Luke "Lukeypants" Turns 3!

My baby turned 3 yesterday, March 30th. I found myself feeling a little sad for this birthday because at age 2 he was still considered a toddler and now he has moved up to the big boy age. Although he is quick to tell me that he is still my "yittle" boy.


I loved this last year with Luke. He went through so many changes and learned so much. We got to experience so much with Luke that we never got to with the twins. Here are a few things that I want to remember about Luke being 2.





Lukey Speak: A list of things I want to remember him saying all the time.


1. His name. for the first half of the year he called himself Tiki and this last half of 2 he started calling himself Yukey. Or Yukeypantsboy. My mother in-law thinks that when he is an adult we will still be calling him Lukeypants.


2. Strawdiddies and Strawderries. Same as his name. The first one is what he called strawberried for the first half of 2 and it has since changed to the latter.


3. See You- This is what he says when he wants to be held or picked up.


4.Yes, But....- This is something we hear a lot. He usually says this when I tell him to do something.


5. Don't want- We heard this a lot at the beginning of 2. It was usually followed by whatever we asked him to do or offered him to eat.



6. He calls his brothers Batyew and Jonny(I never liked the nickname Jonny for Jonathan but Luke came up with it on his own and it is so cute). And my mom went from framma to vramma and now he can say gramma.



7. He can't say 'L' words and says the "Y" sound instead. One of our favorite things for him to say is "I am just Yooking" he tells me this when I call for him in the store when he is lagging behind. Sometimes when we are home he will say "I am yooking for yowercase yetters." Recently he has made a big deal about not being a big boy and gets mad at us when we say he is such a big boy. He tells us "No, I am yittle boy."



8. Poptart- although he does call the actual food this he also say poptart when talking about the golf cart my dad gets to ride around on at his job. Luke loves to go see Poppa at work and ride on the poptart.



As I have mentioned before he is such a good eater. He loves his veggies especially green beans. Sometimes he will ask just to eat green beans for lunch. He also loves fruit, especially berries. He likes just about everything he eats.

Some of his favorites things this year have been Jay Jay the Jet Plane, Thomas the Tank Engine, Blues Clues, Disney Cars and just recently Diego. He developed a love for pumpkins this past fall and still looks for them at the store. He has to eat his lunch on a pumpkin plate we bought around halloween. He still sleeps with his musical sunshine we bought for him when he was just 4 months old. We have gone through 3 of them though. He loves the silky tags on clothes and toys and he usually rubs one to help fall asleep. He loves to be outside and he loves to jump. He wants to help you with everything. He loves to help Gramma water the flowers with his water bucket.

He has had a few favorite things to wear this year as well. His favorite short sleeve shirt this year was a yellow shirt with a frog on it. I had to buy another one in a size larger. His favorite long sleeve shirt was a red one with tools on it that said "Mr. Fix It" I think it should have said "Mr. Break It.". I found a short sleeve one similar to it and gave it to him or his birthday.



He has definitely had his moments this year like most 2 year olds but all in all it was a wonderful year for him and us. It has been such a joy watching the world through his eyes.

Thanks for letting me share a little about my "baby".
Here is Luke celebrating his birthday in PA wearing his favorite Tools Shirt.
Here is Luke celebrating his birthday on his actual birthday wearing his favorite Froggy Shirt. We had only been home a couple of hours from a long day of driving home.

Pennsylvania- Our Trip to Grandma and Grandpa "Rosie"s house.

This post has been almost a week in the making. But here it is.

We made it to and from PA safe and sound. It took us a little longer going and coming home than expected but with 3 boys it wasn't too surprising. The boys did surprisingly well on the long car rides and we only had a couple of bad incidents. Jonathan got sick only a couple hours into our trip but recovered nicely. We also had a few close calls with the newly potty trained boys, but again we made it to a bathroom just in the nick of time.

The hotel stops went really well and Luke did great considering it was his first time staying at a hotel. He loved having Daddy make little beds out of couch cushions for him. He had the option of sharing a bed with Mommy and Daddy but, much to our delight, did not want to.

Micah (5), Katya, (3) Grandma Rosie holding Yuri (almost 3 weeks) Jonathan (6), Matthew (6) and Luke (almost 3).

We made a brief stop in Oklahoma on the way out to visit with Eric's brother and his wife and children. We had not seen them in 4 years and hadn't met our 3 year old niece yet and we got to meet our 3 week old nephew. Eric's mom was there and she was so delighted to have all 6 of her grandchildren with her. She flew home the next day to get things ready for our arrival.

We were fortunate to beat out most of the rain on our way to PA. We were a little worried about getting home when we heard about some of the highway closures in the states that we had driven through. Fortunately all the roads were open on our way back. For the record these are all the stated we drive through to get to and from PA. New Mexico, Texas (the pan handle), Oklahoma, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, about 30 minute of driving through West Virginia and then Pennsylvania. It's about 2400 miles.

The time in PA was great. Eric and I had new sleeping quarters at his parents house and Luke shared the room with us sleeping on a crib mattress. The twins had their own room with separate twin beds and they did so well in those that we are now going to get them their own beds instead of having them share.

One day we drove 30 minutes to Strasburg and rode on an old steam engine train (Eric and I had been there before but not the kids). It was a very windy day and the twins do NOT like the wind but they had fun riding the train. Luke probably enjoyed it the most. It was so fun seeing his eyes light up and that smile never left his face. Such an amazing experience for both Eric and myself.

We celebrated Easter a day early with a big family dinner at Eric's parents house. I think there were 20 of us and 4 generations. It was almost all of Eric's mother's side of the family. Earlier that day it actually snowed. The boys had never been in falling snow. Matthew was mesmerized but did not want to go out in it. Luke loved being out in it.

You can't really tell but it is snowing in this picture.

Easter was a nice quiet day. We had church in the morning and then a nice relaxing afternoon. We had a nice Easter dinner and then we had Easter treats.

Easter picture. Note to Doni, I didn't bother cleaning Luke's face either.

On Monday after Easter we loaded up the kids in the van and headed 200 miles up to New York to visit with Eric's paternal grandparents. We stayed the night and had a lot of fun. Eric got to visit with a couple of his uncles and reminisce about the Giants winning the super bowl.

All of us with Eric's grandparents on his dad's side.

The Wednesday before we left to come home we had an early birthday party for Luke. It was a lot of fun. Daddy ordered a special cake for the birthday boy from a lady who used to make his birthday cakes growing up. He told me he ordered Thomas and Diego, 2 of Luke's favorite characters. I was so surprised to see that she actually created a Thomas on the cake with Diego riding him. Very original I thought.

The boys got out a couple other times to go to the park and to a little lake down the road. Daddy and Papa Rosie took them and had so much fun. They played 3 Billy Goats Gruff on a bridge at the playground and they had fun walking across fallen trees by the lake. Luke was a complete mess both days.

The boys with Papa "Rosie" at Grubb Lake.

Luke also had a lot of fun "helping" Papa Rosie start the fire in the wood stove every morning and helping with whatever else Papa would let him do. They also loved playing catch with the purple ball. Everyday Luke would walk around the house looking for his Papa Rosie. Those 2 really bonded.

All in all it was a good trip and we all had fun but are glad to be home. I think the next time we decide to drive we will have to have a couple extra days added on to the trip. We drove 4 years ago and we were gone 3 weeks and that was a little too long and this time we were only gone 2 weeks and it wasn't quite long enough. Now we know we need about 16-17 days to really have enough time.

Matthew's First Field Trip

Today I joined Matthew on his very first field trip. All the kindergartners at his school went to visit a farm. I got to ride on the bus with him and he really thought that was funny.

Our first stop on the farm was to feed some of the animals. At first Matthew wanted no part of it and then he surprised me by holding out his hand for some goat food. He then got to feed a piece of carrot to a horse and then pet some bunnies.

The other highlight of the day was our last activity of going on a hayride to see all the cows. We were at a dairy farm so there were lots of cows. Matthew and I are both allergic to hay so we are feeling pretty miserable tonight.

All in all it was a lot of fun and it was good to see that he is not so different from "typical" kindergartners. I was also so proud of him for feeding the animals. Something I am not sure I would have done even today.

Cheese Glorious Cheese

The picture above is the look we get most when we sternly call Luke's name. He usually makes this face and say "huh" at the same time. Yesterday and today I saw this look a few too many times than I wanted to.
Saturday, March 8th- I had just finished getting dressed after my morning shower and walked out of my room only to be assaulted with a most horrible smell. My first thought was that one of the boys had gotten sick to their stomach somewhere. But as I made it to the family room I soon saw the source of the smell. Our recliner was covered in Kraft Parmesan cheese. Luke quickly confessed to this and I quickly cleaned it up and scrubbed down the chair hoping to get rid of the smell.
Saturday, March 8th- Lunchtime. I was busy getting lunch for Luke when he sneaked into the fridge and got a hold of a package of shredded cheddar cheese. Luckily I caught him before he made a huge mess. But there was a mess, none the less, in the living room.
Sunday, March 9th- The boys had been up for about 30 minutes before I got out of bed. They are usually pretty good about just playing on the computer before I come out. Well, I walked into the family room and found one section of the couch sprinkled with lotion. There was also lotion in Luke's hair. I cleaned up the gooey mess and got the boys breakfast. After breakfast we headed upstairs for baths and much to my surprise discovered that the lotion mess had actually started upstairs. The top landing was a mess and toys were covered. Again Luke let me know, rather proudly, that he was the culprit.

AHHHH! What is a mother to do? Especially when his new thing is asking for a hug every time he is in trouble and saying "I just yuv (love) you." He is really something else.

A New Kind of Diet

So I think I've discovered the next big thing in dieting. Last night as I was trying to eat my dinner Luke climbed up in my lap and proclaimed "I want to eat your dinner for you, Mommy." He didn't want to eat my food he wanted to eat for me. So what do you think? Getting someone else to eat for you would definitely do the trick.
By the way, he does eat MY dinner with me more often than not. No wonder I am always hungry an hour after dinner.

Duck, Duck, Goose.

The other night Matthew and Luke were playing with their diecast nascar cars and I was on the computer. After a few races across the room I hear a rousing game of Duck, Duck, Goose going on. I look over to my right and see the cars in a circle with Matthew and Luke making them play the game. It was so cute and such a great moment for Matthew, who along with Jonathan, has a problem with pretend play. It really made me smile and I had to laugh when I heard them saying "Okay Jimmie Johnson it's your turn." "Duck, Duck, Duck, Duck, Goose. Get him Jeff Gordon."

I had to take picture of the cars in their circle and new I needed to post this. So Cute.

A Little of This and That

Sorry it has been a few weeks since my last post. Life has again been busy with illness and other things. I went on a little vacation for 4 days in the middle of February. Just me, no kids and no husband. I went to visit my dear friend, Amy in Oklahoma. But before that we had another round or ear infections and I came down with bronchitis and pink eye. Not a fun way to leave for a vacation but I survived.
The twins also had their 6 year reevaluation for autism. In Arizona, in order to keep your state assistance for therapy programs, kids have to have another diagnosis at the age of 6. I guess they think it just in case the child get better with early intervention.
Not much has changed. They are still autistic. However, they are now officially considered underweight. Jonathan is underweight and Matthew is on the border. They do eat, just not a lot of variety and they are very active. Jonathan, however, has stopped eating some things at home, namely his chicken nuggets. This has been a staple for him since he was able to eat table food and he usually has this for dinner at least twice a week. So for him to stop eating it is not a good thing. I could understand if he was sick of it but he eats chicken nuggets at school and he also eats them at Grandma's and at Grandma's house they are the same chicken nuggets that I buy. I have been in tears pleading with him to eat some nights and other nights I just have to leave the room and let Eric deal with it. I have been told that Jonathan might be doing this because he knows how much it means to me and in a way it is his way of having power over me. His eating has been foremost in my mind lately and will even cry myself to sleep thinking about it. Matthew is skinny but Jonathan looks like an anorexic, he just looks so frail and that if I grabbed his arm the wrong way it would snap. It is so very scary to me.
All this to say, could you please keep both boys in your prayers, especially Jonathan. Thank you.