please touch (and if you'd be so polite, don't steal my stuff either!)

we took the kids to the please touch museum today. we had gotten a membership for christmas and hadn't been yet. after a slight detour involving going to their old location several miles away(thanks GPS!) we found it. quentin was very concerned about the purple boy being upside down. he said, "that boy going to get hurt. he get a boo boo."

driving the septa bus

caroline was not as amused with the current selection and made a mad dash for the other side

quentin "extabates" some playground balls with the digger

where's the car keys?

splashing in the water table. there was a kid who kept sticking his whole head into the water. even pickle thought that was odd.

turtle!

we had to give mr. turtle a kiss

crawling through the tunnel (there's no pics of Q at this point because he and daddy were elsewhere in the museum, not because i don't love him.)

swan needs a kiss too. she also molestered a goose and a cow, not caught on camera.

sea cruise! she was cool with the boat until it started to rock and then she was out.

seriously, where are the keys?

dude. keys. now.

she really loves planting and harvesting (and planting and harvesting) these carrots

kid swap! Q spent a long time wheelbarrowing foam bricks into the back of a dump truck.

paging doctor rupon

and then we found the grocery store. they both loved the grocery store. we we in here forever.

clearly, Q is not on a low-carb diet

the good stuff

i love how Q's cart is full of junk and pickle only has fruit... for now

whoa. clean up on aisle 3!

and this is where it sucked for a few minutes. we were trying to put the food back on the shelves and we looked up and Q was gone. jeremy ran around to all the other close exhibits but he was just gone. jer took caroline and ran to look everywhere. i found someone with a walkie talkie. i have to give them credit - within 10 seconds of them radioing to look for an orange-shirted Q, they had him. he had pushed his entire shopping cart (full of pretend tea bags btw) into a separate room with toy trains. scared the crap out of us.

so we decided it was time to head home after that scare. jer went back to get our stroller and our backpack was gone. there wasn't anything in it except diapers and a couple of monster trucks, but it still sucks. obviously we left it unattended but it still sucks that people at a kids museum would steal from you.

there's a cool statue of liberty torch in the atrium made of discarded toys, street signs, etc. pretty cool.

and an elephant too!

and the good news - we got our bag back with contents intact. we checked in at the desk and they had found it ditched in one of the bathrooms. sorry Q, i guess the backpack bandit(s) didn't value grave digger as much as you do!

tired, tired babies.

melmo

phone pic of the balloon elmo hat pickle came home with after her classmate's birthday party at school

this and that

Q is on a major "bolt" kick again (after declaring repeatedly that "blue toy story" (i.e. #3) and the "lighting aqueen" (cars) were his favorite movies over the past few months.)  our commute home from work/school now consists of watching ½ of bolt each day.  he really likes the songs in the movie and likes to sing them loudly and passionately.  he also instructs me to sing (which despite not having a good voice, i am totally ok with doing!)  as a song ends, he says to me every time, "mommy, that was really good singing.  thank you for singing with me."

 

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pickle is big into possessives these days.  she likes to distinguish "mommy's juice", "daddy's juice", "tenten's juice", "wuhwine's juice".  she'll make sure we know who shoes, coats, plates, etc. belong to.

 

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oh yeah, she calls her brother, "tenten"

 

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Q likes to watch "the yellow boy show" and the "yellow boy movie."  (the simpsons, duh.)

 

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Q was invited to a classmate's birthday party.  when I first told him about it, he was adamant that he didn't want to go.  now he asks me daily if today is doruk's party.  poor doruk though – Q really wants to blow out his candles and seems more excited about the prospect of birthday cake than of swimming and the other fun activities the party entails.  and I hope the kid like monster trucks.  because that's totally what he's getting.

 

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speaking of birthday parties… a classmate of caroline's had an in-school party last week, complete with a visit from elmo.  more details and photos coming if i can ever get our computer and scanner to work simultaneously.

gender studies

right now, Q is very obsessed with classifying people as boys and girls.  he will tell me, "mommy, you and caroline are girls.  me and daddy are boys."  then he will run down a list of everyone we know and categorize them.  he will also classify movie and TV characters.  this morning he told me that blueberry, his lovey, is a girl.  my bad, all along i assumed blueberry was a boy.

phillies spirit

tuesday was phillies spirit day at school. the kids did not want to cooperate for photos, so these are the best i got:

he really wanted me to take pictures of the truck instead of him.

would you eat them with a fox? would you eat them in a box?

for the past few days, Q will only eat dinner in a cardboard box on the couch. totally normal.

guys!

whenever caroline wants to get our attention, she exclaims, "guys!" and then dissolves into giggles when we respond. she'll also put a "purse" (grocery bag, bucket, pretty much anything with a handle) over her shoulder and wave politely, saying, "bye, guys!" as she pretends to leave.

i think her teachers must address the class as "guys" so she mimics their words and behaviors.

we’ve created a monster

a pancake monster.  when i picked the kids up last night, Q declared that he once again wanted to go to the pancake store.  i told him we couldn't go to the pancake store again.  he sulked for a bit and then said, "ok we go to target.  and harkadonalds*."  then he stared me down, with the most menacing stare he could muster and said, "you got it, mommy?"

 

*"harkadonalds" has replaced "chickenfries" as his name for mcdonald's.  (mark mcdonald is one of his favorite monster truck drivers, but Q pronounces his name "hark adonald" and i guess since the golden arches is named so similarly, it too became "harkadonalds."

Q&a and other quotable quentin

this week's question at the gym was a slam dunk.  we knew the chance for total embarrassment was slim:

 

question:         what's on your shirt?

quentin:           monster truck! (duh)

 

he cracked me up on friday after i picked them up at school.  he started insisting that we go to "the pancake store" (IHOP) for dinner.  jeremy had picked the kids up on tuesday and taken them there while i was working late.  he told me he wanted a pancake with cream (whipped cream) and strawberries, yellow food (scrambled eggs), and hotdogs (sausage links.)  i told him we'd have to talk to daddy about it since we had yet to discuss dinner plans, so Q said, "well,call him."

 

on saturday, we also went to "the caterpillar store" (michael's, where i once bought him a toy caterpillar) and "the choo choo train store" (wegman's, the grocery store, has a model train that choo choos around in the rafters by the dairy products.)

Q&a

this week's question at the gym: what is your favorite book?

 

Q's answer: NASCAR drive

 

nope.  not a book.  to be fair, i know exactly which book he's talking about.  it's a hotwheels book he got from the book fair at school a few months ago.  Not actually about NASCAR, just cars racing.  he loves the heck out of that book.  and at least he didn't answer "spongebob", "dora", or "mario kart" like some of the other kids.  in fact, only one answered something even close to an actual, recognizable book title when they answered, "caterpillar."

amazing

i had been dreading this past saturday for over a month.  it was the first saturday since the kids started back at the gym that jeremy had to work.  since Q's class is kids-only, his isn't a problem as pickle can chill in the lobby with me.  but caroline's class is still parent-participation, leaving no one to watch Q.  we haven't found (or really even looked for) a go-to baby-sitter (just not ready to trust people i don't already know with these little monsters.)  so i was sad for pickle because i thought she would have to miss her class and then be further tortured by having to watch Q at his a little while later.

 

the lobby at the gym is only separated from the actual gym part by a low counter and other parents leave their (much older than Q) other children in the lobby, amused with coloring books or video games.  i began to wonder if Q could entertain himself for a whole hour.  i figured it was worth a shot – worst case scenario he sucked at it and we would bail.  the other option was no class at all, so it seemed worth it.  on friday i started telling Q about a deal i would make with him… if he was a good boy in the lobby during caroline's class, i would get him a new bug at target (we hit up the bullseye every week between their classes since we have 1.5 hours to kill, it's right next door, and we can do grocery and other essentials shopping there.)  we kept talking about it all night and started right back with it when he got up. i prepped a bag of goodies to amuse him during her class.  he selected a few of his favorite monster trucks and a couple of other toys, and i added some snacks and a juice box.  i also gave him my phone since he is quite adept at turning it on, opening youtube, and locating monster truck videos.

 

i watched him like a hawk throughout the whole class to make sure he didn't bolt through the door.  at the beginning of class, i was sitting in the circle with pickle doing the warm-up "exercises" and i looked over and Q was doing them along with the class.  i probably spent more of the hour watching him than i did watching caroline.  he was quite content to line up his trucks along the counter and stage his imaginary monster jam races, just like he does on the couch at home.  he ate 3 packs of fruit snacks in the first 20 minutes.  but he was good.  so good.  like so good that 4 other mothers commented to me how good he was, one of them even saying her own 3-year old would never be capable of such good behavior.

 

bug well earned.

Q&a

This week's question at gym class was, "what is your favorite animal?"

 

Q's answer: penguins and pandas

 

still have no earthy idea why he selected those but we've asked him several times since and his answer has not changed.

 

(and no, it wasn't "letter P" week at school, nor were they learning about animals.  nor were they learning about black and white.  last week they were learning about money and shopping.)

talking giraffes

the iPhone is a wonderful tool for entertaining the kiddos, especially when we're on the verge of a unstoppable public breakdown (in target, at the grocery store. etc.)  as such, I am always on the hunt for new free kid-focused apps.  i downloaded this gem – talking gina the giraffe – last week.  basically you say something to gina and she repeats it back to you (aka records a snippet of you talking and plays it back), but in a funny, distorted voice.

 

both kids love it.  pickle just giggles whenever the giraffe "talks" regardless of what she's saying.  but quentin is full-on obsessed.  he keeps asking to see the giraffe.  he likes to "talk" to her but i don't think he quite gets that she just spits back what he says (and therefore is not actually as obsessed with trucks as he is.)  i think he thinks he is involved on some sort of bizarre-world video conference call with a cartoon giraffe, because he will run and grab a truck and say, "look giraffe! gravedigger!" which is the same thing he does when he is on the phone with an actual human being.

Sent from my iPhone

potty animal

no, not quentin.  caroline peed on the potty twice on saturday!

 

she woke up in the morning pretty dry so i decided to sit her on the can.  a few seconds later, she was letting it fly.  and then before bath time that evening, jeremy had her sit on the potty and she did it again.  we won't be cancelling her diaper subscription any time soon, but still exciting progress!

A monster truck fan

we were just showing quentin this cool monster truck toy he could have if he went poop on the potty. pickle was checking out the box and pointed, and exclaimed, "taz! monster mutt! gravedigger!" the baby knows her monster trucks.

bad behavior

it has not been a good week for Q at daycare.  on tuesday, i got a call from his teacher because he was "being rambunctious and kept taking his shoes off."  and today i got another one because he bit his teacher when she tried to redirect him because he was not listening.  today's phone call was weird too – as soon as I said hello, his teacher just said hi, and then put Q on the phone to tell me what was going on.  he told me, "i eat miss diana."  then she got back on the phone and clarified the whole story.

 

i don't know what the issue is.  maybe he needs to burn off more energy, because both incidents this week have stemmed from him wanting to run around and being instructed it is not time for running.  nothing else is really going on to cause him to lash out, if anything, our life is becoming more stable after a crazy year.  it's obnoxious too because his teacher says she doesn't know what causing it, but the way she says it it's like she insinuating that i know what is causing it and just don't want to tell her.

 

sigh.

aren’t you glad I didn’t say strawberry?

about a month ago we started taking the kids back to classes at "my gym" – the same chain of gyms we went to in boston.  pickle is one of the biggest kid in her class, since the age range is 7-22 months.  she'll move up in a couple of months and we'll be able to sleep an extra hour on saturday mornings.  but she's having a blast.  she couldn't even walk at her last class in boston (she took her first steps the next day!) so she loves zipping around the gym, climbing on everything, and jumping.  oh she loves the jumping.

 

quentin already moved up to the next level – the first parent-less level.  we obviously stay right there in the lobby like 10 feet away from him, but he participates in the entire class by himself.  the first week he was a little confused (as were we, because we didn't even realize he had moved up!)  but he has done super awesome with it (thank you daycare.)  at the beginning of class, the teachers ask the kids their names and then a fun question each week.  here are the past few weeks in review:

 

week 1

question:         what's your favorite snack?

quentin:           (mommy and daddy cringing in the lobby awaiting his answer) strawberries

 

phew.  he didn't say donuts or an entire bag of sour gummy worms.  or a donut topped with an entire bag of sour gummy worms.

 

week 2

question:         what is your favorite flavor of ice cream?

quentin:           cupcake.

 

um.  ok.  but then when the girl next to him said "strawberry" he changed his answer to "strawberry."

 

week 3

question:         what is your favorite restaurant?

quentin:           strawberries

 

at least he's consistent?

 

week 4

question:         what is your favorite day of the week?

quentin:           saturday

 

aren't you glad he didn't say strawberry?  i am!

who's computer works again?

mine. yay.

cheese

messy dinner cuteness

ponytail!

when i picked the kids up at school a couple of weeks ago, caroline was rocking a ponytail. the school director was fixing her friend annie's pigtails and caroline and another of her rather bald classmates wanted their hair done too. so she got this adorable whale spout.

and since i was taking pictures of caroline, Q had to get in on the action

my funny valentine

we had the kids make their valentines for school. Q lost interest quickly, but caroline thought it was the best thing ever.