Deck Day

In response to Spencie's daily requests for "outside"...the deck was open for business today, and so was Owen's sweeping service.  This week the weather has been milder - warm enough to play out on the deck.  The boys have been itching for the swings and cozy coupes for the past couple months.  And now that Spencie's a big fan of swinging too, we have a constant lineup for the 2 swings!  It's ok though, the cars are still a big novelty to him and so he doesn't mind letting the twins take over the swings...for now :)

Orderly Oliver

Type A neat and orderly...or colorful and creative thinker?  This is what Oliver whipped up tonight by himself as we were getting Owen and Spencer dressed after bath.  The blocks and eggs were put away in separate containers, so it was his own decision to take them out, line them up, and put the egg halves on top!  It's only been a couple weeks - but 2 year olds are starting to amaze me!!  Literally the week of their birthday, the boys' vocabulary has sky rocketed and they are regular little parrots, repeating everything we say!

Terrific Turtles

On Monday Ryan and I took the boys to see a presentation called "Terrific Turtles" at the Great Falls library.  We heard stories, played games, and met a real turtle!  Below Oliver (khaki pants) is hiding his head like a turtle with the other kids.  Afterward, we spent some time in the children's section of the main library - this was the first time the boys have gone in and looked at the books without making a lot of noise and running off wildly into the book cases.  It must be something about being 2...they are more sophisticated now :)  Before heading home we discovered a little pathway over to the Great Falls playground and walked over to take advantage of the warm, sunny day outside.  The boys were really adventurous and climbed up the rock wall all by themselves!  I can tell this playground is going to be much more their speed this spring / summer than it was last year.

Kitchen Boys

I found the boys a little play kitchen on craigslist last Friday since they have been so interested in helping me doing everything in the kitchen lately!  They were screaming through the baby gate for it when they saw me walk in the door with this new exciting toy, and could barely wait a few minutes while I wiped it down really well and made it look like new with Clorox wipes.  It was very cute though, they knew exactly what to do with all the little pots, pans, oven, microwave, refrigerator, and dishwasher!  However, Spencie still prefers the real dishwasher and climbs up there every chance he gets.  The kitchen also came with a pretend phone, and so Owen made multiple calls to Wesley that night.

Spencie balancing on one foot while doing dishes!

Spencie's First Steps!

Spencie took his very first steps at 10 months, exactly 1 month ago on January 22nd, but did not reliably repeat this event very often as he preferred to crawl and scoot around after the big boys.  Then tonight he suddenly started walking across an entire room!  We took a quick video before bedtime, when the boys do their usual jumping on Big Bear.  You'll notice that Ryan got a little overzealous with the pretend "roaring" while trying to encourage Spencie to walk to Big Bear.  And in the same style as Oliver at that age, he was only wearing one sock.

3 Little Monkeys

These aren't the monkeys you're thinking of...rather one of my mini "montessori make-over" projects.  One of the basic steps in the whole process: make things accessible for the boys so that they can take ownership over simple daily tasks.  We've had this up for a couple weeks now, and the boys immediately took to the idea of hanging their coats up and putting their shoes underneath after coming inside (well, not Spencie yet of course).  And it keeps things a little more organized for me, having so many jackets, vests, hats, etc to keep track of...we can fit a lot of outer wear on those hooks!  Props to my creative husband for attaching the 3 individual hooks to that piece of wood and hand painting a cute little vine to go with the theme!  He did such a great job - it looks like it came that way in a store!

Homemade Play Dough

We had a play dough making session today and it was tons of fun!  I found this great recipe and as the article says, this play dough comes out beautifully and is very close to the store bought stuff...except it smells yummy, and I didn't have to worry when I caught Spencie taking a lick!  It's basically flour, water, salt, vegetable oil, cream of tartar (ok that was the odd ingredient that I had to plan ahead and buy last week) and a package of jello.  The boys loved helping me put the ingredients in the pot and then kneading the last bit of flour in afterward to get just the right texture.  We made snowmen, snakes, wheels for pretend cars, and played with some heart shaped cookie cutters!  What a fun and easy DIY kid activity!!

http://www.modernparentsmessykids.com/2012/05/play-dough.html

Twins Turn TWO!!

Happy Birthday Owen and Oliver!!  We had a fabulous day celebrating the boys' 2nd birthday on Sunday.  We got them some birthday balloons and decorated the kitchen - when they came down in the morning they loved it!  Oliver threw himself down on the floor and just stared up at the balloons and kicked his feet...I was lucky enough to catch this on video!

They boys diligently ate their breakfast (Oliver held tight to the Elmo balloon with his free hand the whole time) excited to go visit the "big fishy" we promised them at the National aquarium.  They all loved the aquarium - we saw lots of different fish, sharks, turtles, eels, sting ray, snakes, and alligators!

As usual, Oliver loving on his baby brother...

After the aquarium we came home for a quick lunch and nap before the boys' friends Jakob and Joslyn (also twins!) came over for dinner and cake.  It was so cute to watch them all eat pizza at the kid table and socialize.  The boys loved their Thomas the Train cake - they were definitely into the toy trains that topped the cake more than the cake itself.  Although, just like last year, Oliver did thoroughly enjoy his cake while Owen wasn't interested at all.  Spencie tried to sneak his hand into some cake on the table, but all the big kids watched him like hawks while they protected their plates!  The boys opened some Thomas pillows and pretended to sleep on them on the kitchen floor.  It was a very full, happy, and tiring day...everyone slept good that night, including mommy and daddy!  

Showing off their firetruck tattoos 

Big kids guarding their cake from sneaky Spencie

 

Cleaning up!

This last video is about 6 minutes long!  I put together a few shorter clips of us singing happy birthday, cake, and opening their choo choo pillows.