On Father’s Day we took a little day trip to Adelboden. The weather was iffy. It rained the whole time we drove, stopped while we were out and about and drizzled the whole way home. So, we got pretty lucky weather wise. We went up in a gondola and had some amazing views of the mountains and waterfalls in surrounding areas! Adelboden is about an hour and 20 mins from where we live so it was a perfect distance with the little men.

After Adelboden we stopped for a nice lunch on the way home. We had spotted a Steakhouse on our way to Adelboden and decided to give it a try. We pulled up hungry and may I say a bit cranky…when we got to the door they greeted us by telling us that they wouldn’t be serving until 2 pm. Ummm, okay. So we drove around the village and found a river to explore. We headed back to the restaurant and had a great lunch! They even had American BBQ sauce!

The boys have the best dad ever, I must say. He has what seems to be endless patience even on really tough days and invests SO much time and energy in them. They sure do love their dad!!!  Happy Father’s Day, Seth! I appreciate all you do for our boys! Glad we got to celebrate you!!

In addition to it being Father’s Day we also got to have Jenny along! We are enjoying her month with us! We are over halfway through and don’t know if we will let her go back!!

I promise I will get back into the swing of things with blogging again! Jenny and I took an Indian cooking class on Saturday night and the house has been smelling of peaches, strawberries and cherries so more on jamming and yummy stuff to come!! Oh, and a baby shower that I did! Lots of backlog to catch up on!

On the 21st Owen turned 18 months old…..a whole YEAR and a HALF!!! And today, Jackson is only one month from turning 4!!!  They both have check-ups next week at the pediatrician so I will have real stats next week but while I have a minute I thought I would reflect a little on what our boys are up to these days. Warning: this really will bore 99% of you, read at your own risk!

At 18 months old, Owen is on the run. He is such a ham, still! His sense of humor continues to blossom and the parroting he is doing is only making it funnier.He has a contagious laugh and will work himself into a laughing fit if it means he can get Jackson laughing too.

He only started walking about 4 months ago but he now speed races around the house with Jackson, dodging the corners of the dining room table and plowing through anything in his way. He has an aggressive little streak, likely out of the need to survive having a big brother, The nice part though is that most times before he launches into a pinch or punch he yells “Owch” so you know something is about to hurt.

Owen has had a language burst over the past few weeks. His current words are “momma”, “daddy/dadda”, “jack”/”jackson”, “milk”, “bre”/bread, “cookie”, “dri”, “ink”/drink, “ju”/juice, “more”, “all done”, “all gone”, “nana”/banana, “pupu”/dog, puppy, “woof”, “duck”, quack”, “cockadooo”/rooster, “baaa”/sheep, “cow”, “mooo”, “cat”, “bu”/bug, “wash”, “bye, bye”, “thank you”, “chicken”, “hot”, “flower”, “apa”/airplane,…and my tired brain is sputtering out. “Jenny” is his latest addition. My cousin is here for the month and he has been smitten with her since she arrived!  Lots of these words he has done off and on but over the past month he is trying new words and getting much clearer. I know leave it to the Speech therapist to worry, but folks, the boy is a pacifier boy and his tongue and words are evidence. I have not been willing for him to give it up at bedtime so I have had to accept the fact that he is just naturally going to have some less articulate time. Pacifier + good sleep= happy baby and mommy, which consequently leads to a healthier communication environment, right?!   Despite the pacifier he is surprising us daily with new words!

And my this boy can eat! We went through a long phase where he threw almost all of his food and refused things we thought he liked. But, whew, after letting go of the battle and giving him some time to get his opinions out there he is now eating most things and throwing very few things.  He is a little porker!! the boy can eat an entire cheeseburger and some fries on the side. These Kolb boys move so much they need lots of fuel I guess!

Owen’s favorite toys these days are the toys Jackson has! But if he has to choose on his own he gravitates towards his bike, putting his sippy cup in the cup holder and tearing around! He also has a couple of stuffed puppies that he loves. Yesterday I saw him set his puppy down and he plopped down on the floor on his tummy so he could see eye to eye with the pup while talking. So cute.  He also enjoys climbing, preferably on chairs and onto tables and beds. (My blood pressure remains in the dangerously high level these days)

oh yes, I would be leaving out a whole chapter of this story if I didn’t mention the 18 month old emotions. It’s a roller coaster…but in some crazy way I love this age. The lows are low and dramatic but he snaps out of it so quickly. He can be flailing one minute and then something catches his eye, he shakes it off and is happy again.  He has learned time out and “making things right” when he gets up from time out and pats Jackson to say sorry.

And Jackson. He continues to be a joy! I must say that 3 was much harder than 2 but as we approach 4 I see a new maturity in Jackson. We have struggles with him daily with attitudes, talking back, etc but it is amazing to be able to reason with him now that he is older and to see his personality really forming. Jackson continues to be energized by being around people. Young and old he befriends and enjoys! It’s neat to see him form friendships and care for people. Jackson has a big interest these days in helping. Whether it be in the garden with me or helping Seth with fix it projects. He wants to be right there, close enough so you can feel his breath Ha, ha.

Motor wise Jackson is loving riding his pedal-less bike, running, climbing trees and being non-stop active.  He came in last week from working in the yard with Seth and had a huge scrape on his chest. He has climbed a tree and decided to let himself slide down. Ouch.   His legs are covered with bruises as evidence of his fun!

Jackson is a hysterical little talker. He is now adding every “actually” “suddenly”, “all of a sudden” and “you know somethin’ nelse?” that he can. He is tuned in to every conversation that occurs and I often hear him telling people on the phone about happenings I never knew he heard about. It is nice that he can now carry on long conversations with his grandparents without needing prompting. If anything though I am usually having to bribe him to get the phone back because he always has something more to say. This is when I should apologize to my parents for being such a talker but really I am getting my payback so I will save my apology for some other realization when Jackson becomes even more like me.  Laugh it up, mom and dad.

Jackson’s favorite toys currently are legos, trains and anything superhero dress up! He loves reading books and loves one on one time. He wakes up each day and asks “who are we seeing today?” and “where are we going?”.  He continues to take a nap most days because he moves non-stop and needs the time for his brain to SLOW Doooown.

The boys are learning daily how to play together and be sweet brothers. There are moments of peaceful playing and times (ummm, lots of moments, maybe hours) when war breaks out and they are both in attack mode.  They are getting sharing awards and kind word awards. Any little attempt to reinforce the sweetness.

And so they grow!!!

We had a very low key Memorial Day this year. Jackson and I went to pick strawberries in the morning with a friend while Owen and Seth hung out at home. The field is about 10 minutes from our home. We all took naps in the afternoon and then had a relaxing evening together. Jackson and I made a Strawberry Rhubarb Pie in the afternoon and we grilled and ate outside for dinner. It was nice to be together on a Monday after a busy weekend. Here are some pictures from our day…

we picked 4 kgs..over 8 lbs of strawberries!

a bit runny because we couldn’t wait for it to cool! So yummy!

a la mode

It was nice this year to be able to explain more to Jackson about what Memorial Day means. He sees the Marine’s working at the Embassy so he now has some visuals of men and women serving to protect us. During dinner we talked about being proud to be Americans. Jackson announced that he was a Swiss American. We clarified that he was an American living in Switzerland. He looked over at Owen, who was chomping corn on the cobb, and said, “now that is an American eating corn”.

Not sure if it’s officially summer yet, I know I should know the exact first day but here I am calling it early summer. It’s hot, we’re in shorts and short sleeves and we are enjoying the pleasures like picnicking, ice cream cones and our zoo membership.

A few months back we decided to buy a membership to the zoo. The boys are free so we just got one adult pass. It’s a 15 min walk from our house and the kids love it so at the time it seemed like a good investment.  It may still prove to be a good investment but I have to

be honest that I haven’t gotten as much use out of it as I have wanted.

On Tuesday, the boys and I ventured out for the morning to the zoo and then stopped on the way home to eat a quick picnic and skip a few rocks into the river. It was kind of a little boys dream morning.  I took along the camera and had some fun attempting shots while assisting with climbing and lunching.  I am enjoying capturing these moments that will be gone before we know it! I used to only take the “big camera” when Seth was going to be there so I could focus on taking pictures.   These aren’t as in focus but they are what they are!

(bring your swimsuit dad and Graham, Seth plans on going down the river with you)

It’s hard to see in this not so great pictures but the flamingos were guarding their eggs! I don’t think I have ever seen a flamingo nest!

a little scared without Jackson and sitting up

the highlight of the zoo is really the playground. It’s kind of a lame zoo from an adult perspective, lacking most of the big animals BUT as a parent I will say it is about as much zoo as the kids can do and enjoy and then the park makes up for the missing giraffes and elephants!

pb&j tastes better by the river

Jackson thought it would be nice to eat with shoes off and laying on his tummy watching the people pass by

We’ve gotten busy lately and I am enjoying those days when we decide it’s just going to be the 3 of us!  Sibling rivalry is getting to us these days but it’s these quiet walks and picnics together that I hope the boys will remember!