Another real quick bath story. We have
these foam toys that stick to the walls of the tub, in shapes
of cars, trucks, signs, roads, etc. Eve picked up the stop sign
today, looked at it for a minute, then said “sign!” and looked
to me for confirmation. I smiled, she smiled, and Lex said
“yes, Eve, it’s a stop sign. See, it says stop!” She looked
again and said “Stop!” I love watching little brains work. She
says so many words now it’s amazing. Tonight is the first time
I’ve heard her say “sign,” though she’s pretty good at saying
“stop, stop!” :)

In the tub tonight Lex asked Eve if he
could give her a kiss. She said yes, which is unusual. (I’m
always teaching him to ask her before doing something or taking
something, but she always says no to him). He was pretty happy
and kissed her arm. She grinned, said “kiss!” then lifted up
her foot and said “foot.” He laughed and kissed her foot. She
grinned bigger, said “kiss!” then held up her other foot. He
happily obliged. So cute!

We went to a fun pumpkin festival this
past weekend. It was a busy morning that didn’t end well, but
overall we had a good time. They had horse-drawn wagon rides,
which both kids LOVED, and a big pumpkin patch, and activities
for the kids. They both loved throwing apples in the cider
press and Lex painted a pumpkin and insisted on writing his own
name on it instead of letting the volunteer helper write it for
him. I was surprised that he wanted to write and even more
surprised that it was recognizable. The pumpkin met an untimely
end, but I’m sure we’ll see plenty more of Lex writing in the
future. We also met several friends at the festival. I had
arranged to go with Michelle and her kids, but we also met
several other people, including one of our favorite daycare
kids. That was a nice surprise.

My
little pumpkin in a sea of pumpkins.

Trying
to get a group picture. Notice how I’m the only one interested
in this idea :/

That’s a
little better… kind of.

The
horses.

Yesterday I asked Lex if he wanted to carve the pumpkins
we have here at home or paint on them. He choose painting, so
we set up a little paint station and I let them go to town on
the pumpkins. We all had fun.

Lex put
eyes, nose, and a mouth on this one. Then he added a beard :)
(not in the picture)

Eve
seemed to think the paint was hot and blew on each brush before
painting on the pumpkins.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRBHcbCBIXA]

So sorry for the nearly a week delay!! I
hope you’re all doing ok out there in reader land! :) We’ve
been busy here and apparently I’ve neglected you. We had Alan’s
parents up for a visit last weekend (they brought us new-to-us
dining room chairs and a computer desk!), then dinner with
Grandpa and Grandma the next day. Lots of Pampered Chef stuff
going on. I signed my 3rd recruit!! Go me! :) Michelle and I
took the kids apple picking on a day that was supposed to be
sunny and beautiful. Turns out it was the first frosty morning,
but we had fun anyway. It was a short trip, but fun :)

Caitlin
and Eve. I was debating about getting Eve a more girly winter
wardrobe, but then Michelle offered to let me borrow a very
nice girlish winter coat for her. Yay! So here she is looking
like a boy, but soon you’ll see a more girly look on the girl
:)

Lex,
playing tug-o-war with the local apple stand puppy. He’s an
adorable dog! Lex is sporting his new jacket from our neighbor.
I’m still undecided if I like it, but Lex has taken a liking to
it so I think my opinion probably doesn’t matter
anyway.

Got
back from dinner tonight with our friends Mike & Andi
and their boys. The evening ended around 7:00pm when Lex walked
in to the kitchen, almost in tears, and said “mommy, we need to
go home now.” On the way home he explained that he was crying
because he was angry at me. I had said about 10 minutes earlier
that we had to get going soon, so apparently he was angry at me
because I started talking again and we didn’t leave right away.
I suggested perhaps his tiredness and bad dinner (chips!) also
had something to do with his feelings. He said, “yes, the pizza
made me angry.” Sarcasm? We had pizza for dinner (Caprese Pizza
from Pampered Chef, soo yummy!) and I had him take one bite to
taste it. I guess it was an angry bite! Crazy kid. Anyway, it’s
way too late now and I really should be sleeping. I’m training
my new recruit tomorrow and immediately afterwards several
other consultants will be joining us for a a Pampered Chef
movie night to watch a fun new training DVD. Will be fun, but
busy. Hope this will tide you all over for a few more days.
I’ll try to be a better blogger ;)

Here’s you see an airplater in action,
with a little more information about the green wings. You also
get a little tour of my messy house :)
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AIDJQWZZdWM]

Monkey time.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-1ERizUmo8]

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDbPBhpfslM]

More fun with Max.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhBX_Dbz6JY]

Lex is an amazing person these days. Three
really seems to suit him. He is still barrels of energy, but he
can settle himself down, usually, when necessary. My family was
in town last weekend and we went out to brunch. I brought along
a coloring book and a few crayons (turns out the restaurant had
64 crayons though!!) Lex sat quietly through the whole meal! He
ate his food, colored with the crayons, did the activities, and
was very well behaved. I think Uncle B sitting next to him
helped a lot! Grandpa entertained Eve on the other end of the
table and I think it was the first restaurant meal in 3 years
that didn’t end with Alan or I chasing kids around. Lex also
has a renewed interest in drawing and has started to make
recognizable shapes. Nothing like our friends Lauren and Sarah
(they are amazing!) but he draws lines and squiggles and then
tells me, “Mom, I made a balloon!” Or a box, or an animal, or a
rainbow. He’s branched out from just drawing rivers, which is
refreshing :) He also seems to like activity books, which is a
new thing for him.

His other big development is on the food front.
He’s gone from eating barely anything, to eating some things!!
:) I read a book called Food
Fights, written by Dr. Shu, our old pedi, and she had
a great part about the “no thank you bite.” Have I written
about this before? Anyway, the idea is that instead of
pressuring your kid to eat everything on their plate, just give
them a little of the real dinner and something else they will
like. Then have the kid take one bite of everything and if they
don’t like it they can say “no thank you” and they don’t have
to eat any more. I always thought this was a good idea, but Lex
would flat out refuse. The idea is that once they have tasted
everything they can then have more of what the like or dessert
or whatever. Lex would just leave the table without eating
anything. Frustrating! Then a few weeks ago something in his
brain clicked (I think it was triggered by the carrot harvest!)
and he has become quite a reasonable eater. He still whines
sometimes, but for many days now he has tasted everything on
his plate, often announcing that he DOES like the food. Today
he ate an apple with sunflower seed butter and raisins for
snack. That’s a huge and healthy deviation from goldfish and
bunnies. At dinner he ate all of his green beans, more apple,
and his bagel. We’ve been keeping the fruit bowl full and on
the table, which is good for my WW purposes and apparently good
for him too. On a regular basis he will help himself to a piece
of fruit with his meal. So cool!! I’m loving this new phases
and feeling like a much more competent mommy. (In the picture they are eating
SFSB&H; sandwiches, but Lex decided after the fact that
he wanted cream cheese as well. At his insistence I put cream
cheese right on top of his sandwich, and, of course, she wanted
some too. I thought it sounded pretty yucky, but they both ate
it up.)

He is almost completely done with naps now. This
is good and bad. He tends to be very tired by the end of the
day (and so am I!) but he also goes to bed much earlier. The
past few days he’s been in bed by 7pm (6:30 tonight!) and more
and more he goes to bed easily. Last night we finished stories,
he put them back on the shelf and went right up stairs. It was
great!
(Here
he is playing with the recorder from our hand-me-down music
kit. He’s started being interested in music and we listen to
lots of CDs and sing and dance along.)

I think I’m done for now :) Its just amazing
to watch him become a little person. Smart, funny, and often
even rational. We’re pretty lucky to have him around!

I wonder how many posts I’ve written over
the years about sleep. Not getting any, getting some, everyone
in the bed, no one in their beds, not enough sleep, too much
sleep (never!), etc. It seems to be an ever-prevalent thought
in my head and therefore topic for the blog :)

Anyway, naps seem to be shifting for everyone
around here. Well, not everyone, Alan and I are still holding
steady at none! As Lex slowly gives up his naps, Eve is slowly
shifting to just one nap a day. Luckily it’s usually a good
long one! For awhile Lex was napping every other day or so and
seemed to be doing ok with that, but lately he just won’t nap.
Even when he sits in his bed (dim room, fan on, etc.) he reads
books quietly, but doesn’t sleep. Although this makes for
earlier bedtimes, more often than not they are no fun because
he’s too overtired.

Yesterday we had an
awful experience which inspired me to change up our whole
routine. Maybe awful is too strong a word, but it certainly
wasn’t fun. I’ve been exercising in the mornings then
showering, which means the kids are entertaining themselves for
a good portion of the morning and then Lex is watching tv for
30-45min (ok, sometimes up to an hour!) and then it’s lunch and
rest time. This works well from a WW perspective (I hit my
pregnancy weight last week!), but not so well from a kid
perspective. In the afternoons I try to get him outside, but he
usually just wants to play indoors and ends up weirdly
wired/tired by 7pm. Yesterday I took them to a farm that has a
pumpkin patch, corn maze, apple picking, berry picking and
more. I thought it would be fun and a great way for him to burn
some energy. Instead he was out of control, not listening to me
at all, and almost got hit by a minivan as he ran away from me
in the parking lot. Thankfully the minivan driver was paying
attention and saw him dart towards her! I can only imagine what
she was mumbling about me as she drove away. Anyway, I was
scared!

Eve
immediately found the wagons and wanted a ride. Lex started off
strong as we headed into the corn maze, but quickly decided he
wanted to ride too. We went through most of the corn maze with
me pulling them both on the wagon. So much for them burning off
energy!

I told
them they could each get one pumpkin, but it had to be one they
could carry…

He
almost carried this one! They both ended up with ones much
smaller :)

Alan and I
chatted last night and I think I’m going to go back to our old,
pre-WW schedule of outings in the morning. I think getting him
out in the morning when he’s more alert and happy will help him
be calmer for the rest of the day and may even help prolong
naps for a bit longer. I’m not sure when I’m going to fit
exercise in with this new/old plan, but at the moment I think
getting him back on track is more important. We had a great
time playing with Michelle this morning (the kids played
together with no fighting!), then went to WW, and now he is
having quiet time in his room. Still not sleeping, but
hopefully getting some rest.

Kids are
such puzzles! Just when it seems like one thing is working,
they decide to mix it up a bit! I bet you’ll find lots of posts
along those lines in this blog too ;)