Drive-By Sharing

A couple of things Mr. Linus has been up to lately:

1. Drive-By Sharing - As I've told you before, share is my little guy's favorite word. In a drive-by sharing, he speeds by Veda, says "Share!" as he grabs whatever toy she happens to be holding onto, and makes a quick getaway.

2. This next one is both hilarious and embarrassing. Most of you probably know about our LWD (that's little white dog) named Mimi. She's definitely a high-maintenance kind of girl. Since we've been living in an apartment, she's driving us absolutely nuts with the barking. Seriously, she barks at EVERYTHING. It usually starts out with, "Mimi, please stop barking." Then, "Mimi, PLEEEEEASE stop barking." "Mimi, HUSH!" "Stop it!!!!" And finally (dun dun dun!!!), "SHUT UP, Mimi!" Guess what Linus has picked up on? Yep, his new word is shut up. And he says it only to Mimi. Tonight, though, I was noticing that he's also picked up my bewildered sentiment. Tonight when he was imploring Mimi to shut up, he sort of walked around her with his head hung down just chanting it quietly over and over - "Shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up". My fifteen-month-old says shut up. *Sigh* I thought I had more time!

Easter and Stuff

The blog is now private. I know that makes it a little bit of a pain to get to, and I thank you for being patient.
But now... it's Easter and Stuff! Sort of a special edition of Snapshots of Cute Stuff.


First up, a few treasures I found in our Plan B camera. Here's Veda covered in blueberries. It's practically identical to a photo of me covered in cupcake thirty years ago. It's pretty amazing how much we look alike if I do say so myself.

This was our first try at finger painting. As you might have guessed, they mistook the paint I set out for grocery store-type samples.

This is the recent stuff. Check out Veda making a park appearance decked out in all her pink wear.



Easter baskets. Contents: Eggs (duh), sand toys, matching cards game, Signing Time dvds, Teeth are Not for Biting book, beach ball, and sidewalk chalk. No candy!

I can't get this one to rotate, but here they are in their little coordinating outfits tearing into their baskets. Well, digging out the Easter grass anyway.

This is how you "hide" eggs for a couple of one-year-olds.



Coming out for the egg hunt with Grammy and Grandad

Success!

Veda was more interested in seeing how far she could walk away from us before being recaptured than in finding eggs.

Page Update

The Books page (see link under the site heading) is now up! For now it's all grown-up books, but in the future I'll add a list of Linus and Veda's favorite books. I've also got content on the Recipes, Baby & Toddler Food, and Family Food pages. Next up I'll be working on the Household Management page.

Please let me know if there are any topics you'd like me to address. I aim to be useful!

Food Inventory

Everyone who's ever read a parenting book knows that it's good to offer kids choices because it makes them feel empowered and yada, yada, yada. Thanks to poor planning on my part, snack and lunch choices dwindled down to a critical level this week

Me: "Do you want... uh... these three crackers and some of this orange I was eating... or... um... hey, I think there's a banana in the bottom of the fruit bowl... maybe?"

To avoid any (more) middle-of-the-week shortages, I've created a food inventory to aid with making the weekly grocery list. This is the go-to stuff that my kids eat day in and day out. It's going to become a fixture in my household management binder. If you don't have a binder, my next choice would be to laminate it and stick it on the fridge.

Pantry Foods
Peanut Butter Crackers
O Cereal
Whole Grain Crackers
Graham Crackers or Animal Crackers
Peanut Butter
Raisins
Bananas
Sweet Potatoes
Infant Cereal
Snapea Crisps
Whole Wheat Bread
Fridge Foods
Hummus
Kiwi
Pears
Avocados
Almond Milk
Applesauce

Freezer Foods
Vegetable Pancakes
Spinach Patties
Peas
Mixed Vegetables
Mini Lentil Loaves
Baked Beans
Brown Rice With Diced Vegetables (an Annabel Karmel recipe)
Blueberry Flax Cereal Mix-In
Peach Cereal Mix-In

How's This Gonna Work, EBook?

I read The Little Engine That Could a lot these days. Both of the kids love it, but it's little Veda who toddles over to me and deposits it in my lap. If I told you how many times a day she does this, there's a good chance you wouldn't believe me. Every time through I do the same character voices, the same sound effects, the same wiggles and jiggles. And every time Veda does the same enchanting grin in the same places.

I bet we could still do that with the ebook version.

Yet, for as many times as I've read that book to her, she's "read" it to herself far more. What do you say to that, ebook? Looking at books independently has been a favorite activity for a loooong time around here, and it started well before I would have trusted either of them with an expensive electronic device. (Truth be told, I still wouldn't let them handle an expensive electronic device.)

And what about all of the touch-and-feel books, the lift-the-flap books, the scratch-and-sniff books? What will the e-answer to those literary novelties be?





I heard a few days ago that Amazon now sells more ebooks than traditional books. It made me feel a bit like a dinosaur since I seem to be the only book lover in all the land who doesn't have an e-reader, and I'll probably start getting myself psyched up to make the switch. What about baby books, though? It's not that I think there won't be an answer, but I just can't imagine what it might be.

Does anybody else think about this?

Snapshots of Cute Stuff 4/1/11

Okay, there's not picture of this, but I think it's super cute. Last night the little guys were getting into a fight over a toy. I intervened and said, "We have to share." Then I sang and signed one of our favorite songs about manners from Signing Time. When I went back to washing dishes, Linus started walking some laps between the kitchen and dining room, which is everybody's favorite activity these days, but he was making a sound I hadn't heard from him before. He must have repeated it for five minutes. Then it came to me... he's saying SHARE!

Veda's new word (well, phrase) may well put the babies in the running for Most Well-Mannered Babies Ever. When she's hanging out in her crib, handing me a toy, flipping through a book, looking out the window of the car, she says... Thank you. Okay, so she clearly doesn't know what it means, and I doubt that Linus knows what share means, but I'm so glad they've picked these to be their favorite words, as opposed to... um, other choices.

Now back to signing. The last few weeks have been a sign language explosion in our house. They're doing several signs now, but their favorites by far are dog, bubbles, and bird. When I took them to the zoo this past week, we stopped in front of some monkeys. I signed for monkey and pointed, and Veda signed for bird. Me: "Silly, those aren't birds. Those are monkeys!" Veda: "Bird!" And then I realized that there were birds chirping. Smart one, that girl.

Okay, enough of the mushy mom anecdotes. Here are a few snapshots of cute stuff:

Veda is into the piano. Really into the piano. This pleases me. Here she's playing some Beatles.

I found him this way one morning, snout glued to the glass, eyes wide with a dream of running wild across the plain. (It's their bouncy pony. This cracked me up a for a good five minutes. No, I don't get out much.)

Here's Mr. Linus, still in his pajamas on one of the many sick days we've been having lately. While I was talking to my mother on the phone, I thought the babies were being especially quiet playing under the table. Yeah, they were quiet because they had pulled the takeout container of rice off of the table. This is a real marker of your children getting taller.

 

At the zoo. Flamingos in the background and the kids distracted by person #352 to approach me on that particular day to ask me about the stroller. It was weird.

The unsung benefit of disposable diapers: the box. Yes, that's a dog leash attached to the front. Makes for easy box pulling for Mommy.

We've stopped being compliant with wearing bibs. I've decided the bib battle is one not worth fighting, especially since I doubt I could win it, so we now eat in the buff.

By the way, that's a mini lentil loaf, which they loved. I'm working on a recipe, naturally.

Man, are these kids skinny. Here's almost-fifteen-months-old Veda sporting a very droopy pair of 12 month pants. I really do feed them.

This has been Snapshots of Cute Stuff.