It’s been quiet here on the blog, I’ve been sick, and with finishing up my year long photo project I haven’t had the kick in the pants to get posting every week. But last month Ewan turned two and a half! And boy is he a kick in the pants to get moving. He’s always on the go ready to get into and explore everything. Yesterday we were at the park and he decided he wanted a stick that he left at home, so he left the park and walked all the way home himself to get the stick. He assured me that he looked both ways at the streets. We had a lot of talking about that (and no he didn’t make it home without be going after him fairly quickly but he was not in a listening mood and he’s never done that before).

The biggest change in him is how expressive his language has become. He can explain what he wants and often why, although the reason doesn’t always make sense. Ewan tells stories about what happened, complete with facial expressions and arm movements to emphasize the big parts.

When we’re at home he spends a lot of time in his trampoline. He likes to jump to music, spinning himself in circles and flopping down. He also loves to read books and is pointing at different words for me to read them to him individually. He has started to play games and tolerates taking turns remarkably well for a two year old. The first orchard game we have is a favorite. He’s learning his colors although he’s not terribly interested in them so he’s a bit flippant about me questioning him on them. He also is getting more excited about puzzles lately solving 12 piece ones alone and bigger ones with his sisters.

Outside of the house he’s taking a gymnastics class this winter, our classic one with coach Tanya. He’s reluctant to attend some weeks but once we’re there and he’s running around he has a blast. He likes to show off how he can do forward rolls and tries the backwards ones. He also swings from the bars and likes me to call him a monkey.

His favorite shirt is his ‘yoyo’ shirt as he calls it. It says ‘Y is for Yoda’ on it and we gave it to him for Christmas. Unfortunately it is a short sleeve shirt, but he will wear it over or under other long sleeve shirts for the winter and it should fit all summer too! He’s wearing that almost every other day at this point just so we have time to wash it inbetween. He is very picky about what he wears, even down to what color diaper. So many of my friends have told me their boys don’t give a hoot what they wear, but clearly that is not the case here. Also about those diapers, one of these days he’ll hopefully give them up for real. He can use the potty as desired and on command and he’s super excited about underwear but he won’t remember when he’s wearing it that he has to keep it dry, and he won’t tell me when it’s wet all the time. So I’m not pushing on that as I don’t need more puddles to clean up. Right now it’s easier to keep him in diapers and let him use the toilet when it is convenient. He will also just take off his diaper and go if he so desires at times. See the above story about walking home for a stick to show how he’s decided he’ll just do things for himself. He is resourceful! He’ll use anything for a stool so we really have to watch out with where we put things and when he says he wants something. If I say ‘no’ I need to be ready to follow it up with a physical restraint because he takes that as a mere suggestion. He wants to do everything himself and tries to claim that everything belongs to him.

Outside Ewan loves to play with all the balls and toys. He plays with his hockey gear, soccer balls, basketballs, bike, and his tennis ball. He is full of energy and this quite warm winter has been fantastic for being able to keep getting him outside. Today he lamented that there was no more snow to shovel though, maybe he’ll get some more. It is still only February.

• Size/weight: 2T and 3T clothes, 30 lbs, 37 inches tall
• Favorite food: breastmilk, pasta, sweets, broccoli
• Favorite toy: trampoline
• Favorite book: The Story Of Ferdinand and Maisy books
• Favorite activity: running
• Sleeping: bedtime ~8:30; one short nap at 1:30; gets up 6:30am
• New skill: complete sentences and explaining himself, more words, less violence
• Teeth: I think he’s got the full twenty
• Vocalizations: counting, although he misses 4 in both spanish and english.

Last month Ewan turned 2 according to the calendar, but he picked up the attitude for 2 several weeks before that. He’s decided he has a lot more opinions on how he lives his life, and what he does with his time and he’s not too concerned with our opinion on his ideas. It’s his way, or the high way, or some clever convincing on our part. He has gotten a lot pickier in his eating and won’t even try a lot of foods that he’s previously enjoyed. He also will not be easily deterred from touching and man-handling something that he’s interested in, or retrieving the stool from the bathroom to read something up higher too. He keeps us on our toes.

Ewan is a very happy and energetic guy if he’s gotten enough sleep. He loves to run, jump, pose, point, yell, twist, dance and bounce. He always wants to be on the move and loves to spend time outside, digging in the sand or riding on his bike. For his birthday we took him to Drumlin Farm where he could see the animals, pet the goats and enjoy farm life (before the heat became too much). He has loved to visit Wright-Locke farm which is near us in Winchester and feed the goats carrot peels. When he comes home, and any other time he can get a gate or fence object he uses it to ‘play goats’ where he is the goat that is locked up and then escapes. Then he needs to be herded back into his pen again. He likes to be petted.

In other animal related stories, Ewan calls horses “neigh-boos” because of the sound we have them make with a whinney and then a snort. Jordi does it best. He’ll point out all the neigh-boo’s on the sheets, in the books, driving through the country last week. It’s funny and cute.

Never one to be left out, Ewan also loves to dress up with the girls, including the sparkly tutus. He’s got one small blue one that he considers his own and chooses every time.

Another of Ewan’s favorite games is to play “google express”. That means he rings the doorbell, announces that it’s google express, brings a package into the house and opens it for us. Before doing it again and again. It’s a good thing there aren’t any more neighbors upstairs to be bothered by the bell ringing.

One of Ewan’s most endearing traits is his kindness when his sisters get hurt. He’ll drop everything (including stop nursing) to run to their side and help them stand up and give hugs. I’m glad to say that he’s learned it from them (and me) about how to help someone when they fall down. Let’s hope he continues to keep his loving tradition. Of course we often have the kids hurt because he whacked them with something, he’s not usually so comforting then, more when they fall down on the sidewalk or something.

Just in the last few weeks even his vocabulary has been booming! I hear new words all the time now and he uses full sentences occasionally and usually 3 or more words at a time. He can definitely tell better stories, but he’s also learned how to interrupt more effectively. But we’re onto him as it’s clear he understands what he’s doing!

• Size/weight: 2T month clothes, 25 lbs
• Favorite food: breastmilk, pasta, sweets, broccoli
• Favorite toy: other people
• Favorite book: A Birthday For Cow (or he calls it ‘toot!’ because it’s the first word in the book)
• Favorite activity: running and biking
• Sleeping: bedtime ~8:35; one short nap at 1:30; gets up 6:30am
• New skill: All those words
• Teeth: I should check, haven’t looked in a while
• Vocalizations: Whole sentences!

Ewan is quickly approaching his two year old mark and has become quite a little boy, no longer a baby, despite what Celia may call him. He is off and running with big plans for his every moment. These days he’s constantly telling us what happened previously, what’s going on now, or what he wants. He mostly tell it in one word story lines and you have to guess the rest. Like “Park! Dog! Ball!” if we went to the park and played with a dog with a ball. He also has created his own joke as he tries to copy his sisters knock knock jokes. Here’s how it goes:

Ewan – “knock knock”

You – “Who’s there?”

Ewan – “Ahh Oooo”

You – “Ahh Oooo Who?”

Ewan – laughs hysterically, not understanding that he hasn’t finished the joke yet

Ewan always wants to be in motion, inside or out, generally out. He loves to play with all kinds of balls, from basket balls to base balls to bouncy balls, throwing, kicking and shooting. He is also very much in love with his bike and has learned how to glide on it already picking up his feet once he’s got some speed and balancing. He’ll play by himself for a little while, but each sport and game only lasts a short time before he’s onto something new. At the playground he’s climbing, jumping and swinging around on everything he can reach and he loves to dig in the sand.

At home inside he loves to dance around with his sisters. He wears the tutus, dresses and ballet shoes along with them dancing to the Frozen soundtrack. He commonly asks for Elsa and Anna by name and can point them out on all the products that you find around.

The last month around our house has been particularly exciting because they knocked a house down on our street and are tearing up Mass Ave. to rebuild it. So we’ve been watching all the huge trucks knock down the house, destroy the road and reconstruct it from the foundation up. We have spent many hours over the last few weeks sitting on the ground across the street from the house watching them work, digging, pouring, nailing and sawing. They’ve just put the roof on, and all the walls are up so I imagine it won’t be so exciting to watch much longer as they’ll be doing mostly inside work. But every couple of days I have to chase Ewan down the street to get him back when he decides he wants to watch ‘house’ instead of doing things like taking Celia to school.

With Ewan’s increased vocabulary he is very fond of telling everyone what he wants and what they should be doing. He’s very picky about who changes his diaper and puts on his shoes or cuts his pancakes. Sometimes we can oblige, and sometimes we can’t like when he wants his diaper changed by daddy during the day while Jordi is at work. He’s figured out some great stalling tactics along these lines.

At home he’s always very interested in what I’m doing and he loves to sweep and cook along side me now. He wants to stir, pour and measure. I can set him up for a good ten minutes of play by giving him two water cups, water and a rag to clean the spills while he practices pouring the water from one object to another. Also during quiet times he loves to sit with us all and make art with stickers, crayons, and markers. He just gained the dexterity to get some stickers unstuck from their sheet himself. Once he turns two I’ll start to teach him how to use scissors. He is very pour of his art work and immediately demands that it be put on the wall. Often though he comes along and deconstructs it later.

• Size/weight: 24 month clothes, need to weigh him
• Favorite food: breastmilk, cheese, pasta, blueberries
• Favorite toy: balls
• Favorite book: A Birthday For Cow (or he calls it ‘toot!’ because it’s the first word in the book)
• Favorite activity: throwing and jumping
• Sleeping: bedtime ~8:45; one short nap at 1:30; gets up 7am
• New skill: Riding the balance bike
• Teeth: 17 and more coming
• Vocalizations: Using two words together and telling stories

Hey I got older this past year too! Here’s a few photos from my birthday at the end of last year. I got a new flash for my camera so I can take better photos inside in the evening and the dark. I still don’t get too much practice but it’s getting better!

Well this week was tough finding them in good spirits playing together, more often carping on one another. So I got to dinner today and went ‘ack I don’t have a photo for my project!’ so they mostly decided they were going to pose for me. I threw Rody out in the rug and said ‘everybody sit on him!’ and got my picture. I’ll work on getting better next week, but we’re mostly getting rained on these days and I haven’t taken my camera anywhere fun. Also Jordi is now sick, hopefully he’ll feel better soon.

If you saw a few blog posts back where Ewan ripped the front off our dishwasher you may be correctly inclined to believe he’s a handful. Like most 1 year olds he’s always on the move, wanting to learn and ‘help’ with absolutely everything. These days he’s coming up with more and more new words each day which is such a joy to see him learn and delight in communicating with us.

His favorite thing to do is ‘help’. If you have something to put away, something to put in the trash or recycling, clothes to move from one place to another, he’s your man. He wants to help with the dishwasher, setting the table, laundry folding and even taking out the trash. He’s devastated when he’s refused with a big crumpled up face and crying. Yesterday he started learning to fold his wipes on his own by copying Celia and using his hands very slowly and deliberately.

Ewan has also very recently started to be interested in books. He loves ‘Where’s Spot?’ which allows him to say ‘no’ as you turn each page, Josie taught him how to read that one. He also likes ‘Buenas Noches Luna’ and to point out the cats.

He also regularly can be convinced to make us pretend tea, he uses the pot and pours us cups. It’s very good for distracting him from something else he wants and cannot have. He also helps to make real tea by filling up the tea kettle.

One of his greatest joys though is of course big motion, running around, jumping, throwing and spinning. He loves to jump, run, and kick, which is tough in this winter weather. He’ll be over the moon (and hopefully a bit more tired!) once we get to play outside again. He’ll play outside in the snow a little while now, but he gets tired off it (and cold) after only 20 minutes or so. He loves our indoor gymnastics sessions. He despises his swimming lessons. The second we show him the bathing suit he starts to chant ‘no no no…’ He is lucky that he only has one more, and then we didn’t sign him up for the next session because the timing didn’t work out correctly, and he hated it. [Edited to add – he actually somehow decided he liked his last swim lesson] So it didn’t take too much thought. He does enjoy free swim with us so we’ll stick with that for now. He also will kick and ‘swim’ in the bathtub! As I type this he is now helping by pulling dirty tissues that fell behind the radiator out and then insisting that I pick him up to the trash can to throw them out.

As for food, he’s extremely variable. Some days he’ll eat like a horse, but a lot of days now he’s refusing most everything we put in front of him except for cheese and rice and blueberries, even things he ate the day before. Clearly he’s trying out where he has free will and what else he can expect to get.

Ewan also insists on being involved in all art projects. The most recent one, where we painted on bubble wrap and then made prints from it, he showed the first sign of actually understanding and wanting to participate in the process as we suggested it to him. He painted, and then he printed, and then printed again and again on the same piece, but he looked at it each time experimenting and seeing what would happen!

He’s wonderfully full of live and love, very happy to greet everyone he sees especially his favorite people. It will be nice though when he can keep his hands out of messy and dangerous things upon request.

• Size/weight: 24month clothes, 25 lbs
• Favorite food: breastmilk, cheese, pasta, blueberries
• Favorite toy: ball, anything he can use as a stool
• Favorite book: go, dog, go!
• Favorite activity: throwing and dumping things
• New game: loves to jump into the pool, even if you’re not there to catch him
• Sleeping: bedtime ~8:15; one short nap at 1:30; gets up 7am
• New skill: tons of words!
• Teeth: 16 and more coming
• Vocalizations: talking in single words, naming objects and learning things like ‘in, out, up, on’

We are currently in the midst of another blizzard (yikes 2014-15 winter has been crazy!) and here’s some photos from earlier stuff. I’m not letting the kids play outside in the winds and cold  today.

This is last week’s snow with Josie on the snow pile and Ewan on the porch. Now the snow is level with the top edge of the porch near the porch, and halfway up the front windows for the top part of the pile. Time to hibernate.

Let’s get back to November, when it was warm and there was no snow! Although actually it got rather chilly in Orlando and rained a lot of the day we went to Disney too. On Monday of our visit Jordi’s parents took us all to Disney World! We amazingly got up plenty early and even parked and arrived prior to the park opening. As we pulled up on the monorail from the parking lot we got to see the cast of characters waiting to arrive by train to the opening gate! We got our first (and only) glimpse of Anna and Elsa and some other characters. We arrive to the main gate, get our tickets checked and the show starts right away complete with song, dance, and fireworks!

We walked straight up main street, trying to see if we might be able to meet up with Anna and Elsa in fantasy-land, but didn’t want to drag the kids in a race and ruin the beginning of the day. So by the time we got to the line it was over an hour and a half. Basically the only way to get to see those princesses is to stay at a disney resort so you can get a fastpass many months in advance, none were available by the time we could set our fastpasses. Instead our first stop was the winnie the pooh ride!

We spent the morning going around from ride to ride, using a few fast passes but mostly things were moving pretty quickly since we weren’t going on the more intense rides (snow white, or space mountain). We got onto dumbo and flew. One of Josie’s favorites was the smaller roller coaster, the barnstormer, I think she went three times with different groups of adults. Ewan was not particularly fond of most things as he didn’t like the dark, or loud noises, or being restrained and he was in a clingy phase as well. We visited the tea party cups too. It was a lovely morning visiting a number of rides, including the driving one, and sending Jordi and his siblings off to space mountain which Josie opted out of riding this time. We also visited Buzz Lightyear and played the space game which Ewan loved, but the girls just hid from. It was very unpredictable which ride would please each child.

Then we headed across the park to frontierland to ride splash mountain. I had to physically drag Celia onto the ride as she was quite nervous, but I kept her safe as she will attest! And Josie hid herself to keep from getting wet too! Then we headed off to lunch and found some great options for us vegetarians at Columbia Harbor house. Then we headed back towards fantasy land and got to see Ariel’s ride before it started to rain on us. We snuck into the Carousel for a quick ride while other grownups went to other scary rides.

Sometime around now, it started to pour cats and dogs, and unfortunately continued for the rest of the day. I think we had short line waits because of the predicted rain, but it did rain on the upper end of what was predicted sadly. So we dashed between rides and the camera didn’t get out much anymore. We saw small world, and the favorite ride for all three kids was Enchanted Tales with Belle. No actual ride, but a cool storytime with real people and animatronics. Javi got roped into being a guard up front, my girls couldn’t be convinced to play a role but hung back with us in the audience.

Belle was nice enough to look at my camera too, not just their professional photographer! Celia was rather wary of getting near any of these characters and had to be convinced to hold hands. We also found that the line for Cinderella and Rapunzel was only half an hour (still over an hour and a half for Elsa and Anna) so we waited to see them.

Ewan kept running to the front of the line and I had to retrieve him. Waiting in line is not a strong point for a 1 year old! The princesses were very kind and friendly with the girls, but Josie and Celia didn’t really know the Cinderella story too well and definitely didn’t remember Rapunzel. We taught them some more stories when we got home, but next time I’d review the stories before the trip so they get a bit more into the ideas! Such lovely costumes and decorations. Towards the end of the evening, all wet and tired we had a nice dinner at the italian takeout place. Then we wandered back toward tomorrowland and enjoyed the laugh floor from Monsters Inc. That was very clever and enjoyed by the adults. Finally we watched the castle which still looked beautifully magical in the rain before we trudged up mainstreet thoroughly exhausted, with a few small shopping errands to do. We got a treat and they spent the end of their Disney money.

The park closed by 7, which turned out to be just right for us as the kids were definitely ready for bed from such an exhausting and exciting day at magical kingdom!

While we were in Orlando we kept things pretty low key except for the one day at Disney World. The house and company were plenty to keep us having a good time. We enjoyed the pool, getting in it almost every day. The day before we left when it went below 60 even I was unwilling to get into the pool with the girls, Josie was severely disappointed. We did lots of reading, cuddles, bubbles, swimming, playing and just hanging out talking. Several of Jordi’s paternal relatives live in Orlando and they came to visit us several times.

On Sunday morning, Tere through Celia a belated 4th birthday party. We had in fact found good reason to celebrate most every day as many birthdays were right at the same time! Josie made Celia a tres leches cake, but Celia insisted that she didn’t like tres leches cake, so we left off the tres leches from her cake, hence the missing corner of cake from the picture. Otherwise we also got to visit with Sean, a friend of Jordi’s from high school and his own little girl. She liked watching the big girls and playing with Ewan a bit.

I did the makeup on one of these people, take a guess which one 🙂 I think Tio Javi went home with a bit of a red nose that day even after all the scrubbing.

Ewan has hit the jackpot with two fantastic older sisters, each with different styles, but each learning how to relate to him and teach him how to be a kid in this world.