Bennett Turned Two!

Bennett turned two the other day!

June had been talking with him about it, and the only thing he really 'got' was that we'd be singing Happy Birthday to him and that he'd get cupcakes. This meant that, from the instant he woke up, he didn't allow himself to venture more than a few feet away from the cupcakes at any given time. 

We had a very small get together with two families who have kids Bennett's age. We had a little bagel picnic in the park, then walked over to where some pony rides are. Bennett is really into horses right now, so we knew this would be a hit!

The little ones rode ponies and the big girls rode horses. It was really cute! Bennett did great - I wondered if he might get nervous once he was on a horse, but he didn't, and just seemed so happy and surprised to actually be riding one. He talked about "Dusty," his pony, the rest of the day (and still remember's Dusty's name)!

Bennett is such a sweet, funny, smart little guy. He's mischievous, passionate, silly and helpful. We love watching him grow up!

Ski Day with Friends

First of all, I want to acknowledge that I've been much slower in getting blog posts up these days. Let's just say that life is hectic, work is busy and the class I'm taking right now is very difficult. So, for some real talk, I don't see much changing in the near future as far as quality blog content.

However, I do love this old blog. I love getting comments from you, family members, when you mention that you liked getting to see pictures of the kids. And I love being able to look back on it. So I might go periods without posting, and then write up a bunch of entries without many words, and schedule them to post over the next few days.

So anyway, back at the end of January, some friends asked us if we'd want to go up to Tahoe with them for the day. We packed up the kids, picked up the rental skis and did our thing!

We went back to Sierra at Tahoe, which is a spot that we had been to before. The moms and boys went tubing and the dads and daughters went skiing.

There was also a double tube, so we had a good time getting pulled up the hill all together, and then going down together too!

I interrupt this string of pictures to tell you that I asked Michael to show me the pictures he took of the girls skiing together. He promptly told me that he hadn't taken any. MEN, am I right?!

It was snowing like crazy the whole time we were up there. It was so pretty! But I'm sure it contributed to the drive home taking about 3 times longer than it should have!

Love these friends, and love living close enough to ski country to take day trips like these!

Bennett Lately

Bennett is coming up on his second birthday and every day it seems that more and more of his personality is bubbling to the surface. Two is such a complicated age...kids are testing boundaries, wanting independence and yet not wanting to give up their metaphorical safety blankets. 

This stage is plenty challenging for us. 

Bennett is trying out little acts of aggression. He'll get frustrated at June and intentionally pull her hair. He'll take a swat at me if he's mad at something I'm doing, such as, God forbid, wanting to actually brush his teeth instead of allowing him to do it. When we say, "Bennett! Do we push? Do we hit? Do we bite?" he used to solemnly reply, "No," but now he does it with a mischievous gleam in his eye.

He still decides that he wants to sit on my lap at meal times (usually right about the time I'm finally sitting down to my own plate after grabbing that last spoon/milk/no the other cup). Making dinner when Michael isn't yet home is quite the ordeal because Bennett wants to be held most of the time. If I cannot hold him, he'll squeeze his body in between me and whichever counter I'm up against and push me away from it with all the strength he can muster. Which is surprisingly a lot. 

When he wants more of something at dinner but hasn't eaten anything else (veggies, for example), you can't really bargain effectively when they're screaming. I'm still just...not really sure what I'm supposed to do? Just feed him endless cous cous and say to hell with the green beans if it means a peaceful meal? Insist on him eating one asparagus spear before he's allowed to have more mac-and-cheese, and just deal with the screaming that ensues?

He gets into these little moods that it's hard to break him out of. He just gets mad and then everything is just The Worst. He doesn't want oatmeal! Yes, yes, he does want oatmeal, how dare you put it away! How dare you stir it just like that! How dare you move the bowl slightly closer to him!

But I have to say, for all these challenges, he also has some of the sweetest, cutest characteristics. And I just don't want to forget them.

He loves singing. He sings all the time. Some of my favorites are when he sings the "Clean Up, Clean Up," song, or when he suddenly sings the last line of "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" much faster than the rest of it. Sometimes he'll break out in a song I didn't know he knew, like when he sang "Be polite! Be polite!" the other day, which is part of the Manners Song.

He chants, which is something he gets from my side of the family. As in, when I'm making his snack, he'll chant "Can-ta-lope Time! Can-ta-lope Time!" while banging his fists on the table. (Other chant favorites are "Shower Time! Shower Time!" followed quickly by "Get naked!")

He's getting so many words now, and it's so cute to watch him put them together into little sentences. "Mommy...get...choo choo train!" "Want...to go...out der!" "June...play...rocket ship?" 

I taught him the old Sleeping Beauty routine, which is when he can kiss me to wake me up. The only problem with this is that it interferes with one of my favorite end-of-the-day activities, which is finding as many games to play that involve me laying motionless on the ground. June will be walking on my back, pretending to be a snow leopard, but Bennett keeps trying to kiss me to wake me up. 

He loves me and Michael so much. The excitement in his voice when he shouts, "HI MOMMY!" or "BYE BYE DADDY!" is just too much. Not to mention how sweetly he talks to June, asking her for help or asking her to do things with him while they play. "Here, June! Heeeere!"

His favorite songs are still these two songs from the Hawaiian Disney movie, Lilo and Stitch. Sometimes I can even get him to hang out in relative peace while I make dinner if I put these songs on repeat. "Hawan Dander!" he says excitedly ("Hawaiian Dancer"). 

We're a shower household (instead of baths), so I herd Bennett and June into the shower with me and Michael takes Bennett when it's time to get out. More and more, Bennett is using his imagination. He plays with the toys, pretends he's a puppy, makes a conga line with June. When I ask the kids if they will help me pick up the toys, Bennett shouts "YAY!" and excitedly hands them to me. 

Our little guy is almost two and I'm excited (and scared!) for what that has in store for us. But I think I can make it through any terrible twos if I can keep those wet, soft kisses that he presses into my cheek now and then.

Halloween 2015

We had a really busy Halloween Saturday!

While we were still in our pajamas, we finally got around to carving our pumpkin! The kids were interested in scooping seeds but not really wanting to get their hands in the pumpkin innards. June decided that she wanted to face to be a cat's face, and that the nose needed to look like a heart. We carved it, June named her Juliet and wanted to hang out with the pumpkin for the rest of the morning. ("I'm putting a collar on her." "She'll get sad if I go into my room and get dressed!")

Then we had a soccer game. It went well, June played goalie, all of the kids were interested and sweet, as usual.

Then Michael took Bennett home while I took June to a friend's birthday party, complete with a bounce house.

After naps and dinner, it was time to get dressed up. 

June wanted to dress up as Skye, her favorite character in the Paw Patrol tv show. Skye is the one who flies, hence June's little silver wings. 

I'll never get tired of seeing the excited look in her eye after I give her the mirror after painting her face. 

Bennett, who also loves it when we put Paw Patrol on, was Marshall. He didn't have much of a say in the matter, and I have a feeling that things might be different next year, but this year it was really sweet for them to have costumes that went together.

Bennett was Marshall, the Dalmatian member of the Patrol who is the fire dog.

I was fully prepared to have Bennett freak out and not want to wear the hat, 'pup pack' or even the full costume. But I held up the costume, said that he could put on the puppy suit and he seemed into it! He even sang the little lines ("Paw Patrol, Paw Patrol") of the song. I didn't know if he would understand the concept of dressing up to look like something else, but I really think he did!

At first he didn't want to wear the hat, but by the time we wanted to take some pictures he was leaving it on. He even wore it around the neighborhood all on his own!

Here you can see his 'pup pack' and maybe you can see his little tail (it's the part that has a lot of black spots on it). 

The kids were so cute. June had been so patiently waiting for this day. She's got a cute way with words, you know? She'll muse to herself, "I just can't wait for trick-or-treating! I just can't get it out of my head, I don't know why, but I can't!"

She went up to houses, diligently said "Trick or Treat!" and made sure Bennett got a piece of candy. Bennett was surprisingly great at picking out a piece and placing it in his bucket! The first few houses let him have as many pieces as he wanted, so we had to rein him in a little at other houses. June said "thank you" consistently and we even got Bennett to say "dunk ooo" quietly.

I really thought Bennett would lose interest. Going on walks with him (when he's not in the stroller) has been hard lately because he'll find a house with a cat sitting outside of it and not want to move past it (he wants to just stare at the cat and say 'HI MEOW!' over and over). But I was surprised that he kept trudging along behind June, holding my hand and saying "Knock! Knock" to indicate that he wanted to go up to a house. Sometimes Michael or I would be holding his pumpkin bucket and he would stop and try to grab it from us, insisting on holding his heavy little bucket himself. 

I was a little disappointed by our neighborhood, though. So few kids were out trick-or -treating! I can't believe it since there are normally so many kids around. Maybe some are just to young to go out, or else they decided to trick-or-treat over at the really nice neighborhood nearby. We left a bucket of candy out on our stoop while we were out, but I don't think many came by. When we were home, we only had three groups of kids come.

(One group had boy with a Michael Meyers mask on, which terrified poor Bennett, who spent the rest of his short time before bed with his lower lip pouted out saying "Boy. Boy," with a concerned look on his face. )

Oh my gosh - look at Bennett's little belly!

I hope you all had a wonderful Halloween - we did!

Haircuts at Home

Bennett's hair had been getting pretty poofy lately. The only time his hair has been cut was when I'd try to sneak up behind him while he was being still and trimming his little mullet. Well, the mullet reached such epic proportions that we thought it was time to bring in a professional. 

Here are the 'before' pics:

I had heard about a woman who comes to your house and cuts your kids' hair there, so I decided to give it a try. It was great! We were all comfortable at home, the kids could do their own thing while the other was getting their hair cut, and I didn't even need to put on real pants!

I did have to keep Bennett distracted with a bowl of strawberries and blueberries, but in general he did great.

And the 'after' pics:

We saved a little lock of his hair and said goodbye to his mullet.

He looks so cute!