What are Jack and Cullen up to?

I can't believe in exactly one week they'll be 2 1/2! Here's the latest on their rapidly developing interests and abilities:

*At last, Jack says “YES!” At 2 ½, one of them finally gets it! Until recently, they would only say it if we forced them to repeat it after us, and even then it was rarely. A couple weeks ago I heard him (or maybe it was Cullen) say it once or twice unprompted but this week Jack is suddenly saying it all the time! This is a big parenting triumph for me, I’m so glad to finally have at least one son who answers in the affirmative!

*They know most of their shapes including circle, square, triangle, rectangle, star, and heart. They can tell you that a circle is round and a triangle has three sides. They also just learned pentagons and know that Daddy works in one and they excitedly point it out every time we drive by.

*They can draw straight lines and circles. Jack apparently wanted to demonstrate his lines on our couch last week. So we’ll be investing in a couple of slipcovers this week.*Still completely obsessed with fire trucks and trains… and fire hydrants. I honestly never realized how many fire hydrants there are in the world until these boys took an interest in them!

*They can count to 5 and they try to hold up the correct amount of fingers. They’ve got 1,2,4 and 5 fingers down pretty well. Three is tricky though! They can actually count all the way to 10 but they usually skip 6 and sometimes 2 as well. They’re very proud of their counting though and will often shout out random numbers at strangers and then get extremely upset if their genius isn’t fully appreciated by these strangers.

*They’re beginning to memorize some of the lines on their most watched fire truck and train movies. I guess that makes me a terrible parent. But I already knew that.

*They will literally repeat the same phrase dozens of times until you finally acknowledge them and either respond to their question or repeat the phrase back to them. A simple "Yes" or "Ok" doesn't cut it, they will keep up their constant repetition until get the answer they're looking for. I think this is largely responsible for the deterioration of my mental state recently.

*They recognize numbers 0-10 and several letters by sight. I was completely shocked when they first pointed to a 4 and said “Four!” So now that I know they’re capable of recognizing letters and numbers, we’ve begun working on it more and they’re picking up more numbers and letters quickly.

*They love to help around the house with little chores like watering the plants, feeding the cats, clearing the table, doing the laundry, dusting, and taking the trash out. And they’re wonderful at cleaning up their toys! We clean them up each day before naptime and again at bedtime. Sometimes they dawdle but they never complain, I’m thankful that they like to help so much!

*They are getting really bossy with each other. I think it’s mostly just their habit of copying what I say though. But hearing Jack tell Cullen he can’t have any candy because he didn’t try to go potty is pretty funny.

*Whenever I tell them something is gone or they can’t have any more they immediately say “Buy more ___________ at the store?” The other day I told them I wasn’t going to make any more pancakes because they had already eaten 3 each and so they asked me to go to the store and buy more “pay-pakes” all day.

*Still pretty picky eaters but not nearly as bad as they could be, I guess. I’ve heard of some kids who won’t try anything at all and live off of hot dogs or macaroni & cheese, so I’m thankful they at least like some healthy foods and don’t ask for sweets or snacks a lot. And I’m learning a lot of little tricks to make their food healthier. More bang for the bite!

*They’re just beginning to be interested in what they’re wearing but I think it has more to do with sibling rivalry than actually caring about their clothes. If one boy has a race car on his shirt, his brother also must have a race car or something equally as cool, like a fire truck. The other night we were getting ready for bed and I realized a little too late that the other race car pajamas were still in the laundry. It took about 5 minutes of consoling before Cullen finally pulled himself together, stopped sobbing “raaaace caaaar” and agreed to put on his animal pajamas instead.

*They love to go the pool but don’t really spend all that much time in the water. They climb in and out, walk around the outside, play with other kids, or just sit on the edge playing with their pool toys most of the time. The one exception is when we go to the big pool instead of the wading pool (which we only do when Daddy’s with us) and then Cullen wants to jump in whether you’re ready to catch him or not!

*Still great nappers too... most days at least! They actually play in their room together for an hour or so before they finally fall asleep. But since this means an extra kid-free hour for me, I couldn't be happier! Altogether, they usually are in their room, either playing or napping for 2 1/2-3 hours every day. I call this my 'down time' even though I usually spend the entire time cleaning, organizing, getting dinner ready, or doing other random household stuff. And if I'm lucky, I get time to blog :-) It doesn't matter what kind of morning we had, I always feel so refreshed having a clean house, a homemade dinner cooking and happy, well-rested kids!

Potty Training - Day 15

The first week of potty training was great, both boys tried every time I asked them and Cullen even went several times! Once he even told me he needed to go, so I took off his diaper, and then he sat down and peed in the potty! I was literally jumping for joy!

Unfortunately, since the first week, progress has stalled. They aren't quite as excited about trying (especially since we ran out of M&M's after their Daddy ate a few too many) and sometimes they just refuse to try. I've heard this is perfectly normal and most of the other moms I've talked to about potty training said their kids did the exact same thing. They said within a few weeks (or months) the kids usually become interested again. So I'm just going to stick with it and keep asking them several times a day if they want to try. I don't make them but if they want to, then great. If the weather's nice, I'll let them wear their underwear around the backyard. They really love their Thomas underwear so hopefully this will be an incentive to stay dry and tell me if they need to go.

Here we go on week 3! Wish me luck- I'm going to need it!

Recently...

What a busy couple of weeks. I'm not sure what has made them busier than any other time, but they sure seem to be! I still have a long list of to-do's that I've been working on and the boys and I have been continuing with potty training and keeping busy with little projects and activities. These pictures are from a couple weeks ago but I just haven't found time to post them yet.

On Memorial Day, we took the boys to the Air and Space Museum. We found out that if you go after 4 pm, the parking is free and admission is always free so this is a perfect family outing for us! The boys loved it of course and this is the only good picture I got because they were so busy running around looking at all the airplanes.
We had one week of crazy, record-breaking heat so we spent every waking minute either indoors or at the pool. Finger painting was just one of the many indoor activities we did that week. Thanks to Grandma and Grandpa for the paints!

The boys also went to their friend Rachel's 3rd birthday party a few weeks ago. The pink birthday cake and having their faces painted for the first time were the highlights. Jack wanted a spider and Cullen wanted a race car (actually his first choice was a pink butterfly but I thought Brandon would rather not see his boy come home with that on his face) and they were eager to show off their cheeks to any and everybody they saw that day. They kept trying to touch their cheeks while the lady was painting them, though. so they both had rather smudged faces.

Eating the cake that they talked about for days afterward

A couple weeks ago Renee and I drove out to see our friend Stephanie and her daughter Callie. We had a great time visiting and the boys were really well-behaved and even let me talk with my friends for a couple hours! That's the first miraculous happening- the second is this picture below with all three kids looking in the same direction and smiling! Incredible!

Cullen got a hankering for a peanut butter sandwich one day so he opened the pantry, climbed up the shelves,got the peanut butter and bread down all by himself, and then got a butter knife from the drawer. I discovered him trying to saw through the peanut butter lid and asked him what he was doing. He replied "Eat a peanut butter sandwich" and went right back to his work.

Even though we don't allow the boys to have pens (for obvious reasons) Jack found one lying around somewhere and drew dozens of lines across both arms of our couch. I was upstairs getting ready and needless to say, I was not happy when I came back down and saw this. I looked up what Heloise would do and am waiting for my dry-cleaning solvent to arrive today so I can try to clean it. Hopefully it will come off! I am thankful, though, that God has given me two little boys who constantly remind me that there's no use valuing material things :-)

Potty Training - Day 1

We're actually on Day 3 now but these pictures are from their very first day. And as a disclaimer, we're not "officially" potty training, they're still wearing diapers (and probably will be for a long time) but we've informally begun the potty training process. And I have a feeling it's going to be a long, long process. I still have my doubts about whether they're ready or not yet and my biggest fear is that potty-training will drag on for a year and a half (ughhhh) but we're starting slow and planning to see how it goes.

Brandon had been asking me a lot recently when I was going to start potty training them. I thought "When am I going to start potty training them? Am I in this all by myself?" Pretty much since he's not here some nights and when he is, he's studying. So I gave him fair warning that if he comes home and the house isn't tidied up or the made-from-scratch dinners suddenly stop, it's because potty training eats up a huge chunk of my day. I never realized how many times each day kids have to try and use the potty. Or how long they need to sit there to make anything happen! And we've only just begun!

The first day, we saw no action whatsoever and I was ready to throw in the towel already, convinced that it was indeed way too soon to start trying. But yesterday, Cullen gave me the boost of confidence I needed to continue when he peed in the potty for the first time ever! I think it was actually an accident but I'll take what I can get at this point. He was incredibly proud of himself and repeatedly pointed to it and shouted "Cu-hen pee pee in potty!" Then it was time for his reward (a few M&M's) and he was literally shaking with excitement as I handed his candy to him. Jack asked for "em ems" too and was a little crushed when I told him he only got one for trying. It's becoming apparent to me that Cullen is a little more excited about potty training than his brother. Jack seems to have no interest other than sitting on the potty a few times a day in order to collect his single M&M. But we're only a few days in so far, hopefully he'll get into it soon!

And as additional incentive to stay dry and use the potty, I let them wear their Thomas underwear around the backyard for a little while on Monday. These pictures were taken as soon as they put them on. Good thing because the underwear lasted all of 90 seconds once we got outside. At least they waited til they were outside though :-)