On The Lake...

We took Half-pint out on the lake this morning while Daddy and Aunt K went wake boarding. We took him out on the lake a couple of times last summer, but this was Half-pint's first time on the lake this season. When we pulled away from the dock, Half-pint said "WOW, like on the ocean!" Daddy fell on his first run; so when he jumped across the wake on the second run, Half-pint turned to me and said "Whew Mom, that was a close one!"

He sat next to me and held my hand (I think he was just a little nervous) the whole time we were moving, but I think he had a really good time. His excitement was obvious: when Daddy finished wake boarding, and we were waiting for him to get back into the boat, Half-pint turned to me with big eyes and said

"MOM! That was AMAZING!"

And then he jumped up and said

"DADDY! You're AWESOME!!!"

Feeding Time...

Quarter-pint is driving me nuts. He has not been a happy eater lately. He'll eat a few bites of something, and then refuse to eat any more. So I try something else, but with the same results. And so it goes. Augh!!! At times I get so frustrated I just walk away. That was the case today. I just needed a break so I went to the computer. I could hear Quarter-pint fussing in his high chair in the kitchen. When I decided I shouldn't let him cry anymore, I ventured back to face him. What a face he greeted me with! At first I was confused, then I turned to Half-pint and asked him
"Did you feed your brother carrots?"
"Yep!"
I looked back at Quarter-pint, and then to Half-pint:
"It's kind of tricky, huh?"
"yeah."
Quarter-pint was COVERED with mashed carrots: in his hair, in his ears, all over both arms and hands, his face forehead to chin. There were carrots smeared all over the high chair and even on the floor. When I pulled Quarter-pint out of his highchair, I quickly realized that he also had carrots on his leg and even between his toes! I'm sorry I didn't get a picture, but I don't think a photo would have done the situation justice! I guess that's what I get for having a Half-pint willing to help and for leaving a bowl of mashed carrots on the table!

Out of the Mouth of Babes...

This morning, Half-pint looked up at me out of the corner of his eyes, cocked his finger with his little thumb in the air and simply said "Mom, you twazy!" Then we went about his playing. I have no idea what prompted his side-ways pronouncement, but I have to admit that he's right-at least some of the time!

Brothers...

So, I think I've blogged about this before, but I was struck again today about the bond between brothers. I put Half-pint in the tub to play (and warm up after I let the boys play in the street gutter after a rain storm). I thought Half-pint would love a bath alone; I don't think he's had a bath by himself for months. He proved me wrong. I told him I would let him play in the bubble bath until after I finished feeding Quarter-pint his dinner, and then I would put Quarter-pint to bed...then get Half-pint out of the tub and into his bed.

"But Mom, I want baby in the tub too! I don't want to play with all the toys all by my-selp!"

There have been several occasions since Quarter-pint was born when I thought Half-pint would really enjoy some time with just Mom, or to do something without his brother, but he almost always questions the where-abouts of his brother. It always touches and surprises me. (Probably because I'm glad to have a chance to do ANYTHING by myself-just for a few seconds - now and then...) I only hope the bond they have developed over the past year will just continue to deepen and that their relationship will be stronger and more positive as they grow together!

Catastrophe...

So, basically it's a HUGE catastrophe at our house!!! Quarter-pint has officially discovered the kitchen drawer where we keep the baby spoons, sippy cup lids and filters. Last night he pulled himself up and opened and closed the drawers. Then, he discovered all the stuff in the drawer. He was so proud of his accomplishment! He has also discovered the cupboard where I keep the small kitchen appliances- today I found the electric knife (in the box thankfully) on the floor. Whoa is me!

No Escape...

Half-pint is in rare form lately. This morning while I was getting ready for the day, I heard Quarter-pint babbling in his crib. Half-pint heard him also and said "Baby awake!" as he ran into Quarter-pint's room. I knew that Half-pint was probably going to climb into Quarter-pint's crib with him. Before too long, I heard Quarter-pint crying--really crying, not just fussing about still being in his crib. Half-pint came running into my room quickly. When I asked Half-pint why Quarter-pint was crying, he said
"I do this..." then he opened his mouth really wide and chomped down with a growling sound.
"You bit your brother???"
"Yes."
"Why did you bite him???"
"Because I hungry."
Since when do we bite people when we are hungry??? By the time I got to Quarter-pint's room, Half-pint was already back in the crib. When he touched Quarter-pint's arm, he cried again. Poor kid-he was trapped in his crib with no escape with his seemingly cannibalistic bigger brother! I looked at Quarter-pint's arm and there were marks-not teeth marks, but it was obvious where a three-year old mouth had chomped on his little arm.

"Umergency!!!"

Last week I broke down and bought a gate to block off the stairs. We never used a gate when Half-pint was learning to crawl, walk and master stairs. So I figured we didn't need one for Quarter-pint. What I didn't count on was Quarter-pint chasing his big brother up the stairs (and Half-pint intentionally heading up the stairs because he knows Quarter-pint is slower climbing stairs than simply crawling after him). I got tired of being surprised by finding Quarter-pint in the middle of our stairs. So I actually bought a gate-the kind that has a door in it so that the "big people" can still get through with little trouble. Half-pint was excited about helping me. We assembled the gate together and then he also helped me install it. I debated about teaching Half-pint how to open the door in the gate, but it was only a brief debate because he quickly improvised and climbed through the architectural cut-out between the front door and the dining room. That sealed it-I HAD to show Half-pint! We talked about making sure the gate door was always closed so Quarter-pint would be safe and not climb the stairs. This week we've had a few "emergencies". Half-pint comes running and says "Momma! It's an umergency! Come!" I then find Quarter-pint at least half way up the stairs!

"How did he get through the gate???"

"I opened it for him."

"He's not supposed to go through the gate because I don't want him climbing the stairs!"

"But Mom, he a dood climber!"

Yesterday we had an "umergency" again. This time Quarter-pint was almost all the way up the stairs. When I told Half-pint I didn't want him to open the gate for his brother, he protested and said "But Momma, he want to climb stairs."

"No! We have the gate to keep him OFF the stairs!"

"Maybe we just take the date down!"

"NO! I'm NOT going to take the gate down."

Aaugh! He's clever, I'll give him that much!

Quarter-pint Antics...

I had just sat down at the computer to move some pictures from the camera to the computer and also to post a blog about Quarter-pint when suddenly my computer completely shut off. I was puzzled for a minute...then I looked under the desk...

Yep, that's the power cord for the power strip that the computer's plug into, in his chubby little fingers. So much for surge protection! One of his favorite activities is to unplug anything he can get his fat little fingers on. When he hits the floor in the master bedroom he speeds towards the CO2 detector and pulls it out of the wall. As soon as he's finished, he simply crawls away.

Quarter-pint LOVES to play in the water. He gets really excited when we turn the water on in the bathtub. The other day I had both boys take a bath. We started filling the tub as I helped Half-pint get undressed. Quarter-pint squealed with delight and bounced up and down and tried to reach the toys in the tub. A couple of times I had to grab the back of his pants and pull his little feet back to the floor. He's a little top-heavy and nearly went in head first! When he finally got in the water he played and played and played. What a happy kid! (The ONLY time his hair is flat on his head is when it's wet!)

Quarter-pint has absolutely no idea that he hasn't celebrated a single birthday yet. I think he fully believes he's three just like his big brother. Quarter-pint wants to be just like Half-pint. When Half-pint eats a snack Quarter-pint thinks he needs one, when Half-pint gets a drink I hear Quarter-pint saying "Ah...Ah...Ah" (meaning I want one too!). Quarter-pint chases Half-pint around the house just to be with him and play together. Tonight, I caught Half-pint pulling the cushions off the chair in the living room and virtually made a step-ladder up to the couch. Half-pint was jumping up the cushions to the couch and then going to the other end of the couch and jumping off. I walked into the living room just as Quarter-pint was climbing onto the couch and crawling to the very spot where Half-pint had jumped off. I caught Quarter-pint as he dived head-first off the couch! What am I going to do with this kid???

"Organization..."

So the fun part of having a three year-old is all the conversations I get to have with him! I know the last post was a conversation Half-pint and I had about "tereal". Tonight we had a conversation about organization. If you know my Half-pint, you will know that he likes things just so! He has always liked things just so. He is a master of lining his cars and trucks (or anything that lines up) up in near perfect rows and stacking anything he can find in very neat towers. Here are a few examples of his talents...keep in mind he was 16-18 months old when these pictures were captured!

So back to the organization conversation...Half-pint was looking at my to-do list and asked me what the list items said. I got to the last one and it had the word "organization" in it. He looked at me and said

"What dat mean???" (he didn't say organization so I'm not sure how to spell it in Half-pint).

"It means everything has a special place...everything is just right. You are organized."

So this little snippet of conversation is fairly meaningless until you hear the rest of the concurrent activities...we were working on a count-down calendar. I copied a page from my calendar and colored out the boxes that didn't apply and then let Half-pint cross out the days as we count down. So I handed him the marker and told him to

"put a big X in this square."

"X? X marks the pot!" (that's what he always says when he hears/sees and x.)

So then he proceeds to color in the entire box, but he only got about 3/4 of the box actually covered with bright orange ink. I think, Okay, that's fine. We had a few days to fill in because I was a few days late in making the calendar, so I had him x-out the next couple of squares. He colored in the next few, but only got about 2/3 of the boxes filled. I told him that he did a great job and tried to put the calendar away for the evening. He was finishing a pre-bed pbj and while he was taking a monster bite and shoving the rest of the crust into his little mouth, I asked him if I could hang the calendar on the fridge. He quickly shook his head no, but his mouth was too full to tell me why. I think I asked him about a half-dozen times before he had swallowed enough to answer.

"No Momma, I need to tolor in the boxes. No white, Momma!"

He was insistent. The first thing that came to mind was the Monk episode when Monk is trying to take a fill-in the bubble standardized test. Oh no! OCD??? Half-pint again commenced to "tolor in the boxes-no white" but covered the same patch of orange several times before I convinced him he had colored enough of the white. He did get more white covered, but not all of it. I hope he learns to fill in a box more effectively by the time he is required to take one of those fill-in the bubble tests!

Cereal...

This morning Half-pint found me in the office working on the computer. He seemed a little upset and when I asked him what was wrong, he said

"I can't bind the tereal I bike!"

"Is it on the counter because the box is too big for the cupboard?"
"No!"

So I followed him into the kitchen to see if I could find the cereal he likes. After some less than helpful questions, we had this discussion:

"What does the cereal box look like?"

"It white. It has tereal on it!"

"The box is white, with cereal on it?" (Oh great, that narrows it down!) "What does the cereal look like?"

"It has dugar on it, and you eat it!"

"The cereal has sugar on it and you eat it?" (That was as helpful as my last question!)

"Yep"

"Shall we go downstairs together and see if we can find the cereal you like?"

"Yep! Let's go together!"

So we went to the basement and I couldn't find any white cereal boxes. I did find a light-colored box of frosted shredded-wheat and asked Half-pint if that's the kind he liked. He responded with a very enthusiastic "Yeah! Dood-job Mom!" Then I got a thumbs-up! Whew, I'm so glad we had the "bind the tereal he bikes"!!!