Weekend Update

We started the weekend on Saturday morning doing rainbow fizzies...aka baking soda and vinegar with soap for extra bubbles. Max loved this activity so much that I went through a jug of vinegar.

We then headed north to the Seifert house to celebrate Karen and Tom's 60th birthdays. There were a lot of people there so after Max got settled in he started to have fun with the other kids and playing like crazy. We left late and thought he would sleep on the way home, but nope, our jabber jaws talked the whole way home.

The first thing Max said on Sunday morning was "Mommy, I want to do a project." So, I ran upstairs to the bathrooms and dug toilet paper rolls out of the waste basket. In no time Max was making fireworks.

It was a quiet but fun filled weekend. We also spent plenty of time in the pool with our little fish.

Making Rain Clouds & Seeing Friends

Pinterest projects don't always turn out bad. In fact, most of them turn out a success. On Sunday morning, we made colorful rain that came down through the clouds.

Max was pretty excited about this project and couldn't wait to do it. I got it all set up and he was very serious about making his clouds rain very pretty colors. Soon the container was filled was many different colors and Max thought it was pretty cool.

We used this project to talk about the clouds and when they get full then it rains. He's very fascinated with rain lately and that might just be because he doesn't get to see it that often.

Andy's buddy Jordan was in town this weekend and Max gave him a tour of his Paw Patroler. Max was surprised, and impressed, that Jordan knew a lot about Paw Patrol from his own little boy. This showed Max that Jordan was an OK guy and they could play together.

Since Jordan was in town, we had friends over for swimming and dinner on Sunday. The only pictures I took were of Max giving Evan a ride in his red Mercedes. Too cute! 

My Little Baker

Since Max loves to cook so much I decided to bake cookies with him. I figured it was something fun we could do together this weekend and it would keep him entertained and occupied. Since I started the cookie talk on Thursday he was pretty pumped to baked cookies on Saturday. By the way, I did the cookie baking solely for his entertainment. I normally do not bake because I do not eat sweets, so this was purely for Max's enjoyment.

I figured we would go with grandma Laura's peanut butter cookies with the Dove chocolates in the middle since it seemed like an easy and fun recipe for him.

Max helped put all the ingredients in the blow and mix them together.

He then helped me unwrap the foiled Dove chocolates. I knew he was my kid when he did not sit there and eat the Dove chocolates. He's a kid, so he does like sweets, but not that much. He had a super big job to do....roll the peanut butter balls in the sugar. He was very serious about this job and worked really hard at getting the balls rolled in sugar.

He then helped me push the Dove chocolates into the dough after they were taken out of the oven. 30 minutes later I asked him if he wanted one of his cookies and he said "No, I will have one after my nap." He's too cute!

Potato Painting

Max loves to do projects and he especially loves to paint, so I got him all pumped up to do potato painting. I cut the potatoes in half and cut out four different shapes for him to do. He was pretty excited about it and he like to do the different shapes. This kept Max busy for an hour on Saturday morning.

Shooters

Shooters on Friday nights mean something entirely different in the house than it did five or so years ago. This was another Pinterest project that worked out and provided some fun in our house. I cut up a pool noodle, attached a balloon and then used fun duct tape to attach the balloon to the pool noodle. Then Max could fill the noodle with soft little arts and crafts balls. He pulled back on the balloon and the soft balls went flying. This Pinterest DIY project was a hit with Max. He kept wanting to shoot everything with his new shooter.

My Little Chef

I am very lucky that my husband and son both love to cook. Almost nightly Max wants to help cook dinner. He's always excited to help and so we involve him in as many meals that will allow a three year old to participate. This week we made pizzas and Max loved making a thin crust pizza for the two of us with ham and pineapple on top.

Baseball

Last Sunday we took Max to his second professional baseball game. Again, it was to see the Brewers versus the Diamondbacks and again, we were given my Firm's awesome seats behind home plate. Again, Max doesn't understand how lucky he is to be able to sit in these seats.

Since the game began at 1:10, right at the stat of nap time, we decided to give Max an early, and short, nap. We were also crossing our fingers that this would not back fire on us. Of course it did though. Max was a little crabby at the game and therefore he was not very interested in it. Of course he wouldn't take a picture with us. This was my first attempt.

Max got a snack.

Attempted to watch the game with daddy.

...and mommy.

Max did watch a little bit of the game by himself.

Andy did eventually capture this photo of the three of us before we left.

A Little Bribery

The Before you become a parent you always say what you are not going to do. That you will become the perfect parent and never do this and never do that. I most certainly was never going to resort to bribing my child into doing anything...nope, not me. Well, I was wrong. I was wrong on many things. Being a parent is hard and saying you are not going to be "that parent" when you have no idea what parenting is like is absolutely ridiculous. I wish I could go back and tell my "pre-kid self" that, but I can't. Now, I just laugh at people with no kids say "this and that" about parenting. Boy, they have no idea.

Anyway, back to my bribing story. Max has been addicted to his paci and he is three years old. Another thing I said I wouldn't do if I was a parent...allow my kid to have a paci past 12 months old. Well, here we are past his third birthday and finally giving up the paci. We initially said he couldn't have it past two years old. Well, his second birthday came and we removed it from the car seats in both cars, but couldn't get rid of it for bed time or nap time at home. Ms. Marie did not allow the paci during nap time at her house past 12 months old, but some how we couldn't get rid of it at our house. We started slowly by removing them from the car seats and then telling ourselves that by his third birthday the paci would be officially gone. Just like that, his fire truck themed third birthday came and went and Max was still going to bed with a paci. Ugh! I tried to "forget" the paci when we went to the cabin for Fourth of July, but realized we had other people in the cabin and it wasn't fair to them to listen to Max's tantrum at bed time. So, I miraculously "found" it in the bag of clothes. Max was thrilled. I then thought of doing the same thing when we went camping and on the drive up Andy said it was a bad idea: toddler screaming his face off in the pitch black night in a tent where everyone could probably hear him for miles was probably not a good idea. I also tried reasoning with him many nights and that was not the route to go. I began to wonder if I was going to have a kid with messed up teeth because we were never going to get rid of this thing.

Then, the other night Max asked for the Paw Patroler vehicle at Target and Andy said no. They got home and Max told me all about it and asked for it from me. I told him maybe some day. Then Andy had a great idea. Let's trade the paci for the Paw Patroler vehicle. I negotiated with Max and he responded way too quickly that he was willing to trade. I realized he didn't understand the deal, so I told him that he can think about it and use his paci for one more night and if he still felt the same way in the morning we will go to Target after Ms. Marie's house and we can make the trade. He woke up in the morning and came into the bathroom to hand over his paci because he is a big boy and he wants the Paw Patroler vehicle. I explained that the trade was for good and not just one night. He said ok.

I came home from work to one happy little boy with his new toy and the paci was safely tucked hidden away where Max couldn't find it.

It's 8pm and bed time. Time to go potty, brush teeth and get tucked into bed. Once in bed Max says "Where'd my paci go." Here we go....we explained the trade and Max lost it. "I neeeeeeeed my paci" complete with tears and all out crying. I re-explained to him the trade off. He didn't care. I then gave him the choice to keep his paci and I will return the PP vehicle to Target or keep the vehicle and I will keep the paci. He chose the vehicle. We are on nought three and paci free...and just like that we got over the paci and we became the parents we said we would "never" be. HA HA!

Level 3

Max passed level two of swim lessons and started level three this past Friday. He had a new instructor named Anthony. My son doesn't do new people, so we were very pleased that he responded well with Anthony. Plus, we learned that Anthony is a very good swim instructor. On Friday Anthony was teaching Max to dive into the pool, touch the ground, come up, turn around and float on his back. WOW! Max was doing pretty well with this. I was very impressed with his effort. Max officially is a better swimmer than his mommy. Ha ha!

Here are the pictures Andy took of Max at swim lessons.