A Weekend at the Farm

As the saying goes "Better Late than Never!"

William got to spend about 3 days with Memaw and Pawpaw on the farm around the 12th of this month. Pawpaw came down to San Antonio to pick him up and they headed back to the farm that Thursday. Will was so very excited to see his beloved Memaw and horse Tess. William had such a fantastic time feeding the animals and spending time with his grandparents. Will was also able to spend some time playing with his second cousins Dani, Neil, Kati, Mark, and Lee. All range in age from almost 4 to almost 1 year. Lots of little ones having a great time.

Mommy and Daddy headed up to the farm that Saturday to pick up their little monkey. They sure did miss him, but are thankful for the time William was able to have with his Memaw and Pawpaw. Sunday morning was quite an adventure. We all helped Pawpaw tag his cows. Well...Memaw and William helped us round them up and then they played at the house while Daddy and Pawpaw tagged. Mommy helped supervise, but she did tag one cow. Hooray! Before we left Daddy helped Memaw plant 4 blackberry bushes, and William had us act like "happy", "sad", and "mad" trees. It was great fun!

Here are some pictures from William's great adventure with Memaw and Pawpaw.

William and Pawpaw getting ready to feed


William and Tess


Memaw's (and really all of ours) favorite shot...


Getting the gate for Pawpaw


Playing with the girls


Playing with the Neil



We are in the process of updating William's room...AGAIN! Thursday night William announced that he no longer liked his "baby" bed. His baby bed is really a toddler bed. Yesterday we set up his new twin big boy "cowboy" bed. For some reason Will has been equating his twin bed with a cowboy bed and now wants a cowboy room. Good thing we can change it pretty easily. Look for some pictures of his new room in the near future.

Love,
The Tates

William in 2010

Happy Sunday everyone! Today marks the end of Mommy's vacation, and the return to our normal routine. BOO!!! We had a great day together as a family, and are starting to plan the rest of our weekends this month. We truly treasure our time together, and know we are blessed. We really do live for our weekends together. :-)

As 2010 begins we thought it might be nice for those of you who don't get to see William that often to have a better idea of what is he up to, his personality, and the things he is able to do so far. We feel like there is so much more to include in this list, and it may change as we think to add things. The plan is to add a list at the end of the year to see how much more he can do. We still can't believe our baby will be 3 in April!

William Joseph .....

is almost fully potty trained.
now prefers a cup over a sippy cup.
is in love with chocolate milk.
is able to "read" books to an audience now.
knows his alphabet including most of the lower case letters.
can count to 15 in English and 10 in Spanish.
knows many words in Spanish.
now sleeps with a small pillow, his favorite bear, and a cars blanket.
very much enjoys Thomas the Train and can identify most of the engines by number.
enjoys quizzing us on the engine numbers.
can put on a pair of pants.
loves to give "one hug and one kiss."
really enjoys playing games on PBS kids.org.
knows how to use a mouse and how to find his games on PBS kids.
is starting to become interested in dinosaurs.
practically runs everywhere while laughing.
can use tools and enjoys "fixing" things.
uses basic sentences now and is very inquisitive.
loves cows and horses.
enjoys playing with cars, trains, and trucks.
always wants chicken nuggets and french fries.
is starting to really use imaginative play. He even talks to his friends at school while playing at home.
remembers his relatives and talks about them.
loves the great outdoors.
has really started to show his personality by playing silly jokes on us.
enjoys going to school.
loves to play memory on Mommy's phone.
really enjoys puzzles and play do.
has a girlfriend and even talks about her away from school.
loves to wear his hippo towel after his bath and run around the house yelling "I'm a hippo! ROAR!"
loves the zoo and going on a train ride around Brakenridge Park after every zoo visit.



Mommy is almost perfectly happy with her New Year's Resolutions and may post them later this week along with Daddy's (if he has any). Hoping everyone has a fantastic week.

~The Tates

Happy 2010!

We had such a great time saying good-bye to 2009! Our good friend Valerie came down from San Marcos to spend some time with us. We love seeing her! Will just adores "Battery" at least that is what he thinks her name is. :-) William's godfather and Colby's BFF, Joshua, came down from Austin to spend the evening with us. We had a blast, and William really enjoys playing with him. When he woke up this morning he kept talking about Joshua having to go home last night. Such a silly boy.

We were all lazy bones and fell asleep before midnight! OMG! We know! We are really bad, but we did enjoy our evening of fondue and visiting with our friends and family. In our defense we did celebrate and do a countdown during Brazil's New Year. We wanted William to experience New Year's and we figured he wouldn't make it to midnight. No one expected that the rest of us wouldn't either ;-)

William and Valerie aka "Battery"



Happy New Year Brazil!






The boys



This morning we welcomed 2010 in with our traditional bagels and locks breakfast. William had an English muffin and opted out of the locks. We also made a yummy fresh fruit salad.

Ready for breakfast!



The rest of the day we are watching football and eating chili. We just love our holiday traditions! We plan on just having some nice family time together this weekend before Mommy heads back to work. Boo! Mommy and Daddy may even have their first date night of 2010 tomorrow night. Woo hoo!

We hope everyone had a wonderful end to your 2009 and a fantastic beginning to your 2010!

One of our New Year's Resolutions is to update our blog more often. Hopefully that is one we can keep.

Love,
The Tates