Who's Bored?

Never a dull moment in this house... Can't find something fun to do? Make your own fun.
I caught Noah putting on this little show the other day. I don't know what he is saying either. It is just the idea of it that I appreciated. As I continued to watch, he did a few songs and even gave Batman a chance to get a word in. He didn't have much to say.

Here's Abs. She has no toys, apparently, so she has to make her own. Now, this was before Christmas. Maybe we have since fixed her toy deficiency.

Also from December... Here I thought she was just pleased with her ability to say my name. Not so much. She had been doing it for a few days and while I listened to her, I never really stopped to watch her. Make sure you watch her mouth closely.

I don't have anything on record for Benjamin. I'll have to try to get him to tell us a story this week. The problem will be getting him to keep it under the blogger time limit.

For Grandma

Grandma Bonnie sends Abs lots of cute clothes. (That's just one of a Grandma's many jobs, right?) I take lots of pictures but don't always remember to send them along. So here are the last few, Grandma. And you all can see my cute baby, too. You are welcome. First up, the Abby Cadabby outfit because, c'mon, who doesn't want a pretty pink fur coat with their name on it?

Abby has learned this little trick. When she says 'Cheese', she does this little cheer move. Love that baby belly! I had this great idea that if I turned the camera screen around so she could see herself, she might be more apt to let me take her picture. Didn't work out. Take two: The sweater skirt. Abs learned the joy of jumping on the furniture. Uh, yeah. WITH the tongue out, of course. Let the fun begin!

Teddy Bear Picnic

Friday was the much-anticipated Teddy Bear day at Noah's school. I didn't really understood all that it entailed, unfortunately, but it was a BIG day. His teddy bear got an invitation from the school to come and attend. We went through all our bears and he selected who he thought it would be the best guest, but at the last minute traded him in for Pooh bear. (That IS who he took last year after all... Will we ever be able to convince him that he can change things up a little?) So it turns out in addition to the picnic, they had a full on Teddy Bear Olympics. After coloring his torch, he had been telling us that he was going to do 'twirling' (which we finally convinced him was called 'curling') and the "super-fast ice sled (commonly referred to as 'luge'). We really thought we was just dreaming big, but no. They actually did these things. Apparently Pooh did also. We didn't get to see any of these things - hopefully the teachers took some good picures. It was daddy's Friday off, though, so he got to join us for the Teddy Bear Parade. All the kids brought in shoeboxes which they then decorated as their floats. All the rooms paraded around to "Teddy Bear Picnic".
I know I am nuts, but these kinds of things just make me so emotional. It is just too darn cute to see your kid being so darn cute. They are all so proud of their floats. And torches. And headbands. And medals. I just love it.

Your Attention, Please

Christopher and I are please to announce that we have completed a home project. Sure, we started it 4 years ago. Sure, we still need to paint the ceiling. Could you just let me have my moment here??!?! I decided on Friday that I was ready to take on the dining room. I never knew what exactly I wanted to do there and a few weeks ago an idea came to me. The kids seem to be at ages that we can leave them to themselves for longer stretches of time, so we took advantage of it. Only three trips to Home Depot! And now that we have one room done, it just makes me wish that we could finish the rest of the house. Let's see... 4 years for each project... 8 rooms left to do... Man, we shold be out of this house before we retire! Oh, and here is what Abby did while we painted. (FYI - we were just across the gate and she was in our sight at all times.) It's probbly going to take me all week to pick this mess up. Mostly because she can take stuff out faster than I can get it put back away.

He Loves His Books

Benjamin has always loved his books. From the very beginning he has loved to have us read with him. That said, he has also been pretty content to sit alone to flip through books when no one was available to read. The boys have a pretty well-stocked bookshelf in their bedroom. This has recently become a bit of a problem. See, Benj, for wahtever reason, has decided he no longer needs to go sleep before 11:00PM. Skipping naps regularly doesn't appear to be an option at this time as he can't stay awake until dinner without it. So, Noah usually goes to bed in our room and is asleep pretty quickly afterward. We put Benjamin to bed around 8:00 and usually see him downstairs three or so times, hear him in the bathroom a couple three times, and hear him getting in and out of bed a lot. When we go to move Noah back to his bed, IF Benjamin is actually asleep, we always have a big stack of books to reshelve. I guess last night he wanted to make sure we didn't leave him empty-handed, so to speak. The Little Mermaid. Every boy's favorite book, right? Funny little kid.

Let's Make Believe!

The boys have been dress-up fans for quite some time now. Well, this week, Abby got to try her hand at it. We got this puppy costume as a hand-me-down and it was too small for the boys to ever use but it was so cute I could never bear to part with it. So Benj went for Captain Hook.(Noah was at school so he could pick whatever he wanted.) Abby was digging through the box and I pulled out the hood and put it on her completely expecting she would cry and remove it immediately. She didn't. In fact, she started walking around meowing. (We're still working on the dog sound.) She loved twisting her head and watching the ears move. Eventually we got her panting. Still no barking but we will keep working on it. She did keep trying to call Noah on the Mickey Mouse phone. "Hi-whoa, Whoa-wah!" But she got upset that he wasn't answering and she would throw the phone. Most upsetting, however, was Benjamin stepping on her tail. Any guesses as to what Benjamin liked to do the best during dress-up time??? Un-hunh... Poor, Abs...

SCIENCE!

A while back, the Chicken House gave out science experiment goodies in their kids' meals. Now, most children would probably think that was pretty high on the lame scale. (Sorry, Whit & Britt.) But not Noah! He still is sooooooo excited about it. Each piece came with its own suggested experiments that could be done. When he finds one of the booklets (or in this week's case ALL of the booklets), all we hear about is science. "Can we do science?" "Hey, mom, when you put Benj and Abby to bed, do you wanna do science?" He called his dad at work several times on Wednesday to remind him to bring home an empty pop bottle so he could "do science". He really doesn't care about the outcome or what the experiement is attempting to teach. (They list it at the bottom of the booklet.) He just likes the doing. He must get that from his dad because I am pretty sure I never got excited about "doing science". I just hope he keeps that excitement in the future.

FINALLY!

WE MADE IT OUTSIDE TODAY! I cannot remember when we were outside last. It has been that long. The sun was shining today and, much to my surprise, when I checked the temperature - WE BROKE 40! With 80% chance of snow/rain/ice tonight and nothing above 30 the rest of the week, we took full advantage of our afternoon. Well, about 30 minutes of it anyway. The boys finally got to try out their new bikes. Benjamin had a hard time remembering he has to pedal forward ALL the time to get any momentum. He also didn't want me following him around pushing him, so he didn't ride all that much. But he was so happy just to sit on his bike. Noah did pretty well once he finally caught on. Abby loved trying out her legs - in less than 15 inches of snow. Unfortunately, she went right for the mud puddle and refused to stay out of it until she fell in. Then she was happy to jut wander through the yard. (Special thanks to Noah for lending her the Spiderman hat and gloves.) Just a small taste to confirm what I had already suspected: WE WANT SPRING!!!

Rub-a-dub-dub

My three babies in a tub. And we all lived to tell about it! While I had thought of trying it a couple of times, it wasn't really my intent this morning. However, they all came a running when he bath water started so I thought I would try it out. They had a blast! Abby even got to try her first bubble bath. Unfortunately, she spends most of her bath time drinking the water. That didn't go over so well.

I [HEART] Valentine's Day

I [HEART] little boys in homemade ties.

I [HEART] little girls in matching dresses.

I [HEART] little boys trying so hard to pose for group pictures without any help from a certain little girl.

I [HEART] little girls taking pictures to give to daddy.

I [HEART] little boys who love sleeping goggles.

I [HEART] little girls who love books.

I [HEART] making cookies for MY Valentines.

I [HEART] little boys who dress themselves - backwards. Right down to their shoes. (He appears mad because his brother told him he had his shirt on backwards but I wouldn't help him change it until I took his picture. I know - so unreasonable.)

I [HEART] little boys who can ask a million questions about a single t-shirt. ('Why am I dressed like a robber?' "Why did I steal your heart?" "Did it hurt?" "What am I going to do with it?" "Will I ever give it back?")

I DO NOT [HEART] this. Enough already. Go away - we will see you next Christmas.