I Get a Kick Out of You

The time has come for another round of adorable Miles pictures, just in time for his second birthday. Here are just a few, but you can check out the whole album on Facebook.

If you love these as much as I do, take the kiddo (or middle-aged spouse, family iguana, or yourself in an indulgent new outfit) to Portrait Innovations. I think I've gushed about them before, but they're great with Miles, produce pretty pictures (yeah, my starlet son probably helps), and you get a ton of prints for your money.

So, on to the good stuff!

The crowd favorite:

Representin' the Bulldog Nation:

Playing with blocks:

And knocking them down again:

(Almost) Dos, Deux, Zwei, Two!!

And now...the most controversial of them all:

Jason loves that one. I think he's pretty cute in it, but I also think it looks like he is getting ready to go off to college! Aunt KK calls it his "old man" picture. Uncle Bub probably put it best, like Miles is saying "Evenin' Ladies..." ready to chat up some hot toddlers sporting sundresses and bloomers, drinking chocolate milk out of their sippy cups at the Baby Singles Bar. What do you think?

We have more pictures than we know what to do with, so if I plan to see you soon, please be prepared to take a load off of our hands! We have enough wallets for him to give out to all of Morristown Jr./Sr. High School, I do believe. I'll make sure to write "Don't change. It was fun knowing you. Class of '26!!" on the back of each one.

Next stop - Birthday Party #1 of 3!

A Day for Mommy

The good news for me - we've been able to spend our evenings and weekends with Daddy again. That's bad news for you, my fair readers, because nights together means holes in the blog timeline. Lucky for you that Miles' cold made him too cranky to go to the grocery store tonight. That means Jason has a date with Meijer and I have a date with all of you.

I'll spend this evening's date talking about my date with Miles and Jason on Mother's Day. Did you notice that "Mother's Day" is singular this year? Although the grandmas were in our thoughts, they had other obligations, so this year was all about me, me, me! It was such a great day.

After church, I got a nap while Miles had his. Then, we were off to the Indianapolis Museum of Art. Not surprisingly, Miles only lasted through Gaugin's early years and partially through the pointillists. That's 10 minutes, for those of you unfamiliar with the IMA.  Thankfully, it was a nice afternoon and the museum has beautiful gardens.

Miles' favorite part of the day was watching the fishies:

We then went to dinner at one of my favorite restaurants - Claddagh. This is Miles "excited" face - guess he was really pumped about fish and chips.

Not really...I think he was more pumped about wishing Nana a Happy Mother's Day:

It was the best Mother's Day I could have - spending time with my boys!

On a completely unrelated but obligatory Miles progress note, we're in the Potty Prologue. Most days we get a "no" when we ask Miles if he wants to sit on his Froggy Potty (still in the diaper on phase). On Sunday, he got really excited when we told him he could bring his new (ok, garage sale) fire truck with him.

We'll keep you posted on the potty progress...the perfect ending to a perfect date, right? 

Derby Delight

We had a fun weekend down at Uncle David and Aunt Hilary's house at their annual Kentucky Derby celebration.

Miles was only slightly interested in the horsies on TV. After a half-dozen or so races, I can personally see how it loses its luster too. I guess there were plenty of people there (and dollars too) that disagree with us. One of those was Daddy, who flushed several of our dollars away by not winning a single race.

Despite his lack of interest in racing, Miles tried to at least look the part. I tried to enable a repeat performance of Miles' "Little Jockey" shirt from last year, but he refused to take his sweatshirt off the entire time. Luckily, he humored us with the tacky hat for a minute or so:

The best part of the party was getting to spend time with some of Miles' favorite people. Grammy enjoyed her bonus time with him, while Miles enjoyed his sucker from Aunt Hilary:

Miles loved hanging out with his cousin Lyla, escorted by Nana and Aunt KK:

Big (Boy) Ben and Miles had fun playing together...or should I call them Pete and Re-Pete? Miles liked to do and say whatever Ben did, and they did a pretty good job of playing catch, coloring, and playing with trucks. They also were excellent at resting together on Miles' new race car bed:

On an unrelated but equally cute note: Miles' first taste of sushi:

He was ambiguous about it at first but got really excited about dipping it in the "green stuff". I said no to the wasabi, but Daddy wanted to let him try. At first, I didn't think Miles actually got any, so we let him take a bite. Wish I would have gotten a picture of that surprised face! Please don't call Child Protective Services...all turned out ok.

One More School Lesson...

So, I thought last night would be the end of my "school" theme, but I just got a doozy tonight that had to have come from school!

Scene: Culver's, Miles/Mommy Date Night. A feast of delicious Butter Burgers are spread out before us.

Miles grimaces with the pained look that graces his face on many occasion. Family members - you know the one. I dare not discuss its origins in mixed company.

I reach over to comfort him - smoothing his back and brushing his hair out of his face. I coo with a maternal sigh, "Do you want Mommy to hold you while..."

Before I even have the chance to complete my loving inquiry, Miles spouts:

"Mommy, keep your hands to yourself!"

Gettin' Schooled

For those of you that don't now, Miles is a big boy who goes to "school". We love his day care, and he loves his teachers and friends there. Whenever we ask him what he did that day, he always tells us "Sing songs. Dancing. Eat." We still haven't figured out the song he tells us he likes to sing with his best buddy Colin. If any of you know what "Dub-dub-die...sit down!" might be, just let me know.

He recently had his official school pictures taken. Here are some illegal downloads because we're too cheap to buy them before he gets his 2-year old pictures taken next month:






And my personal favorite...one I entitled "Suspicious."


He learns lots of things at school. He tells us his favorite song to sing with Miss Callie is the ABC song. Don't mind the visual - the audio gives you a pretty good idea of how good he's getting at his alphabet. As usual, he loves to give a grande finale flourish at the end!

Of course, we also need to stay up to date on current events at home:


And every boy needs a little fun after school!

Knockin' Back a few Moo-skees

The Man of the House is working again this evening, which means you, my dear readers, will benefit from yet another post this month.

With Jason being gone so much in the evenings this past week, Miles and I have been enjoying lots of date nights. We went for ice cream one night - just Wendy's - can't do Frosty Boy without Daddy. We had a pizza/playground night. We even had an evening that didn't involve food, but it did involve shopping! In general, Miles is learning to be a much more pleasant boy in public, and I'm so proud of him! He even behaved at a wedding last night...sort of. If Jenny and Jan don't mind hearing "goldfish" and "Amen!" about 20 times on their wedding video, then we're in the clear. No tantrums!

To reward him for his good behavior, we put him to work:
Miles is finally big enough for his Bubble Mower (thanks, Uncle Bub!), and he wore it out today, which gave us some much needed time to pull weeds and clean the garage a little. It's so nice that Miles is getting big enough to entertain himself, but it also makes me a little sad.

We also had a big afternoon today at Trader's Point Creamery. The first thing we did was take a look at the machine bottling chocolate milk. Miles kept saying the cows were drinking chocolate milk, so he wanted some too. Amid about 40 choruses of "Miles' chock-it milk", we managed to visit the chickens. Miles wasn't too thrilled, especially when the rooster started crowing. Neither was Mommy - I swear Rooster #2 was shooting me an evil chicken grin. We hightailed it to the old/tired cow and baby cows hanging out in the cool of the barn. Miles wasn't so excited about that either. He really started to freak out when we watched them bring the loudly-mooing cows in from pasture to be milked.

I have to side with my boy here - skip the outdoosy, stinky, loud, animal part...and get to the part where we lounge on the patio with a glass of cool chocolate goodness!

Can't believe that my boy is big enough to drink out of his own glass so well - or that he's sporting that darn mustache again:

So, what did we do to wrap up our outdoorsy afternoon? Shopping, of course! Check out Miles' find:

Hippety Hoppety

The Kahls somehow celebrated Easter amidst the hubbub of Butler getting to the National Championship. Yes, I know how close that shot was -- I saw it 812 times after the fact.

Considering we were out until midnight watching the Bulldogs kick some Sparty behind, our 7:30 call to be at church came very early. We still managed to get in a couple minutes to check out the Bunny's stash before heading out.



Peter Cottontail brought just what Miles thought he would - lots and lots of suckers.



Not only did we have to sing both services at church, but Jason played his trumpet and I played my flute. Miles was generally a very good boy - not whining, but a little hopped up on sugar. To calm him down, Jason let Miles fiddle with his trumpet a little bit. He wasn't making noise, and it kept him quiet and out of trouble - that is, until it came time for Jason to actually play his trumpet. Of course, taking away Miles' "toy" led to the Grand Easter Tantrum. As I was carting Miles' butt out of the sanctuary, he screamed the whole way, "MY...DADDY'S...TRUMPET!!!!!!"

Luckily, his cuteness overpowered his orneriness, and everyone kept telling us how adorable he was at the breakfast afterward. I try to stay humble, but I have to admit that this just oozes cute:



Since it was just the three of us this year, we decided upon a delectable Easter lunch of Chinese takeout. Miles then decided to take a little time on the back nine to aid his digestion.




We then hunted down eggs that the Easter Bunny hid in the front yard. Miles still looks for eggs every time we go out to the car.



Finally, Miles got to enjoy some non-sugary treats as a reward for his excellent egg hunting skills:



It was a good day.