Fall update, part 2

Just pictures!

I love this boy, and he loves this hat.

My little sea turtle and dolphin at Boo at the Zoo

"Mama, we are in boats!  And these are our treasure maps!"

Little cutie

Eleanor set the table for the first time!  Not pretty, but we all had what we needed!

I love finding him like this.

Eleanor helped me make pumpkin mufffins and was actually able to scoop the batter out with an ice cream scoop all by herself.  And don't you love her choice of clothes/accessories?  :)

Eleanor had a little pumpkin painting party, though I forgot to take pictures of the actual painting process.  Arthur loved it too!

How to entertain your children: let them "paint" with water!

They loved the pumpkin painting party so much that I let them have a round 2 and add more color to their pumpkins.

Halloween pre-trick-or-treat pictures

She can ride her bike!  She doesn't particularly enjoy it or want to do it for more than a few minutes, but I think that will change as she gets better at it.

First fresh squeezed orange juice of the season.  My Florida boy loved it!

Arthur is REALLY into trains now.  He loves to hook every one of his trains together and take them all over the house.  No tracks necessary.

He lines everything up and calls it a train, just like his "train" of Little People here.

Arthur is 2!

Arthur turned 2 over a month ago, and he loved every second of his birthday celebrations.  We had an informal little party in the park with a few friends, but sadly I forgot my camera!  He insisted on a "yellow circle cake" with nothing else on it, and that's what he got.  He was thrilled!  

The day before the party was his actual birthday, and we spent the day at "Sea Whoa-whoa", aka Sea World.  Both kids LOVED seeing all kinds of sea creatures and they especially loved the dolphin show.  We squeezed just about everything into one day - 4 shows, several rides, and we still managed to see just about all of the animals.

Arthur didn't get to blow out candles at his party because it was too windy, so we recreated the moment at home later that day.  (That's what the pictures are from.)  He loved us singing to him and blowing out his candles.  He is such a sweet, sweet boy!

At two years old, Arthur is starting to talk non-stop and picking up new words every day.  He makes sentences and communicates really well.  I used to be worried about his speech, but he is getting easier and easier to understand.  He is extremely happy and outgoing, though he can be timid in new situations.  He loves turtles (and all animals really), trains, the color yellow, playing outside, his sister, helping out around the house, and balls.  He is a pretty sensitive kid and seems to really care about how others are feeling.  He is a very tall boy too - at his 2 year well check he was 37", which the pediatrician said puts him almost off the chart.

We are so lucky to have had this little boy in our family for the past 2 years!  Happy birthday, Arthur!

Fall update

Way behind here, so here are some quotes I've been writing down in no special order:

Arthur was riding on my back, piggy back style.
Me:  Are you my little monkey?
Arthur:  No.  I turtle.
I guess he took his Halloween costume seriously.

Eleanor has been into jokes lately and was making up all kinds of stuff at dinner the other night.  None of them were particularly funny, but then she accidentally made up a real pun:
Eleanor:  Why did the orange go to the hospital?
Hunter:  I don't know, why?
Eleanor:  Because he wasn't peeling well.

I was cooking dinner in the kitchen and it was one of those nights where I just wanted to do the job by myself.
Arthur:  Help you, Mama?
Me:  No Arthur, I'm sorry, but I don't need your help right now.  You can go play.
Arthur walked to the edge of the kitchen, started sobbing, and said, "Luuuuuv you, Mama!  [SOB]  Want to HELP you!"
Needless to say, the sweet boy got lots of hugs and I found a random "job" for him to do.  He is the best helper ever - when I bring in groceries he insists on carrying stuff in and I have to keep leaving individual items out in the trunk for him to carry since he can't handle most of the bags.  I hope he still loves to help this much when he's 15!

And pictures!  These are at a petting farm near us.

"Mama, take a picture of me!"

Hayride - they were having more fun than it appears here!

Not sure why they have a fire truck there, but it was Arthur's favorite part!

And these are from Eleanor's class field trip to a local farmer's market

Arthur got in on the action too!

Pictures and more pictures

Today is Arthur's 2nd birthday and I feel like I need to do a big birthday post for him, but first of all I am waaaay behind on this blog.  So I'm just going to try to catch up on the last few months and I'll do a birthday post sometime in the near future.

Eleanor's first day of ballet class!

Arthur had surgery on his neck.  Here he is the next morning - it didn't stop him from building towers!

I found this fun (and easy!) idea on Pinterest.  Just put a little bit of dish detergent in a pan with warm water and let the kids play.  The idea is to let them blow bubbles through a straw, but Arthur kept trying to drink it so I blew bubbles for him every once in a while and gave him other stuff to play with.  They loved it and played with this for a loooong time.

 Eleanor LOVES to dress up these days.

One morning Arthur went and got a napkin, climbed into his seat, and put it on his lap.  I guess he was ready for breakfast!

Nothing special going on here, but this is how I think of my baby boy.  He is growing up too fast!  And for some reason he really loves that random orange string.  (actually a piece of felt)

Admiring the fish...check out how he's standing up on his toes.

Miss red fairy

Eleanor brought this picture home from school one day.  I love how we all have blue eyes except for Hunter, and she gave the baby blue eyes too.

"Fix me some breakfast, Mom!"

The boy loves his legos.  I love watching him clear a space for himself on the table and then climb up.

Wearing her shoes inside Mama's shoes

This cracked me up.  I thought she had been asleep for 30 minutes when she wandered into our room and said that she was being a pirate that night.  Crazy kid!

This is how Eleanor came downstairs after her quiet time the other day!

At lunch yesterday I got sad thinking about how it was Arthur's last day as a 1-year-old and how my babies are growing up so fast.  I took lots of pictures of their sweet faces.  

Living it up on his last night as a 1-year-old!

Kid-isms

Gone are the days of my "Eleanor-isms" posts - there are two talkers in this house now!  I feel bad because I haven't really kept track of funny things that Eleanor has said lately because she says so much every day.  Anyway, here are a few things I actually remembered to write down.

Eleanor:  I am a very fast runner!  I am faster than a roadrunner!  Or an ostrich!

Arthur at dinner the other night:  (pointing out the window)  Green tree, Mama
Me:  Yes Arthur, that's a green tree.
Hunter:  I wish there were blue trees.
Arthur:  YESSS, Dada!  Pink trees too?

Arthur counting to 10 while playing hide and seek:
Two, fwee, four, fwive, seex, sweven, eight, nine, twin, evan, fohteen, fohteen, fohteen, fohteen, fohteen...

Me:  Arthur, what kind of birthday cake do you want?  A train cake?  A turtle cake?  (We had already established that he wanted  a big cake, not cupcakes.)
Arthur: (making a circle motion) Circle cake
Me:  Yes, it can be in the shape of a circle.  But what do you want on top?  Trains?
Arthur:  No.  (makes circle motion)  Circle cake!
Hunter:  You will have a circle cake.  But do you want anything on top of it?  Maybe turtles?  Or fish?
Arthur:  No!  Circle cake!  (thinks a little)  Candles.  Two candles.
Me:  Okay, you can have a plain circle cake with candles.  What color cake do you want?  A blue cake?  A green cake?
Arthur:  CIRCLE cake!!
(a few minutes later...)
Arthur:  Yellow circle cake?

A yellow circle cake it is!  This was last night at dinner, and this morning when he woke up he said, "Hap bee dee to Arfur.  Two.  Circle cake.  Yellow circle cake!"  Can you tell what was on his mind?  :)