Wednesday, February 26, 2014

Conversations with Kids



Some of the best comedy comes from the cute, innocent things the kids say.  I find myself laughing so often at what they come up with, but then later forgetting what they said.  Here are a few of the tidbits do I remember, written down so I'll keep remembering:

Dylan:

Dylan has sunk to a whole new level of procrastinating bedtime. Every few minutes he sobs from his dark room, "daaddy, I hurt my toe! You tiss it?" And poor josh goes and kisses his toes. It's just genius.

Dylan is now potty trained.  So much so that he just goes by himself and doesn't tell me anymore. Then, he discards his clothes like a tiny nudist and goes about his day. Josh ran into a naked Dylan and asked, "Why are you still naked son? Go talk to your mother."
Dylan stomped over to me in the kitchen, his hands on his hips, in all his naked glory and bellowed a line from his favorite movie, The Incredibles, "Honey WHERE'S MY SUPER SUIT?" 

Josh made hot, gooey chocolate chip cookies. Dylan clamored for more. Josh moved to get up to take his plate to the sink at just that moment. Dylan began cheering, clapping and yelling, "thank you!!! I love daddy!!!" That was just more adoration than my husbands poor little heart could take. Dylan got his second cookie.

When I try to entice Dylan to eat or do something he doesn't want to eat or do, I use a lot of positive, descriptive adjectives.  It goes something like this:
 "Dylan, here try this delicious juicy chicken."
and he responds verbatium with a negative, "No, I don't want delicious juicy chicken."
"No? How about some cool creamy milk?"
 "NO, I don't want cool creamy milk!"
"Want to read a nice quiet book?"
"NO, I don't want a nice quiet book...."
 "Do you want an unhealthy chocolate cookie?"
"yes! I want unhealthy chocolate cookie!"
"Oh, well then you need to eat your delicious chicken first."
Well, you can imagine what he says to that.

Dylan is a spunky, obstinanate little soul. It's not that surprising. Two year olds aren't the easiest people to live with.  Except maybe Ryan at that age.  If I corrected Ryan, I could almost sing it, "No, no Ryan." and he would immediately stop, cease and desist.  Usually he responded with a polite "yes ma'am." When I tell Dylan to stop he looks away from me for a split second, debating.  Then he intentionally stares at me and repeats the offense.  A battle of wills ensues and ends up with me reigning down discipline and conesequenses. Sometimes he breaks things. I didn't think it was intentional, just something his creative little personality needed to figure out how things worked (until last night).  All our toys have survived in great shape under Ryan, but after Dylan we've had some casualities.  He broke our suction cup fishing rod--pulled the suction cup right off.  He bites the faces, feet, and tails off plastic animals.  He takes Josh's keyboard apart, including the keypads. He snapped our other fishing pole clean in half.  Yesterday I caught him nearly breaking another toy.  I told him gently but firmly, "No, no! We don't break it! that will break it! We need to be nice to our toys." He looked at me and for the first time when corrected, gave me a sweet smile and said in his tiny voice, "O-tay (okay) Mommy, I will not break it." I wanted to jump for joy.  Finally some fruit of obedience is beginning to show after many months of putting on the war paint! 


Ryan:


Ryan sneezed while we were doing school. Immediately after that he looked accusingly at me and said: "You know mom, when you make people do school they get allergic to you." My bad.

Ryan was discreetly picking his nose in the backseat of the car on the way to church.  Dylan knows this is BAD because he has been told many many times recently not to pick his nose. He lost no time trying to correct his brother. Except he has pronoun and negation problems, which is completely developmental right now. But Ryan didn't take too kindly to it. 
Dylan to Ryan: Stop picking my nose!
Ryan to Dylan: I'm NOT picking your nose!
Dylan: YES you NOT!
Ryan: NO I'm NOT
Dylan: Ryan! Stop picking MY NOSE!
Ryan (beside himself) I AM NOT PICKING YOUR NOSE!
Dylan: YES YOU NOT.
Ryan: NO!
Dylan: YES!
(well you get the picture. Repeat about 500X)

Sunday, February 23, 2014

Wishing for Spring

 It is certainly not spring yet, but our first significant thaw left most of us itching for it to get here NOW! Lucky for us we were able to take advantage of the "free" day offered by our local botanical garden and we were able to soak in the warm and the fragrance of the flowers.
 Like most boys, all of mine were pretty bummed to be going to see flowers and plants. So they were pleasantly surprised to see a super cool electric train set up complete with smoking volcano!



 After that little mood booster, Ryan became very interested in the pretty flowers and in taking pictures with me. 


 After a while, we were in for another little surprise.  We were each given a pebble in the bonsai tree garden to vote for our favorite bonsai tree.
 Then a little later, we ran into a cute little kids market   Ryan liked weighing the food and ringing up customers at the cash register.  Dylan liked pushing his little cart around and filling it with good things to "eat." 




 Although my biggest boy staunchly remained firm in the opinion that the botanical garden is like going to a giant boring zoo full of plants that don't do anything, for the rest of us, it was a very nice break from winter!

Monday, February 17, 2014

How to Survive Winter.

Yup. It's still winter out there.  It's still cold and white.  There's still a bunch of snow on the ground. There's so much snow, in fact, we are swimming in it. Literally. 
Some people, like Dylan, just really hate the snow. It's just too cold and wet. 
But some people, like Ryan, just love the snow.  When they go outside, they find a magical wonderland of happiness and delight. 

So today I have compiled some ways to survive winter, whether or not you love it or hate it. 

1. Dress warmly: Dressing for the weather makes a huge difference! So wear that stocking hat and mittens. Pull out that skii coat that makes you look like a giant walking marshmellow. You will have more fun that way. 

2. Even if you hate it, get your butt out there and make the best of it: You may actually have fun.  You may learn how to sled, or design an igloo or snow fort, or make snowmen or snow angels. 
3. Get creative! Build a giant straw maze and drink hot chocolate. 
 4. Pull out a favorite book or puzzle. 
 5. Paint a picture
 6. Hit up some fun indoor play-areas when cabin fever hits, such as the Children's Museum or the play-place at the local mall. 
 7. Engineer with legos. 


 8. Admire the length of the icicles. Remind your kids not to use them as swords.  
 9. Play with your dog. Just beacause it's a frigid -5 outside doesn't mean the puppy isn't stir-crazy. Go "knock some nerves out" as Ryan would say. 
10. Play a nice stimulating board game, like Checkers, or Candy Land, or Battle Ship. 

11. Make yourself a summer get-away in a box. Draw windows with trees, the sun, birds, green grass, etc. 
12.  Get some binoculars and check out the wildlife in your very own yard!
And if all else fails..... sit tight, wait for spring, and eat a LOT of chocolate. I hear it releases endorphins and let's face it, when those long winter days seem to last forever, we all need lots of those happy little things floating around in our bodies.