All About Thomas

Most of my recent posts have been mostly about Hayden. So, I decided to dedicate this post to the youngest and wildest member of the Temple Texas Hutson's. That's right, Captain Destructo!

Thomas is a sweet, funny, stubborn and smart little boy. He loves to give kisses and to cuddle in the recliner after a bath. He wants to do EVERYTHING for himself and get very upset if you try to help. He's a trash compactor when it comes to eating. He speaks, at times in a deep voice, which is quite comical. When playing, he is either Buzz or Ironman. He will put his finger on his other forearm and make laser noises just like Buzz or hold up both arms to fight off attacks just like Ironman.

Thomas loves Hayden and ANYTHING Hayden likes. Hayden's big thing is Mario and Thomas is now playing Mario. "Ya-yo" is Thomas speak for Mario.

We are in the process of potty training Thomas. He's doing very well and we've even had him in underwear.

Hayden and Thomas are sharing a room now and the other room is our playroom. It's worked out well, for the most part. Thomas is usually upset during nap time because Hayden isn't in the room with him (Hayden does not nap on a regular basis) It's so sweet to see the love between these brothers.

Thomas is sneaky climber. We had to move out the changing table out of the playroom because he was climbing up and we think he got down by jumping. He's fearless when it comes to climbing but is very hesitant when it comes to the pool.

Here are some of the funny things Thomas has been saying lately.

Bye-bye tee-tee. I flush you!

Boo, I scared you!

BYE-BYE GUYS, BYE-BYE FRIENDS *(It's in caps because he always yells his bye-bye.)

Hank you Esus for our food, Amen

(growling) I love you.

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Love to all,

Larry, Kori, Hayden and Thomas

Oh, no! Summer! I'm not ready

Today marks the official start of the Hutson's summer. I'M NOT READY!





Reason: If it starts, it will end. When it ends, our baby will be in kindergarten. I'M NOT READY! I do concede that he will be ready for kindergarten. Hayden asked me to teach him to read earlier in the spring. We started "mommy school" where we work on handwriting, phonemic awareness, sight words and next week, what Hayden has been waiting for, reading. He is doing really well (thanks in large part to his wonderful pre-k teacher, Abbie Atkinson). Even with all his progress, I'm not ready to let go. He's still our baby. He still climbs in our lap and wants to cuddle or rock rock. How can he be old enough to be in big, big school? The reality is that he is old enough and I have to let go.





However, I am ready to fill our days with bubbles, bike rides, trips to the zoo, swimming at the pool and lots of play dates. I plan on art projects and taking a page for my friend Jamie's book, shaving cream painting (due to my OCD need to be clean, it WILL be an outdoor activity only). I am determined to treasure every moment of this all too short summer with both of our boys.





Larry and I went through a Bible Study series by Ed Young with our previous church. Ed Young said the goal of parenting is to teach and train your children to leave.


Teach: And these words which I command you today shall be in your hear; you shall teach them diligently to your children and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down and when you rise up. Deuteronomy 6:6-7


Train: Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it. Proverbs 22:6

Leave: For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. Genesis 2:24

I know that kindergarten at the "big, big school" will be a wonderful adventure for Hayden. He's going to make so many new friends and make an impression on the world around him. I will let him go. But, someone would you please remind me of that come August 24th. Oh, and please send me some Kleenex!

More about Thomas on the next blog. He's hilarious.

Lots of love,

Larry, Kori, Hayden and Thomas

Disney World--Excitment and Disappointments

EXCITEMENT:


Larry and I decided in November to take the boys to Disney World in mid April. We kept it a secret from the boys and let them find out by discovering a box filled with Disney goodies 4 days before we left. At first, it seemed the toys were the only excitement to Hayden. We would say "did you hear us, we are going to Disney World?' His response was "yes, but Mommy, look at this spinner thing!" The next day, it finally started to sink in. "Mommy, I'm so excited that we are going to Disney World. I can't even stand it!" Of course, Larry and I were excited too. We've been several times and could imagine their little faces lighting up with wonder.

We flew out of Houston on the 11th. We weren't sure how Thomas was going to handle the flight and all that goes with flying. We managed to make it through security with relative ease. After a trip to get snacks, it was just a waiting game until time to board. Thomas was my airplane buddy and Hayden was Larry's. Hayden did awesome. He played his ds and snacked. Thomas was in his car seat. He did ok. He wanted to get out of his seat, but after the flight attendant brought him some milk, he fell asleep. Actually, he slept through the landing and the taxi to the gate.

Faces lighting up with wonder was exactly what we saw. I will NEVER forget the expression on Thomas' face when he saw the life size Woody in a parade. Hayden's eyes were twinkling when he saw "Disney World: aka Magic Kingdom from our hotel room.

DISAPPOINTMENTS:

Here's a picture of our new camera. We had been in the market for a new camera for quite a while. After lots of research and testing at Best Buy, we settled on this Sony cybershot. One problem. It wasn't suppose to come our until the first of April. We ordered it anyway and it was delivered on the Friday before we left.

We got precious pictures of the boys and their cousins playing before we left, pictures of excited kids in their seats on the airplane and pictures of our first night at the Magic Kingdom (including the carousel, Dumbo ride and the tea cups).

That's where our pictures end. We lost our camera somewhere between the people mover and the monorail. We called the front desk of our hotel and discovered that Disney has a central lost and found. They really think of everything. Larry filed a report and was told that it can sometimes take several days for missing items to get processed and indexed.

Tuesday--no camera found

Wednesday--no camera found

Thursday--no camera found

We decided not to go check on Friday because it was gone.

My first thoughts were of all the pictures I'd miss without my camera. I thought of the blank scrapbook pages. We did have our iphone pictures and of course, the Disney photo pass. I was just blown away by the fact that someone found the camera and decided not to turn it in. Did they look at all those precious pictures of the cousins playing? Did they think about the mom who would be missing all those photographic memories? Probably not, otherwise, they would have turned in the camera.

I had a choice to make. I could be full of anger towards that person or I could let go. I could be upset about the moments I couldn't capture with my iphone camera. OR, I could cherish my family and the memories that I camera couldn't or wouldn't be able to capture.

I chose, after some prayer, to let go. Instead of anger, I prayed for the person who found the camera and used it for themselves. I hope that they were able to capture precious memories of their vacation that they will treasure always. This was, by no means, easy for me to do. Human nature tells us to hate those who do harm to you. Jesus said "And if someone want to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well." (Matthew 5:40). It's not easy to follow God's path. The good news is that we don't have to go it alone. I've had to ask God, constantly at times, to help me forgive and give them my cloak too. After all, they may have our camera, but they don't have our memories.

With love to all,

Larry, Kori, Hayden and Thomas

Kite Day!

Our wonderful Church sponsored a kid's kite day after worship this past Sunday. When we arrived at church, there wasn't really any wind. Between worship and life groups, the wind had picked up slightly, but didn't seem like enough to fly kites. At some point during life groups, God turned on the fan. Eating hot dogs was quite a challenge since you had to hold on to your plate as well. At one point, Larry's plate went flying away, not before hitting me! After Larry, Thomas and I had finished our hot dogs and Hayden had finished his pb&j, it was time to fly kites. However, our boys LOVE to jump, so the bounce house was more appealing than holding a kite string.

We finially convinced Thomas to come fly his Buzz kite. He decided that the tail was easier and more fun to hold.

Daddy could not get him to let go. Have we mentioned that he is STUBBORN?

Thomas decided to go back to the bounce house. Yes, those are bright red crocs he is wearing. I had pulled out his "church sandles". He had other plans. In the end, there are some battles you just have to walk away from.

Poor Daddy, left all alone to fly the Buzz kite!

The boys plus a new friend decided to stop bouncing long enough to watch all the kites in the air. Then, bigger kids started coming in to the bounce house and the boys decided it was time to going kite flying.

It was a great day. The boys had a good time and where actually pretty good at flying their kites. We had one broken string followed by a runaway kite and one big kite tangle that included 3 kites.

I really love our church. I love that they are committed to families and want to work with us as we raise our boys to be men of Christ. For the first time since leaving First Baptist Luling, we feel like we are a part of a family of believers rather than just another member of a church.

Love to all,

Larry, Kori, Hayden and Thomas

Cameron Park Zoo

Over Spring Break, I took the boys to Waco to the Cameron Park Zoo. It was bittersweet because it was our first time at a zoo without our zoo buddies, Preston, Amelia, Brady and Reese. It was a nice day and the boys and I had fun.

Thomas did NOT want to stay in the stroller. Such independence!

The absolute highlight of the entire zoo. "Raff" yelled Thomas. Hayden was reminding me of when we were with our zoo buddies and saw the giraffes fighting.

As always, Buzz made the trip with us. Thomas took this opportunity to shoot the laser at the rhino.

I had a "mommy moment" at the lion cage. The boy lion was walking next to the windows. He stopped, stared right at the boys and then started to roar. The boys thought it was extremely funny. I started thinking "how strong is that glass and how fast could I scoop up my boys and run away from the big bad lion.

Cute boys. Sometimes I can't believe that God let me be their mommy!

Playing at the playground. They had fun sliding!

After we finished at the zoo, we went to our favorite place to eat (by favorite, I mean the boys favorite), Chick-fil-A. Such a great day!

Kindergarten...Here we come!

How did this happen? Really, how did this happen? How did we go from pacifier, late night feedings, and cooing to kindergarten testing?

This time 5 years ago, I was preparing for the parish wide kindergarten testing and for our first baby. Here we are now on the edge of shopping for school supplies and uniforms.

After lots of discussion, pray and tears (from me), we decided to apply to send Hayden to Central Texas Christian School. It's a wonderful small private school on the border of Temple and Belton. It wasn't an easy decision for us to make as Hayden's preschool is fabulous. However, it's the decision that we came up with and God gave us peace about it.

Hayden had to go in for kindergarten testing on Monday. True to his nature, he was very charming. He shook hands with all the people he was introduced to. I, nervously, sat in the hallway while he was testing. I pretended to read my book, but really couldn't concentrate. Again, I can't believe that we are at the point of kindergarten.

I'm so incredibly blessed to be identified as Hayden's mommy and I am so proud of the kid he is. Last night during his devotion time, we were talking about patience. The devotion talked about "God has a plan for you". I couldn't help wondering, what does God have in store for this clever little guy. I love him so much and cherish all our quiet times together.

With love to all!

Thomas' 2nd Birthday

Last Saturday, was Thomas' 2nd birthday. Wow! It's hard to believe that he's two. We had a wonderful group of friends and family come to help our little Buzz Lightyear celebrate in style. The cake was from one of our favorite places, Megg's . It looked incredible and it tasted incredible.

Hayden did a great job of being a helper. His shirt said "greatest big brother", so true. He was very patient while his little brother was the center of attention. Thomas got lots of cool toys that have kept him busy all week. Our wonderful babysitter, Kaitlin, gave Thomas a very special present--a handpainted Buzz Lightyear painting with Thomas' face instead of Buzz. So precious and so is our Kaitlin.

After the party was over and our little Buzz was napping, the clean up started. Thank you to Renee, Steve, Ranger Scott, Carrie and Becca for helping us. We wanted to let our the latex balloons go, since they are dangerous for little kids. Renee suggested that we send them up to Heaven to Carter. We thought that was a great idea. I love you, Carter!