To sum up March, April, and May (so far) 2012, I would use the word bargain.
We bargain all day everyday. For example, I will give you this, if you ask me 'please'. I will let you keep this, if you tell me 'thank you' when you receive. I will let you have a bite of yogurt, if you eat another bite of vegetables. I will read this book to you, but only after you put the first one back on the shelf. Bargaining.
March:
Do you see what I see? Look closely and you will see Lino
in the tree on the right. He is by himself, no one is holding his ladder and I am in our kitchen, fearing for his life. The boys watch his daring feat from the safety of our windowsill.
They love cards that make music!
For some reason when I give them more than one graham cracker at a time, which I usually give them 3 pieces, they have started to gather them all like a sandwich and stuff them for a tiny bite into their mouths.
Big boy Eli sharing Evan's apple.
I finally remembered to keep the camera in the kitchen with me. This was their routine for a couple of weeks as I was cleaning up their trays/washing dishes. They rearranged the chairs and sat in them for a couple minutes. I was able to sneakily snap away while they worked.
Again, with the kitchen routine. It's a good surface for sliding fruit cups or bibs across the floor.
April: Early morning laundry view.
May:
I was putting groceries away before nap-time the other day and realized my friends were quiet. Lately this means they are in our bedroom taking all my shirts out of the 4th drawer. However, this was not the case. I could not believe my eyes when I saw them stacking blocks together, actually working together, to build a tower.
After I was spotted, they each started work on their own towers.
Porter was getting a lot of blocks because he was grabbing two at a time to build.
The end result was this tower. I snapped the picture because I figured it was going to fall soon because of the obvious lean. Believe it or not, he balanced it out and it stood for a couple seconds before toppling. I had to just watch my not-so-little boy work to accomplish this task with swells of love and pride.
How have we made it to the almost-twos? Why has time gone by so quickly? I feel like I've been so lucky to be present for each moment and all the moments are too much now. There are so many moments.
*They both still clean a lot and are good at picking up their toys. It still takes a long time to put everything away but they both participate.
*We've taken them to dinner twice in the past few weeks and they both have done really well sitting and eating.
*We sing a lot of songs and dance to a lot of nursery rhyme songs. They especially like the ones with movements.
*They look for Lino all the time. If we go downstairs, we have to stop at his door and I have to stop them from pounding on the door. If we go to the car, we look up at his balcony for a few minutes each time--even in the rain. If we talk about him or actually see him, they do the "Lino". You crouch down in a small squat and clap your hands 3 times.
Porter
*Still sucks his thumb.
*Eats so much better now with the bargaining mentioned above.
*Would sleep until 9 a.m. (I'm pretty sure), if Eli didn't wake him up everyday.
*Is very much like me and has a lot of my tendencies.
*Still maintains his Porter-ness: observant, conservative, stubborn, snuggly.
*He looks out for everyone. If we are getting shoes on, he gets my shoes and my jacket. If he's ready first, he likes to make sure the diaper bag is ready to go.
Eli
*Still sleeps with his pacifier.
*Weighed 23 pounds at a recent MD visit.
*Has the cutest little gap in between his front two teeth. When he laughs or smiles, it is beyond cute.
*Has a really cute laugh.
*Still has his Eli-abilities: risk taker, sharer, gung-ho, so loving.
*Eli is busy taking things out of the diaper bag that Porter is trying to help me carry.
I could not have been more wrong. He was a little timid at first about the chair and the cape, but Christina moves slowly and talks and doesn't rush into the cut. He sat in the chair the entire time looking around, sucking on his pacifier, and playing with the brushes.
First cut. It was his teeny little curl in the back.
He does not even look like the same little boy. I have been here for every moment, yet I don't understand how they have gotten so big and have turned from infants to toddlers to little boys.
