown out, so we let him do it again.

We let Henry dig into this cake...and he did dig right in!

Playing with one of his toys with Erica

Last Sunday was Henry's 2nd birthday. It's amazing how fast the time has gone. It seems like it wasn't long ago that we were celebrating his 1st birthday. This has definitely been an exciting year with him. We've really watched him change so much from a little baby to a spirited, tractor-loving, trying-to-be-independent, sweet little boy. I've posted some pictures from his big day. We had our families and some friends over for his birthday party on Sunday to celebrate. It was such a fun day. We were fortunate that the weather was beautiful and we could celebrate outside.

Henry's New Trick

Last week we had dinner with our friends Jon and Tiffany. Tiffany told us about a flip that her cousin does with his 2-year old son where he starts out sitting on the ground and ends up sitting on his dad's shoulder. Patrick, who is always up for a new trick with Henry, wanted to do it right away so as not to be out-done! Fortunately, Henry loves doing all of these crazy things and loves his new trick.

A Wonderful Word

Henry has been on quite the "no" kick lately. Even when he means "yes", often he will still say "NO". Hearing this word repeatedly throughout the day has been wearing on me a bit. I have been trying to say lots of yes's and keep my no's to a minimum to encourage him to respond more positively, too. There are days though that I feel like if I hear him say the word "no" one more time I will go crazy! Well....yesterday a new little wonderful word entered his vocabulary. It's "ok". He has been responding "ok" to things now when I ask him. It is the most wonderful sound! He has even had a really cooperative attitude to go along with it. For example, today I told him we were going upstairs to get ready for his nap and he could pick out one book to bring along with us. He looked at me and responded, "ok" and then ran to get the book and came right upstairs! I know it seems like no great feat, but I think it's so great. It's a feat for us and our sweet, spirited boy. I know there will still be "no's", but I love that he also has "ok" to mix in.

Welcome Baby Caleb!

Here he is!
Big Brother Gabe with Caleb and Mommy
The proud Daddy

Do you recognize this big brother??
Holding Caleb for the first time!

We were so excited to meet sweet, little Caleb for the first time. Dan and Sara are such wonderful parents and Gabe is such an excited big brother. It was fun watching his reactions to the new baby. When we were in the waiting room and we heard that Caleb was born, Gabe was so excited he started dancing and jumping up and down! It was so cute! He couldn't wait to go meet him. It's hard to believe that in just a few months Henry is going to be the big brother in the waiting room. In some ways I can't wait and in others I can't believe it's going to happen. I'm thankful to have Dan and Sara go before us in this new adventure. I will be leaning a lot on their knowledge when it's our turn in October. Congratulations Dan and Sara and Gabe! We are so happy to have another amazing little nephew!

Happy Independence Day!
One float threw Matchbox cars...Henry was thrilled!


Henry with Charlie on the slide at the park across from where we saw the fireworks.



Watching the fireworks.

(For some reason, blogger isn't letting me type anything in the "title" box) We had so much fun celebrating the 4th of July with Henry this year. He was feeling very patriotic as you can tell from the first picture with the glasses! In the morning we took him to a parade in a town near us. We actually found out about it last year on the 4th and decided to take him again this year. It was the perfect parade for Henry. There were tons of tractors (!) and one float threw Matchbox cars to the children. He didn't think much of the candy from other floats, but he was thrilled when a car landed in front of him.

Then we decided to watch the fireworks at a country club near our house. Our friends Brandon, Emily and Charlie and our neighbors with a boy a few months younger than Henry joined us. We walked to the park and pushed the boys in their strollers. It worked out perfectly because the boys were able to play on the playground for a while until the fireworks were about to start and then we went across the street to the country club and sat on the fairway to watch the fireworks. It was the perfect setting...it wasn't crowded or crazy with people...we just spread out blankets and had a great view. These were Henry's first fireworks and he actually liked them! The first few scared him, he kept saying "no, no" and was shaking a little bit (very sad). But as he got used to them he was pretty mesmerized. When they were done he kept asking for "more boom boom."

Eating corn in 2006

Eating corn in 2007


So Henry loves corn. And he thinks corn on the cob is wonderful because it's this big, fun thing that he gets to eat all by himself. I actually love watching him eat corn on the cob probably as much as he likes to eat it. I think it's the cutest thing how his nose gets scrunched up when he bites into it. I found this picture from last year when he first began eating corn from the cob, and I thought it was cute to compare.