The goings on #2

Here I am, back for the second installment of The Goings On! You might notice some overlap, that is due to the photos being a mix of ones from my phone and ones from the camera. I'm just going through the folder of photos and selecting as it goes, so yes, there will be overlap on events with the previous post.

Anywho... the goings on!

We recently unpacked Elliott's tent. He was delighted and has spent a lot of time playing in the tent since then.

Shadow puppets in the tent.

An incredibly cute pic of the little guy.

Warm, clean laundry + Clifford = best morning ever

He loved snuggling in the basket of just dried laundry.

Oh how I wish I was small enough to curl my whole body into a basket of warm laundry!

Bear doing what she loves to do these days: Monitoring the neighborhood.

Lovely spring color.

The indestructible bandaid. This Curious George bandaid lasted approximately a full week. This was Elliott showing me how it was firmly affixed even after swimming lessons.

Out for a trike ride on what has been a very rare sunny day. he rode his trike all the way to his friend's house with minimal help from me! This was also the ride where he had his first bike riding injury... hence the bandaid in the photo above.

We painted Elliott's room. One half wall has magnet primer covered with chalkboard paint. It has been fun!

Elliott helped ;)

Sacked out after a day of painting.

Free scoop day at Ben and Jerry's.

Easter cookie decorating with one of Elliott's best buddies, Levi.

I baked a lot of cookies. The boys did a pretty good job decorating, but it's a good thing Levi's mom, Michelle, and I both like cookie decorating ;)

Deep in imaginative tractor play. It is kinda hard to see, but he was lifting pieces of tinker toy with one of his tractors.

Ready for an egg hunt. This was right before leaving home for the first of three egg hunts Elliott participated in this year.

Our Easter Tree. Elliott and I made an Easter Tree from a branch I found in a boulevard in NE Portland, some pretty "stones" and eggs we (or I) blew and Elliott dyed. We were super pleased with our tree!

Elliott after saying to me: "Mom? I need sunblock. Can we go to the beach?"

We really love our new neighbors (across the street). Here Elliott eats a little mincemeat pie they baked and gave us and last weekend they gave us some fresh baked bread. Yum! We gave them some of the Easter cookies we made and decorated.

And we love our sunny days! We've gotten so few that when one rolls around we pretend it is August!

Rainbow! Elliott loves rainbows. One of his favorite songs to sing is the Rainbow song from the "Cat in the Hat knows a lot about that" show on OPB. "Red, Orange, Yellow. Then Green, followed by blue. Indigo and Violet, That's a rainbow song for you!" (btw, he looks like he's not excited in this picture only because I was standing there shouting "Smile!" as he was being blinded by the sun.)

Our BIG egg!

Another BIG egg.

Our centerpiece for Easter Brunch. The Easter Tree on the table and our big eggs hanging from the ceiling fan.

This is what Elliott calls "taking a shower." One of his favorite activities these days. Not mom's favorite.

Yup, glad we replaced this exterior outlet. Yipes!

And I'm working on killing grass. Yup! Super exciting!

Probably one of the best lego constructions I've ever done. Elliott commissioned me to make a "Mack Truck" for his race cars out of Duplo Legos. I should note the trough on the top of the trailer part of the truck. That is a rain collection trough... completely Elliott's idea. This kiddo loves to talk about collecting rainwater. Super awesome!

Pretty much the best bedtime event Elliott has ever experienced. A Wendy's frosty and a trip through the carwash. Five star night for the three-year-old.

We checked out the playground at the nearby elementary school. It pretty much rocks Elliott's world. He keeps asking to go back to the "new" playground.

We made a friend on the way to the "new" playground. Elliott has asked a few times since to go find the friendly kitty.

And a stop at the flavor spot waffle food cart. We miss living a 1/2 block from it.

In my quest to find more creative ways to fulfill Elliott's need for more physical stimulation, I devised a pully system so he can pull loads from the main floor to the second floor. He's been having a good time with it.

Having fun at OMSI.

On the submarine tour. Looking through the periscope was the only part he liked.

Elliott set the table :)

We went to a birthday party recently where Elliott got a balloon sword. He said it was an anteater and here the anteater was sniffing for ants.

Eating pizza at the birthday party.

Meeting Micky Mouse at the birthday party.

I sewed some light blocking curtains for Elliott's room. He chose the fabric...

purple with Robots.

Playing with fake snow.

Taking Bear on a walk in a wooded area near our house. She loves to go walking through there.

We purchased some solar lights at Costco. Elliott made a birdhouse from the packaging. Totally his idea. Super cute.

Nate and Elliott found four little salamanders in a hole in our backyard. Here they are in the dump bucket of Elliott's trike right before the boys took them to the swampy area in the park near our house to release them back into nature. Elliott was very serious about the release (and it was incredibly cute.)

The hole where we found the salamanders. (with one salamander visible)

Grocery Shopping. When he got into this cart, he said, "Mommy, this cart is for big boys!"

Sorry it is out of focus, but I think you can still appreciate

the crazy post swimming lessons hair.

Sweet. Sweet, sweet, sweet. I love this man. I love this boy.

My heart on a mini-merry-go-round.

On Mother's Day we went to a restaurant the recently opened near us. It is a pizza and such all you can eat buffet and it has an arcade with rides too. Here are my boys playing skeeball.

Elliott whacking sharks.

Getting goofy in the car. (Don't worry, we were not moving). After running errands, we pulled in our driveway and Elliott didn't want to get out yet. He asked for some carrot sticks to snack on, so after giving him a couple I got the idea to make a walrus face with a couple sticks. Elliott thought it was HILARIOUS when I whipped around in my seat with the walrus face. He immediately tried to do it and has been making the walrus face ever since every time he gets ahold of a carrot stick. Anyhow, I took this to commemorate the moment.

YAY! We're all caught up on photos for now! I hope you all have enjoyed the little snapshots of our lives!

the goings on

So much has happened since I last updated! Whew! So much! So, I'm going to do a picture post with some captions to catch everyone up. Sorry for the lack of substance writing-wise, but I have a feeling the cute pictures of Elliott are why most folks are here anyhow.

The day before Easter we took a family trip down to the Tulip Festival. It was Elliott and I's third trip to the festival, but was Nate's first. We had a great time, above and below

Waiting for the start of the egg hunt. This hunt was Elliott's second of three hunts this year.

Elliott had his first pony ride. He really liked it.

Riding the cow train was a huge deal. We had a great time and Elliott rode by himself for the second year in a row.

I didn't get much for pictures of Elliott in the tulips this year.

This is basically what he wanted to do this year: Run.

Nate tried to help him stand still long enough for a picture, but it didn't work.

Yay! We got ONE good one!

We got to see (and hear) an old fashioned steam tractor.

This is what Elliott thought of the steam tractor.

Elliott always enjoys a corndog.

There were tables filled with chicken feed for the kids to scoop and dump.

Elliott spent a lot of time there.

... and the obligatory Tulip Festival child-in-wooden-shoe shot

Elliott decided to put his Easter basket on the front porch so it would be easy for the Easter Bunny to find. He was very, very excited about the Easter Bunny and spent the week before Easter singing Christmas Tunes, but substituting "Easter Bunny" for "Santa". Or, sometimes, they worked together in his songs.

And, of course, we left a snack for the Easter Bunny.

Opening Easter baskets from Grandparents! Thank you!

He found his basket!

He was excited about the chocolate chicken in his basket. (one of his favorite Easter books was the Max and Ruby book, "The Chocolate Chicken")

Also was excited about the chocolate carrots hanging from his basket.

We invited Elliott's friend Noah and his parents over for Easter brunch. We had an egg hunt (Elliott's third) in our backyard. By this time, Elliott was a seasoned vet and we had to actually work on slowing him down so Noah could get some eggs too. We've never seen him so competitive.

Elliott and Noah egg hunting

Elliott finding some of the more difficult eggs.

Boys and their loot.

During brunch we (the parents) were saying how wonderfully the boys were playing. They were so good! They played so well, we got to enjoy our brunch! It was amazing. Well, after our guests left, I went downstairs where the boys had been and discovered foil chocolate wrappers everywhere! No wonder they were so good! They sat downstairs and ate chocolate! Ah, silly boys!

Okay, I have more to post, but it is late (12:30 p.m.) and I'm tired. So i promise to get back on and post more pictures from the last couple of months. Promise. Cross my heart!

Thoughts on Bin Laden

I'm not sure how to start this entry, but it has been on my mind and I know it will continue to stay there until I get it out. So, I'm getting it out. Please forgive my clunkiness and rambliness in advance.

A bit more than a week ago I was working on sewing Elliott some light blocking curtains. (A must with summer's long days coming soon.) I saw a couple posts on facebook saying Osama Bin Laden had been killed. Of course, my ole' journalist mind went crazy! OMG! Turn on the TV, watch obsessively, think of all the possible implications, holy cow! "Big news!" was the big thought in my head.

The second wave of thoughts were political. I was excited for Obama to have such a great military win under his belt. With all the talk about how inexperienced he is, how he would be ineffective in the war, didn't have enough history and clout, "Well," I thought. "This shows all the naysayers where they can shove it!" My feelings about Obama were further solidified when I listened to his speech. The time they took in executing the maneuver showed pragmatism that I don't think this country has seen in a long time. It showed that careful thought and evaluation went into the decision as to when/how to strike. I appreciated his nod to the S.E.A.L.S., saying they performed professionally. So good to hear after all the embarrassing debacles since the "War on Terror" began.

Then the celebrations began. The celebratory facebook posts and the hundreds (thousands?) of people cheering, dancing and celebrating outside the White House. My first thought was, "Wow. I really hope this gloating doesn't come back to bite us in the ass." Really. I've always been wary of this kind of celebration... especially when the job (in this case, the "War on Terror") is clearly not wrapped up. it's still a intensely complicated matter. I have no doubt that there was some sort of plan in place in case this happened. Relations with Pakistan are dicy right now... it's delicate.

Many friends were admonishing the celebrations, saying celebrating a killing is barbaric and shouldn't be happening. I agree with them. Like my Grandma Sally said to me, if we flipped the situation and it was people celebrating the death of a soldier in Iraq, for instance, we (Americans) would consider them barbaric. It's not different for us over here.

But for me, my concerns were more about what these celebrations will say down the road. Are we going to look like fools? How will it play out politically?

I hope, hope, hope that the killing of Osama Bin Laden means a brighter and less violent and scary future. But deep down I know that's just Pollyanna and I'm sure our world will see more challenges.

Potty Training

Elliott is rocking the potty training bit!

I'm not expecting miracles or anything, but we've had two nights in a row with a dry diaper. He sometimes still wets his diaper or undies, but more and more he's figuring out that he needs to go ahead of time and getting his pants and undies off in time. We're working on his aim, since at least in one of our bathrooms he insists on peeing standing up. It's a work in progress, but improving.

The biggest thing for me is watching how independently he is doing this. For the last year, I have been so, so ready for him to potty train. I've encouraged, pushed a bit, then backed off. Over and over. I made a potty chart, not with the intention to potty train completely, but to motivate him to connect potty and pee. Not sure if it really worked, but he really liked it.

But right before our move he started showing real signs of being ready. With the move, I was fairly pre-occupied with, well, moving, so I wasn't pushing. I was excited when he did go on the potty, but potty training was on my list of things to concentrate after the move.

Then, after the move, I noticed he was running to the potty more and more. But he didn't want my help, he wanted to do it himself.

So now I find myself standing behind a closed bathroom door, or if I am lucky, standing in the doorframe of an open one, asking questions like, "Are you done?" NO! "Do you need my help?" NO! "Do you need me to wipe your bottom?" NO! I do it myself!

ahhhhh....

So, he wants to do it all on his own (I do insist on helping with the wiping, though... as much as he wants to do it himself. I tried letting him do it on his own today... and let's just say he's really not ready...)

And I was thinking about the push to do things in our society. The push to wean, the push to potty train, the push to this and that. And I started thinking about how frustrated I would get when I wanted him to be ready and to do something and he wasn't. And I realized that every single time I've tried to push him into something (even gently) it turned horrible. I end up being an insane stress case, he's upset and starts acting out... it is never a good situation. But, I let go, find my MamaZen as I like to call it, and wait it out. Wait for him to be ready, to make the first move, when I let it be his own accomplishment, it is amazing.

Like now. It is so amazing to see him figuring this out. He's happy, he's excited and it is ALL HIS OWN. I can't take a bit of credit in this process. It has been all about him. I've only been a cheerleader, given minimal guidance (lifting the seat when peeing standing up, small stuff like that), and been his support staff waiting in the shadows for my next opportunity to help.

Without fail, every single time I've been able to let it happen, it has been so positive. It has been a positive experience for all of us, and most of all, it has been positive for him and he is able to OWN the entire experience. I love that.