Henry's birthday and the following weeks

Henry's 2nd birthday party was a few weeks ago. These 2 years have gone by faster than any 2 years of my life! The highlights of the party would have to be Henry's cheesy camera smile; which looks identical to mine when I was younger! Also, the drum set he got from uncle Travis! 

Henry has become obsessed with Thomas the Train. His cake and a lot of his gifts were Thomas. He even shared his new Thomas sleeping bag with Evelyn.

Henry ended up getting sick a couple days after his birthday party. On his actual birthday we took him in to the doctor to get checked out. It was nothing serious, just needed to run its course. While at the doctors we had an embarrassing parent moment when we told the nurse we use a rectal thermometer. She very politely said, "OK. Um, we try to not use rectal thermometers after 6 months of age." I'm sure everyone that works there got a good laugh after we left!

Henry then passed what he had onto me and then onto Evelyn. Annie got a little of it, but thankfully not much. We were also very thankful to have grandparents that live close which provided Henry with a sleepover at grandma and grandpas so we didn' t continue to pass it back and forth!

Here's to everyone bring healthy again and getting back to our normal routine!

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. 

Strangers

I'm not sure if other toddlers are like this, but I am beginning to realize teaching Henry the dangers of strangers will be pretty challenging. While at the store yesterday he walked right up to an elderly woman and grabbed her hand. I'm fairly confident that this old lady wasn't going to run off with him, but you can never really be sure. She did say to Henry, "you want to come home with me? I'll take you home." I was about ready to pounce on that old lady. That's why I wear my sneakers. If there's any trouble, zip! I spring into action!

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.

Wrestling

Henry and I love to wrestle and rough house. He desperately wants Evelyn to be old enough to join in the fun. Evelyn is slowly getting there. She's got him in some type of MMA choke hold and is giving him a little pop to the face!

Hair cut

Thanks to Aunt Kelsey at Style Up Hair Studio for the much needed hair cut!

Putting you in your place

I know I don't have the best singing voice. It is just something I was not blessed with. When I put Henry down for his nap or to bed at night, I usually sing him a song. Today, while rocking him before his nap, I asked him, "do you want me to sing?" He responded with a very clear, "no." I asked again just to be sure. Yup. He did not want me to sing. Henry apparently has already reached the age of realizing his parents aren't the best at everything. I thought I had many more years before that hit.

Such is parenthood. Humbling you and putting you in your place day after day!

Good man

I asked Henry what shirt he wanted to wear yesterday. He picked his UNC shirt! Even at less than two years old he could feel the UNC-Duke rivalry and March Madness brewing inside him. Good man Henry, good man!

30 minutes later

I've been asked by people, and I'm sure even more people wonder but don't ask, what I do all day. Well, here's a glimpse into what 30 minutes of my day consisted of.

Two diaper changes, three pairs of Evelyn's pants, three onezees, one pair of Henry's pants, one of Henry's shirts, one of my shirts, and some carpet cleaner later, we were back to Henry pretending to give me milk and water to drink and Evelyn sucking on her fingers.

Just another morning

Another relaxing morning, another morning of cleaning up poop. This time, it was cleaning poop off the floor. Oh potty training...how nice it will be when it's all over!

I know it's an exaggeration, and this morning was nothing like this, but it made me think of THIS scene from the movie Daddy Day Care! Hahaha!

Practicing letters

Part of being a stay at home parent is teaching your kids. Teaching them what? Everything. Literally. They know nothing when they are born, and everything they learn in the next few years will be what you indirectly and directly teach them. So far, Henry is learning his number and letters terrifically!

Mornings

Mornings are always an adventure and quite often a surprise. Gone are the days of enjoying a quiet breakfast where I could gather my thoughts and prepare for the day ahead.

Yesterday, while drinking my breakfast smoothie (I have been eating these in the morning as they are easy to transfer around and if something comes up, I can put it in the frig and eat it later) and cleaning up Henry's breakfast, I enjoyed the serenade of one of the new toys Abuelo brought back from China!

Henry has become obsessed with this toy. Here is what else he likes to do in the morning with it...

The last couple mornings have had been interrupted by poopy diapers. For two days in a row Evelyn didn't even make it to the changing table. She went right into the bathtub and soon after was sound asleep. Today, she was in the jumper for about 10 minutes. I smelled something...I was speechless when I picked her up. Below is the picture of what I saw when I pictured up Evelyn. Look at your own risk.

Kisses

We are very happy that Henry's obsession with Evelyn has turned from throwing things at her to kissing her. This wasn't staged at all. Henry just laid right down next to her and kissed her!

Bathroom

Reason why my kid is crying: mommy went into the bathroom.

Hi baby

Henry is pulling out his Chilean roots. Or, at least his Tío Rodrigo, who's favorite saying is "OK baby." Over the past few days, Henry has been putting a "baby" behind a lot of his words. Last night for our 5 minute drive home from the dining hall, he said "home baby" the whole way. He also likes to grab his phone and say "hi baby" over and over.

I thought the days of calling girls on the phone and having to listen to him use pet names would be many years down the road. If I hear him say shmoopy I might not be able to handle it!

I have to look my best

We were riding in the car. Henry was being so good and quiet in the back seat...until we realized he had gotten into mommy's makeup bag and we took her mascara away from him!

We were on our way to dinner, so I guess Henry just wanted to make sure he looked his best.

Can't juggle, gotta poop

We somehow got on the conversation of juggling. Annie asked if I knew how to juggle, so I grabbed a few clementines and juggled for her. Henry saw me juggle and then mimicked the movements with his hands, or at least tried to. He looked more like one of those people waiving their arms and hands all over the place dancing to techno music. We tried to get video of it, but Henry had some other pressing need to take care of!

I got to have something fruity

During the day I am constantly talking, singing (along to pandora), playing, or horsing around with the kids. I do this for multiple reasons: I am constantly interacting with them so it helps their overall development, they are hearing constant language so their verbal development will be strong, it's fun and goofy so they know our house is a house of fun. Annie got a glimpse into the craziness by secretly recording Henry and me. It's embarrassing, but it's what it takes to be a constantly involved and interactive stay at home parent. That, or it's just what I tell myself to explain my own weirdness...

Evelyn is the funniest person in the world

In an attempt to control Evelyn's spitting up, we decided to try some baby cereal. She could not get enough of it! And, Henry could not get enough of her!

As far as whether or not it helped with stopping her spitting up so much...results were inconclusive...

Holding on for dear life!

Evelyn held on, literally, as long as she could before falling asleep. It makes me wonder how tired I would have to be to fall asleep like that. The next night she fell asleep in the middle of the Calvin vs Hope basketball game. I would have to be half dead to fall asleep in that crazy loud place!