::::::Warning...this is a ridiculously long blog that summarizes my summer. Read at your own risk and leisure! If you don't make it though, I don't blame you :) I really just like to do this so that I remember things that happen as Rex is growing but welcome and love readers! Happy reading! ::::::
So my little Rex will be 20 months old in just 5 days. That leaves only 4 months until I have a two year old!! Whoa...that was weird typing that out! A two year old! It's funny because, he still seems like my baby. I guess I really am beginning to understand why our parents say we will always be their baby. He's still my baby baby to me...but he definitely has grown quite a bit in the last few weeks!
Our summer came to and end Sunday night since I went back to work yesterday. It was definitely a bittersweet thing. I was really ready to go back to work. I do not function well at home. I don't like to stay at home. I LOVE being off to be with Rex and spending that time with him but I don't like physically being at home all day. I knew it before and have said it before and I'll say it again: I would be the worst housewife EVER! I get very lazy and can literally do nothing all day because whatever needs to be done can be done "later" since I have time but "later" never comes and I end up doing nothing. I'm not proud of the woman I become in the summer! When I'm at work, I'm in work mode and I know I only have x amount of time to get things done so, they get done. Hats off to the mommy's who have the motivation to get things done at home!! I honestly wish I enjoyed it more. To each their own, right?
The bitter part of going back is, of course, not being with Rex all day. He's becoming quite the character! My favorite new thing he is doing is our bed time ritual. I take him to his crib, kiss him goodnight and lay him down. His Nana (Corey's mom) got him a little Precious Moments Stuffed Animal that says a night time prayer: "Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep. May Angels watch me through the night, and keep me in their blessed site. Amen!" We start the prayer with the sign of the cross and then I press the button for the prayer. He smiles every time I play it! At the end we say "God bless Mommy and Daddy and My Whoooooole family" while lifting our hands up when we say "whoooooole family." This is something Ms. Anna does with the kiddo's when they say grace at lunch so we continued it into night time. We end with the sign of the cross again with a kiss on the hand at the end. When he kisses his hand he goes "Mmm-aaaaa!" It is absolutely precious! When he did it for the first time last week, my heart just melted! If there is one thing I pray that I can teach my son, it is to have faith in and believe in God. I'm glad we've started that early!
In July, we re-assessed Rex's development to determine if we should continue or discontinue physical therapy. I'm very excited to say Rex is no longer receiving Physical therapy! He has made so much progress! He goes up and down small steps without hesitation and has even started climbing up big stairs on his hands and knees which is a big jump since he never crawled. He LOVES being on top of the bed and couch. He says "Up, up, up, up, up, up" Over and over to get me to help him up on the couch or bed. He thinks it's hilarious to plop down on the cushions and fall over! He is also loving pillow fights and being knocked over! He's only fallen off the couch once and it wasn't too big of a disaster :) I know there are many falls to come! He is also going down the slide in our backyard on his own. I have to admit, I didn't know he could do that! Ashley C. and I were busy inside doing something while Scarlet and Rex were playing outside. It was then that he went down on his own! That was definitely an a-ha moment when I realized I needed to quit worrying so much and let him figure things out on his own.
Feeding him is still a challenge sometimes. His latest thing he does when he doesn't like something is that he will gag! It drives me bananas! He has actually thrown up twice just a little bit! Little stinker! Some of the things he loves are yogurt, white grapes, string cheese, applesauce, strawberries, goldfish (What would I do without goldfish!), ritz crackers, Turkey, potates and gravy Lil' Entree by Gerber, spaghetti, mexican rice and taco meet, spaghetti, chicken nuggets, french fries and cheerios. Oh and baby food! My 20 month old is probably the only little weirdo who still likes baby food and baby oatmeal. I feel bad giving it to him because I feel like he's too old for it but sometimes, that's all I can get him to eat! I try to squeeze in other things as much as i can but most of the time I'm unsuccessful. I'm not going to lie, one thing that makes me feel even better about him being back at Ms. Anna's is that I know he is eating good at lunch! He loves her cooking and loves Mexican food!
We officially have a dog in the house! My little Bella is finally back home with me. She's been with my mom since I moved out. We were supposed to take her when we bought our house but never did. Rex absolutely loves her and Bella does really well with him so we decided to finally get her. I was sitting in my bedroom the other day and all of a sudden Rex came running faster than I've ever seen him run! And here came Bella behind him! I love that he has his little buddy with him!
We recently got new neighbors in July. I was so worried about what our new neighbors would be like because our old neighbors, Jeff and Jana, were wonderful! We couldn't have asked for better first-neighbors! So the new ones had big shoes to fill! Our new neighbors are Danny and Jessica and they have a little girl named Ella who is a month older than Rex. Can you say PERFECT???!! From day one, we've gotten along great with Danny and Jessica and have clicked so well and so have Rex and Ella!! We have definitely hit the neighbor jackpot twice! Having great neighbors is one of those things you don't understand the importance of until you live in your own place.
Over the summer we got to spend quite a bit of time with Ashley Olive, Drake and Hunter and of course, my number one sidekick Ashley Collier and Rex's number one, Scarlet :) Over the summer Ashley Olive found out baby number 3 is on the way!! I am so so stinking excited!!! Brandon, her husband and Corey's cousin, was not able to get off work to go with her to her first appointment and she didn't want to go alone so she asked me to go to help her with the boys. The boys didn't end up going but she still had me go with her. Honored sounds like such a cheesy word to use but I felt so honored that she asked me to go to share something so special. She is due in March and I could not be more excited! It was so much fun watching Rex, Drake and Hunter play together this summer. We got to do a couple of group dates with Ashley and Scarlet to the Childrens Museum so the kids could play in the TotSpot. The kids had a blast! We plan on having Rex's birthday there! The majority of my summer days was spent with Ashley Collier house shopping for her and Cody. I'm a sucker for looking at houses so it didn't take much convincing! Not to mention, again, it was a great honor to help her do that. If it weren't for my two Ashley's, I seriously would have been depressed being stuck at home all summer! I love you girls! Yay for best friends who are teachers too!! Watching Rex and Scarlet play together has been one of my favorite things to witness. They play so well together! They hardly fight and are always having fun. They'll be even closer now that Scarlet is going to Ms. Anna's full time! It's so precious!
Ashley Collier and I got to experience cheer camp for the first time as sponsors. Our camp this year was put on by the Pasadena Memorial cheerleaders who did an AMAZING job! Our girls improved so much over the week that we were at camp. They got camp chant champs and we also had our mascot and 3 of our cheerleaders name to the all star squad. Needless to say, we were very proud of them! Not gonna lie, some of the fun cheerleader games and dances brought be back into being a kid again! I had to remind myself that I was the adult this time and not the kid and couldn't get up and dance silly like the girls were! It was a very tough internal battle to fight that off! :) I'm really looking forward to working with the cheerleaders this year.
My big summer project was fixing my taqueria of a house and redecorating to fix the God-awful paint color we chose the first time around. With help of a wonderful decorator named Billy Marbery, we got it together starting with the perfect paint color! Corey and I painted the house again. We also added bead boarding to the bottom half of the dinning room walls with the bottom half being painted a truffle brown. We mounted our TV on the fire place and turned out living room around. Rex now has a designated play area on the back side of the couch where I put a bunch of low shelves with cube openings where he can store his books and toys. The wall above my shelves will be a work in progress. The room looks great already! Makes me love my house even more now that we've made it more our own.
Sadly my summer ended on a very sad note for the Lopez side of my family. My great-Aunt Catherine (My grandpa's sister) passed away on Friday, August 10. It was very difficult seeing her in the hospital those last few days before she passed because my aunt Catherine was always so active. She was 86 years old and still driving around! Family was so important to Aunt Catherine. She never missed a celebration for our family, even though we were not her immediate family. Although it was for a short time between when Rex was born and when she passed, she never missed an event for him. She was at my shower, his baptism, his birthday party and even the little halloween party I hosted for the kiddo's last year and everything in between for the rest of her extended family members. When I had Rex and had those gatherings for him, I really grew to appreciate her presence at each event. I will miss her very much. She was my Momo's best friend and I know she will miss her very very much. I know we will see her again, though, and I know she is with us. If you've gotten this far in my blog, please pray for our family, especially her daughters, grandchildren, sisters, and my Momo.
I've been back at work for 2 days and I'm already super busy! I'm teaching a new thing for the 3rd year in a row but very excited to be working in special education which is where my education background is. I'm going to be doing mostly inclusion in general education classrooms and will teach a math resource class. I'm excited about the subject change but not so excited about the room change as I had to give up my giant science room since I did not need it! I was blessed to inherit all of the materials of my good friend and former 4th grade teacher, Leigh Anne Lidrbauch since I replaced her position (she is our new peer facilitator) so I don't think I will need to buy math materials, thanks to her! Hopefully this will be the last time for a long time that I need to move rooms! I'm definitely looking forward to getting my room together and done by the end of this week! I'm ready to see the finished project! And I'm excited for our new school year! Our cheerleaders are looking great already so I'm very excited about that too!
If you've made it this far, you deserve a medal! But you can't say I didn't warn you! :)
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