Happy Halloween! Happy Birthday!

It's Halloween - Oct 31st and it's my 31st birthday. What a great combination! I've already had two parties this week - one for my German friends and one for my American friends (those with kids around Benjamin's age). And now I still have my actual birthday to celebrate and go trick-or-treating on and tomorrow Kelly and I are going out to dinner! Do I know how to draw out the festivites or what!? I love it.

Here are a few pics of my parties. We had a Baskin Robbins ice cream cake - 31 flavors, get it? :) We decorated cookies and I read a kids' story in which the main character is a mummy for Halloween, so we made ourselves into mummies with toiletpaper. That was a lot of fun.








Also, I never posted the pictures of our trip to the zoo a couple weeks ago. We went down to the Toledo zoo and met up with some friends who were in town from Utah. Thanks guys for the great pictures! Benjamin's favorite animals in the zoo were the statues. I guess if the real lions let you crawl all over them, he'd like those too.

Singing in the Rain

It rained most of the afternoon yesterday, so we did what Benjamin likes to do best - little finger plays to songs and rhymes. However, I finally thought to use my camera and save some of these little gems for posterity. Because I think he's adorable, I decided to post them. Enjoy them. By the way, this is all him - there was no prompting from me behind the camera.

Itsy Bitsy Spider:



Where is Thumbkin? and Three Little Monkeys:



Popcorn Popping:



We've also been working with Isabella on sitting. She's decided rolling just isn't for her, but I noticed she's always trying to pull herself up, so I thought maybe we'd skip a milestone. Sure enough, she loves to sit. She's wobbly, but does quite well. We put a boppy behind her to catch her when she gets tired and she's seems much happier. Benjamin likes to take her sock off and do "This little piggy" with her. Of course, his limited vocabulary has turned this entire rhyme into "Wee wee wee home. Wee wee wee home" over and over again.


Here she is preparing for the fun holidays coming up - one in her Halloween costume and another in a Christmas outfit from grandma that I thought she should wear now because she's likely to be too big at Christmas.

He's a Hugger

Quick adorable story: I was in Isabella's room putting something away while Benjamin played in the kitchen. Suddenly I heard Benjamin running from the kitchen screaming, "Hug!" He thought I was in my bedroom so he ran past her room at full speed, his arms outstretched, right into my room. Then he discovered where I really was, so he turned back around, screamed "Hug!" again and ran into Bella's room, where he threw himself against me and wrapped his arms around my legs in a big bear hug. It doesn't get any better than that.

Farm Livin' is the Life for Me!

My German mom's club visited Three Cedars Farm this week. All the kids had a great time. Nothing beats feeding goats, riding on tractors - both real and not, and sliding down slides coming out of the side of a barn. My favorite part was when Benjamin discovered that the toy tractor's pedals were just a bit too far away for his feet, so he just started randomly jumping into the carts attached to the bigger kids' tractors. Luckily they all seemed okay with the idea of a 30 pound passenger.



When he got tired of that, mom is always available too, of course. Poor little Isabella. It wasn't until my friend sent me this picture that I realized how contorted she was! She never made a sound! She was just happy to be coming along!


We also went to a little buddy's third birthday this week. His mom did a great job - great healthy but yummy food, games, crafts, etc. I took notes for next year. The kids had a great time. I knew it had been a good party when after a few hours I discovered Benjamin was missing and I found him upstairs all alone in the birthday boy's bed, tucked under his blanket. He was worn out! :) I wonder if he would have fallen asleep if I hadn't come in! Benjamin? - nah! probably not.

A Train!

I just had to write this little story that I'd forgotten about until now. I went to Milwaukee last weekend to visit some friends. One night we were at a restaurant next to some train tracks. A train passed by as we ate and as soon as I realized what the rumbling noise was, I jumped out of my seat and rushed to the window. There was one other in our group that also has a son. She also jumped at the same moment I did and we both stood at the window for a minute or two exclaiming excitedly, "A train! Look - it's a train!" Then it hit me - Benjamin is hundreds of miles away, I'm a grown woman out with my friends, and I'm jumping up and down in front of a window because a simple freight train is passing by. "WHAT are we doing?" I asked my friend and she started laughing with me at the realization that having a son changes you forever and there's just nothing you can do about it. I have to admit, I was mildly embarrased, but at the same time, I thought how fun it was that Benjamin has helped me to find joy in some very ordinary things. It was just a shame he wasn't there - he would have loved it - it was a very long train.

The Results Are In!

All blog entries, regardless of topic, should start with adorable pictures like this, don't you think?

Anyway, on to the entry. We did some taste tests with Isabella today. Results: rice cereal - yucky, foot - yummy! Babies. Go figure. I finally decided to enter the next stage of life with Isabella and attempt solid foods. I tearfully bid farewell to the simple infant meal plan and dug out the baby spoons and bowls again. Just like Benjamin, Bella was less than enthused by the new cuisine. Every last bit of it got spit right back onto her bib and each bite was accompanied by an expression of disgust.


Yet, despite this, later in the day, during a diaper change, she discovered what a delicious treat her toes can be and sucked away delightedly. I think tomorrow I'll try putting the cereal on her toes and see what happens.


The great thing about Isabella, though, is that despite being forced to eat yucky rice, she ended the experience with a grin.


Cute Benjamin moment: Benjamin is learning new words all the time and it's been such a delight to hear him begin to speak. The other current adventure is potty training. Not such a delight. He's far away from getting it, but we've convinced him to start pooping in the bathroom (stil in his diaper), rather than wedged behind the couch or under the table. Yesterday he began grunting in the kitchen. I told him to go to the bathroom. He obediently went in and shut the door, but then realized that there was no light on in there and he can't reach the switch. "Help! Sun! Mama! Help! Sun! Please!" I turned on the light for him and got a "Danke!" and a big smile. Then he shut the door in my face and continued his business. :)

Sorry these are so small and hard to see - camera phone AGAIN - but I thought these pics of Benjamin on the firetruck were cute. There was a firetruck at a fall festival we went to recently and he spent over an hour inside. Yet, what did he choose as his Halloween costume? Police Man. The mind of a 2 year old is an interesting place.

Happy October!

I am so happy it's October. I will miss the warm weather and the BEAUTIFUL summer we had this year, but October means my birthday is almost here and I'm so excited! I don't know why but no matter how much older I get, I still love to celebrate my birthday. I have the kids' Halloween costumes ready - Benjamin picked his out himself - and I've got party plans and ideas already swirling around in my mind. It's going to be so fun. (No - Kelly's suit is not his costume.)


Benjamin is in gymnastics right now and he and I love it. He's amazingly strong and coordinated and it's so fun to watch him have so much fun and feel so proud of his accomplishments. He loves to come home and keep practicing - summersaults, handstands, cartwheels, etc. Every curb or log becomes a balance beam. A dad at the playground yesterday said, "Is that little blonde boy your son? He's a little monkey! He's amazing!" Aw, shucks. :)

On another note, the universe has it out for my car. I was sitting in the living room reading with Benjamin while Isabella napped, when I heard a loud crash in the garage. Upon inspection, we discovered our bike stand had come detached from the wall and the 2 bikes and the stand had fallen onto my car, severely denting and scratching it in various places. I won't even go into what happened to the bikes and the stand! Alas, this time I'm NOT counting it as an accident! I was definitely not at fault! :)


Isabella has her first cold right now. The poor little girl sounds like a little pig snorting and sniffing. The upside is that it's made her sleepy and she's finally been taking longer naps! :)


That's really it around here. Boring, I know. Mostly I'm just trying to sift through all the mumbo-jumbo and decide who to vote for next month. I keep flip-flopping. If anyone has a strong opinion one way or another, I'd love to hear your reason. I'd really like to feel good about a candidate for once and stop simply voting for the "better of the two evils."

(Yes, I know the pictures have no relevance to the text. I just had these cute pictures and wanted to share them. In case you're wondering, there are beans in the exersaucer because we had been bowling with cans and I wanted them out of the way. We really don't usually store our food in the kids' toys.)