Where rain comes from

During a nice summer evening downpour tonight, Ty explained to us where rain comes from. Here's his explanation, which he gave while holding up his hand in the shape of a shower head:

"God makes the thunder. Then Jesus holds his hand up and the rain comes out of his hand. His hand has holes in it."

Our young but very seasoned air traveller

We know that with my airline benefits and our need to travel by air to visit family Ty has been on more flights in his 35 months than a lot of people have been on in their lives. However, we didn't know exactly how seasoned he was until he started playing with Kelli and Kaitlyn in the lake and assigned the following roles: Chicago, Florida (our two most-frequented destinations), and "Security".

Our favorite things (Part 3 for Ty and Part 1 for me)

It's been a while since I've posted an update on Ty's favorites (here's Part 2), so here you go...

• He now loves the color green and pretty much anything green (except most vegetables). He picked all of the green M&M's out of the potty reward jar first and loves to wear green clothes.
• He loves ramps...anytime we see a ramp (no matter if it's 2ft. or 20 ft. long), it's a special treat if we get to go up (and down) it.
• He loves watertowers and will yell excitedly any time we see one
• He loves playing in the water (no matter how cold it is--see the pictures linked below)

And now for me...

• I love to feel baby #2 kick :).
• I love when Ty sings "You are my Sunshine" with me and points at me when he says "You'll never know how much I love you"
• My favorite place, ever since I was young has been these stairs.

My dad built them and they lead from my parents' cottage to the most peaceful and fun-filled place for me--the lake that the cottage is located on. Thankfully, Ty, Jeff, and I once again got to enjoy these stairs a couple weeks ago and had a great time. Ty knows that "Up North" is mommy's favorite place and according it to him, it became his too (see him having fun with Nana below). For videos and more pictures of him having a great time with his cousins on our recent trip, click here.

A blogging dilemma

Well, I obviously wasn't thinking past the present moment when I created this blog. You see, I named it "Tyler's Times" which pretty much limits its content. Now that wouldn't really be a problem (since so much of our life happily revolves around him right now) except for the exciting fact that we'll have a new family member joining us in early December. So, will there be another Schmidt blog? Hard to say right now. For the meantime, Ty will have to share...

Here's the early picture of our new friend (taken a couple of weeks ago during the ultrasound):


PS: Place your vote on whether Baby Schmidt #2 is a girl or a boy at the top right corner of this blog :).

A week with a holiday and a trip to the Potty Train!

It's been an eventful week for Ty! It started out with a neighbor's party and the fireworks on the 4th of July and ended with a much-deserved trip to the Potty Train (named by Ty--see the last post). Ty's had about 10 days (and 4 nights) completely free of diapers and he's doing really well. I'm sure we'll still have accidents, but it's nice that we'll at least have a 5 month break from diapers before we start all over again :).

Ty wasn't quite as thrilled with the fireworks as he was last year...in fact, he was pretty terrified when we were outside, but he enjoyed them when we went inside and watched them from his window. And we weren't sure if he was going to go through with the ride on the Potty Train once we found out that neither Mommy or Daddy were allowed to ride with him, but he was a brave kid and even though he didn't look like he was really enjoying it, he talked (and sang) about the 3 minute ride for a good while afterwards. To see some photos and videos from this week, click here.

All aboard the potty train

We've been working on potty training with Ty for quite a while (he went for the first time on the potty about 16 months ago). We've tried not to push it too much, but always give him the opportunity and encourage it as much at possible.

One day when we were at the mall last March, he saw a little train ride that you could pay like $2 to ride. I didn't let him ride it that day, but I told that when he was 'potty trained" and wore underwear all the time, we would come back and he could ride it.

Well, we've been having lots of success during the past couple of weeks which makes me very happy in itself, but my smile gets even wider when Tyler turns to me after he's had an accident-free day at school and says, with very wide eyes, "I'm getting closer and closer to the Potty Train!" Seems they're going to have to put a new sign on that attaction at the mall.

Fun family visits

This past month, we've been lucky enough to get two visits from family. First, my sister Cathy and niece Elise (who was celebrating her 18th birthday!) came to spend a long weekend with us (their weekend got a little longer due to some cancelled flights, but they were good sports). Then, my mom, doing really well after her surgery, flew out for a few days. We had a great time during both visits and Ty loved getting to see his aunt, cousin, and Nana.