Serious Casto Fun

We had a great time this week with Trent's brother, sister-in-law & their 4 boys. Here are some of the highlights...

Jace turned 1 on Wednesday! We had so much fun celebrating his birthday all day!

We played putt-putt.

The girls

We walked the 2.25 mile boardwalk through natural swamplands at Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary.

It's a great place to see a lot of Florida wildlife, but we didn't see too much.

Anna Kate enjoying nature

Six Little Castos

First, I want to say that Trent is MUCH better! He passed the kidney stone on Friday evening, about 28 hours after the pain started. It seemed amazingly similar to many women's labor, except the end result was what looked like a little piece of gravel. We are both rejoicing that he's better.

A couple interesting things we learned about kidney stones is that we live in the "kidney stone belt" and this is "kidney stone season." More people have kidney stones when the weather is hot & sunny, but also breezy. The sun causes people to sweat and need more water, but when there's a breeze people drink less water since they're cooled off. When you're kidney's aren't getting enough water they can develop stones. Needless to say, we've both consumed a lot of water over the last few days.

Trent was better just in time for his brother & family to come! Chad & Jessie have 4 fun boys.

Jessie with 5 boys in the pool.

The 5 Casto boys on the Naples Pier

Austin trying to help his brother, Jack, smile

Anna Kate wearing her first bow.

Yesterday I wore a shirt that said "My Husband Rocks." Well, it got changed by an ER employee (with a stickie note) at our local hospital to "My Husband Has Rocks." Trent was literally knocked down at work yesterday with a Kidney Stone. He still hasn't passed it yet. He's at home and it was a long night. We're praying it passes quickly.

I thought I'd use this post to share a few more pictures from Trent's ordination that his mother took.

Elders from several churches praying for Trent, our family & his calling as a Pastor

Doing his first official act as an ordained minister- giving the benediction that day.

The Big Brother

I am happy to say that Hudson is enjoying being a big brother again. Last weekend, he went to a big brother party and had a blast! Two of my friends and I decided to get one babysitter for all of our boys. We all have little baby girls as well. So, instead of just having a babysitter (while we all took our baby girls to the party we were going to), my friend turned it into "Big Brother Camp."

They did several "big brother activities", including making these crowns. Hudson wore his everywhere we went for a few days. He got lots of people congratulating him on being a big brother while we were out running errands.He loved the attention.
He has asked to hold Anna Kate a few times and has done an excellent job being gentle.
He's also wanted to sit next to her and console her when she cries.
Tomorrow we are having a potty party at our house! Hudson is SO excited! I am so not excited. Mostly I just do not feel confident in my timing of trying to start potty training Hudson tomorrow (he's been asking for awhile to use the potty) or in my competency of my method. I'm wanting to cancel the whole thing, but Hudson would be crushed and confused. So, I will venture on.

If anyone has any tips, I'd love to hear them (although I'm starting first thing tomorrow morning!). The plan is to hang-out on the porch/pool deck (where I can easily hose it down) with Hudson only wearing a t-shirt. We have a little toddler potty out there. I let him pick out some juice today (a huge treat), some tic tacs (his favorite treat...he's crazy about tic tacs!) and some big boy underwear (he chose cars). The plan is to encourage him to drink lots of juice/water and regularly put him on the potty.

Do I put a diaper on him for his nap/bedtime? If anyone has a thought before 1pm EST, I'd be happy to hear it.

One Month

Although Anna Kate is 5 weeks old now, she had her 1 month check-up yesterday.

She's 10lbs 7oz, which puts her at the 75th percentile for weight. Can you see the rolls in her arms? I love them! She's 21 inches long, so 50th percentile for height. The pediatrician said she looked healthy!

She's playing and interacting more and more. It's so cute to watch! She even gives us and her toys from her activity mat lots of smiles.

We love you so much, Anna Kate!

Our New Mode of Transportation

I'm loving our new stroller and looking forward to cooler weather (in several months) when we can get even more use out of it.

We can walk to the beach, a park or a friend's house and let Anna Kate nap while we play.

In case anyone's worried, Anna Kate normally has a head support (a rolled up receiving blanket) in the stroller, but I guess she doesn't have it in the pictures I took.

Finger Painting

How fun!

Hudson was very proud of his work

and glad to have his Daddy home!

Adjusting to Being a Big Brother

Hudson absolutely adored being a big brother for the first couple of weeks. Around the 2 week mark, he started saying things like "Mom, I'm all done with Anna Kate" or "Mom, time for Anna Kate's nap, Anna Kate go to bed" (within 30 seconds of me getting her up from a nap). After a couple days, this progressed to Hudson hitting Anna Kate. He has hit her with his hand, kicked her, thrown trucks at her, stepped on her, scratched her, pushed her and pulled her. I guess you could say he's having a hard time.

I realized I made the matters worse by the way I was responding. I would get very protective of Anna Kate. A typical interaction would go like this:

Hudson & I playing while Anna Kate plays on her activity mat

Hudson hits Anna Kate (for no apparent reason); Anna Kate cries

I say angrily "Hudson why did you hurt your sister? She's just a baby and you're a big boy. You're her big brother. You can't hurt her" while I pick up Anna Kate and console her. I tell Hudson to go to his room and I'll come talk to him in a minute.

I calm Anna Kate down & go talk to Hudson about not hitting.

The problem I think I've had is that my actions would communicate that I would protect Anna Kate from her mean big brother. Somehow I need to discipline Hudson (because he can't hurt her) but also build him up (since he's having a hard time adjusting to having a baby in our family).

Trent was out of town last week at our denomination's annual meeting in Nashville. Hudson actually ended up getting a very high fever (over 105 degrees!!) for the whole week. While it was very scary for him to have a fever that high (he's all better now :)), it seems to have caused him to not be as violent towards his sister. While he was sick, he was very low key, just laying in bed, on the couch or on me. Since he's been better this week, he hasn't tried to hurt Anna Kate as much. Although I imagine it'll take awhile to adjust to being a family of four, I'm hoping some of the initial aggression he's displayed is on the decline.

Hudson found a cool turtle in our front yard.

Anna Kate slept through the action inside.

She loves playing on her activity mat now. Here she's really enthralled with a puppy dog toy.

Can you see her mohawk patch of hair :) It goes nicely with her big blue eyes.

Fun Visitors

Over the past week, we've had visits from Trent's mom, Vickey, and one of my best friends from college, Martha Jane. It was absolutely lovely to have both of them here!

All of us on the pier

I was hanging out with Anna Kate in the shade on the beach (there's shade from a building until 10:45am every morning) watching Hudson play with his Dad & Nana in the water

Anna Kate hanging out at the beach

What better place for mother & son bonding than in the ocean

Nana & Hudson watching some birds catch fish in the surf