2 year pics

Kenna took Karsten's 2 year pictures and I couldn't be more thrilled with the outcome. It was a challenge to find a day for pics that wasn't super hot, but we lucked out with a morning when it wasn't 'tooo' hot. Karsten wasn't making it too easy on us with easily giving us smiles, but Kenna managed to capture some great expressions that represent his personality. Below are just a few of my favorites - I haven't figured how I am going to choose which ones go on my walls!

Helpful note for all of you other photo loving moms out there. If your child loves balloons, DON'T start with balloon pics unless 1. you want the balloons in a LOT of your pictures OR 2. you want an unhappy kid when you try to take the balloons away. After a while with the balloons we managed to distract him with another toy, whew!

What a great smile - love the dimple and the blue eyes!

He had lots of fun on these steps - I think Kenna took a ton of pictures here to get a few great ones!

We took a snack break and our snack spot ended up being a great spot for some pictures. He had a good time waving at the cars driving by on the street.


He was ready to explore some more after his snack break. Kenna saved the morning by bringing a snack he had never had before - dried mangos. YUM!

I love this one of him playing with his train on these steps.

Yes, those baby blues are just as irresistible as they look here. And he already knows how to work them.

In this one I feel like he's looking at us like 'What?!"

PEEK-A-BOO! I love how you can see so much excitement in his face!

I just love this one!

I think this was one of the last ones Kenna took. The grafitti behind him was so colorful but he was done with standing still. You can tell he's starting to get a little hot as his cheeks are getting pink. I think it's a great picture.

Hi Pigs!

Karsten has recently become enamored with his piggy banks. He likes 'feeding' the pigs so we've been hunting down all of the change in our house so he can feed the pigs each day. He moved the pigs onto this table and the other morning while I was getting ready for work I heard him talking to the pigs. I snuck up behind him and heard him say 'hi pigs, what doing pigs'.

Red high heels

Karsten loves to wear our shoes. He'll find a pair of my shoes or a pair of Scott's shoes and walk all around in them, he's usually pretty proud of himself when he does that. Lately, his favorite pair of my shoes are my red high heels. I think he loves to walk around in them because they make so much noise as he walks around on the tile floor.

The other morning he was walking around in my shoes and said 'mow in mommy's red shoes'. I quickly grabbed my phone because I knew this would be a photo opp to preserve!

I think he'll love me for this one when he's in high school, don't you? :)

Painting with Daddy

We're beginning the room preparations for the new baby, and part of those preparations include painting a new room for Karsten because the baby is going to move into Karsten's current room. I knew I wanted a green color that would match Karsten's current bedding; however, green proved to be a hard color to match. In the first picture, you can see snippets of the various green paints we tried. We finally landed on a nice, light yellowish green. Those little paint samples are the greatest invention!

Karsten was fascinated with the ladder. We let him climb it if one of us was there to hold it for him. We convinced him that someone always had to hold the ladder at the bottom, so when Scott got on it, Karsten held the bottom of the ladder for him.

Moving 'daddy's paint' for him. Don't you love the outfit? I couldn't find an outfit that was ok to get paint on, so I settled on a pair of PJs that he had just outgrown. :)

Karsten said 'uh oh mommy, mess my arm!" Turns out Karsten helps paint much like I do, we end up with as much paint on ourselves as we have on the wall.

He had a hard time remembering not to touch the walls with his hands or by leaning up against them. We asked him to touch the wet walls so many times that he started to say "no touch daddy's walls, messsss"

Each time we paint or do something in the room we talk about how he's getting a new room - hopefully this will get him excited. I'm sure it will still be an adjustment, but hopefully we're helping it make sense to him as we do things in baby steps.

Well I never...

I'm learning that Grandparents REALLY do allow the grandkids to do things that they would have never allowed their kids to do.

Exhibit 2,761: drinking melted ice cream from a bowl. This was NEVER acceptable when I was growing up. Now - grandma suggested Karsten drink the melted ice cream.

Yup, there she is encouraging him. :)

He was pretty proud of himself.

Just like daddy

Karsten and Scott were laying on the floor playing with this bead toy. Scott had his head resting on his hand and Karsten kept trying to lay just like Scott. He layed down and tried to figure out how to put his arm like Daddy's. He never quite figured out how to prop up his head - this was as close as he got!

Don't you love the slippers with shorts?

Salsa and a Cowboy Hat

We stopped by our favorite Mexican restaurant for dinner and Karsten immediately dug into the chips. As soon as he saw us dipping our chips in salsa, he started doing the same thing. He loves anything and everything with 'dip'. Yellow dip (aka mustard) seems to be his favorite but he's also a fan of red one dip (aka Ketchup).

As Scott started cutting Karsten's enchilada, Karsten picked up his fork and started wiggling it around in his food. I'm sure to him, it looks like we're just waiving our silverware around when we cut his food.

While we were eating, a guy walked in wearing a cowboy hat. Karsten was excited and said Hat!! Scott said 'yep, it's a cowboy hat'. That was the last of the cowboy hat conversation at the restaurant.

When we got home, Karsten said 'where my hat boy hat'. It took us a minute to realize that he was trying to say cowboy hat. We convinced him that his hat was like a 'hat boy hat' which made him happy and he wore it all over the house for the rest of the evening.