Me Too!

And this is how 2 year olds break their arm. Once Ben had finished riding his bike, Nick had to have a turn. I guess we will be looking for a 10"or 12" bike for Nick at the garage sale this year. 

The Most Important Thing

So we are at Toys R Us trying to pick out a bike and what happens? Ben gets totally distracted by the safety cones and signs. It is the only thing he is focused on - forget the bike, forget the horn, forget everything but the safety sign. I wasn't sure we would be able to get him to ride his bike without it, so we picked up a safety sign. It had to be placed in the driveway before Ben would get on his bike. 

The Bike!

Saturday was a beautiful day for mid-January - 60° and cloudy - so we decided to get Ben's bike a day early so he could enjoy it. We took him over to Toys R Us and let him pick out his bike. He said he wanted a blue one. We ended up getting him an 18" which is just a smidge too big, but will probably be perfect by spring/summer. Well, the only blue bike they really had in that size just happened to be an Avengers bike! Perfect!

Ben helped daddy put his bike together. It took them about 10 minutes.

He was a little whiny when he first got on and tried to start, but once he figured out how to petal and not apply the brakes, he was off! He rode for about 15 minutes before he went onto the next thing but then once our neighbor Lexi came out, they were racing their bikes around the cul de sac and showing off his mad biking skills. He did fall a few times, but no tears. He just got back on and took off again! Hopefully he'll remember the next time he gets to ride his bike which probably won't be until May!

It was such a nice day, Ben ended up playing outside with Lexi for almost 5 hours! A great way to spend a January day!

Playing Trains

One of the things the boys played was trains. For some reason they crammed into a tight space in front of me, between the ottoman and the coffee table for this. But they played trains for probably 30 minutes together and we had no issues other than Nick getting in Ben's space a few times. I did some toy rotating and organizing. It is amazing to me how much they are playing with toys they haven't touched in months!

A Night of Play Time

Tonight the boys played with just about every toy in rotation. They played together for 3 hours non-stop. There was no yelling and no fighting. They were 'going camping' when I got home. Then Ben had to cook dinner with his camping equipment. Then they played animals and cars and trains, bowling, and built with blocks. And amazingly, every thing was cleaned up and put away in its proper box by the time the boys went to bed! 

More Bouncing

Nick has been wired in the evenings lately to the point of being in time out a lot in order to settle down. He took out some of his energy on his bouncy horse.

Water Optional

Nick hasn't gone swimming in a week, so he had to improvise. I particularly like the arm swinging before jumping. Helps get more air time. 

Pants Optional, Apparently

Nick has officially come into his pantsless phase. Every night this week I came home to a pantsless child. He now goes into the bathroom and acts like he wants to sit on the potty, so we take off his pants and diaper, he sits on the potty for 2.5 seconds and then he jumps up and runs away as fast as possible. You will notice a lot of half naked Nick in future posts. 

Just Hanging Around

Last Friday we went over to Playland with Little Ben next door. Nick figured out how to swing on the rings and did it several times, sometimes with my help and sometimes by himself. He could hold on for quite a while.

Still A Very Trying Activity For Me

Decorating cupcakes or cookies with the boys is still a very trying activity for me. I just can't handle the 'Ben Method' and we won't even begin with the 'Chaokolas Effect' that is Nick decorating anything. Anything Ben 'decorated' was deemed to be edible by only Ben, which meant Ben had like 6 cupcakes to call his own. Nick just ate anything he could get his hands on. Needless to say, Ben was pretty happy with just sugar sanding the cupcakes and not going the whole nine yards of creating billiards balls. 

Hello, Cupcake

I have an app on the iPod called Hello, Cupcake. It is based on a cupcake decorating book and it shows videos on how to decorate cupcakes various ways. Ben loves to watch the videos. Saturday he asked if he could make the billiards balls cupcakes. I figured what the heck, so we made cupcakes. Nothing fancy, just straight up chocolate cake mix from the box and Thursh's frosting (which can always be found in my freezer).  Ben even sported his chef outfit for the baking adventure. I also got out the remote for the camera. I believe Ben may have had more fund with the camera remote that with making cupcakes. He took 50 pictures of himself in about 1 minute. I deleted almost all of them because they were the exact same thing, 50 times over. 

Action shot - scooping batter, while taking a picture with the remote. 

The Many Animations of Nick

We all know we love a good Nick crying face - they really are priceless. Here is a sampling of other Nick faces (again, modeling so I could practice with my speedlight)

My personal favorite, the finger thinking pose.

'Huh, you don't say...'

'Oh my goodness, would you look at that!' 

And smiles for mommy

Bucky and Trucks

Last week Nick gave me the opportunity to play with my flash some more while he played with his Bucky ship and trucks. We even figured out how to use the flash and the remote shutter release! Nick loves playing with Bucky and his trucks. I cleaned out the toy room and started a toy rotation and they do seem to be playing with their toys a lot more. The boys have also been playing very well together...Sometimes a little too well resulting in chaos that leads to timeouts, but what are you going to do?

More Painting

Well, if Ben is going to do something, then Nick has to do it too. Nick got to paint one of his painting pages but really, he just painted with water. Ben tried to show him how to use the paints, but Nick just wanted to do it his way. He was pretty happy when Ben left him alone.

A Post Christmas Craft

Saturday Ben did a post-Christmas craft. Grandma sent some sun catcher painting crafts up, but we didn't have a chance to do them before Christmas. Ben did ok with the paint - he spilled some, but he did paint a few of the ornaments before he was done. But really, it was just an excuse for me to practice with my new speedlight...