Kid Update

Hazel has a fascination with words. Her ears are magnets for new vocabulary and fun phrases. She's already a major chatterbox, and then how she throws in all sorts of unexpected words is just too funny.

One night at dinner, Hazel saw that I was almost finished eating and said, "Dude, you are goin' to town!"

Earlier that day, she had asked me to put a bunch of clips in her hair, and after the fourth or fifth one, she started calling out, "We are really goin' to town here!" "Why are we goin' to town on my hair?" "Woah, we are totally goin' to town with these clips!"

Every morning before Todd leaves for work, we all say, "Cheerio!" I tried to change it to "adios" or something else one day, and Hazel insisted that Todd not leave until I had said "cheerio."

One day we were at the park and she was pretending a section of trees were some dark woods. She said, "It's a little scary. Come with me and comfort me."

The other day she wanted some privacy in the bathroom, and as I took my leave, she insisted that I "leave the door open just a smidge."

She loves words like terrible, mischief, nibble, and fascinating. I notice her speaking in terms she heard in Berenstein Bears books, like "Dear me, no!' and starting sentences with "Say." I just think it's the most adorable thing ever.

In other Hazel news, she has been taking a gymnastics class and is a super star at spider walks (precurser to handstands), bear walking, and forward rolls. Her favorite part of class is jumping on the trampoline. The class is a good outlet for her energy and channels her impressive strength and balance. She talks non-stop through the whole thing, and the teachers are constantly calling her name to get her to remember to keep moving (as the line of kids waiting behind her backs up!) She's a bit of a daydreamer, turns out. We went to Happy Hollow a week ago (a local amusement park/zoo for little kids) and we saw that Hazel's just barely tall enough to ride the roller coaster all by herself. She wanted to give it a go, and I was thrilled, since that would mean she could ride it when we don't go with a friend who can watch Jack while I ride with her. I was so proud of her. She felt so big and excited and she totally held her arms in the air as it climbed its first hill. Maybe we desensitized her at Disneyland??? Whatever the reason, she was totally brave and LOVED going on her own. Make the picture bigger so you can see the fantastic look on her face!Jack got his first haircut today. Crazy that he and Hazel got their first haircuts within months of each other. He was hitting the point where his hair looked more feminine and/or rockstar mullet than I would like. So I got out the buzzers and popped a no. 8 on. That's all there was to it. Super easy.

Before:After:

Jack's turning into a bit of a menace. He doesn't really choke anymore, but he still sticks non-food items in his mouth all the time. Then he'll walk towards me, already shaking his head and saying, "uh, uh," as he spits said item out. He waits until I'm watching before dropping food onto the floor when he's in his highchair. Again with the "uh, uh."

If the bathroom door is open, he makes a beeline for the toilet every time. And today's unfortunate accomplishment is that he figured out how to lift both bathroom's toilet lids. Yes, he likes to go fishing. It's going to be harder to manage this bad habit now that he can lift the lid. I hate hearing the lid open, followed by his happy swish, swish. He loves it so much. It's so disgusting.

Jack's started to love having books read to him. He'll grab one out of the book basket, carry it over to me, and climb right onto my lap. He rarely makes it through til the end of the book (even board books) but I'm happy that he's beginning to love books and reading. His current absolute favorite toy is a quart-size ziplock bag of Littlest Pet Shop pieces. He brings it to me several times a day so I can open the bag and he can get all the pieces out. Yesterday I had to put all the smallest pieces inside a snack-size bag inside the big bag because I got tired of taking them out of his mouth. He loves the little animals. When I hold up the cat, he leans in for three or four kisses.

Disneyland

We went to Disneyland last week with Todd's sister Missy's family and his parents. Todd hadn't been since he was a teen, and it was my very first time ever. There is far too much I could say about it, which is why I've been home for five days and still haven't posted. It's highlights today, or nothing, so here goes.

Loved:

* the characters! There were plenty of them around, and we usually didn't have to wait long in line to meet them. I swear Hazel thought they were the real deal. Her hugs for them all were so sincere. We met Tigger and Winnie the Pooh, Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Tinkerbell, Cinderella and the Fairy Godmother, Aladdin and Jasmine, Rapunzel, Ariel, Aurora, Mulon, and Belle. We bumped into Cinderella four different times! * the parade our last night. We got a great character sweep, seeing everyone we hadn't found already, so Hazel walked away satisfied that she'd also seen Peter Pan and Captain Hook, Tiana, and Snow White. I don't think she would have felt complete otherwise, as she'd been "keeping her eyes peeled" for those guys the whole time we were there.

*Tower of Terror. Nothing like free-falling twenty stories or whatever it was. Got my heart pounding. It was probably the only ride that gave me a rush. Poor Hazel. I think she was too young for that. She was sitting next to me. There I was, body off the seat, before I realized Hazel was totally mid-air as well, and probably freaked out. But I loved it!*Autopia, Go Go Gadget Coaster, Ariel's Undersea Adventure, Silly Swings, Peter Pan's Flight, Dumbo - those were probably Hazel's favorite rides.

*spending time with family. Hazel and Jack both seemed totally happy to be with everyone we came with. I feel like we really strengthened bonds and made memories with them, and we had a ton more fun than we would have if we had gone alone.* pineapple soft-serve ice cream outside the Tiki Room. Delish!

* the Hotel Disney swimming pool we played at our last morning before driving home. We found out Hazel and Jack both love water slides!

Unimpressed by:

* most of the rides. I suppose I had this idea that Disneyland is the end-all for amusement parks, but most of the rides were just eh. Lots of sitting and looking at recreated movie scenes. The perfect customer would be six years old and familiar with every movie featured on the rides.
Hated:

* the noise! All the rides were way too loud, and there was music being piped in throughout the entire park, so there was nowhere to go to have some peace and quiet. I got a migraine. :(

* the crowds! It was serious low-season and I was still feeling claustrophobia. There were way too many people there. And it boggled my mind how we'd get on rides with no line, but we had to walk for five minutes from the entrance to the actual ride just getting through space dedicated to ride lines! Mark my words, I will NEVER go in the summer!Overall, I don't think you'll ever be able to classify me and Todd as major Disneyland fans, but it was a blast and everyone had a good time. We're glad we went, if only to give Hazel a place where she could wear her dress-ups all day long and fit right in!

Yarn Wreath

I've had the hardest time finding some way I like to dress up this yarn wreath I started. I was just playing around with it a couple of days ago and made it up into a Valentine's Day wreath with a boa of Hazel's and some scrapbook paper. So that'll dress up the door for a couple of weeks, but after that, it's back to the drawing board. It might wind up under my bed. We'll see.
Also, I think my front door is not awesome for wreath hanging. All that address-label/huge doorbell box business really detracts from the overall balance of it. Ug. Wreaths on pinterest are always hung on gorgeous front doors. Where's mine? Oh well. Work with what you've got.

A Chocolate Morning

Today is the kind of day chocolate was made for. Too bad I made a vow to go ten days without dessert or candy, 'cause I could sure use some right now.

Hazel was just a super whiner all morning. She wanted me to do everything for her right now. She wanted me to make her eggs, set up her play house, and read her a book all at the same time. It frustrated me to no end that while I was working on something she asked me to do, she was yelling at me for not doing something else she wanted right then. I finally had to threaten to take away every single one of her dress-ups if she didn't stop yelling at me. Luckily for the both of us, we've made it to nap time without having to resort to that.

We made it to the grocery store, where I had the kids in one of those enormous two-seater, pretend-you're-driving-a-car shopping carts, and it's snack time and so it's not completely terrible that Hazel and Jack are both loudly grunting for crackers every fifteen feet or so. But it still annoyed me. Hazel told me I had the "gimmies" because I was putting so much stuff in the cart. Thank you, dear, but that's not exactly what the Bearenstein Bears were trying to say.

Back in the parking lot, I got Hazel out and told her to hop in her carseat. Then I took Jack out and started to load him in. Hazel started whining that she couldn't get her door shut. I looked over and saw an elderly man (veteran, we were at the military commissary) sitting in his car. He couldn't get out until Hazel's door was shut. So I left Jack unbuckled and bounded over there to help Hazel shut her door, which I thought was just open so wide she didn't have the strength to swing it shut. Not quite. It was lodged against the man's car. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I loosened it and saw two lovely paint stripes on his car door. I was panicked and stressed and v-e-r-y close to bursting into tears as I hurried back to Jack to buckle him in before he climbed out and fell on the pavement or something. Mentally, I geared up to get yelled at and swap insurance information.

The man stepped out - I was still on the other side of the car with Jack - and I said, "I am so, so sorry." He reached over, touched the marks, said, "Aw, it'll just wipe off," and walked into the grocery store. Nothing more. I was floored. I walked back over to buckle Hazel in and could see that it was not just paint marks; there was a dent in his door. I took in how new and expensive his car looked. I took a few steps backward to look at his bumper. Yep, a Lexus. That was a miracle. For reals, a miracle. Right then and there, I bowed my head and said a prayer of gratitude for that man's mercy. Then I found a scrap of paper in my purse and wrote him a thank you note.

I can't remember the last time I felt so overwhelmed with gratitude for something someone has done for me. Tears were coursing over my cheeks the whole drive home. I just couldn't pull it together. I almost pulled over to wait it out. That could have been so bad. I can't believe he just let it go. That man is an angel to me.