Today

Today:

Wren...

- invented a bell-ringing machine with a mobile our cousins Barb and Tum sent from Thailand when he was born (that has little bells on it).

- told me he wanted to stop eating so he wouldn't grow because he was afraid he wouldn't know how to drive a car when he got older.

- made newspaper hats with me and decided he wanted a string under his chin to keep it on and figured out how to do that and made it work.

- was a helper at Wegman's and even scooped his own olives at the olive bar - he likes the big green olives with gorgonzola cheese in them! Even I don't like those very much!

Erik...

- said amazing things like "I see green trash truck over there" and "I pooped on potty - big potty!" (which is also amazing and true!).

- tried an olive and didn't like it, then tried another one.

- took a bite out of raw ginger at Wegman's when I wasn't looking and the couple shopping next to me laughed at the face he made. He was so surprised!

Scott...

- graded a bunch of papers :)

- played World of Goo with Wren and Erik.

- ate at Qdoba with all of us for lunch.

Emily...

- swiped my Y card for the first time in two years (renewed our membership after I let it lapse while I was pregnant with Erik!) and went swimming tonight.

- actually made some food! A yummy beef broccoli stir fry.

- read the book Comfort Me With Apples as part of my spree of reading all of Ruth Reichl's books.

- posted on our blog! :)

Almost five and two!

I've been inspired by a couple of friends' blogs lately and thought that I should continue our blog.

Just to check in on where we are - Wren will be five years old in a couple of months and Erik will be two! Can you believe it? Scott is getting farther along the tenure track and I continue to try to keep our home clean and somewhat organized, and trying to be calm and fun and keeping my sense of humor. I may or may not succeed in these things but as you notice, the key word here is TRY! :)

Wren has been going to a Montessori preschool every day this year and last summer, and we absolutely love it. It has been great for him to be able to do so many different projects and make friends and interact with teachers and other kids at school. He's not just bouncing around the house while I try to keep him occupied while taking care of Erik and housework as well. I really enjoy doing preschool aged projects myself and miss the chance to do this with him, but I wasn't finding the time and patience to be able to set things up like I'd like to, so I'm enjoying his opportunity to do all these things at a school that is like a second home to him.

Wren likes to invent things, build things, figure out how things work. All last week he was asking every day if we could "build a toy record player" and when I brought two very old toy record players out of the basement for him (both of which do not work in different ways), he has been very taken with them. One doesn't have a needle and seems to be playing two different grooves of the records at the same time. He will put on a record and make us come in and listen and say, "isn't the music beautiful?"

Erik's language has really exploded in the past few weeks - he went from speaking one or two words together and now says so many things, including some favorites:

"I need go somewhere"

"I go too!"

"I walk too!"

"I cook too!"

He calls Wren "bupo" for brother and is very good at saying please and thank you. He was saying "mac n cheese, mac n cheese" at dinner tonight and when I put it in front of him, he said "thank you! cool." I said, "did you just say cool?" and he said, "uh huh!"

Erik for the most part is pretty agreeable still and a phrase I absolutely love that he's been saying less lately is "Uh huh, sure, I do!" all together like that. I love it! So cute. I love the sound of his little voice saying "sure!" and all those words.

Erik is practically running places, can get up and down on the chairs very well, loves to do what Wren does.

Today Wren and Erik spent a lot of time "cleaning" using a toy cleaning cart and a spray bottle, some disinfectant wipes, and I even got out the Magic Erasers to see if they could actually be useful. I thought we were doing pretty well until I found Erik in the bathroom, dipping his Magic Eraser in the toilet to get it wet... !

Oh wait, I have a blog?

Well I bet you thought I was never coming back! Turns out I have had less time lately, or really what I think happened was Christmas and then... I never looked back! Anyway, I thought, hey, oh yeah, I was writing on our blog to keep folks updated on what we're doing. So I'll just continue doing that if you don't mind!

Let's see. We just took a weeklong vacation to Emerald Isle, North Carolina to hang out on the beach. We did some playing on the beach. We also did a lot of taking care of our boys. Young kids need a lot of taking care of, especially on "vacation", so it wasn't exceptionally relaxing during the day, but after they went to bed in the evening, Scott and I did enjoy some time on the spacious front porch of the house we rented and lounging around inside in the air conditioning. We also took turns taking walks down to the beach which was great to do too. I love the ocean and could walk on the beach for hours!

Wren just started a new preschool - this is a Montessori preschool and it's a change for us because Wren is there for longer. Last year he was at school for 2.5 hours on Tues and Thurs and this summer is now going for 4 hours on Tues, Wed, Thurs, and then in the fall will be there 5.5 hours five days a week! So that will be a lot more. But there is honestly such a difference in this kid already just going there for three weeks. He does a lot more things for himself and seems more confident and responsible, and like something has "clicked" in his brain. I was just attributing it to his age but then we went on vacation and he has been whiny and back to his old bouncing around and then today he went back to school and when I picked him up, he was great again! For the rest of the day! So... I guess it is school! Wonderful!

Erik is 14 months old today. He just started walking a couple of weeks ago and now is practically walking all the time and barely crawling. He's officially a toddler! Although we still call him "Baby Erik". Wren calls him that a lot so it rubs off on us. Erik loves dogs and pants (the dog sign in baby signs) whenever he sees them or thinks about them. He does it in the car when we pull onto our street because he's thinking about our neighbors' dogs! He looks so happy when he does it. It's super cute. Erik has a very sweet disposition and seems to love interacting with people. He and Wren love to play together and got up to some serious shenanigans in the backseat on our two day there and back car drive to North Carolina. It's really fun watching them be brothers together.

Christmas cards coming soon!

I've used Shutterfly before to order prints for my photos, but not for anything else. This year we're making a photo card for our Christmas card. I have always enjoyed sending "real" cards but last year I was thinking it would be fun to try a photo card so I didn't buy any Christmas cards after Christmas like I usually do. I forgot about that and was searching around for my cards for this year and then I remembered -- photo card!

So even though I feel like everyone sees enough photos of us online because of my photo albums and videos and such, we’ll give the old photo card a try. I always like receiving them. A friend mentioned that her cards end up you-know-where in January, but I keep a photo album (now on our second one) around, the kind that just has the cellophane that peels off and the sticky pages, to put photo cards and random school pictures and things in that people send us. Then we have a photo album to look at of friends and family! It ends up being pretty random and there’s not much organization, but it’s an easy way to put photos somewhere where we’ll see them again and keep track of the odd-sized things we have.

Erik

At a few days before being seven months old, Erik can sit and scoot/tummy crawl and it's pretty fun! He has his two bottom teeth in and maybe the top ones will come in soon. He's still not sleeping through the night. He's super interested in Wren and already likes to play with Wren's toys. Erik loves to be carried in the sling for a little while. He flaps his arms down on his tummy to say he wants to be picked up. I think he understands when I say "Wren" or "Daddy" -- he looks to the right person. He's eating some solids -- apples, squash, peas, pumpkin, banana, rice cereal, teething biscuits so far. Pears, peaches, and apricots are next up.

'scuse me!

I was just looking at some videos from last summer and it was amazing to hear Wren talk! It's like he had his own language then. Good thing I was translating on the video because otherwise I don't think I would have remembered what those words meant!

Now Wren can say anything! It's true that at some point language just explodes. Maybe it's more noticeable in boys than in girls, I don't know. But it is neat to talk with Wren.

We have been teaching Wren to say "excuse me" when he wants to say something while Mommy or Daddy is talking to someone, and he's gotten the hang out it for the most part, but it's pretty funny that he also thinks it's appropriate to say "'SCUSE ME!!!" to my face when I'm talking to HIM. So when he wants me to shut up and quit talking so he can say something, he just starts yelling, "'SCUSE ME!" Pretty silly.

Wren also says things like "that's a good idea" because we say it a lot. He likes to add words like "also" to his sentences and that makes them interesting.

We've been pointing out emotions to him a lot (I took a class on emotion coaching your kids) and have a piece of paper on the fridge with a lot of "feeling faces" showing many different emotions and Wren really has been into it. We've talked about the different faces and he studies them and asks what they are.

When I'm mad, he tells me he wants me to be happy and will go to the fridge and show me the face he wants me to have (the happy face or the calm face). He also is always saying "I feel a little bit sad" whenever we want him to do something that he doesn't want to do (at three and half years old, that is everything!).

Right now Wren has a cold and ear infection and on our way from the doctor's office to the pharmacy, he was talking about how he was going to get a Dum-Dum lollipop there, and he said, "I'm a little bit happy AND a little bit sick". :)

late fall

The birds are back! Every fall this huge flock of birds comes through here and spend a couple of days flying near our house and lands in the yard and on nearby trees and rooftops, covering everything. I don't know what kind of birds they are or where they're coming from or where they're going, but I enjoy witnessing their migration.

This morning we made a visit to our doctor's office, and along with pottying and getting stickers and having appointments for at least two family members, we tend to make ourselves at home! Erik had his six month appointment and is doing well. Still in the 95th percentile for height but dropped down a little bit in the weight percentile. He's still a big boy - just an ounce away from 19 pounds. He got his vaccinations and did not even cry for the first shot! Then after the next ones he only cried for about 10 seconds. We were amazed!

Dr. Brian also took a look at Wren because he's been coughing and waking crying at night (unlike him) and yesterday after a nap (also unusual at this point) while Scott was holding Wren, he fell asleep in his arms. That NEVER happens! So Wren does have an ear infection in one ear and Dr. Brian said he was surprised his other ear wasn't bothering him just as much because it was full of fluid too. So hopefully the amoxicillin will get Wren back to feeling better really soon!

Thanksgiving is only two and a half weeks away! Seems strange. We'll be putting up our Christmas tree the day or two after so my mom can join in on the tradition while she's here. So that means in three weeks we'll have a Christmas tree! Seems a bit early to me at this point, but it will be worth it to decorate it with my mom.

All of this is trivial when you consider that today... Scott mailed his book to the publisher! Scott has been working days, nights, and weekends for months to turn his book in on time to meet the deadline of the fourth year review committee for tenure, and he's finally at a point where he took a day off! Wowie! It was so great to have my husband back on Sunday. We haven't had a day like that for so long, it's ridiculous. And Scott feels good about his book, so we're happy. Well I'm happy. I think Scott is in shock. But I think it's safe to say that we're excited to move on!