Pepper person

We've been going over to the new house every night to move stuff in, paint, etc.  Colin was ecstatic to discover that in the garden the former owners left us, there were peppers.  ORANGE peppers, to be exact.  So this kid who hates vegetables, who would throw a fit if I put a pepper on his plate at dinner, has been going out and plucking the orange peppers and eating them whole like an apple every night. 

His love of orange runs DEEP. 

our new house!!

After first seeing our new house in January, making an offer in March, closing in June ... we FINALLY got the keys yesterday and were able to head over and check things out and celebrate!!

We were all very excited to have the run of the place... literally.  Every time I turned around there would be the blur of a kid racing past me.  They were having SO much fun!  They were excited to stake their claims on their rooms.  Charlotte told everyone it was "Charlotte's new house!"  and Colin described Charlotte's room as "so pink it kind of glows."  (he's right)

We had a pizza picnic dinner on the floor of the living room.  Colin gives it a thumbs up. 

All this open space was just an invitation for wrestling.  The kids took Mike out in our bedroom. 

Grandma and G stopped by to check the place out, and we also were greeted by these visitors.  Can't beat that view!

the next few weeks will be full of work and paining and moving but it will all be worth it soon! 

grant's farm, the sequel

We took advantage of the day off last Friday and the beautiful weather to head over to Grant's Farm.  Unfortunately every other family in the city had the same idea.  We waited in line FOREVER but once we got there... it was worth it.  The kids had a blast again.

All charlotte cared about was getting to ride the "choo choo train."  Here she is, still happy because the tram ride hasn't ended yet and I haven't had to physically remove her from the tram. 

Last year Colin only wanted to feed the goats from behind the fence, and we didn't trust our little piglet Charlotte with bottles of milk.  This year, they headed on in and fed those goats.

Chach was a little wary of the goats and preferred to offer them milk from 4 feet away, or to set it down in front of them.  

bottoms up, guys!

it was not at all hot enough for this, but Colin took a few runs through the sprinklers...

and colin got to feed a camel, which got a few delighted squeals...

this happened almost immediately on the way home - the mark of a good day!

my big big boy :(

Every day my little guy looks more and more like a big kid.  We're just about a month and a half away from Kindergarten and I can hardly believe it.  Here he is today playing baseball at school.  Where did the baby go?

We had his kindergarten physical last week and he's up to 43 1/4 inches tall (25th %) and 35 lbs (3-5%).  While the doctor was probably expecting a different reaction I was ecstatic to hear that he's finally back on the growth curve at all :)

He aced the rest of the exam and is cleared for Kindergarten!

Cousin (and grandparent) Time!

Grandma Karen and Grandpa Doug came down for a visit this weekend, with speical guest visitor cousin Graham!  The boys hit it off immediately though they hadn't seen each other since they were 3.  So much mischief in these faces...

They had way too much fun with squirt guns.

so Mike put them to work on his car rather than the grown ups... good thinking.

The boys got some ice cream and then hit up a movie in City Park Saturday evening...

Colin was excited to have another cub fan around :(

Sunday we all headed out for a very hot morning at the zoo.

It was Charlotte's first time on the train!

I was worried how she'd do on the train - well, no baby has ever loved the train as much as Charlotte.  As soon as it started moving, she squealed "WHEE!" ... she was waving to everyone, and shrieking "Train Train!  Choo Chooooo!"  the whole way.  At every stop she would yell "AGAIN!"   When it was finally time to get off the train I had to physically pull her off, screaming in rage.  So, I guess we'll be doing that again soon...

When she wasn't riding the rails, lady got the grandparents to escort her about the park.

Meanwhile the five year olds decided to ride in style...

We got to see lots of cool things we didn't get to last time, including the hippos, elephants, and even a chance to see the brand new polar bear.  Very cool.

 So fun to have another kid around to play with!  (and yes, Graham is only four months older than my peanut!)

charlotte the entertainer

Here's a random sampling of videos of charlotte from over the weekend...

This is Charlotte's rendition of "Charlotte Hanson," the song I used to sing to her when she was a baby.  She has learned it entirely from watching videos of me singing to her when she was a baby.  

This is charlotte's new game at bedtime, listing everyone that loves her.  Aw!  G gets top billing on this night... though it's possible everyone else is lumped into the gibberish in the middle...

and here she is portraying the "huggy monster" -  no idea where this came from but she has recently started lurching around our house like a zombie and then attacking her victim with hugs.  This girl. 

charlotte update!

I have been a total slacker on updates about Charlotte!  So for her 28 month and 1 week update, here’s what Charlotte is up to:

- This girl’s vocabulary is exploding.  She’s gone from being pretty quiet to complete sentences almost overnight.  A lot of what she says is either gibberish, or completely insane, but it’s fun to get to have a conversation with her finally!  Here she is making up a totally fabricated story about a flight we were going to take on a “big plane to chicago” “tomorrow.”  (I know many of you have already seen this, but it’s just a charlotte classic!)

- She’s about a year and three months ahead of colin with potty training.  We are very close to being done with diapers FOREVER!!!  Hooray!

- We had her parent-teacher conference last week and her teacher said she wished she had “twenty charlottes” in her class.  HAHA.  Okay..  But it was good to hear that Charlotte is happy there and doing well.  She is apparently the class singer (no surprise there), loves her dollies and playing dress up with the other girls, but is more than able to “hold her own” against the boys, even though she’s the smallest (not the youngest, mind you, but the smallest) in the class.  Good for her!

- She still seems very musical, she has plenty of songs memorized and will burst into song at any given moment, including when she wakes up in the morning in her crib.

- Still loving books and pointing to pictures and asking, “What’s this?”

- She has an incredible memory – and we are used to those with Colin around -  but every day I am just baffled by something she’ll recall or remember or understand.

- Still adoring her brother.  Here they are “dancing” (?) after bath last night.

- Still just our happy, fiery, fun little cha cha!  We love this girl!