Like Father, Like Son

Nicholas is such a smooth talker.  I have received the following compliments this week:

"Mom, I like your hair.  It is not wet."

"Mom, I like your eyes.  They are very open."

"Mom, I like you.  You are very big.  I'm so glad you're big."

Of course, he also pulls out his favorites.  These tend to get him what he wants.

"Mom, I love you sooooo much!!!"

"Mom, we are best friends."

"Will you play with me?  Please! Please! Please!"

"Mom.  I just neeeed you!"

Nicholas has stopped taking naps most days.  This smooth talker pops out of his room and always has an excuse.

"But Mom, I just want to do good things."

"Is it play time yet?"

"Mom, I missed you."

Do You Want to Shake My Hand? (aka Easter in July)

Nicholas saw a Mickey where they hunted for Easter eggs this week.  He begged me for two days to dye Easter eggs.  I finally gave in on Friday.  We spent the whole morning dying eggs and then hiding them in the backyard.  I was hoping to have hard boiled eggs for lunch, but the six eggs I let him dye were pulverized by the time we were done.  During the hot afternoon, we hid plastic eggs filled with raisins and fruit snacks.  Lexi loved all the plastic eggs scattered throughout our house. 

Highlights of the Week

I'm glad this week is over.  Joseph has been gone.  Lexi has been cranky, needy, and DIFFICULT to get to sleep.  Nicholas has been Nicholas.  I have had a kid with me round the clock to keep me company.  I'm really looking forward to Aunt Mary's visit.  We are counting the days!!!  I am one burnt out Mama!  I don't mind being Mama.   I just  need a break from being a full time playmate to a two year old!!

 We visited Nichols Park and played in the sandbox.

 We made snake bubbles.  This was really a lot of fun and super easy to do.  It entertained Nicholas for a whole hour.

Nicholas and I made cupcakes for the USA's birthday and gave them to our neighbors.

We didn't go to any fireworks because Joseph was working.  Maybe next year.

Pedicure is Nicholas' new favorite game. Anything to keep him entertained!!  I let him pick the fingernail polish to do his toes.  He chose Raspberry sparkles.  His sparkle toes help him run faster and jump higher.  I told Joseph it is a good thing too, because when the other boys come to beat him up he better be able to get away fast!!

Lexi's new hobby is picking carpet strands out of our carpet and then trying to eat them. She then chokes and empties the entire contents of her stomach on to my floor and then cries.  I don't love this new game.  

Lexi crawled today for the first time!!!  She is now really good at sitting up all by herself.  She isn't a baby anymore and that makes me sad.

Best Nicholas Story of the Week:  Nicholas always has a hard time going to bed.  He comes out once or twice after we put him to bed.  We put a bunch of glow-in-the-dark planets, dinosaurs, and stars up on his ceiling to give him something to look at as he falls asleep.  He was laying in bed looking up at his ceiling and trying to create an appropriate story/reason why he needs to get up.  This week he came up with the following:  "Mom.  A dinosaur almost came down and fell on my head, but it didn't.  Then it did its potties and its potties almost fell down on my head and that is my story."  This story bought him five extra minutes up and a drink.

Today as I was putting him down for his nap, Nicholas suddenly left the room in the middle of our story.  I yelled, "Hey, where are you going?"  He yelled back, "I just need to go.  I'll be right back."  I waited like three minutes for him and then went to get him.  I found him ridding our exercise bike with his fireman hat on.  He looked so shocked when he saw me.  He told me, "Mom.  What are you doing in here?  You were suppose to be waiting for me in my puppy bed?"  He looked completely surprised that I had disobeyed his orders.

Nicholas is really smart.  The other day he told me, "Lexi spit up there on her left knee."  He was completely right.  The only time I really question his intelligence is that he answers EVERY single question at the end of Diego wrong.  I don't know if he thinks it is funny or what.

Highlights of the Week

JOSEPH:

• FINISHED HIS 3RD YEAR OF MEDICAL SCHOOL ON FRIDAY
• His ear has not fallen off despite looking like it wants to!! In fact, he has started to hear a little out of his right ear.  When he was mowing the lawn he said it sounded like static.  He hopes to get back to hearing as well as before the surgery, and much better after the next surgery.

MAREN

• I made a big celebratory dinner after Joseph's last test on Friday.
• I haven't gone completely crazy being stuck inside with a two year old and an infant.  

LEXI:

• Lexi is almost crawling.  She gets up in crawling position about 50 times a day but then just plops back down to do her army crawl when she actually wants to get anywhere.
• She got into a sitting position all by herself on Friday.
• Lexi FINALLY started to do well at eating her rice cereal.
  She started using her binkie!!!  Yeah.  I know I will regret it when we have to take it away, but right now the binkie is a blessing!
  We have been spending lots of time at home and in our backyard.  It is getting too hard to do most outings because Lexi really needs to get two good naps during the day.  Nicholas doesn't mind the fact that we don't go that many places, but I'm super stir crazy.  The 100 degree weather hasn't helped our efforts to get out.  We have been spending lots of mornings and nights jumping on the tramp.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

NICHOLAS:

• Nicholas is at that wonderful stage where he thinks parents can do anything they want.  He really wants us to help him build an airplane.  Paper airplanes, cardboard airplanes, or model planes just won't do.  He wants a yellow airplane with a front and a backseat.  It needs lots of buttons, two wings, and the ability to fly "super fast."  Nicholas needs to wear his Spiderman goggles when he flies it.  He is willing to take people to the beach or grandma's house once he gets his airplane.  No amount of talking will convince him this isn't doable.  He says we will build it out of "missing pieces" and he has drawn us lots of maps about where to find these "missing pieces."  He has also found about 55 cents under the bed and in the couch and that money will pay for his airplane.  I told him you have to go to school for a long time to learn how to build an airplane and that Mama and Papa went to school and learned something besides how to make airplanes.  I also told him that Grandpa Wells went to school for a long time and he only learned how to make it so pilots can talk to other people from their planes.  He told me, "Don't worry Mom.  I will take my phone and you will take your phone and then we can talk to each other."  I wonder why Grandpa didn't think about that?:)  It is so sad to hear his little whines all day, "But Mom, I really need an airplane."  Despite all our discussions, Nicholas' aspirations have only gained strength and now he also wants a spaceship.
• They are digging up our street and repaving it.  I took Nicholas out to see all the noisy machines and he got scared.  He made me hold him and then he insisted we go back inside.  When we got back in he announced in the cutest little voice, "Whoa, that was a close one."
• I read a blog post about how to keep your kids quiet without toys and treats in sacrament.  We decided it was time for Nicholas to start learning how to behave reverently without a lot of entertainment.  I would have never thought this day would be possible.  From age 14 months to 27 months, we would bring a huge bag with tons of toys and a seven course meal and still he would have to be taken out.  A few months ago we weaned him down to a sticker book, one treat, one toy, and the iPad.  Now we are down to one small magna-doodle toy and two warnings before he gets to go have a special time out with Papa.  He has done amazingly well for the past two weeks.  I have tried to be super strict, reverent, and completely no fun.  Changing my behavior has probably helped the most with changing his behavior.  
• Two Sundays ago in our desperate attempts to entertain Nicholas, Joseph invented a treasure hunting game.  Nicholas sleeps in my old day bed, which we put on risers so we could store a bunch of boxes underneath it.  Joseph pulled some of the boxes out and had Nicholas climb back there to retrieve all the stuff that has fallen back there over the months.  Nicholas had so much fun that Joseph started dropping extra stuff back there for him to retrieve.  It was such a popular activity that I removed most of the boxes from under the bed and made him a little fort.  He loves to find treasures in his fort.  Today to get him dressed for church I dropped all his clothes behind the bed and he went and searched for what he wanted to wear.  
• Nicholas loves the trampoline.  It is great to wear him out, but we have to work to keep him hydrated.
• Tonight during prayers I asked Nicholas who we are talking to when we say our prayers. Nicholas thought about it and then smiled and said, "Elvis."  We haven't stopped laughing yet, nor have we figured out where he even heard the name Elvis since we've never mentioned it that we recall.  It makes us wonder what is going on in nursery.
• He loves to tell stories.  They always start with "once upon a time" and have a mean, big, fire-breathing dragon named after someone in our family.