Tyler Colby Stratton

As precious as can be...Tyler came at 6:25 Saturday morning, 8 pounds, 19 1/2 in. He is so mellow and sweet and I can't believe we are so blessed to have another handsome boy. More to come...

I ended up tagged...

I was just checking out Katie's blog and realized that by reading all the words I got to pick the 4th pic in my 4th folder of My Pictures. This ended up so appropriate since it's Marshall's birthday and I felt like I should let everyone know why I love him so much.

I love the way Marshall is such a tough guy that idolizes his daddy. I have so much fun watching the two of them wrestle each other and be crazy boys. Marshall would do anything to go anywhere with Dad. I think it is so adorable. And even though he is such a daddy's boy he still can be tender and sweet to me. I figure that's because Colby has done such a good job teaching Marshall to love me and watch out for me. This boy is such a blessing to me and I just can't wait to see how he will be a blessing to his little bro/sis as the world's greatest big brother.

Some more of my favorite things about Marshall are:
his hysterical laugh
his strange vocabulary that only I can mostly understand
his love of trucks
his animal sounds...they are so fun to hear
the way he smiles when he says "baby"
the way he has changed our lives forever

By the way, you are tagged if you want to be.

We Love the Birthday Boy!

Marshall is TWO! This dirt cake was such a hit. Can you tell?
He got totally spoiled by everyone. We got him this little bike. He looks like such a big kid when he rides it. We'll get some good pictures of that sometime soon I'm sure! We love you, buddy.

By the way, it is Colby who requests to match with Marshall. I promise I'm not the driving factor behind it.

Hope Yours Was Just as Good

Happy Easter from the Stratton's!
It took no time for Marshall to figure out what an Easter Egg Hunt is all about. He loved searching high and low. Somewhere Marshall got the idea that you're supposed to open the egg to check out the treasures before the egg ever reaches the basket. We picked up a lot of candy out of the grass... He was hillarious.
Check out this belly...only about a week and a half to go.

He made out like a bandit. More candy than a kid should have in a year... the Kisses were definitely his favorite.

Marshall Loves Easter

Hunting for and coloring eggs were big hits this year. I took about 30 or 40 pics while we were coloring eggs and here is one of about three where he was smiling. He was really enjoying himself, it was just serious business for this little boy. No messing around.

It's going...fine.

I've had quite a week. I expected potty training to be exhausting and eventful and I was right. Nine months pregnant and chasing a two year old to the potty really takes it out of you. I'm still glad we decided to do it now. Here's how its gone:
Day One: Marshall was really excited but had a handful of accidents (to be expected, duh).
Day Two: Fewer accidents by far and I thought we were making progress...until after the nap. Seems like it suddenly became a game to see if Mommy would continue to be patient if his "unders" got wet just one more time. And yes, I did stay patient.
Day Three: Less accidents (YES! Progress was visible.) but Marshall seemed annoyed by my constant questioning of his potty routine.
Nightime: Definitely the greatest triumph for us. No wet beds so far and I'm knocking on wood like crazy so that it keeps being a successful thing.

Now here we are at Friday night...it's been interesting. Early this afternoon we reached what I felt was a milestone. He went 24 hours with clean "unders" and I was feeling relieved. Too relieved, I guess, because the three of us (Mommy, Daddy and Marshall) had quite a time taking care of a poopy accident in WalMart. Thank heavens for family restrooms! Seems like I suddenly forgot to remind Marshall to tell us when he needed to go potty. Oops. Better luck tomorrow. And I can feel it...it's going to be a lot better.