August

August was a nice wrap up to summer.  We enjoyed a few visitors.  My nephew, Zerano, had a soccer tournament in Lawrence so he was able to come for dinner one night.  Louis had a blast with him, Zerano ate Joe's BBQ ribs like a teenager and held Nola like a pro.  The visit was too fast as we don't get to see him much since he is busy with sports and school.

Nola turned 5 months old!  She was able to sit up without falling over so we tried the swings at the park.  She giggled and loved it!  She is changing so fast and we are really enjoying this time with our little lady!

She also loves getting up in the morning and is super cheerful.  If you know me, you probably wonder where she gets this from!

We were excited to go back to the Ethnic Enrichment Festival this year & eat our way through several countries!  After looking at my pictures in this blog, I am realizing why I'm holding onto the rest of my pregnancy weight.  I can fool myself into thinking I'm eating well until I see the proof in photos.

Our first stop was to Spain for some meatballs & patatas bravas!

The event is family friendly.  Louis liked checking out the different items at each booth.

Refreshing coconut on a hot day!

My mom and Tom met us for a little while.

They also have a kid's booth where Louis did some crafts and his own face painting.

 Louis started potty training around 20 months when we took him to Germany.  I never really pushed it and still kept him in diapers half the time since he still had accidents.  I had heard they regress after a new baby comes along and that is exactly what happened.   He wanted to be the baby again and I was too tired with a newborn to risk the accidents.  He slowly went back to going on the potty and I decided it was time to ditch the diapers.  I printed out a free potty chart online and we picked out a prize and special stickers.  It took less than a week for him to earn his new train, James.  I can finally say he is officially potty trained!

Joe's little sister had her first baby so we took Nola to Houston to meet him.  Louis stayed behind with his other cousins since we drove down and back in 4 days.  She did great in the car!  We stopped at a friend's in Dallas on the way there but came all the way back on Sunday.  It was a long day but she only needed to stop 3 or 4 times which was perfect!

Nola looked huge compared to Ethan.  She is about 4 months older.

The trip wouldn't be complete if Joe and I didn't sample some local food.  Taco truck?  Yes, please!!

On the way home we had to find out what a fried pie was since there were signs all over.  Leave it to Texas to offer something fried and delicious.

My friend, Hayley, and I have been meaning to take the boys on the bus for a while now.  It stops down the street from my house so we thought it would be fun to take it down to Crown Center.  There was a free Curious George exhibit.  Hayley is pregnant so the smells on the bus were very pungent for her!  The boys had a good time and keep talking about Max the bus.

We ate at Fritz's so the boys could get their food delivered by train.  This is a must do in Kansas City if you have little kids.

 My other nephew, Jonah, made his first trip down without my brother.  He enlisted in the Navy so it was a practice run at taking an adventure as an adult.  He explored the city on his own during the day but made time to teach Louis to skateboard.

Jonah inherited the artistic talent that skipped over me so he drew some pictures for Louis to color.

I had my heart broken for the second time watching Louis try to play and getting denied.  We were at a local pizza place and some little girls were coloring and running around.  He asked politely several times if he could play.  They just wouldn't let him.  I felt so sad and wanted to slap their parents for seeing it all go down and not tell their kids to let him play.  But I just sat there.  Joe was oblivious to all of this and told me I was being ridiculous of course.

We finally had our neighbors over for dinner.  They have kids around the same age as ours so we are trying to start a rotation of hanging out between our houses.  One of the couples has two sets of twins almost exactly Louis and Nola's age.  I can't imagine!

The rest of the month was spent doing lazy things around home.  Like finding cicada shells on our walks.  Louis got over his fear of these things and now wears them.  He told me these two were talking to each other.

We met Becca and Landon for a play date in Loose Park.

This is what happens when I am changing Nola and Louis tries to make his own breakfast.  This is from two different boxes.

We walked to Brookside a few times to hit up Reading Reptile.

Louis loves running on the trail and can go about a 1/4 of a mile without stopping.  He will run the whole mile though with breaks in between.

We did a few trips in September that I'll update next time!

Big Boy Room

Here is Louis' room finally finished.  "Finished" in our house means at least one thing isn't totally done.  In this case, it's the old wing back chair.  I want to paint the legs and make a new slip cover for it but that is pretty ambitious for me.  I'll keep putting it off for now.  

I'm also really bad at picking out paint when I'm pregnant.  It happened in my bedroom when I was pregnant with Louis (will post another day).  I didn't learn my lesson and picked his gray furniture paint while I was pregnant with Nola.  It should be about three shades darker than it is.  Joe painted it with his paint sprayer so with the cost of the paint and the time it took, whining will get me no where.  He is not changing it.  

I've always painted my ceilings and if you look closely you can see I painted it navy.  We painted the walls white because I liked it so much in the nursery.  I like it in person but not as much in these pics.  I'm blaming the lack of contrast with the furniture!  

Here is the other side of the room.  I'm thinking of adding pictures or a hot air balloon to this side of the room but will wait until something really catches my eye.  The globe was Joe's and his grandpa made the wooden stand for it.  Louis loves getting it down to see where we have traveled.  We also look at it or the map on his wall when Joe is on a trip.  Louis has a pretty good memory and can usually point out places we have been.  The piggy bank was my mom's and she gave it to Louis when he was born.  

I'm not into super themed rooms and prefer it to be more subtle.  I went with an airplane/travel theme.  I found the planes at Hobby Lobby and the prints below are from Etsy.  We found the barn wood frames at Hobby Lobby as well.  I also picked plain bedding so I can change the theme as he grows.  The duvet cover and sham are from Pottery Barn.  The rug is from Overstock.com.  

My mom had the map mounted on foam board for me but it kept falling off the wall.  Joe ended up making the barn wood frame to solve that issue.  He also made the barn wood shelves and bench. The orange bins are from Land of Nod.

We were able to do the room on a pretty tight budget since we had all of the furniture and just had to paint it.  My mom had the bed and chair but everything else was Joe's as a kid excluding the bench he made.  I like all of the things from the past.  It makes it feel special in a way.