Random Bits

My kids crack me up! I gave Ephraim a bowl of colored goldfish crackers. He just smashed them into the carpet and didn't eat them. Less than 5 minutes later, I find him chewing a mouth full of colored chalk!! It was bits of blue and red chalk and he had lovely purple saliva oozing out!

I made two loaves of meatloaf for dinner a few days ago. The first time Gabriel had meatloaf, he asked for seconds. This time, he wouldn't touch it for two nights in a row. So tonight, I made spaghetti noodles and sauce, cut the meatloaf into cubes and called them meatballs. He was excited and gobbled them down! Yay, for mommy creativity!

I was taking a shower Saturday morning when Gabriel burst in on me and excitedly shouted "pirate turtle" and ran back out. So random!

Indoor and Outdoor Fun

Gabriel spelled his name all by himself using the letter magnets. I asked him why there was a 4 in the middle of his name and he matter-of-factly told me it's because he's 4 years old. (Duh!) He can spell out his name using a pencil, but usually forgets the "I" there too.

New game for the week: making bubble soup in the bathroom sink. (Gabriel learned how to pull the stopper in the sink and has been giving his action figures and frogs baths for about two weeks now.) The boys were fighting over the one wooden spoon they had found, so I gave them a second. It made for a good clean mess, that's for sure!

I rediscovered the local Farmer's Market. We went first thing in the morning on Wednesday and went to the park up the hill from it afterward. We were just in time for the water sprinklers to be turned on.

On Saturday, Paul's friend was in from WA, so we invited people to a park to play with boffer swords. It turned out Eric, John, and the four of us were the only ones there. But we had lots of fun!

Happy Anniversary!

Gabriel is growing up so fast. He had his 4-year check up and is still at the top of the charts for height. This was his first "big boy" check up, where they did the eye and ear test. (It seems like just yesterday he was on the baby scale and we were so worried about how tiny he was.) He is healthy and strong and very active. Gabriel favorite game outside is a game he made up called Gingerbread Man. I chase him around the yard and he sings, "Run, run, as fast as you can, you can't catch me, I'm the gingerbread man."

Trains continue to be popular in our house! One day while Ephraim napped, Gabriel built a train set all over the front room--even between the couches as a tunnel toward the front door. "Choo-choo!"

Once Gabriel asked me to built a set for him. I tried to make it as complicated as possible. Had to take a picture to record it.

Ephraim loves hats. He also found the ogre wrap. This was too cute!

 Some days Ephraim seems to be growing out of his naps. He'll fight it as long as he can until...

Ephraim is so patient. He loves taking the time to balance and stand each of these characters up.

August is our anniversary month. This year we celebrate 10 years since our first date and 8 years of marriage! Paul spent lots of time designing two necklaces for me. He modeled them in a 3D program and then sent them to a special company that makes whatever you want. One was super-sturdy red plastic, the other was gold-plated metal (I'll have to take a picture of the second one too). The heart necklaces represent the heart we made out of Contrux during our second date.

Our wedding anniversary is the 30th, but we celebrated early on Saturday. We went to Comedy Sportz, an improv comedy show in San Jose which we saw on our second date and loved! It was so special going back again after all these years.

More Quotes

Gabriel quotes of the day:
"It's the end of the day? Which day is it now?"
"Mom, don't be a small animal because big animals eat small animals."

Ephraim hands me the pirate hat and asks me to put it on his head, and starts singing his version of "Yo, ho, pirate's life for me" (which has a sing-song quality and sounds kinda like "yo-yo, yo-yo")

And sad to note: Ephraim is outgrowing his naps! He used to fall asleep between 11:30 and 12:30pm. Now he doesn't even show signs of being tired until at least 2:30pm.

Date with Ephraim!

Paul took Gabriel camping today (his friend from AZ is in town and Paul took Wednesday through Friday off work to do fun stuff). I am excited for Gabriel and wish I was there, but I thought it would be too much to handle both kids. So Ephraim and I stayed home. He's been having a very tough three days, so when our new membership to the Children's Discovery Museum arrived today, I jumped at the chance to get out of the house. It turned out to be the best afternoon I've had in a while!

I loved seeing his reactions to all the awesome exhibits! I remember taking Gabriel to the CDM when he was about this age and it was fun seeing Ephraim's own personality come out (different reactions than Gabriel had and no big brother to overshadow the experience). He enjoyed seeing the real fire truck and ambulance:

Here he is still warming up to the place (he was a little clingy and overwhelmed the first half hour). He loved the climbing dragon and the sound room where he could press the frog, dinosaur, duck, and hammer to hear sounds.

The lights and carousel and colored shadows are naturally a hit with kids. He was pointing and talking up a storm!

He couldn't get enough of the tunnel (Gabriel's favorite at that age too.) We spent a lot of time in the tree with the animal puppets too. At one point a mother came up to me briefly and said: "I love the way you play with your son, I can tell that you must really be in love with him." I was touched! She walked away before I could say anything except, thank you. But the more I thought about her kind words which she took the time to say, the more I treasured my time with Ephraim because they were so true. I got to spend quality time seeing his interest in the world around him come out. He is adorable and so sweet! I can't wait until our next date! :)

Happy Place

Happy Hollow is the name of a kiddie amusement park and mini zoo very close to us. They were having a discount this week if you bring in a "zookeeper supply," so we were extra motivated to go (of course, I forgot our donation at home!). We had a lot of fun and will go back soon.
Ephraim loves elephants and we found a statue of a baby elephant. Ephraim got a little scared once he was up close though. (This was after petting the goats at the farm area, so perhaps he wasn't sure if the elephant was alive or not.) Gabriel had no problems climbing up, naturally.

The carousel was a huge hit! Ephraim pointed at all the animals. There was only one horse, the rest were fun animals--Ephraim rode a hummingbird and later a sea dragon.

Gabriel rode a seal and was VERY excited to be able to ride the tiger. We could have ridden the carousel all day. If dad had been with us, we might have, but mom kept getting motion sick.

The zoo area was disappointing, but next to it they had a sandpit where the kids could "dig" up dinosaur bones. Gabriel thought this was so cool and Ephraim was quite excited too.

Ephraim is good at stacking--he has so much patience! I missed the first stack of blocks on camera, but here he is almost done with the second stack.

4 Years Old

Gabriel turned 4 years old last Tuesday!
I took some pictures of him. The angles make him look funny, but that's my cutie pie! (He fell on his face a few weeks ago and his front tooth turned gray. The dentist said to just keep an eye on it.)

 We had some family over on Saturday. The new train tracks were a big hit with all the boys (Paul in Han Solo outfit, Everett, John, Ephraim, Gabriel).

Gabriel got cards, gift cards, and presents in the mail. Here he is putting "frosting" stickers on his birthday cake card from Grandma and Grandpa Gunn.

Grandpa McMillan made a Darth Vadar cake for our Star Wars-themed party. So awesome!

Dry ice kept the cake cold on the drive to our house, so we had fun with it in our drinks. Uncle Mike, Grandpa McMillan, and Uncle John all made foggy drinks. (That's Dagobah swamp streamers coming down behind his head.)

I took this picture of the boys early last week. They have been playing better together. Both doing puzzles here. Naturally, Ephraim "helped" Gabriel with the pieces, but Gabriel is trying to be patient. I feel behind on posting pictures and videos and stories, but I'll get there.

We had so much fun this weekend. On Thursday, Paul got free tickets through his work to go see the newest and last Harry Potter movie at 5:30pm (4 hours before it opened to the public). It was an awesome movie and we appreciated Grandma McMillan coming to watch the kids. On Friday, Grandma and Grandpa Cook came. We went out to Red Lobster (yum) and then they babysat while Paul and I went to see the Star Wars One-Man Show at the Rep Theater in downtown San Jose. We were laughing the entire hour. On Saturday we prepared for the party. Grandpa Cook pruned all the roses in the yard (wow! thank you) and Grandma Cook sewed an impromtu Jedi robe for Gabriel in just two hours! During the party, Gabriel's new Iron Man toy wasn't working, so Uncle John grabbed a screwdriver and it was fixed before dinner was served! We have amazing relatives!!

Sunday we relaxed and really enjoyed our family time!