The McPherson Chronicles

We invited our friends and family over for an afternoon birthday party before Halloween Trick-or-Treating. It was a fun, hot afternoon of pumpkin painting, eating, cake, costumes and our friends and family. Thank you for everyone who came to celebrate Andrew. It was such a fun day! Pumpkins from Kevin's work contest Auntie Sarah & Baby James Robin got sleepy Donald Trump

October 30th we celebrated Andrew's second birthday! The girls were so excited all week and kept reminding him "It's almost your birthday!" He wasn't really into it mostly because birthday to him just means cake and he didn't see a cake anywhere in the house but also because he wasn't feeling well. He got a fever and slight congestion the day before his birthday. Luckily it cleared up in time to really celebrate at his party on Saturday (more on that in a separate post). We had a good day with a small celebration on his actual birthday. He got to open his presents from us and the girls and loved his toy vacuum, music player, books, coloring books and cars. The girls and I picked up a small cake at the store and we had his favorite turkey taco dinner followed by delicious cake and ice cream. Playing with his birthday balloons Before sisters headed off to school Being sicky requires extra Mama cuddles He LOVED it and promptly "v...

What a busy weekend! The girls' school had their annual Fall Festival on Friday night. It was a lot of fun and nice and warm so we stayed the whole time. There was food, games, a fire truck, ambulance and police car. The girls loved seeing their teachers and friends and playing all the games. Their favorite things were the tricycle racing and hula hoop contest. Even Andrew got in on the hula hooping fun! In the fire truck Saturday was our church's Trunk-or-Treat and Lizzy, Liam and James came to join us along with Grandma, Grandpa and Nana. It was the first time we got to put on Halloween costumes which of course was super exciting. Lucy is a purple cat, Olivia is a witch and Andrew is a member of Odd Squad (his favorite TV show). Most people don't recognize what Andrew is and cleverly one man called him Donald Trump which was perfect and totally made us laugh. If he loses his Odd Squad badge we're just going to tell people he's Donald Trump. A...

My sister reminded me about the game Andrew (and she) made up on the long drive up to Santa Cruz. We call it "Potato!" and it's very easy. Andrew takes whatever he wants (typically blanket, lovie, toy, book or shoe) yells "Potato!" and throws it on the ground. Everyone laughs, he gets the items back and then it repeats. They laughed and played this game randomly throughout the trip. We even began using it like a verb, "Here's your sandwich but don't potato it!"  When you're driving for 13 hours you get desperate and amused by even the silliest of games. Potato!

My cousin Stephanie got married this past weekend in Los Gatos and I'm so happy we were able to go. We had a brutal 13 hour drive up there on Friday. Yes, 13 hours!! It was supposed to take 6-7 but due to a mudslide closing the 5 freeway, everyone had to take the 101 and it was stop and go traffic for a majority of the trip. The kids were phenomenal. No one freaked out, no meltdowns, we had plenty of snacks and there was no fighting. It definitely could have been way worse. Thank goodness Aunt Mary rode with us so she could entertain and pass out snacks and drinks. We had a lot of fun going to downtown Santa Cruz for some shopping on Saturday and loved seeing all the Redwoods on the drive there and back. We stopped for lunch in downtown Los Gatos before it was time to get ready for the wedding. Everything was so cute and I loved the cooler, fall weather.   After nearly missing the wedding due to incorrect map directions on both of our phones, we finally found the cut...

Just a quick update. Andrew has been in Pull ups now since Friday and he is still telling us when he has to go potty and having success. Seems like he wants to keep up the potty training, at least at our house. In other news, he's in full on terrible two's... and he's not even two yet. He is testing the limits with "no" to everything, tantrums, hitting and throwing. Ignoring him seems to be the most successful so far. His favorite go-to the past couple of days is laying down on the ground in defiance. When we left my parents on Friday night we got outside and then he decided he didn't want to go so he lay on their front porch while the girls and I loaded up the car. He didn't want to go back inside and he didn't want to go home. He finally caved when we all got in the car like we were leaving. This evening he asked for water and when I got that ready he threw himself on the floor yelling, "No water." Then he asked for milk so I switched gea...

Long story short, we're giving it a break. Andrew knows what to do and is pretty good at home for me and Kevin. He is dry most nights and naps at our house. But, and this is a big but, he refuses to cooperate with the program for Grandma and Grandpa. I don't know why he resists it so much over there or if he's just not interested unless he's at home, but it was wearing them down and that wasn't worth it to us. The last thing I want is Andrew dreading going to Grandma and Grandpa's house because of all this. He was starting to act out at their house by hitting and throwing which I'm sure was his way of venting frustration. I just don't understand how he can be terrible about using the potty all day at their house, come home and ask to go potty, do his thing and then be dry all night just to do it all wrong the next day at their house again. It baffles us all. Rather than continue to push it and have them deal with the bad behavior we're going to go to...