last set of molars

ugh.

8 months old!

caroline is 8 months old! she's become such a big girl. she's not quite crawling yet, but she does scooch and launch herself forward like an inchworm so it is only a matter of time. she is extremely interested in what's going on around her, especially what ever her brother is doing. she really likes to play with toys and is very interested in exploring how they work. and she definitely prefers to play with Q's toys rather than her own baby toys. we have to pry monster trucks out of her hands all the time. she also loves finger food. she eyes the can of gerber puffs until you give her some, and she'll have a fistful of them as soon as they hit her tray. she and quentin are currently spending a few days with grandma and grandpa while jeremy and i work on getting the house ready to go on the market next monday. we're going to pick up the babies tomorrow but not before we take quentin to see bish on ice (disney on ice, finding nemo edition.)

MONSTER JAM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As our loyal readers are likely aware, Quentin LOVES monster trucks. We watch an absolutely horrible video about them at least three times a day. We've now seen it so much I could probably type the entire script from memory. There is also a video at daycare about them that he watches all the time as well. He also now has lots and lots of monster truck toys. His favorite one is Grave Digger, or in Quentin-speak "Digger." I got him a toy Grave Digger a month or so ago that has become attached to him, often ending up in his bed at night. With all this in mind, about three months ago I started looking to see if the monster trucks were coming to a town near us and they were. The Monster Jam was coming to the DCU Center in Worcester February 19-21. I checked my schedule and saw that I was amazingly not on call. So we got tickets. When grandpa heard about this he decided he was coming too!! So as part of an elaborate plan to go see monster trucks and dump the kids at the grandparents' we met grandma and grandpa for dinner right next to the DCU center. I got even more excited this week when I saw a commercial for the event saying that Grave Digger was going to be there. In addition, the Monster Mutt was going to be there. Not surprisingly, we have three Monster Mutt toys, I mean it is a monster truck that looks like a dog with floppy ears, a wagging tail, and tongue that moves! After dinner, the three boys went to see the trucks and the girls headed back to Western Mass.

I had a little trepidation going into this event. While I knew he would love to see the trucks, I was worried it was going to be so loud that he would freak out. Well, he loved it! I put some earplugs in his ears and amazingly he only took them out twice. As soon as he saw the Monster trucks, his eyes did not move away for one second. While I saw a parade of kids leaving because it was so loud, Quentin never flinched. We were seated in the first row of the second level and there was a guard rail in front of us. The only time he got upset during the two hour show was when I would peel him away from the guard rail so he wouldn't plummet onto some unsuspecting jabroni in the first level. I tried my best to keep him in my lap but occasionally I had to give in so he could look the rails and jump in sheer excitement. Grandpa bought him a Grave Digger flag that he waved with pride. He even caught on the idea of waving his hands to try to get the guy with the T-shirt cannon to shoot a shirt his way. He's really been going through a stage where he is pushing his boundaries and can really be a pain in the ass, i.e. like at gym class earlier in the day. However, last night reminded me how amazing being a father is and how much I love my son. Please notice that there are very few pictures of the front of his face because he would not turn away from the action for one second.

no seriously, we must be terribly boring

at the beginning of lunch today

- -

fading fast

-

- actually chewing while snoozing - - out -

-

to be fair to us and our mealtime conversation, the kid got up some time prior to 4 today. this is his new thing. he gets up somewhere between 1 and 4 and just stays up. he does play in his room for a bit before he starts calling for me, but still, today i gave in and went into his room at 4:26. we can't figure out what his deal is.

-

also note that instead of eating his PB&J, he merely licked the peanut butter and jelly off the bread.

no shirt, no shoes, no service

lions and tigers and pears, oh my!

caroline tried pears for the first time last night and they immediately became her favorite food yet. the spoon could not get to her mouth fast enough. i only defrosted one cube, as we usually do with anything she is trying for the first time. but i ended up nuking two more cubes to keep up with her demands!

guess we are boring dinner conversation

check out that nice shiny new bathroom

oh, and the kid using the potty.

-

quentin loves the potty now. he even asks to go sit on it. doesn't stop him from going in his diaper, but this is still miracle progress.

We Found a Pulse

Many 2.5 year olds are potty training or a last showing interest in potty training. Quentin, not so much. A Huggie full of crap does not slow him down. We read an article about signs your child is ready for potty training. They gave a list of 5 things, Quentin was not doing any of them. We've had a little plastic potty for awhile and I tried to get him to use but he just wasn't interested. We recently got one that you can put on the big pot, but we hadn't used it yet. Anywho, after deciding to wear his dinner again, I gave him a tub and afterwards decided I would put him on the little potty that goes on the big potty. He was sitting up there all comfortable and then he starts straining and the next thing I know he's peeing! I was so excited for him and you could tell he was really proud of himself. He now loves going to the potty. I am hoping this means that he'll be potty trained before his sister!

my son, the chef

maybe he's making us dinner?

hodge podge

lots going on we met with our realtor on sunday to talk about getting the house on the market soon. she came back today with comps and a price suggestion. sadly it's not great, but it's on the high side of what we expected so we're ok with it. based on the experience with the last house, we'd rather start lower and sell earlier than languish on the market for more than a year and end up selling low anyway. so the plan is to be on the market by march 1st. we have a few projects to finish up - bathrooms mainly and then a bunch of decluttering and packing to do. there is a shiny POD in our yard just waiting to be packed. it will be fun to trudge through snow to do so. quentin is a disaster these days. he is definitely in that "pushing his boundaries" stage. he gets a big kick out of ignoring us when we say no to something, like throwing his dinner at his sister or similar. and time-outs don't seem to have any impact - he thinks they are funny. his speech is also improving and he's getting more conversational. there may be hope for him yet! we had an interesting (only to me probably) conversation about one of the other kids at daycare. quentin was very concerned that baby charlie was not coming home with us but then he decided it was ok and said, "baby charry go with charry momma home." i think he really digs daycare because every morning when i get him up he asks to see linda. then he asks me if he will see the kids at daycare, "mikey? wyan? breddan? charry? bay-ee?" he's not usually happy when i tell him he's stuck with me for the day. his counting is also improving. he still refuses to acknowledge the existence of the numbers 3 and 4 but i have heard him get as high as twelve otherwise. he likes to count his body parts - "one nose. one, two ears. one, two eyes." (set the bar low, kid!) and his brand loyalty continues to expand... coming home from daycare on tuesday he was pleading for me to stop at "gurgit" (target) because he wanted cookies. normally he says, "no want this" when we pull into a target or other shopping center.

another favorite game

it's called "where cat go?" basically when the cat heads to the cellar via the kitty door, you get down in front of the hole and yell, "where cat go? here kitty kitty." and when the cat comes back, you yell, "cat!! cat!! cat!!"

Q's new toy

Q has become obsessed with holding his sister. he'll climb on the couch next to me when i am nursing her and ask, "preez? sister?" he giggles like crazy when we put caroline on his lap and usually within moments he is shoving her aside to go back to playing. but he almost always comes right back, asking, "preez. more sister?"

squash

the vegetable exploration continues with butternut squash, by far her favorite so far!

do green beans want to go to the party in my tummy?

yes. - caroline tried beans today and LOVED them. this was the first time she did the "baby bird" where she sits with her mouth open waiting for the next spoonful to come her way. -