This Week

I'm not gonna lie. It's the end of the day and I'm saving what little sanity I have left by parking the children in front of an episode of Sesame Street. Here's what has been going on with us this week.

• We've had a total role reversal around here that started last weekend. Perhaps it was inspired by the backwards Halloween costumes. All of a sudden this week the personalities have switched. Zoe is sweet as pie and going with the flow, whereas Silas is being a total pain in the ass. He always "marches to his own drummer" as Derek & I fondly say, but now it's to the point that he is completely obstinate and throws a massive temper tantrum if he can't do whatever he wants in that moment. We have had a week's worth of nightmare bedtime routines. Last night he ended up with back-to-back 2 minute timeouts right before we went in the bedroom for pj's. I'm really hoping this will turn around soon.

• Going along with Silas' very 2-year-old behavior, he has started repeating everything Zoe says but with a 'no' in front. Zoe cries for Daddy and Silas says "no dada!". Zoe asks me to play their favorite c.d. and Silas says "no music!". Zoe comments while we're driving that she saw a tractor, and Silas says "NO TRACTOR!". 

• Zoe has started saying "Zoe do it" for everything. And she means it.

• Derek took the kids back to the Little Bookworms Story Time at the local animal shelter. They got to meet some bunnies this week. Zoe remembers Nigel the parrot from last time and says "bird loud" whenever we pass by the sign for the shelter.

• Our landlord, Mike, replaced all the miniblinds in our house today. It's the little things in life that make me so happy! Every room seems so much brighter now that we don't have dust-covered blinds covering every window. He's also going to paint our guest room in the next few weeks, so I'm very happy to get that room brightened up from the dark blue that it is currently painted. My mom will also be very happy :-)

• We're hosting a Thanksgiving feast for 15, so we're busy organizing and menu planning. There will definitely be more to come about how we manage to pull this off with two 2-year-olds running underfoot! 

• Silas has started putting his little play crockpot on the real stove burner, stirring it, and saying "on" or "cook". I ended up removing the knobs from the burner controls, even though they are on the top part of the stovetop, not the front. The last thing we need is to be gassed out by our 2-year-old son who is trying to make us soup.

And last but not least, Zoe pooped in the bathtub again this week. This is probably the 3rd time it's happened when Derek has been on solo Daddy duty. Here's what happened this time: It was Silas' turn to get out of the tub first, so Derek was getting him dressed in the nursery and Zoe was still in the tub. Next thing he hears is Zoe grunting, and then screaming and crying, "yucky, yucky, yucky". He runs in the bathroom and she is trying to climb out of the tub. He plucks her out and she says "Siya poop". He said, "no Zoe, Silas didn't poop, you pooped". She said "Zoe poop tub". One of her first three word combos, and it will go down in family history...

Other than all that, they are still as goofy and cute as can be!

Doing downward dog in honor of Gwa-wa's 65th birthday

Wearing the cow hats they got at Sydney & Ivy's farm-themed
birthday party!