Brady Is Two!

I can't believe my baby is two years old already!  Time goes by way too fast, but it is so fun to watch him grow!  Life is pretty busy right now and since there are two brand new babies on the Bell side who are not ready to travel yet, we decided not to do a party this year.  But we still had plenty of celebration!  I made these cute cupcakes for Brady to share with his friends at daycare (thank you, pinterest and Megan).  He also got a balloon from Lori and some cute Nemo bath toys.  She sure knows what Brady loves and we are lucky to have our Lori!

 After daycare Grandma, Grandpa and Aliisa came over to do presents and Brady had a lot of fun with all of his presents!  He got to read his new book with Grandpa

 He also thought this sports wrapping paper was pretty awesome and much cooler than the Christmas wrapping paper that I used to wrap his presents.

 He also got a fun little animal puzzle from Grandma and Grandpa!

 I bought this marker set online and had no idea it would be this huge!  But Brady loves markers so I'm sure we will have a lot of fun with it (and here's to hoping they are actually washable)

 I bought this fun little tunnel set online a long time ago and decided he is the perfect age for it now.  And I really nailed this one!  He played with it for quite a while and, as you can see, Quentin had fun with it also.  And it just folds back up when you're done, so it's pretty neat.  Quentin appreciates my online shopping habits a little more when it comes time for birthdays and Christmas :)

 Brady also got his very own "laptop," which I knew he would love after I saw how much he loved playing with Allison's at daycare.  Plus anything with buttons that makes noise is awesome...right...?

 After we did presents we went to eat at Wendy's, and Brady ate SEVEN chicken nuggets!  We also ran into Stella and Hamilton from daycare and Brady even shared his fries with them.  After our tummies were full we went to get Brady his very first fish.  He was so excited and maybe a bit overwhelmed by all the animals at the pet store, but I tried to have him pick a fish.  I had him pick blue or red and he picked red so I gave him two choices of a red betta and he picked one.  On the way home we asked what his fish's name was and he said "water" at first, but then I asked again and he said what sounded like "Ian," so here he is with his new friend Ian, the red betta fish.

I don't think he actually grasps the concept of a birthday yet, but he sure had fun celebrating anyway and it was fun for me to watch my hard work preparing pay off with the big smiles and excited looks he had.  He really is such a sweet boy and we are so blessed to have him in our family!

Early Valentine's Day

 Since Valentine's Day is on a Thursday this year (and Quentin happens to work Thursdays), we decided to celebrate a little early.  So Friday night we met Cassie and Kyle in Jeff City and went ice skating.  I'm proud to say that none of us fell.  Cassie may or may not have had a death grip on the wall 90% of the time, and none of us were very daring, but it paid off as we were able to keep both feet on the ground...errrr ice.  I did notice my ankles have aged quite a bit since I last went ice skating.  We didn't last long there before we called it quits and headed to Red Lobster, where we enjoyed our endless cheddar bay biscuits, so much so that we hardly had room for our food when it came!  I even had someone take our picture so we have proof of our ice skating.  I think Cassie and I started out closer, but she must have tightened her death grip on Kyle before the picture was taken :)  We had a lot of fun and feel lucky to live close enough to do stuff like this with them!

Busy Boy

 Remember how I used to have a seemingly endless amount of pictures to post?  Well, I have noticed that as this boy gets busier, the number of pictures goes down.  And he is a very busy boy now.  So even though it has been quite a while since my last post, I really only have a few pictures to share!  But they are all very cute of course!

This is how Brady accessorizes.  And yes, he did insist on wearing this stylish necklace to church.

These are the play doh glasses Brady made with Daddy.  Isn't he lucky to have such a cool Dad?

 This is when Brady insisted that Aliisa take some pictures of him, and I liked this one best.  He has been getting pretty excited every time Aliisa comes to visit (he used to just point and say no when she walked in the door).  He is talking a TON now, even though we don't always understand him.  He also likes to repeat himself until you either say it back to him or just agree with him.  He loves to "help" with whatever you are doing and also likes to do everything himself.  Some of his favorite phrases are "I do it." or "my turn" and "I nooot." Here's an example...tonight he was "helping" Grandma make cookies and he was licking the spatula. When Grandma told him not to lick it yet he said "I noooot" as the spatula was still in his mouth.  It's kind of funny sometimes, but can also be frustrating.  He is so much fun and says cute and funny things every day.  He definitely keeps me on my toes!