Bi-Annual Report

Let's see. Since the last time I blogged, Maggie turned 3, Brenn turned like 8 months, my blog was lost, then found, and there's been roughly 18 holidays. This should be easy enough.

So Maggie's still crazy into trains. I had no choice but to make her a train cake for her birthday. We went with a Halloween theme since that's the candy Winco had. I'm nothing if not resourceful.

I cooked up some mac n' cheese and placed a bowl in front of Maggie one afternoon. She gave me the evil eye and said, "But mom, what about James? He needs to eat, too." Naturally. If this is what it would take for her to eat, I had no choice but to oblige and serve James a plate up as well. And this is how he continues to take many of his meals:

For Halloween, Maggie told me she needed to be Thomas. So, aiming to make all her wildest dreams come true, I looked to Google and decided I would set out to make it myself. I think my exact search term was, "I got suckered into making a Thomas costume. What now?" Or something like that. Here's a tip for you: If you're gonna make a Halloween costume, don't make it out of cardboard and paper. It will rain. I promise. Also, Super Glue isn't always so super.

Anyway, here's what I came up with:

And in all its glory, she was in heaven and perhaps a bit proud of me. But things only went downhill from here. Basically, she sorta lost her footing on some steps and the wheels popped off. So we did some quick reconstructive surgery and went out for round two. And then the head popped off. In the middle of the street. By this point she was traumatized and asked if we could just go back home and put her fairy wings on because "they won't fall off in the middle of the road." Her words, not mine. It was all very touching. Here's one more for good measure:

Brenn was Batman. Sort of. It's the best I could do. Regardless, I was left with no choice since, according to his father, his name should still be Batman.

Here's a few more shots of the boy. He's kinda army crawling now, which is interesting. I hear he looks like Maggie. Thoughts on this?

This is how he hung out for months 4 through 8. All day, every day. Which contributed in part to his excessive purging habits during months 4 through 8.

I wouldn't be a decent mother if I didn't include a kids-in-front-of-the-Christmas-tree photo on the blog, now would I?

Let's talk about Christmas, shall we? Maggie asked for more tracks. She threw in some dinosaurs at the last minute, and thanks to Kory's sister & mom of three boys, Santa was able to come through for her. Each of her engines asked Santa for presents as well. Luckily they all just requested candy canes this year, but apparently I have 2 kids and like 8 trains to attend to these days. It's exhausting.

Brenn got some biter biscuits and a new crib sheet, due to the fact that I change his sheets about 2-3 times a week because of the massive quantity of spit-up he ejects from his tiny person. For example: 

I rest my case.

Turns out this is how you play a reindeer - "the rudolph one...the one with the red nose" - pulls a sleigh of dogs. Note the boots on both hands and feet. She takes her pretend seriously.

Also note the Grinch's dog, Max, in the sleigh. Which brings me to another item of business. The Grinch. Starting mid-November this became yet another obsession. We ate, drank, and slept the Grinch. Everything revolved around the Grinch. It's all we saw on the TV. It's all we listened to in the car. La Who Doree" a.k.a "Welcome Christmas," became "Maggie's Song" and nobody was allowed to sing it but her. And sing it she did. Even her nursery class got the privilege of hearing her rendition when the teacher announced it was singing time.

I was awoken several nights in a row with Maggie, patiently standing at my bedside, informing me that she could see the Grinch in her eyes ... Emotions were calculated by heart size, i.e. "My heart is really big, mom, so I'm really happy." Or, "That man is mean. His heart is small"... I was asked on several occasions to join hands with her and sing "La Who Doree" with our eyes closed around the Christmas tree, just like the Whos. In any event, we go all out for her obsessions.

The boy's still kickin'. Literally. It's his favorite past time and once he's kicked himself into this position, he couldn't be happier with his job well done.

Maggie told me she wanted to take her purse to Costco. Pretty girly for her I thought. But sure, why not? When she showed up at the door, I noticed it was full of dinosaurs. That's more like it.

So I'm not done talking about trains. We're never done talking about trains. Anyway, you know your kid's seen too much Thomas when she refers to ornery people as "cross" and mutters the following phrases under her breath when she's disgruntled: cinders and ashes, bust my buffers, and fizzling fireboxes. 

And I'll conclude with some random pictures taken circa summer 2010. My mom took us all to Boondocks for a day o' fun. And it was. 

It started raining and Maggie told me she needed to get her umbrella. I scratched my head because I wasn't aware she had one. I was right. She waltzed upstairs with this beauty:

Wonder how that worked out for her. Also check out my awesome self-portrait on the patio. Skillz. For realz.

Here's Kory riding with her in a model train at the new tracks in South Weber. Pretty cool really. Made her day. Doesn't he look jolly?

The things we do for our kids...and somehow it's always worth it.

Here's a tree with some bikes in it: