Cell Phone SASS

Dear Man at WalMart,

I know. It's WalMart. This store has a solid reputation for harboring teenagers in pajamas, young mothers shopping with infants at 10pm, and other generally inappropriate public displays of ineptness. However, for those of us who shop there and don't display these tendencies, we do our best to simply ignore those in the world who do.

But you sir, are very hard to ignore. While I applaud the fact that you came dressed in nice clothing, even wearing slacks instead of jeans, you still managed to fit in with the WalMart stereotype.

You see, the "Jawbone" bluetooth headset attached to the side of your face did you in. While I'm sure the advertising for this wonderful piece of equipment used words like "stylish" and "sleek", it still looks weird attached to the side of your head.

Lucky for you, we as a society have been taught to ignore such displays of strangeness (see teenager reference above). We have even been taught to ignore the fact that you answer the phone and have private conversations in the middle of a very public place.

Despite our desire to pretend you do not exist, I could not ignore the fact that you were YELLING into your headset. I was three aisles away, and could hear every word. Even more disturbing was the fact that after saying hello and finding that your wife was not available to chat, you asked (and I use that term loosely, as you were still at decibel levels rivaling a rock concert) the person on the other end whether or not you should purchase toilet paper for the family.

Yes, Mr. Jawbone Bluetooth Businessman in Slacks.... you've just blown your cover. Welcome to WalMart.

Sincerely, 
Another Shopper Who Knows More About You Than She Ever Wanted To

Another Week Gone...

I can't believe we're looking at December peeking just around the corner. This year seems to have gone by unbelievably fast! Today's post is not only late in the day, but will be a short and sweet post as well because there is a piece of pie in the other room with my name on it... but that doesn't mean someone else won't eat it.

The biggest news, of course, is that Mark had his first Thanksgiving:

He got to try out the mashed potatoes we promised, and he thought they were pretty good!

Gracie enjoyed her meal too, especially the sweet potatoes!

After the meal was cleared, we all sat down and had some fun. Mommy thought the most fun was the fact that Mark is finally learning to hold his own bottle! Yay!

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday, and didn't get up too early for those Black Friday sales! See you next week... when I'll fill you in on Gracie's artwork - applied directly to our living room walls. Sigh.

A New Season

Many moms who are finished with the infant/toddler years like to tell those of us still struggling with them "Remember, this is only a season."  It is meant to be an encouragement; to help us refocus and remember that our kids will not be little forever. In fact, our kids will not be little for long at all.

Here's the problem: sometimes I don't want a season. I just want an episode. Then, a nice six day break until the next episode. Apparently when you sign up for motherhood, you don't get to check the episode box. You're only offered the full season package, and maybe a few grandparent breaks if your agent is good. And so, I am trying to remember that while dealing with whining, training, discipline, diapers, laundry, sippy cups and bottles, there are two little kids under all that dirt and rice cereal.

It's not really all that hard.

Today we were grocery shopping and out of nowhere Gracie reaches up and gives me a hug. When I leaned in a bit to hug her back, she got her arms all the way around and hugged me hard. I had to stop right in the middle of the aisle because I couldn't move my arms and was hunched over. I didn't mind stopping. I could hardly stop kissing the top of that little red head.

Yesterday Mark was babbling away to himself, and reminded me of when Gracie used to do the same thing. Back then I said to Robert, "I can't wait until she's talking. I wonder what she is trying to say!" Of course, now she is talking, and I still wonder what she is trying to say...

This week Grace has, on multiple occasions, shown love for her brother. She kisses him on the head. She says "Uh oh baby!" when he cries or gets stuck in his travels around the house. In the store today, I was feeding him a bottle as I was walking, and I had to pause to get something from a shelf. She turned in the cart to grab his bottle, and held it so he could finish. She brings him toys and covers him with blankets. She also hits him over the head with wooden blocks and kicks him if he gets too close to Tickle Me Elmo. We're working on that part.

Again I find myself trying to remember to enjoy my season with the kids. I'm not always successful - just ask Robert. Sometimes he comes home and I'm the one drinking from the sippy cup, looking for a blanket and babbling incoherently. No one in the early mom stages will tell you it's easy (unless their agent got them a nanny thrown in with the package) but we all feel it's worth it.

We all appreciate our children, I think sometimes we just wish they came more in episodes than seasons.

Another Week Gone...

Okay, so can there be two episodes of Another Week Gone? Because despite having the flu for the better part of this week (more on that later), I have a lot to share. This twice a week posting bit is really cutting into my chat time. We'll definitely be re-evaluating that decision as part of our New Year's Resolutions. Here's Part One, as Part Two is entirely made up of cute pictures of Grace at the museum we visited Saturday.

Milestones... really it should be microstones. Mark is hitting the new stages so fast I can barely keep up. Was it really just three weeks ago that I reported he had just started crawling? 'Cause now he's sitting up like a pro, pulling himself up onto boxes, and about to learn how to fly like Buzz Lightyear...


Okay. The directions on how to fly are somewhere
on this box... Just call me Space Ranger.

He hasn't quite figured out the whole flying thing just yet... but he's definitely working on perfecting the pose:

To Infinity... and Beyond!

It was about this time though, he realized that Woody was right...

You aren't the real Buzz Lightyear!
You're an Action Figure!



Buzz wasn't flying... he was... falling with style! Help!

Oh, we also saw "Toy Story 3" for the first time last week. Can you tell? Gracie loved it. I didn't think Mark was paying attention, what with all the drooling, cat naps and crawling under the coffee table, but apparently he liked it too.

Remember the tooth I bragged about in early September? Well, it never really arrived. We could see it, but it just sat there, hovering under the surface like an alien probe, silently waiting for activation from an alien ship. Or bananas.

I'm guessing when we tried mashed fruit two weeks ago, this tooth decided it had better erupt like Mount Vesuvius before we introduced tri-tip and Mark missed out. Sadly, I was not the first to notice the tooth. Nor was I the second. Or third. On second thought, maybe I should be eternally grateful to be the fourth person to learn of the tooth, seeing as how I still breastfeed Mark once a day.

Yes, Grandma Dee Dee noticed first, when he bit her. (A bite of pure joy at seeing her, I'm sure.)
Then Uncle Kevin mentioned it to no one in particular, when Mark bit him on the finger (at which point Grandma Dee Dee shared her story).
This comment was then picked up by my husband's radar ears. (Programmed to hear all things relating to his children, trucks, and new video game releases. Also programmed to 'selective hearing mode' when his wife begins talking...)

Alas, I was the fourth to know - and even then I didn't find out until two days later! I guess everyone assumed I already knew, and just forgot to share. I BLOG PEOPLE! I don't "forget" to share. Sharing is my digital mommy duty. If my kid has a tooth, and there isn't a picture, comment or video of it here... I missed it. Re-send the memo.

Moving on...

There is still another milestone to report. I KNOW, this kid is keeping me up at night wondering what he'll dream up next. Since he's gotten to be such a pro at sitting up, we moved him to the big boy chair... in the bathtub. This photo pretty much sums up his reaction:

You get to play in the water every day??? This is great!

He loved it. The whole thing. The water, the chair, his sister pouring water over his head... okay, we put a stop to that pretty quickly. But Grace did prove to be pretty entertaining with her splashing and playing about. He thought she was hilarious, and kept leaning over the bath chair to "pat" the water. So. Stinkin'. Cute. But just one picture here, because hey - this is the internet after all, and even obsessive mommy bloggers have limits.

Our last milestone was the dreaded flu. Mark got to throw up for the first time (yipee?) and I learned that being a SAHM does not include paid sick leave. Luckily, my awesome husband came home to rescue me just ten minutes before I crawled to the bathroom to bow to the porcelain god. My rescuer came down with the flu two days later, just as I was recovering, so I suppose the Lord was watching out for us in some small ways. If you haven't seen or heard from us lately, now you know why.

You haven't seen or heard much about Gracie this post, but don't worry, there are lots of cute pictures in Part Two. I will give you one fabulous picture though:

We're building a stuffing skyscraper!

Gracie helped carry in food to our local food bank yesterday. We delivered a few items to help needy families, and the staff just loved her. She was a bit shy at first, but the woman who helped us was great, and had Gracie play "blocks" with the stuffing boxes so mommy could snap a picture.


I was very excited to help out this year, and I really wanted Gracie to have a part in reaching out to help others. Our church has some events we'll participate in, but I would love for this to be an annual event for our family. We may not be rich, but we certainly can afford to lend a helping hand.

I hope your week was filled with fun, and not flu. I also hope that you would consider checking with your local food bank or church to see if you can help those who are struggling this year - many for the first time ever - to have a Happy Thanksgiving.

Gracie Discovers...

As noted in Another Week Gone... there was just too much to talk about to cram everything into one post. Cousin John turned four this month, so we all went to help celebrate.


Happy Birthday Iron Man!

Once again, when the Happy Birthday song was sung, Gracie got a funny grin on her face - certain the song was for her. She didn't seem too upset about not getting any gifts... probably because there was cake.

After cake and ice cream, we headed to the Discovery Museum near my sister's house. They had a fantastic program, not to mention the view:

Yes, that is the real Golden Gate bridge in the background. (I'm not that good with Photoshop.) And the blue sky dotted with beautiful white clouds? Yup... real. And my husband wearing short sleeves in the middle of November in a Pacific coastal town? Well, he's just crazy.

Actually, it was an incredibly beautiful day, and while we live quite a distance from my sister, it was fun to go visit and let the kids play together:


The Cousins.
My two are the bookends, pinned down
lovingly held by unseen family members.

The above picture is somewhat of a minor miracle, as it is the first time I've ever seen a picture with all five children's faces looking in generally the same direction, and not one of them has burst into tears. It must have something to do with the large spaceship taking off just behind the camera - because I can think of nothing else that would have brought this to pass.

The Discovery Museum is designed for kids under age six, so John and Grace had a blast. I had never been to a place geared for this age group. Gracie hit the jackpot - there were so many fun things to do there:

Someday the hula hoop will seem small... but today it
was a giant circle of fun!

The museum had a "stream" where toy fish would float from one end to the other, even under a small footbridge. The height was just right for little fishermen, and of course, everything was hands on:

I can handle this, but baiting a hook might
be a problem...

Inside this area was a room with water streaming between plexiglass and a tunnel that went through it all, connecting "ponds" that moved like waterbeds - so fun to jump on!

I know it's blurry, but see how deep the tunnel
floor is behind her? How did she manage to get off the
ground like that without hitting her head?? Crazy kid.

Outside was a large play area with "sunken ship" remains, an underwater cave, a bridge to climb, and a big area with gravel that could be scooped up and dumped into bins to fill up the large Tonka dump trucks underneath. Great fun!

Wow. Shoveling rocks is a lot of work. I could be here
for hours!

The setting was beautiful, and Grace had fun heading off into the woods on any path - or sometimes none at all:

Gracie the Explorer, heading around the corner!

One of the most innovative areas was the art room - kids were able to "paint" onto a large plexiglass wall with thinned water based paint. A water bottle is used to spray the glass down, a squeegee clears the paint and water into a trough at the bottom, and the "canvas" is ready for more art. Very cool!

Here she is demonstrating her amazing ability to draw a "cirque":

Circle! She's in her Geometric art phase.

There was also a sand table in the art room, kind of like those zen sand gardens for your executive desk decor, except this one had miniature baking pans and playdough rollers. It was still relaxing though, until there weren't enough scoops to go around... we just improvised:

This is the look of complete and utter exhaustion.
The sign of a fun day at the museum...

And that concludes Part Two of Another Week Gone. Thanks for tuning in to our extra long show this week!
Until next time, we'll leave you with this mystery:


HOW DOES SHE GET HER HAIR TO
FLIP LIKE THAT?

The world may never know.

It's Greek to Me

Gracie has begun to jabber. It is one of my favorite toddler milestones. She will stand and look at you earnestly, telling you all about... something. I just don't know what. That's the problem with two year olds. They have a lot to say, and not a lot of words to say it.


"Did you get all that?"

She's getting pretty good at imitating our words, and can say some things very clearly. The clearest are Cee (the letter) and Amen! She says "sheep" then lays down, closes her eyes, and pretends to nap. She also yells "Coo, coo!" when she spots Blue's Clue, and says "choo choo!" when she hears a train. Clue and Choo are remarkably similar, as you would expect. They aren't the only ones.There are some that are rather difficult to translate.

Cow sounds a lot like car. Car sounds a lot like cold. Usually this isn't a problem, as you can discern from the situation what she's trying to say. Unless you're traveling through the back country roads in December and pass a dairy. Then it could be a problem.

There's also milk and Mark. When she says "Mik", I try not to say "milk"... because if she was trying to say Mark, and I chime in with "Milk", her face suddenly changes. A new idea has been presented, and she is no longer interested in her brother, but gets a big grin on her face and says "Pease mik more?" And then I'm stuck saying, "No, not right now honey." Which makes me feel like a bit of a cad, seeing as how I'm the one that brought up the whole milk thing - she had just been talking about her brother.

Next we have baby. Which sounds (surprisingly) a lot like pee pee. Which sounds like purple. Which sounds like Papa. Basically, if it starts with the letter "P", you get the drift. This gets tricky, as she is more than happy to have you take her to the nearest potty, just for a change of scene. If you say "pee pee?" and she was saying "purple", now you have to stop what you were doing and find the nearest bathroom. Not good.

Sometimes her words come with clues. For example, if a baby is crying, she'll say "Baby. Wah. Baby. Wah." This is quite helpful in avoiding an unnecessary trip to the restroom. Other times, she'll say "Pee Pee?" and tap on her diaper. This is also pretty straightforward. It's the times she's watching Blue's Clues after downing her second sippy cup of milk, and she says "pee pee". Or is it "puppy"? We're still unsure. Therefore, whenever a word that starts with "P" is presented, we do our best to run through all of the other possibilities in the hopes to avoid an unnecessary trip to the potty - a word she never says.

And finally, there are words that we have NO IDEA what she is trying to get across. She tries so hard to get us to understand. I'm sure she thinks we are morons, as she is clearly communicating something we have taught her, and yet here we are, pretending we don't understand.

She reminds me of a foreigner trying to talk to a native. She just says it louder and slower. We still don't get it. We respond with various words (trying to avoid any that involve food or a trip to the bathroom) and hope we get it right. If we don't, she eventually just shrugs and gives up, moving on to the next thing. It's rumored this scenario repeats itself when they become teenagers.


Another word she says very clearly: Yay!

When we stick it out, and finally do understand a new word, Gracie and I are both giddy with excitement. We find ourselves repeating the word to each other multiple times, just to get it "set" in our minds. Re-learning the English language with Gracie has been a lot of fun and has us asking for "More pease!"

Another Week Gone...

We didn't "go and do" much this week, but we still managed to have quite an adventure. Here's the run down:

Both kids tried to kill themselves. Well, maybe killing themselves wasn't the intent, but they still managed to scare the living daylights out of me (do you lose weight when that happens?).  Grace might have eaten a prescription bottle of lotion. Poison control said she may have extra dirty diapers, but that's about it. She seems to be none the worse for wear, so that's good.

Mark found a small part of a leaf on the entry way tile. I came around the corner after having just taken Grace to the potty, and found him red faced and gagging. After having the living daylights scared out of me the afternoon before, all I had left was sheer panic. I picked him up, leaving his head in a semi-down facing position. He seemed to clear (or swallow) the leaf on his own. He was a tad frightened, but seemed fine. I gave him some water, and we all went on our merry way. About an hour later, after breakfast had been eaten, I came in from the garage and found this:


Why are you looking at me that way?
Doesn't everyone do this?


I didn't realize until after I took the picture that there was a tiny part of a leaf in all that loveliness. Well, at least I won't be finding it in his diaper. (Yes, I stopped to take a picture - really now, how much worse could it have gotten at that point? Yes, those are finger streaks in the pile. He's already turning into a great little helper, trying to clean up after himself.)

At naptime on Tuesday, Gracie found a new way to entertain herself. Previous entertainment attempts have included taking off her diaper (dry - thank goodness), banging her feet against the wall, climbing onto the bookcase beside her bed, and making every sound possible, from zerberts to tongue clicking.

Tuesday, she decided to collect spit in her mouth, push it through her teeth until it was nice and frothy, then spit it out in little dots all over her dark sheets, making pretty little spit patterns. Joy. I suppose I could have gotten a picture of that, but frankly, I had other things to do.

So here is the latest. It's hard to explain what happened, but I can tell you it was hilarious. She is not supposed to get out of bed, so when I went to check on her and saw this, I ran to get my camera. The first time she heard the shutter click, she suddenly got very, very still. I clicked again. And again. She stayed on that ledge, still as a stone. I could feel the tension in her, as she knew she'd been caught red handed.



Um, Gracie?  I can still see you.



Look mom, I'm doing my rock star
modeling pose! Aren't I cute?

Finally she popped out from underneath, with that big grin on her face. Don't let her fool you. She knows she's in trouble, but she always tries to "charm smile" her way out of things. Sometimes it actually works.

The kids are learning lots of other things that don't warrant a picture, but keep me on my toes... Grace can now use the pump soap dispenser in the bathroom all by herself. So far I've managed to avoid an all-out soap fest, but my fortune telling skills are hinting that may be coming soon to a blog near you.

Mark can pretty much sit up on his own, and go from a laying down to sitting up position. He is fully mobile, and loves to ignore all the toys we set out for him in favor of playing his own version of "How Clean Is Your House". If there is hair, crayons, food, or, um, leaves on the floor, he is sure to find it. If he breaks out in an English accent soon, my suspicions will be confirmed. Here he is checking the cleanliness of Gracie's kitchen toys:


Yeah, this one needs a little more scrubbing...

Mark has also, on multiple occasions, made the "Ma" sound. He hasn't said "MaMa", but I just know it's coming! Gracie's first word was DaDa, so I'm not encouraging Mark to change his pattern in any way.

I mentioned last week that Gracie has been very nice to her brother on many occasions, giving me heart flutters. Here he is after she gave him every piece of her toy kitchen items that would fit on his tray. He loved it.

Don't try to butter me up buttercup!
I'm coming back for re-inspections next week!

And here they are playing peek a boo. He didn't love this one quite as much:



Gracie, are you sure this is a game? Gracie?



Lastly, Gracie demonstrated a new way to sit in her high chair. She didn't like it as much as she thought she would:

I'm so disappointed!
They told me this chair had a massage option!

Hope I'm the only one who had to call Poison Control this week... keep an eye on your little ones, they're a sneaky bunch. Tomorrow we're headed to Auntie Kim's to celebrate November birthdays with the clan. A children's museum is on the agenda, so I'm really looking forward to sharing our adventures with all of you next week!

Olympic Medalist

This week has been a rather slow one, in terms of chaos. It's only half over though, so I'm sure something will pop up just to keep me on my toes. During the lull I've had time to reflect on the things I've gotten particularly good at. If any of the following were turned into an Olympic event, I'm pretty sure I'd be a medal contender:

1) Changing poopy diapers on a wiggling infant. Extra points for using three wipes or less, not getting poop on any clothing (yours or theirs), and completing the task in under 60 seconds.

2) Baby proofing a home. While this may seem like a one time event, it is a daily (hourly?) occurrence when you have an infant AND a toddler. This is not a solo event. No, this is you and your competition on the same playing field, trying to outdo the competitor just a few feet from you. Much like Michael Phelps racing to hit that wall mere nanoseconds before his competitor, I have to stay one step ahead of the tiny tyrants in the arena if I am to win.

3) Completing everyday tasks - with one hand. There would probably be some stiff competition in this category, as moms are always trying to reign in a child with one hand while completing a task with the other. Still, I have been known to perform some pretty amazing feats while holding an infant. For example: I can eat cereal and milk with a spoon in my left hand while feeding Mark solid food with the spoon in my right hand. I can empty the dishwasher, fold laundry, prepare food, and even BLOG while only using one hand. Don't even get me started on what I can accomplish while breastfeeding, Mark in one arm - the world at the other. Also, if using your feet to complete tasks does not get its own event, then it should have bonus points in this one.

4) Identifying sounds from three rooms away. Yes, I can hear a toddler from my room and KNOW that she is not in bed. I can tell when my son has woken up, even when he is just playing in his crib, not crying out or trying to make it known that he's awake and ready to get up. I know when crayons are being dumped, toys are being thrown, and the worst sound of all - SILENCE. I just know when it has been too quiet for far too long.

5) Speed Showering. Gone are the days of long, hot showers to melt away the day. In this category, I would give new Army recruits a run for their money. Having a two year old walk into the bathroom, slide open the shower stall door, take one look at you under the hot spray and then burst into tears is quite a bit of motivation to stick with the essentials when showering. I'm trying not to analyze the bursting into tears part too much...

6) Sneakily eating Halloween candy. Until last month, I had no idea just how good I was at this. My two year old scored almost half a pumpkin pail full of candy in just two streets... and has no idea about the concept of Halloween candy, or that it's even still around the next day. This puts me in the enviable position of being able to hijack all the leftover candy with nary a protest. The only challenge here is to procure a treat, unwrap said treat very quietly, and pop it into my mouth without small eyes and ears catching on. I can have a Tootsie roll from the bowl to my mouth in .046 seconds. Those twisty type wrappers are great. M&Ms take a bit longer, but still... I think I could win the gold medal here.

7) Straightening up the house. Yes, if you've seen my house you may wonder why I think I would even make the team, much less medal in this event. However, with the proper motivation, you would be amazed at how much I could cram into cupboards and closets, throw into the garage, and toss under beds in just a minute or two. Unexpected company just around the corner? No problem. Landlord needs to check the heater filter? Come on over. 

Notice I didn't say "clean" the house. No, the dust bunnies, handprints on the windows and pb&j on the kitchen floor would certainly require more time than this event would allow. But getting toys and shoes from point A to point B? Oh yeah, I'm a contender.

In case you were wondering, during the time it took me to write this post, Gracie (who is supposed to be napping) found a sample bottle of prescription eczema lotion, and emptied it. The problem of course, is that I have no idea where she emptied it. In her bedclothes, on the floor, in her mouth? This last possibility has now prompted my first call to Poison Control. (Mild to no side effects, give her some water and she'll be fine. Whew.) I'm thinking my next post may be Olympic Events my children should enter...

Re-reading my post, I am forced to admit I may not medal in event number two after all. However, based on my second sentence - if fortune telling opens up, I'm definitely in the running.

Another Week Gone...

Okay, what happened to October? How in the world did November get here already??? I'm not the only one who can't believe it's almost Thanksgiving. We had temperatures in the eighties this week. Even the weather can't quite believe summer is over.

This week has seemed exceptionally long, probably because we managed to cram so much into such a short period of time. Here is a peek into the excitement in the Sunshine household:

She NEVER stops moving...

Gracie "graduated" to a big girl bed. Er, mattress. She did great her first night, and finally fell asleep after about an hour of playing (and only got out of bed twice!).


Okay, she SOMETIMES stops moving. This was her first
night on the mattress. Well, mostly on the matteress.

Someone sent out a memo that Saturday was the day for partying! We had three parties to attend that day: a baby shower, birthday party and Halloween party... We managed to fit it all in, and had a great time visiting with friends.


Grace and the Birthday Girl share banana chips at the
monkey themed birthday party

Crayons, maracas and cake! What fun!

All dressed up! I'm the angel...
(but then, you already knew that.)

Mark was fascinated by another person his size

Um, is this how they say hello when they can't talk?


Sunday was Halloween. Grace was shy at first, and would hardly speak as we walked up to the neighbors' doors. After about three houses, she caught on and began running to the next house!

At one home, there were four little girls just about to leave on their own trick or treating adventure. Grace was absolutely mesmerized. I'm certain she would have followed the Butterfly and Strawberry Shortcake around all night if we'd let her!

"We do what? Are you sure?
Yeah, I'd wear a silly hat for that!"

My princess and her daddy

Yes, that's chocolate around her mouth.
She got that look on her face after visiting
the second house, and it never left...

At the end of her trick or treating session, Gracie sat outside with Daddy to hand out candy. Or, um, eat candy. I'm not sure which.

"Ya know dad, if we walked inside right now, we
could keep that bowl all to ourselves..."

Despite hitting her brother on the head with a cardboard tube last week, Grace has been surprisingly loving towards Mark lately. I love it. She tries to pick him up. She brings him toys. If he cries, she says "Baby!" and runs to him. She even got a burp rag and wiped the drool off his chin! I wish I had more pictures of her loving on him, but you just never know when the mood is going to strike.


She's not torturing him, I promise. She's saying
"Baby", and he's just blinking. Really.

A moment later, this was the picture. Mark isn't
thrilled, but he is quite tolerant...

Speaking of Mark... that little boy is a mover! He has been crawling just one week, and boy does he get around. He is quite fast now, and has the army crawl down pat. He occasionally crawls on all fours, but not always. I'm alarmed at how quickly he is adapting to mobility. My life has entered an entirely new stage now that I have an actively exploring infant in the house again.


"One-Hundred! Whew! What a workout!"

Mark also tried some semi-solid food this week. He has never choked on his food, and eats rice at a very thick consistency, so we decided to try some mashed up banana on Wednesday. I figured he'd grab the banana and shove it in his mouth like everything else he seems to find...

I was wrong. He was very good at grabbing the plate though. Good thing bananas are sticky.

This would be a lot easier if my nose
didn't get in the way...

"You people eat this chunky stuff all the time?"

"I am NOT impressed."

And he really wasn't impressed. I don't think he's quite ready, so we'll give it a try again later. Maybe Thanksgiving  potatoes... yum.

I hope you enjoyed your princesses and pumpkins this week too. I thoroughly enjoyed living vicariously through my two year old this week. Honestly, what is better than walking around dressed up like a princess and getting free candy?