Our crazy boy Miles

So Miles fell and hit his head yesterday in the living room (this is a common occurrence for Mr. Daredevil) so I tell him to come to me and I'll give it a kiss. He comes over and I pick him up as he's crying with giant tears falling down his face. 

Me: Where does it hurt?

Miles: Here (touches forehead then looks at his hand)

Miles: Wook mommy no bwud (look mommy no blood)(immediately stops crying, gets down from my arms and goes off to play again).

Oh Clara....

Today was.... rough. Clara is in a I don't really need to listen to my parents phase because she thinks she knows better than we do. She is really smart and yet she is still only 4 (although she is under the impression that she's 16). Seriously. Just pray for us. This morning she injured me because she wasn't listening then this afternoon she injured Miles because she wasn't listening. After some yelling, I finally sat down at the table with her (head in hands).

Mommy: I just don't know what to do with you today.

Clara: You could send me to heaven.

Mommy: I'll be real its crossed my mind today.

Clara is 4!!

My first born is 4 years old!!! WHAT!!! Clara went for her four year check up today and was 40.8 inches tall (60%) and weighed 35 lbs (50%).  This little girl brings us so much joy with her constant curiosity about the world, her love and compassion for those around her (especially her brother/bff), and her motivation to constantly learn and do new things. Clara currently knows all the sounds for her ABC's and we've started to work on reading. She loves to do workbooks and any kind of craft, play games, do puzzles, play outside and read books. For Clara's birthday we basically had a birthday week!

On Monday they celebrated her birthday at school and she got to be the starfish which means she got to bring in a show and tell item corresponding with the letter of the week. We were blessed with the letter Y ??? so she brought in a ball of my yarn and her crocheted blanket. She also got to bring in a special birthday snack so Sunday night we popped a ton of popcorn with the air popper then bought several different shakers of popcorn seasoning. Her teacher said it was a big hit.

On Tuesday she got to be the special person of the day at LAMBS and brought in her favorite toy, her baby doll.

On Wednesday it was her actually birthday so we had birthday pancakes for breakfast then opened presents after dinner that night when daddy got home.

I promise I don't normally serve my children whip cream for breakfast.

On Friday we went to the zoo with all our family and a couple of friends. That was what Clara had requested for her birthday and I was more than happy to not plan a party with a house full of four year olds!

Then on Saturday we had a little family party with spaghetti for lunch and ice cream cake! Shew, I need a vacation after all this partying!

We are so blessed to have this beautiful little girl that is so full of life in our family!

Seriously where does she get this sass from? Her TV time is limited to Peppa Pig and Octonauts so I'm pretty sure she didn't get it from there! 

Clara's cow box idea

Brian wanted me to make sure and write this down for us to remember even though it was months ago.

So last summer Clara was very disturbed that the cows on Pop Pop's farm just pooped all over the place.  A few days later she told me she had a great idea! That we could get a really big box and teach the cows to poop in it like Hope poops in her litter box. I thought that was pretty creative but we told her that there were a lot of cows and that cows poop a lot so the box would get full really quickly.  We didn't hear anything else about it for a couple of months then one day in the car she says, mommy remember my idea where the cows poop in a box (this comment was completely out of nowhere). Yes I said. Well, she says I have a better idea about that. How about we put a drain on the box and connect a pipe to the drain so that the poop can come out and it won't fill up.

At three years old this kid was blowing our minds! I can't wait to see what 4 brings!!

Miles is 2

Last week Miles had his two year check up. He's grown a ton lately so I felt like he would be higher on the charts this time. Not the case. Guess he got mommy's short genes. Miles was 32.8 inches tall (11%) and 26.2 lbs (34%).  He's wearing size 24 month clothes and has tons of blonde wavy hair. His eyes are brownish/green and he is ALL BOY. We've developed quite the attitude since turning two but his language has also exploded in the last month. He has gone from using only single words to three and four word statements in just the last couple of weeks. My favorite is "wach dis mommy" translation, I'm about to do something crazy and dangerous so make sure you watch. Or "mommy, Cawa still seep?" Because Clara still naps longer than he does. He loves tractors, Olaf and Peppa Pig. Our lives are wild and crazy with this little guy around but we couldn't love him more!

For his birthday we had a tractor day at the farm in Raeford. He LOVES riding on the tractors with Pop Pop so it was the perfect birthday surprise for him.

He wanted a tractor/Olaf cake so daddy came to the rescue and made all his dreams come true!

We grilled ribs! Yum!!!

And opened presents by the bon fire!

And the day of his birthday we had sprinkle blueberry pancakes (his favorite)!!

And some other miscellaneous pictures from this month.

Clara's First Day of 3 Year Preschool

This girl is getting so big!! She was so excited to go back to school today. She walked right on in her class and I had to stop her to even get a kiss! This girl is 3 going on 13 these days! She's quite the fashionista and likes to pick out her own clothes and dress herself. She'll be wearing a dress of course because seriously who wears pants or shorts? 

Yesterday we had a story for the record books. It started with Clara telling me she wanted to go to the jumping place that morning. Since we didn't have any plans I told her we could do that but she would have to hurry because we only had an hour before we had to leave. After her refusing to get dressed then refusing to located and put on her shoes them protesting at pretty much anything else I asked her we finally got in the car only for it to be too late to make it to the jumping place on time. So I tell her we are going to have to do something else. She wants to know why and I explain that she didn't listen to mommy to get ready quickly and now its too late to get there in time. She then tells me that I'm a mean mommy and she is going to move to Mimi and Pop Pop's house and never ever come back. After much effort of keeping a straight face I tell her that if she leaves I won't be able to give her hugs and kisses when she gets hurt or tuck her in to bed at night or give her kisses. And won't you miss me? No I won't and Mimi can do all those things for me. Well then...

Today was also Clara's first ballet class at the community center. We got her all dressed up in her leotard, ballet slippers and of course a bun in her hair then daddy picked her up to take her to class. Talk about one excited little girl! 

Miles was 18 Months Old! (last month)

I just found Miles' growth charts from his pediatrician visit last month so this is an 18/19 month old post. He weighed in at 23.4 lbs (20%) and was 32 inches tall (40%). Dr. Franklin commented on how muscular he was as he ran all over the exam room in his diaper. Yes, thats from climbing EVERYTHING. He's not swinging from the ceiling fans yet but I'm guessing we will be able to check off that box by his next visit. The last two months his words have really increased and the last two weeks I've really felt like he's starting to communicate well with us (which has taken away a lot of his frustration). Some of his words include: nak (snack), momma, dada, mimi, bop bop (pop pop), gigi, g-pa, love you, thank you, dog, kitty, more, all done, come on, upstairs, I don't know, truck, car, airplane, apple, blueberries, oatmeal, eyes, nose, head, ears, belly, blocks, book, outside, and slide. I'm sure there's a few more things I can't remember but I think that's pretty impressive considering two months ago he only had 4 or 5 words.

Miles favorite toy is a set of blocks that stack and then fit within themselves. He LOVES to play with these and wants you to help him do it over and over again. Last night he cooked in the play kitchen and brought me a plate with eggs and then when I asked for a fork then a drink he went and found each item and brought them to me. He put Clara's baby in the high chair and fed it some eggs too. So fun to see him starting to pretend! He also loves books. He doesn't have the patience for me to read to him yet but he likes to flip the pages and me ask him "where's the dog?" "where's the ball?" and he points things out.

Little man's favorite food is still fruit. We've been making frequent trips to the farmers market this summer to meet this little guy's fruit quota. He also really likes black beans and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Breakfast is our most difficult meal because he really doesn't like breakfast foods except things that are messy like oatmeal and yogurt. He's been known to have black beans and cheese nips for breakfast on more than one occasion.

Miles continues to be our fiercely determined little boy who knows exactly what he wants. The terrible twos are already creeping in with fits and tantrums. Some days are very long and very hard but then this energetic little boy will crawl into my lap and say love you and blow me a kiss or snuggle his head up against my neck and say book book momma and its all worth it over and over again.

Also, did I mention that we went to the beach the last two weekends and Miles slept through the night every night somewhere other than at home! Alleluia!!

The bandaid is because Mr. Miles tried his hand at shaving his face like daddy.