"Some Nights" by Fun. (by Lincoln and Daddy)

I posted this on Facebook, but in case you missed it there...here it is again. Lincoln says this is his current favorite song (replacing "Pumped up Kicks" by Foster the People...at least for now).

"Some Nights" by Fun.
Featuring Lincoln and Daddy

Things Lincoln Says

(I hope you are able to imagine him saying these in his own voice. Hilarious, this kid!)

"OK. Here's we going to do. We going to get all the monsters and wodats and say "GO AWAY!!!!"

"You pwease come help us, mama? Cause we doin' somfin' fun. You pwease pway wif us?"

"Da pumped up kids, bedder run bedder run"

"I all full, you see my big belly?"

"Dis is my special game. You pwease help me wif my special game?"

"Now let's go to da mine! It's my favorite. It's da hitting mine." (after watching the video about salt mines...)

In response to the mama who asked "What's your name?" at the play center: "Squirrel"

"I just doing wike dis..." (when we ask him what he is doing)

"Tell Bennett say "All done!"

"You want to pet my fwuffy tail? It's vewy soft!" (as the squirrel, of course)

"I sorry for doing dat" (when he thinks he is in trouble)

"Where (....) come from?" (today it was his belly, potty, chairs, and toilets)

"You wanna pway wif dis affer mama and I make a tower, Beddett?" (subbing after for while)

"How'd dat come from?" (meaning where'd that come from)

"Put it in a tuppaware and DON'T frow it away. And DON'T eat it. And DON'T give it to Wembwey." (whenever we ask him if he is done eating and he still has food leftover...)

A Day in the Life

This was an e-mail I sent to Lucas yesterday. He said I should post it as a blog entry. So, here it is. In case you were wondering, yes, we do have hard days around here ;)


here is our day thus far.

(Awwww, sweet brothers. The death grip means "i love you.")

6:58: MAMA! IT'S LIGHT OUTSIDE. I WANT TO GET UP. (Bennett is soooouuuunnnnnd asleep. He sleeps through this, and me yelling back to Lincoln to come into our room).

7:00: I manage to convince Lincoln to lay down with us until Bennett wakes up. I am amazed that he is actually under the covers and laying still.

7:04 We hear a strange ripping sound. I ask Lincoln to see what it is. He looks over the edge of the bed and yells "IT'S POOP! Wembley has a poopy diaper! Mama, get it."

7:05 We are all up now. Wembley is outside. I am cleaning up what is left of a poopy diaper from who knows when and where since bennett didn't poop yesterday. It is under our bed and the gel has all come out, so we are off to get the vacuum.

7:15 Our entire bedroom is now vacuumed, including using the hose attachment to vacuum under the bed. We decide to vacuum the entire house, since we are already vacuuming.

7:20 Bennett decides he is still tired and doesn't want to be up yet. I carry him during the rest of the vacuuming while Lincoln runs in front of me depositing pieces of lint he finds for me to vacuum up in front of the vacuum.

7:35 Done vacuuming. Then I find more places I missed, but Bennett is not having it. Lincoln has to poop.

7:40 Make Lincoln breakfast. He requests a show and I give in since Bennett is so grumpy.

7:45 Bennett poops. I go to change him and it's contained! A victory! I give him a toy to hold and take off the diaper. He flings the toy at my head and plunged both hands into the poop. I yell, "NOOOOO!" and try to move the diaper out of the way. He starts kicking and manages to get his whole leg in the diaper, so now he has poop from his ankle up to his pelvis. His hands are both covered in poop that he is now smearing on his stomach and he is beginning to reach for his head. I grab both of his hands, so now my hands are covered in poop, and try to begin to clean this mess and what's left of our dignity. Clean up ends, get the baby dressed, and go tell Lincoln I am putting Bennett down for his nap.

8:15 Bennett is asleep. I go find Lincoln, who is finishing his show and breakfast. We start playing the elevator game and get through 3 rounds before Bennett wakes up.

8:40 Bennett is awake. I was going to put him back to sleep, but Wembley decided to jump off the bed and shake instead. 

8:45 2 more rounds of elevator!

9:00 We decide to hang the pictures in the bathroom. Find the hammer, nails, and level and get it done. I am so excited because it was easy, no crying, and everyone is still happy.

9:10 Lincoln goes to put the level away while I straighten up the bathroom. Bennett follows him. The garage door slams and Bennett is screaming. I run out there and Lincoln is standing next to Bennett starting at him while Bennett pounds on the garage door. I ask Lincoln if Bennett's fingers got caught in the door. He says yes, but I determine they really didn't, Bennett was just upset he couldn't crawl around the garage. Lincoln is set on giving Bennett Thomas Ice (note: Thomas Ice is our ice pack for "owies") anyway, so we do.

9:20 Lincoln asks for second breakfast. I get him another bowl of cereal and raspberries, making this breakfast 2.5 since he also ate his own and half of mine earlier. Bennett and I play while he eats on the couch. 

9:28 Lincoln is done and asks to put his bowl in the sink. He spills the bowl and the rest of the milk in the kitchen before he gets to the sink and it splashes and now he has milk all over his face and hair. He is wailing, and I assume this is because of the milk everywhere. I help him clean it up and put his bowl in the sink and he is still crying and screaming something but I can't understand him. He finally calms down enough to say he wanted to carry the milk to the sink. I give him his bowl back and he screams nooooo, I was LOTS of milk to carry to the sink. Essentially, he wants me to pour new milk into his bowl to carry to the sink and dump out. Nope.

9:35 Tantrum over, we start the elevator game. Again.

9:45 I write this email while bennett plays and lincoln hangs from my neck. 

10:00 break while lincoln poops again.

10:10 We finish cleaning the bathroom. In the span of the 3 minutes it takes to vacuum, Lincoln manages to stuff the shower curtain into the tub 4 times. It is still in there since I got tired of fixing it. I try to put vacuum away but Lincoln insists he want to vacuum more. Bennett and I come to Living room and I start to finish this note. Lincoln vacuums about 30 seconds more then declares he is done and mama come put the vacuum away.

And that is how the first 3 hours of our day have gone.

I have a 3 year old!

Lincoln turned 3 years old last week. SOB. How did he get so old?? We celebrated his birthday with an Art birthday party a week earlier since having a birthday so close to Christmas can get hectic.

Our Art Party went something like this:

 Cherry Limeade birthday cake!

(a peek at the inside...drool...)

 Birthday boy--ate every last bite.

 All the kids painted their own canvas--everyone had his own unique style!

 I spy lots of glitter glue!

 Salt dough ornaments and a tape resist canvas drying.

 An unexpected party hit was this old fence board-turned balance beam. The adults had nothing to do with this set-up, it was entirely kid orchestrated :)

 When I said every kid painted a canvas, that was a lie. The birthday boy spent most of the party "mowing" our yard while wearing sound-proof headphones. I think the only paint he touched was at the car station...

 I forgot to take pictures of the kids actually doing art at the party (Bennett was fussy during most of it). These were pipe cleaner/bead candy cane ornaments.

 The aftermath from the canvas painting station--tempera paint, egg cartons, and sooo many paintbrushes.

 We dipped tennis balls in paint and threw them at the fence. Amazingly, only one made it into the neighbor's yard (where it will remain forever).

 This was a fun station--we dipped cars and trucks in paint and sent them down the ramp. This was even fun enough to attract the mowing birthday boy over for a few minutes.

Thanks to everyone who was able to come and celebrate with us! 

First Day of MDO

Lincoln started attending a Mother's Day Out program this fall. I was on the fence for a LONG time whether or not to enroll him in the program (waited so long in fact that we got the last spot in the class on the worst days--Monday/Friday, in case you were wondering. Why?  Because out of the school year, there are 6 Mondays and 6 Fridays on which there is no school (holidays...there are actually more days I didn't count, but they are enveloped in Christmas and Spring Break, and thus affect everyone, not just the M/F peeps). That's 12 days of school we pay for that we don't get to attend.  We switched our days to Monday/Wednesday (thanks to whichever family dropped out of Wednesdays, thus opening a spot for Lincoln!) and automatically have 6 extra days of school. Cha-ching!) End rambling.

Anyway, I readied myself to cry for days on end once school started (my baby! he's too little! *sob*), and then somehow, miraculously managed to hold it together. Nary a tear was shed, by either mama or the little guy. I think it helped that he was SO excited for school--how could I be sad when he was literally sleeping with the thermos we bought him for his lunches because he loved it so much? 

Morning of:

These pancakes started off as blueberry, but became blueberry chocolate chip, because who can deny their first born child chocolate chips on the first day of school? If I'd had whipped cream, and he had asked for it, you better believe I would've piled it on...

First day of school picture!  Backpack, thermos, and lunchbag, check!

Lincoln headed straight for the monster trucks when we got to the classroom.  He looked a little worried when we left, but he did fine!

I made Lincoln a napmat, since they take naps at mother's day out. Wodats! I was really doubtful that Lincoln would do any actual sleeping on this napmat...the way it works, all the kids lay down on their mats on the floor next to each other and somehow go to sleep. When I went to pick him up on the first day, I was blown away because every single kid in that room was sound asleep. How in the world???

Lincoln was so sound asleep when I picked him up the first day that every other child had picked up their mats, packed their backpacks, and left the room. I had to wake him up, and he was soooo groggy. School wore him out! Highlights of the day:  exercise ("I do a pull-up!), singing songs, and using his new napmat.

So, there we go.  My baby is growing up. 

Green Smoothies

Lincoln is waaaaay into samoovies (smoothies).  We make them for lunch at least 3 times a week.

The process:

• Lincoln wakes up from nap saying, "Mama, let's go make a samoovie! Need all da inbredients!"
• We run to the kitchen and get out the blender and Lincoln's stool.

• We add all our "inbredients":  this particular one has frozen strawberries, pineapple, and mango, blueberries, raspberries, spinach, a tiny bit of lemonade, and water.

• Blend it up!  It's gonna be a widdle woud! (Lincoln runs into the other room at this point while I blend).

•  Enjoy your samoovie!

(Note:  our blender is a Kitchen Aid 5 speed.  It works great for what we blend--we do have tiny flecks of spinach, though.  Doesn't bother us, but just fyi.  It was either tiny flecks of spinach or spend Lincoln's college savings on a Vitamix.  Flecks it is!)

Balance Bake Makeover

A few months ago, I scored a sweet deal on a balance bike for Lincoln on Craig's List.  These babies run for around $100 new...I got Lincoln's for $30.  Bam!  As you can see...it was a tad on the girly side.  Lincoln surely didn't mind, nor did I, but we decided that we'd ask Lincoln if he'd prefer a different color and use that to gauge if we should paint it or not (note: we were painting it anyway...Lucas said it was way too girly...I was just trying to play it like we were all about the gender neutrality.  You know, progressive parenting and such.  Which we totally have no problem with at all.  Just so you know, we would have let him keep it purple if he wanted.  He chose orange.)

 Lucas took the entire bike apart and taped it up real careful-like, then broke out the spray paint.  Orange!  Orange wheels!  Orange seat!  Orange splash guards (you know, for toddler off-roading...)! The swirls and crowns were just stickers, so we peeled them off.  The handle bars are rubber, so they remained purple.  Orange and purple!  They totally go together!

 (yep, that's a dead hydrangea.  It's dry here.  Watering restrictions dry.  Worst drought ever, they say.  As in EVER--since they started keeping weather records ever.  We need rain.)

Lincoln picked out the helmet himself.  I showed him the whole page of options, secretly hoping he would pick the black helmet with "DANGER" emblazoned in red across the front.  For obvious reasons.  He went with the white one with stripes.  Three times (I really pushed the danger one...) in a row.  So, white stripes it was.  Lucas says I should have made him "choose" the danger one.  Eh.

He likes it!  "I'm gonna wide my bike!  Mama, put my helmet on.  Mama, put the kickstand up.  Mama, pome (come) wif me!"  We're still working on the independent riding thing...

My Tenderhearted Boy

Lincoln is constantly amazing us with his huge heart.  He is such a fantastic big brother to Bennett.  As soon as Lincoln sees Bennett in the morning, he says "Bennett happy?  He smiling?".  He always makes sure Bennett has a toy or something to look at when he is in the bouncy chair or on his lambskin rug.  

When Bennett is crying, Lincoln tells us to "make Bennett happy!"  

On Sundays, Lincoln goes to the "class" while we are in the service.  Towards the end of service today, my friend Annette brought Lincoln into the service to us.  He had been crying (very unlike him) and Annette said he wouldn't let any of the teachers pick him up or tell them what had happened.  They said he was pointing to another boy in the class, but they weren't sure why.  The first thing he said to me was something about Bennett's pacifier (which was in my purse, so I was confused...).

Eventually, we determined that he was telling us that "a fwend (the boy in his class) took baby Beddett's pasafidet".  Our guess is that the boy must have had a pacifier and Lincoln thought he had taken it from Bennett.  This upset him so much that he just broke down into tears. (*disclaimer...we aren't for sure that is what happened, but that is what Lincoln kept telling us...).

I just know that Lincoln and Bennett are going to be best friends.  Lincoln already watches out for his baby brother.  They are both the sweetest boys I know.

Answers and the Ward Family Band

Sooo, apparently the game was much easier than I anticipated.  Everyone who guessed got the answers correct.  And I even tried to pick the pictures where they looked the most alike!  :)

I've been working on uploading videos to Youtube.  We have quite a backlog, so I'll try and link to a few a week to catch up.  First up:  The Ward Family Band, featuring Lincoln on drums and Lucas on guitar.  Watch and you can say "you knew them when..."

Budding Photographer

Recently, I've been trying to show Lincoln some techniques for taking pictures that don't involve placing the lens directly on his eyeball (a favorite of his!). We practice pushing the "big button" on top (he used to just push power over and over again...), holding the camera with arms out, and asking the subject to smile! The whole "smile" thing is really for my benefit...it is HILARIOUS to watch him run around saying "stile wedy! stile towch! stile ball! stile bwocks!" (translation: wembley, couch, and blocks). :)

Photo #1: "self portrait of the artist as a (very) young man"

Photo #2: "Mama" (he was attempting to take a picture of me...)

Photo #3: "Bugs and Shoe"

Photo #4: SMILE WEDY!!!!

Photo #5: "Fog"

Photos #6-9: the following are a series entitled "James--a Study"

Photo #10: "Thank you for admiring my work"

The Kid is Two!!!

Two years ago today, this guy joined our family:

One year ago today, we celebrated his first anniversary on this earth:

Today: he is turning two. TWO. I can't really handle that. At all.

In the past few months, Lincoln has morphed into some kind of miniature human (crazy, I know). He is talking ALL the time--in phrases, even! He understands us. He follows directions (when he wants to, of course). And all this, too:

• Kicks, throws, and rolls a ball. Or, specifically, a "sahwpah" (football...)
• Makes requests for songs for Lucas to sing as he falls asleep at night. We are still trying to figure out what song "bus" is...but whatever it is, he is very dismayed that we don't know it.
• Names all his colors--red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, pink, gray, white, black, brown.
• Can identify almost all his letters, and name over half of them.
• Pretend play is really starting to emerge. He makes roads with his blocks, pretends to "eat" pictures of food, feeds his toys, makes toys into phones, sweeps the carpet and floor in the living room, drives his cars all over the house, and makes airplanes and helicoptors out of anything.
• He says "bus" instead of "buff." sigh. I miss "buff."
• A few times, he has actually asked for bath and bed. I think they may have been flukes.
• He is soooo polite. He says "thank you mama" and "thank you daddy" for almost anything--handing him his cup, putting his shoes on, picking up the toy he dropped...it is enough to melt you and make you do almost anything he asks...
• Sleeping through the night....how we miss you! It has been about 2 months since Lincoln has made it all night through.
• He is way into the Hokey Pokey--and is pretty good with the actions!
• A common phrase: "Wedy, STOP!" (that's "Wembley," our dog. Lincoln tells him to stop no matter what he is doing. Barking? Wedy, STOP! Licking his hands? Wedy, STOP! Standing too close to the table? Wedy, STOP!). Note: yes, he is actually using the S-blend :)
• He loves to cook--requests at least once a day to "mis?" (mix).
• Has some great concepts knowledge: big, little, hot, cold, wet, soft, on, off, open, close, up, down.
• "Ohdat"-open that
• "no no no no toush!" Usually says this after we tell him not to touch something, like an outlet, hot stove, or scissors. He is fascinated with all 3.

There is so much more. I think I'll try and break it up into more posts, because this could get out of control...

We celebrated today with some of Lincoln's favorite things! Dodos for breakfast (that's donuts...yes, we live in Texas). Lincoln had a sprinkle donut and tried his best to handpick each sprinkle off to eat. It is quite a process.

He got to watch a bit of his new favorite movie (Robots!) followed by the unveiling of his new train table and trains (been waiting since June to give these to him...so exciting!). After prying him away from the trains, we took him to lunch followed by a nice nap in the car while we drove around (and then sat in the driveway until he woke up...). After nap commenced almost 3 straight hours of train table play. Never got old! When we broke for dinner (his favorite-mac and cheese), he wanted down to go "see dat choochoo?" We had to cover the train table with a sheet tonight before bed in order to peel him away for sleep (it is in his room...).

side note: a strange coincidence with turning 2, Lincoln has started speaking in sentences nearly over night. Literally. Yesterday, he might have said "Mama? Help?" Today, he looked at me and said, "No, Mama do it please." Other new phrases heard today: "Daddy frow (throw) it," "Where Hawoud (Harold...as in the helicopter) go?," "Heddy (Henry...as in the train) push dat." Crazy.

Lincoln and Lucas getting ready to blow out the candles on their shared birthday cake (Lucas' birthday is tomorrow) :)

Happy Birthday, Linc Linc! We love you, and can't wait to see what this year holds!

Smile!

Lincoln recently learned how to "smile" for the camera. He actually gets really excited about it, which then makes me laugh, resulting in blurry pictures more often than not. Below is a sampling of some of his best camera smiles:

Double the cuteness factor by adding footed pajamas. It is foolproof.

One more, because you just can't get enough of footed pajamas. True statement.

This got uploaded accidentally, but I am leaving it here anyway. It makes me smile :) He used up the entire tube of lipstick, but kept it all on the tile. Clean-up time was less than 3 minutes. Thank you, mr. magic eraser!

Smile + Yogurt Face=cuteness

Cheese!

Smiling so big he can't even keep his eyes open.