Summer fun ... and s'mores!

One of our favorite things to do on summer mornings is to play with sidewalk chalk and lately we've had even more fun with sidewalk chalk paint:

We had a fire one evening after dinner and enjoyed a treat after dinner - s'mores!

We learned that, in addition to graham crackers, Clare loves marshmallows...

...and Sean likes his marshmallows untoasted, thankyouverymuch!

We painted coffee filters with watercolors to make "stained glass" window hangings...

...Clare doesn't have much patience for painting (she's more of a marker girl), so she works on getting colored tape off the windows:

We also have been playing with bubbles - with wands that make regular bubbles, big bubbles, and many many bubbles:

Clare sometimes branches off and plays with rocks...

...while Sean spent a nice long time chasing many, many bubbles!

Adventures in the grocery store

On our way back from the beach this past Sunday, we came upon the grocery store.  Although Sean had napped for about 20 minutes total that day and Clare was due for a bottle in 30 minutes, I decided to take a chance and go in for our weekly trip. 

Unfortunately, there were no two-baby shopping carts anywhere! But I pressed on, putting Clare in the Baby Bjorn (which she's wayyyy too big for!!) and Sean in the cart.  This worked okay for a little while - the kids giggled and pinched each other's noses, but then Baby Clare started to fuss in the cereal aisle. And then Sean started whimpering in the spaghetti aisle and finally in the coffee aisle he announced, "My butt hurts Mommy! Too much sitting today!" Yeesh. 

So I let him out to walk with me under the condition that if he strayed, I would take away the bagel he was munching on.  So with a happy Sean chatting and walking and a happy Baby Clare sitting in the cart, the trip went much smoother.

And thank goodness for bagels! They make everyone happy… except for the checkout lady who saw the bagel in Sean's hand and asked, "is that the only one he's eaten?"  I wanted to say something snappy, but just chuckled at the thought that my Sooy Babies probably could put away more than one bagel on a shopping trip if they tried.

Ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

Sean's been moved over to a booster seat at the dining table!

 

We're making room at the table...

 ...for Baby Clare!

Clare had her first taste of solid food this morning - rice cereal!

I think more ended up on her bib than in her mouth - Clare figured that out and kept trying to eat off her bib.  I guess I wasn't quick enough with the spoon for her :-)

Yum!

Groceries

A few times this summer, I've taken both Sooy Babies grocery shopping with me since Thom John was busy working on his summer semester course.  On each trip, I buckle Sean into a grocery cart and I bundle Clare into the Bjorn.  Sean is happy to go shopping with me because of the chance to meet new people and to gobble up a bagel - a blueberry bagel - of course.

On one trip I grabbed a new toilet bowl brush and tossed it in the cart.  Sean shouted, "That a brush!  That you hairbrush, Mommy? I want to brush my hair."  I was quick to correct him - "That's not a hair brush, Buggins!" and I thought we were done with it... until a few aisles later, when I was busy looking for a good deal on bread and I hear Sean giggling.  I looked over and saw him brushing his hair with the toilet brush and telling a lady - "It not a hairbrush!"

Another trip was a disaster in a kind of funny way - Clare started squawking about 3 aisles in to the trip and then she was full-on crying for the last 6 aisles before falling asleep at the cash register (of course). And Sean was providing his usual commentary at full volume (when his mouth wasn't full of bagel) to compete with Clare's crying. We must have been quite the spectacle. Anyway, I ended up going a smidge overbudget since I was just grabbing things and trying to get the heck out of there.

Blueberries!

It's the most wonderful time of the year for a certain toddler.  We've waited very patiently all spring for big, juicy, not-too-sweet-not-too-tart Jersey blueberries to make their appearance and they're finally here! Hooray! (I wonder what would happen if we made Sean choose between blueberry season and Christmas?)  So far we've enjoyed blueberry bread, blueberry cake, blueberry pancakes, blueberry smoothies, and of course - just plain ol' blueberries.  As you can see, Sean gobbles them up before he even touches his beloved bananas at breakfast:

I wonder if Clare will share the blueberry love with us next year?

Week of Randomness

We've had an upside-down kind of week so far - and it's only Wednesday night!

Monday - President's Day - school was closed, so Mommy stayed home with Sean in the morning and Daddy came home in the afternoon. Sean seemed a little sniffly over the weekend but woke up on Monday with yucky eyes - pink eye again! So, we made our first trek of the year to the pediatrician's. We hadn't been there since December 23 - to get Sean looked at for pink eye (what else?) and because he received a really bad bite from one of his classmates on his back.

Tuesday, Daddy went on a business trip and Mommy took a trip to North Jersey to see her Mommy. Mommy got back in time to pick up Sean from school and go about a semi-normal evening routine. At bedtime, Mommy gave Sean his eye drops - which he was not happy about - causing Sean to curl up into a ball on his changing table saying "Not nice, Mommy!" over and over. Then he called for Daddy repeatedly until Mommy was able to distract him by reading his new favorite book, "Pinocchio."

Today Mommy woke Sean up super-early to take him to school which made him a tad cranky. Luckily he cheered up considerably when he sat down to eat his banana at breakfast. After Daddy got home from his trip and Mommy came back from work, we went out to eat for burritos!

Sean enjoying his own quesadilla:

Back in June 2009 when Sean was about the size of a burrito:

Light? Light?

Munching and Scooting

I can do it myself!

Sean's been trying to take the lead at mealtimes and Mommy needs to learn to let this happen. It's not that I don't want him to be a big boy and it's not that I mind mealtimes taking two or three times as long - it's just that this tends to happen:

Heyyyy - what's down there tickling my feet?

Oh... hi Pepper!

You like blueberries and bananas, too?

Nom nom nom...

Snow! Again.

We're making it through "Snowmageddon" 2K10! We made sure we were stocked up on diapers and formula, and that we had good food and liabations, as well :-) After a night of sipping Manhattans and playing board games, we woke up to about 16 inches of snow and now it seems to have finally tapered off, leaving us with over 2 feet of the white stuff on our driveway. Amazingly, our neighbors came by with their snowblower to give us a head start, so I bundled up Sean and brought him outside to thank them. Sean seemed a little more excited about the snow this time, but something tells me he has warmer climes in mind:

"Seal me up, mom - and address it to MIAMI!"

Maybe I can convince Sean to stick around long enough to help me bake a "Thank You" gift for the neighbors. Besides, I'm not sure any box can contain him.