Around Here

Baby blankets adorn furniture, the swing, the carseat, the pack-n-play. Burp cloths can be found in all major areas of the house. Grocery sacks are filled in a day and a half with itty bitty diapers. Desitin is under my fingernails. We've got a baby in the house!

Excuses, excuses...

I will give you none! I have perfectly legitimate reasons for not posting recently. Morning sickness for one. Oh, wait! Forget I said that because "No excuses!" So. To show you we are all just fine and Charlie is as cute as ever (maybe cuter), I will appease you for now with some of his most recent remarks.

As I made lunch, Charlie came into the kitchen and said "Look! You found lunch!"

As we got out of the car, it started to rain. Charlie said "Its rainin' again. God turned on the rain!"

Charlie doesn't miss much. At the playground, every once in a while he will overhear a mom calling to her child. She might say something like "Come on David." Helpful Charlie often chimes in "Come on David! Come on David!" The mom usually smiles. I'm not sure how David feels about it.

Strangers at the park beware. If you so much as smile at Charlie, he will start pontificating. He will lecture you in his semi-gibberish language about fans, generators, the slide, ladder, whatever. Its best to smile again, and walk slowly away. He won't stop until you do.

We are currently working on getting Charlie to ask for things nicely/politely instead of outright demanding them. It's not sticking so far. Last week at the grocery store, the change slid out of the cash register. As I picked it up, Charlie loudly and clearly said "Give me some money!"

Lately, when we get into the car, it can be rather warm if not hot. Before I say a word, Charlie pipes in with "Its not hot. Its warm." Which I can only take to mean that its hot.

When Charlie likes a particular food item, he'll say, while eating it, "I'm so hungry, hungry for yogurt" Or, "I'm so thirsty, thirsty for juice."

We often remind Charlie that Mama has a baby in her belly. The other day I ate something and Charlie asked me where it went. I told him it went in my belly. He said "The baby's eating it!"

He is a little confused about the baby in the belly. He really thinks he has one in his belly too. I hope this clears up when I start to show more.

I guess with early verbal skills come the early questions. Charlie wants to know how everything works. While we drive along, or walk along, or just sit around, Charlie will find something, anything, even if he already knows what it is and ask "Mama what's that?" My answer is promptly followed by "What do's wiff it?"

For instance: "Mama, what's that?"

"Those are trees."

"What do's wiff it?"

And then there are often the reptitive questions:

"Where's my hammer?"

"Downstairs."

"Where's my hammer?"

"Downstairs."

"Where's my hammer?"

"Downstairs."

"Where's my hammer?"

"Charlie, Mama said DOWNSTAIRS."

"Where's my hammer?"

(Me cluing in) "Shall I get it for you?"

"Yeah."

A Little Trip

A couple of weeks ago, Charlie and I took a little trip over the mountains to visit my family, while Keith stayed home and hunkered down with his studies. (One month to go!) We had a great, relaxing, fun time. The timing was perfect for us as it was spring break for some of my nieces and nephews. Oma (my mom) ended up babysitting four of those rugrats, and so Charlie had some quality time with his cousins. One thing I discovered about Oma is that rules have changed since I was a kid in the house. An option for lunch was chocolate sandwhiches. Yum!

Here's Charlie with cousin Johnny. Surprisingly, Charlie wasn't too fond of his chocolate sandwhich, but peanut butter cookies made up the rest of lunch, so it all worked out.

Chillin' with Uncle Dawit. The way to a toddler's heart? Let him play with your cell phone.

This picture with the bad lighting is of my niece Emma. She's nine and plays a mean game of Monopoly. My brother Dawit had to take over for me. The competition was just too intense! (And Charlie's messy diaper might have had something to do with it...)

The next day, we had a playdate at my brother's house, where three of the same cousins live. Charlie had a great time with their amazing train set!

We took a couple of trips to Opa's farm. Charlie gets very excited about trackers and cows. He kept saying "Hi cows. How are you well?"

Once we spotted Opa, it was all over for me. Charlie wanted to be wherever Opa was and even coerced him into playing in the fabulously big mud puddles on the farm. Charlie also go to sit in one of those amazing trackers he admires so much.

Unfortunately, trackers make loud noises once you turn them on and the charm was a little lost for Charlie after that. Oh well! Maybe when you're bigger, Char Char, you'll have fun riding, and not just sitting, in that good ol' John Deere.

Thanks Oma and Opa for a great visit!

More Charlie Charm

Charlie's latest thing is to make whiny sounds, stop and ask himself "What's wrong?" Especially, if I don't ask him first.

He also asks himself, "That fun?"

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He sure knows how to make us laugh. When we put him to bed at night, we used to get him calmed down by saying, "How about a song?" He has now taken the responsibility upon himself to encourage us to sing more songs, thus delaying our inevitable departure. We'll sing one song, and then he'll pipe in with "How 'bout again song?" Lately he's been so pleased with our laughing response he just says it over and over "How 'bout again song?" Until he's worked himself into a fit of giggles. We think its pretty cute, so we laugh too, and pretty soon everyone's laughing at everyone laughing but nothing funny actually happened!

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Charlie's beginning to understand the concept of "later" and "not right now." So, when he asks me a question and I say no, he get's a big grin on his face and says very cheerfully, "Later maybe!"

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Last month I took some coins to the Coinstar machine and let Charlie help me deposit them. When the jar ran out, I told Charlie we were finished and it was time to go. He erupted, very loudly with "I want more money!"

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My social butterfly called out to some friends on our walk this morning, "Hi peoples!"

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Charlie is very affectionate with his stuffed animals and will often get on a roll with kissing each of them smack on the lips. The other day he kissed his truck too.

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Charlie is dilligently working on figuring out colors and is convinced that almost everything is blue. Or orange/blue.

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Does your toddler narrate? Because at the park the other day, Charlie was so excited he described everything he was doing as he was doing it. "I jump on that. I climb up this! Charlie go down the slide! I'm jumpin'. My reach it. Dat blue!"

Get your craft on.

It seems that lately I have been simply thirsting to do creative projects. I have a list called "Want to Do." Unfortunately, I seem to be stuck in some strange gear between desire and ability. Ability: covering the areas of time and in some cases money. Getting my craft on with my little guy hanging around is a big challenge, though I did manage to cut out some fabric for a big boy church suit today. Whew. I feel a small need has been met in my being. At any rate, I did manage to get this done a few weeks ago (I'd been working on it since February):

Please ignore, or rather excuse since I'm pointing them out, the untidy nightstands. It is rather difficult to keep up. I am very happy with how this quilt turned out. It looks just like I wanted it to. However, its too small! It barely covers the sides and when two people try to sleep under it, well tug of war has taken on a whole new meaning. So very soon I'm going to have to put a white border around it. I really don't want to, but I usually win the tug and I want my husband to get a good night's sleep.

And because I know most of you log on just so you can get a peek at the super-cute kiddo, here's a little video of him going down the stairs all by himself, and with a sippy cup in tow, no less. Enjoy.

Life around here...

Well, I can see that its been a while and of course, I know all Charlie fans are wondering-- how IS that awesome kid? Well, I'll tell ya! He's awesome. More details? Ok, he walks everywhere now. And Keith and I just sit around and watch him in amazement. He can also now say "Mama" with much certainty and clarity. We know he knows what he means. He loves to look out the window (he's doing that right now). Even more, he loves to play outside, so much so, he can say it: "Ow sigh?" That means, "can we puh-lease play outside now?" Unfortunately, its been raining a lot, so not much ow sigh time. He can't say "Papa" yet, but looks hopefully at the front door everytime I say "Papa." Oh yeah, and we walks right to Papa when Papa gets home from work. That makes someone very happy.

Charlie's sippy cups have built in straws, so he'll bite down on the straw and wrap his little arm around the cup so he can walk and drink at the same time. Sometimes, if he needs both hands, he can just use his teeth to hang on to his cup. He loves his sippy.

The other day, Charlie saw me washing windows. He picked up an extra rag and started wiping the window he was closest to. Then the next day, at a babysitter's house, he used up all her kleenexes wiping down whatever surfaces he could reach. If he spills milk, I hand him a napkin and he wipes it up. He also helps me load the dryer (he gets to put in the dryer sheet and press "start"). I haven't taught him to iron and vaccuum yet, but we're definitely on the right track. Oh, and he takes to resetting Keith's alarm clock almost everyday. Wants to keep us on our toes, I guess.

He's still blond, still has a sweet, generally cheerful disposition. We like him.

What we've been doing lately.

Mama got a hair cut! Charlie has this "thing" about getting into stuff. As I'm sure most babies his age do.

He as another "thing" about cuddling up on our bed.

He doesn't stay in one place for very long,

but will move around and snuggle for a good fifteen minutes.

And don't worry, he's very good at getting off

the bed without hurting himself.

And I'm never very far away.

Now there's a handsome fella!

Unfortunately, I don't have any good recent pictures of Keith,

probably because he's so busy!

School, work, homework, play with Charlie, kiss the wife, back to homework.

What a trooper!

Mealtime with Charlie

Whenever Charlie has a meal (solid food), he likes to hold his spoon as soon as he finishes. I'm guessing he's "practicing" for the future. Today, for some reason, he was in a particularly good mood after each of his meals (probably because I decided not to serve "Garden Vegetables") and we got some fun shots.

We have also noticed that he is starting to love the camera and seems to want to put on a good show whenever I pull it out.

He's... laughing?

Trying out his Bumbo seat.

Or should I say trying to get out of his Bumbo seat?

Two Milestones

Yesterday, Charlie successfully took a rattle from my hand and put it in his mouth, and I fit into a pair of pre-pregnancy jeans. Good day.

Random Shots

A Day in Charlie's life...

Ok, so its been a while since I made a post and I know all my relatives out there are probably wondering what Charlie's been up to lately, so let me tell you.

He's been reading.

Making friends.

Swinging in the sun.

Exercising.

And of course, "talking."

Because I can't help myself...

Here's one for the grandpas.

For the Grandmas

Happy Birthday Granny!

And just for fun... Hi Oma!

We've given in...

We are now "paci" parents.



And here's some shots of the baptism yesterday. We had a rockin' party afterwards. My apologies to all who attended that may have tried to converse with me--I'm afraid I was a bit of a zombie!

I love fat babies...

Just look at that belly!

Lovely pretty things