Cleaning our rides

While Evelyn was sleeping the other day, the men were out cleaning our rides!

I'm pretty sure Henry used half the bottle on his hog!

For lunch today I gave Evelyn some oatmeal, then Henry needed help with his food. I helped him for about 2 minutes, then turned around to see this!

After putting Evelyn down in her bed, Henry and I got to test out the new vacuum! I really don't know who was more excited. Henry kept saying "my vacuum. Nice vacuum." We also got to "fix" a chair which Henry loved and didn't stop saying "I helping. I fix it."

It has been a busy and eventful couple of days. Evelyn has cut two teeth and is sleeping much better!! She is starting to eat more solid foods. To my disappointment, she hasn't really made too many funny faces, which is half the fun of starting your kids on solid foods!

This is the funniest face we've gotten so far. Henry liked it, then he tried to take over the camera work.

Henry and Evelyn are starting to interact more and more, which is amazing and so much fun to see. This is the tail end of a conversation they were having.

It is amazing how efficient Henry is at getting into things. This is the result of him getting a bottle of Annie's finger nail polish...it could have been a lot worse!

Henry's engineering and OCD personality continue. He came running up to me holding what is in the top picture saying "gate" over and over again. In the video, I heard him talking a lot in the other room and found that he lined all his Llama Llama books up and was saying "bye bye" to them.

Henry was hit by the spring cleaning bug yesterday. He first took the hose off the vacuum and vacuumed for  20 minutes. Then, he got out the spray mop and cleaned the entire floor...and table...

He also had to bring his little dog around the house so she could supervise his work.

Reading to Evelyn

When Evelyn is playing on the ground I will usually put some toys and books around her so she has some things to play with and look at. I'm constantly thinking of helping her develop, grow, and learn. 

It appears Henry is of the same mind. He noticed Evelyn on the floor and brought over his current favorite book, Dora Duck, and read it to her. 

A busy week

It has been a pretty eventful week. The kids have been growing and developing a lot.

Potty training is under way with Henry which has been fun! He wasn't too interested until I gave him the reward of playing the Bible app, endless alphabet, animal sounds, or watching Daniel Tiger on my phone. The funniest thing about him potty training this week is that when he goes he says, "bubble out hole." I thing you can figure out what exactly that means...

One of Henry's favorite things to do now is push his little cart around the house, run into things with it, and say beep beep and then whatever he runs into. A few of his favorites: "beep beep ottoman" "beep beep house" "beep beep daddy"

Henry has started to call many things baby or mommy, depending on their size. A few of his favorites are mommy and baby zebra, mommy and baby rock, and mommy and baby tree. Annie and my favorite occurred today when he saw a patch of ice on the grounds and said over and over again, "ice ice baby!"

Evelyn continues to develop. She is rolling over very easily now. She also sat up by herself for a few minutes! Growing up too fast!

Henry has discovered the word tada! He likes to hide things, then reveal them with a big tada!! The other day he discovered a new hiding spot in the bathroom!

Henry and Evelyn are getting along better and better. Whenever Evelyn starts to cry, Henry rushes over with a pacifier. Sometimes he tries to help a little too much and cram the entire thing in her mouth, but at least he helping!

 Henry loves to dress himself now too. For the most part he does a halfway descent job. The best part of this outfit was him choosing the puma jacket, which he kept calling goat, of course!

Henry's imagination and pretending has really taken off. His absolute favorite thing is to pretend to feed mommy, daddy, Evelyn, and all of his stuffed animals. His favorite animal to feed is his bow wow!

Evelyn has moved into a big crib! Henry and I assembled it a few days ago. He was a big help! He screwed in some screws and cleaned it with his brush! Kind of nostalgic as it is the same crib I slept in as a baby!

Our week ended with a trip up to Frankfort to visit Gramma, Grandpa Rob, Tia Betsy and Fritz. Two highlights: the amazing sunset, and when we left Henry said buy gramma house.

Putting the dishes away

A routine has started in our house.  When Henry hears the dishwasher open he runs over.  After I finish putting away the bottom rack, I move to the top and Henry climbs into the dishwasher and helps put everything away. Heres to hoping he has this strong desire to help do chores for a long time!

Swiping cards

Because Annie works at a college we get to eat in the dining hall. When you walk into the dining hall a worker swipes your ID card to let you in. Henry has always been fascinated by this, and has progressively gotten more and more involved with this process and with his favorite worker, Chris. First, Henry would point to Chris as soon as we got to the dining hall. Then, he would grab our ID cards, hand them to Chris, she would swipe them, he'd grab them and give them back to us. A few days ago, after we were in the dining hall and finished eating, Henry walked over to Chris and asked her "up please?"  So, she put Henry up in her chair, which was the highlight of his day. Today, Henry almost took over Chris' job. While we were still getting our food, Henry walked over to Chris, so she put him up on her lap. Students continued to come in, so Chris continued to swipe their IDs and, sure enough, Henry grabbed every ID card from Chris and handed it back to the student. He had everyone cracking up!

Cleaning the Bike

It doesn't matter what I'm doing, Henry wants to help. Sure, it takes about twice as long to get anything accomplished when he's helping, but one of my goals as a dad is to always welcome Henry's (and soon Evelyn's) help. I never want them to feel as if they are bothering me. The look on Henry's face after he "helps" me with something is priceless. You can tell he feels such a sense of worth and accomplishment, and that he is looking to me for recognition and praise for the hard work he just did. I want him, and his soon to be sister, to always know: Yes, you are valued, loved, and always appreciated!!

In this picture Henry is helping clean off my bike after a long ride.  He "cleaned" the pedal for about 2 seconds then found it fun to bang his hand on the chain.  Cleaning grease off a toddler's hand...fun!