18 months

This is the price I paid tonight for doing dishes while talking to my mom-in-law on the phone. I noticed he was creating kitchen catastrophe, but I really didn't notice. I was standing 3 feet away from him. I do not profess to be a super multi-tasker, and this is obvious proof. I can't talk on the phone, and do the dishes, and do something else at the same time. The plastic is my roll of garbage can liners, unrolled. That boy is an efficient mess-maker.

At the dinner table, he must be served whatever someone else is having, even if he won't eat it. If his cup is full of water, and someone else pours a glass, he wants his topped off. If Jilly gets more Parmesan cheese, Gordon wants more, despite the small mountain of cheese already on his plate. You get the idea.

This week he started shrieking for the first time (up until now it had just been an insanely loud "Hi!" and "Bye!" in Costco to whoever he made friends with). Whenever something is happening he doesn't like, the volume in the apartment starts rising. I'm fairly certain anyone in our quad who has seen me with the kids knows right where we live, due to the crazy noise coming from the windows. Gordon also mimics my countdown when the girls are in trouble. He gets to 4 all by himself, while slapping the shut door to the kid's room. The girls won't open until I start counting with him though.

Gordon still climbs everything. He doesn't even really need a footstool anymore to get onto the bathroom and kitchen counters. The kid is good. He hardly ever slips or falls. If he can get a good grip on the surface he's trying to top, he can muscle his way up there. I suspect he'll be trying to climb trees before long. He gets on top of our tall-ish dresser all time, and he could get on top of the fridge, no problem. He hasn't done that by the way, and I hope he doesn't.

He started nursery on Sunday, and got part of the way through it, but melted down after a while and sat with Ben the last hour of church. 11 am is a bad time for us. 1 pm will be more manageable in January.

He eats ice cream cones from the bottom first. Major drippage. He gets it mostly on himself, but what gets on the office-grade carpet I don't care much about anyway, they're gutting our place when we move out.

The 3 of them are definitely becoming a more cohesive group, instead of the girls off playing, and excluding Gordon all the time. I'm hoping it's a pattern that continues.

Water and Sand

 On one hot day last week, we emptied out some toy containers and put water in them to splash out on the balcony. The kids had fun, but I think the extra water on the balcony may have had something to do with the ant infestation we found on Saturday morning. 

 Another morning while Evelyn was at school we headed to the mall to play on the splash pad and do a little shopping, for me. It's been quite a while since I bought anything new.

Jilly has entered the "I can't make a normal smile for pictures" phase. Evelyn is just starting to come out of it, for now. Because the girls are so close in age, I don't really get a break between developmental phases. I'm always surprised to see Jilly begin a phase that Evelyn is just leaving. I can't believe this little girl is growing up so fast. 

 After General Conference ended on Sunday, we went to our local beach to see the results of the annual sandcastle competition. These ones were my favorites. 

 Another statement about the housing market? Our economic reality? 

 A replica of Minas Tirith, from J.R.R. Tolkein's, "Lord of the Rings". (Great movies, haven't gotten around to reading the books). 

 The kids enjoyed Thomas the Train, the girls are standing here with a favorite friend. 

Someone poking more fun at Bret Favre. 

First Day of School

 Waiting in line. It was a long wait that first day, she got kind of impatient! 

We got the bus pass a few days later. Riding the bus was the thing she was most excited about with the onset of kindergarten. When I picked her up from school on the first day, I got an earful and then some from her sweet little mouth. She thought for sure she belonged in the "bus line" when it was time to go home, not the "pick-up" line, and when her teacher told her to get in the "pick-up" line, she was hopping mad. It will be a funny story for me to remember when she's older. 

"I'm meellltiiiinnng..."

Between my last post and this one, it has been very nice and comfortable weather-wise, luring me to think that fall was on it's way. Ha. Mother Nature is cruel. 108 degrees today, and no A/C. The hottest weather of  our entire time in California, which is just over a year. Yesterday was hot too. What do you do on a super-duper hot Sunday afternoon?

Close all the windows at 10am.
Go to church in a air-conditioned building for 3 hours.
Run every fan you own. (We have 5).

 Eat cold fruit while sitting on Dad.

Dad will shave off his beard and later trim his hair really short to keep his cool. And apparently Evelyn will continue to master the art of making funny faces in pictures.

Eat ice cream cones. Gordon is still trying to figure out what to do with his. He's actually crushing the bottom of the cone in this picture. I had to rescue the poor cone and eat it. What a shame.

Go snuggle with Dad. In the 85 degree upstairs.

We spent 3 hours at a pool today. It's a good plan for tomorrow too. I just need to find a pool to crash.

Hot August....Days

Where I grew up there was a car show titled, "Hot August Nights." But nothing in this post happens at night. So there's my little pun. 

Here's my attempt at recording our last few weeks of summer break. I can't say it was the end of summer, because it's summer for at least 10 months out of the year here. We just can't be as spontaneous about doing stuff now.

Our favorite beach, on a busy day. 

Sand is starting to taste gross to this kid (finally). I think most normal people find the texture a little hard to swallow. 

Going to the surf with my two water babies. 

The 'not a beach' girl. Happily collecting shells within the two foot perimeter around the beach blanket. 

I love, love, love hydrangeas. I bought this one in Trader Joe's because it screamed at me to take it home. I had never seen a hydrangea of this type before. I love the color, and hopefully the love I have for it means it will live for a few months on my front porch. 

Harry Potter.....actually just the doctor kit glasses that Gordon wears to imitate Mom and Dad's sunglasses. 

Our good friends Jared and Emily have parents that live not too far from our homes, and have this awesome pool set-up in the backyard. We also had grilled burgers and garden-fresh tomatoes. Loved the tomatoes so much. Thanks for the invite guys!

On the way back home from the pool excursion. I don't think Harry Potter would approve of this. Maybe he would. 

Ben's birthday was toward the end of August, and for the first time in Ben and I's existence together, we had a planned birthday party. (We've always been driving while vacationing on his birthday for the last 7 years). We had éclair torte and apple pie, and the kids tore apart all the common room sofas in grand fashion. A very appropriate Sunday activity. 

Not pictured: Ben giving surfing a try (fun but he hurt his shoulder), joining a softball league, kids playing in a sprinkler on the lawn (I'm not entirely sure this is legal in our apartment complex, but they didn't say 'no' in the lease, so...), Evelyn starting kindergarten (this will be pictured, eventually), Gordon taking spectacular falls (two chipped teeth, super bruised gums, bitten tongue, etc.), going to swim at more swimming pools (so grateful for nice friends in our no A/C situation), etc. Life is just not slowing down!  

A post in under 30 minutes. Amazing!

"eeeeeeeEEEYAAAAAA!"

We went for a visit to the Orange County Zoo. We liked it, it's a perfect little kid zoo. 

Jillian is obsessed with applying sunscreen. Not a terrible habit to have I guess. We were walking around and she's just casually applying sunscreen.

The ocelot sauntered in front of us, checking us out I guess. 

"I want to eat your stroller...."

A kestral. This was Evelyn's favorite part of the zoo. 

One of the things I love about our area are the AWESOME city parks. This is Evelyn's favorite one, we pass it on the way to Costco and she always wants to stop and play at it.

We all got some fun in on this toy. 

Watch for Jilly's high-pitched, "eeeeeeeEEEYAAAAAA!" in the middle of the video. We think it's hilarious. 

Summer summary

Our summer isn't quite done yet, but I wanted to record a few things for memory's sake:

Girl's favorite movie: The Court Jester

Gordon's favorite: Any movie, so long as he can climb up and stand 3 inches from the TV screen to watch it. He will watch "Elmo's World" from the floor. 

Ben's new hobby, which I completely approve of, is road cycling. He loves it.

We don't have a yard, but I bought a hose and sprinkler for the kids to play in anyway. No one from the apartment complex has shut me down yet. We only get to use the pool across the street on Saturdays. The beaches have been a lot more crowded since school got out in June, and the water has remained cold. So we haven't been out to the ocean as much as I would have liked this summer. 

Looking for missing vital items like wallets cell phones, and keys. Gordon is a master Houdini. I was in the 90 degree laundry room, and on my way out noticed my keys were missing out of my bag. I spent 5 minutes looking for them, and began to assume Gordon had thrown them in the washing machine. On my way out of the room, he opens one of the dryers and there they were. 

Ben didn't work this summer, and that was a welcome break. He needed it after the graduate school marathon he'd been running since fall of 2008. He got to hang out with the kids, play with them, and I got some much-needed time to myself. I feel ready for him to go back to school and work, something I have not been able to say for the past few years.