Big Cedar Vacation

Last weekend we went to Big Cedar Lodge with some friends (Misty, Jason & Britney). We had a great time. I just wanted to tell a few of the "Brayden Tales" from the trip.

We went to Silver Dollar City. Brayden was so excited.

We went last year and he rode the "Fire in the Hole" It's a very mild roller coaster that goes through a dark tunnel filled with different scenes. Not scary stuff. There are 3 instances where it looks like you are going to hit a train head on, but at the last minute you drop. He loves it. We figured since he liked it so much we would take him to a bigger one... "The Powder Keg". (in the background of this picture)
Looking back, it's the biggest one there and probably was too big of a leap, but he handled it like a trooper. He was very excited to get on. He was about an inch to short, but nobody noticed so we let him ride it anyway. It begins by taking off and going from 0 to 53 mph in 2.3 seconds. It is followed 3 huge drops. He was scared and kept his head to the side, but he never cried. When we got off he was laughing and saying it was fun, but he didn't want to do it again. We then took him to Thunderation. It's a bit milder, but the bar didn't feel tight enough on him, so I ended up reaching over from the back and holding him up by his underarms. He had a great time that day. He even went to the little schoolhouse and wrote his name and drew a pciture on a piece of slate. He got an A+!

We went to the pool one night and Brayden insisted on going down the slide. So I put a life jacket on him and let him go. Did you know you can still go under with a life jacket on?? I know now! He came up gagging, but wanted to go again. This time he just used a ring though and I caught him. The pool was great. I even convinced him to get in the hot tub outside. It was below 40 outside, so the trip from the pool to the tub was chilly!!
(Brayden is on the phone with his Nana)

We had a jacuzzi tub in our room. It pretty much served as a kiddie pool for him. He loved the jets. He asked if we would get him one for his house.

The last night we were there, we went to the Buzzard Bar. It's located in the Big Cedar property. It's really more of a restaurant than a bar. They have a "singing cowboy comedian". He is pretty good. Brayden LOVED him. We sat right in front, so of course Brayden was giving his own show. He was jammin' to the music. He had the air guitar going and used the table as a piano. He was rockin' out. He had the whole place watching him. He was talking to the cowboy and giving out the yee haw's during the songs. We definetly have to take him back there soon.

Our little getaway was a lot of fun. Big Cedar is awesome, but it was too cold to enjoy everything they have to offer. Hopefully we will be going back real soon.

Here a a few more of my fave pics from the trip...

Stomach Bug

When I picked Brayden up from daycare yesterday he was complaining that his stomach hurt. His teacher said that he had been saying that all day. I instantly had this feeling that tonight was going to be fun! The roto-virus was going around and my gut said he had it. So we went home and he started with the diarrhea! He didn't want dinner, instead he chose to get on the couch and go to sleep (at 6:30). He woke up areound 9 and straight to the potty he went. We went to bed and about a nhour later he began throwing up. Well it went on and on for the rest of the night. Around 5 he woke up and puked all over me and our bed. Oh the joys of parenthood! So we all got up! I did laundry while the boys went and slept in the living room. He woke up about an hour ago and has managed to keep down a pop tart and some sprite. I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I asked him how he felt and he said good. He said "If I feel sick again, I'm going to try real hard not to throw up, it's yucky!"

Red Bellied

Last night I was laying on the couch. Out of the blue, Brayden came over and lifted up my pant leg and peered up into it...

M:What are you doing?
B: Checking to see if you still have a sunburn.
M: Nope, it's all gone.
B: Is your tummy still sunburned.?
M: Just a little.
B: Let me see.
(so I lift my shirt enough for him to see my belly)
B: *sounding horrified* UHHH, who scratched it off?

He thought the few lovely little stretch marks on my belly were scratch marks. (Yes I will admit I have them, don't most childbearing women have 1 or2? If not, please let me continue to believe that)

Dreamin'

Brayden came into our room last night and climbed into our bed. He was sniffling and it sounded like he had been crying. I asked him what was wrong...

B: I had a bad dream, it was a nightmare
M: What was it about?
B: You *3 sec pause* and dad.
M: What were we doing?
B: We were all playing?
M: So what made it a nightmare?
B: *suddenly perkier* It wasn't a nightmare, it was a good dream!

Then he went right back to sleep!

I'm still confused?!?!?!

Brayden and the "Lovies:

By the way, in case you've been wondering - Barry (the bear) likes the new paint in my bathroom. Brayden asked him if he wanted to go see his new bathroom. (we repainted about 4 months ago) He grabbed him and ran to the bathroom and was telling Barry that it's brown and it's awesome. I heard Barry in a high pitch bear voice say "cool, I like it"!

Also, notice Barry is holding Boots. Barry likes to eat monkeys, but not Boots, because Boots is Barry's friend.

Brayden walked into my room this morning and gasped in horror.... I turned around to see what was wrong and he was standing there holding up the red band that you see to your right (the kind you put around a sleeping bag) He said (very dramatically) "MOM, somebody stretched your hair thing and it's too big now"! HA!! He thought it was one of my ponytail holders (in the middle of the picture)!!

How do they do it?

How does a child watch the same movie/show over and over again? I can understand twice maybe 3 times. Even I enjoy a movie the second time around because you always catch something you missed the first time, but 20+ times!! I would guess that Brayden has seen every movie in his collections atleast 10 times and then there are the few that he has seen at least 15-20. The worst were Elmo and Blue's Clues. When he was younger he would watch the same one day after day after day. I try to only allow 2 -3 movies a week (mostly on the weekends) and for the last 3 weeks he has watched the same movie everytime - "The Big Green". He watched it a once or twice last year and wasn't too thrilled with it. But he asked for it again recently and now it's the "best movie". I don't know if it's because he's older now and "gets it" a little more or what. It is a cute movie and it has some pretty funny parts, but come on - 8 times in the last 3 weeks!!
I picked him up early yesterday so we could spend the afternoon together so he missed his nap at daycare. He crashed on the way home around 3:30 and slept until 7:30. I tried several times to wake him up, but he was out. He had not slept well the night before because of the tornado, so I guess he was exhausted. Since I knew he wouldn't be going to sleep at his normal bedtime, I agreed to let him watch a movie. Guess what he picked? Yep - the goat movie (his name for The Big Green - there is a goat in it) He was so upset because I wouldn't watch it with him, but I just couldn't do it. If I had gone in there to watch it, I would have passed out and be asleep by 8:00. I told him I would watch any other movie, but that I could not watch the goat movie anymore. Rather than pick a new movie so that he could enjoy my company, he refused and watched the goat movie by himself. It is so funny to listen to him while he is watching it. He cracks up everytime he watches as if it were the first time. I wonder what would happen if the goat movie "accidently got lost" for a month or so?

Stormy Times

Sunday night our area was hit very hard by tornados. We just barely missed the action. The path was less than a 1/2 mile from us. There were a lot of homes destroyed but fortunatly there were no life threatening injuries. We had been under a tornado watch the entire day. Well around 9:00, the thunder begin to roll and the lighting got pretty bad. We turned on the news to discover we were now under a tornado warning and that we were about 45 minutes away from being right in it's path.
The sirens were blaring outside and I was beginning to get nervous. As we watched the news we could see that it was getting closer and stronger and once we realized we were only about 15 minutes away from the action, we hauled it to the bathroom. So all 3 of us climbed into the tub (note to self, have a bigger tub in our next home). Bobby took the mattress off of Brayden's bed and we covered ourselves with it. Brayden wasn't exactly sure what to think. We stayed calm, so that we wouldn't scare him - but obviously it's not normal to climb into the tub with mommy and daddy and put a mattress on top of you. I explained to him what a tornado was and that we were doing this "just in case" it comes near us and I assured him that we would be fine. I don't think he believed me. He asked if tornados made "people died". I was honest and said that yes sometimes it does, but it's because those people didn't get in the tub and put mattresses on them.... I think he felt better about being in the tub after that. So much better that he relaxed and went to sleep. So there we sat with our legs cramped up under us, holding hands. I could hear the rain begin to pound and then it sounded like someone was beating on all the windows and walls. It was hail.....big hail. About 5 minutes after the rain had subsided, we heard the "all clear" from the TV.
Brayden woke up as we were getting out of the tub. We all went outside afterwards to check out the damage and saw a bunch of neighbors doing the same. Other than the swing blowing over, we had no damage. Everyone was outside collecting hail. The biggest we had was golf ball size, but some areas had hail the size of softballs. They showed one yard on the news that was covered in hail. It looked like snow. I've never seen anything like it.
So now that we have survived the tornado, they are talking about snow next week .... gotta love this Arkansas weather!!

Shhhh...

How did I get so lucky? Brayden's favorite game is The Quiet Game. He is always up for a round or two and he can usually last for quite sometime. If we are in the car and he is in one of his jabbering moods (which seems to be a lot lately), I can interrupt and ask if he wants to play. He agrees and it buys me a good 5-10 minutes of silence. I usually end up losing, either because I myself am tired of the silence or because I need to use my voice to yell at the guy that just cut me off. Yes, I know...I lost the game to yell at someone that can't even hear me! So anyway, this morning while I am in here reading some of my favorite blogs, I hear the song "Here She Comes, Mrs. America" playing on the TV. So I begin to hum it and then before you know it I'm belting it out. A few seconds into it, Brayden yells...."Hey mom, you wanna play the quiet game?" Touche! It seems I was interrupting his morning dose of Jimmy Neutron.

Girl crazy...already?

Brayden has been talking about getting married for months now. Lately he has focused in a one girl. Her name is Chloe...and she's a cutie. Here are just a few things he has said over the last few days about her and marriage..

He was talking in his sleep this morning and said "Ms. Lisa (his teacher), Miranda, Mykala and Chloe are being mean to me" Then he woke up and didn't say anymore about it. So on the way to school, I asked him if he had a dream about the girls and he said "actually it was a nightmare" He said that they were being mean to him and picking on him. He then followed it up with "but I better not tell Chloe about my nightmare or she won't marry me"

He caught a glimpse of himself in the car mirror and said "hey my hair is spiky, just a little bit" (he loves his hair being spiky) and then he was quite for a second and gazed out the window and said in a soft distant tone "i hope Chloe is at school today" (he knew he looked good and he wanted her to see him...does it really start this young??) I asked him why and he said very matter of factly "because I want to see her"

A few minutes later he asked if we could get Chloe's phone number so he could call her and then he said "or we can give her my phone number so she can call me"

He also talks about growing up all the time. He asks almost everyday "when am I gonna grow up" He talks about having his own honey (wife) and his own sons and daughters. He already talks about moving out. But then again the very next day he says that he is going to live with us forever and his honey can live in her own house. So this morning he was playing with one of those rubber "cause" bracelets and he asked if he could have one. It was too big, so he said "how am I going to fit this" and I told him that he would just have to keep it until he grew up enough for it to fit, he said ok and went on about his business. About 10 minutes later he came to me and said "you know mom, when I grow up I'm not going to live her anymore, so I think I will have to take this (the bracelet) with me to my new house"

Where does he come up with this stuff??

To: My precious Brayden

This blog has been a long time coming. When I was pregnant with you I kept a journal. Just little things, like when you started kicking and what we were feeling as parents. I talked about the anticipation and the love we already felt for you. I vowed that I would continue writing in it after you were born. I would record every milestone, the first word, your first little tooth and definitely the day you took your first step. Well here you are, 4 yrs old and I have only written in it once since the day we left the hospital. I was too busy playing with you, taking care of you, and loving you to take the time to write it all down. I thought about writing in that book all the time, but just never got to it. It’s the same reason we don’t have a home movie of every little thing. Who wants to be behind a camera when you could be enjoying the moment? So whatever the reason or excuse, it is what it is. I may not have a lot of written memories, but I have a mind that is overflowing with memories. My hope through this blog will be to begin retracing some of those and writing about things I remember. It will also begin to serve as the journal I always dreamed of doing. Between me and your Nana we could talk about you for hours on end. So get ready because once we start it’s hard to shut us up. I love you precious!