Cecilia's vocabulary has been exploding lately - much of it is unrecognizable to any but us, but I'm finding it pretty amusing (or annoying).

Some of the more amusing words:

"Bubba" or "Bwuh-buh" = John Paul.  This becomes a whine when John Paul is upstairs napping, since Cecilia wants to be around him ALL the time.

"HI DADA!!!" while holding a toy phone to her ear

"Doooooohs.  Aaaaaahm."  Toes.  Arm.  She likes to point those out to us frequently.

"Hop!"  Hop.  Duh.  Frequently accompanied by the action and brought on by pictures of bunnies.

Some of the more annoying words:

"NUH BWIH!"  Nurse, please!  It wouldn't be as annoying if it weren't all. the. time.

"Gheeeeee?"  While running to the fridge, begging for cheese.  Again, doesn't need to be the only thing you'll eat, kid!

"Baby? BABY???"  Every time she sees a computer or a phone, she demands we show her pictures of babies.

Sensory play

How fun does this look?

Pipe cleaners in a strainer - so simple!

Meanwhile, Cecilia found her new swimsuit...

And insisted on "trying" it on!

What's that?

What's that you found?

An entire apple!!!

Okay, she doesn't look that excited...  But that apple provided us with a full day of fun!  She just happened to be attempting a poop while I took that second picture...

Alone time with Cecilia

John Paul took a rare nap the other day.  Cecilia and I didn't know what to do with ourselves!

Well, Cecilia knew what to do with herself...  She likes to station herself at the screen door, watching everything happen outside.

Of course, that can always change when Mom has a camera to grab!

She was BEGGING to go wake "Bwa-bwa" up.  I told her he was sleeping, so she ran to the stairs and put her head down with a loud sigh.  

But then she found a crumb of something on the stairs and tried to offer it to me...

Before deciding to eat it herself :)

Also, she bashed her head on a chair because she decided to take a pillow off the couch and try balancing on it.  Not child abuse, I promise!

Chalk!

A friend of the family came to visit, bearing gifts of sidewalk chalk for the kids!

Cecilia thought it was food.  John Paul was IN LOVE!

And then someone demanded to go on a second walk of the day...

"Please, Mom???"

Just say "Yes!"

The weather, as is usual these days, has been glorious.  I'm trying to get outside with the kids at *least* once a day.  The problem is, the second we get outside Cecilia makes a run for it and John Paul thinks we're going to the playground.  I can't get them to just play in front of our house!

But today I figured, sure, why don't I let *them* lead on a walk?

So I took both their hands (no stroller, no carrying either child, they're getting so big!) and we walked to the little playground down the hill from our house.

Oh, it was MUDDY.  This playground is not my favorite...  The equipment is a little too old for my littles, and the slides tend to have standing water on them at all times.  Cecilia, of course, made a mad dash for the slides and very tentatively put a finger in the water.

PLAYGROUND TIME RUINED, KIDS GETTING DIRTY!

Nope, I decided to say, "Yes!"

I told Cecilia she could splash in the puddle.  She got a HUGE grin on her face and spend the next 10 minutes splashing in the puddle, picking up wood chips to taste them or see if they floated in the water, and splashing some more.

She was WET.  John Paul decided to join in.  He was a lot more wary than she - immediately upon getting his pants wet he started pulling them down saying, "Pants off?  New pair of pants???"  I assured him that we were here to get messy and we'd change when we got home (this did not prevent this from occurring several more times.  He does NOT like to be dirty.).

Cecilia decided to take it one step further and climb up onto the slide, belly flopping down into the water.  Lovely :)  Then she fell in the mud several times, but "washed" her hands off in the mud puddle.

We walked home, soaking wet and muddy, and went straight upstairs for a bath.

Clothes can be washed (next time I won't wear a hand-wash only shirt...  But we were being spontaneous!).  Shoes can, too!  But this tired John Paul enough to take a LONG nap this afternoon (and those are rare these days!), so it looks like we'll be getting muddy as long as the bugs haven't started biting yet!

Pretty awesome

Andrew:  "John Paul, guess whose feast day is today?"

John Paul:  "St. JOSEPH!!!"

A:  "That's right, and St. Joseph is pretty awesome."

JP:  "And MAWWY is pwetty awesome."

*Cecilia starts freaking out in her high chair yelling "MA-WAY!  MA-WAY!!!" and flailing towards a picture of the BVM*

JP:  "And JESUS is handsome awesome!!!"

Baby Jesus?

"John Paul, what kind of baby do you want Mom and Dad to have next?"

*Disclaimer:  We are not knowingly pregnant, but these kinds of conversations are really funny with a 2-year-old


*John Paul thinks long and hard*  "...Baby Jesus?"

Then I explained to him that that's not an option.

"Baby boy?  For John Paul?  And baby girl for Cecilia?"

Boy is always his preference, although apparently now he's being generous and allowing us to have another girl TOO!

A Funny

John Paul likes to ask for a piece of tape at some point every day; he likes to stick it to his shirt, pick up lint, etc...  He's also very used to asking me to tape up pages in books that Cecilia rips, flaps that she pulls off lift-the-flap books, and various easy mending jobs.

So he came asking me for a piece of tape, and I obliged him.  Then I saw him bending down and trying to tape something on the floor...

A piece of apple that had broken in two.

I thought that was pretty adorable - of course you can't EAT a broken piece of apple, you have to FIX it!  I convinced him to eat it anyway, but I'm wondering if he would have eaten the tape, had he been successful in taping the apple back together...

Little weirdo...

Apparently it wasn't satisfactory to leave the piano on the floor...  John Paul normally likes to curl up on the love seat with a pile of books while I'm putting Cecilia down for her nap.  But the piano seems to have trumped the remainders of the pile...

The Farm!

We headed to Frying Pan Park the other day for the first time - I don't know why it took us this long (well, it's a hike...), but it was awesome!

And also very windy...

Didn't stop John Paul from exploring!

Cecilia, still rather wary of all animals, was content to sit in the stroller.

Peacock!

This is about as excited as she got - real live ducks!!!

And of course, we had to have them each pose on a tractor.

Too cute!

These piglets were 4 days old.

And these were 2 days old!  John Paul thought they were mice...

And we got to pet Franklin the cow, which John Paul is still talking about!

If only Herndon weren't so far away...  We'll have to go back soon!

John Paul has taken to reading two books at once.  He feels the need to nest them inside each other and carry them around the house so that nobody loses his place...

And spring clothes are officially being worn!  The kids went to the playground THREE times today, and the weather was perfect for shorts and rompers :)

A Sunday Stroll

In celebration of the first spring-like WEEKEND day, we walked the 1.5ish miles to the park at Lake Accotink.  There are some SERIOUS hills on the way, let me tell you.  Thankfully, Andrew pushed the stroller most of the way :)

Apparently everybody else had the same idea - there were quite a few birthday parties going on at once!  Cecilia was pretty darned excited about the balloons.

I love the look on Andrew's face here!

Slides are awesome!  She's pretty close to being able to go down by herself, but not quite...

And John Paul mastered yet another climbing apparatus.

(Yes, that looks like a Bill Cosby sweater.  I think it's adorable.  And he LOVES wearing sunglasses and never takes them off.)

"DA!  DA!!!"

Probably the only interaction they had with each other the entire time on the playground...

John Paul very carefully turned them all to X's, so of course Cecilia had to wreck it.

And then she followed him on the bridge and decided it was HILARIOUS to sit down and let the big kids bounce her.

Look at that blue sky!

Shh, that's me in the background breaking one of my cardinal rules, leggings != pants.  But I don't think that rule applies when exercising, and that was QUITE a walk!

This one she had to go down on her own and didn't do too badly!

The lake, pre-spring.

Shoulder ride!

They took the high path up by the lake.  We stayed down low with the stroller.

Because no way was I pushing it down that hill!

AND back in the stroller for the walk home.

One little monkey...

Someone decided to cram all her banana in her mouth at once during breakfast...  Who needs pacing?

An Easter Preview

Cecilia has an Easter hat.  It is REALLY cute.

Also, this picture made me realize that she needed a little trim to un-scraggle the front of her hair...  So she had her first "hair cut" while nursing in the bathroom and Andrew cut maybe a quarter inch off of like, 5 hairs :P  It looks a lot better now!

But we can't get a good pose...  Hopefully by Easter!

And of course, reading a pamphlet about canning.  Wouldn't you, in your Sunday best?