puzzles and playing around the house

I bought Harrison a 24 piece puzzle. I don't know what I was thinking. I know the packaging says 3+ but I knew he liked to do puzzles and he needs to start using his brain in other ways then baby toys and baby puzzles. He was thrilled to see the thing. But then the logistics part starting showing up. He still has issues with his hand eye coordination. Yes, I know that this is something that will help that. But he gets frustrated very easily if things aren't going his way. Not to mention he doesn't care what the picture is, he's too busy cramming and shoving any and every puzzle piece into the puzzle which would be frustrating. I need to work on my patience. I never lost my cool but I still had that antsy feeling, like "Really Harrison? can you not see that that piece is NOT going to work in that spot?" It took everything I had in me to not just put the thing together all by myself and put the thing away. Of course I helped him and he started to understand. And after what felt like hours of cramming and shoving puzzles pieces and a couple of meltdowns, the finished product would be before our eyes. And then Harrison would look up at me and say "more, more mama?" and dump the puzzle over again. To which the cycle would continue. We did the puzzle probably 5 times until I was finally able to divert his attention to some other project. My nerves couldn't handle the thing anymore. We haven't brought it out since but I know I have to face my fear and calm my nerves and let the kid learn. This mothering thing is harder than I would have ever imagined.

Carter's starting to free stand and it's AMAZING! lol. I know it's just standing but I find it crazy that every day he's getting braver and braver. I can't imagine him every walking. He's still pretty shaky and he seems to have no motivation to actually try and walk when I stand him up against the couch. He now has a turbo speed. Something Matthew and I nicknamed it. He can crawl pretty fast but if he wants to go even faster, he puts his head down and trucks on even faster. It's totally cute.

Trying to make the best of things

I guess one of the things I don't want to do is sulk around the house. So, I'm trying my hardest to get out and about with the boys and let them see and do fun and new things. Monday evening we took them to the island and had a bbq picnic at the park. A little buggy and it would have been nicer if the wind would have been blowing more but we did pretty good. With much hesitation on my part, Matthew convinced me to take the boys on the pier to see a big cargo boat leaving the port. Harrison loved watching the big boat. Matthew got him to try and get the boat to honk (which of course they always do when they're going through the sound) but Harrison's eyes lit up when the huge ship let out a deep blast.

Today, Wednesday, I ran some errands and Jen came along with us. We ended up at Chicfila for lunch and Harrison had a blast. It's the day before school and all the kids are having their last minute fun before open house this afternoon. The place was pretty busy, as usual. But, with the heat index it's 110 degrees outside today so it's the perfect place to have lunch with kids and let them run around like hoodlum children in the air conditioned playhouse/room. Harrison's always a little timid in the play room. He's never made it past the first three steps of the fort. It's pretty tall with a enclosed slide, which is a BIG no for him. But, there were children running and playing around him and it rubbed off. He was so excited that he climbed higher than ever before, then he realized that he couldn't see me anymore and he didn't know how to get down. I asked a little boy named Bradley, who was "bout to start kin-de-garden" to try and help Harrison out. Him and a friend climbed to the top and one pushed his rear and the other pulled his arms. Harrison found this delightful and laughed during the whole process. Finally they convinced him to get in a caterpillar line down the slide with a bunch of other kids. The squeals and chuckles coming from the slide was hilarious. The look on Harrison's face when he crawled out of the slide with 5 other small children was priceless. I was glad he was finally down. He comes up to me and taps his fingers together and looks up with his big blue eyes and says "more, more, please" So, the kids were good sports and they played with Harrison for the remainder of our lunch. It was so nice to see him playing with other children and just being a kid. Made me a little sad but mostly proud that he's growing up to be such a pretty and playful little boy.

August came from no where

It's August and I can't believe it. Seems like we literally just had Harrison's birthday party. But, it's now apparent that I need to get into full swing of planning Carter's 1st birthday party. *sigh* He's too little to be one already.... Since plans have changed, we're now not going to Cocoa Beach, we will be having a little family get together with cake and ice cream at our house. I think I found a cake I like at Walmart, which is shocking. No particular theme. I like 1st birthdays to just be able turning one and not necessarily mickey mouse or Winnie the Pooh, eck. Hopefully this week will go by fast. I hate it when Matthew has drill weekend. It's too long of a stretch of me being home alone with the boys. It's getting so unbearably hot here these days that we're cooped up in the house for days, it seems. I am excited that Matthew starts college next week. Seems like it's been a long and detailed process for him but I'm glad all the pieces are falling into place.