Hidey, Hidey, Ho! The elephant is so slow!

Peanut has been walking around our house saying this and a variety of other catch phrases and punchy lines that he's picked up. This is a particular line from his Zoo book. We have been spending ample amounts of time in the tipi postponing bedtime with books. That Peanut is a sly one. He is also saying other equally amusing things like, "Mommy, tomorrow see friends and eat broccoli?" and "Thankful for potty, party, Grandma and Daddy. Amen.".  I even listened to him sing the phrase "choose the right" for at least 30 mins straight in his bed one night.

Well we've been busy with life lately. It's fun. It's exciting. Life and the pursuit of living, that is. So here's a rather long list of what's going on around our house. And per some requests, there will be videos included in the continuation of this post. I guess I have more readers than I realized and some say they even check daily to see what's new. Gasp! I haven't posted more than twice a month for who knows how long. Sorry to disappoint. I'll see if I can satiate any appetites.

1) Cashew rolled over by himself for the first time today! I was fearing he had no desire. That he would be hairless on the back of his head forever. He sure fooled me. He also tried his first solid food. It went as well as bottle feedings have gone. Absolutely, positively a failure. All subsequent tries have fared equally as well. So much for listening to the Doc on that one. She wants him eating proteins by 6 months. Ha!

2) Everyone's caught a cold. I'm going to blame the play place at the mall. Mommy's have to walk somewhere when it's cold out and I can't keep Peanut locked in the house forever. And speaking of the mall, I found Peanut scaling the shelves of gumball machines they have conveniently placed next to the little'uns playground. It's like he was scaling the barricade getting ready to battle for a quarter that I obviously was not going to surrender. I wasn't quite quick enough to snap a picture but I'm sure you can all do one up in your brain just fine with all you know about Peanut.

Our budding artist showing off his masterpiece.

3) I am a rock star. Yes I'm going to toot my horn about a feat which many other women have accomplished before me. I watched 4 children, ages 3, 2, 1 & 4 months, from 6:30am to 5:00pm last Wednesday (yes two were my own).  No one died, we didn't have any real tears, everyone got fed at the correct hours, they napped, I got some laundry folded, the house was not destroyed, we were all dressed before lunch time, we didn't watch movies all day and I did not hate children by the end of it. In fact I quite enjoyed it, except for the part where I was absolutely exhausted by 8:30pm.  My mother once described my babysitting philosophy as "taking the path of least resistance, in order to simply endure the experience of tending children. Boy have I grown! Kids I am not afraid of you anymore! Good thing, since I have two of them. I felt amazingly accomplished and absolutely spent. So I demolished an entire Café Rio salad in one sitting to rejuvenate. Hats off to all you Mothers who dare or dared to have over three children and three in diapers at the same time.

And as an aside, quote of the day from the 3 year old:

Her: "Oops, I tooted."
Me: "Yeah that was crazy."
Her: "Mmm hmm. It was like it was talking."

4) Which brings us to other great and important news, we have a Café Rio, now located just 3.2 miles from my doorstep. Bless that Tex Mex goodness!

5) I am making curtains. I am sick and tired of having to put clothes on to come down the stairs to grab something from the fridge (don't you love my motivation), so a fabric decision was finally made. Much to Rob's relief. As much as I know he loves pouring over fabric swatches and decoration ideas.

6) And speaking of the fridge, I made Neopolitan cupcakes. I tried a recipe from pinterest...Awful! So I changed it. I found this excellent recipe in my Cake Bible (thank you Tiffany!), for a checkered cake (vanilla and chocolate) and then made a buttercream frosting and laced it with strawberry jam. Oh mama were they good! You should all give it a try. Here is the unfrosted version. I think they look like cows.

7) We went to a Superbowl party. Any favorite Superbowl commercials anyone? I love living in the state with the winning team. There is a lot of Raven pride around here. I'm just a fair weather fan though, let's be honest. I was just excited to say that I knew two whole players on team. One from BYU and one thanks to that excellent movie the Blind Side. Oh boy do I sound like a girl.


TO BE CONTINUED...

3 & 4 Month Cashew

 

I missed a month of updates with Cashew with all the Christmas-ing and birthday-ing going on around here (there should be a Rob birthday posting coming one of these days as well). I did however make it my goal to get some photos in before his well check-up at the doc today so I could blog during nap time. Accomplished! It takes so little to get me excited these days :). 

Well the cashew was aptly nick-named as he is definitely the bigger nut in this family--yes, interpret that however you wish. He is rolling in at 14 lbs. 12oz (50%), and 26.5" (92%).  I've had to bring out the 6 month clothing to keep up with all of this length.

This is one pleasant baby folks.  He has a hearty little laugh and has surprised me with how ticklish he is. It's delightful. He is also so calm. He let's Peanut lay on him to read a story and generally just smiles and looks around or wiggles but doesn't ever fuss just to fuss. 

He has discovered his hands this month and the look on his face is priceless as he clasps them together directly in front of his eyes. It's like, "Whoa! Do you see these glorious things?! I can not believe I am so lucky to have received these appendages on my body. I just want to eat them...no study them...no eat them...no study them." I know all baby's do this but I find him particularly comical in the endeavor. He enjoys bath time I think, as he puts on his concentrating face and just kicks and kicks his little legs from the minute I put him in until I take him out. I sure enjoy watching him.

He is still an excellent sleeper. We finally have his bed time worked out so him and Peanut go down at the same time and I go in to feed him right before I leave for swimming in the morning. I think I may be one of the only parents that is grateful that his first feeding of the day could be placed somewhere between 4:45 and 5am. He then goes back to sleep till maybe 9. I think I'm going to have a hard time with these two boys getting them up and off to school when the time comes.

I just love my baby!

 

Peanut is 2!

Can you believe it? Life is moving so fast and I'm trying not to miss it. I love watching him grow, listening to him talk, and I absolutely want to kiss his face off when I see  him run. It's like he's jumping, leaping and bouncing instead of running. He is so darn cute. My little man. Even when he's six feet too tall, he'll still be my little man.

Here are the stats...

Height: 37 inches (just 8 inches shy to ride the big rides at Disney :) ) (90 something %)

Weight: 27 lbs (50%...we're moving up in the world here)

Noggin: Large...something in the 70%???

At the doc the other day when he was having his check up he was whining through the whole measuring process and the nurse finally made me do all of it. I told him the nurse was trying to measure for a hew hat. It almost worked. Oh and he got a flu shot. He screamed bloody murder (what happened to the tough 1 year old that just looked at his blood being drawn with indifference?), until I said there were fruit snacks. The tears dried right up after that statement.

 Well his birthday was an occasion to celebrate and celebrate we did. I decided I'll need to make a real concerted effort here on out to make sure his birthday does not get lost in the Christmas holiday shuffle. So to make this year memorable we decided to go to the air and space museum near Dulles airport. Peanut like planes and helicopters almost as much as a toddler likes to throw a tantrum. As you walk inside this museum you come to an overlook of the whole hanger that is filled chalk full of hundreds of full size flying machines. The minute Peanut looked over the edge he started pointing and yelling, "PWANE! HELICOPERT!", over and over and over. I thought he just might continue to do so throughout the whole visit. I knew our field trip was a good idea at that point. I think my face lit up as much as his, watching his excitement. I only had eyes for my boy at that moment and goodness knows I love airplanes just as much as he does. I wanted to jump up and down yelling, "PWANE", myself. The place was amazing!

I also threw him his first friend party. We used the theme, "You're A Little Monster". Which he is... sometimes. But I still love him forever and will like him for always. Like my Dad always said, "nature dictates there be a bond". I now fully understand that statement. Well in true Anna style we invited 20 of our closest friends and had ourselves a party complete with all of Peanut's favorite foods: peanut butter pancakes, "ogurt", juice, treats (cookies, cake and candy) and fruit. We had monster truck races, coloring pages, balloons, and general chaos while the children watched movies, played on all levels of the house, and the Mom's chatted. I think it was a success.

Ok and if you've read this far, you should stay for one more story. Peanut never ceases to entertain. On Thursday, I had just changed Cashew's diaper and had headed out of the room to put the soiled diapers in the pail. When I came back I found Cashew's diaper off and Peanut changing him again. He was wiping him down holding his legs up and everything. I was laughing out loud it was so cute. So I said thank you and had him help me snap the diaper up again. He was so  pleased with himself.

Please come back and read soon. I have a lot to catch up on!