I'm not a baby! I'm a big kid!

The title to this post has been the story of my week.  Every time someone calls them babies, they politely correct the person.  Tucker even did it to Mina when she called him a baby in Spanish.  He corrected her in English.

Lots of the things they have done this week have kind of proved that they are no longer babies. Whitney purposely drew Q's all over her pink hair picture.  Her pink hair picture included filling the entire page full of bright pink ink with her marker.  Aunt B would be proud.

Tucker drew T's all over his paper.  After he traced his own foot.  It was a pretty impressive tracing job.  Then he asked me to trace his hand, but I got marker on his hand.  He told me I wasn't careful and that wasn't good.  He also drew a D, but that might have been by accident, because he pointed out the D like he was surprised, didn't draw anymore, and made it into a banana

I would also have to say that potty training has finally taken.  Whitney has not had an accident in a really long time.  She also goes herself most of the time when we are at home.  Every time she does this, she likes to comment on how she is a big girl.

They can put their own shoes and socks on.  That is so, so heavenly.

One of the cutest things was their first dental appointment.  The dentist told me usually they start with "happy visits" around age 3.  This usually means seeing the equipment work, taking a quick peek at their teeth for a screen and that's about it.  But not Tucker and Whitney.  They tolerated a regular dental visit.  None of us could believe it.  The dental team let them climb up in the chair together.  Then, they gave them each a pair of sunglasses for the light.  They both loved that.  They followed directions of "open your mouth" and "look over here" the whole time.  Whitney especially loved the chocolate toothpaste and Tucker wasn't complaining about that either.  Tucker, naturally loved the buttons for the chair.  They didn't seem to mind the polisher, although there were a few giggles about how tickly it was.  They let the technicians probe and floss their teeth.  The toy box after and the cool new toothpaste along with their OWN tube of toothpaste sealed the deal.  They were so cute that even the dentist thought so.  She took a picture of them.  Whitney was so excited about her new toothbrush, she wanted to use it two more times that day before bed.

This week Jim was sick, the worst of it when he was in Japan.  Whitney told me that it was because he didn't wash his hands when he got home from work.  Every night since he's been back, she makes him wash his hands when he walks in the door, something I make them do when we get back from being in public for that reason.  Jim complies.  Who wouldn't when you have little Whitney mommy ordering you around.

It has been cold and foggy here.  So much so that the moisture from the fog has frozen on all the trees like snow.  Today it melted and it sounded like melting snow outside, not just frost.  All the ground under trees was soaking wet.  Whitney pointed out to me that it rained, but how does it rain only under trees?

Tucker has only been able to stand about 1/2 hour of play outside.  Yesterday he withstood 45 mintues.  Whitney didn't.  We stopped at a park and went on some of the walking paths.   We turned around to go back to the car once Whitney started to comment on the cold.  The branches over the stream had 1/2 inch of ice encased about.  Looked cool, but way too cold.  We also found a stream that was "orange for Tucker" to throw rocks in.

We found something else they like about the dark.  I needed to go to the neighbors after dark.  Tucker and Whitney brought their lanterns with them.  Boy! Was that a fun adventure!!!  They loved walking across the street and to the mailbox with those things!

Whitney has been very excited about her new scarf.  She likes to go downstairs and play "uh-oh pillow" and ask me to work on her scarf at the same time.  They added the couch cushions to the outdoor patio cushions to play "uh-oh pillow".  Now they can cover almost all of the floor space downstairs with pillows.  They also pretend they are lily pads or train tracks.  Tucker likes to "fall off the tracks" in between the pillows and Whitney pulls him up on to the tracks.

The other thing they like to play is "rest time". Rest time is something they do in Joy School and they've incorporated into their play time.  They have covered the treadmill with a blanket and lay under it like it's their bed and have rest time.  Rest time only lasts about 10 seconds before "it's over"  Or they turn off the lights. It cracks me up.

I like to explain to Tucker and Whitney what we are going to do each day.  They seem to protest less if they know exactly what we are going to do, especially during errand running.  So this week I said that Mommy's friends were going to come over for a party (a book club) after dinner.  Whitney got really excited about that.  She really wanted to make more lanterns for the party.  Once everyone came over, she got more and more wound up and excited.  She liked having the people there and wanted to know when I was going to eat.

Tucker loves to find numbers and letters wherever he goes.  Whenever we are out, he is reading off numbers or sounding out letters he sees around.  It is pretty stinkin' cute to me.

Whitney with the flowers she "planted"

Whitney's baked creation  Muffins with sprinkles

Tucker's biscuits he made with the pillows and blankets.  He asked to have his picture taken with it while sleeping

Tucker's collection of important toys

A pic from when my sister was here.  Tucker following the exercise video and Whitney getting her yoga mat situated

Very intent on painting the shower

Painting the shower

Playing rest time on the treadmill

Whitney dumping out her "paint" while painting the shower

Daddy and Whitney

Tucker and Daddy

The other thing that melts my heart is how patient Tucker is with little kids.  Twice this week 15 or so month old kids have tried to pull his hair or ear.  Both parents stopped their kid and told them to be soft and gentle.  So basically Tucker has gotten his head petted.  What cracks me up is how much Tucker loves it.  He has this look on his face of feeling loved.  He turns away from them so they don't poke him in the eye, but he will let them be soft and gentle as long as they like.

I think I forgot to write about the last day B was here.  We went to get frozen yogurt.  Yum!  We brought home the spoons, one pink one for Whitney and one green one for Tucker.  Whitney wanted to go home and eat "warm yogurt" after the frozen yogurt.  I think she means regular yogurt.  Either way, yogurt is sooooooo yummy.

On the way home we went to the park to just be outside.  We lasted all of 40 minutes.  I think B complained about the cold more than Whitney did.  It might have been cold.  The pond was mostly frozen.  One poor duck walked all the way over to us on that frozen pond.  Slipped the whole way.  It was so pathetic.  It was one time this non- animal lover felt a need to have food to give that poor duck.

B also came with me for an OB appointment.  Since I've only had twins, and OB appointment to me means you always have an ultrasound.  Not so.  I was a little bummed because it would have been fun to have B see the kid, but when you only have one, they just listen for a heart rate and know that if they can still hear it, the kid is still alive.  And of course they have to measure just how big you are getting.  But this was also a little rewarding for me.  B had made a few comments about how big my belly was for only 4 months.  I agree.  I was surprised how fast the belly popped out this time, but whatever.  No need for comments on how big I already am.  But then, when I got on the scale, she said "That's it?!"  Like,  how could you weigh so little when you look so big and swollen.  So all in all, it was fun to have her with me.

B also finished up the scrapbooking that I hadn't done in 2 years.  While she did that, she played cheesy tacos with Tucker and Whitney.  They stacked up couch pillows and cushions and laid on top for the cheese.

When we took her to the airport, Tucker asked her for a hug and kiss.  Whitney allowed her to kiss and hug her when Aunt B asked.

Getting home we got back to real life.  It was a dry day and the garbage was empty, so we loaded branches into the green waste.  Whitney put a bunch in the can while Tucker was the poop look out so Whitney and Mommy didn't accidently step in any.  Since being pregnant, I have put Jim on poop scooping duty.

Tucker also helped me mop.  He can squeeze out the mop pretty well in addition to pushing it around the house.  This new skill caused him to exclaim "I'm a big helper boy!"  Yes you are, Tucker.

Then they acted out all sorts of activities that happened while Aunt B was around.  I heard them saying various things during their play.  Like putting on high heels, a bracelet, and a skirt and saying "We're going teaching!"  I went visiting teaching while B watched them on Sunday.  I also heard them saying "What happened to the airport?  They are painting it!"  A comb, I guess of bringing B to the airport and us painting my room. During a dry moment, we went outside and Whitney painted the toes of a bunch of rocks.

Whitney is getting a feel for time.  When Jim left for Japan, we talked about how it was dark where Papa is and light where we are.  So that means Papa is sleeping when we are awake and we are awake while Papa is sleeping.  Whitney can tell me all that on her own.  She also recited the order of holidays.  First Valentine's day, then Papa's birthday, then Mommy's then my birthday again when I turn four!  Just summing up the year.

Tank, Dump Truck and Thomas are regulars in visiting stores or other places, in addition to Meow-meow.  Tucker usually is the one that insists on bringing them in the car with us.  He even put Thing 2 and Thomas in the bed of the dump truck and then brought dump truck to bring the neighbor her newspaper.

Tucker now notices newspapers at all houses.  If there is a newspaper in someone's driveway, it must be for our neighbor and we need to stop to go get it.  It took a bit for it to sink in that not all newspapers are for our neighbor.

We went to the craft store the other day.  We are working on some pretty cool stuff for Daysforgirls.  It's a humanitarian project that helps girls in Kenya get a better education.  I can't remember if the website is .org or .net or .com, but one of them works.  It's pretty easy to help out.  Anyway, we were getting fabric for that project and Tucker and Whitney were singing I Am Like a Star Shining Brightly at the top of their lungs together as we looked at fabric.  The lady at the desk asked them for another duet, but they declined.

Whitney likes to play penguinita.  She sits on my feet, usually when I'm cooking or  waiting for something

I had to cut Whitney and Tucker's toenails this week.  I really had to put a lot of effort to convince them this was necessary.  When I was actually cutting them Tucker said "Not the blue!" and Whitney said almost the same thing.  "not the pink!"  They were worried I was going to cut off all the nail polish off their toes.  There are small flecks left.  Next time I might have to paint more on to keep the nails trimmed.

Last Saturday she had a lot of stuff to play with me.  She gave me a pretend paper and said "Here's your ticket", like we were going on a train ride.  She also asked me what I wanted to do for my birthday, go to the snow or go on a train ride.  When they were painting the shower, I peeked in to check on things and she said "go paint your room, Mom!"

Now when we go shopping and there are small shopping carts, Tucker has a job.  He is extremely good at it.  He can steer the shopping cart really well.  He can get those things manuevered around all sorts of obsticles, knowing how to back up and turn the right amounts.  The only problem is he can't see in front.  I have to direct him around objects directly in front.  I wasn't paying attention at first, thinking he could see my head and follow me, but he accidently ran right into an older woman's hips.  Good thing she was good natured and had good balance!

Aunt B

We've had a lot of fun with Aunt B.  Whitney could hardly wait for her to get here.  I told her Aunt B was coming to help her make her birthday, so once Aunt B was here, Whitney was ready to get started.  She even mentioned it to a mom of one of her playmates on her own.  This mom asked me when I got back from a bathroom break with Tucker if Whitney's birthday was soon. I guess that was what Whitney was telling her.  Then Whitney proceeded to launch into the whole story of how when Aunt B comes, Aunt B will help her make her birthday and then go home.

Last week Tucker and Whitney had a lesson on reverence in church.  Something about talking quietly.  It had the opposite affect this week in church.  Tucker yelled "the A says aahh!" really loud once and they were both meowing a bit loudly in between using their regular voices the rest of the time.  But they were playing nicely and not laughing hysterically, so I guess maybe it did work.

Tucker had a blast playing potato sack, luggage, drag the luggage, hammock and horsie with Aunt B.  Mommy doesn't play that wild.  Even Aunt B commented on how her neck and back hurt a bit after.  Aunt B put her legs up as a bridge and invented toll bridge.  She told Whitney it would cost 2 cookies.  Whitney looked at her, like, are you serious.  Then went in the kitchen and got 2 cookies for her.  B said just kidding.

We've been laughing at the silly stuff they say.  Whitney was having a fit about something in the bathroom.  I think Tucker flushed the potty for her and she wanted to do it.  She was on the floor screaming.  She had been screaming a bunch today.  Really tired, I guess.  I could tell she was just having a fit and consolation was not going to work, so I left her in there to cry it out.  Tucker kept opening and shutting the door.  Each time he opened the door he would check on her and say "are you done screaming?  No?  Ok." and shut the door again.  Then he started trying to help her by saying, "Whitney, pull up your panties" or "Whitney do you want Meow, Meow?"  He said everything in such a sweet voice, showing his concern for her.  But it cracks me up because he is just parroting what I say to them.

Tucker reading with a Joy school buddy curious george

Whitney's pedi

Tucker receiving his balloons from Grandma

Tucker's blue for Tucker pedi

When we got home from church, Aunt B was baking double choco chip cookies.  yum!  Fastest they've changed their clothes and washed their hands after church, a requirement to help Aunt B.   But I had made them a grilled cheese sandwich to eat for lunch.  Aunt B asked Tucker if he had room for a grilled cheese sandwich after eating half a cantelope.  He said no.  But then she asked if he had room for a cookie and he said yes.  Hmmmm...  That didn't even pass the auntie test.  He didn't get a cookie, until later.

Mommy with her big kids

Tucker being cute trying to give Whitney a hug and Whitney wants nothing to do with it.

Aunt B will let him hug her!

"This one has a band-aid

Cupcake and sprinkle prep

After bath snuggle

With "phone"

Tucker showing his chocolate hands.  He loved eating his b-day candy bar for morning snack

The only one who wanted to take a family pic was Mommy

We're cute.  Whitney keeps biting her lip.  It has created a third lip, not a juice mustache  Jim calls her a clown

Papa had to blow on each bite

so yummy!

riding with aunt B

Tucker was so excited he blew out the candles.  he kept saying I did it!  The next time he got a cupcake, he wanted candles to blow out again

Finished product

Whi

on the train with Daddy

Whitney clutching her ticket

More Mommy and Whitney

If anyone doubts Tucker looks like my family, take a peek at this photo.  These guys definitely look related

Tucker adding glow sticks to lanterns all by himself

Whitney and happy about birthday cupcake

So excited about cherry on top of cupcake

Putting on lotion

We had a lot of fun together celebrating.  We went to the potsticker place for lunch and Daddy got them smoothies (real ones that have sugar in them) to go with the meal. We also rode the escalators and the light rail together, just for fun.  We ended with fried food, Tucker's request, including french "cries" (fries).  The cupcakes were a hit.  They ate the T's and W's covered in sprinkles off first after blowing out candles.  We also played "aliens" with the lights off  with glow sticks around their necks.

While Jim and I were trying to coordinate something during the day, his phone cut out during me calling him and I thought he had screened my call.  I said "Did you just screen my call?" out loud and heard  them saying the exact same thing..... over and over and over.  But then they switched topis. There was a seagull on top of a light, doing what seagulls do best.  Pooping.  So I said the seagull was pooping.  Then every seagull was pooping....

When Tucker opened presents earlier, he picked one up and starting pulling off the tape saying, "This one has a band-aid"  One of his presents was a calculator.  When he pulled it out, he said "Oh! it's a phone!" After I showed him how some of it works, he started saying "number 1, number 2, number 3, etc" as he pressed each key and saw how the numbers came up on the calculator.  But then he got a bit frustrated with the division key.  He kept pressing it, but nothing happened!

We wrapped up a bunch of glow sticks, all individually.  On his second gift of that, Tucker felt the package and said "It's a blow stick (what he calls glow sticks)" before opening it.  Already learning the art of knowing what's in the package.

When we rode light rail, we saw some pigeons on the opposite railway while at a stop. Tucker and Whitney were very concerned for those pigeons.  They were telling the pigeons to be careful and fly away so  they wouldn't get squished.  They were quite relieved when some of them flew away, but kept track of the remaining ones until they all flew away.  Later on the trip the train rocked back and forth on the track and it was bumpy.  So Jim made the comment that we were "squishing birds"  Lovely.  They kept repeating that for every bump along the way.  "...We're squishing birds!......"

When they were decorating cupcakes in preparation, we kind of had some issues with the coloring of the frosting.  Finally B gave up trying to get the frosting red.  It looked like a darker pink, not red.  So she just re-taught Tucker the definition of the color red.  He totally went for it.  Then they had a great time putting on sprinkles.  And eating the ones that fell on the counter.

Aunt B got me started on painting my room.  I finally got the paint for the samples I put on the wall 2 years ago.  When we went to get paint, Tucker lugged one of the bags out.  He had to work a bit to lift it off the ground, but didn't seem to be concerned about holding the bag.  One of the 5 items was a quart of paint.  No problem, in addition to the other awkward items in the bag.

She also did my scrapbooking since the big kids turned 1.  2 projects I've been dragging my feet on for 2 years. 

In general, it has been lovely to have another adult in the house for five days.  And even better that it was a woman.  When she left, I noticed the toilet paper roll had been replaced. The sheets were folded.  During her visit I went to go do the dishes or some other chore like laundry, and find it was already done.  Ha!  It was lovely!  

Whitney does not like that her name is Brittany.  The few times I called her Brittany, Whitney corrected me in a mad voice that her name is WHIT-ney.  Whatever.  I just stuck to B or Aunt B most of the time.

They made party lanterns, an idea Whitney got out of a library book.  She loved making those things with Aunt B.  They made some before our outing to the ping pong place and some when they got back, but Whitney would have preferred to have stayed home.  It was hard for me to get her out to the car, because she wanted to stay inside to make more lanterns.  On our drive home, she was reviewing the order of errands and emphasizing when we got home, she could make more lanterns.  She was also ready to go home a lot sooner than Tucker, reminding us on the way out that she was ready also to make more lanterns.

When we went to the ping pong ball place, they were both disappointed that the balls labeled 1 and 2 were not available to chase through the pipes.  I finally told them they were taking a bath.  So every time they couldn't find the ball they were looking for, Tucker would say it was in the bath.  They finally decided on 42 and 10, since there was a 1 and a 2 in there.  Tucker had ball 42 and Whitney 10.  Aunt B had 46.  Tucker and Aunt B played together for  awhile and Tucker looked for her ball, too, when it went back into the "ocean"  Every time he would exclaim the number written on the ball.

When Whitney woke up on her birthday, she remembered.  While going potty, she commented on how she was big because she was three and Tucker was still little.

Whitney told me going to bed on her birthday that she was excited for me to make her scarf so she could wear it and not be cold near the pot sticker place.  True.  It is very drafty outside that restaurant's doors. 

They still quote a bunch from books, which crack me up.  When we drive around town, Whitney and Tucker both often say Stop, Mommy stop the light is red.  Then when the light changes, Go Mommy go it's green ahead, straight out of Go Dog Go book.  Tucker also randomly says Oh dear!  What a shame, What a shame, from Cat in the Hat.

While cooking dinner this week, they played train and car and shopping cart with their plastic white chairs on their side.  I got lots of conversation about parking the car in the parking lot, then going in and using the shopping cart to put some favorite items in it.  Yogurt, cheese, cupcakes, cookies...

One morning this week Tucker woke up saying Bash the burrito and laughing hysterically.  Whatever, but he woke up happy as usual.  This day Tucker was so polite and kind to Whitney.  He was hammering at his work bench and glanced behind him to tell Whitney "Careful!  I'm working!".  Then he hammered a bit, stopped and looked back at Whitney again saying "thank you for watching me", just how I did with them when I was using the Saws-all outside.

Whitney invented pushing their blankets in their soft chairs, calling them strollers.  Then they parked their strollers and started eating with their blankets.  Whitney said "This restaurant is really good!"  She really likes good food.  And going out to eat.  But I also think she is missing summer because they played that they went to the beach and put on their swimsuits.

Whitney wanted to make a tent and instructed me on the kind of tent she wanted.  But then Tucker wanted to play with her creation.  When the tent was made, Tucker came over and said "Wow!  Cool! A tent!" in such an excited voice (how does he know the word cool and to use it so well in context?) that made me laugh.

Monday we decided to make cookies.  Whitney was having a great time participating in making cookies this week.  I was trying to finish something else, but she really wanted to get started on the cookies, so I started talking her through getting out all the ingredients.  She was really good at it.  All I had to do was ask her to get out another ingredient, and she knew where it was.  She also was able to start the safe steps.  To soften the butter, she put the bowl on the stool and pushed the stool over to the microwave and put the bowl in.  Now I know she has even better helping skills.  Tucker ran over the receipe book with Tank.

Ryan.  To answer your question about when I would stop calling the babies babies.  It's now.  They don't let me call them babies, because they are big kids now.

have I mentioned that tucker reminds me of Scott?

There were 5 kids under the age of 4 running around this day.  I volunteered to watch some kids.  Whitney was not amused.  She finally crawled up on the counter to read her Cat in the Hat book undisturbed.

Merrily popping bubble wrap that was to go around Christmas decorations.  Whatever.  It's what kept them from unpacking all the christmas stuff I just packed.  Do no be deceived by the sunshine.  If it is sunny, it is bitterly cold and everything is frozen.

Whitney loves how her shoes look.  Can't walk in them

Tucker with fancy shoes on.  Couldn't walk.  Did more skating on the floor than anything else

Tucker reading Cat in the Hat and saying "No, no Thing 2.  Don't bonk that!"

So I remember having a discussion with Ryan about kids.  He asked me something along the lines of had I thought about the consequences of having kids.  Like paying for stuff they wreck or break.  I told him it's a risk that comes with parenting that I wasn't too worried about.  Well, time to worry.

Some how Tucker (we think) threw a plastic drawer and broke the inside pane of our bathroom window.  I don't get it.  I was convinced that he threw his tank, but Tank was sitting on the counter "watching" and the drawer was on the floor.  Jim thinks he must have just hit it with the corner with the right amount of force.  And of course he wanted his drawer back to play with.  He also thought it was funny the window broke.  Grrrrrrr.....  He got put in time out for not listening about not throwing things, something I'm always getting after him for. But it was just an accident.  It amazes me how things happen so fast.  They were just playing, running from room to room like they always do when they are playing together.  Yet this time they broke glass.  Thank heavens they were far away from the glass!  And we also got lucky in that one of the panes is still intact, considering it's winter and all.

Today I was looking for the UPS store.  Couldn't find it.  I had forgotten to look up exactly where it was on the street.  So I started saying "UPS store, where are you?"  Whitney took up the chant until I gave up and turned around.  I told Whitney I couldn't find it and she said "I can't find it, either, Mom!"  Her earnestness in helping me came out in her tone of voice and made me laugh.

She was also very earnest this morning in response to something else I said.  She came over and slugged Tucker.  I told her she needed to go in time out for hitting him.  She said " I DON'T need to go in time out" in the same way I told her she did.  It was hard to resist the laugh and there's where it ended.  I had a hard time getting in time out after that.

She also has taken to picking stuff out to eat.  Drives me nuts.  For example, I ask her if she wants an apple or grapes and she says orange.  She does this most of the time.  She also says things like "I'm hungry for something else" when I make lunch.  It's usually yogurt.  The past couple of days she has taken to opening the fridge to look around and find something.  Grrr...  but then again she also puts her food in the refridgerator to "save it for later" when she gets full. Not such a bad thing, that she is helping me put away the food.

This week has been really cold.  Yesterday it finally warmed up and felt downright balmy after the previous days.  The temperature increased 20 degrees in one day.  It was so cold, even Tucker didn't want to be outside.  He asked to go inside after only 30 minutes of pushing the mop bucket around.  Amazing.  Then, amazing of all amazing, he went in his room BY HIMSELF and snuggled in his blanket to warm up for a half an hour. He usually is always with someone, either me or Whitney.  And this is with gloves, hat, jacket, etc, like we were going to the snow.

A great thing they both learned how to do this week is put on their gloves.  Hallelujah!!!  It takes forever, but it's getting faster each time.  I really didn't like putting on their gloves in addition to their socks, shoes, jacket and hat.  It takes forever to get suited up.  All for a half hour.  Whatever.  Sign me up for cabin fever instead.

I've decided to make the darkness fun.  We'll see how long these games last.  Around 4:30 or 5, I can turn all the lights off in the house and let them run around with glow sticks, (pronounced blow sticks for some reason by Tucker) their light up balls, or Turtle.  With Turtle, they take turns holding him and just literally running around the house.  So far, so fun.  It's also my method of them getting energy out when not one of us wants to be outside much, but we're all getting cabin fever.

We often have big branches fall in wind storms around here.  Makes me nervous.  All the pinecones falling on the roof makes such a racket.  So do the branches.  Luckily we haven't had a serious branch hit our roof directly.  Regardless, one night I woke up from a dream during a windstorm where a bunch of branches were falling.  I moved the babies in the basement because I couldn't sleep imagining that the tree was going to fall on them any minute.  Never happened, but you know how the imagination works at 2 in the morning.

After the storm, I gathered the branches.  Makes a big ugly pile that doesn't go away unless I do something about it.  So I decided to do something about it this week.  It requires a chain saw, but since I don't have one of those, Jim's saws-all is a nice substitute. I got the saws-all out, but then Whitney pointed out to me that "those are Papa's tools"  I had to explain I asked him before then to use it and have to put it back nicely in order to use it again.  But so far they both have a healthy fear of the tool.  I told them they couldn't step off the cement while I was using it so they didn't accidently come up behind me when I couldn't hear them.  Before I turned it on, I turned around and saw them on the other side of the driveway, sitting on the steps watching me.  They stayed there the whole time I was using it, much to my relief, but it was pretty cute to see them over there, so seriously watching me.

This week we've been helping someone out with the last name French.  I made french toast for breakfast one morning and told them the name.  Tucker looked at it and said "Oh.  Sister French toast?"  He seemed a little sad because he wanted to eat it and I think he thought it was for her to eat, not for him.  I didn't even make the connection, but he did.

In helping out this person, I've been on the phone a bunch with someone named Pat.  I didn't realize how much I've been on the phone, back and forth until Tucker was playing with me and said, "Oh.  Are you talking to Pat?" when he handed me my pretend phone.  It has been a bit much for them, too. 

I had a bunch of roommates in college that liked to quote movie lines.  I think Tucker inherited it from them.  He does the same thing.  He really likes quoting media in general. 

The other day I gave him a banana for lunch.  He looked at me and started quoting the banana mini movie from the minions again.  I decided to play along and be the other minion.  He loved it and kept it up.

They both do this for the Cat in the Hat book.  Tucker repeatedly reads that book and every time he gets to the part where there is the box, he asks Whitney "Whitney, who's in the box?"  like it's the first time he's asked her.  She has patiently answered his question each time.  She no longer turns around to look at him or stops what she is playing.  Already doing the mommy thing.  One time she was downstairs and he was upstairs.  He didn't realize where she was and got a little distressed looking for her so he could ask her the same question.

Whitney also quotes media.  The other day she randomly started saying, "you look like a chicken in trouble".  Made me laugh, but then I realized she was quoting curious george.

Tucker likes to play bump, bump everywhere.  now he wants to include me in the play.  He tells me "Mom, say 'ready, bump, bump! '" while he rolls his tank around.

They are both grasping more and more concepts.  Reading books is even more fun because they apply what they learn to stuff in the world.  They find numbers all over the place and have a great time doing it.  We read a book about shapes and Whitney ran around finding those shapes in the house.  She also saw them on the store walls 3 days later.  That was pretty fun.

It's kind of nice they get the concepts.  I decided to tell my parents they are getting their last grandkid from us in June.  Now I don't worry about Tucker and Whitney announcing things accidently, so I explained it to them.  Whitney got it a little sooner than Tucker.  Or at least she verbalized it back to me faster, that is.  I told her a baby was in mommy's tummy and it was going to grow bigger and bigger every day until it's too big.  She lifted up her shirt and poked out her full belly and said she had a baby in it, too.  Then I said she could only have a baby when she was a mommy.  Oh.  I also told them to be careful with my tummy, that it hurts when they press against it and the baby goes punch when they push too hard.  She got that.  She doesn't squish it any more.  When Tucker does it, she tells Tucker that the baby goes punch.  Now Tucker is carefully unless he really wants a big snuggle. Then he forgets or doesn't care when I tell him he can't push on it.

One last thing that cracked me up this week.  Jim flicks his nose a lot when it itches, which seems to be always.  Whitney got a cold this week.  One morning she was having to blow her nose a bunch.  One time she looked like she was tickling her nose with her fingers.  She looked at me and said "flick, flick"  I realized she was mimicing Jim.  Cracked  me up!  Hah!  I told him he still has allergies and needs to do the shots.  He still really has an itchy nose!

Tucker pickling his own cucumbers

A short clip of how Tucker salts each and every cucumber.  He did this for his thanksgiving dinner

Tucker playing the snorkel

My grandpa played the saw.  Tucker plays the snorkel.

a week of bliss

I forgot how fun the week after Christmas is.  They still love their toys and play independently quite a bit.  I've been getting caught up on random projects, none of which you can see or include cleaning the house of course.  Maybe I'll get to the point where I can paint my room the color I have painted in swatches.  Put those swatches on almost 2 years ago.  Don't even notice my four toned walls anymore.  I don't know.  Painting sounds really ambitious.

Whitney is going to really love Activity Days when she gets old enough, I'm sure.  Today she said "activity days is for eating cupcakes" randomly. Last time I made cupcakes and/or did activity days included that.

We had a blast today.  We went to a new park.  They had an education building that included following a water cycle.  You pick a ping pong ball with a number on it and put it in different chutes, starting at the ocean.  These pipes went all over the place.  Thank heavens we were the only ones there for much of the time.  We were there 1 1/2 hours just doing that activity.  Forget about the rest.  Whitney and Tucker were running wild.  Another great thing is that a grandma was running the place today and didn't mind all the ruckus.  She was just glad they loved it so much there.  Even after such a long time, I had to tell them we were leaving.  They didn't even want to eat goldfish crackers for snack.  What made the activity even better is that they found (by themselves to my amazement) the number one ball and the number two ball, so every time they found it in some other chute, Tucker would exclaim about how it is number one for Whitney and number 2 for Tucker.  This Thing 1/2 carries over to a lot of their life.

Speaking of which, my grandma called today with very important news.  At least that is what she said on her voicemail.  She said the Rose Bowl Parade has Dr. Seuss as the theme, so that's what we need to see on New Year's Day.

Today I caught Tucker reading books.  Normally, if he even plays with books, he sits and just turns the pages.  But today he was reading his book.  He had the Cat in the Hat book open in his lap and making all sorts of comments about various pages.  Like "No, no, Thing 2.  Don't bonk that!"  or "Keep your hat on Cat in the Hat" and then "Good job Cat in the Hat" when he turned the page and the Cat in the Hat had his hat back on.  He also ran over to Whitney and asked her "What's in the box, Whitney?"  for the page that the big red box comes out.  It's a question I ask them sometimes when I'm not speed reading it before bed.

Tucker has lost a lot of his hesitation of talking in front of strangers.  Lots of my friends have commented lately about how good he is at talking and how much he talks.  Previous to a few weeks ago he was mute in new or different environments.  I keep telling them that he's talked this clearly for awhile, they've just never known.  But he is only just recently coming up with his really silly stuff.

He is the one that most often gets disciplined, probably because Whitney screams bloody murder when he hits her for Whitney hitting him or taking a toy from him.  This translates to him telling Whitney, his Thing 2 or truck, or Mommy what to do or what the rules are.

He also is quite the commedian in training.  He seems to understand humor to a point.  Whenever they squeeze out play dough he does this perfect teasing "Wha ha ha Ha!" exclamation and gets Whitney to do it with him.

Other times it's just us coming out of him in a funny way.  I'm always getting after Jim about how much toothpaste he puts on their toothbrushes because they always swallow most of it.  I say "it's too much!" when Tucker comes back with a ton of extra from Jim helping him.  So the other night he ran to "use Papa's" and brought it to Jim yelling "Papa, put too much on!"

A couple of days after Christmas Jim was playing with the train with Tucker and decided to put batteries in Thomas.  As if Tucker wasn't in love with Thomas before.  Now Thomas is alive and real.  Who cares about Santa.  Tucker ran around and around the track chasing Thomas most of that night.  Whitney would lay on the track and lift her hips up just in time to make a bridge for Thomas.  Thomas gets lots of How are you's and I'm happy about equal to Thing 2 now.

Jim also has been having fun with the doll house.  He stuffed Snowflake into the baby high chair and put Thing 1 in the doll house bathtub one night.  Whitney didn't seem to notice, so after waiting a bit for her to start playing with them, he asked Whitney where Thing 1 was.  Without skipping a beat she said, "In the bath".  Jim was shocked about how observant she is.  Yep.  She doesn't miss much.  Always been my observer bear.

One thing that I'm not fond of during vacation breaks is not having a lot of fun with time off, so we've actually done a lot of getting out of the house.  We went to the fish hatchery.  Not a new place, but since it was raining, I discovered the indoor section that lists the fish life cycle names (eggs, sac fry, fry, fingerling, etc).  We had a lot of fun learning those together.  I also said I would follow Whitney where she would go, and she loved that.  It was totally fine to walk in random patterns, since, for some reason, the rest of the sane world was not outside in the wet during non spawning season.  Surprisingly there were some fish big enough to see in the profile, though.

We went to the lake, taking a path purely for the sake that I knew Tucker needed to get some serious energy out.  It turned out to be really fun because there was a stream on the side for them to splash in almost all the way down and back to the lake.  Tucker managed to fill up his boots again.  He doesn't seem to mind the wet and cold if it involves big splashes.  I wear my boots simply to protect myself from his big splashes.

Thing 2 in his bed.  Looks REAL comfy, right?

Whitney looking out on the lake while raining.  She decided it looked like snow

splashing in the creek

Whitney and Tucker both like to know what are things are girls and what things are boys.  Whitney tells me in no uncertain terms that girl cows have udders and boy cows (don't mind the cow thing meaning a girl) do not.  She can say all that very clearly and did so during church.  Good thing she has a quieter voice than Scott and Tucker.

Whitney also likes to snuggle her "girl pasauvas" raisins in a blanket of oatmeal.  I love this new game.  There is a lot less picking out of raisins only and a lot more eating of the actual oatmeal since this game began.

She has also come up with all sorts of observations about girls and boys. She comes up with this stuff all by herself.  She first started saying that "when I grow up I will turn into a mommy".  This has evolved to several other observations like "when I grow up I will turn into a mommy and visit the temple" (this last bit came from a conversation we had about how no one lives at the temple, only visits). Or "when I grow up I will turn into a Mommy and Mommy will turn into a Whitney". Sadly, yes, I'm sure I will have to yield my independence to her, but I decided to correct her observation and so now she says "when I grow up I will turn into a Mommy and Mommy will turn into a Grandma".  Today it finally transferred over to boys and her and Tucker were having multiple conversations about how "when Tucker grows up he will turn into a daddy and Daddy will turn into a Grandpa" using her cute "grampa" pronunciation.

Happy new year!

the most fun christmas so far.....

Man, this Christmas thing is really fun the more they get it.  Until they get demanding.  We had so much fun.

I've never done Christmas completely myself before.  We've always had family or friends to invite over, but never just us.  I've really been missing out.  I was worried about it being fun enough, but it was definitely fun.  The babies made it so fun.  We had so much fun watching them.

It started around 7 am.  Tucker has been falling asleep late the last three nights.  One night 9, the next 9:30, last night 10:00.  And of course he wakes up the same time every morning.  Around 7.  Since we waited for him to fall asleep to finish prepping, we got to bed late and I was hoping for a bit of sleeping in.  Nope.  This morning he turned on the light in his room and went and sat back on his bed.  I went in there when I saw the light go on.  Whitney needed more sleep and didn't even flinch with the light turning on.  I walked in and asked him, "Tucker, what are you doing awake?"  He looked at me and said " It's sunny outside".  This is their standard response to it's light enough to stay awake.  When they wake up in the night, I say they have to go back to bed because it's dark.  Anyway, I had to laugh, because it's not sunny here in the winter.  I opened the blinds for Tucker and asked him "Do you see the sun?"  The sky was only barely light enough to differentiate the sky from the trees, but only barely.  Still very, very dark.  He looked at me and said "I don't see it!" Whatever, we were awake. 

We were doing the usual morning routine in their room.  I acted like it was a normal morning until Jim got up.  When Jim came in, Tucker got all excited and said he wanted to watch Papa out the window.  Usually when he sees Daddy in the morning, it's only to see him off to work out the window.  So Jim explained he got to stay home this morning.  To Whitney he asked, "Whitney, do you want to see if Santa came?"  She said, Yeah, in her casual Whitney way, not really convinced Santa came and having no expectation for something exciting.  Then she walked in the living room.  Her face lit up and she laughed a bunch.  Then she looked at Jim, like, is this for real?  And laughed some more and ran over to check out.....  the doll house.  I told Jim I thought Whitney would really like a doll house about now and was looking at the smaller, plastic ones for toddlers.  Then Jim found this one and bought it.  It's pretty fun.  Both kids absolutely love it.

Jim stayed up to assemble it.  He had put all the furniture in it and even added a great touch of putting her Thing 1 doll in the bed.  That's what she saw when she walked into the living room.

My favorite part about this Christmas morning is how much fun we had opening presents.  They checked out each and every one.  We didn't even start opening presents for a half an hour because they were so busy playing with the doll house.  Whitney took her doll up the stairs, checked it all out.  Tucker liked sliding the couch down the doll house stairs.  I think my mother will laugh at this.  There is an iron and ironing board that came with the doll house.  Whitney has no idea what it is, let alone how to play with it.  We don't own an ironing board and when I iron on a rare occasion, I'm not sure she's been present for it.

Tucker also discovered the blanket on the bed is the perfect size to make a burrito with his Thing 2 doll.  He wrapped and unwrapped Thing 2 several times throughout the day saying " He wants a burrito.  He is tired".

The next exciting gift was the train set.  As soon as he got a bit of paper off and saw the Thomas train car, he could barely contain himself.  He was right there with Daddy setting it all up and played with it off and on most of the day. This train set also has some mechanical parts that he loves, like a plug to turn on a light and a coal chute that puts it in the train as it goes under. 

The other toy they enjoyed a bunch is the playdough ice cream shoppe. I was just looking for the play dough press that made spaghetti that I played with as a kid, but of course they don't sell simple toys like that any more.  It has to be cooler.  So I found the press idea in the ice cream maker.  But boy did we (me) have fun playing with it, making ice cream cones and brownies for daddy. 

It was so fun to have them play with each thing for a good long while before even wanting to open another gift.

To "wrap it all up" they helped me get the boxes ready for the recycle.  It all started because Whitney liked the popping noise the styrofoam I was breaking down.  It turned into an indoor snow globe in Jim's office that I'll be vacuuming up for months to come.  Next time you see the little tiny round bead in a styrofoam cup, think billions of those in our house.  But it was so funny to watch them play.

Styrofoam stuck to his eyelashes early in the game.  When it was all still in the box

THE doll house

Tucker holding Thing 2 in his burrito

We had a lot of fun today being together and watching them play.