Step ups

This morning the kids were doing step ups on the stairs. When I asked what they were doing they said "we are doing Stroller Strides Mommy!" They are loving seeing exercise and doing it themselves too! When we went swimming later in the day, I had Emily in the water and she was so happy kicking and swimming and she says to me, "Look Mommy, I'm exercising!"

Little Mermaid

Emily is all about the princesses. She has them on her sippy cups, undies, stickers, etc. One of the princesses is Ariel, the Little Mermaid. She has seen the movie as well and knows how Ariel sings. And she likes to imitate her. Here she is imitating Ariel.

And this afternoon soon after this video was taken, she had to go potty. Her undies today were none other than Little Mermaid undies. She saw this on the potty and said, "Mommy, can I sing for da Little Mermaid?" And she proceeded to sing for Ariel. I told her that Ariel likes that. She then asks me, "Can Ariel sing for me now?" Way too cute!

Emily's Stripes

The kids have a lot of stuffed animals. About every other day, Emily finds one that she gets attached to for a day or two. We tend to ask what the animal's name is. Most of the time, it's a fairly predictable name, like "Tiger" for a stuffed tiger or "Miko" for a monkey (the name of Kyle's monkey which we named - the quick story: we asked people how to say monkey in Spanish and we heard miko, mono and chongo and miko was the one that stuck, yet most people we have talked to since haven't heard that miko means monkey in Spanish). Yesterday, Emily decided that she loved a little tiger that's a hand puppet. She says, "is he so soft Mommy? I love him!" I asked her what his name is. She paused for a moment, thought, and then said, "His name is Stripes Mommy!" It was the first time she has named her stuffed animal something other than what it actually is! And she has carried Stripes around for the past 2 days. It's really very cute!

Burrito as big as your head

This morning we took the kids to the kiddie gym to make up for their class they missed this week when we went to Kyle's ortho doctor appointment. They had a blast. Afterwards, we walked down to The Broken Yolk Cafe for some lunch. We ordered a burrito and the kids loved it. It was huge! Even half of the burrito was as big as their head!

Bedtime singing

The kids have asked for Frosty the Snowman and Jingle Bell Rock nearly every night for bedtime songs since Christmas. And they are pretty good at it. Kyle really likes to sing along. Emily will chime in as well.

Frosty the Snowman:

Jingle Bell Rock:


And Jeff has added "Castle on a Cloud" to the songs as well and they both know that one very well too.

**I apologize for the black screen movies. I just wanted to upload these as audio files and not videos because there is nothing to see in the videos (Kyle and Emily's room was dark), but Blogger doesn't allow just audio uploads. I had them all converted to .wav files and them MP4 files, but it kept erring out because it wouldn't take just an audio file. Sorry.

I play basketball like Duke!

This afternoon at snack, Kyle and Emily were telling me what they wanted to play after they were done eating. Basketball. In their excitement, Kyle says, "I play basketball like Duke!" Emily adds, "I play basketball like Duke too Mommy!" Too cute!! So some video of them playing basketball and telling me they play basketball like Duke.

Guitar

As you all know, Kyle LOVES playing guitar. Emily enjoys playing the guitar as well and has gotten a little more into it with Kyle. When we picked up the marble game the other day, we also picked up a little guitar for them which they were really excited about. Emily goes up to the guitar while it's laying down and strums it and sings, "guitar, guitar, guitar, guitar". Kyle got in on the action a little bit too singing his own version of that song, "tigar, tigar, tigar, tigar". The more he said guitar as "tigar", he self-corrected recently and called it a guitar. Anyhow, they are having a great time playing with the guitar. Kyle sang us the ABC song with the guitar the other day. Note he is playing with his right hand in this video. He switches it up quite a bit, but had mostly been playing leftie. Also, whenever the kids hear the ABC song, they always sing the ending, "now Emily & Kyle know their ABC's...." Whenever they hear someone else singing the ABC song, they tell me "dat's Emily & Kyle's song!" Emily told me this when we were on a preschool tour! It'll be interesting in preschool when everyone is singing lots of their songs!

Marble races

As I mentioned a few posts ago, we turned the kids cribs into big boy and big girl beds. They have been doing great in them. They don't get out of them when they should be sleeping. In fact, each morning, they stay in bed and talk to one another and they don't get out until we come in there to greet them. They even like to play in their room and talk to one another on their beds. They are so proud of being in big boy and big girl beds!

When we first changed the cribs to beds, we told them if they stayed in their bed for sleeptime, we could get the marble game at the toy store. And they did. And so we did. And they love it! We constructed a great marble maze for them to play with and they were so giddy! We had to record them dancing around all silly happy about it.

And that shirt Kyle is wearing, it is one of his most favorite shirts these days. It's his kickball shirt, but lately he's been calling it his running shirt. He asks to wear it every single day! You think I'm kidding, but I'm not! It's everyday!! Some days it isn't dry yet or hasn't been folded yet and he tells me "Mommy I will put it on a little bit later when the washing machine is all done." And he asks to wear it after he gets up from his nap! Seriously a favorite shirt!! Anyhow, onto the silly kiddo video! I just love how happy kids are over relatively simple things! Ahh to be 2!

Cupcakes and a sleeping princess

Today Kyle woke up before Emily from nap! Crazy! Well, Emily had decided last night that she would keep Jeff company while he worked until 5:30am! Apparently she woke up quite a few times starting at 11pm and going until 4am. She even had a midnight (2am) snack with Jeff of salami, cheese and milk which she happily told me about this morning! So needless to say, she was

tired and needed a long nap this afternoon. So while Emily was napping until 5:15, Kyle and I made good use of some overripe bananas - banana cupcakes! Kyle was a fantastic chef! He LOVES cooking and turning the "spinny fing" (mixer) on and off and lifting it up as well as measuring and pouring ingredients into the bowl. He is always a huge fan of "barfing eggies".

(Side story - a recent dinner out at Benihana's, they make the egg talk and then it barfs out the yolk. The kids saw this and called it the barfing eggie. So now whenever we crack eggies, they ask for the barfing eggie.)

Anyhow, back to cooking with Kyle. We had a lot of fun. He also loved putting the bananas into the mixer because they thumped around and got all squished. He laughed with such delight when putting them in and watching it! And what was really impressive was how he could handle scooping the batter into the cupcake tins and doing it neatly. Check out the video of him meticulously filling the cupcakes. So when we do the ingredients, I keep a hand on it so that we don't lose half of what's in the measuring cup because then I have no idea how much made it into the bowl and such, but for the batter, he really just wanted to do it by himself. And I figured why not! A mess is just a mess and can be easily cleaned up. So he went to town scooping the batter so nicely into each cupcake! Note the before and after pictures of the cupcakes. 95% of the batter made it into the cupcake tin! Go Kyle!!

And all the while, sweet Emily caught some serious and much needed zzzzz's.

Linguistic laudables

I know, I know, I am writing a lot of the same thing over and over, but Kyle and Emily's language usage and understanding is just amazing. They start as little, tiny babies crying, cooing and grunting (not necessarily in that order) and progress to fluent kids in such a short time! I've had 6.25 years of French language instruction from 7th grade to first quarter in college and came NOWHERE near fluent! And babies just pick it up! Awesome! So the latest cool things they have said:

At breakfast, Kyle found their sunglasses sitting on the counter. He says, "we wear sunglasses to protect our eyes!" Emily then says, "and we wear hats too!" I asked them "why do you wear your hats and sunglasses?" Emily replies, "because it's sunny Mommy!" And tonight at dinner, I asked Emily about the sticker on her forehead. Her most favorite place to put stickers is the middle of her forehead. The other day she wore a squirrel sticker on her forehead ALL day! She will also put stickers on her hands and legs, but without fail, one goes on her forehead. Anyhow, I said, "Emily, why do you have a sticker on your forehead?" She replies, "Because I like it there Mommy." I loved her use of "because". It's just something you pick up in hearing language, not something you really teach your kids to say. I know it's so simple, but just how they pick these things up and incorporate the correct usages is neat to see.

Kyle is fascinated by any map we see. He is very quick to point out any map from out on our runs to looking through magazines, he finds them and accurately says, "that's a map Mommy! Can we look at that map?" So the kids are learning the states in the U.S. We have a little static cling / plastic map that goes onto the sliding door with all of the states on them so we look at it and talk about the states. They are really good at California, Illinois (which they know as Chicago), Florida and are learning Indiana and Texas. Today I was wearing a longsleeve triathlon shirt of Jeff's from 1994(!) and Emily pointed to the "O" in Illinois which was represented by a picture of Illinois instead of an actual "O". She says to me, "Mommy, that's on our map!" I pointed out the state of Illinois on our map to them, showing them that what is on my shirt and the map is the same, the state of Illinois. Emily was thrilled! "That's Illinois Mommy!" Kyle chimed in, "Do you see Indiana next to Illinois on that map too Mommy?!" I love it! I want to teach them the "Fifty Nifty United States" song as well while learning the map.

Yum

This morning for breakfast, we had cereal and strawberries. Emily has a very unique way of eating her strawberries. I washed them and cut off the stems and gave them to her. She then bites off the tip of each of them and then places them down on the cut end. And that's it. Today after she bit the tip off the fourth one, she looks at me and declared, "YUM!" It was way too cute!

that tickles

Today Kyle had a doctor's appointment to see if we can figure out why he keeps complaining of knee pain. He did great with the x-ray and then we had to do some blood tests. We hadn't really talked about this beforehand like we did the x-ray so I was worried he'd have a hard time with it. Kyle and Emily just seem to like predictability and to know what's going on... So just before we went in for the blood draw, I told them that the nurse was going to take some blood and that it may pinch a little bit. Kyle responded, "it's not gonna be tickle Mommy?" I said, "no, it may pinch a little bit." And we sort of left it at that.

Fast forward (long waiting time) and we get back to our turn. Emily is standing in the chair next to us. Kyle is on my lap. The nurse puts on the rubber band thing (sorry don't know medical term) around his arm and asks me to hold his other arm down and hold the banded arm up by the band - basically holding him and preventing him from messing with the blood draw. Now I know that when I get my blood drawn I can't really watch, it just makes me squeemish. And I also always make sure I get the smallest butterfly clips because those seem to hurt the least and you don't feel the changing of the tube, even if it takes longer to do the draw (go ahead say it, I'm a wimp). So I asked the nurse if she was going to use the butterfly clip and then pointed out some things (there were a ton) for Kyle to look at on the wall so as not to watch the draw. I'm checking out the wall and calling out things for Kyle to look at and Kyle proclaims, "that tickles!" Thinking that the nurse had just wiped off his skin with the alcohol pad to prep and he was just feeling the cooling nature of the alcohol pad, I look at his arm and see that Kyle is checking out the needle in his arm and watching his blood being drawn. The needle was in! And he said "that tickles" again as she changed the tube. He was pretty fascinated and didn't even care he had a needle sticking out of his arm drawing out the blood! And it seemingly didn't even hurt!!!! No tears, not upset, just totally mild and interested in what was going on!! What a champ!

The nurse told us that in her 6 years of doing this, she has never had a kid say a blood draw tickles! They've of course said that hurts or that didn't hurt, but never, that tickles! All I know is that Kyle is a champ! And I think the power of suggestion is well, powerful! And Kyle sure has his mind right about it!

That's me and that's you

Dinner the other night was full of Kyle and Emily talking to one another.

Mikos

As most of you know, Kyle loves his Miko. We tried to get some duplicates just in case, so we'd always have a back-up. But he knows his real Miko from afar. Here he introduces another Miko with his real Miko.

Castle on a cloud

Today the kids built quite a castle with blocks. They were pretty excited about it!

mmm pear juice

Today for a snack we had pears. One of my most favorite canned / jarred fruits is pears. And the reason I like it so much is for the pear juice. Kyle and Emily got to experience that today, taking turns, "taking a slug of pear juice" from the jar!

That thing you say

I know it's a common post these days, but the things Kyle and Emily say are just stunning, amazing, funny and cool!

The other morning, I asked the kids what they want for breakfast, egg related. I asked if they wanted them scrambled, poached, fried or hard boiled. They probably didn't understand what any of these meant, but Kyle replied, "we want tap tap eggies!" Emily added, "we do tap tap and get to roll them Mommy!" I knew exactly what that meant! Hard boiled eggies! They love being involved in the process so we let them peel their own eggies and I think it helps motivate them to eat them more. (p.s. they have become MUCH better eaters in the past few weeks. I mean they actually eat their food! And the floor is much cleaner because of that too!)

Today (a few days ago now that I am actually posting) we went to Target because the kids were out of toothpaste. As you well know, they make a infant / toddler toothpaste that the kids don't have to spit out. There's no flouride in it so it's safe to swallow. We've been out for at least a day or two so I've put some regular toothpaste on their brushes and told them they need to spit it out. And they've done very well with it. And it's not the first time they've had adult toothpaste so they've practiced spitting toothpaste. So anyhow at Target today, we got them Tom's Natural kids toothpaste, one that you have to spit out. Well fast forward to tonight when the Target bags are still downstairs and Jeff is getting baths ready and the toothpaste is still downstairs with me while I clean up dinner. Jeff tells Kyle to go downstairs to ask me where the toothpaste is. I tell him it's in one of the 3 bags and it's in the box with the strawberries on it. He happily says, "Okay I will find the spitty toothpaste!" And he proceeds to find it and takes the "spitty toothpaste" upstairs to get the toothbrushes ready!

Kyle and Emily are doing great with their letters and numbers. They pretty much know all of their letters, big and small. Kyle notices numbers EVERYWHERE! During the NCAA games today, he saw the game clock ticking in the corner of the screen and proceeded to call out the numbers (seconds) that were constantly changing. And he gets so excited when he sees the number 5. It's his favorite number. "Do you see dat number 5 Mommy?!" He also likes to read all of the letters across the bottom for the team names. And Emily gets into the game as well. She often comments on the "good shot!" And the other day, one of the teams did a lot of passing before shooting the ball and Emily turns to Jeff and says, "Daddy, they are playing catch!" Back to the numbers, when we were teaching the kids their numbers, we called 8, the ocho once. So now when Kyle sees 8, he calls it "the ocho"!


The kids know they are getting to be big boys and big girls. Today I changed their cribs into big boy and big girl beds. And verbally they are with the game too. We were talking about how they were going to see a friend's baby brother and I asked them if they were my babies and Kyle responded, "I'm not a baby. I'm a Kyle." So matter of fact!

Kyle has been complaining of his leg hurting him lately and not wanting to walk on it. Emily has been so sweet with Kyle. When he was just hurting and not wanting to walk and all upset, Emily says, "Kyle, here's your Miko. He will make your leg feel all better." She is just so sweet to him! And at dinner the other night, we were having pork. Kyle said, "Emily, good trying your chicken!" Emily said, "Thanks Kyle! I love you" and she leaned over in her booster chair to give Kyle a hug. So sweet!!! I know the following video isn't quite of their exchange about trying their food, but it is from the same night and they were trying their brussel sprouts together and just so sweet with one another.


And one that I had typed up but blogger wouldn't save because I must have logged out or something and then couldn't remember when I posted this one the first time, but remember now... The kids call hills "big weeees!" This must come from whenever we go down a hill in the car or at Stroller Strides, I tell the kids to put their hands in the air and say "weeeeeee!" And they do! They also do it for when we are going uphill. The other day at SS, Kyle and Emily got upset because we couldn't run up (i.e, me pushing them in the stroller - boohoo!) a "dat big weeeeee." And "weeees" also extend to smaller 'hills'. They like walking 'balance beams' outside which are curbs. And there are 2 particular curbs that go up by a tree near the schools that are raised on either end. So the kids talk about going up the "big weee" and then doing the balance beam and then walking down the "big weeee". Mind you, these particular "weeeees" are maybe a foot high, but they are "weeeeees" nonetheless. Cute how make sense of the world. Their preschool teachers are not going to know what to do with them calling hills "weeees" and eight "the ocho"...

Chopsticks

The kids LOVE Japanese food! Every time we drive or walk by the sushi place down the street from us, Kyle declares "dat's sushi place for eat-time mommy!" So on the way home from dropping Jacki off at the airport yesterday, Kyle saw the sushi restaurant and said "we have sushi for eat-time." So we went to sushi for dinner. The kids love playing with the chopsticks and even can pick up a few items with them. And I'm not talking about stabbing it with the stick and picking it up. I'm talking about using both and getting food between them. Last night they accepted the orange kiddie chopstick joiners so they were even more successful. Emily was a champ at picking up her edamame with them and was SO very proud! And the meal wasn't complete without some yummy pink mochi to wash it all down!

Kiddie Gym!

Today finally arrived! Today the kids officially joined MyGym today for their kiddie gym classes! They were SO excited! I made the mistake of telling them that we were joining the gym this week, last week! Every day until today they asked me if we were going to the kiddie gym and got upset when I told them it would be on another day. But today was the day and they couldn't have been more excited! They talked all about going in the ball pit and the trampoline and hanging. And they made a beeline to the ball pit as soon as we got there. We had a lot of fun and surely there will be many pictures, stories and smiles to come from our time at the kiddie gym! **while we were eating lunch, Emily was in her chair and started twisting back and forth and she says, "Mommy, I'm exercising!"

mountain climbing

Today Jeff, Jacki, Kyle, Emily and I hiked down Torrey Pines to the "Spakific" Ocean and then back up. Well, Kyle and Emily were on our backs for most of the way up, but they were champs walking the whole way down and wanting to walk up! We had a great time and were very pleased to make it all the way down and up with the kids. Kyle held my hand most of the way down and doing "hippity, hoppity" jumps down each step there was! He is so energetic! And Emily got in on the action too with Jeff. Down at the ocean, we had a great time skipping stones and playing and posing for pictures.

tree climbing

Kyle and Emily are quite the monkeys these days! They see trees that may be low enough for them to climb and they are on it!

Cupcakes!

When Jeff went to NYC the other week, he arranged for some gifts to arrive while he was away. He sent us a cupcake cookbook and aprons for each of us! Getting mail is always great fun and such yummy items even more so! We broke the cookbook and aprons out as soon as we could to make us some delicious chocolate chip cupcakes! The kids had a blast making them and wearing their aprons. Kyle mastered the "spinny thing" and Emily is expert at 'picking up' chocolate chips and clearing the mixer!

Ticklish Kyle

After the beach, we had to clean off our piggies so we didn't bring a ton more sand into the house. Kyle has very ticklish piggies!

Quite a quack!

Jacki is here visiting so a trip to San Diego in winter isn't complete without a trip to the beach. Last night the weather said it was supposed to be 67 today. A little bit cool and not lay-out-at-the-beach-weather, but still pleasant. Fast forward to almost noon today when we head out to the beach and it's only 58 degrees. Oh well. Onward to the beach! After we parked, these four ducks came right up to us. They must be very well fed ducks because they must have thought we came just to see them and just to feed them some bread. They were really only 1 foot away from us. Kyle and Emily didn't seem to mind and Emily was just adorable having a conversation with the ducks.

Emily: Hi duckies. Whatcha doin' duckies?
Ducks (moving around us, still VERY close): Quack, quack.
Duck (poops)
Emily (pointing to the duck poop): What is that?
Mommy & Jack ignoring
Emily: What is that?
Mommy: That duckie pooped!
Emily: Dat duckie pooped! Heehee!
Mommy: Let's go to the beach now.
Emily: See you later duckies. See you when we come back to the car duckies.

So we walk over to the beach and are just getting settled in our space and the four ducks come flying over to us! Unreal! Like flying bloodhounds!! At this point though, Emily and Kyle had chosen some seashells for themselves and to take home for Daddy. The ducks approach and one of them is eyeing Emily, especially what is in her hand. No, it's not bread, it's the shell! And he takes it RIGHT OUT OF HER HAND!! And as you would appropriately surmise, Emily didn't like this very much! We were just astonished that the duck when right up to her and took it out of her hand! And I just happened to have the video camera rolling!

And Kyle got to take his first video with those silly duckies.

Baby Gorilla

The same day we went to the zoo and saw Jacques the Peacock, we also saw Frank the baby gorilla's first public appearance. All the news cameras were there to record the event. We went into the zoo right behind the Channel 8 news cameras so we asked what was going on and went over to the big event. Apparently Frank the gorilla is 4 months old and is about 13 pounds. Despite being 13 pounds, he seemed about the size of Kyle and Emily height wise, should he stand on two legs. His mother wouldn't / couldn't nurse him so they had to keep him with the zookeepers for care and this was his first time for the public to see. He's a cute little guy, crawling around and climbing a little bit and exploring with his eyes open wide. Kyle and Emily knew we were going to see a baby gorilla, but were more interested in climbing the benches and fence behind us than checking out the monkey. They would have blended in with the gorillas on the other side of the glass climbing around. Anyhow, here is some video of Frank, the little baby gorilla at the San Diego Zoo. It's pretty stunning to see the size differences between the gorillas, yet the similarity in size to a toddler!

Jacques the Peacock

For Ryan - we saw Jacques the Peacock at the zoo the other day in his typical spot wandering around visiting with the zoo visitors.

Blue princess

As I have said before, I am constantly amazed at what comes out of the kids mouths! And no, I'm not talking about food or liquids coming back out, though that does happen - and my kids will tell you about each time it did - but what they are saying these days! The mind of a 2.5 year old is really something to marvel at.

Today I went to Target to pick up some Diego bandaids for Kyle and more Dora bandaids for Emily. It's amazing how a simple bandaid or booboo ball makes owies all better. As Emily was picking up the bandaids she had dumped out for the millionth time and put back in the box, she stated that "I will use da Dora bandaid when I fall down in the park again next time. And Kyle will will use his Diego bandaid when he falls down in the street."

And Emily has been so sweet with Kyle and his owie. He fell while we were at the OB Kite Festival on Saturday and scraped his knee and got a small road gash on his wrist that hurt a decent bit. This morning they had a little conversation:

Emily, sweetly looking Kyle right in the eyes: Kyle does your owie still hurt?
Kyle: Yea, my owie still hurt a little bit.
Emily: You need a bandaid Kyle? I get one for you and take off the paper for you.
Kyle: I need a bandaid! My owie is feeling better.

Then the other night when Jeff got back from NYC, the kids were SO happy to see him. Kyle must have said, "I love you Daddy" a million times and given lots of hugs! And Emily was just so happy she was running around in circles, she could hardly contain herself! What a way to come home!!

So as he was getting them ready for bed, it was a bit later than normal, Emily was breaking down a little bit. And here's what I heard:
Jeff, to a crying Emily: Are you a tired princess?
Emily: Yes.
Kyle, not to be left out: And I'm a tired blue princess!

I love that the color makes the gender! Later on, I think it was the next day, Kyle told me that I was a pink princess because I'm a girl! Too funny!!

Best friends

The kids and I had a great day today. We went running over to the kiddie gym only to learn I was looking at a schedule that is for 2 weeks from now. So we ran to the bookstore a few doors down, picked out some exciting books and walked to a nearby park. We read the books and then played on the park. The kids had a blast. They LOVE wall climbs and are pretty good at them. As they were happily climbing up the pictured one, over and over, they would turn to me and say, "Look at me! I'm mountain climber!"

Then they would go down the yellow slide. And then they decided (all on their own) that they wanted to do a tandem slide. The picture for February on our calendar was them doing a side-by-side slide so they've clearly had going down slides together on their minds. At first Emily was sitting in front, but then Kyle decided that he wanted to be in front and Emily hold on to him. It was really sweet because when she would hold onto him, he would wrap his arms back around her as much as you can with your back to someone so he could hug her back.

Their relationship has really grown and it is outwardly apparent that they love each other so much. Jeff always said that having a twin means having a built in best friend. It is really sweet seeing this develop with Kyle and Emily.

On the way to pick up Jeff tonight, Kyle was saying, "That's my Daddy! You are my Mommy, Mommy! That's my Emily! I love my Daddy. I love my Mommy. I love my Emmie!" So sweet!!

Appreciation

You know, as hard as it is in the early stages of kids with them being newborns and not being able to express themselves, as they grow, they sometimes say the silliest things that may make you laugh, cry or cringe, but lately, Kyle has been SPOUTING appreciation! It's so amazingly sweet. Tonight we had some mommy friends and their kids over for dinner as we were all roughing it alone this week while our husbands traveled, played golf, or had late work. The meal, I'm disappointed to say was sub-par (sorry Josh, it was poor meal time planning on my part and I didn't account for my kids hanging on my legs and not being able to be as efficient with 5 things going as I'd like to be because of that), but the company was awesome. And the kids had a great time.

As we were getting ready for bed, Kyle and Emily were so excited about having friends over for dinner that they went through each of them and said something so sweet. (oh backtrack - when the kids woke up from a nap, I opened their window and it beeped. They asked me, "Mommy, who's there? Is it our friends?" I told them no, it was just me opening their window and their friends would come later. But they were SO excited for their friends to come over.)

They told me how one of them has a cute Elmo doll. Another little girl (that Kyle seems to have his eye on) is good at soccer. And Emily told me that little girl has a brother... ;-) and that another little boy has cute jammies with a monkey on them!!

And some more excerpts from tonight as Kyle spouted his appreciation:

Kyle: Mommy, thank you for getting me clean in da baft (the bath). Mommy, you good at putting lotion on me. Mommy, thank you for putting my diaper and undies on. Mommy, I'm proud of you for putting my jammies on. You good at brushing my hair! [and again, same as the night before] Mommy, I'm proud of you for cooking me rice and beans and guacamole! I ate nicely my beans and guacamole!

Could he be any sweeter?!?!?! As hard as the sleepless nights were early on, he sure is making up for them with his sweet appreciation! And Emily too! Last night she woke ~3am, and normally I just don't hear ANYTHING in the middle of the night (really, Jeff, I don't hear ANYTHING!), but I was up until 1am making their 6-12 month baby book that has to be submitted by midnight tonight (I best hurry!), I heard her and went in. When I got her, she said, "Mommy, I wanna do big hugs!" She gave me a sweet, big hug and went right back to sleep until 7:30 / 7:45 this morning when her and Kyle woke up talking about her rainbow blanket (see previous posts about when she got her rainbow blanket... I think we need to retire this blanket because she has such an association with it!!) Anyhow, they are very sweet and appreciative! Very surprise to me for toddlers!

conversations with toddlers

I had some pretty amusing conversations with the kids today. They really just speak their mind and remember EVERYTHING!

Emily: Mommy, you need to take a shower? (She knows that when I take a shower while they are awake, they get to watch a show so she often asks me if I need to take a shower!)
Mommy: No, Emily I already took a shower today. (This was 8pm and I had just taken a shower at 4pm)
Kyle: But you have poop on your shirt Mommy!
Mommy: Really?! No honey, it's just barbeque sauce from dinner. (Kids wiped their hands on me as a napkin tonight.)
Kyle: Yea, it's not poop. It's barbeque sauce.

Kyle, at dinner: Mommy, can I give you a big hug?
Mommy: Of course Kyle. Thanks!
Kyle: Mommy, I love you. Mommy, I'm proud of you for cooking dinner for me!
Mommy thinking: [huh? I cook nearly every night!!]
(We often tell the kids we are proud of them for something, like using the potty or eating their food nicely or sitting in the big boy / girl chair so well. So it was cute for Kyle to be modeling the compliments.)

Emily, getting ready for bed, noticing the blanket she will use tonight for covers: The rainbow blanket is from barfing.
Mommy: Yes Emily, you did get that blanket when you were sick. [we were out and about in Boston without a change of clothes, go mommy, when she got sick so we found a pair of shorts in the lost 'n found at My Gym, bought her a shirt and a blanket to cover up. There weren't any pants for sale anywhere near!]
Emily: I barfed on Mommy's back. I wore a blue shirt. I barfed the juice up.

Lovely isn't it? They remember everything and know how to work it!!

cuteness

We had a bit of a tough dinner tonight. The kids eventually ate everything, except their broccoli, but it was tough to get to that point. It consisted of 2 cups of spilt milk, dropped salmon, couscous / grain blend on the floor, about 4 major meltdowns and several timeouts. Needless to say, bath was going to be quick and bedtime just as quick. But two year olds just don't have the capacity to stay upset / frustrated for very long. Thankfully! They were totally over it by the time we finished eating, but I was still frustrated with the mess and meltdown and tough sequence of events after such a great day. Fastforward to after bath, Kyle is totally ready for bed and Emily just needs her hair brushed. I was only able to do 1 brush - as in 1 row (for lack of a better term) of hair and she stands up with her hair tangled, standing on end except that one row and proclaims, "I'm already bellisima!" It was just too cute!

BIG doggie!

We stopped by Point Loma Seafoods on our way home from the beach today for lunch. As it turns out, the Great Dane meet-up group was also there for lunch. Those were some IMMENSE dogs! After we ate and were throwing out our trash, Emily saw the dogs and went tearing after them. Being a bit afraid of dogs myself, I tried to reign her in, but she kept on going. Kyle stayed by my side at the sight of these giants. I was afraid Emily would go after the dogs tail because that was where she was headed. Apparently, she was so intrigued and just wanted to touch the dogs she told me. I got her back before she reached the dogs and the owners said that they were super friendly dogs and no amount of pulling would upset the dogs. Not wanting to pass along my fear of big dogs to Emily, we talked to the owner for a little bit and he said that it was okay for Emily to pet the dog. I was still hesitant, but Emily was all for it. She gave the dog gentle touches. And mind you, this dog is at least a head taller than Emily (she is at least 3 feet tall) and outweighs her by 200 pounds (she weighs ~25 pounds)!!!! I had to take a picture of the dog. He is a Great Dane / Mastiff mix the owner said. He eats 4 pounds of food per day!! Note, in the picture, Emily is basically standing next to the dog so your eyes really aren't playing tricks on you. He is just that big of a doggie!!

Beautiful day in the neighborhood

You gotta love the San Diego weather! It was mid 70s this weekend and just perfect outside! Today we met up with some friends at the beach and had a great time. Kyle even went in the water when he normally sticks back away from the ocean because "the waves not gonna get me!" And Emily was pretty much a fish like normal though she did get upset because she got messy (wet). And eve more impressive for both of them is that they did their first boogie board! Their friend Olivia brought her boogie board and her daddy was giving her boogie board rides and Kyle and Emily thought it looked like so much fun that they wanted to do it too!