Let's Chat

Bryson has been talking SO much this Summer. I've been blown away with how many words he adds to his vocabulary on a daily basis. It's so fun!!

Almost every morning this Summer, we played with sidewalk chalk in the backyard. We drew all sorts of pictures, but his favorite thing was always for me to spell and write his name. He would "trace" over the letters and repeat the letters.

Now, he spells his name all the time. I'm not sure why he leaves out the "y" but he can't quite put that letter in there yet.  He even does it all on him own playing around the house or driving in the car ;-)

He also REALLY likes to count. Most of the time he'll count along with us and say. "(no one yet) do, dee, (no four), eye, dik, eyeye, eigh, nine, teh!" He didn't get all the numbers in the video, but still, it's precious!

I've taken a lot of videos of him recently. I go back to work tomorow and it's killing me to know that I'm not going to be home with him all day anymore. :(  At least I can watch him on my phone whenever I need a little pick-me-up.

Family Vacation. The kind where everything goes wrong.

{Caution: read at your own risk. May not be suitable for the queezy stomach.}

After a fun couple days in Houston, it was time for our first family vacation!! We woke up Saturday morning, ate breakfast with my family and then left for Galveston. My aunt and grandma gave us a few "just in case" items as we were walking out. One of them was meat tenderizer and alcohol (that we've always used on bee/ant/jellyfish stings) and also a bottle of maalox (to get rid of the pain of sunburn). I took them "just in case",  and we jumped in the car and headed  South.

We decided to go to Stewart Beach. It's a nice, family friendly beach with lifeguards, outdoor showers and restrooms and a couple shops. The beach was busy. Very busy. There were people everywhere! Next to the building with the restrooms and showers, there was a massive inflatable slide set up and a couple of guys sitting under an umbrella manning the station. {this is important to know for later. :) }

We unpacked the massive amounts of beach gear and found our spot in the sand. The weather was so nice (92) and was a nice break from the 110 temps in Dallas. The only thing that was hot was the sand. And it was HOT!!  Bryson, of course, sprinted straight into the "wawa" and belly flopped into the water. He LOVED splashing around!!  It was soo funny to watch him belly flop face first into the water, splash around, stand back up and then do it all over again!! Michael and I had so much fun watching Bryson enjoy himself so much :)

He even loved the sand. He spent quite a while filling up and emptying his bucket.

We played a little catch. But he wanted to go run around with older kids that were playing soccer.

We enjoyed ourselves for about 3 hours.

Swimming, splashing, playing in the sand, drinking lots of juice, and watching the birds. Everything was going so perfect...

until....

Around 1:00, I asked Michael to go checkout the big building with the showers to see if there was A/C and just to see what was there. I was going to take Bryson back down to the water to swim and I noticed that he was standing a little funny {like he needed to go to the bathroom}. I figured his feet were hot or something, even through he was standing on a blanket, so I picked him up and carried him to the water. He said "momma, oh no" on the way to the water, but I didn't really think anything of it. His toes barely touched the water when I noticed yellow stuff was dripping down. I looked down at him and realized he had a massived explosive diahrrea poop that flew straight out of his swim diaper. I'm talkin': up his back to his neck, down both sides of his legs, ALL over my stomach and down my legs. It was BAD. I swooped him up and all I could think to do was to run to the building (where Michael was) and wash him off in the shower. But, to  get there, I had to run through the hundreds of beach-goers that were looking at both of us with the utmost disgust. I never thought to run back to our umbrella to get my shoes or clothes, or a diaper--I just bolted straight to the building. At fist, it was no big deal, but after a minute or two of running through white fire, I was on the verge of tears; my feet were SO hot. Bryson was screaming bloody murder at this point and yelling, "momma, oh no. OH NO!!" the entire way. Several minutes later, I got to the inflatable slide, with the umbrella. I stood in the shade for a brief  second. I kept my back to the guys manning the slide so they couldn't see us covered in yellow goo, but i know, without a doubt, they could smell it. With Bryson still screaming, I look down and realize my swimsuit top broke and is literally hanging on by a thread. Bryson, of course, yanked on it.

So, at this point, I'm fighting back tears because of  my burning feet, both of us are completely covered in poop, my swimsuit top is about to fly open, Bryson is screaming and pulling on my barely there swimsuit top and Michael....well, Michael has absolutely no idea any of this has ever happened.

I finally spot him as he leisurely walks down the steps of the building. I  started running as fast as I could and as I sprinted past him, I yelled, "Bryson just pooped EVERYWHERE!" He dashed back to our umbrella to get my shoes and a diaper. I ran straight into the bathroom and yanked off his clothes and wiped him down with toilet paper. I realized he had 2 massive welps on the inside of his thighs, right under his diaper. :(  I had no idea what they were at this point; I just knew that if I touched them, he shot off and had more diahrrea. After I washed him off, and Michael brought me my shoes and the extra diaper, he ran back at full speed and packed up all of our massive ammounts of stuff all by him self. He was amazing. Oh, what I would give to have apicture of that!! Ha!

So, it's 1:15 at this point. All of this happened in a 15 minute time span! Michael drives the car up to get us, I set B in his car seat and he conks out before we even leave the beach grounds. I sent a picture of his legs to my dad and he thought it was a jellyfish sting which caused an alergic reaction with the instant, awful diahrrea. Thankfully, my Grandma and aunt were prepared and we had the meat tenderizer with us. We couldn't check into our hotel until 3:00, so we drove around Galveston for a couple hours.

We check in to the hotel, unpack the car, and get to our room. And our keys don't work. Great. Just add that to the list.  B is fussy and we're totally blocking the hall with all of our junk. Michael runs to get a worker and after messing with the door for a while, we finally get in our room. We all shower off and get clean and I decided to put the meat tenderizer and alcohol on his legs. He screamed bloody murder for a while and I just couldn't take it anymore, so I poured a bottle of water all over his legs to get it off. Seriously, I'm feeling like the worst mother in the world right now.

Even though it hurt like crazy, it seemed to help his legs. He started acting like himself again!!  We all got ready to go to The Strand for dinner. Michael had just finished ironing his shirt (see, I told you he was amazing!!) and we were putting up the ironing board and Bryson climbed up on the bed, stood up and tried to lean against Michael, but completely missed. So, just adding to the list AGAIN, he fell off and did a little side roll and hit his head on the leg of the ironing boad. He didn't cry or anything, but he has quite a battle wound from that little fall.

And that, Ladies and Gentlemen, is the end of our terrible, horrible, no good, 4 hour unending streak of bad luck.  {Phew}

We headed over to The Strand to eat dinner. We ate at a really fun place called Fisherman's Wharf. Bryson loved the boat in the water right behind our table. The food was delicious and it had such a fun atmosphere :)

We tried to go back to the beach in front of our hotel on Sunday morning, but we were only there for about 15  minutes when Bryson said, "Momma, ah duh" (all done).

We packed up and drove back to Houston to eat lunch my Grandma, Aunt and Uncle. It was fun to see them again and tell them about the trip that went terribly wrong! Haha. Then, to split up the drive again on the way back, we stopped at the lake again since my parents, sister and BIL were there. It was good for B to get out some energy!! :)

Even after this crazy crazy family vacation, we're still looking forward to many many more to come in the years ahead. It's times like these that make fun memories! :)

Houston!

A while back, Michael and I decided we wanted to take Bryson to the beach for the first time. Michael was busy at work, so Bryson and I traveled to Houston a few days early to spend time with my Grandma, Aunt and Uncle. It was so wonderful!

I was a little nervous about driving the whole way to Houston with Bryson because, recently, he gets super antsy in his carseat. So, I had my "busy bag" packed and ready for him

To break up the drive a little, we spent the night at the lake house Wednesday night at Richland Chambers.

It was a nice break, but we had the most sleepless, restless night. Bryson slept in the bed with me for the first time...and last time. It was awful. I woke up every 15 minutes worried that be was going to roll off the bed, even with pillows on the edge. And, I had a right to be worried, because he did fall off!! Thankfully, I put tons of huge pillows on the ground. {Just wait; this is nothing compared to the rest of our first family vacation...} 

This is what kept me awake the next morning on the rest of the drive to Houston!!

This is what kept Bryson SOO entertained!! (toy computer and DVD player)

He played with the tape for about an hour!!

He also took apart and put the bottle back together for about 45 minutes. He loves taking things apart and putting them back together!!

We finally made it and had the BEST time!! Bryson loved seing everyone and was spoiled to pieces by them.

If I told you he was being a ham for them, it would be the understatement of the week!! He did anything and everything to impress them. Including about 30 front rolls :)  He would always look around to make sure everyone was clapping for him. Especialy my Grandma (GiGi) he really wanted her to watch and clap for him, it was so cute!!

My Granddad caught a sailfish quite a while back and it's hanging in their dining room. Bryson loved going in to look at the fish. He tried to run in there often to look at it :)

My Grandma, Aunt and Uncle played with Bryson all day long, and he ate up all the attention!!

On Friday, we all went to the Houston Aquarium. It  was soo much fun!! My grandma wasn't able to make it, and she was missed for sure. It was fun to go home and tell her all about it :)

It was a really neat place. Not only is it an amazing aquarium (with tigers!), but also has a restaurant, had a mini carnival outside and a train ride through a fun shark tunnel.

This tiger paced the window and wanted to eat.Bryson.for.lunch. ;)

B went on his first ferris wheel ride!

The Shark tunnel was great!!

It was such a fun 2 days with our family!! We already can't wait to see them again!!

Michael drove down Friday night after work and we were very ready for our first family vacation the next morning!!!

{Little did we know what the weekend had in store for us....}