For the past two weeks or so I have been running behind Brandon (yes he's running now) picking up everything he leaves in his wake. I feel like I'm pulling my hair out, and I can even hear Zach and Julia getting completely frustrated with him! I commented to David, "What is wrong with this baby?" He calmly said, "Don't you remember, the other two did this...he's starting his terrible two's".
How could I have forgotten this stage? Oh that's right...I blocked it from my mind on purpose so I didn't scare myself about having a third child. Had I chosen to remember the horribleness of this stage...I would have taken swift action sooner to be sure that we procreated no more:) All that being said, he is awfully cute while he is being bad and I am repeating, "No Brandon" a million times while whacking his hand or hiney or whatever I can grab at the moment.
Yesterday he had all my china pulled out of the bottom of the china cabinet...and all while I took a quick shower. His favorite thing is pulling all the movies out of the cabinet and taking them out of their cases...he has it down to a science...less than five minutes and all the vhs tapes are all over the living room floor! His curiosity has no end, but I guess it is all new and exciting now that he can walk around and climb chairs and scare his mother to death when she finds him standing in the middle of the kitchen table about to topple off:)
A few mornings ago Zach and I were at the breakfast table (which happens to be the same as the lunch table and the dinner table, in case you were wondering) and I thanked him for getting Brandon out of his crib that morning. "You're welcome mommy," he replied. "Actually I had to put him back in though". When I asked why he stated, "Well he was really whiny and I put him back in and told him that when he behaved and quieted down I would get him out again". I was trying so hard not to laugh at this point, but was able to ask, "Well what happened next"? He told me that Brandon quieted down and he got him back out but told him it was his last chance to behave! At this point he looked at Brandon and lovingly said, "And you were a good boy after that, weren't you?"
Thank heaven there is still laughter here in our house!
For the past few weeks we have been getting snow off and on and the kids have had some days off from school. It's easy to get bored on these days and just let them watch movies or play the Wii, but I was determined to do something creative. Zach has several nerf guns that shoot soft bullets with suction cups on the end of them. That gave me an idea, since he and Julia were always running around shooting things (the TV, Brandon ect) I could create some sort of safari for them to "hunt" in. I printed out pictures of animals and laminated them so the suction cups would stick. Then I went around and hung the pictures everywhere, on walls all over the house. The kids were thrilled to hide behind doors and pop out long enough to shoot the zebra in the hall, or the turkey on the fridge! When they tired of that I took them down, and have stashed them away for another snow day:)
We are FINALLY anticipating a fall trip to Mississippi to see all of my family down there and I have been so excited planning what I can so far in advance. The kids know who "Aunt Rose" and "Uncle Matt" are by picture, but they have been drilling me on the names of the children. Julia is surrounded here by mostly boy cousins, and asked me the other day, "Does Aunt Rose have any girls to play with"? I was delighted to tell her she had not one, not two but three girls to play with! Her face lit up and she instantly began planning what dress up dresses she was going to bring, and which high heel shoes to play princess! Zach frowned at the thought of three girls, and asked me if she had any boys. I excitedly told him yes, she has something for everyone! So thank you Rose and Matt for making enough boys and girls for my kids to play with:)
Last night at dinner we were talking about our trip south while we were eating, and I told Zach and Julia that we were going to work on our manners so we were nice and polite when we got there. Zach replied, "I bet Aunt Rose's kids don't talk with their mouthful." I told him I wasn't sure, but I think they will be pleasantly surprised that Camie, Lissy, Micah and Cassie are very real kids who do lots of the same things they do. Of course the daily question is..."can we go there now?" And of course the kids are asking the same question too:) Can't wait!
Well it's off to torture shopping, or as David likes to call it...grocery shopping!
