Hey Hey its your Birthday!

It is hard to believe that our little Dylan turned 5 years old today! The past 5 years have gone by in the blink of an eye. At times I just want to go back and see little glimpses of time to cherish those moments even more! Dylan came into this world surprising the heck out of us and each new day with him he does or says something that makes us smile and the love fills our hearts more and more. When we already thought we loved as much as we could we continue to love even more. The love for our children is unconditional and there is no limit on the amount of love we have for them.
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5 yrs ago today, in the hallway of a local hospital on the way to the OR, I delivered a little boy who weighed just 1 pound 5 ounces. It was one of the scariest and happiest days of our life. Our little boy has defied the odds and fought one hell of a battle. Every day we are reminded what a gift he is and he continues to show us every second of every day how strong he truly is.

We sat on the couch tonight, a child on each leg of mine and we read book after book when all of a sudden Dylan said he wanted to watch his video and Grammy's video, the ones I made. We watched each of them 4 times, no joke, and as the tears streamed down my face he looked at me and said, 'its ok mommy, i'm grown up now.' Its almost like he knew why I was crying, seeing in the video all he has gone thru in just a few minutes of a video clip brings back so many memories and makes me count our blessings that he is with us today. Then their was a St. Lukes special on about their NICU and we had that on in the background. It feels like just yesterday we were there, a distant memory but the memories are still fresh in our minds.

 We are so blessed Dylan to have you as our son and you remind us how truly great God is! You are our Miracle! Happy 5th Birthday buddy! We ♥ you SO much!

Back in the zone...

The School Zone that is! Dylan had a fantastic summer filled with lots of fun! At childcare this summer  he was able to do quite a few field trips, Chuck E Cheese, Play Station, Potters Obsession, Splash Pad and numerous water days! He had a blast and every day it was easy getting him ready because he was so excited for the anticipation of his fun filled day ahead!
The final day of childcare the parents were invited to attend the summer end Talent Show! I really had no idea what to expect. Dylan rarely showed or told us what he was doing until the morning of the show then he did a little break dance in the living room. Well I arrived and much to my surprise this was a very official Talent Show at that! The older kids were serving hot popcorn, homemade chocolate chip cookies and lemonade! The gym was decorated with lights and a balloon lined stage, it was SO cute! It almost brought tears to my eyes....seems so silly but every single event that we have at his school is just so perfect and makes us more and more happy that Dylan attends All Saints. This was over the top especially for a child care summer end performance, I was so excited for the show!
The preschoolers came out first and sang, '12 things I learned at summer care'. It was hilarious, they were decked out in their fab star shades and sang and did their little dance moves, too cute and SO much fun to watch!

There were several performances from dance to a puppet stage to joke telling and singing, it was very cute seeing all that the kids had in store. They sure had practiced really hard that is for sure! At the end of the show they called all of the students and parents to the dance floor to do none other than the chicken dance! Too much fun! We had a great time and it was awesome watching Dylan in his element having a blast with his childcare and school friends!
Last Monday we sadly said good bye to our sitter Michelle. Michelle has cared for Dylan since he was a tiny baby on oxygen. She more than welcomed our family into her home with open arms, she was a mother figure to Dylan, she was fantastic! Every morning Michelle made going to work so easy for me. It was big hugs in the morning and hugs at night, it was caring and snuggling him on those tired days and super fun play time in her toy room and park like back yard. It was a kids dream and we are SO fortunate we found someone like her to watch our little man. It takes someone special to take on a child for daycare, let alone a tiny baby that came with oxygen tubing that went all over her house. She did not hesitate, she did not show worry, our home health care company would deliver her oxygen as needed and she was more than willing to have Dylan regardless of what he needed. We cannot express in words how thankful we are of what she has taught Dylan over the past 4 years and the love she has shown him and the fantastic care she has shown. It was very hard for me to accept him going to school full time now knowing he will no longer have any fun filled days with his daycare Mom! Thankfully we LOVE his school just as much, but this step was a bit of a change for this Mama!

Thank you Michelle for taking such great care of our children!

Wednesday Dylan got to go to his 'Yellow' Room to drop off his supplies and meet his teachers and classmates! He is very lucky that he already knew his teachers. Mrs. Kray was a teacher of his last year and Mrs. Miller is the pre-school director and she often sat in on his pre-school room. They are two of the most fantastic teachers ever! Mrs. Miller's daughter is actually Danielle's Speech Therapist at Witwer so there is also a 'small world' connection there also! We can't wait to see the exciting things that Dylan will experience this school year. They have so many fun things planned. He seems to be very excited for sharing days as he loved those days last year. This year they are a bit different, each student gets to bring home the stuffed bear and small suitcase for a week. The students will name him/her and the bear will attend family activities for the week. The student then brings a sharing item at the end of the week in the small suitcase. Dylan is pumped up for his turn to bring the bear home! They also have cooking sessions each week, first is home made mac n cheese from Italy and then Johnny Appleseed homemade apple sauce! Just a few tid bits of what Dylan gets' to look forward to in the month of September! Brad and I both think that Dylan going to school 5 days per week is going to be so good for him. We are excited for what this school year has in store!

Today was his first day and I got the 'traditional' pics this morning. As you can tell by the smile on his face, he was more than excited to head off to school!

Dylan was exhausted from the moment he got in the car. He told me all about his 'Yellow Room' and all of the fun they had today. They sang songs, said a prayer, made a couple of pictures and played outside. Plus the snack was Scooby Bones, Gold Fish crackers and Apple Juice....can't leave out the snack of course! It is music to our ears hearing about our child's day thru his own eyes. We love every minute and each day brings more joy than the previous! Back to School is a fantastic thing....especially when you are 4!

Schooools out for the Summer!!!

WOW, it is very hard to believe that it is already past the middle of July! Where in the world has the summer time gone?! Dylan took about 2 week to finally realize what 'Summer Break' actually meant! He was not happy the first day of summer break when I took him to childcare at the school and he found out he was not going to his 'yellow school room'. After a few weeks and a couple of field trips he finally figured it out!
We were kinda sad to see the school year come to an end as he really had 2 great teachers and met so many friends at his first year at All Saints. His teachers were fantastic and were so great about bringing family time into the classroom and making sure us parents were always knowing what was going on currently and coming up in the kids' learning. We seriously could not ask for a better school for Dylan, we are SO very happy there!

On the last day of school they had a special graduation party for the kids and parents and we enjoyed the little show they put on for us. Almost every Mom in the classroom, including myself had a little tear in their eye! The cutest part was that, during the show Brad came in and surprised Dylan. We didnt' know if Brad was going to make it but he did and I held off and didn't tell Dylan. Well they were just getting ready to start and sing their first song and Brad walked in and Dylan yelled out at the top of his lungs, 'DADDY, look my Daddy is here.' OMG this melted my heart and the tears started flowing down both Brad and I's faces. Dylan had a fantastic year and us, as parents, have enjoyed everything about him coming home and sharing with us everything he learned during the day! He has really grown up this year, emotionally, physically, spiritually and we are so very proud of him!
All Saints had a very fun year end School Carnival for the kids. This year they had a Pirate theme which was literally just up Dylan's alley! They had games in every single classroom, the gym was full of bounce houses and a section for face painting, makeup, beads, jewlrey and all accessories girl and boy pirates need, basketball and hair art, then outside they had a huge rock climb up to a huge bouncy slide! They had snowcones, popcorn and meals for families, hotdots and walking taco's. There were tons of activities for the families and for the little siblings, the pre-school rooms was a childcare area with the pre-school teachers being the sitters, it was perfect! So of course we went and had a BLAST! Here are a few pictures of our little pirate!

This summer Dylan has been going to childcare at his school. After he finally figured out what 'Summer Break' actually was, he now has the hang of it and understands it and I think is learning to enjoy this time of non-stop play! They have some awesome field trips that they have done this summer and will still do yet. A few of Dylan's favorites are: Bloomsbury Farm (yes there is still a lot of fun stuff there in the summer!) Play Station, Chuck E Cheese, Splash Pad, Bever Park Zoo, Potters Obsession, Dairy Queen, Old Creamery Theatre and every other week they have had a water day right there at the school! They have all kinds of super fun sprinklers, a slip n slide and pools they set up for the kids....SO MUCH FUN! Dylan looks forward to every single day he goes and literally comes home those nights, eats supper, takes a bath and is ready for bed by 6:15 he is so exhausted from playing so hard all day long. His pre-school teachers are each working there 1/2 of the summer for field trip days so that has been awesome for him too. And most of his friends parents work, so a lot of his friends are at childcare at the school with him during the summer too!
While he has been having a blast with his friends, we have had a lot of fun with Dylan at home too. We have had lots of our own water days, we all secretly thrive for those days, I think everyone in this house is a water baby! It is no secret that our kiddo's love the water so we take full advantage of it when it is nice and hot outside!!

We have so much more in store for our summertime fun!!! Everyday with Dylan we cherish, everyday we laugh and giggle at the new things he continues to learn and say, every single day is a gift! We are enjoying summertime fun with our little man, if we could pause time we certainly would as these days go all too fast.~

Weather Academy!

For the past few weeks, Dylan has been learning about good ole' Mother Nature. He has come home from school with all kinds of neat things he has made, stormy clouds, a weather meter with sunshine and big fluffy clouds, a kite and lots of stories about the weather and the sun and clouds and rain and snow too! This section has really captivated him. Since he was just a tiny little one about 8 months or so, every time the local news weather would come on, his head was instantly focused on the TV. He could hear that jingle from two rooms away and he would come crawling in, and eventually running in just to watch the weather!

This Monday the KCRG News Weather Academy visited Dylan's pre-school. He was very much looking forward to actually meeting the 'weather man'! He was full of all sorts of information Monday night. Right away I asked him who he got to meet today, he said, 'the weather man Justin Gerdts Mom'. Like duh, I should have known or something ;) The Weather Academy brought their mobile weather lab to pre-school and showed the kids all kinds of fun experiments. Dylan had an awesome time. Then that night on the 6pm news they showed the pic of the kids from that day's visit. Dylan loved seeing his picture on TV too!
That evening he was flying his kite all around the house and yesterday took it outside to test it out! Every day with Dylan is a day of smiles, he brings us so much joy and love and giggles too!

Happy St. Patty's Day!

We are dressed in green, dashing that mighty sneaky Leprechaun! Yesterday was Dylan's sharing day at pre-school. It was also his snack day, he took Cheese Crackers and Apple juice. Well during wash up time prior to snack time, the mighty Leprechaun had made a visit to Dylan's pre-school room. That silly Leprechaun turned the room 'upside down'. Turning over all of the chairs, messing up the kitchen and putting all of the kids backpacks on the floor! But most of all the naughtiest thing the Leprechaun did was to turn their Apple Juice GREEN! Dylan did not quite know what to think of that! But even in the midst of the naughtiness, the Leprechaun did leave a pot of gold coins for the kids.....so Dylan says that made things all better!

Enjoy the beautiful Day! Next up.......our family Road Trip!

New Year wish for you!

Happy New Year Dylan!

We want 2011 to be a fantastic for you little man! 2010 brought many wonderful new life changes for you....you are growing up right before our eyes, in the blink of an eye.

You started 2010 as yet a toddler. By May you were potty trained and preparing for your first full year of pre-school. Potty training was sure a journey in itself, but now you are like an old pro. We found you a wonderful school to attend and we plan on keeping you there for as long as possible!

We ventured on a few fun family vacations in the Summer time. You continue to LOVE the water. We set up the swimming pools virtually every weekend for you and Danielle. You begged to continue swimming lessons and of course we loved watching you! We ventured to a couple of water parks during the summer. In Minnesota, Waterloo and even the new one in Des Moines. Every splash brought more giggles and we enjoyed watching you splish, splash around.

In the fall you started pre-school and a new you began to transform. You went from Toddler / little boy to full fledged little man in a short amount of time! Every day when you came home from school you brought with you new stories about what a wonderful day you just had....learning! It is so wonderful hearing about those new things you learned, makes Mom and Dad even more proud of you!

In September you turned 4! Oh my goodness, it seems like just yesterday you were born! Right around your Birthday you also got your first pair of glasses. Many say you look like a little professor, we tend to agree! They make you look so sophisticated and so very smart just like you are. A daycare mishap caused us to replaces the lenses already. You have thrown them around a few times and gotten in a little bit of trouble for that, but for the most part you are very good with them; realizing how well they help you to see!

You sure were a ball of fire at Christmas this year. We got teary eyed at your very first Christmas program too. It was so special seeing you on stage belting out Christmas carols with your school friends and teachers. It was a lot of fun to see you anticipating every gift. We celebrated with many family members this year. You like helping everyone open their gifts, and while you were excited to see what was inside, you also savored every moment, carefully tearing back each piece of paper. We really enjoyed listening to you sing your Christmas songs each day around the Holiday. You have the words down exact, but you tend to lot like when Mom and Dad sing along with you, you would rather sing on your own!

Dylan we are very excited to see all of the wonderful things that 2011 will bring for you! You are going to start a new journey in school next fall. I talked with your teachers last week and they recommended for you to skip over the 4 year, 4 day program; rather you will be in the 4/5 year old 5 day Enrichment class!!!! This was wonderful news for Mom and Dad to hear. We are SO proud of you and your eagerness to learn new things. When your teachers recommended that to your Dad and I, we weren't surprised, yet we were a little taken back thinking, 'this is really happening, our little boy is growing up so fast, you have really developed into a smart young man'. We are ready to join you in this journey of learning. We truly believe we have you at the best school and are surrounded by the best educators.

You are truly such a wonderful big brother to your little sister Danielle. You like a little father hen most times. You have identified each and every sound of hers and you fully know what she wants by the sounds she makes. You come running when she cries and you laugh with her when she giggles. You get very concerned if you are with Dad or I and Danielle is not there. You love to give her toys, you try and help us put her socks on and her coat on too. Every single day with you and Danielle in our lives is one more day that our heart gets more filled with love. You are a gift from God Dylan, we are so blessed to have you as our son.

Dylan we wish you the VERY BEST in Twenty Eleven! We are very proud of you and your accomplishments. We are happily sitting beside you and we are holding on tight for the best ride!