baby doll ballet

Sim and Ro were playing with baby dolls at the table yesterday. Sim flipped her doll over and stared at it and then started requesting a diaper because the doll had a dress on -- but no undergarments. She was shouting, "Mama diaper! diaper! Mama!" Ro thought this was funny and pulled the clothes off the other baby doll, which had a fabric body. I came in and said, "Ro, you're doll is naked too!" He said, "He's not naked! He's just doing ballet!" Then, he proceeded to make the baby doll leap and pirouette. I about died laughing. Sometimes he says and does the most unexpected things. Ballet! sheesh oh man. I suppose the fabric body did look a bit like a leotard but Ro's exposure to anything ballet related is extremely minimal so I was still surprised.

cold water medicine

For some reason, Ro accords medicinal and healing properties to cold water. If any of us have any sort of ailment, Dr. Ro prescribes rest and cold water. We all contracted colds around Thanksgiving and Simone still has an annoying, lingering cough. It's like she's had three consecutive colds or something. She doesn't cough very often, only like 3X per day, but when she does cough, it sounds absolutely terrible. Even Ro notices how bad it is. So, while they were in the bath tonight, he insisted on filling cups with cold water from the tap and then spoonfeeding it to Simone in an effort to improve her cough. He used her teeny tiny teaset spoon, so it took a long time to get through a cup of water but Sim ate up every drop like an eager baby bird. They were so cute. I wish I had video of it but both kids stop being cute anytime I grab the camera now. Even more weird, her cough was better the next day.

it's important to know where your towel is

Simone's flowered washcloth, Towel, has been figuring more and more prominently in her life. She uses it for so many different things. We play tea party on it. We play peekaboo with it. We clean up with it. We can't help making lots of allusions to Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy about it. It's just nice to have "Towel" around.

We accidently left it at grandma's house and she was distressed. She made do with Ro's rocket washcloth for a few days until we could get it back. She survived but rocket washcloth wasn't nearly as good as her towel, which has flowers on it. When she can't find it now, she always says "Towel! Wash!", which means is my towel in the washing machine. Sadly, we lost Towel on Tuesday in a grocery store parking lot. I think it fell out of the car. So, Sim returned to rocket towel but it's not real Towel. But, Grammy came to the rescue and we received a butterfly washcloth of similar color scheme in the mail. She seems to like it but it's not quite as wonderful to her as the original.

Recently, Sim was flipping through a picture book from the library and found a drawing of a boy wiping his face with handkerchief or cloth. She was beside herself and ran over to me carrying the book and her towel and pointing at the picture shrieking "TOWEL! TOWEL! TOWEL!". She was so happy to see someone else who shared her enthusiasm for towels. he he.

The flying machine and other creations

flying_machine, originally uploaded by skweerell.

We've been doing a lot of projects lately. We build a flying machine for Ro's tricycle, so he could be a helicopter. We've built submarines and pirate ships. We built an igloo out of sugar cubes and made a penguin family to live in it. We're currently in the process of making a paper mache rocket.

Ro also built his own cable car system in his room. We built one with yarn and toilet paper tubes in the yard about six months ago when it was warm and he suddenly decided to reproduce it in his room. I was surprised because he hasn't really talked about it or anything.

He's also really keen on waterwheels at the moment. He dug a canal in the dirt in the front yard and dragged our hose reel out to be the waterwheel. He's been drawing "instructions" for building waterwheels as well.

tea for the tired

I am so worn out today. I collapsed on the sofa for an after dinner snooze. Ro decided to revive me by making me some tea, which he made by soaking a tea bag in cold milk and then giving me the cup of milk. I was so bleary eyed when he gave me the milk. I tasted it and it tasted slightly flavored. I gave Daddy a quizzical look and he assured me that it was ok. He did save me from cold "tea" in a dirty cup he said and by making sure Ro used a clean one.

It's fun to poke things up your nose!

Somehow or another, both kids ended up with carrot pieces stuck up their noses at dinner tonight. Another case of Monkey see Monkey do. Although Ro was copying Simone in this case rather than the other way around which is more typical. Daddy got the job of getting the carrots unstuck.

I was vividly reminded of how I thought Ro was having some sort of freak brain hemmorhage when he was about Simone's age (18 months). He stuffed a dried blueberry up his nose and after awhile it "rehydrated". A drop of clear purple/red liquid dripped out his nose while we were playing and I freaked out. Only to discover it was a blueberry from lunch time a few hours previously. gah!

Sim also used color wonder fingerpaint as lip gloss. It was an honest mistake. She sees Mommy lip glossing frequently and it really doesn't look that different as it's colorless and remarkably like vaseline. It's very gross. It doesn't make nice pictures either. The colors are dull and low chroma and the pictures are sort of greasy even when dry. bleah!

bizarre ice breakers

Roen used the weirdest conversational ice breaker I've ever heard. He traisped up to a 6 year old and said, "Excuse me sir, did you see that cloud that looks like a kangaroo?" As you might expect, it didn't exactly work. 10 out of 10 points for style though.

love

Ro and Sim love each other very much, which makes me so hapy. Sim is the most demonstrative but they both miss each other when the other is off staying with grandma. When Ro stayed with Grandma a few days ago, Sim was in the car crying and saying, "My brovver, my brovver, Roen, my brovver." She was so sad he was leaving.

Today, Sim went to Grandma's house while Ro and I went grocery shopping. About half way to the store, Ro slumped over and said, "Mommy, I'm sick!" After I queried him about it, he said, "I'm not sick. I'm just really sad." I was surprised because he normally loves going to the grocery store due to it's wonderful play area. When I asked him what was wrong he said, "I miss Simone." Then, he started crying. He recovered relatively quickly. He was pretty emotional about stuff all day today.

santa

santa, originally uploaded by skweerell.

I've been taking down and putting away our Christmas stuff. Ro has put up some resistance and seems a bit despondent about it. I think he'd like to keep the tree in our living room forever -- in hopes presents might appear under it again quite soon.

Since he has presents so heavily on the brain, Ro has been pretending to be Santa quite a bit. Here he is posing in his sleigh (a storage bin) after harnassing the reindeer (pillows). He has five pillows and two dvd cases to be his deer.

location, location, location

The most constant question on Sim's lips is "Where's Daddy?" Closely followed by "Where's Roen?", which is only a hair ahead of "Where's Mommy?" I answer the "Where's somebody?" question a hundred times a day -- probably more. It's completely replaced "What's that?", which I don't think she's asked for a week.

When she's not concerned with where we are, then she's focused on the location of various body parts. The belly button, fingers, toes,ears, eyes, nose, etc. She even knows elbow and back now. I need to teach her the head, shoulders, knees and toes song. I think she might be able to do it already since she likes dancing.

breakfast in bed - sort of

Happy New Year! We are shattered today. Stayed up late and then got up really early because the kids woke up at 6:30. ugh. Sim is pretty sick. So, by the afternoon, we were all a bit tired and tetchy. Sim took a nap and we sent a grumpy Ro to his room to read books. Then, we zonked out on the couch. After an hour or so, I heard him in the kitchen and then saw him dragging his stool back to the bathroom. I got up to see what he was doing. He says, " Mommy, Go back to sleep. I get you water and breakfast of yogurt and you'll feel better. Go back to sleep." He ushered me back to the couch and I laid down and listened to him rummage in the silverware drawer and cabinets and refrigerator. He came back and positioned an alarm clock near the couch. Then, he set glasses of water and bowls of yogurt next to me and Daddy. Right next to us, somewhat precariously balanced on the couch. One false move and yogurt and water would've been all over the couch. Then, he quietly told us to wake up. Then, he said, "Mommy! Daddy! You need to eat your breakfast and have more energy. You need a break. Do you like water and yogurt for breakfast?" Then, he urged us to eat and drink so we could get treats from the treasure chest. It was very cute. Everyone was in a much better mood afterwards.