I Don't Want to Forget

I don't want to forget....

• Bret "fixing" one of the kids' broken chairs with his hammer.  It was one of those little folding chairs, and the cushy back had come apart from the metal frame.  Serena had brought it down from their playroom to show Jordan, and he had assured Serena that he would fix it with her that night.  So, the chair was sitting in two pieces in our living room, and Bret (who has been fascinated with the idea of fixing things for people ever since we read the part in the book Heidi where Grandfather helps Peter's mother and grandmother by fixing things around their house) went upstairs for his hammer so he could "fix" the chair.  Bret returned with his hammer, picked up the little "back" piece, held it in place, and hammered away on it.  And I have NO IDEA how this worked, but when he stopped hammering and stepped back to assess his work, the piece actually stayed on!  For like 5 seconds, haha!  Bret's face was priceless!  Later, I was rocking Bret and reading to him in the living room after his nap, and he was intermittently looking at the pictures in the book and then staring at the broken chair.  Suddenly, he interrupted me and said in that Bretster-boy way, "I need to find something sticky to put on it and then hammer it on and then it would stay."  Mmmm, good idea, Bret.  Silence for a moment, and then I continued reading.  A couple pages later, he interrupted me again, "Mom, can I have some honey?" 

Things are starting to get more physical between Bret and Cody.  Bret still likes to introduce perfect strangers to Cody as his "little baby brother, and I take care of him."  But, at home, Bret and Cody are doing more and more of the wrestling each other down and then laughing about it.  They also love to be in on a joke together, and when they start singing it's so loud!  Unfortunately, they both still struggle to remember that it's not okay to take toys from each other; so that's our main problem area with these two right now.  ;)

• When Bret said to me one evening, "When I smile at you, I feel like eating ice cream."
• When Bret says to me as I carry him out of his room after waking him up from his nap almost every afternoon, "You're the best Mommy."  He rests his head sleepily on my shoulder and drapes his arms around my neck.  He really is so sweet!

We had such an awesome time with my Mom when she visited us a few weeks ago!

• When Serena said,  "Just wait until we go, Mommy.  Then you won't have to worry about Daddy doing all the crazy stuff he does to you."  She was getting ready to run a few errands with Jordan that afternoon, and Jordan was tickling me while he waited for her.  ;)

More and more, Cody wants to be in on everything that Serena & Bret are doing.  And please DON'T hold his hand or help him because he does everything BY. HIM. SELF!  ;)

• When Bret said,  "When I'm as big as the sky, I will wash the sky.  And the clouds.  I will be very very big."  This kid is obsessed with being big and strong.  At the same time, he's the most cuddly of the three.
• When Bret said, "Mommy, that was a boat!"  He was so excited about this knowledge, that it seemed to beg the question, "Wow, Bret!  How did you know that?"  "Because I just did...and I'm very strong."

A favorite activity is sitting in either Bret's or Serena's bed and reading all the books in their basket.  This will usually entertain them for nearly an hour!  Cody especially loves the big Bible story books.

• When Bret gave us this bit of information, "Is it Friday?"  Yes.  "K. Cause I only go potty standing up on Sundays and on Fridays."  The next day, he went standing up, and then asked me what day it was.  I told him it was Saturday, so he amended his rule to include Saturdays as well.  ;)
• Crocodile hunting.  Bret had just gotten up from his nap and had a snack, and as he stood in the kitchen he suddenly said, "Mom!  Did you hear that?  It was a CccrrrrOCodile!!!  But you don't have to worry because I am going to get my gun and SHOOT it, and then I will bring in some crocodile meat for you."  After this, all three of the kids spent an hour in the backyard hunting crocodiles and getting distracted with building bird nests.

For National Library Week, Culvers offered coupons for free ice cream when the kids drew a picture from their favorite book at the library.  Bret & Serena were so serious about drawing their pictures and giving them to the librarian for their coupons.  When Jordan got home that evening, they were so excited to show him their coupons!  He suggested hanging onto the coupons for a few days and using them on our way to Grandma & Grandpa's.  This idea was approved by all.  Then, the coupons became their prized possessions for those few days.  I was so afraid they were going to lose them!  They played with them constantly, and I even had to tape Serena's because it got so worn out from being folded!  Bret covered the back of his with stickers, so it was a little more sturdy.  We had the wooden building blocks out that week, and they LOVE to play with those blocks; but they told me they wouldn't be playing with them now because they loved their coupons so much!  Haha!  (I love this picture, and Cody sitting on the potty in the background!!)

• The building of the whelping box.  Jordan was seriously unbelievably patient with the kids when he built the whelping box one Saturday a couple weeks ago!  He put ear muffs on Serena & Bret and let them be out in the garage with him, "helping" and generally being underfoot.  As soon as Bret got wind of the impending building project that morning, he ran upstairs for his hammer.  He wanted so badly to build with his hammer, but Jordan told him they'd be using screws.  No problem!  Back upstairs he went for his screwdriver.  There were tears of frustration when he was made to realize that his screw driver would not work on Daddy's screws.  Reminded me of how difficult it was for him to wrap his brain around the fact that his "real" car keys (I got them off a mailer a local dealership had sent) wouldn't actually start the car.  He wanted so badly for me to drive our car with them!!

I picked up the book King Bidgood's in the Bathtub at the library, and Bret just LOVED it!  Listening to him read it is awesome!

• When Kari tried to get Bret to be her helper.  We had just arrived at Jordan's parents' house and it was 10pm, but all three kids were still wide awake.  :P  They were so wound up about being at Grandma & Grandpa's house and it really was hilarious!  Kari asked Bret if he would help her do some work tomorrow.  "What?"  "I have some work that needs to get done and I wondered if you would help me."  "No.  I can't do that."  A little surprised, Kari asked, "Why?"  Bret looked a little surprised too.  "I can't drive," he said, with a duh-what-do-you-think kind of expression.

One of the kids' favorite things to do at Grammie's house is playing with her collection of games!!!

• Bret's fascination with car windows.  A few weeks ago, Bret discovered how to operate the car window.  He pushed the button, the window went down, and Bret looked like he'd just seen fireworks for the first time.  His mouth was wide open, his eyes were twinkling round saucers.  I tell you, that kid does everything 100%!  Every time he put the window up or down during that 10 minute drive home, he would look just as pleased as the first time!  (It was one of our first nice days.)  And, being the Bretster-boy, he was not one to put the window up and down and up and down over and over.  Instead, he put it down and reveled in that for a minute or so; and then put it back up and rejoiced in the fact that it worked!  After a while of staring at the window and the button and wondering about it, he tried it over again.  A couple weeks later, when we were driving down to Iowa, Bret had his "real" car keys and was making a big deal out of "locking" the truck door.  Then Jordan asked him if he'd locked the window.  For the next 20 minutes or so, Bret and Jordan played a game of "locking" and "unlocking" the truck window and putting it up and down.  It kept Bret so entertained, and it was hilarious to see him get so excited when his unlocking and locking really "worked."  ;)  Just last week, he stuck his hand a little ways out the window while we were driving down the interstate and discovered how it will "buck" the wind; so now he thinks that's really cool to do.

Helping Daddy paint the whelping box.  We didn't think of getting the kids paint brushes for this project, so I told them they could get their water color paint brushes.  They had an awesome time!  :D

• Serena's book.  I know that one of the biggest reasons Serena loves the Little House on the Prairie books is that she knows the characters are real.  She has a little rag doll that Kari gave her, and Serena calls her "Charlotte" and likes to speculate that it might really be the one that Laura had.  A few months ago, Serena started asking me a lot of questions about why Laura wrote those books.  Why did she think people would want to read them?  Why did she write about those stories?  Serena is still by far our biggest why-question-er.  ;P  After a month or so of pondering these things, Serena began adding at the end of these discussions that maybe she would write a book someday too, like Laura.  Then it became more definite, she would write that book.  Now, this past week, she's started coming up with chapter titles and planning what stories from her daily life she will be including in the book.  For example, I've always had to open Bret's string cheese for him, but the other day he opened it for himself for the first time.  He was very pleased with himself, and Serena began cheering for him.  Then she said that she would call this day "The Surprise" and people would be curious to know what the surprise was, so they'd be excited to read that chapter. (Yes, she said "curious."  Another time she asked me if I was "astonished" about something.  She seems to have the vocabulary to be a writer, haha!)  A few blocks later, after some contemplation, she decided to change the title to "The Most Wonderful Summer Day."  She has an exciting life, doesn't she?  ;)  Yesterday, we were talking about the time Bret threw his paci in the trash (we like to keep these memories alive for Cody's benefit) and Serena said proudly that she would title that chapter "The Wonderful Time."  Not to be confused with "The Most Wonderful Summer Day."  ;)

The classic toddler swaddle

• The healing power of Mommy's kiss.  Mommy's kisses are still the therapy of choice for most owies.
• When Bret said sleepily, "Mom, that almost woke me up!" after Cody had randomly woken up scuh-REAMing one morning.  Two minutes later, Cody and Bret were still in bed laughing uproariously at each other.  So ended those chances of their sleeping in!
• Bret's love of fishing/turtles/worms/sticks ("logs"), etc.  He cannot get enough of fishing, and any body of water must be considered as a possible fishing spot.  We went to Heckrodt Wetland Preserve, and explored their Nature Center yesterday.  They had a bunch of aquariums holding fish and turtles, and Bret was fascinated.  I had a hard time keeping track of him because he would just get enamored with one tank and not keep up, or wander off in another direction that his curiosity would lead him in.  The Preserve was pretty flooded with the spring rains we've been having, so the playground (which is located in the middle of the woods there) had flooded creek water all around it.  Bret and some of the other boys (all older than him by a year or two) were playing with sticks by the water for a good 10 minutes or so.  After a while, the other boys wandered off to something else, but Bret stayed there for another 10 or 15 minutes, poking his long stick in the water.  When I finally called him over, he was all excited to tell me about how he was trying to catch some fish.  :)  He loves sticks and is always trying to find the biggest one.  At the Preserve, he was finding even bigger ones than we find around our neighborhood, so he kept asking me, "Is this a log?"  I found some worms under a rock when I was weeding out the landscaping in front of our house last week.  Serena, of course, would not touch them, but Bret held them and played with them for the rest of the evening.  I had no idea how much enjoyment a boy could get out of a couple worms!

Sleepy Bear

• How "big" Bret is.  Okay, so Bret is a squirt.  There's no other way to describe him.  Being 3 years and 3 months old and weighing 30 pounds, he is in the 20th percentile for his age.  But his small size looks even smaller next to Cody's overgrown body.  At 20 months, Cody is almost 28 pounds, which is the 85th percentile for his age.  No wonder people ask me if the boys are twins every time we go anywhere these days!  However, Bret is big.  And he will not hesitate to tell you that he is big.  And that he is a big strong boy.  And isn't it nice that I have a big strong boy?  And don't I like having a big strong boy?  Because he is "bery, bery, bery, bery, bery, bery, bery, berrryyy, BERRRYYY, bery big."  In all seriousness.