Cutest kid on the water :)

Connor was born into a hang-out-on-the-beach, fishing-on-the-boat, kind-of-family :)

He does it all quite well too!

Sunday was a wonderful day on the water with one cute little fisherman!


Any fish is a good fish with Captain Connor.

After each fish was reeled in, it was a "More fish, Papa!"
Pressure was on to keep catching fish!

So thrilled he wears a hat and glasses without a fight.
He is just so darn cute!

Busch Gardens Take 3!

One lucky boy has been to Busch Gardens THREE times already. He walks in like he owns the place and requests we get a move on over to "Sessssame Stree." Our first trip he wasn't too comfortable going up to the characters. Trip two was when he started to warm up to the characters, but Mom still needed to be close by. By trip three, my child wanted to be around the characters All. The. Time. Let's just say that during the Sesame Street character show, my precious bundle of joy was throwing a massive tantrum on the ground since he couldn't be ON STAGE with HIS characters. He wanted to hug on them and have them all to himself. Luckily the music and show drowned out his adorable screaming :). After the show, we knew where to go to be first in line for pictures with the characters. The last two trips we made, Cookie Monster and Abby Cadabby were the characters for the pics, so THIS MOM made the mistake of promising pictures with Cookie & Abby after the show. To Connor's not-so-delight, Zoe came out instead of Abby. He was thoroughly annoyed, as seen in pictures below. :)

A little happier to see Cookie Monster, but still wanted nothing to do with Zoe.

As we walked around the rest of the park, Connor continued to call out, "Abbbby!! Abbbbby!" Since Abby made me into a liar and never showed her furry self, we opted to go on some rides as a distraction. Connor had finally reached the age where he would sit still and actually enjoyed the rides. For the next two weeks, he still mentions riding "Big birds egg" and the "orange elephant." I love his little memory and how he holds onto his 'fond memories' :).

Sesame Street land was some pretty neat areas to let the kiddies climb and play. Since Connor has become a master climber, he was definitely in his element. I had a tough time keeping up with him!

World's biggest bounce house! I love his face of concentration and thrill!

We also had a 'first' for Connor that day. Connor sat through his first theater movie. What better than a 4-D adventure with Elmo and the gang! Seriously the cutest thing ever to see Mr. Smurf trotted around the theater with his yellow "gassses" on. I take that back...cutest thing ever was Connor in his yellow glasses reaching up to try and catch the 4-D characters during the show.

It was flag day at the park, so what better gift than a free flag for one giant flag worshipper. He loved it!

We had a great trip to Tampa and hope to do it again soon!

Father's Day shananigans

Our Father's Day consisted of lots of water, family, giggles & love :)

I think Papa did more work than should be permitted on Father's Day, but he had quite the little helper through out the day. Connor & Papa helped wash cars, wash the "boap" (aka boat), and worked out swimming lessons in between. Connor could not get enough of his Auntie "Tee Tee" and was also very excited to see his "Unc Egg" (aka Uncle Craig) and "Pole" (aka Auntie Nicole) as well as a special visit from Uncle Pete! Nana made a wonderful family lunch and the day was pretty much perfect :)

Connor is one brave little guy in the water. He's getting better and better at staying afloat!








I've never seen one child so obsessed with the hose!


Connor wasn't quite strong enough to spray the hose by himself, but figured out that if you toss the hose just right at the ground, it sprays...and boy was that FUNNY! Big giggles from my water boy...

This Father's Day...

This Father's Day I am grateful...

For the male figures in Connor's life...

Thank you for being there for him...

I can't thank you enough...

We love you all dearly!

It's POTTY time!

We've had a potty chair for about 6 months. We've had a potty seat for about 2 months. Connor didn't want to have anything to do with either of them until yesterday. You couldn't BRIBE him to sit on either of them for more than 2 seconds without wanting "up, up."

With the help of books, letter crackers, and singing songs like the alphabet, I was able to get Connor to sit on the potty long enough to go POTTY yesterday! I, of course, must sit on the big potty and go at the same time as a strange form of encouragement, but WHATEVER WORKS! As Connor was going potty, he looked down with a strange, confused look, then turned his "hose" toward him to see what was going on. He, of course, managed to spray his MAMA in the mean time! Ever tried to cheer for your child and fake smile while being showered by urine?!?!?!! After a small puddle clean up and change of clothes for mwah, Connor had jumped his first hurdle of going on the potty! We busted out his big boy underwear (he opted for Cookie Monster this time around) and we played while Mom kept a close watch on the clock to make sure we would make it to the potty again without an accident. I asked Connor every 10 minutes if we should go try the potty again and he became more and more frustrated & said "NOPE!" While I was busy sending out photo text messages of my big boy in his underwear & receiving text messages back, Connor managed to slip around the corner for a second to come right back to me & say "Uh oh, Mama"...as he took me by the hand to bring me to the scene of the crime where a nice puddle of urine was found. That very moment was a giant flashback to when I was house breaking Cooper...

We cleaned up, cleaned the carpet, changed clothes & slipped his diaper back on, so we could play outside for a bit. Connor was growing annoyed and tired of my constant potty reminder while he was playing, so I knew we weren't quite ready to sit nicely on the potty to go into potty training at full force. We tried again after supper, but Connor was too focused on wanting to go "pedal" on his bike outside.

We will continue to try and emphasize that the potty is what the cool kids do ;)

Here's Mr. Big man as he was all curious poking and prodding at 'places' while sitting on his frog potty. His potty splash guard has a dual purpose of a cup holder apparently...

We were cheering about wearing his big boy undies at this point...


After a successful urine deposit, it was time to model his briefs :). Cute as can be!

Wish us luck on our future potty adventures!

A boy and his wagon...

A wagon was collecting dust in Connor's closet for about a year...

Then one day Connor found a use for his wagon and...

This wagon hasn't been left unattended ever since...