Who needs naps?

So the week of no day care continues. How do stay-at-home moms do it? Seriously. I get nothing done when the kids are here. Add to that the fact that I'm supposed to be working full time this week too, and and it gets pretty crazy. Fortunately, practically no one I work with is working this week, so that means there's not much going on. There were enough people to scrounge together for my weekly Wednesday meeting I run for my current project. Only problem was I have 2 kids at home and Braden was running practice this morning during my meeting. Thank goodness again for Blythe's friend Ashley and her mommy who had Blythe over for the whole morning and then some. My meeting happened to fall when Ethan takes his morning nap, so we were covered. Phew!

I picked up Blythe and we got back around 2pm, just in time for her nap. And she was starting to get Krr Anky, so I was glad to put her down. We read a story, kissed, hugged, etc. Then I put Ethan down. Took him a while, but I finally had them both down! Or not. I heard Blythe banging stuff around in her room, so I went in there to check. She had tried to baracade the door by moving her stool in front of it, but I was able to overcome the obstacle and enter her room. She was playing with her magnetic letters. As soon as I came in she said, "I'm just going to do 'T' and 'D' and then I'll take a nap". Okay. So FINALLY we were down for nap. I went downstairs to get back to work. A short while later Blythe came downstairs and declared she wasn't going to take a nap. Ugh! So this is a first. A first I an unto happy about. I have always said that whenever Blythe gives up naps, I will have her observe "quiet time" and play quietly in her room for an hour or so (hopefully more like two). So, I figured I might as well start that routine from the get go. I explained to her that she didn't have to take a nap, but that she had to play quietly in her room by herself while I worked for a while. I told her she had to stay there until Ethan woke up or until I came to get her. She was agreeable and off she went. She was in her room maybe 5 minutes before she made her way to my bedroom, then the bathroom, then the guest room, then back to her room, all the while slamming /quietly closing each door behind her until miraculously Ethan woke up. Go figure.

So we all came downstairs to get a snack. After I (smoked some crack) ate a cookie, I decided to take BOTH of my overtired children to Walmart to get groceries. Actually, I have no good stories from Walmart, as both kids were remarkably very good.

4 more full days until they are back at daycare, not that anyone's counting.

More Christmas pics

Forgot a few more pics from Christmas #2. Lynette has a cool "photo booth" program on her computer that makes crazy pictures. Blythe LOVED playing with it. Here are some of her crazy pics.

Christmas adventures and Ethan takes steps!

It's been a little while since I wrote...guess things got a bit busy there with Christmas and all. The holidays were good. Nice to spend time with the families and it was fun to have the kids open their gifts. After Santa came on Christmas Eve, I could hardly sleep I was so excited. Felt like when I was a kid and was so excited to open all those presents, except this time I was so excited for my kids to open their presents.

On Christmas Eve we went to the family service at church, which is code for the "whiny children/crying babies" service. Since we have whiny children and crying babies, we're banned from the other service (just kidding, but it would be terrible to have them at that one). The kids were a little sick last week, so our normally happy little Ethan was a nightmare! Nothing made him happy. So we just kept feeding him snacks because then the cries weren't so loud. Blythe, on the other hand was pretty good. Though during the first song (I think it was Away in a Manger), she started dancing and "shaking her booty" in church. Then all of the children went to the altar to hear the Christmas story. Blythe and her friend Ginsey weren't really paying attention. Between Ethan's crying spells, I could glance at Blythe and see her showing Ginsey her new dress and pretty bow. Next time I looked up there, they were both lying down with their legs in the air (and both wearing dresses), basically showing everyone at church their underpants. I had to laugh. And if I wasn't dealing with Ethan, I'd have picked up my camera and got it on film.

After church, Blythe got to open 1 present. She opened the princess rollerskates we got her. She was much better than at the skating rink, but still not very good. Needs practice. The next morning, Santa came and brought Blythe the blue baby, the legos, and the yellow castle. The yellow castle was the Candyland Castle game (good thinking, Santa!). Ethan got megablocks, a soccer ball, and a pop-up toy. Then they opened like 8 million other presents before we had to say good bye to Peep, Grams, and Hampton before they hit the road. We too packed up and hit the road to drive to Gommy and Poppa's house.

Here's a few pics from Christmas at our house:

At Gommy and Poppa's we had Christmas #2 the day after Christmas. Blythe got an easel and a scooter and Ethan got the "push along alphabet train". We all gave my parents a Wii for Xmas, so we played A LOT of Wii when we were there. And now I'm sore.

Here's a few pics from Christmas at Gommy and Poppa's (Gommy got a new camera so she took lots of pictures and I didn't...thus the reason there are only a few here):




Exciting news for Ethan yesterday. Just before we left Gommy and Poppa's, Ethan took his first steps! He was cruising (holding onto furniture) and I put out my hands for him to come to me. He didn't even think about it (which is probably why he did so well), and just walked 2-3 steps over to me. And then he even kept standing for a few seconds (so not the walk-and-fall-type first steps). In a month, that boy is going to be quite the handful. As soon as we got home last night, he kept making a beeline for the stairs to climb up them. So we dug out a baby gate and put it up and he was VERY unhappy with us.





So anyway, now that we're home, the challenge is finding places to put ALL this new stuff. Won't be easy. Oh, and the other challenge will be trying to work this week with the kids off of daycare all week. Won't be easy.

So much for those plans

Yesterday afternoon I had my hours carefully planned out to:
1. pick up Blythe's room
2. clean up the guest room so it's set up for company
3. exercise
4. take a shower
5. clean the basement bathroom and the kids bathroom
6. wrap 2 more presents
7. put away all the wrapping stuff
8. set up the aerobed "guest room" in the basement

After #5, daycare called and said Ethan had a 101 fever and we had to come pick him up. So much for my afternoon plans.

Today the guys went hunting so my modified plan (since Ethan was home) was to take Blythe to daycare for a few hours (since today is her last day in the 2's room before she moves to the 3/4 room after Christmas break), get some work done (since I have no vacation days), pick up Blythe and take her to lunch and for some last-minute shopping. But Blythe woke up with a fever, so so much for those plans. She missed her last day in the 2's room, which made me remember that she also missed her last day in the toddler room because she was sick. Guess it's a trend now.

She wasn't THAT sick, so I still took her to lunch and to the mall with me for some last-minute shopping. Nice to get out just the two of us. Hasn't happened since Ethan was a month or two old, so it was time we needed to spend together.

Ah, the cleanliness

Ugh! So I forgot to make the Rice Krispie treats last night that I said I'd bring to Blythe's "winter" party today at school. Party isn't until 3 though, so I have time. Though I have to look online for the recipe for how to make them. Does that mean I'm not quite an official mom since I don't know how to make them? I know there are Rice Krispies and marshmallows, but I don't know the ratio of each. And I'm pretty sure there's a little bit of butter involved. They used to have the recipe on the Rice Krispie box, but not anymore. I guess they figure everyone in the world knows how to make them, so it's no longer necessary.

I didn't blog all weekend because we were having such a fantastic time CLEANING! But I'm happy to report that the whole freaking house is clean....except for my office (God, I never get that clean!) oh, and my bathroom. Don't ever go in there, it's not part of the house tour. I taught Blythe how to wash windows and mirrors, and she did a fine job at it. Ethan is no good at cleaning. While Blythe and I were washing the mirrors in my bathroom (we did get that part cleaned...nothing else), Ethan was busy unrolling the ENTIRE roll of toilet paper in my bathroom.

Other than cleaning, I can't say we did a whole lot this weekend. While Daddy was replacing the broken garbage disposal (that we've lived with now for several months), I took the kids to the library to read some books. They did quite a bit of playing and very little "reading" of books. And our big outing out on Sunday was to the grocery store where both kids rode in the car cart and were so cute and having a blast until Blythe got a little too "huggy" with Ethan and he wanted out.

Nowadays Blythe likes to tell other people what they are going to get from Santa. Tommy - yesterday she pretend called you and told you Santa was bringing you a snowman...a little one. And she told Gommy Santa was bringing her Coors Light (okay, maybe we told her to say that one).

And what does Mommy get from Santa?

Last night at the dinner table Blythe was again telling us how Santa was going to bring her a blue baby, legos, and a yellow castle when she stopped mid-sentence and told Braden Santa was bringing him a microwave. That was interesting. So we tried to get her to say what he would be bringing me. After interjecting her normal "Mommy, you're Poco Loco" (Braden taught her that and she tells me I'm "a little crazy" at least 60 times a day), she said Santa was bringing me soap. Great. Just what I need. And also, according to Blythe, Santa is bringing Ethan a chicken. So we told her that wasn't fair that she was getting 3 things and each of us were only getting 1. So she said Daddy would also get a plate and I would also get a cup. Whoopee! Ethan apparently is still stuck with just a chicken.

And as we were conversing she went right into Santa bringing "sticks" for Mommy. Braden got in on it again and this was the outcome. This joke has run its course, so promise this is the last "stick" video:

Oh, such innocence.

I also just wrapped a few presents to put under the tree, so she now realizes Mom and Dad give presents too. So now she has to be nice to us as well (which is good, since the "be nice for Santa" routine is becoming not quite as effective).

And Ethan said "cow" at day care yesterday too, so it wasn't a fluke. My boy can talk!!!

Ethan said his first word!

Ethan said his first word this morning! He's been saying "mama" and "dada" for weeks now, but I don't count those as real words (even though I guess they really are). Anyway, should have known my little chunk-a-roo who will eat anything you give him would have a first word of "cow".

His room is decorated with farm animals (and college penants...I know, they totally don't go together). He has a farm animal blanket hanging above his changing table and he always loves to touch the cow. Every day I tell him that's a cow. Yesterday he started trying to say it, but could only get out "Ga". Today he figured out the "Ka" sound and said that a few times. I kept working with him and he finally finished it and said "cow". He was SO proud of himself. We went and told Daddy and of course he would not repeat it again.

It's funny with those little ones. You really have to keep your ears open to hear what they are saying. It's not like they just start talking one day. With Blythe, I was the only one who heard her first word. She pointed to my dad and said "Pop" (which is what he went by before Blythe renamed him to "Poppa"). She said it so quietly only I heard her. Then I didn't catch another word out of her for at least a few more weeks. Made me question myself on whether she actually said it or if I just imagined she did. But when she did start up with a few more words, "pop" was definitely one of them, so it confirmed what I had heard. I'm thinking the same thing will happen with Ethan. I wouldn't be surprised if he says no words again for a few weeks. But we'll see.

A visit to Santa Claus

My mom pointed out to me that I didn't blog about taking the kids to see Santa a week or so ago. We told Blythe Santa was making an appearance in Blacksburg to take orders for Christmas, so she had no choice but to sit on his lap and tell him what she wanted otherwise he wouldn't know what to bring and may bring nothing at all.

For Blythe's first Christmas, we went to the mall to see Santa. Going to the mall is a rip though because they won't even let you take your own pictures and they charge you an arm and a leg for a 5x7 and 2 3x5's (and who even uses 3x5's?).

So once a year, on the day of the "famous" Blacksburg Christmas parade, Santa makes an appearance at the Lyric Theatre (an old 1 screen theatre in downtown Blacksburg that still runs new movies today). I looked online and it said Santa would be there 4:30-7:00. So we picked the kids up from day care and headed over. Just after the people in front of us went in, a lady came and put a dinky little sign up that said basically "no more people can see Santa". We were like, "what's up with that?" Since we were next in line, she made eye contact with us and told us Santa had to go to the tree lighting and to the parade. My Bitchy McGee self started up with "online it said he'd be here until 7:00, blah, blah, blah". Here sign was so small that people were still coming in and getting in line and no one was turning them away, so we thought screw it, we'll just get in line to because I sure as hell don't want to go see him at the mall. Anyway, people kept coming and people kept being seen by Santa, so eventually the lady took the sign down. Maybe there was a second Santa who went to the tree lighting and the parade? So lots of kids didn't want to sit on Santa's lap and were crying, but our kids were on a mission to communicate "baby, yellow castle, and legos", so they got the job done and we were out of there.

So on to the second part of the story....

We are members at the Blacksburg Country Club. Yes, we are rich young yuppies who hang out at "the club". No, not really. Braden got a free membership when he was promoted to Associate Head Coach. It's not quite free though. We have a $30 minimum we have to spend on food each month (and alcohol doesn't count toward that minimum). That's no problem at all in the summer when the pool and snack bar are open, but the rest of the year we have to remember to go eat there once a month (and it's 15 minutes away so it's not exactly down the street). In Blacksburg, 15 minutes = clear on the other side of town. So we saw in the newsletter that there was a "Santa Brunch" on Dec. 14. Was $14 for each adult, free for kids under 5. So that would take care of our $30 minimum (or just about....yes, I can add). So I called and RSVP'd for that.

We got there and they had tables all set up and our table had our name on it. There were probably about 15-20 tables in all. And Santa was just sitting over there waiting for someone to come see him. Stark contract to the mall and the Lyric where people are pushing and shoving to go see him. After we finished our meal, we went over to say hi to Santa. We told Blythe she should ask him how her baby, yellow castle, and Legos are coming along. It was crazy because as soon as we sat her on his leg, she started going on asking Santa how he was doing, how his elves were doing, how were her toys coming along, telling him she actually wanted a yellow baby, but she already had a yellow baby, so mom and dad said she might want a blue baby instead, and that she used to want a car for Christmas, but then she decided she wanted legos instead because daddy said elves can't make cars, and that she wanted a yellow castle just to throw everyone off because really, where can one find a yellow castle....

See:

Just kidding, actually, she didn't say all of those things. She of course acted very shy, but did finally tell him the 3 things she wanted and asked him to say "ho, ho, ho". Ethan also sat on Santa's lap and seemed quite mesmerized by the white beard:

After they were done, Santa gave them each a wrapped present. Each said "To: Holloways From: Santa". Blythe got the "Cootie" game and Ethan got a stuffed teddy bear. So I have to give a big shout out to Blacksburg Country Club. They actually took time to see how old our kids were and buy age appropriate toys, wrap them, and address them to us. Made us feel like the privileged, rich people that we are not.

And next year we know not to bother with the mall or the Lyric and just sign up for Brunch with Santa.

Bowling

Today we decided to try bowling with the kids. Virginia Tech has an 8 lane bowling alley on campus, which is nice because it's never crowded, it doesn't smell like smoke, and it's incredibly cheap to play. And they have toddler sized bowling shoes.

Initially we tried using the ramp with no bumpers up. For some reason, every time Ethan bowled (i.e. we put his hand on the ball just before it rolled down the ramp) he would do quite well. Had a couple of spares I think. But then when Blythe did the exact same thing, gutter ball every time. So eventually we had them put the bumpers up and then we tried to get Blythe to send the ball down the lane to the pins all by herself. She did okay. She ended up bowling a 48, but we were there for quite a while. Could have had something to do with this (notice the bowling ball making it's way down the lane):

As has been the case each of the few times we've bowled, I beat Braden. It wasn't even close. I mean, I demolished him. I beat the ever living....okay, you get the picture. All in good fun though, not competetive at all.

So, I think the "threatening to call Santa" thing has now backfired. Tonight I told her it was time for her to go to bed because I was tired. Then I pretended like I was going to sleep. She said no, that wasn't allowed. Said I was being bad. Then she picked up her fake cell phone and said she was going to give Santa a call. She proceeded to tell Santa I was being bad. Then she told me Santa said to give me dicks (make sure to read previous post for explanation). Then she held out her hand and said, "Here Mom, here's a dick". Then Braden got in on it and told Blythe to give me a big stick and of course she then said, "Here Mom, here's a big dick".

If you're bad, Santa brings you...

Last week a couple of the blogs I read on a daily basis talked about their "elf on a shelf". This is an elf that sits on a shelf, or anywhere you want to put it, and watches people to report back to Santa whether they've been good or bad. I thought this sounded like a good idea for our household, especially with Blythe at her age right now in which she believes EVERYTHING we tell her.

The problem is that we don't have an elf. I already had to buy a new Christmas tree this year, and any additional Christmas decorations were not in the budget. Fortunately, I have a mother who has more Christmas decorations than the White House, and she just happened to be getting rid of 3 large boxes of decorations. I sorted through the breakable stuff, the tacky stuff, and the "is that really a Christmas decoration?" stuff, and pulled out a few items I would like to keep. None of which was an elf.

But there was this snowman:

So he's now our version of the Elf on a Shelf. Except he's a snowman and he doesn't sit on a shelf. So far, we just call him "Mr. Snowman", though I guess he could also be referred to as "Santa's Snitch".

Mr. Snowman is working out well so far. I'm really loving using the "you better stop that or Santa won't bring any toys" routine. Wish I could threaten that all year long. I'll be sad in 2 weeks when I can't use it any more. Nowadays, we say "Mr. Snowman is watching you and he's going to tell Santa you're being bad". Blythe gets a temporary look of fear on her face, then tries to fight back the tears, then usually starts acting normal again. When Mr. Snowman isn't around, we reach for the phone. I have Santa on speed dial. There are 3 things Blythe wants from Santa: a baby, a yellow castle, and Legos. So I just use, "okay, I'm calling Santa and telling him not to bring a baby". Has been working quite well.

According to Blythe, Santa brings toys to good little girls and boys and bad children get....well, you see for yourself:

What did she say? Did she just say bad girls get....dicks? That may very well be true, but 2 year olds shouldn't be saying those things. We're trying to work with her on her "st" sounds...

The mystery of the stolen food

Recently we discovered that there seemed to be some food missing from our refrigerator each morning. Well, not every morning, just every now and then. Initially, a few things of yogurt were missing. Then we noticed the american cheese was dwindling away. The apple juice seemed to be disappearing as well. Then even more recently it was the cottage cheese and the hot dogs. One day Braden seemed to think one of his beers was missing too. Naturally, we blamed each other. I mean, really, who else could it be? But I don't drink beer and Braden doesn't eat cottage cheese, and cold hot dogs are just plain disgusting.

The dogs sleep in kennels, and unless they figured out a way to unlock them, get out, open the refrigerator, then lock themselves back in their cages, it couldn't be them.

Our neighbors have a key to our house. Just from process of elimination, we started to suspect them (and considered getting an alarm system for the house).

Anyway, we were able to set up our camera on night vision and set the timer to take pictures every few minutes throughout the night. So imagine our surprise this morning when we found this image on our camera:

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Crazy, huh?

Baby models

So I got this "babytalk" magazine in the mail the other day. No, I didn't subscribe to that. I get it free for some reason, probably after signing up for baby formula coupons or something. Anyway, I look at the pictures and read the large print just like basically any magazine I get.

So I see this baby in the magazine:

Seriously??? That baby looks like an elf. Apparently any baby can model for print ads? My children should be on the covers every single month if that baby can make it as a model. Sorry, it's a bit crinkled and torn since Ethan tried to eat it.

Anyway, I know that was a bit out in left field, but I just had to share it.

Ethan went for his 9 month appointment yesterday. He is 20.2 lbs and 28 inches long. About the 50% percentile, where he has been since birth (well, not birth since most babies aren't 8 and a half pounds). I checked Blythe's baby book and she was 19.5 lbs and 29 inches long at 9 months. That surprised me because Blythe was such a little chunk and Ethan doesn't seem to be. He had to get 2 shots, which he of course cried about, but he got over it quickly, so that was good.

I've been trying to teach Blythe the days of the week. Apparently at day care they don't teach the 2 year olds the days of the week because they "are incapable of learning that...it's memorization, which they are not capable of". Or so says the administrator. Last time I checked, letters, numbers, shapes, and language in general is memorization and Blythe seems to have taken to all that pretty well. So every day we look at the calendar and I ask her what day it is (and then we also mark off the day so she knows how far away Christmas is). And every day she is clueless about what day of the week it is. Maybe she'll get it when she turns 3.

"Girls" weekend?

This past weekend was supposed to be my "girl" weekend. Or at least that's how it was played out in my head when I first thought it up. My best friend is turning 30 in a few weeks so a while ago she was thinking of having a party or dinner on the 6th to celebrate. Braden didn't have a meet planned, so I thought it would be a great opportunity for me to get away and for Braden to have some "bonding" time with the kids. Didn't quite turn out that way.

Instead, Braden had to go recruiting in Raleigh so I took the kids to my parents house. So on Saturday, I left in the morning, drove to Greensboro where we met my mom and sister for "Disneyland on Ice", then drove another hour or so to my parents house. I was able to "relax" for about 30 minutes, before I left to drive another hour plus down to Charlotte to meet up with my friend Emily. We had a great time and went shopping and out to dinner and then I drove the hour plus back to my parents house, spent the night, hung out for a while the next day, then drove 3 hours back home with the kids.

Braden, on the other hand, did some recruiting, went shopping, hung out with his friend Magnus, went to lunch with his friend Greg, and hung out with Doug and Lynette.

Somehow, my "girls" weekend turned into a weekend with the kids. And Braden's "bonding time with the kids" weekend turned into a "boys" weekend for him. Not quite the way I had it all playing out in my head.

Oh well. It was still a fun weekend. Disneyland on Ice was actually really good (much better than Elmo). And Blythe got to go check out the fire station where Poppa is a volunteer fire fighter. He had her pull the cord to do the horn and it was super loud and Blythe didn't like is so much. She said, "Don't do that again". Then later when he did the siren, she cried.

Here is our little firefighter who is afraid of loud noises:

The Elmo Show

Last night was the big night...Elmo show! The Sesame Street Live Elmo show comes to our area every December and yesterday marked our second annual trip to see Elmo. And cookie monster, Big Bird, Telly, Grover, Zoe, Oscar, Oscar's girlfried (I want to say her name is Willamina, but it's something "trashier" than that), Ernie, Bert, Abby Cadaby, Betty Lou (or Sue Ellen, or whatever her name is), and several more...can't remember them all.

As with everything "special" that we do with the kids, we hyped it up big time. I couldn't find the Elmo stuffed animal (the regular sized one...we have the giant one, the Elmo chair, tickle-me Elmo, and countless other Elmo plastic toys and figurines), so we brought the Cookie Monster one and presto, Blythe was the biggest Cookie Monster fan alive.

Of course, I had thought earlier in the day that I'd pick them up from school a bit early so we could get dinner done early and get everything ready to go at a nice leisurely pace and be out the door by 6 o'clock. But Murphy's Law kicked in and I got 37 work calls between 5 and 5:15, so didn't leave the house to pick up the kids til 5:20. I'm not sure if that's really Murphy's Law, but it sounds good so we'll go with it. So anyway, that left for some major hustling when we got home and some really quick eating. We were rushing Blythe so she got upset a few times and we threatened to leave her home while we went to the Elmo show. Like that would actually happen, but she doesn't know that so it works. We left the house at 6:07. Not too bad.

I was hoping Ethan would sleep on the way there, and he did. He fell asleep 3 minutes before we got there. Great. That's worse than not sleeping at all. I was actually really worried about how Ethan would do, but he did quite well. He almost fell asleep at the end of the show, but got his 4th wind and made it to the end.

The beginning of the show was the best part. Seeing the faces on both of the kids as all of those furry creatures came out on stage. They were both so excited, so it was all worth it. The show drags on a bit long though. It started at 7pm and as soon as it hit 8pm, you could hear the whole arena reach a higher level of crankiness.

See you next year, Elmo!

Blythe and Ginsey

Yesterday after day care, Blythe's friend Ginsey from next-door came over to play. Immediately they went up to Blythe's room to change into the princess clothes. Actually, apparently one outfit is "princess" and the other is "Barbie". Ginsey is 9 months older than Blythe, but she is quite small so Blythe towers over her. See here:

They've been friends since before Blythe could walk, which always amazed me back then (when Ginsey was WAY older) since Blythe was basically about Ethan's age now. Since Ginsey is older, she's usually the boss or the one that decides what they will do. We always say Ginsey is the brains of the operation and Blythe is the brawn.

So Ginsey the brains decided they would play hide and seek. Blythe still doesn't quite get the game. When we yell, "where are you?", she doesn't stay quiet or giggle softly. She yells back "I'm in the office!" But Ginsey helped her out and they actually found a couple of good hiding places. Then we switched roles and Braden hid while they tried to find him. They would count to 10 and then ask, "Braden - are you ready?" One time he didn't answer (since he was so close) and they just sat there waiting for him to respond. I finally told them he was ready so they could go find him.

It's so nice now that Blythe can play nicely with her friends. Used to be she was so excited when they came over, but she had such a hard time with sharing that they would just end up fighting a lot. Finally she is starting to share pretty well (except for with Ethan - I'm guessing there will be no sharing for quite some time there).

Pushing buttons

Oh, how I love organizing! It's not so much I love organizing, but being organized. And to me, nothing can ever be organized enough. But if I'm close enough, I'm happy. Recently I've been feeling very disorganized. Probably because I spend most of my day in my office, which is the most disorganized room in the house. So I'm on a mission to organize again. You'd think I'd start with my office, but I usually end up doing it last (which means I never get to it...thus the disorganization).

So I'm starting with the upstairs, which is all of the bedrooms. I started with Blythe's room first yesterday since it was a disaster zone. I put all of her fake food away in her play kitchen, put away all of her dress-up clothes, and put away all of her books. I know better than to "really" organize the food, the clothes, or the books since she can destroy hours of work in a split second. As I was going through the books, I pulled a few out that were too "baby" for her and that she hasn't looked at in a really long time. I decided to move those to Ethan's room. He's starting to show an interest in books recently. Blythe must have at least 100 books in her room, and I moved about 10 or 12 books to Ethan's room.

So anyway, after I put Ethan down last night and it was time for Blythe to go to bed, I asked her to pick out a book to read for her bedtime story. And what book does she ask for? "I want the Truck book" "where is the truck book?" "It's my favorite book". Of course it was one of the books I moved to Ethan's room since she NEVER reads it. How does she do that? How does she know that quickly which books are missing? And secondly, WHY does she do that? Why does she always ask for something she knows she can't have. Like when I pick her up from daycare and she says "I want Daddy" when she knows he's at work. Or she knows we ran out of apple juice and only have Orange juice, so she insists on having apple juice. Doesn't take long for a child to figure out what buttons to push. Can't wait until Ethan's there too, and I have 2 kids pushing my buttons!

MOM! Watch this...

Back in my younger days I remember sometimes saying to my mom, "Hey Mom, look!" "MOM! Watch me do this!". Then she'd say, "Yep, I see you" when she really wasn't looking. It would drive me crazy! It was one of those things that I thought when I was little "when I'm a mom, I'll never do that".

Fast forward to today. This is what I hear all morning and evening long...Mom, look at me, Mom, watch me...Mom, you're not looking, Mom, look at me, Mom, watch me (flip my hair), Mom, look at me (stick this in my mouth), Mom, watch me (touch my toe), Mom, Mom, you're not looking, Mom, watch this, watch me (put my shirt on my head), did you see that? Mom, look over here...Mom, Mom, Mom, look at me, watch me do this (jump off the toy box wearing dress up high heels) Mom, did you see that? Mom...Mom...Mom!

This is multiplied by 10 if I'm busy with Ethan or if I'm talking on the phone. Multiplied by 20 if I'm on the phone with someone from work.

So now I can see why mom's don't always look when their child says "Watch me do this!" It's physically impossible to do it every time.

In other news, Blythe can now spell her name. I thought she could also spell my name too, but apparently not (quite).

As for Ethan, his favorite thing to do is still to ride on his little car. Though his second most favorite thing to do is to push it around and walk behind it. If he runs into something, he tries to turn it and it becomes unstable and he usually falls over with it. So we've been trying to have him use the walker toy instead. Here he is walking from the front view:

And from the back:

Christmas Tree

Yesterday we put up the Christmas tree. This year I went out and bought a new one (one of the Black Friday door buster deals). Our old one was one where you had to put in every branch and it wasn't pre-lit, so it took 3 days to put up (1 day to put in branches, 1 day to rest, and 1 day to put the lights on). So I was determined to get a pre-lit tree that comes in 3 pieces. Since it was the first time putting it up, I had to arrange every "tip", which took quite a while. Having 2000 tips makes the tree look more real, but arranging 2000 tips is not fun. Made me think back to the old fake tree we had growing up. We also had to put in every branch, but each branch had 3 tips. I'm guessing there were about 60 branches, so there were 180 tips. 180 tips = not very real looking.

Blythe had fun helping with the tree and actually was helping. Ethan was not so helpful, except to test maybe the durability of the tree. Here is a pic of Blythe putting the angel on the tree.

We also decided to take the kids to the pool yesterday. Neither had swam since the summer, so we wanted to get them reacquainted (plus they have a really nice hot tub). The pool water was a little chilly, but both kids did well. Blythe wasn't as comfortable as she was at the end of the summer, but she still went underwater a few times with no issue. Ethan loves the water more than Blythe did when she was that age. He is completely comfortable in the water, even on his back. And he loves splashing!

Blythe and Ashley will be taking swimming lessons starting in February, so it's probably a good idea to keep going every now and then before she starts. I think we may also sign Ethan up for water babies. Then we can trade off and each of us would only have to get in 3 times.

When I was downloading pics from Grams' camera on Saturday I came across this pic from the end of summer which I think is so funny.