Wordless Wednesday

Start of Summer

Memorial weekend always signifies the start of our summer at the lake.  This year was no different.  We loaded up and despite the gale force winds we still had a great time.

Corbin played around, threw some rocks, bravely went in for a cool swim, and rode in the boat. 

This is the start of summer…yahoo!

Animals Beware

Apparently Corbin has begun potty training…with his stuffed animals. 

We were playing in his room with his animals, when he promptly turned over Kangaroo and announced that Kangaroo had a poopy.  I encouraged him to run Kangaroo to the potty (of course!).

I’m  happy to announce Kangaroo made it…just in time;)

So once Kangaroo went successfully on the potty all the other animals needed to go as well, so said Corbin.

Corbin would turn over the animals and look at their bottom.  Here Giraffe is getting a quick check…yup it’s potty time.  Oh my!

And it’s logical that once all the animals have pottied that they all climb into the sink and have community bath time!?! 

Disregarding the odd bath situation, Corbin proved to be a patient, kind, caring, and responsible potty trainer.  I hope that I can follow in his footsteps when I begin the process with Corbin!

Some Firsts…

On Monday Corbin had his first experience with paints.  A friend came by and brought paint supplies and we let Corbin have at it. 

He took to the paints right away.  Much to my surprise he dipped his little fingers right in there and begin smearing away.  However, once he discovered the brushes next to the paints he decided that those were a better option and his hands needed to be wiped right away;)  Ahh, love my little neat and tidy guy.

Here’s his finished project:

Then today he had another first…not such a good one.  Corbin has been testing limits and wanting to discover more and more for himself.  He has been told repeatedly not to touch the stove when I’m cooking because it is hot.  He’s always done a great job respecting that, until today.  I was making him a quesadilla for lunch and out of the blue he comes running into the kitchen and grabs the hot pan.

Ouch!!

He of course was stunned and upset by what happened, but his hand seems to be doing fine.

Although I never wanted this to happen I hope that now he truly understands what “hot” means and why we don’t touch the stove.

Well, some firsts are good and some firsts are bad, but having firsts both good and bad are part of life.  So Corbin just had a chance to experience and grow a little bit more this week.

Steak Lover

This evening we had steak for dinner.  Corbin was so excited!  He waited at the door for it to come off the grill and in the house.  Once on his plate, he devoured his first helping and then asked for more.  Once his second helping was on the plate, I kid you not, he leaned down and “hugged” his steak and then gave it multiple kisses.  Wow, that’s showing your food some love:)

Accolades

Lately, when Corbin has been awakening from his naps he will lay in his crib and say the alphabet, count his numbers, or sing a song.  After he completes one of the above items he gives himself an enormous round of applause, a huge “yea!”, and then often a “good job!”  And I do mean these are loud claps, hollers of "yea”, and shouts of “good job”…nothing timid about his shouts of praise for himself;)

Yes, he’s already developing a healthy self-esteem:)  That’s good, there’s nothing wrong with giving yourself some claps and cheers for a song well sung or the alphabet well said. 

I applaud you Corbin for cheering on yourself when no one else is around to do that.  I hope you always continue to do that!

Wordless Wednesday and Sidenote

I’m so thankful Wordless Wednesdays exist because without those I would have one less day in my blog books:)  We’ve been busy and I’ve just lost some motivation to blog…yikes!  I think my school classes are just zapping me.  It was a tough spring semester and the summer semester, although it’s just begun, is going to be full of assignments and readings.  So to my few and faithful blog readers, the blogging might be slowing down for awhile (as I’m sure you’ve noticed) but at least we’ll always have wordless Wednesday (we hope:).

Lemurs, Lions, and Birds…oh my!

We headed to a nearby zoo (that we had never been to before) with Grandma and Grandpa Saturday morning and we had some great close up encounters with animals.

First, we spotted the giraffes and headed in that direction.  We were lucky: they were feeding them!  Corbin made quick friends with this baby giraffe.  She wanted to show Corbs some love!

Then it was off to see the birds.  Oh the birds, specifically the Lorikeets. We went into the cage and I had no idea how “friendly” they would be.  They were not afraid to perch on an arm, shoulder, or even your head.  Grandma decided we should feed them, which brought over even more friendly birds…yippee;)  At this point no bird had touched me, but it seemed inevitable that it would not stay this way so I retreated to the outside of the cage where safety  awaited me.

We saw many other great animals such as rhinos, monkeys (although Chris continually corrected us b/c they were really gibbons. They looked like monkeys to Corbin and I so we stuck with that), kangaroos, and alligators.

There was an interactive part of the zoo which Corbin adored.  He got in with the rabbits and made it his mission to gently touch each one. 

Then he climbed in with the turtles to inspect their shells.

And finally the guinea pigs, but he just referred to them as “pigs”.  Umm, hope that doesn’t confuse him;) 

Finally we ended that area with a camel ride…and I rode with Corbin!  It was my first camel ride and although I was a little nervous at first it was totally fun and I would do it again!  Corbin and I had a blast on Charlie the Camel…thanks Charlie, I’ll see you again.

The day ended with the tiger exhibit and the lemurs.  The tigers were super exciting, yet a little intimidating to Corbin.  He would giggle in excitement and then let out a yelp in fear…cute boy. 

Then the lemur exhibit came.  Corbin had been talking about them all day.  Grandma had introduced the word “lemur” to him in the morning and promised we would see them.  Corbin would repeat the word “lemur” and then laugh and laugh.  But, when we finally got to the lemurs it seemed they liked him more then Corbin liked them.  Don’t take it personally lemurs, maybe just try to temper your excitement and not act like you like someone so much upon first introductions.  Crawling on laps and jumping around people doesn’t make for the best first impressions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We had an amazing animal adventure.  Thanks Grandma and Grandpa!

Scraped for the Very First Time

Chris’ company held a family picnic at the zoo this weekend.  Corbin of course loved it!  He had a great time looking at all the animals and eating his nachos in celebration of Cinco de Mayo.

It was all going well until we got to the penguin exhibit.  Corbin was excitedly running up and down following the penguins as they swam across the water when he stumbled, fell, and skinned his knee.

This is the first time he’s had a skinned knee. (See picture below.  This was taken when we got home. It’s a tiny skinned knee, it didn’t bleed much, but it’s his first so it’s blog worthy;)

It’s the first time Corbin has seen blood.  He didn’t cry too much, he was more curious about why his knee was red. 

After a few hugs and kisses he was good to go and we continued our zoo adventure.  However, throughout the evening and even into the next day he would look at his knee and ask “why red?”  He was very curious and perplexed by his red knee.

And because the zoo picnic was on Cinco de Mayo they gave the kids hats (that he would only keep on for seconds) and because he looked so cute in it I will leave you with pictures of the cuteness:)