Happy Birthday Bryce!

Dear Bryce.

Happy 2nd birthday to you! I can't think of any other way to describe you, but pure joy. You have blessed us beyond words over these past two years. We have so much fun with you. It's amazing how easy it is to make you laugh, but also how easy it is for you to make us laugh. You make the funniest little jokes, faces and dances.

What are you up to at the age of 2? I'm glad you asked. Your vocabulary this past month has soured. You put so many words together, it's becoming so easy to understand what's going on in that sweet little head. You can repeat words now, so we're starting to hear all sorts of fun things. My favorite phrase so far? "Mommy... go, go, go, bobby". Which I believe means, "Mom, go get me some barbecue". Which, seems to be your favorite food so far. You ask for bobby at just about every meal.
I can't wait until you start eating vegetables after you second birthday : ). You're a little on the picky side. You can sense if something is in the fruit/vegetable genre from a mile away, and turn up your nose and say "noooo". Dietitian Mama is cracking down now that you're 2, Mister!

Last week you started saying "I love Daddy" and "I love Mommy". Absolutely adorable. You are also a big hugger and kisser. You love to hug Chris, and sometimes they turn into a little bit of a tackle. You are also all about the kisses. You like to give one on each cheek, and then love to smack a big one on the lips! You really like to play with other kids. You especially want to play with all of the big kids that Chris hangs out with!

It's easy to tell you're going to be super athletic. You're fast. Like not too long until you're faster than mom fast. You still love balls. You still can't say ball (you call them "catch, catch"). You can catch and throw amazingly well. Today we were walking home and you went to the field and started kicking your foot, saying "Catch, catch"(your word for ball). I think you were telling me you wanted me to get you a ball immediately : ).

Sleeping is still not your strongest suit. More nights than not you get up in the middle of the night. It's usually different things that you need. One week you insisted on peeing in the potty. This week? Muffin Man. Yes, you need us to sing you "Do you know the muffin man?" a few times to relax. You're an excellent napper, so I'll give you credit for that one.

One of your very favorite things to do is read. You could sit on the big chair and read for hours. You know some letters when we point to them, most letters are T and B. You can count, as long as we're only going up to 2 : ). Your favorite color is yellow, and you call every color you see yellow.

You really love your brother. It's amazing how you imitate absolutely everything he does. You want to be just like him. Your brother really loves you too. He includes you in everything he talks about. I really don't think he can remember a time before you. I love what good friend you two are becoming. We are so lucky to have you in our family, Bryce!

We love you so much!
Mom & Dad

Bryce's birthday

We had so much fun celebrating Bryce's 2nd birthday today! 

We started with birthday bagels. 

After we dropped Chris off at school, it was Bryce's turn for Toys R Us. Here's his happy birthday balloon and crown!

We had to do the ferris wheel! Bryce was really excited (not that you can tell from this picture : ).

Here's his happy (but a bit blurry) face.

Then, it was toy time! We have the tradition of letting the kids pick out their own presents on their birthday. This has nothing to do with me being unprepared for the big day : ). Bryce scoured the whole store. It was hilarious. He would hold one toy, see something different, and then hand me the old toy and pick something else up. He was very excited about the plastic animals.

He was also a fan of the Duplos. This picture makes me laugh. He started out looking at a small set. He  would look over and see another bigger set, and then another. This is where he ended. Sorry bud, no way is that fitting in the cab with us on the way home!

Here are a couple of photo ops in time square. Total chaos! Of course we were there after the Cookie monster incident. We were having to fight off costumed people left and right. 

Could he be any cuter?

We made a quick stop at the diner on the way home for some silver dollar pancakes.

Conan took half the day off, and picked up Chris from school. When they got home, it was present time. Bryce was pretty excited to unwrap all of the presents he had just picked out!

This picture is very deceiving. It looks as if Chris and Bryce were peacefully playing with Bryce's new Duplos. They were not. Bryce wanted to build a super tall tower. Chris wanted to build the cars exactly how they were on the box. It wasn't a pretty sight. No worries. They each got a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle figurine that could beat each other up, and all was solved!

Bryce's current favorite food is Bobby (bbq). We took him to Blue Smoke. He wasn't a huge fan of their sausage this time, but ate his weight in mac and cheese. 

They had the boys decorate a cookie before the meal, and they cooked it while we were eating. After we finished they brought it back out and we sang Bryce Happy Birthday. 

When we got home it was dance party time with Dad!

And a little tickle box!

Time for bed! Bryce definitely caught on by the end of the day! He kept saying Happy, Happy, and then he would say "two!"

So sweet! We had a wonderful day with out little two year old! We love you Bryce!

Spring break!

We had a fabulous spring break. I can't believe how quickly it's gone! I'm going to work from today backwards, because I think it might be easier to remember each day. We fit a lot in!
Today we went to City Treehouse. It's one of our favorite play spaces. There's a treehouse that the kids can run around in and slide down.

The water table! 

Bryce loved the slide!

During the day on Friday we went to the playground with Chris' best girl friend: Abigail, and best boy friend: Luke (these are his labels : ). It was gorgeous outside. We were probably out there four hours. We even had a picnic!

We went to one of our favorite pizza places last night, Patsy's. The boys were fans.

Bryce and I liked it too!

On Thursday morning we went to the diner down the street for silver dollar pancakes. Here's Chris' serious face. 

Pancakes were my bribe for what was about to happen. Chris has had a broken blood vessel on his face since he was about 2. It's progressively gotten larger, and we were told it would never go away. We decided now was a good time to get it removed. They were able to laser it off, but ask Chris, it didn't feel very good. Bryce had the same one growing in the exact same spot as Chris (they are like twins, born 3 years apart!), so I decided to get that one taken off too. I learned the second time around, and stuck a lollipop in his mouth the second they did the laser. Bryce didn't even notice any pain, he was so excited about the sugar!

Our bribe afterwards was Johnny Rockets with Dad by his work. So fun!

On Tuesday Chris and his friend Asher, and Bryce and his friend, Noah,  went to the transit museum.  We rode the subway there, which may have been the best part for these guys. Asher may like trains just as much as Chris, which is a lot. His favorite Yankee player is the same. They were meant to be BFF's!

They loved the turnstile exhibit in the museum. They had turnstiles from all of the different decades.  

 We stumbled upon a show about Grand Central. I was thinking it was going to be a movie. No, it was this amazing singing/dancing production celebrating Grand Central's 100th birthday. We all learned so much, and it held the boy's attention the whole time.

The downstairs has all of the different trains from different years. The kids ran from one to another to another. 

Bryce taking a little break. 

They also have real buses that can be "driven". We left the driving up to the almost two year olds!

While we were at the transit museum, Aunt Buggy was having a baby! We were underground, and when we came back above we got a text saying she had just had baby Layla! We were over the moon! She is so precious, and we can't wait to meet her in person!

Okay, last day! On Monday we went to Pie face. This is a new restaurant that makes everything in pie form. If you know me, you know this was my choice for the restaurant. I love pie! We had different types of savory pies, and then we split a chocolate pie. Bryce ate every bit of his bbq pie, and then woke up from his nap saying, "I want Bobby". Delicious!

Here's us at the Museum of Math. We love this place! 

Chris' creation!



We had an amazing spring break! Thanks for sharing ALL of the details with us. I promise a shorter post next time!

Car show!

Last weekend we went to the car show with Lauren and Ty. The boys had a blast. The grown ups even got to have a complete conversation when the boys locked themselves in the back seat for a while (we were able to get in through the front, no worries!)