March/April in Pictures and Stories

Hi Everyone! Happy Friday!

We've had a lot of fun around here the past month and a half, and the kids are continuously doing new and cool things. First, a few pictures:

The kids got sand toys for their birthday and a favorite activity is definitely playing in the sand. It's been warm some days, cool others but unless the wind is really blowing I try to get the kids outside every day:

This is the bed in my home office/our guest room...I've been trying to make this space more kid-friendly, with a coloring station set up and some special toys they can only play with in here, a nice soft throw on the bed they can curl up in, etc. My thought is that if they are in here and letting me work, they can hang out for short peroids (especially if I'm doing something that's more rote/not super mentally taxing)...but if they start to get disruptive they have to go back out with Grandma. Trying to eek out some extra kid time while still getting the quiet/concentration I need...we'll see how it goes...

These pics were taken in front of the house en route to the mailbox one morning (the kids LOVE to mail out letters)...

And the zoo...if I take the kids by myself somewhere I'm finding the stroller is imperative so I can corral them if need be. Here we are at the zoo one weekday morning:

And a recent Saturday with Daddy: (We have an annual pass to the zoo/aquarium/botanic gardens, which is the best thing ever because the kids love all 3 places and we can go for just an hour or two without feeling like we are not getting our money's worth.)

And these pics that didn't make it into my Easter post...a little walk with the kids up to a duck pond in the foothills...such a beautiful day that day:

And let's see...what else...so much happening around here that I haven't snapped photos of...

When the kids first got the sunglasses (see above zoo pic), they put them on inside and ran from mirror to mirror, giggling at their reflections...cutest thing ever.

Luke is starting to recite things pretty much word-for-word (my husband has a memory like that too). Like the "5 Little Ducks Went Out to Play" song, one night in the bath I listened to him do the whole thing start to finish. And "Where the Wild Things Are" (oh my gosh I love that book)...one night Luke sat on the couch with me and I turned the pages and he told me the story as written, even including the little wordless song I do on the pages where Max and the monsters are wild rumpusing.

Sis isn't doing the word-for-word reciting, but she is singing back songs I sing to them at night, like I've been singing "True Colors" and Sis now sits in the rocking chair and sings it to me, her voice so soft and sweet. She is still super snuggly and lets me rock and sing to her every night. Luke would rather sit next to me in the second rocker, and that's fine, he's his own person, I still sing him his own song, he's just in his own space while I'm doing it. Both kids also like me to make up songs these days because their daddy does it...he is much better at it that I am...

Luke also is starting to get frustrated easily...everything has to be a certain way, his food whole not cut, he has to pour the milk, he's saying (whining really) "Mommy don't kiss me!" a lot and one morning last week he said, "I don't do shirts!" when I was trying to get him dressed. He also says, "I don't like it!" a lot, about food, about songs, about strong winds outside, etc. It's challenging. He is also super caring about other people and kids, very compassionate and empathetic, a mix of contradictions like I'm sure most kids are but I'm really feeling that way about him these days. 

Sis is starting to say, "Yes." instead of "yeah," which makes her sound so grown up. She also says, "Sissy happy!" a lot which just melts my heart. She also talks about making other people happy (as does Luke), eg, "I color a picture, make Grammy and Papa happy!" (We color and send pictures once a week. And speaking of coloring, the kids have such distinct styles already, Luke more of a minimalist, Sis with color covering the page.) Sis also talks about things being cozy a lot, which is super cute. "My fuzzy blanket is cozy." "My play house is cozy." :My crib is cozy."

We're seeing pronoun issues with language development, eg, they'll say "Pick you up" instead of "pick me up." I know it'll sort itself out but it's kind of interesting to see how language progresses.

Sis especially is really into superheros. She runs around waving her Spider Man doll in the air going, "Bip! Bip! Bip! bad guys! (Helping Spider Man fight crime.) She also asks regularly to put on the pink superhero cape her grandma made for her and runs around the house with it flaring out behind her.

The kids are really attached to their daddy. We've been seeing him off to work in the driveway, and welcoming him back home (he'll call me when he's 5 minutes or so from the house). Yesterday morning we waved goodbye, and as soon as Daddy was out of sight Luke sat down on the pavement and said, "I wait for Daddy to come home!"

There is also lots of "Tackle Tackle Daddy" going on (where they bring him down to the floor), and "Tunnel," where they go under his bent legs, and they like to sit inside his legs when he's laying on the bed, they say it's their boat and outside of it are sharks. And "Baby Races" with Daddy as the referee/judge who decides the winner, the kids either running or crawling around the coffee table 3 times and the one back to daddy first wins. And "Ring Around The Rosy," which I taught them in the driveway one evening waiting for Daddy to get home...they want to do it now all. the. time.

We're trying to get together with friends once or twice a week...sometimes bigger groups...more often now just one or two kids they are starting to get to know well. One day after a playdate I asked Luke at nap if there was anything else he needed in his crib and he said, "Elliott and Annabelle in crib!" (Elliott and Annabelle being the twins he had had a playdate with that morning.)

We're talking a lot about potty training around here...we are going to try the 3-day method starting in a few weeks (wish us luck!). I realized a little ways into discussing potty training that the kids thought it was an actual train. "Potty train's coming!" they would say.

Stanley and Fuzzy Britches, the stuffed kitties they got for their birthdays, are constant companions around here. Kids are "feeding" them food and when I ask Luke what he wants for dinner he says, "Stanley wants Mac and Cheese!"

There is lots of racing around the house with their big dump truck or wagon. Full speed.

We've been having a lot of "where do babies come from?" talks, which I didn't expect this young. They generally go like this:

"Where do little cows come from?" 

"Big cows!"

"Where do baby bunnies come from?"

"Big bunnies!"

(They answer the question themselves or for each other these days.)

Etc.

Luke's also been having some nightmares, generally some sort of animal in his room...peacocks, donkeys, dogs...he's generally soothed back to sleep pretty easily but I hate to see him wake up crying...

We had a few days of Luke getting out of the crib...he wanted to be in Sissy's crib with her, which would of been fine with me but it wasn't fine with her, she wanted her space, which I respect but it broke my heart to have Luke crying to be with his sister and her saying no. (He also tackles her and pinches her sometimes...he's either 100% love or 100% a menace.) Problem solved by moving their cribs further apart so he couldn't just flip into her crib. I think we're about to go to toddler beds when we do potty training, though...nervous about that transition, mostly because I want to keep them safe and the thought of them having run of part of the house (I think we're going to block off the back hallway where their room, the playroom and their bathroom is)...I'm sure it'll be fine but I just don't want them getting hurt...

Easter was super fun...loved Luke's excitement. "The Easter Bunny is coming!!!!" he would run around the house shouting. Such enthusiam in both those kids...love it.

I'm doing letter flash cards with them at breakfast sometimes (just A through F to start...and honestly, they got their colors really fast but letters aren't going so well...but I don't really care...I want them to be kids and if they get it, great, if not for a while, they love doing flash cards for 10 minutes in the morning and I figure, what's the harm?) The cutest thing though is when Zo finishes eating before Luke and then she wants to do the flash cards and then holds them up one at a time and says, "What's this, Luke?" like I do, and Luke will guess...she is just so cute mimicking me I can hardly stand it.  

It's so fun to see how the kids put thoughts together. Zo is doing this sort of thing too but the examples in my head are Luke:

--Big white circular onion flowers in the garden, he tells me they are like jellyfish (and they are).

--The other day he was talking about reindeer when he was eating lunch/I was prepping dinner. I couldn't imagine where talk of reindeer was coming from...I asked him and he said "olive" pointing to the can of olives I had out...there's a story we read at Christmastime called "Olive, the Other Reindeer"

--The kids are really into trucks, which they know go "beep beep beep" when backing up. We were reading a story about a rhino, which you could tell it's a rhino, I explained to Luke, because it has horns. "When the rhino backs up it goes 'beep, beep, beep,'" Luke then said.

Anyway, lots of joyous stuff happening over here, punctuated by lots of whining for things the kids want or don't want vs just straight-up asking. And temper tantrums. And exhaustion at the end of the day.

Can't wait to see what May will bring!

XOXO