and so it goes...

Landon: "I'm going to hit you!"
Arlan: [laughs]
Landon: "Stop Laughing!!"
Arlan: [laughs]
Landon: "STOP LAUGHING!"
Arlan: [laughs]
Landon: [giggles ... finally]

Sigh ...

A couple of shots from September...

Arlan LOVES to wear our shoes. He's always slipping some on and then attempting to walk. Here he is this morning with John's shoes on!! LOL

Landon loves dad's new workbench. He was very proud of his organization job, and was showing it to me yesterday like a peacock with his chest puffed out!!! LOL He sat up there for 45 minutes or so, rearranging the wrenches. Too funny

On another note, we discovered last night that Arlan likes sushi of all things! Yup - he had some of my california roll and was quite pleased with it. Stinker. Landon still won't even come close to a piece of sushi ...

Maybe THAT'S why they ask so many questions...

If the answers that I give to Landon's 1 million questions a day are even half as entertaining as the answers Landon gives to my questions, it explains why he asks so many questions!!!!

Landon just told me he doesn't want to have a penis anymore, he doesn't like it. I asked him what he would have instead. He's walking away from me (naked, of course), saying he'd have a bum in front, and a penis in the back (pointing to his body accordingly). "That's a good idea, right mom?" *ok*

So I think I should remember his answers to all of these questions we pose to him. They are quite amusing. Some other examples:

He told his babysitter that "Bees unscrew the lightbulbs and put their honey in there, and that's how they work." I don't know if that's how lightbulbs work, or how the bees work, but it's an interesting point to ponder....

Ah well, I will put more of these 'learnings' in here as I come across them!! Until then, we are enjoying another (close to) 30' day, and dreading the end of summer (and the approach of 'less play outside winter'!! ugh)

Toronto Trip

we had an absolute BLAST in Toronto!! It was SOO much fun - Landon and Arlan were in their glory playing with their cousins! And I really enjoyed a few relaxing days too!!

The flight there was pretty good - I am glad that there was both John & I for that first flight with both boys. It took Arlan quite awhile to give in and go to sleep, but once he did both he and John got a nap in. In fact, Arlan slept right through descent and landing and everything - so sweet! Before he caved and went to sleep we spent a fair bit of time letting him crawl up and down the aisle - much to both his and the other passengers delight! He was making friends everywhere! LOL
Landon was pretty good too - it was a bit boring for him, but he managed well enough. It would be a lot easier if he would enjoy some sedentary activities - like colouring! But we survived it :-) John and I traded off the kids, so neither of us had to deal with one kid the whole trip - and the change was good. From the "follow Arlan around, keep him happy" type of work, to the "answer 1,000,000 questions, or maybe the same question 1,000,000 times" kind of work with Landon!! LOL Ah well...

In Toronto we spent our days playing! Of course. The first thing Landon did when we arrived was head downstairs to play with trains! LOL Plus he LOVED all of Thomson's trucks (LOTS of construction vehicles!). And Landon & Izzy are two peas in a pod, they had so much fun running and squealing. We spent time at the park by Liz & Rob's, plus we went to two different parks to play - one with a Pirate ship, the other with a castle. Landon was in heaven!
Arlan loved the action and Izzy too! Well, Izzy was loving Arlan lots I think as well! When we arrived, Arlan was hungry so we strapped him into his 'high chair' (that attaches to the table) and were going to feed him some yogurt. Well, Izzy beat us to it - feeding Arlan yogurt herself! It was so precious!
One thing that continues to amaze me is just how much Thomson and Landon look alike. John did manage to get a pic of the two of them (Landon was posing for pics by the end of our visit as we were all taking so many!! LOL) - I'll post it when he gets home with the camera. It's crazy - they could be twins, just different ages! aiaiai

Anyways, so John stayed in Toronto to go golfing with his buddies (is there still), while I ventured home with both boys, by myself, on the plane, for 4 hours ... The plane was right packed full too (on the way there, there was an entire row with no one in it, so John and Arlan were all sprawled out napping together -- so cute, I have a pic of that too!). I was lucky enough to be seated by a Grandma who was oh-so-patient with me and the boys. And both boys were pretty well behaved too, which was a blessing. There were a few squawks and grumps, but for the most part we were ok. Arlan did less aisle-cruising, as it becomes much more cumbersome having Landon tag along for that game and he didn't want to stay in his seat by himself (I don't blame him, must've been a pretty big ordeal overall for him, and what if I didn't come back!??). But Landon did stay to play with Betty for awhile when I had to change Arlan (did you know that Landon has NEVER pooped while we've been travelling -- car or plane? He always waits till we get there ... not ARLAN!). And Betty was so kind as to read some stories to Landon and to play trucks with him, giving me a nice break to deal with only Arlan.

The excitement, as it were, actually came after landing. First of all, Arlan slept during the entire descent, and was completely konked out when were to get off the plane. To top that off, Landon fell asleep right after they turned the seat belt sign off at the GATE! So I have two boys fast asleep - which allowed me to get packed up, etc, but put me in a dilemma as to how to get them off the plane. Landon would NOT wake up (his eyes just rolled in his head and he lolled over further in his seat), and although Arlan was awake, I still needed to carry him. In the end, a flight attendant carried Arlan out and put him in his stroller while I carried the still very-sleepy-headed Landon out. *shaking head* He could've pulled that stunt about 2 hours earlier, would've been easier on everyone! LOL
Now Landon is SO TIRED at this point, and I'm hot and tired, and I just want to get our baggage and go. Landon wants to be carried and is pouting, loudly, because I won't carry him. But we get going through the airport and there's lots to see, and things are going pretty good. We get to the escalators to leave the secured area (the place where it says "Keep going. Do not stop, or alarm will sound") ... Landon's been begging to go on every escalator we see. He's pumped - he jumps right on the escalator, I stand beside him with the stroller on the escalator (I know I know, you're not supposed to do that, but I didn't want to spoil his fun). Then ... Landon gets scared and runs back up and off the escalator!! And there I am, still going down, with the stroller so there's no way I can go back up to grab him, no matter how much I wanted the stair-master-type exercise!! And Landon is hysterical at the top, and I'm yelling for him to just get on the escalator. At this point, I'm thinking I'll have to park the stroller at the bottom and run up the stairs to get Landon, setting off all the alarms, and we'll be detained and strip-searched and the whole nine yards ... YUCK! Then, a man, a nice man, comes walking up to the escalator. I call to him "Please, can you grab my son and put him on the escalator?" The poor guy looked around like he thought it was some sort of candid camera joke (or if there were perhaps another way down!! heh heh), but in the end scooped Landon up and brought him down for me. All without that stupid alarm going off (even though I had stopped at the bottom). Phew!
So Landon tells me every day (usually more than once) that he was REALLY scared of the escalator ... and we've a good story to cap off our trip! LOL

Oh yeah - and then of course we get to the luggage carousel, the luggage starts coming around, and Landon has to pee :-/ Figures. So we beetle off to the washroom and come back to just our two bags going around and around ... at least I didn't have to elbow my way up to the carousel!! LOL

So we made it home - and we're all happy to be here. The day we got home (Wed), Arlan ate, slept, ate and went to bed for the night! Landon and I were in bed pretty early too, and we all slept GREAT!

Fun in the Park

Arlan thoroughly enjoyed his first real play time in the park. He went to the park several times last year, but was usually snoozing in the stroller :-) So today he go to PLAY! At first, he was quite content to watch Landon and check out the Grandpa that mom was visiting with ... so he sat on the bench with mom. But after a short while he wanted to get down and see what all the fuss was about. It was a very fun game to try to put rocks in our mouths and then laugh laugh laugh when mom batted them away and said "no". He laughed so hard ... would put his hand almost to his mouth and wait there for me to bat the rocks away. Too funny. Arlan also LOVED his first big swing ride. It took awhile though ... it seemed as though as soon as Landon got on the other swing Arlan realized it was all good and started giggling and laughing. Then Landon was swinging his legs back and forth, laughing that his swing was 'wiggly' ... so Arlan had to swing his legs back and forth while laughing even harder. Too CUTE! I loved it and am SO looking forward to many more trips to the park. Not to mention getting Arlan's little swing seat hooked up in the backyard ... that'll be great too!

Piano Man -- er, Men!

A favourite game for the boys is to play the piano. Arlan has just discovered this wonderfully noisy new toy!! LOL Whenever Landon starts banging away, Arlan stops dead, listens, then starts 'singing' while crawling full-speed to join Landon!! It's pretty funny. And if Landon nor I are available to play the piano, Arlan tries to do it himself. He gets SO frustrated when the lid is down, or when that darned piano bench gets in the way. But sometimes mom HAS to have it that way, or her ears might fall off of her head....

Some pics of the cuties!!

A few pics of the boys, and even me with them!

On Feb 4, Landon and I made some cookies with my new heart-shaped cookie cutter. I enjoyed it, but I think Landon loved it even more!! He was SUCH a good helper, dipping the cookie cutter in flour for me, then helping me to press down to cut the cookies. Of course, it made for some great moments together, and I loved his 'look'!

And Arlan is getting better at eating ... not quite so fussy. I have recently discovered that he will eat peas when mixed with carrots, so I can finally get some 'greens' into him!! LOL Little stinker!

And heeeere's our fashion plate :-)

Can you believe this kid!! I went to buy groceries, leaving John at home with the kids. This is what I see when I pull into the driveway!! LOL His pj top (still), a diaper, and rubber boots (on the wrong feet no less!). It was very difficult not to laugh at him!!

.

But he had a blast splashing through the puddles. There's no shortage of them on our street, that's for sure. And when he was done splashing he took off his boots and walked barefoot through the mud (our flower-bed), then smeared mud all over the front door and steps!! Gotta love it - I remember loving mud as a kid too!! And luckily I was at Wendy's for a few minutes to dad got to clean it all up (and even luckier Landon couldn't get the front door open to get in the house himself like he was trying to do!).

Yup - the snowy-slushy mess is our street - YUCK! We have to blast out of our driveway and back up about 2 houses to where they've snow-blowered the street a bit, then take a big run forward to get past the mess in front of our house!! Both John and I have been stuck once out there :-/ But it's supposed to be up in the mid-teens again tomorrow, so maybe some of it will finally disappear?

Yes, it was about +15 or something when Landon was out like this...gotta love chinooks in January!! Even Arlan was hanging out outside - without a coat (but still a blanket!).

Why were we all outside? John was painting the trim and doors for the basement -- he sprayed them in the garage, and was cleaning up.

and yes, that's my FILTHY car ... will have to get it washed one of these days obviously :-) Mucky, yucky mess!!

We did actually have the neighbours daughter to babysit for about an hour this afternoon. John went to wash his car, I went to buy groceries. Arlan had a snooze while she was here, so she just had to play with Landon. And John was back from his errands quickly, so he was basically just in the garage. But we did want to have Briana watch the boys as a bit of a 'practise run' ... hoping this works out and we can employ her much more frequently. It's nice as she's right next door, so if there's questions or problems, her mom is close too. And with John's band practises starting up again in Feb we'll be needing a sitter on Monday nights ... so she'll get about 7 weeks out of Feb / Mar -- some good income for her :-) So hopefully it all works out well -- it's a win-win situation (well, win-win-win as Landon already was asking to play with Briana this evening!! LOL)

Landon didn't want to nap today with all this fun outside. So we didn't make him. By about 4:30 he was so sleepy. I put on CARS (surprise surprise) and he laid on the couch. I said "Landon are you sleepy?" He said "Mom, I'm SO sleepy!" LOL Then he went to sleep on the couch and was konked out for about 45 minutes until we had to get him up to go drop John's car off. He wasn't impressed when we got him up - but he snapped out of it once we got him in the car. Then he was all talk "Mom, look at that BIG WHITE TRUCK! Do you think we'll see a semi truck pulling a TRAILER!???"

Arlan Pictures

Arlan LOVES to play on his tummy. He can now get himself maneuvred around to get the more interesting toys, and is quite good at rolling to his back and to his tummy as he wants. Unless he's tired, then he wants help!! I noticed yesterday he's also starting to pull his knees up under him a bit, especially when trying to reach a toy that's out of reach in front of him (he used to just stick his legs straight out the back!), so I'm thinking crawling will be on order soon....

Here's Arlan asleep in the sled again. It was much colder this day, and snowing slightly. He didn't care - he still nodded off!! LOL So sweet :-D

And here's our little smiler. The sun shines in to the computer room (bonus room) so nicely in the morning, and he loves to play in here (which works for mom to check her email too!!). He is just too cute. And his hair -- like, what do you do with that!! It looks like the wind's blowing it off to one side!! LOL And those curls are always off like that! In some pictures he reminds me of a mad scientist or something with this wild hair all over the place! heh

some other photos from the past week

Here's our mantel Xmas Eve, and our Christmas tree with the presents under it. Looking at it now, I wish I would've plugged the lights in for the picture LOL But then you'd see our little section close to the top where the lights don't work!! frustrating thing ...
But ah well... The angel on top is a homemade gift from Aunty Yvonne last year. And of course, those big gifts in front are from Santa.

Here's Arlan and Grandma hanging out this morning before Grandma and Grandpa left. This was one of Arlan's favourite places to be ... sitting on the couch beside Grandma and he was very happy :-) Oh yeah - and he's playing with his new octoplush ... his fave gift!!

Here's Landon mid-somersault ... I think this is Xmas Eve. I don't know how he didn't hurt himself on this one, given how close he is to the futon. *shrug* He LOVES to do somersaults.

And a few days before Christmas, Landon decided he didn't need to nap. He was in bed for about an hour, but didn't go to sleep. When I checked on him he said "I no need to sleep. I wake up now!" ... so I let him get up. He was miserable!! So finally we told him to go upstairs until he could feel better (he likes to go to the computer/bonus room if Arlan's making too much noise, or if he's just overwhelmed with the world at the moment). John and I continued to eat our supper, then I noticed just how quiet it was. John came up to check on Landon, and well ... I guess he did need a nap after all!! Of course, this is now at 6:00 at night, so the question became how long to let him sleep. But we left him for about half an hour and it didn't seem to disturb his sleep too much that night. Stinker!! I think that is the only time he's ever fallen asleep outside of bed on his own (he has fallen asleep on either John or I a couple of times, and oh yeah - once in his high chair!). It was cute, I must admit!

oh baby it's COLD outside!

Welcome to the deep freeze ... aiaiai We're spending our days indoors, and are even more thankful for the basement to play in!!! We spend time down there every day, I'm hoping Landon gets so used to it that he'll be confident enough to play down there by himself soon. Right now if we go upstairs even for a moment he is running up those stairs with us. Which isn't that bad - running stairs should tire him out, right? Heh heh But I'm enjoying having all of the toys in the basement, that's for sure. And Landon loves having his own play space. His favourites right now are drawing with chalk (thanks again Aunty Yvonne for the easel & chalk), trains (of course) and doing yoga with mommy (he rolled out paper yesterday to play yoga too! LOL). Oh yeah, and running around and around and around....

Landon has also fallen in love with playing outside. We were outside Thursday for over an hour, and he cried when I made him come inside. He was having WAY too much fun to want to come in the house! We shoveled off the deck (John found Landon his very own shovel, just his size, which he loves), and he pulled his sled around the backyard. Then he swung for awhile (yup - we're using that swing, even in the snow!). But the most fun of all was when I'd throw a shovel-full of snow in the air and it would fall down on him - he thought that was the bestest!! We also learned through this game why it is so good to do our jacket right up (snow down the front - or back- of the jacket is COLD!). He also continued his mitten experiment, taking them off about 12 times, only to realize that snow is still cold -- so he'd cry to get them put on. Thankfully I'm getting MUCH better at getting his mitts on him, so they stay on a lot better, and probably feel better too (we are getting lots of practise getting our thumbs in the thumbslots!).

Arlan is a cutie-pie, even if he wakes me up at 6:30 am! Silly kid! But he is cute as a button, with those chubby chubby cheeks and big smiles all of the time. I've been trying to give him some foods other than cereals the past week or so - but he's having none of it. While he showed mild dislike for sweet potatoes, he downright grimaced for the apples. I thought ' what kid doesn't like applesauce?' ... the answer: Arlan. LOL So I'm just going to stick with cereals for a few more weeks and maybe try some other stuff after Christmas. He's still happy with the cereals anyways, only eating between 6 and 10 Tbsp a day (between 2 or 3 feedings), so I'm not feeling that we need to introduce anything else yet anyways. He is, after all, not quite 6 months yet. And while I say that he likes cereals ... he likes cereals mixed with breastmilk -- not formula, not water, just breastmilk. So it looks like I'll be pumping until at least the New Year, which isn't too bad as long as I can keep providing enough milk for his cereal needs.

And we have our tree up, and presents under the tree. I'm wondering how long til Landon rips them open!! LOL Last night I wrapped presents with Landon playing (in the basement, of course!), so he saw what was inside and what was going on. So we put those under the tree. Should he open them, he'll find 'boring' gifts - -the stuff for Aunty Yvonne, Uncle Greg, Grandma and Grandpa -- so maybe he'll be disinclined to open any other gifts. *shrug* We'll see ... it's worth a try. The worst thing he could do is open them all, then I'd have to rewrap ... not exactly the end of the world. His gifts (and Arlan's too, as Landon LOVES Arlan's toys almost as much as his own) will not go under the tree until Christmas Eve ... that's too much temptation (even if we didn't tell them they are for him). Also - should he rip open gifts and find stuff for himself, that he likes, he would want to rip open all gifts, all the time. So we'll just leave them.

I made a 'Christmas calendar' for Landon last night in the basement ... just on a big piece of paper with markers. So that we can 'count down' to Christmas ... see how excited I can really get him ... heh heh.

Oh yeah, and we got Santa pics done on Friday. Arlan was like 'whatever', just sitting on Santa no problem. Landon, however, wanted nothing to do with Santa!! LOL He wanted to open the presents, and pet the penguins, but not sit on Santa's knee. At least last year I got him propped on Santa's knee for the pic. Not this year -- you can see my hands in the picture trying to push Landon away from me!! LOL Poor kid. But he's in there, and he's looking at the camera. And he managed to tell Santa that he wants a garbage truck for Christmas, so maybe Santa will bring him one :-)

That's the news from here .... just staying inside where it's a bit warmer! aiaiai The fireplace AND the furnace are running very frequently in this house ... the north winds come across the prairie behind us and lambast us, so I only feel warm in the sauna these days! Maybe I am a little glad John insisted on that thing ... but don't tell him that!! LOL

Until next time...

conversation with a 2-year-old

Mom: "Landon, quit playing with that. It's not a toy!"
Landon: "Mom! BUZZ OFF!"
Mom: "Landon, buzz off!"
Landon: "Mom! Get out of here!!"
Mom: "Landon, get out of here!"
Landon: "Mom, you're driving me NUTS!"
Mom (surpressing belly laughter at this point): "Landon, you're driving me NUTS!"

Then fits of giggles for both parties, while Arlan looks on thinking we're both insane.

scary squeaky door!

Forgot about the scary squeaky door....

Last night I played volleyball (and was it GREAT to get out of the house!). On my way home I called to see how things were going. Well, it seems that Landon was snuggled into our bed because he was so scared of the squeaking door! When our front screen door isn't latched, and the wind hits it just right, it squeaks. John didn't know this though - so he hadn't been able to locate the squeak for quite some time ... giving Landon enough time to work himself into quite the fright!! Poor kid! LOL That imagination is kicking into overdrive.
So I got home, pulled Landon out of our bed and we went and showed him how the door squeaks when not shut tight, and then we shut it tight and the squeaking stopped. Still Landon was pretty scared, so he snuggled back into our bed while I showered. But after that he was ready for sleep and happily went back into his own room -- PHEW! I thought I was going to have to sit in his room until he fell asleep, but he just snuggled into bed and said 'leave the door OPEN!' like he does every night.

So that's the story of the scary squeaky door. Makes me giggle a bit, and a bit sad because our little Landon just keeps on growing - this imagination that he's recently developed if proof of that.