Mommy-Mister Date

Me and the little mister had a little date afternoon today. We splurged with some of his birthday money and went to the Manhattan Children's Museum. One word sums it all up: AMAZING! The museum is completely hands-on so T (and 100 other tots) ran like crazy playing/learning all about science, math, letters, numbers, and, uh...the Wizard of Oz!

We started out in Wizard of Oz world which is a guest exhibit that we adored. They had Dorothy's house (which was on a crazy slant), ruby slippers, the talking apple trees and so much more. Talmage was way too interested in the rooms to stop for a picture so don't expect to see any photos with him looking at the camera! That's alright...I was so happy to see him enjoy this experience.

T loved playing with the scarecrow and the tinman...but he was a bit cowardly when it came to the lion. Fitting, don't you think?

Aunty Em's farm provided LOTS of entertainment. We sat here pushing buttons and listening to animal sounds for ages.

The Wizard was pretty intense! T would push the buttons and then fire would erupt and the wizard would turn red and angry. Without skipping a beat Talmage would start backing up (and so would all the other children in the area!)

In another area of the museum, Mr. T also tried out his hand at driving trucks, buses and a fire engine. He thought it was pretty cool...but would have liked it more had the machines actually moved.

There were slides and stairs, ladders and bridges, ball pits and tunnels. T ran around until he was hot and sweaty...and in heaven.

We visited Dora and Diego's land and were very entertained by all of the animals we met, playgrounds we found and, as you can tell, the jungle vines hanging from the ceiling and walls!

There was a green mirror that let the kids pretend like they were in the jungle with the monkey's and Talmage was so excited. I love that big smile!

And T also pretended that he was in charge of this fruit stand. I loved my date day with T--I feel very blessed to have had such a handsome hunk holding my hand!

Stitches be gone

Band-aid on:

Stitches in:

Stitches out:

Attitude on...VERY on:

Cars Party

On Saturday we had a Cars birthday party for Talmage with a few of his friends. T is beyond obsessed with Cars. BEYOND! All week he told everyone from our doorman to randoms at the grocery store that he would be having a "Cars birtday" or a "Queen (McQueen) Party." It took a lot of preparation (and a ton of work entertaining two-year-olds for 1 1/2 hours) but Talmage had a BLAST and I was very pleased.

The pictures aren't perfect, I was way too busy playing "Pit Crew Captain" to take any good shots! But luckily I took a few before the kiddos came and managed a few while Jim took over the pit!

We had the party in the lounge of our building. This picture is looking at "Flo's V8 Cafe" from the Race track. The white chairs are the bleachers so the parental units could watch their kids race...at least that was the idea!

We had a nice snack bar style lunch. The kids ate wheel-shaped sandwiches (three different options), Chick Hicks Chips, Sally fruit Snacks, fruit, stop and go M&M's and Racer grab-bags filled with pretzels, cheez-its, craisins, chocolate-covered raisins and dried apples. Of course we had V8 gas (AKA-juice!)

My Lightning McQueen cake was being a little difficult, ie the frosting kept slipping off the cake. Woops! At first I thought I'd start over...and then I realized I was throwing the party for two year olds who definitely wouldn't care as long as it tasted good. And luckily it did, so we were just fine!

The Par-tay table!

There is a huge pillar in the middle of the room so I decided to decorate it with streamers and cover it with road signs and pictures of characters from the movie cars. All of the numbers on the speed limit, interstate, etc were 2 for T's second birthday! It was a nice centerpiece.

The kids all got a Mater party hat and a Cars sippy cup full of treats.

We had a station where the kids could play with cars on the mat...

...and a Pin the Lightning on McQueen game. Jim drew this and I was way impressed!

We had a race track where the kids did car racing, and we also played some red light/green light (which PS was more like green light/green light...once I said go there was no stopping them!)

I made these cars out of some old boxes and construction paper and they were a big hit. We did car races and they were running so fast I couldn't even get a semi-ok picture of the cars. But they had so much fun and kept going back to play with them. Woo-hoo!

They all loved the lunch full of fun food!

And Mr. T felt pretty darn special when everyone started singing to him. He loved his cake and didn't even hide from the candle which was progress!

After fun and food, all the kids helped Talmage open his presents...

...and then they all waited patiently while Talmage's Daddy took the toys out of the box so they could play!

I LOVE birthday's and had so much fun making Talmage's second party special for him! We are in birthday season at the Wiggy casa. Jim in April, me in May, new muchacho in June...bring on the parties, bring on the cake, bring on the fun!

3/11/11=2

Mr. T is officially two years old today.

We've had two full years of those big brown eyes, that mischievous smile, his stronger-than-crazy spirit and his never-ending energy.

We sure are lucky!

This little monkey spent his birthday climbing bananas at the park (chain stairs that lead to the slide), popping bubbles that Daddy blew, playing ring-around-the-rosy at least 100 times with Mom, singing happy birthday to himself over and over and eating...oh, how we love to eat! We made it through the day with one picture from the park (as seen above) and a million pictures of mealtime!

He had a strawberry ice cream cone for his birthday treat after dinner (we put a candle in it, but he wasn't loving it. Hopefully his cake tomorrow doesn't freak him out!)

And we went to the Pizza Chef for dinner where he scarfed his slice of white pizza!

For breakfast Daddy stayed home and we had cini-mini-rolls, eggs, fruit and orange juice.

I think he ended up eating 6 cini-minis, maybe more. He loved them and would say, "More, more, more cookies please!" That's right...I feed my kid pure sugar for breakfast.

I'm always just a little bit sappy on T's birthday. There are so many memories and emotions related to his birth that I replay over and over in my mind. Needless to say, we are so lucky to have him, and we're so glad we got to keep him. He's fiery and awfully stubborn, but in difficult moments I try to remind myself that his willful spirit kept him alive when the odds were slim. He brings so much laughter, joy, comfort and direction to our family.

Our little Talmage boy is two, and we are too excited!

More Hats and a Bug Ride

A couple more hats that T LOVES to wear:

And cheesing it up on the Bronx Zoo's bug carousel:

(These are all from last week...hence no mickey band-aid on his head. Those were happier days. T didn't have to keep a band-aid on his head 24/7, and I didn't have to fight him to keep it on!)

ER

It all started like any normal Friday. Talmage woke up insanely early, he spilled his cereal while watching Mickey Mouse and he insisted on coming within inches of my tired face saying, "Mommy sleeping? Mommy wake up!"

I gave the little mister a haircut to prep him for afternoon birthday pictures (the little rascal turns two next week) and then we headed to the shower. Oh bother.

The Reader's Digest version is as follows: He jumped in the shower. I told him to stop jumping because he would hurt himself. He looked me in the eyes, as he always does, to prove that he heard what I said and he would make his own darn decision as to when the jumping would end. He jumped again. He slipped. His head landed on the marble step and split open--clean and deep.

I held his head together with a towel, and called my neighbor to see if she could come assess the situation (she has two little girls and has already done the stitches thing). She agreed with me that he needed to get to the ER, and bless her heart she drove us there as fast as she could (and stayed with me until everything was under control, and took this picture of me and T waiting to get stitched up, and brought food to the hospital for T and I, and picked us up after the whole ordeal was over, and made us dinner and cookies...yep, she's a saint!)

We spent all day in the ER, ALL DAY! It took them six hours to see us, get him stitched up and to send us on our way. Most of it went smoothly, except when they put him in a straight jacket and started injecting the cut with anesthetic. T's face was so red and sweaty, and he was screaming and crying so loud that I thought his head might just blow off the rest of his body! Luckily it didn't, and luckily once he was numb the stitches part was semi-less traumatic.

Poor Jim was at school when this happened and I was only able to send him a one-sentence email telling him where we were and what was going on. I didn't get reception in the ER and by 4:30 he was going crazy with anxiety. He was supposed to have a late night, but instead came home to have dinner with his boy! He's also being a good sport about helping T keep the bandage on his head. He's supposed to wear it for 24 hours straight (and then band-aid's after that) but he doesn't think it's quite as cool as wearing a hat and keeps trying to take it off! But when Daddy wears it, T wears it!

I kind of thought T would come home a little more timid and careful (and obedient maybe). Wishful thinking on my part! He's been just as crazy, just as jumpy, and just as...independent! I feel like my first ER visit was kind of a right of passage...I just hope we don't make it routine. But with one wild boy and another on his way, I bet we'll be there more that I'd like ;)

Before Bacteria Ruled My Life

Before my two-week brush with death (at least that's what it felt like), T and I were having fun and life was lookin' good. We were getting back into our New York routine, and being happy! Here are a few things we were up to:

T the Sous Chef
T and I whipped up some pink rice krispy treats for Valentine's Day, and T was a great little helper!

T stirring.

T eating.

T rummaging through my candy stash.

Cookie Bouquet

My mom sent us this "it's a boy" cookie bouquet and it brightened up our apartment! Not only was it cute as can be, but the cookies were absolutely delish. Fun!

T's Total Hat Obsession

Talmage is constantly coming out of his room wearing a different hat. He LOVES his top hat from a tea party he attended over the summer, and wears it all the time. What a doll!

CHINATOWN!

We went to China town with some friends to celebrate Chinese New Year. It was fun for me to walk around and see all the chinese signs, but T wasn't a fan of the sub-degree weather, as is evident in the photo below.

Although he was already double/triple layered, he was using his best opera voice to let all of Chinatown know how miserable and cold he was. Before we knew it, all three of us mom's had stripped off layers of our own clothing to help him warm up. He had Melissa's arm warmers on his legs, and Catherine and my scarves draped around him like a blanket. Before long, the screams turned to snores...thank goodness!

Here are the three little rascals enjoying their suckers from a chinese store. I love these kids!