Category: Pictures

Today we took advantage of the fact that the heat index of below 100 coincided with a relatively open weekend for us and headed to Brook Run park.  Matt had never been with us before, and there’s lots of space for Liam to roam so there was something for everyone to explore.  Here are some pictures from the outing:

Enjoying the chimes:

Toddler jail:

Swinging:

Giant roller (and enormously bad idea):

Trying from a safer vantage point:

Everything’s more fun when Dad joins in:

Danger Mouse struggles to reach new heights:

Everything’s better with the help of Super Dad:

Setting high goals is important (but you might have to toil along the way):

Even difficult new goals are more fun when Dad joins in:

Frame 1:

Frame 2:

Frame 3:

Frame 4:

Final Frame (AKA: What happens when your child pays no attention to where he’s going and your pregnant reflexes aren’t quick enough to stop him in time…):

Liam does his impression of Marcel Marceau asking for a shoulder ride from his Dad:

Dad catches on (and obliges):

Up, up, and away!

Liam gets settled and begins immediately giving direction:

Dad takes a rest:

Father and Son Series (I find editing anything tiresome these days, so I’m just including all of these):

I’m still not sure what’s happening in this one, but I find it hilarious, so I decided to include it:

Liam uses Matt’s face as his own personal handle:

Liam goes exploring:

Matt gives chase:

Liam obliges:

And…they’re off!

Observation:

Toddler zip line:

It was so nice to be outside with my boys and I hope that it happens again soon!

We continue to be semi-trapped by the potty training.  I’m not sure how to describe whether there’s progress or not, but I will say that my rapidly deteriorating patience would indicate that there’s not been too much of it lately (or it could just indicate that there has been some progress in Operation: Baby, we’ll never know…).  Here are some more pictures of “Connolly House Arrest 2010″ and a couple of our first out-of-the-house venture to Grammie and Pop’s to celebrate Grammie’s birthday:

I think they call this multi-tasking:

Visitors make house arrest so much nicer!

Especially when they’re this cute!

On the long (and growing) list of things I’d never have thought to do with my child for fun (but which he immensely enjoys when his Daddy thinks them up):

Don’t you enjoy having ice-water thrown at you from a Nalgene bottle?

Sometimes you just have to try things for yourself to truly understand their awesomeness:

Liam’s first encounter with a sprinkler:

Contemplating…

“Ummm…I don’t think so.”

“Save me, Mama!”

Playing piano with Grammie:

Here’s hoping we get to leave the house again this week (otherwise Matt may be looking for a maternity straight-jacket very soon…)!

Due to the potty training house arrest we’ve been under we haven’t left the house in days and days.  As a result, Liam has tried out just about every inside activity that doesn’t include television (he did watch 45 minutes of Sesame Street this morning, but it resulted in pee on my bedroom carpet so that won’t happen again for a while).  The other result of being trapped in the house for days on end with a toddler and his bodily functions is that I’ve taken quite a few pictures to document the experience.  We’re by no means finished with the process, but if I don’t get some of these pictures up now, it will take me untold hours to sort through them all when we are finally finished (or he turns 18, goes to college, and his urinary habits become his roommate’s problem, whichever comes first).  So, here goes:

Brooding pantsless artist:

Caught with his pants down:

Giant pregnant woman admiring the brooding artist’s work:

Smooches!

Caught with his pants down.  Again.

Sheer concentration while tracing his foot:

“I see you!”

Pay no attention to the boy behind the trains…

Sandy feet:

Tortured artist:

Oh, the torment!

Tough guy:

I rounded the corner to find this:

Contradiction:

Seriously.  Could my kid be any cuter?

Today went pretty well and I’m hoping that within the week Liam will really have the hang of things.  Here are the stats:

Peed in the potty:  11

Peed in the potty of his own volition (without any parental prompting):  11

Pooped in the potty:  1

Pooped in the potty of his own volition (without any parental prompting):  1

Accidents:  1.5 (1 was while he was in his chair eating dinner and didn’t realize what was happening until it was too late — thank goodness for the booster seat!  The .5 was when he was playing with trains, started to go, and then stopped himself midstream to run to the potty chair and finish his business.)

Number of times pee landed outside the potty during a successful potty attempt:  5  (This was generally the result of not having his parts pointed in the right direction while seated, but twice it also involved attempts on his behalf to “pee like Daddy” while standing up.  He’s really not ready for that quite yet!)

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Reading “The Little Engine That Could” for inspiration:

Let’s just hope that his learning curve keeps improving as his (and my) cabin fever also increases.  I think he did fantastically well for his second day and have my fingers crossed that today is even better!

After our first day of employing the “naked time” potty training method, I’d call it a raving success.  We’ll see what tomorrow holds — there’s still a lot of ground to cover — but I was terrified about today and all in all, things went very very well.  Here are the stats from today:

Successfully peed in the potty: 8

Successfully pooped in the potty:  1

Accidents: 1

Accident to alerting parental unit ratio:  1:1

Peed in the potty after sitting down without prompting:  1

Peed in the potty after being placed there, but seemingly on cue:  1

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Here are some pictures from the day (after all — there isn’t much cuter than a bare two-year-old hiney):

“Whatchoo lookin’ at, Mama?”

“What?  You mean other kids potty train without a weeble village on hand?”

Bare-bummed scootering:

This is what caramelizing onions looks like when you’re 29 weeks pregnant and have spent the entire day being hyper-vigilant about someone else’s bodily functions:

Fingers crossed that tomorrow goes just as smoothly!

This morning we took advantage of the cool(er) temperatures (meaning that it was bearable, although still hot enough that I could have wrung my clothes out afterward) and headed to the Gardens.  We spent two hours wandering according to Liam’s druthers (which surprisingly did not include any time in the flower fountain, despite my intricate preparations for just such an occasion).  Here are some pictures from the morning:

This was my view of Liam for most of the morning:

Smile?

Again?

Contemplating a swim:

“That’s very clever Epicurus, but what I really want to know is how to work this thing…”

Hidey-hole:

“Reading” me the sign:

Favorite manhole cover:

“Reading” me the recipe:

During a brief respite from all the running I got the chance to take my favorite series of pictures from the day.  I’ll let them speak for themselves.

And, he’s off (again)!

Reading with Mr. Froggie:

Living dangerously:

Intently checking out the dew-covered spider webs:

Closer inspection:

Hanging out in Peter Rabbit’s den:

Strengthening his core:

“You comin’ Mama?”

I never did figure out what was happening here:

Favorite benches:

Sheer concentration:

Success!

And then it was time for a nap, for both of us.