Why do they give me their cutest smiles...

when they're doing something naughty?

Whenever I ask my mom for parenting advice, she always says, "I wasn't a great mom, I just had great kids." Well, I know her kids well enough to know that that isn't the truth, but whatever, that's why we love her. I think she honestly believes it (and I think that THAT is why she had "great" kids). Anyway, just some thoughts I've had lately... I believe in consistency with parenting. Every time they do something that they shouldn't be doing, something must be done- even if it's a really small, "don't do that," and move on, you gotta do something. Is there an exception, though, when they're doing that something together, and enjoying each other's naughty-as-it-may-be company and laughing uncontrollably, a laugh you can NEVER get too much of? Like, pulling all of the Q-tips out of the box, or clothes out of the drawers, or taking too long to get to the car because they're looking at something (but mostly just annoying mom)? I'm leaning towards letting them do the small things if bonding is the reward, stopping anything permanently damaging or dangerous. But is that just teaching them that if they're having fun together they can get away with anything? And is there really anything wrong with that? Anyone care to shed some light?

the boy

Ethan is a boy. He likes to throw things. We work on it daily to only have him throw balls. As longs as it's a ball that he's throwing, I try not to get mad- even if it's directed at the tv or Kate or myself. I redirect and move on. When he's being playfully naughty, he likes to fake me out and throw the ball towards something that he knows is naughty- into a body of water, the tv, me, etc. This week in church, his playful-naughty-fake-throw was directed at the nice old lady sitting, in her wheelchair, behind us in church. I was too mortified to see how she reacted.

25 months

• Kate still calls Ethan, "E.E," except for when she's mad at him. Then it's E-tan man (we call him that sometimes). I guess it's his full name.

• Cause we don't want Mr. and Mrs. "toe-head" tracking their dirt all over the house...
• They've definitely had a harder time adjusting to the changes than I realized they would. We're working through it. At first, they wanted to bring their blankies with them everywhere. I've convinced them to reconsider and bring their favorite toy, instead. Ethan always brings Lightening McQueen and Tow Mater and Kate always brings Sleeping Beauty (or seeping booty) and Belle.
• This morning Kate told her dolly she was going to change her diaper "real quickie."
• When they hear a sound they don't recognize, they ask, "what's that noisy?"
• Last night, they saw lightening and heard thunder for the first time (that they were really aware of). They thought it was so cool
• Kate loves things that are "teeny tiny." When we're looking for rocks, she finds the teeny tiny ones. She likes to eat teeny tiny bites. And she lifts up her shoulders and eyebrows and whispers, "teeny tiny." It's usually followed by "oh, cute."
• I learned why it is that Ethan doesn't like to eat. I don't know why it took me so long, cause my brother, Matt, has the same problem. I could never understand it myself, but it's that eating is boring. So... during lunchtime and dinnertime (he's usually hungry enough to eat breakfast), I become the entertainment. I sing. I dance. I taunt him and tell him that he better not eat one more bite, or I'll tickle him. The chicken dances. The BBQ sauce sings. Lightening McQueen takes a bite. Now, he eats. A lot. If my teenage self could see me now...
• Instead of saying "mine," they say, "my's." Like mommy's, daddy's, my's. Makes sense.
• When things match, they say, "same. same." Ethan was thrilled this morning that they were wearing matching flip flops. He was dancing around, saying "same same."
• "whassat?" all. day. long.
• The Foot Book by Dr. Seuss is Kate's favorite book. She can read it all by herself but would prefer if I read it to her.
• Ethan's current favorite is Trains, Cranes, and Troublesome Trucks (a Thomas the train book), but his changes a lot
• If I ask them where something is, they say, "I 'o know. Mayme..." and then fill in a possible location, like their room, the car, or my bag.
• They like their milk "nice and warm." After baths, they get "nice and dry" and then put on their pjs and get "nice and cozy." Yep, it's 1920 in our house.
• If Kate would hold Ethan's hand everywhere they went, Ethan would be the happiest boy in the world.
• We went to the Aquarium this weekend. It was such a cool aquarium. Ethan was in heaven, but he was also all business. I think this boy likes fish.
• The other day at lunch, I asked if they wanted a fork or a spoon, they both said, "both."

Don't judge the mac 'n cheese. At least there's peas in there.

Survival

Celebrating a beautiful victory...Finding new places to play with trains Enjoying an Easter egg hunt Accessorizing, even indoors

Note: That's a red pepper sticker on her shirt. I honestly do not know how she got it, but it cracked me up when I saw it on her shirt.

No words

I kinda go in streaks where I take a lot of videos. We're in one of those streaks.

So, watch 'em. Don't watch 'em. Whatever suits your fancy

Day 3 of the drive. Time to break out the good stuff. Turns out, there are benefits to

never giving your children candy. When you do, it goes a looong way.

Editor's note: A couple weeks ago, Kate found a plate of french fries. She was so excited.

She carried 2 around with her (after eating quite a few, I'm sure) and was doing this dance.

I asked if she was doing the french fry dance. She thought that sounded good and said,

"yeah." Since then, she'll do the french fry dance on command. She knows we think it's cute.

I've been singing to them sing they were born (poor things) and they've never sung along.

Never. Rarely would they even do motions back to some basic songs that even newborns

can do. So, about a month ago when one day they just started singing songs, I was shocked.

They sing probably 20 songs, and know every word and action. I don't really know what

happened- it's like they learned them over night. I'm not complaining, I love it, let's just

hope they get their father's voice.

We love the way Ethan says "mo-cYYYcle." We know that with how much

attention we give him for it, he'll stop soon, so I wanted to get it on video.

And for some reason, I thought this video was pretty cute. Really shows

his low-key personality.

No, we don't yet know what we're doing with our lives.

We do know that a brand new SuperTarget is a wonderful thing.

I also don't know why blogger decided to switch fonts on me mid-post

or why the format is so weird.

I do know that I hate blogger and I can't wait to get back to my computer.

why they share a room...

The kids are napping. About an hour into their nap, Ethan starts to cry. They usually nap for about 2 hours, so this leads me to seriously think about crying myself. All of a sudden, I hear Kate's voice. "It's okay. E.E. It's okay. Go night night."

Silence.

Happy Easter

Let's Go Duke!

So... Texas

I figured I should wait till after April Fool's Day to post about this because it is hardly believable, even to me. We are in Texas right now. Houston, to be exact. Greg's law firm opened up an office here and we thought we'd check it out. We've always talked about Texas as a future landing site for our family. It's cheap. Nice neighborhoods. Good schools. But, let's be honest, it's Texas. And we LOVE California, the weather, the people, being close to family, and to be honest, Greg loves his job. So, we're here for a month and who's to say what one month from now will bring? We may be high-tailing it out of here (not really high-tailing it- the 3 day journey back isn't a fun one), we may be here for the long haul. Only time will tell. Either way, it's a good opportunity for us to check out what everyone is talking about.

A few things have surprised me about Texas

• people say "ma'am" a lot
• people here smoke A LOT more than in California (I only say more than California because I don't know if California is the outlier or Texas)
• the churches (of all religions, it seems) are HUGE and on like 5 acres of land with baseball diamonds and playgrounds. The first one we saw we thought was a high school. Nope. Grace Church of Christ
• the Eastern side of Texas is very green and quite beautiful
• Junior Mints aren't popular here. I've bought TWO boxes that were stale. How does a box of Junior Mints go stale? They should be flying off of the shelves!
• H.E.B

And in case you still don't believe that we're here, here's a couple of pictures from one of the many stops along the way. Ethan was in heaven- a "tractor", just chillin on the side of the road.