Those terrible two's? Yeah, those. They are driving me crazy! Max bit, as in clamped down HARD on Lyla's arm yesterday over a bag of potato chips. And this morning when he didn't want to be buckled into his car seat? He pinched my arm, WITH HIS NAILS, even took some skin with him from the nails scratching me. Seriously! I am so nervous what is going to happen at daycare today. I warned them about his new love of violence when he is frustrated so hopefully that will keep them on high alert. I don't even know what happened that suddenly made a spark go off in his brain that says - "Hey I'm upset, lets hurt someone". We don't spank or hit him and he isn't getting hit or bit at daycare. (Well, he hasn't received any incident or accident reports to imply that he is learning that reaction there.) I realize this is partly just his stage in life but it is very, very frustrating.

OK, enough about that for now. Let's focus on the cute things instead right? We went to the Minnesota Zoo yesterday with Grammy, Auntie Rosie, Auntie Katie and cousin Lyla. Our original plans had us all driving down to southern Minnesota to go to a cabin and hang out with the extended family, but the weather down there was rainy and it got canceled so we detoured to the zoo instead.

The kids had a blast and were so cute to watch with the animals. They'd get all excited and make the cutest little faces, like here they are screaming in excitement over the monkeys.

A lot of the animals were active, I think it helps that it was cloudy and cool so the weather was perfect for strolling around like this tiger.

Or swimming like these two bears.

Rory was so good in her stroller, she mainly people watched as the animals didn't intrigue her much. But she did find a couple that she really enjoyed. Here she is watching those silly prairie dogs.

We also made it over to the farm and I took Max and Lyla in to feed the goats. That was one crazy experience!

Lastly, we were able to teach Max and Rory about the birds and the bees. They are so excited to share this information with all their friends! Haha

We had a really great time and the kids were great. We didn't eat lunch until 2:30pm and skipped afternoon naps to be there. You'd never had known outside of their tired eyes, they had so much fun! (The biting incident didn't happen until we left the zoo to have our picnic in the parking lot - so he really was good for the zoo part!)

I also have to give a big thank you to Dido as he rented a vehicle that would seat all of us for our trip. While we didn't make it to the cabin, we still had a great time at the zoo and the kids and the adults all enjoyed being able to ride together. (It was much easier to change our plans last minute when there was only one vehicle that had to make the plan change.) Thank you Dido (aka Curt)!

I came to the realization that Max has started having temper tantrums very, very slowly. He's been getting more and more difficult over the past few weeks and there have just been too many convenient excuses nearby.

His top eye teeth have popped through but the bottom two have not even though he has had two huge swollen lumps where they obviously are working their way out. I still believe this is the reason he's been screaming shortly after we put him to bed. If we give him some medicine, he'll only cry or whimper but if we don't give him medicine he'll be screaming within 10 minutes of laying down. Max is a very active guy and I think the pain doesn't really get to him most of the day, just when he's quietly laying down. So that has been a convenient excuse to use when he's been difficult.

Plus, with summer, we've had the occasional late bedtimes and it's easy to use this for an excuse too. Tuesday evening he's just a ball of tears and screams? Well he was up late all weekend while we were at the lake. Thursday morning he's impossible to get dressed and out the door? Well he did have a rough time getting to sleep last night.

So yeah, obviously it's finally hit me that these are just excuses to the real issue. He's two, he's going to start expressing his likes and dislikes and he's going to start establishing his independence. Where does that leave me? Reading all over the internet on what I should and shouldn't be doing.

I thought I was prepared for this, I mean I've already done a lot of research preparing for this but somehow I'm completely blown out of the water that he is really just throwing a bunch of temper tantrums. Oh the joys! I miss my old Max man, easy going, always the charmer; but I have to admit, I'm pretty excited to see where this new one takes me - a little scared too.

If you have any helpful tips I'd appreciate them. I mean, I am new at this and anything would be appreciated!

It's raining, it's pouring, the old man is snoring. He bumped his head and went to bed and couldn't get up till the morning. Or at least, that is what I sing to Max and Rory whenever it is raining out!

Max and I headed outside to try out some mud puddles in the driveway. He insisted on carrying the umbrella around, and my poor umbrella is uber muddy now. Thankfully, I have a second one I can use!

Later that evening I was finally able to get a couple pictures of Rory attempting to crawl. Which entails getting up on her knees and elbows and then rolling over because she hasn't figured it all out yet. It's pretty cute so you'll have to check it out! Here she is with her butt up in the air.

Here she is after she rolled to her side.

She's going to get it soon and then she'll move up a room at daycare. The teachers in the crawling to walking room have been sneaking into the nursery to encourage Rory's crawling so she'll move up to their room. Yup, I have two very popular children at daycare!

Since you probably read my last post about how my son almost got hit by a car I’ve decided to make this blog post all about the Max Man.

Saturday while we were at the farm, it was raining and Max really wanted to get out of the shop. Dusty got the great idea to put Max in our van. Given, this isn’t a new thing, we know it isn’t the safest play area but he just likes to honk the horn or climb all over the seats. Nothing a vacuum can’t fix up when he’s done. What Dusty neglected to remember was that he had quite a wad of cash in the center console as we had planned to go to the St. Paul Farmer’s Market if they decided not to plant the garden in the rain. So when we finally got the kids and get ready to leave we see all this cash lying all over the van. Dusty picks it up and says that his $100 bill is missing. So we both get out and start searching all over the van and we’re joking about it with everyone else. After we get home and I put everyone’s muddy/wet clothes in the wash Dusty reassures me he went through his cash at home and he really is missing a $100 bill. Sure enough, I go to put the clothes in the dryer and check Max’s pocket to find not only the $100 bill but also a $5 bill. I took this picture and sent it to everyone else that was at the farm too. He sure does make us giggle sometimes!

Saturday night when I left, Rory had been put to bed and Dusty was hanging out with Max in the family room. I go in there to see Dusty playing his deer hunting game on the Wii. I was upset because I feel Max doesn't need to start watching a hunting game where animals are killed, it’s just a bit violent for a two year old in my opinion. Dusty tried to argue that it wasn’t a big deal and that Max only watched it for a couple of seconds before getting bored and playing. While we’re discussing this Dusty shoots a deer and it makes a bunch of noises and falls over to die. What does Max do? He goes “oh oh” and points at the screen. Dusty and I instantly smile because we both know who’s winning this argument and then Max points at the screen and starts going “pfff” “pfff” like he’s shooting the gun! Needless to say, the game was shut off. I know he’ll get in trouble at daycare if he makes shooting noises, so I’m not completely irrational here.

Lastly, we’ve cracked and bought our first box of Pull-ups on Sunday. The plastic pants have given Max two bad cuts or burns on his inner thigh in the last 2 weeks. I’m assuming that with the humidity and all his running it just wasn’t mixing well. On top of that, since we are spending so much more time outside, he has been having more accidents. I’m not sure how I’m going to feel about the Pull-ups so we only bought a box and we’ll decide after that if we want to continue (as in he is still keeping them dry and using the potty) or if we’ll want to postpone our potty training attempts until the fall. I’m really not sure which way we’ll go, I hate the idea of relapsing after all the progress we’ve made, but they are more expensive than diapers and I don’t want to waste money if he isn’t going to try to keep them dry like he has with his under ware. He has done his best to keep his diapers dry when we have put them on him so I’m hoping he’ll do the same with the Pull-ups.

Our weekend was more then I could handle! It started out on a Friday night, as Dusty planned a date night for us and we headed to Roberts, WI to watch a tractor pull. Yup, you read that right, my date night was at a tractor pull!

It was actually a really exciting date, as I’d never seen one. It was fun, for the first couple hours, then it got pretty lame and we left shortly after 9pm. I was giving Dusty crap because all the couples around us were all cuddled up and I looked down to see that we had quite the large gap between our two butts on the seat.

Yup, over a foot between us. We’re such good cuddlers!

There were a few girls that were competing with all the boys. I thought that was pretty funny and told Dusty I had to get a picture for my blog and that “the masses would love it”! Here’s to you my masses:

Saturday morning and afternoon were spent at the farm helping to plant the garden. It was raining and I forgot my camera so no picture shots but still great news to share, Rory started saying Mama while we were there. I’m so proud! Saturday evening I left the kids and Dusty at home and headed out to watch a friend’s band in Stillwater. We had a large group of girls and had a great time dancing and singing.

I pretty much danced all night and was exhausted when I got home. Katie also apparently had a good time as I found this picture on my camera on Sunday!

Sunday morning I had to be up and moving as the kids and I had plans to go to Como and meet up with Kristen and her boys. I was so tired, but we went, and when we got there I found out that the Polar Bear exhibit had opened that week, so it was really, really crowded. We had to see the monkey as both Jackson and Max were both talking about them on our drives to the zoo. Here's the kids checking out the animals.

We got the customary picture at the giraffe statue. Yeah, I know it turned out cute!

Then we quickly checked out the polar bears and left there to head to a grassy hill where the kids could eat and play without being so crowded in at the zoo. They had fun running around and Max had been great all day, staying close by if he wasn’t in the stroller and listening. Then the worst experience of my life to-date happened.

We got back to the van and I started to load up Rory and saw Max getting out of the stroller. I told him that I didn’t say he could get out and quickly turned around to get Rory situated in the car seat so I could get him. A couple was walking by and I heard the guy say “no no” and look to see Max walk to the front of the van and look at me with that “come get me look”. I yelled “Max NO” as he jetted out in front of the car. I dashed and miraculously was able to grab him as he was inches from hitting a car driving by. By inches, I mean INCHES, if he had been a little taller he would have been hit by the car’s side mirror, that’s how close it was! I scooped him up and walked around to see the couple standing there. Now in my much saner mind I realize they were waiting to make sure he was OK, but at that moment I was so stressed out by the situation I assumed they were upset with me and I just said something about him being a two year old and breezed past them to get him buckled into his car seat.

I knew I wasn’t calm enough to try to reason with Max. He was looking behind him the whole time, just smiling at me chasing him, and never saw the car, so he didn’t even get scared which would have worked to my benefit. After I got him buckled in I looked him in the eye and told him that he was almost hit by a car and he can’t run into the street. Really, what else could I have done? He’s a two year old and he did what two year olds do. He doesn’t understand what being hit by a car even really means. I think that is what makes me so upset, I couldn’t even use it as a teaching moment in hopes it never happened again; he just doesn’t get it and didn’t even see the car he was almost hit by.

So naturally the scenario has played in my head since that moment and I can’t get the sick feeling out of my stomach. I realize there really wasn’t much I could have done differently. I mean, I could have buckled him into his stroller or I could have put him in the car first since Rory isn’t able to move far on her own, but I didn’t and I can’t change that. I’m not really mad at myself for those things either, I mean, it was an unpredictable situation. I’m more upset that I couldn’t think of something different that would have distracted Max from his initial idea to have me come and chase him. That is what I’m more focused on, that I didn’t think to say “Look a puppy!” and have him look in the other direction long enough for me to get him. I guess if anything, I’ll have to take away something from the situation since Max really won’t be and there is nothing I can do about that.

My morning did not start out well. I haven't blogged about it because it wasn't all that interesting, but my hearing aids have gone from no big deal, to sucking up all my time. (OK, I'm slightly over exaggerating here.)

Two weeks after getting my hearing aids I went in for a follow up appointment and mentioned that the ear buds wouldn't stay in my ear canal. The audiologist took a look and told me that I'm going to need custom made ear buds. Well that sounded pretty cool, I figured it would make them even less noticeable as it would keep the ear buds in which would keep the tubes from sticking out further from my ears. She proceeds to put a putty like substance into my ear to make the mold to send off to the hearing aid place for my buds. It was a pretty cool experience, I was pretty much deaf with the putty in my ears for about 2 minutes.

Two weeks later I get my new ear buds and go on my way. Of course, by the next day even those are not staying in correctly. So I go to my next follow-up appointment that was two weeks later and we order a second set of custom ear buds that have a little "foot" that sticks out of my ear and helps hold them in place. Apparently all ear canals move with jaw movements but some people tend to have more movement than others. (I chose to believe it isn't because I'm flapping my jaw more than others and that I just have a stronger movement. HA!)

About a week after getting these ear buds I'm sitting at home and I got this ridiculous pain in my left ear and take out my hearing aid. I tried to put it back in and it hurt so bad I got tears in my eyes. Of course I can't get an appointment thanks to the holiday weekend until the end of the following week (today). So I don't wear my hearing aids for the rest of the week and go in to get checked out by the audiologist and end up getting squeezed in to see the ear, nose and throat doctor for a second appointment as my audiologist doesn't know what is in my ear. (The same doctor we almost had to take Rory to see - but thankfully she's been ear infection free for 4 weeks!) He takes a look and pokes at it - and yes, it hurts still! -then he tells my audiologist, who is in the room with us, some medical jargon that was way over my head. Thankfully they dumbed it down for me; either I have a blister that popped, or even sexier, a pimple that ruptured in my ear canal.

So now the hearing aid has to stay out of that ear until the pain is gone and then I have to go back to see the audiologist for yet another fitting and also do yet another screechy hearing test to make sure there isn't any unwanted feedback. But on the upside - I met the ear, nose and throat doctor, so now we're pals if I have to go back.

OK, now it is time for the funny pictures from the weekend! I mean, how can I not show those pictures off?!

Mama and her jazz hands are helping to clean up before the storm.

Tara is kind enough to protect Peanut from the wind on the boat.

Andrea is fist pumping down after successfully over throwing Dusty and Chris at goofy golf.

Chris is, well, just Chris, and getting ready to sumo tube.

 Yeah, we had a good weekend up at the lake!