Forever In Blue Jeans: THREE

Well, July was the month our Oliver turned THREE! It was a month filled with milestones so let's get started. We celebrated the Fourth of July with family.

A fireworks show at the Peterson's, BBQ and swim party. Oliver takes his U.S. citizenship very seriously...

or maybe just his cupcake frosting.

Monsoon season officially began. Every early evening {say that three times in a row} is filled with beautiful sunsets, possible dust storms & sometimes thunder, lightning, and rain. {I used to hate these monsoon storms because I'm not a huge fan of lightning - - after living in Tulsa, the thunderstorms here no longer scare me. Like at all.}

Arizona's thunderstorms might pale in comparison to Tulsa, but Arizona's sunsets are by far the most breathtaking.

Cadbury waits each morning for me to open Ollie's bedroom door so he can say good morning to his little brother. He is such a nice dog.

Before Ollie's third birthday, I grabbed some pics of the little hunk before church one Sunday.

The Smolder...

He put his hands in his pockets without my telling him to, which made for extra cuteness.

Our BIG Three-year old!

Ollie had a pretty great birthday.

He got to play with me all day until daddy got home from work {which is every day of our lives, but on his birthday it was even more fun than usual}. I heard him yelling for help from his room. I walked in and found him begging me to "Save monkey. He fell down like Humpty Dumpty..."

"...and I can't reach him."

The cake was a masterpiece that took me 12 hours the day before. I was happy with it until the dog house. That got tricky, but lucky for me my Charlie Brown & Snoopy loving three year old could care less about it being perfect and absolutely loved his cake.

The first thing he said when he woke up on his birthday was, "Mom, where's my Snoopy cake? I want to see it." {He saw a lot of it the day before, but as I worked into the late evening hours he didn't get to see the completed cake until the next day.}

I needed a pick-me-up to shake off the exhaustion from the cake and thankfully, Whataburger Coke never disappoints.

Cadbury and Oliver sat by the window and watched humming birds for a good half hour.

Our conversation whenever Ollie puts on my glasses...

Oliver: "I'm mommy."

Me: "Hi Mommy. I'm Oliver."

Oliver: "Hi, Oliver."

Spoiled little guy opened a lot of presents later that day once daddy got home.

The favorite gifts were "Woody!"

and

"Buzz Reindeer!"

{During Ollie's "naps" all I hear these days are Buzz and Woody talking back and forth to each other.}

After Ollie's birthday, my parents & Ben left for three weeks to visit my sisters. One week in Park City, Utah

and the next two weeks in Denver. I had always planned on using this time to potty train the little dude. I gave myself one day to clean the house top to bottom so I wouldn't have anything else to do and could just focus on the task at hand.

I also didn't put any sort of pressure on myself or set any sort of expectations. I was going to just take it slow and be okay with however things went. So that first day I put a Pull-Up on him explained to him these were his new big boy underwear and not to go potty in them. I also set out the trusted froggy potty next to the t.v. and put on a good movie. I occasionally asked Oliver if he needed to go potty, but again nothing that required too much effort. If he peed in his Pull-Up I would just explain it again and start over. To my complete surprise he never peed in his Pull-Up. He did so well after a few days I put real underwear on him. He had two pee accidents that first day with real undies on and then went a whole week without anymore accidents. We run errands and the kid always tells me when he needs to go. He is a champion and spoils me with these big steps. I always stress and fret for no reason because he always just rolls with it.

The rest of these pictures are from the month of July. I can't remember where they fit in time wise because it is now the month of September {I'm a little behind} so I'm just going to throw them up for the sake of getting things done.

Here we go!

At some point in July we had a nice day out with Grandma at Scottsdale Fashion Square Mall. Oliver did great and we all had a fun day. This is some obnoxious chair in Dillard's that Ollie thought was the perfect spot to take a rest after all the walking we did.

There must have been a minute of nice weather at some point because I got these pics...

and I wouldn't have been outside if it hadn't been somewhat nice.

Another random outdoors pic...

Ollie says, "I'm Innie-anna- Jones!" - - Like he even knows who that is?!

During a nap, I went in Oliver's room to wake him up and found that he fell asleep with his "bowl hat" on. I lifted it up and the bowl was dripping with moisture and his hair was sopping wet. He had steamed his own head. Such a weirdo.

I found poor Woody sitting in time-out for some reason or another. I think when I asked Ollie about it he said, "Woody's not being nice to me."

One morning I threw some clothes on Ollie and then realized he looked just like Smee from Peter Pan...

We met Jordan for lunch another day and Oliver made use of the doggie bags. Have I mentioned that anything can be a hat to this guy. Anything. Anything at all.

While watching Disney Junior one morning I found Cadbury's identical twin brother...

Seriously. I couldn't believe it. Cadbury should be earning us $$$ with his sitting in a car, acting like a normal dog skills.

Oliver is always chilly in the morning {even when it's 117 outside} so we bundle him up. He just needs some more meat on his bones is what he really needs.