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A 5 month break from blogging? Inexcusable I suppose. I'll blame it on spending all of ButterBean's nap-times reading the Game of Thrones series and summer time. Here are a few highlights of the last couple of months!
Summer is flying by! We are lucky enough to live within walking distance of 3 parks, so we've spent a lot of time there. The most time consuming part of playing at the park is continually emptying ButterBean's shoes/sandals since he can't abide having any sand in them and will sit on the ground yelling "Shoes off!" until his little piggies are free of sand!

Going down the "side"

Whoahhh! 

As every summer should, ours has had a good dose of WATER! Water in all forms: sprinklers, pools, lakes, and rivers!

The slide doesn't work so well, but he loves it

We indulged his Lighting McQueen obsession with a Cars kiddie pool 

Rocked to sleep on the boat

Romance on the St. Croix River?

Roomies on the St. Croix

A highlight of the summer was my best bud and college roommate came to MN with her family. ButterBean enjoyed a day in Stillwater playing with her three beautiful daughters. Obviously, a marriage contract is being drafted for her middle daughter and BB :)

More on the water topic - my parents bought a lake cabin, so we've had extra water fun including boating and our newest hobby, paddle boarding. 

What a helper!

And last but not least, there is an addition to the family! Tubby!! My sister Lil T, has a sweet, calm, adorable new dog. He's a perfect fit!

The Tubster!

2nd Birthday: Sesame Street

Somehow ButterBean is 2 years old! He is growing up so fast and each day more of his personality emerges. He is one of the funniest people I know!
His love of all things Elmo/Abby/Sesame Street prompted the theme for his 2nd birthday party: Sesame Street! I had so much fun planning this party!

Decorations were easy because it seems that every party store has a section dedicated to Sesame Street. Any bold primary colors work for this party! I picked up some plates, napkins, balloons, and table cloth at Party City. Michaels provided some cute little cardboard cutouts in the scrapbooking section. We had the party at Gatsby's work since our house would not accomodate the amount of people we expected to come. 

The food was the most fun to make. I made the same turkey sandwiches that I made for his first birthday (big success both times). We also had Abby Magic Fairy wands -- fruit on bamboo skewers

Burt & Ernie veggie sticks with Ranch dressing

Big Bird popcorn puffs (ButterBean gags on  the hulls of popcorn, so we had to get the puffy kind)

Goldfish crackers in honor of Elmo's goldfish, Dorothy. I considered getting ButterBean a real goldfish for his birthday, but I decided I didn't want to take care of one!

Elmo and Big Bird crackers and Sesame Street juice boxes were picked up at Babies R Us on a diaper run, but you can find those lots of places. 

For dessert we had Cookie Monster Cookies and Elmo cupcakes. 

The kids played Oscar's Trash Toss, which was just throwing crumpled news paper into my tiny compost bucket that looks like a mini trash can. Running up and down the hallway was another favorite!

 ButterBean got more presents that we know what to do with! It's time for a toy purge in this house!

I had a great time with this party and most importantly, I think ButterBean did too!

After the party ButterBean insisted I put a tie on him!

party favors!!

First Crush

I knew this day would come. 

ButterBean has fallen for a girl. She's cute, friendly, wears pigtails...

His first crush

Her name is Abby Cadabby and she lives on Sesame Street! Yes, ButterBean has a crush on a puppet fairy girl. 

Elmo (or Melmo if you're talking to BB) used to be his absolute fave, but he has moved on to Abby. Before Christmas, I was at Target and picked up a stuffed Abby doll for my cousin's daughter. ButterBean spent the entire trip yelling "Ahhhbeee!!" and giving her kisses. So, Santa brought ButterBean an Abby for Christmas. 
Fast forward to this week. I won tickets to Sesame Street Live a few weeks ago and we brought little ButterBean to see his favorite characters sing and dance on stage. He LOVED it and yelled "Ahhhbeee! Melmo!! KeeKee!" (*cookie monster*) over and over. 

He looks terrified, but really he was thrilled!

All went well until we were a couple blocks from home when all of a sudden there was a loud shriek and wail from the back seat. 

ButterBean burst into huge crocodile tears and continued to wail. He wouldn't tell me what was wrong, but finally he sobbed "Ahhh...beeeee!" When we got home he stood by the door, pointing and crying Abby's name. Not even his stuffed Abby could console him at first. He finally snapped out of it, but he and Abby have been inseparable ever since. Every car trip, nap, journey from living room to kitchen - Abby is right there! The first words out of his mouth waking up from his nap have been "Ahhbee???" every day. 

Snuggling on the couch with Abby

Napping with Abby

Playing in his room. What do you know? Abby's close by!

ButterBean's first crush! How cute! She's going to break his heart some day...

We stood in a long line (of girls) to get a picture with the Abby cutout

What We've Been Up To: Arizona

As a present to ourselves and as a reward for surviving anesthesia school we went on a fantastic vacation to Arizona right after Christmas! We went to escape the cold, but somehow we brought the cold with us and Arizona experienced unusually cold weather throughout the entire week we stayed! The weather promptly warmed up the day after we left. Even so, we enjoyed a good 30-50 degree increase in temp by going to AZ!

I've never been to Arizona and it was amazing! We went to Scottsdale, Sedona, and the Grand Canyon and I already have a list of things I want to do when we get to go back some day!

 ButterBean was an absolute champ travelling (other than vomiting in a museum...we're still working on that) and kept us entertained at all times with his crazy dances and songs.

Checking out the cacti in the Botanical Gardens

Pure ButterBean bliss: a golf cart

My in-laws, who had also never been to AZ, came as well. ButterBean loved spending time with them! The most frequent words out of his mouth were "Papa!! Papa!! Mama!" Mama  = Grandma to him. It gets confusing.

We are back in frozen Minnesota and trying to getting back into the groove of real life. Vacations are never long enough!

What We've Been Up To: Christmas

Another fun-filled Christmas has come and gone!  

An almost-two-year-old is the best at Christmas!! Every time he sees a Santa he says "HoHoHo" in a really low voice, followed by "pum pum pum", which is Rumpapum-pum from the Little Drummer Boy song. He also loves to carry around baby Jesus and put him to bed.

Here's Christmas morning!

Putting Big Bird and Abby Cadabby "nigh nigh"

Really got into the wrapping paper ripping this year!