Some quotes

On our trip
Eleanor:  Mama, I think you and I were both bitten by the travel bug!
So glad my girl enjoys travel like her mama!

While playing with another kid on the little playground in the Boston airport
Eleanor (pointing at us):  Those are my parents, Beth and Hunter.

Me:  Okay Eleanor, I'm going to set the timer for 45 minutes for quiet time.  Eleanor:  45 minutes is too long!  Can we have quiet time for one hour?  Pleeeeeeeeeeease?

Me:  Be careful with that muffin Eleanor, because the inside might still be hot.
Eleanor:  I'll be careful!  I'll be as careful as a skunk!
Because apparently skunks are extra careful creatures...

And thanks to Dinosaur Train, "hypothesis" is a word she uses regularly, only she says it "hypockisis".  I love it!

And I don't want to leave Arthur out, so here are some of his newest words:  key, car, choo choo, two, blue, cupcake (kuh-kuh...this also means cake or muffin), juice, cheese, bear, Daddy (as opposed to "dada" which he already knew), and probably more.  He's been adding about one word/day since he got his tubes...I guess they really did help!  The best Arthur "quote" I have isn't verbal though.  The other night he asked for more milk and I got it for him.  He drank some, smiled at me, did the sign for thank you, and pointed at the cup.  I was so proud!

States

We got back from New England last week (pictures and stories coming soon), and while we were in Massachusetts we went a little out of our way to go to RI and CT.

I have now been to 32 states (plus DC and PR).  Which one should be next?!

Eleanor has been to 15 states and PR and Arthur has been to 12.  I keep a map for each of them and we color in each state after we visit it.  Of course Arthur doesn't get this at all yet, but Eleanor was very excited on our trip with each state we entered because she knew she would get to color it in on her map.

Busy month of May!

Arthur gets his fourth (I think?) haircut.  I've done all but the first one myself, and I think I do a pretty decent job thanks to our lesson on cutting hair at MOPS!  :)  I do need to invest in better scissors though.

Happy Mother's Day to me!  Eleanor decided that I needed a cake as my gift.  A BIG cake.

I love how Eleanor wanted to hold hands for this picture!

Yes, it was GIGANTIC.  I sent it to work with Hunter after a day or two.

Eleanor is taking swim lessons and asked for goggles.  She was so excited that she wore these ALL day long!

Ready for swim lessons

When did she get so big?!

She's not really a fan of getting her face wet, but she's getting there!

Learning to float

Eleanor's birthday is in July, but she got her own special day at school last week.  I got to join her for snacktime since we brought cupcakes, and I told her that I liked her birthday hat.  "Mama, it is a birthday CROWN."  

The class sang happy birthday to her.

Mmm, rainbow cupcakes!

Disney had a FL resident special this spring, so Eleanor and I both got 4-day passes.  We took Arthur along (he's free) the first two times we went back in February, but we went by ourselves these last two times.  I never think to bring my camera or take pictures while we're there, but I tried to make an effort for our last day.  We went to Magic Kingdom this time, and we did everything!!  We went on the Peter Pan ride, Under the Sea, the merry-go-round, Astro Orbiter, the people mover (twice! this was a favorite), the Barnstormer (her first roller coaster!), Buzz Lightyear, Small World (my favorite), Pirates of the Caribbean, Jungle Cruise, Dumbo, the flying carpets, the Tiki Room, and the speedway.  We also met the fairies and had lunch at the Be Our Guest restaurant (the Beast's castle).  We had long waits for the fairies and to get in for lunch, but otherwise we had very little or no wait for everything we did, so we were done by 6:30.  It was a great day!

So excited on the tram in from the parking lot!

 

 Not great, but here's the classic shot with the castle.

On the merry-go-round

We waited 45 minutes to meet the fairies!  I don't even remember this one's name, but they had a long conversation about what fairies eat.

Finally, Tinkerbell!

They had a great discussion about pirates and how they smell like codfish.

Shortly after leaving the fairies, Eleanor turned to me and said, "Mama, I learned something new today!  Fairies are REAL!  They really DO exist!"  She was so excited.

And now for a little more of Arthur.  The other day we made zucchini bread muffins and I left them out to cool.  I came back in to find Arthur making his own version of muffins!

When he noticed the camera, he looked at me and said, "cheese!"

Some videos

Here is Eleanor singing one of our favorite songs from Music Together - Arthur chimes in a little bit too.  :)

We are not going to be able to attend Eleanor's end of the year program at school, so the teachers were really nice and let me come to one of the practices!  She's on the top right corner.

Fairy Garden

For the past year, Eleanor has loved all things dinosaur.  We have listened to dinosaur songs (oh yes, two whole CD's full of songs about dinosaurs), done dinosaur puzzles, read countless dinosaur books, seen the dinosaurs at the zoo (twice), thrown a dinosaur birthday party, visited Dinosaur World in Plant City, eaten at the dinosaur restaurant in Downtown Disney, visited the dinosaur store in Cocoa Beach, watched The Land Before Time and many episodes of Dinosaur Train, and pretended to be dinosaurs many, many times.  I have completely loved her fascination with dinosaurs (along with planets and pirates, two of her other favorite things), but I have to admit that I'm excited that she is finally into something a little girly: fairies!

Eleanor loves telling stories about fairies and pretending to be a fairy, so today we made a fairy garden.  I took her to Michael's and let her pick out a few things.  It was fun to see what she wanted for it versus what I would have picked out.  They had a little set of  toy fairies, but she said that she didn't want those because she already has fairies; they're just invisible.  I love her imagination!

First, her's my fairy and her double-tailed dinosaur brother going on a walk.

We looked at lots of bird houses, but this is the one Eleanor picked out to be her fairy house.  She also picked out her paint colors and spent a long time painting her fairy house just how she wanted it.

We got a little one for Arthur to paint too.  This kept him occupied for probably 30 minutes!  He painted for a long time, then when I thought he was done he did the sign for more.  I gave him another color and he kept signing for more colors.  He is quite the little artist!

So proud!

Arthur's final product
Of course you can't tell, but the inside is almost completely painted!

Eleanor's fairy house

Eleanor's fairy garden.  The "mushrooms" are actually wooden drawer pulls from Lowe's that I painted.

She loves it!  We keep it in this box so that she can put the lid on (after taking the fairy house out since it's so big) and keep out destructive little brothers.  It's also nice because it can just slide under her bed for storage.

Growing up

It has been over a month since my last post, and I'm too overwhelmed to remember what all has happened in that time.  So instead, here are some pictures!

Arthur really loves wearing headbands.  Not sure what Eleanor is up to here.

I love those rare occasions when they actually work together on something.

Buela came to visit over her spring break.

Arthur built that shorter tower all by himself

My TALL 18-month-old!  He is growing up so fast!

Sibling love

Eleanor wanted to have her picture taken, too.

Some friends and I went to a chocolate factory in Orlando where you get to make your own chocolates.  SO fun!!

My kids were fans, too.

I bought several crates in an attempt to organize my closet.  Eleanor found them before I put them away though, and decided that she was a predator and would hide and wait for her prey.  "I am camouflaged!"   Then she started calling Arthur her prey...

Of course, whatever big sister does, he has to try too.

I just found him on here one day playing with the airport.

My little dinosaur helper

All boy

They are growing up so fast!!

Dinosaurs and more

A few weeks ago we went to Tampa and our first stop was Dinosaur World.

Yup, it's just a huge park with life sized dinosaurs!  The museum had some very cool fossils too.

Dinosaur playground

This little girl was in heaven

Digging for fossils

Eleanor wasn't the only one excited by the dinosaurs!

We walked rather quickly past some of the displays...

Eleanor's favorite dinosaur, Orfax the Dilophosaurus, next to a life sized replica.

(And yes, he wears a sparkly silver "scarf".)

Back home...

Arthur REALLY enjoys helping me clean anything and everything

I love to watch my kids eat corn on the cob.  Their faces are hilarious!

Hunter built the kids a sensory table that we now have filled with beans and little Easter things.  Eleanor got to help paint!  She also painted the top of Hunter's head.  "Eleanor, did you just paint my head?"  "Oh, I'm sorry Daddy.  I thought it was a table leg."

I change around the toys on this play table every once in a while.  I put away the trains and went upstairs to get some different stuff to put on it, and when I came back this is what I found.  I guess Arthur thought it looked like a good place to relax!