It's true: My name is Barbara, and I am a scrapblogoholic. Seriously though, it is sooooo easy and fun to do these!!! (PS--you can click on the picture for the full-screen version)
I forgot to add a funny little anecdote. I say "Oh my gosh!" all the time--any time Aiden is showing me something or I see something neat I will say, "Oh my gosh Aiden, that is so cool!" Well, my little copycat has picked it up too, only it sounds really southern for some reason and comes out as, "Oh Ma garsh Mommy! Look at that car, oh that is so super cool!" The funniest thing is that he always uses it in the right context too. He surprised Chuck the other day by blurting it out and Chuck said right away, "Ok, THAT he did not get from me-you need to stop saying that." Lol. Hey, at least I changed it from god to gosh, ok? :)
Say CHEESE!
My favorite one--she's like, "Um, WHAT are you doing?"
Ava has not been herself for almost a week now--not sleeping at all, fussing most of the day, not wanting to eat her bottle. I finally took her into the Dr. this morning, thinking maybe it was an ear infection. The good news is that it's not, her ears look great. The bad news is that she has coxsackie, a viral infection (you might know it as hand, foot and mouth disease) that causes blisters all over the throat and sometimes hands and feet. Luckily, Ava only has the blisters in her throat, but that is what is causing her not to eat. I feel terrible--she's been in pain now for several days and I had no idea. :(
Anyway, since it's a virus we just have to wait it out and let it take its course. Hopefully she'll be feeling much better in the next day or two.
I was singing the song "Hit the road Jack" the other day, and now for some reason Aiden thinks that the word "road" is actually "road-jack." He calls all cars he sees on the road now "guys," so this is what he says all the time when we are in the car:
"Look at the yellow guy on the road-jack, Mommy! Look at that red vertible (convertible) on the road-jack! Oh, so COOL!!!"
This morning I came downstairs and Chuck had already gotten Aiden up and he was having breakfast. He greeted me with, "Oh, there's my friend Mommy!" Be still my heart! :) He melts me sometimes:)
Thankfully, Aiden is no longer saying, "He said" after everything he says. It was a short, albeit annoying, phase--thank goodness!
We borrowed a baby play mat that has dangling toys from a friend to try to get Ava more motivated to roll over (she's STILL never rolled over once and she'll be 7 months old on Thursday). Aiden is in love with this thing (ironically, it's the same mat that we had when he was a baby, and he loved it then! I sold it in our garage sale though--so he hasn't seen it in almost a year). Anytime Ava is underneath it playing, he stands right by her waiting and saying, "Is it Aiden's turn yet? It's Aiden's turn, Ava. Aiden's turn now!" Lol. At least he knows he has to take turns! It is rather funny to see my 2 year old batting at toys on a baby play mat though!
That's all for now--I'm sure I'll think of some more later!
Well, we did something today that we weren't really planning on doing for a while yet, but Aiden seems ready. We took the rail off his crib and turned it into a big boy bed. There is a small side rail to keep him from falling out (thankfully it's on the side where he always sleeps). He was excited about it and liked being able to get into his bed all by himself.
Ironically, we didn't--like most parents do--take the rail off because he was climbing out of his crib. We actually took the rail off because several times a day Aiden requests to get IN his crib and go to his room. Sometimes when he really gets mad he just needs some alone time to cool off (he probably gets that from both his Mommy and his Daddy, lol). So, to give him the privacy he sometimes wants, we decided it was time to convert his crib.
It's naptime right now, and Aiden is NOT napping, but that's not all that unusual. He doesn't nap most days anymore. He's lying in bed, talking to his stuffed animals, and hasn't attempted to get out of his bed at all, so I'm considering the switch a success for now.
I guess we'll see how tonight goes!
Just an ode to sleep. Oh, how I miss you so!
I know probably no one cares, but my baby girl is not sleeping at night at ALL. It's been awful. The first night unswaddled she did pretty well, but it's been all downhill from there. It's clear that we need to stop swaddling her, she's already sitting much better and rolling onto her side now, but she is not doing very well at night. Up every hour or two, crying and crying...ugh.
If you know the sleep gods, will you say a little prayer for us that tonight goes better? We could use some SLEEP!!
(Luckily, Aiden seems oblivious to her crying and is still sleeping just fine. One thing to be thankful for!)
Monday is the "free" day at the Macon Museum of Science and Art. Don't let the fancy name fool you, this really is a pretty lousy museum, lol. Aiden can't say the word "museum," it always comes out sounding like "you-see-EM!" lol. But it's something free to do in town that is air-conditioned and somewhat educational, so we usually take advantage of it!
They have an exhibit right now on the human body, with little stations to learn about different parts of the body and what they do. Aiden REALLY gets into this exhibit. It's been up all summer, so he's seen it a handful of times. Today he completely took the lead, telling me what he was doing and looking at. He especially cracked me up on the "smelling station." There are a bunch of bottles with different scents inside them, and you squeeze the bottles while sniffing at the top and then try to guess the scent. He has no idea what different scents are called, so they all smelled "pretty." Too cute:)
Listening at the "hearing station"
Learning all about the human brain
Sniffing at the "smelling station" 
Checking out fingerprints with a magnifying glass
My newest online obsession is www.scrapblog.com. Warning: DO NOT go there unless you really need a new hobby, because you could easily spend hours a day there doing digital scrapbooking, lol. Oh, and did I mention it's all FREE. I *heart* scrapblog:)
Anyway, one of the small glitches is that I can't save them and post them here, so I'll have to direct you straight to the source. Check out this link: http://www.scrapblog.com/viewer/viewer.aspx?sbid=442783 for a cute 4th of July scrapbook page of Ava. I think you can look at all of my pages that I've done. They're not great yet--but hey, I'm still learning!
:)
Well, if this isn't proof that maybe you CAN read to your kids too much, then I don't know what is.
Aiden has started narrating his life to us. Quite literally. He has started to do this very quirky thing--adding "he said" to most of the things he says, just like you would hear if it was being read from a book.
"Good morning Mommy....he said."
"Where is my Daddy?...he said."
"No, I don't want to try broccoli...he said."
"WOW!!!...he said." (Chuck got quite the laugh out of that one, lol)
We're hoping that if we ignore this little phase, then he'll stop doing it. It certainly is interesting at least! Ah the toddler stage, a new phase every week:) Gotta love it, right?...she said. (he he he, I couldn't resist!)
We're stuck at home today, waiting for a package from FedEx (ok, ok, we ordered Guitar Hero in an effort to find something to do together in the evenings. Yes, we know we're not 13 years old, lol). Anyway, Ava is napping and I wanted to do something new with Aiden, so I busted out the only two dolls we own (I'm sure all that will change about a year from now when Ava is one and a half!). Aiden went to town. He wanted to wrap the babies up and put them down for a nap (in the ball pit, of course, where else would they sleep? lol). He sang them the "wake up song" that I always sing to him when he wakes up ("Wake up, wake up, now it's time to wake up"--yeah, it's really original;), asked them, "How was your nap babies?" It was so cute. Their names are Alfie (I named Alfie, he's the little bald baby) and Sweet Pea (that's just her name, she came inside a little pea pod and was a present for Ava from my Aunt Nancy). Aiden was having such a great time showing Alfie how to play trains and showing Sweet Pea how to roll around in the ball pit. Two really is such a fun age sometimes!
Alfie and Sweet Pea all wrapped up and sleeping with their "snuggle bear"
Aiden in the ball pit with his napping babies
Taking Alfie and Sweet Pea for a walk
