We started the month out right by sitting in a shoe box. Yep, that happened.
Later that evening we spent some time playing outside, and Nolan thought he was hilarious running around with the basket on his head. What.a.crazy.
We ran some errands and had to stop at PetsMart, because Nolan loves watching the animals (it's become a new routine to go once a week... free entertainment!) He particularly liked the birds this day and was cracking up at them flying around!
The jokester thought it was pretty funny to be eating olives off of his fingers, and of course he stopped when I tried to take a video. Then he turned from happy to upset, typical toddler style.
The weather has been HOOOOOOT so we filled up the pool and splash pad and let Nolan go crazy in it. Once we realized this one wasn't cutting it, I lucked out and grabbed THE pool of all kiddie pools on clearance at Target. Yep- 10 bucks for this bad boy! (Thanks @Hip2Save, don't know what I would do without your $ saving goodness!) Nolan was a little scared of the palm tree sprinkler and didn't like getting sprayed, so we pushed it down into the pool and all was fine. He loves this thing (and I may or may not have gotten in with him...)
I started Nolan in our own little "Tot School" that was Pinterest inspired, and it was a great way to give him a break from our daily monotonous the summer and hot days have brought us the last few weeks. We set aside 30-45 minutes a day (split up) with activities such as Table Time, Arts and Crafts, and Games and Activities. Each day is dedicated to a subject and specific learning theme, and each activity follows up with learning and reinforcing said theme. It's an early introduction to what he would be doing in a preschool setting, and he enjoyed most of it! To say he cooperated the whole time would be a lie.... there were struggles, of course, and we have a few kinks to work out, but we will reintroduce Tot School again once I have more ideas put together and have it all organized a little better! I'm excited to get him into a nice routine of it come Fall, and hopefully it will help us with more to look forward to when we're at home so much!
(For any activities pictured below, take a peek at my Pinterest page with all the Tot School links, separated by learning themes!)
(For any activities pictured below, take a peek at my Pinterest page with all the Tot School links, separated by learning themes!)
Monday was the color Red! We sorted and counted poms and stacked our red barns. I introduced him to Red Light, Green Light and we colored a red apple.
Tuesday was the Letter A. We used our Do-A-Dot markers for the first time, learned about things that start with the letter A, played Feed the Monster, and sang our ABCs. We also made the cutest Letter A craft with fingerprint Ants.
Thursday was the number 1. We Dotted our Elmo worksheet and counted tiles, we played Number Bowling and counted while we fingerprinted our Caterpillar.
We took an early morning trip to the park for some cooler weather, and Nolan ran around like a crazy man! He finally is starting to enjoy the slide and going up and down the play structures with assistance.
He rocked a sweet man bun, but Daddy wasn't impressed when we showed him the picture later.
Nolan enjoyed some cereal and working on his spoon skills, but still likes to use his hands once in a while.
We started bubble baths with Nolan not long ago, and now he looks SO forward to taking them that he learned to say "Bubble Bath". It might be one of my favorite things he says!
We met with our friend Aaron at the District, and while he and Jason grabbed some happy hour drinks at Whist and Stove, I took Nolan over to the splash pad. He wasn't feeling it, so he just assessed the situation on the outskirts and looked cool in his shades. This kid has so much style it's crazy!
Afterwards, we all met back up and ate dinner at Lucille's. Nolan thought he was a big boy and just had to drink out of the big boy glass.
We started going to the recreation pools around town, and in the beginning, Nolan stayed close to the sides and shallow end. Soon enough, after a few more trips, he was getting more brave and playing with his friends with minimal timidness!
We took a trip to Bass Pro Shops one weekend, and Nolan enjoyed running around the entire store for over an hour, plus taking a little trip to the Mermaid Aquarium to share his snacks with the fishes.
We went out to dinner with our friends Erin and Jeremy at Tivoli Village, and since we showed up a little early, Nolan got some play time in at their playground. It was super hot, but he didn't mind and ran all over, climbing on everything and playing with the new play structures he had never seen before.
More Tot School followed the next week, with the color Blue and the letter B (and a whole lot less pictures!) We even crafted a Cookie Monster plate that Nolan still carries around everywhere!
We've been spending lots of time at the recreation center activity pools with our friends in the mornings, so when we returned from out hot outing one afternoon, Nolan decided to cool down with a fruit puree blend using his new ReSqueeze pouches that we won on Instagram! These things are the BEST! Nolan will not eat fruit for the life of him (I think because of the texture), and so when I decided to use up our leftover fruit purees that we had, I was shocked that he finished it off in minutes by eating it in this pouch! They are reusable, baby food squeeze pouches that you can fill with pretty much anything (purees, smoothies, yogurt, applesauce... anything!) and work exactly like a store bought pouch, just without the unknown surprises inside that our Facebook feeds like to scare us with. The bottom is sealed with a durable double dual-zip to prevent it from leaking and spills, which thus far, has proven us to be correct! We haven't had these things leak anywhere but right into Nolan's mouth and tummy! Definitely check these babies out by following this link... you won't regret it!
Of course we took an impromptu photoshoot since Nolan was being such a ham. He rocked his sunnies (from Subsidy Shades) and pouch with his rash guard and diaper. What makes a baby SO dang cute in just a tee and diaper!? It's the best.
More eating of Resqueeze pouches ensued.
Followed by dinner and dessert at Sammy's... they have the craziest, most delicious sundae that Nolan was instantly excited about and then instantly disappointed about. He does NOT like ice cream so he was a little upset that this is what dessert was! Crazy kid.... don't worry, Jason and I took care of it!
We took some silly family selfies at bedtime.
Nolan and I did some shopping at Old Navy, and he bonded with the mannequins.
We spent Father's Day by relaxing at home with Jason, and taking advantage of Las Vegas Restaurant Week for an early lunch at DB Brasserie in the Venetian. We were skeptical taking Nolan to a finer dining restaurant than we're used to, but we rolled with it and he surprised us at how well behaved he was. We spent some time walking around the Venetian and Nolan had tons to look at! We are so lucky to have Jason who works so hard for his family. He loves us unconditionally and keeps us laughing everyday, which makes him the best Daddy to Nolan and an amazing husband to me.
For Father's Day, Nolan got his Daddy a cool VW shirt for him to rep (because his VW GTI is his third baby, after the human and the dog). Mommy always picks out Nolan's clothes and chooses what to buy for him, so she suggested getting a new shirt that Dad would appreciate. Before running some errands, Nolan shared his swag and, of course, had his sunglasses in tow. Can you tell he's going through a sunglasses stage!?
Nolan got his third haircut, and we went back to our original place with kiddo cars and Elmo on T.V. It went MUCH better than our previous experience at Great Clips, and he went from shag to swag in no time!
I snapped a cute picture before heading out to Music class one morning, and the shirt could not be more true for this kid.
He wore his Ants in my Pants shirt and read his corresponding book, Georgie and the Ants in the Pants, while eating a snack and watching his beloved Sesame Street (are those ants on the back of his shirt not adorable!? Another contest win on Instagram! Check out her cute stuff here!)
The Women's World Cup started this month and, of course, I had to watch every second of every game. I tried to teach Nolan how to say, "GO USA!" and wave his arms in the air, but all I got was throwing snacks in the air and screeching. Close enough!
The game held his attention for a little bit, but not long after kickoff, my game watching partner quickly turned into this:
Nolan isn't one to sit and watch T.V. (although we are a family that keeps it on all day.. more for noise than actual watching) unless it's Sesame Street, so I decided I would try to have him watch something I loved as a baby. I searched YouTube and found the video I used to ask for 50 million times a day, and was curious to see how Nolan's reaction would be to it. Sure enough, he has him Mama in him... he sat and watched the whole thing! His favorite part is watching the monkeys and the "water world" songs of the video. He is obsessed with this now, and although it's cute, I'm kicking myself a little bit now that he asks for it 50 million times a day. I'm sure my parents are enjoying watching this epic payback! The link to this awesome 80s goodness is here!
We met up with our friends Kelly and Nolan to check out an indoor playground, called Child's Play. It was super fun and they ran all their energy out going up and down the slides and playing with all of the toys. Our friend Nolan was all about giving love and kisses... these two are way too cute together!
...Until next month!
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