Update: 2.75

I’ve been ruminating this post in my head for a while, but have been held back by one thing: kitchen renovation. It has completely consumed our life these past few weeks (actually months, but who’s counting). But today I’m breathing a sigh of relief and refusing to do anything kitchen—because we’re almost done! (Who am I kidding? I started this post over a week ago, and am just now finishing it!) Countertop is finished, painting 90% finished, and backsplash is 90% finished. We LOVE it, but truth be told, I’m totally burnt out on house construction and ready for it to be over. I’m tired of using every spare moment to work on the kitchen, thus causing all my other chores to back up. Not to mention the extra chores that the renovation has caused like the layer of sawdust the covers every inch of our house, or the extra laundry from our work clothes or rags, or the scrubbing of the carpet from all the stains created. All that said, however, I can’t wait to completely finish and post pictures of the renovation—because it’s gorgeous!

Now to the real reason of the post: my boys growing up. How can it be that Seth and Sam are 3 months away from their third birthday? They are so grown up now. Here’s what those little twins of mine are up to these days: (the picture below is of them in their fort eating popcorn: Seth, Sam)

-Pretending, pretending, and more pretending. They will spend hours on an elaborate imaginative trip with their stuffed animals, backpacks packed (with blocks for clothes), going to the couch (the car), driving to various places (usually Dufur or Lakeview), to do various things (usually a football or basketball game). When I asked them how long they would be gone, Sam replied, “Four days,” while Seth, “Two weeks.”

-One of their favorite things to pretend is playing music. Our wooden train tracks are guitars or drumsticks, while their aircraft carriers are the drums (yes, this makes a loud noise). Their pegs are trumpets. My favorite song they’ve made up is one in which they belt out, “I don’t want to sing, I don’t want to sing…”

-Basketball is still huge in the house, with the addition of fouling each other—HARD. Like plowing each other over. I made the rule they can only do that when Ben is watching as the ref. They also play defense with their arms out and shuffle their feet while squatting down…pretty good form actually. And they fall down on purpose lots. Because apparently that’s what they’ve picked up from watching uncle Caleb’s games: fouls, defense, and falling down.

-We’re entering into the questions phase (thankfully not “why” yet, but other questions). I feel like I hear, “What’s dat mama?” and “What you doin?” a million times a day. They want to know what every sound is and where it comes from. They always want to know where I am and what I’m doing. They want to know how everything works. It’s cute, and good—but also very mentally exhausting for me.

-They know almost every letter in the alphabet. They can spell and recognize both their names. They can also spell “mom,” “dad,” “stop,” and “go.” They want to know what all our family member’s names start with, and have almost all those memorized. They love to learn and are very curious.

-They completely get themselves dressed each morning.

-They love doing art projects, coloring, cooking with mama, playing trains, doing puzzles, wrestling with daddy, taking baths and most of all, playing outside. They are very earnest in all they do.

-Word of the month: college. Not sure where they got it from? Maybe college basketball? They use it in very funny ways, but never correctly. “This is my college house.” “The ball is college.” Hum…

-In general, they get along pretty good. However, they have entered into quite a selfish stage. When one boy says, “I want to play with ____,” I’ll see the other run to try to get to it first. If one is wearing a certain shirt, the other one wants it. I spend a lot of my day saying, “Don’t covet what your brother’s playing with.” “Why don’t you ask for a turn in five minutes?” and most of all: “Stop being so selfish.”

Sam:

• Lots of funny expressions and voices. 
• Likes to mimic and tease.
• Laughs a lot and thrives on touches and attention. 
• When he’s happy, he’s very happy. When he’s sad, he’s very sad.
• Tends to be a bit of a liar (can you say that about your kids?). Yep, he will lie, exaggerate, etc.
• More social than Seth; usually plays with people of any age and has lots of friends.
• Doozy comments of the month: when asked what he wanted for his birthday present (and after Seth had replied, “A basketball"), Sam told us that he wanted “his present to be bigger than Seth’s.” Are you kidding me? Ben and I’s jaws dropped, and we stumbled to tell him to not say selfish things like that and to want good things for his brother too. Second comment: as Seth was stressing out trying to find something, Sam told him, “Don’t worry about it. It’s in the drawer.”

Seth:

• This month we discovered Seth has been struggling with acid reflux; we are not sure for how long and are wondering if some of his sleep problems have been attributed to it. He’s been on medicine for a couple weeks now and is doing better.
• Has been struggling with what I call a “countenance problem.” In kid language: a poopy attitude…just being whiny and discontented. In hindsight, we believe that this may be attributed to his tummy hurting a lot. It seems to be getting better with the medicine.
• Loves to cuddle, especially with his mama!
• Is a potty training champ, and hasn’t had an accident in over a month. The great part about it is that he does it all on his own without me having to remind him.
• Is a “door nazi,” i.e. always wants to be the only one opening and shutting the door. It drives me crazy.
• Doozy comments of the month: when he was sad that Ben was going to a Blazer game without him, and I told him that we’d take him to a game soon, Seth seriously said, “Yeah, when I become a man.” And on the same night, as he was pretending to play guitar, he told me, “I the big (meaning biggest) guitar player in the world.” Where do they get these ideas?