Fall...

We have been having fun this fall and have lots to report. Arlo added quite a few new tricks in the last two days. Today he started clapping! Yesterday he went downstairs on his little belly for the first time, and gave me an actual kiss! So cute! He is quite a funny little nugget and has a rather strong personality. He Sure does know what he likes and dislikes and is certain to let us know what those things are. He had a cold with a little croup last week. For the past, oh nearly two months now, he has slept (or not slept) poorly. He is not great at disconnecting from me in during the day, and even worse at night. He is getting a little bit better, but Sean and I are pretty tired. His saving grace is that he is just so cute, sweet, and utterly hilarious. He is getting to be more independent as he experiences more and has more curiosity. He loves to play with James' toys, particularly his cars, and even knows what to do with them. He is experimenting with standing, and is just starting to walk behind a little walking toy. He eats everything for the most part that we eat off the table, but we still note that he has some issues with wheat. Speaking of eating, he is a little eater. He sure can put it away. And loves strong flavor. He is much like James in this way. Perhaps it is one of the few things that they have in common! 

James remains a great eater with few things that he won't touch. The two things he dislikes are string cheese and mac n cheese. Go figure. He would rather eat clams. 

James is hilarious, loving, caring and FULL of energy. Quite the goofball. He talks nonstop and is very funny. I was thinking about it recently and he sure does have a whole lot of friends. Since he has gone to so many different schools, he has made friends all over town. He has a more active social life when we are out and about than Sean and I these days! It is really cute. Today he came home from school very excited that he is making doing a big lesson on the North American continent when he draws via tracing the continent, then will fill it in with the countries and states and then label them. Sounds neat! It is large, so he will get to put it on his wall when he is done. He is really, really into it. This morning he told me he wants to go to every country in the world before he dies and that he also wants to go to every state. He must be my kid. 

Explosion

Explosion: this is exactly what happened to Arlo last month. He all of a sudden had four new teeth, crawled, got up to sitting on his own, and pulled up to standing all in about 48 hours. It all happened between July 10 and 12th. He officially crawled on the 12th. Wow! He has been a little tough to deal with since all of this because he just wanted to hang out and party practicing his new skills. Sleep and naps have been pretty tough. But, we have been trying to sleep train (finally) over the past few nights, and it seems to be going a bit better now. Also in the past week He has started to try to clap and wave. He also shakes his head as to say "no". Turns out he is a stubborn little bugger! He has no problem letting you know when he isn't getting his way! He is also pretty attached to me and has entered the phase where he does not really want anyone else. My arm is starting to get tired.... But his personality is really beginning to shine through and that is super fun to watch happen.

But, he sure is sweet and has a smile that can light up a room! What a little snuggler and sweetie pie! He sure gets excited too, when he crawls around! He is so proud of himself that he kind of bails on his hands. He is quick to giggle and loves James to pieces. He has awesome dexterity - nearly better than James at 4! His fine motor skills are great - the large ones, not so much.

Funny, because he and James are just about as opposite as you can get, but they love each other so much. James rocks the large motor skills and totally kills it on his big bike. He is totally an O'Callaghan on the bike. He is also quite the ladies man. He gets SO distracted when there are cute girls around and flirts and gets all dorky when he sees a girl that he likes. Hilarious. He even wrecked his bike a few weeks ago while charging down a gravel trail while checking out two teenage girls in bikini's floating in the pond on our neighborhood. He just got out and shook it off and got right back on the bike and took off. With how cute he is I think Sean and I might really be in for something come the teenage years....Wish us luck.

A Good Time

These kids of ours are super happy little buggers! Arlo is a little bothered today since he is cutting his third and fourth teeth! His two tops have finally emerged after playing hide and go seek for the past few months. He got the first teeth right around James birthday. Today number three cut through and number four is probably cutting now. He actually had a really tough time going down tonight. This is really unusual for him. He is a good little sleeper and has been sleeping through the night (at least until between four and six AM) since June 25th. He is a great little guy that James now calls his little pumpkin! I have no idea where James came up with that but is is SO adorable. Arlo will smile at just about anything and is quite the little charmer. He certainly can light up a room. He is also just in the beginning stages of crawling. Yesterday he took a couple of scoots (3) a few times. It was great! Then he got so excited that he would fall back to his belly shrieking in excitement.

Today James took a field trip to what he called the "Nursery School" then he revised that to the "Nursery Home". They took the kids to a local assisted living home. He said "Mom, today I played with old people". They played Go Fish and he was also really excited that they rode the "city" bus to the home. He said "Mom, it was my first time on the bus! It was so fun". One of the teachers at his summer school came to me when I picked James up this afternoon and told me about the little trip today and said that it was wonderful seeing him in that environment and that he did really great. I could tell that she was really proud of him. He is typically the kid there with all the energy that hits the playground hard every day. He certainly is energetic and has the running around playing thing down. He comes home tired and dirty daily - a good thing. He falls asleep really well and has a really sunny disposition. Of course, he is four and certainly has his own opinion about things. He also has a way that he likes things and is SUPER particular about a few things. Other times he just goes with the flow. But there really are certain things that just really get him. And he typically hates cheese. I think he may be the only kid that won't eat string cheese.

Love them!

A Tooth!

Well, Arlo is having a week of firsts. He has his first cold (boo - and I have it too), and while we were hanging out today I noticed that he is actually cutting his first tooth! He is drooling like crazy and chewing on his thumb and fist with a vengeance. He even let's out little grunts and mini screams while chewing! So very focused! I can't believe how early this is. He pulled my finger into his mouth to chew in and there it was...a very swollen gum with a little tooth right under the surface. Bottom left. He seems to be weathering it better than James did. Less crabby, but with the cold he seems a little miserable. He still smiles all the time though! Laid back kid...love him!

Arlo is Five Months Old

Yeah! Arlo is five months old! I think that if I could freeze time at this age I would. It really is such a wonderful age for babies. Arlo is so fun right now. He is such a happy, smiley, laughing baby boy (except when he isn't). Man does he love his brother. James seems to be his hero. It is beyond words. James feels the same way too still. We took these pictures before bed tonight.

Today Arlo has his first real runny nose - so sad! He had a little bit of a rough day, but was still very pleasant but wanted extra snuggles (as if you could give extra - he always wants to be held and snuggled). He also is drooling up a storm! He had his first week at Little Tree this week going now on Tuesday and Thursday mornings. Hopefully it isn't a cold that he picked up there. But he is typically a little bit more ok with being put down in his swing or in his new (to him) jumper activity center thingie. His sleep patterns are not good right now since our big trip, but we are keeping our fingers crossed that this week will go better.

James is doing great as well. He is so happy-go-lucky. We had a dinner with two other families including his best buddy Oscar's family this evening and while there was some chaos with other kids, James just hung and stayed mellow (strange!). We were very proud of him. We had a nice weekend hanging out with friends. We had quite the social calendar this weekend. Dinner Friday with Bill and Maggie and their grandkids who James LOVES and of course their parents, then James had a birthday party yesterday (where he didn't get crazy from the cupcake until we left the door to come home - bonus), and then playing with friends tonight. Wow, quite the social calender for our little man this weekend!

Arlo rolled over!

Arlo finally decided to roll over! He went from back to tummy yesterday afternoon. James and I were very excited! So was Arlo. He thought it was great. He laughed and giggled. He was very proud of himself you could tell. He is a funny little guy. He just loves to hear his own name spoken to him and smiles almost all the time. And he is pretty much too cute to resist and such a little snuggle bug. We all adore him, especially big brother James. They are just in love with each other. James can always make Arlo happy when he is upset. One day a shortly after Arlo was born, James said to us "Arlo is my best friend". He has such a wonderful heart that kid.

Anywhoo...Arlo is really trying now to roll the other way. I am not helping him at all because then that would mean that we have two mobile children. Watch out world!

Four Family Members, Two Weeks, One Truck, Three Thousand Miles...

Happy St. Patrick's Day! We arrived home from our epoch road trip this afternoon at just shy of 4:00. What a whirlwind. We had a most excellent time on our little adventure to see family and attend the wedding of a great old friend of mine. We saw many different landscapes, lots of family, and had tons on new experiences. But first things first...

In the car this afternoon, I was in the backseat with the boys and was talking to Arlo - telling him his name and he repeated it!!! Seriously. Repeated it. Sean and I were stunned. Even James heard it. So, I know he really didn't know what he was saying, but we thought it was super cool that he was able to mimic the sound that he was hearing. It was very, very cool. We also noted that when you say his name he looks at you. We think he does know that Arlo is his name. He also almost rolled over tonight for the first time. So close there!

Back to almost a month ago...Arlo weighed in at his four month appointment at 13 lbs, 12 oz. WOW! He also was 23 1/2 inches. Again - WOW! I wasn't crazy in thinking that he seemed so much heavier! Considering that he was born at 5, 4 and came home at 4 lb, 11 oz, I just can believe the size he is now. For reference, James was born a hearty 7 lbs, 11 oz and 21 1/2 inches. At his four month appointment he weighed 14 lbs even and was 24 inches long. Little A has just about made up the difference! Astonishing to me.

We have not really stopped moving since then! We left on our road trip two weeks ago today after a little drama with Bodie (he took himself on quite the adventure out on the town without a collar on on Friday the 2nd - luckily Sean posted an ad on Craigslist and the guy who found him had the great idea somehow to check the site! We really thought we would never see him again) at 6PM for quite the drive to Pocatello, ID in serious wind and black icy roads. I must say that I am married to a serious rock star when it comes to keeping cool and steady in tough situations driving. He is sooo good. I am a lucky girl, for that and many other reasons. We made it to Las Vegas the next night in time to schlep all of our gear (you should have seen us, it must have been quite the site) through the Treasure Island casino, make so PB&J sandwiches for dinner, and head out to see the volcano explode at the Mirage. Next up was the pirate show at the TI. At first James was scared and didn't want to watch it because he proclaimed that he was afraid of pirates. But when he say it was a bunch of scantily clad chicks shaking their booties he was super into it. Seriously. It starts this young. Three years old and 11 months. He was really into it. We were not.

The next day Sean took James to see the lions, tigers and dolphins at the Mirage while Arlo and I hit up Nordstroms. Fun was had by all. Then we took off after lunch across the desert to Palm Springs. We took the road less traveled and ventured on back roads across the Mojave National Preserve. Spectacular. So glad we did it. The road was full of whoopdie-do's which James loved and we even met up with Route 66 for about 10 miles. When we told him we were on 66 he instantly said "We need to find Doc Hudson" (from Cars). He was grinning ear to ear and thought it was so cool. We had a great time in Palm Springs thanks to the terrific room complements of Judy and Pat and their timeshare. The weather was good and we had a marvelous time at the wedding of one of my best friends from high school. It was a very small, intimate wedding of only 28 people at the most beautiful place the Korikia Pensione (www.korakia.com) in downtown Palm Springs. We highly recommend checking it out if you are ever in the area. Super cool place.

Next it was off to Orange County for the day and WONDERFUL visits with Auntie Barbie and Uncle Bob, Grammy and Papa, and Auntie Wheeze, Steven and Hayley. We enjoyed the day so much and it was nice to catch everyone even if all the visits were too short. We headed off from Auntie Wheezes house at about 9PM for Rory and Nicole's place in Santa Ynez. Driving through LA at night is SOOOO much easier and we made it to their house in less than three hours, even after making several wrong turns.

Our visit on the central coast with Rory, Nicole and Dad and Patty was terrific. Superb weather, great visits and good food. We all ate at Full of Life Flatbread on Friday night for a most excellent meal. Check it out if you are even in the Los Alamos area! James had a blast. Especially at Funpa's house doing "farm work". He kept asking Funpa to do the work. He collected eggs, fed the horses, picked fruit, and most importantly drove the tractor!!! Funpa let him steer all by himself. When Sean got on the tractor to take James for a ride, he had hardly sat down in the seat before James had the thing started up on his own and was lifting the bucked up to take off! It was so cool.

Next it was off to the Bay Area for a great visit with the family. We got to see all the Uhlenbrock families, which was very nice. Especially since Grandma was recovering from hip replacement surgery. We also had a terrific day playing with Jason and Jessica (and of course Jen and Jeff). The kids had a blast playing in the backyard and picking mandarins from Grandpa's tree, and even riding bikes in the street out front. They had a blast. James even said to me when going to sleep that night that he wished that we lived there so that he could play with Jason and Jessie every day. It was precious. I think he may have even had a tear in his eye. Tuesday, the rain began in time for us to head out to the coast. We tried to explore Point Reyes but only made it to Point Reyes Station where we ate at the Station House (www.stationhousecafe.com) which was AWESOME. Go there if you can. We also had a nice visit with our friend Kari. Then we were off to Truckee for a quick visit with friends and with Pat before heading back North on Friday.

Phew - did we get our miles in or what!!!