Language arts

Faith: "I'm working on homoph.... at school."
Me: "What?"
Faith: "In languages, I'm working on homoph...."
Me: "Say that again."
Faith: "Homophones."
Me: "Homophones?"
Faith: "Homophones."
Me: "Homophobes?"
Faith: "Yeah. That's it."
Me: "In languages?"
Faith: "Yeah."
Me: "Do you mean 'homonyms'?
Faith: "Oh yeah. That's it. I get confused."
Me: "So do I."

A big milestone

Faith walked home on her own from school today for the first time! She was so proud of herself!

A guest post

I found this snippet that Faith typed out on our laptop:

Blake really wants mommy now he is playing ball with daddy. Now he wants mommy. now he is playing with daddy. Now he is peeing in the potty.

This pretty much sums up all our days.

Happy Valentine's Day

Here's the kids' attempt to make a human valentine. :) Lots of love to friends and family...and wishing you a little chocolate too!

My official two year old

Things that I want to remember about Blake being two:

As my friend said, "He's the politest two-year-old I know." This has nothing to do with us. Yes, his first word was "thank you", but it could just as easily have been "crap", "shit" or "beer". Now, whenever I do anything for him, he says, in the cutest toddler accent, "Thank you, Mummy." And, yes, he pretty much gets whatever he wants when he does this.

He kind of potty trained himself! (Also, thanks to the efforts of my fantastic babysitter.) He is now officially potty-trained. He is even dry at night! He does, however, like to "dump the pee", a delicate procedure that involves traveling from the living room to the bathroom with a potty seat of pee. This definitely requires adult supervision, something I discovered after a particularly messy attempt.

His favourite songs are Operator (by Shiloh) and Happy Birthday. He breaks into the chorus of Operator spontaneously at various points throughout the day... "Oprator! Oprator! Don call me i call woo later!" (Yes, Shiloh, ex-girlfriend of Joe Jonas. If you don't know who these people are, then you likely do not have tween girl in your household who has fallen prey to the Disney marketing machine.)

He's got moves. Dance moves. Lots of them. Yes, he looks like a little white boy when he dances, but he can pull this off at two. Not sure if it will get him too many women at 22 though.

He has seen the "Move it, move it" dance scene in Madascagar 2043 times in the last 6 weeks. (See the last point.) I was never so happy to have a sequel come out on DVD--"Move it, move it" in Madagascar 2 happens in the first few minutes instead of halfway through the movie.

His physical abilities have increased as his listening abilities have decreased. He climbs the stairs one foot per step, no hands on the rail! This gave me a heart attack the first time I saw it. He climbs, he jumps, he climbs again--on things he's not supposed to climb on, then falls...frequently.

He gives real kisses now. Not the open-mouthed, slobbery baby kisses but actual lip-smackers on the cheek. And, sometimes he'll grab both my cheeks and pull me in close to his face for a giggle fest, and a little kiss.

And, on really good days, he'll say "I love you."

Love you too, buddy!

Cute little animals

The kids and I spent some time watching this video that Papa sent them today. Faith lost interest after a bit, but Blake watched it out 5 times in a row. At that point, I clicked Replay and said, "Last time."

He promptly replied, "No last time, Mummy."

(Note to my brothers: This is not a training video for hunting practice)

Random list

We finally had Blake's birthday party last weekend, after he recovered from pneumonia (apparently a small case in his right upper lobe according to his xray).

Faith helped me get ready for the event. We made cupcakes and tried to tidy so people think we don't live like pigs on a day to day basis (even though we do). It all went well, including have lots of extra space now that our basement is done. Karen and I even played pool! And, miraculously I won due to a wayward eight ball.

So, after chili, cupcakes, and ice cream (also beer and wine), we declared another birthday party a success.

Anyway, I was doing some more cleaning this week (what's up with that?), and found a random list that Faith had written before the party, each item with a little checkmark beside it:

Blake's Birthday Party

• music
• cupcakes
• presents
• love
  

Cue melting hearts.