4 years + 4 months!

Summer is in full swing over here.  Ryder is definitely getting into a summer routine of sleeping in (sometimes til 8, just like when he was a baby!  What a great kid!!), watching some dinosaur or fire related tv and then wreaking havok!

 At the beginning of the month, there was a lot of 4th of July stuff that Ryder loved.  He loved all the candy and fire trucks of the Gloucester and Rockport parades.  He got the hang of grabbing that candy pretty quick!  Of course, the Rockport Bonfire was a huge highlight.  The look on his face when they lit the bonfire and while it was burning was priceless!  He was acting like a firefighter, telling us to keep back and then kneeling down to spray the fire with his imaginary hose!  Later in month, he got to try on a real fire fighter's suit, so this has probably been his best month ever.

He is now (again) completely obsessed with trash and recycling trucks.  We used to have to fight with him as he wanted the trash bins out on the side of the road at all times; luckily he doesn't do that as much.  But he does take them out to play trash pick-up with them all the time.  The trash and recycling guys on our route are super nice and have stoked his interest in their jobs by letting him throw stuff in the truck and climb up to pull the compactor lever!  We officially can't go anywhere on Wednesday because we would miss trash and recycling pick-up and that would be a crime!

There is a group of 2-6 summer kids who come to their beach house periodically over the summer and Ryder has loved having all these extra kids to play with.  Somehow they have started playing games with pirates, so that is another new obsession to add to his collection. 

The funniest thing that happened this month was when we came into the kitchen to see that Ryder had made a "salad" of green tomatoes, grass, cinnamon and chili powder, all by himself.  He had been using a sharp knife, but we replaced that with a butter knife, and he kept cooking.  He brought the salad to my birthday party for people to eat!

Testing the waters

I love that face!

Getting ready for a paddle

Ready to go out on the kayak

Pondering the river

31 Months!

The dog days of summer are very popular around here because Vivien loves to go down to the river.  Ever since beach weather arrived, Vivi has been into go down there as much as possible.  She loves climbing on the rocks and wading in the water.  Just like last summer, she loves to go deep, up to her chin pretty much!  She loves splashing and swinging in the water with us and she loves all the little creatures and shells that there is to see down there.

Vivi is a good eater and will eat lots of things that Ryder won't, but even though we have strawberries growing in the yard, she still isn't into berries!  When Ryder and I are picking strawberries, she always wants some too, but then she takes a tiny bite/licks it/pretends to eat it and then tosses it!  Maybe next summer!

Vivi has always like to play with water in the sink, like when I'm cleaning or doing dishes, but now she likes to play with frozen water.  I've come out a couple of times now to find that she's taken the tray of ices cubes outside and is playing with them on the porch.  She likes to hold them  and watch them melt, push them around on the porch, and of course, throw them.  She also likes to lick them, which is a problem after she's rubbed them all over the porch!

Thanks to the unrequested haircut that Ryder gave Vivi last summer, her hair is just now long enough to put in a little ponytail.  Her hair is super curly now too.  The slightest bit of humidity and she has a little Shirley Temple do going on.  

Vivi is a little imitator at this point.  Anything anyone does, she likes to get in on it.  This summer she has been imitating my yoga moves, which is super cute!  She does a couple of cool moves and she also practices handstands on the wall!

Snacking at the beach

I love that mischievous face!

She loves climbing

Waiting for her turn on the kayak

She's ready to go!

Straight chillin'

4 Years + 3 months

At the beginning of the month, Ryder helped me get the garden going.  We planted some early seeds back in April/May, but this month we got everything else in.  He helped me pick out the tomatoes at the garden place, then he helped me dig the holes and poured the water in them to plant those tomatoes.  He loves to check the garden for any signs of progress, and to pick all the strawberries that he sees!

We are 100% back in fire fighter mode this month.  The briefly, slightly neglected fire fighting toys have been back in heavy rotation.  There are emergencies inside and outside, upstairs and downstairs; pretty much everywhere one can imagine.  Ryder sets up elaborate scenes of fires and accidents and then his guys go to work.

Ryder still enjoys cooking, as he has since he was very young.  One of his favorite summer things to prepare is lemonade.  He loves to squeeze the lemons on our little tool and then stir everything together.  His favorite part is obviously drinking the lemonade.

As he has the past couple of years, Ryder enjoyed the Fiesta.  He really likes all of the rides, but especially the huge slide.  He runs up the huge staircase to the top and then wants to turn around and get right back in line.  It is also fun to hang out at the beach during the Seine Boat races and the Greasy Pole, of course!

Enjoying the tiny waves!

I couldn't get him out of the water if I tried

A start of summer tradition at Holy Cow

On the Merry-Go-Round

30 Months!

Vivien is turning into a big girl so quickly.  Sometimes it seems like she is growing up more slowly than Ryder, since at 20 months he got a new little baby sister and all of a sudden seemed grown up; but even though she'll always be our baby she is getting grown up too!

Vivi has always like playing with baby dolls, but she has been playing with hers a lot more lately.  She wants to carry baby around and bring her places with us.  She always seems to have a little blanket to cover baby up with and she likes to hold her while she sits watching tv.  She basically carries baby around in a chokehold around the neck, so it's pretty funny.

We have been doing a lot of art activities this summer and Vivi is back to holding her pencils and markers correctly.  She did it right at a year and a half or so, but then all of a sudden started coloring and drawing with them clenched in her fist.  Now she can draw circles and other shapes.  She has her own style of circles with a dot in the middle, so we can now identify who has done which drawing on the wall!

This is the first summer that Vivi could do anything more than sit in a carriage at Fiesta.  She went on a few rides and mostly liked them.  She was a little unsure of the Merry-Go-Round, but she liked the Crazy Bus and loved the huge slide.  If allowed, she and Ryder would climb up, slide down and get right back in line to go again!  She also loved playing at the beach during the Seine Boat races and Greasy Pole.

Vivi loves to be outside and heads out whenever she can.  This summer she has been loving pushing around the play lawnmower.  She mows everything, the yard, the driveway, the street.  She also really likes to follow Daddy around when he is mowing the lawn with the real lanwmower.

Just chillin' in the water at Pavillion Beach

Enjoying an ice cream at Holy Cow

There;s the Merry-Go-Round

So happy to be at the beach!

4 Years + 2 months!

Ryder is very much in a phase where he knows what he wants and when he wants it and good luck to you if you get in the way of that.  It usually involves yelling and sometimes a full blown tantrum.   When we tell him what he needs to do, he will respond to us "I'm in charge!"  He seems to really believe it too!  

My favorite thing he said this month was a funny analogy that he made at dinner one night.  We had recently watched a Dinosaur Train special about the center of the Earth that explained about the different layers of the Earth.  We were having tacos that night and Ryder picks up his taco and announced "This taco is like the Earth."  I asked him to explain what he meant, because I had no idea what he was trying to say, and he told me that the taco had a hard crust like the Earth and that the hot fillings were like the hot lava in the center of the Earth.   Then he ate the Earth, I mean his taco.

Though Ryder still loves dinosaurs, we are back in mostly fire fighter mode around here.  After a couple of months of neglect, the fire fighters and trucks are back out in force.  Whenever the kids are outside, Ryder is playing some kind of fire fighter game.  Sometimes it involves the back of Janda's truck, sometimes it involves the swingset and clubhouse and unfortunately sometimes it involves the actual hose.  Occasionally we find him outside using the hose to fight some imaginary fire.

The most fun thing that we did this month was take the commuter rail to Boston to go to the Public Gardens and see the ducks.  The train ride was an event in and of itself.  Ryder was absolutely pumped to get on the train, to see the conductor, and to see the sights out of the window.  For a while, he enjoyed the view and then he started testing out other seats.  He really like sitting in the small seat across the aisle from us.When we got to Boston, we walked to the Common.  On the way, Ryder has to play with every single fire hydrant that he saw.  Somehow, some way, Ryder managed to get the cap off of one of the fire hydrants across the street from the State House.   That was probably the highlight of the trip for him because he thought that it meant that he's a real fire fighter!

After we got to the Common we had a quick picnic and then started exploring and heading to the Swanboats.  On the way, Ryder started chasing a squirrel, they had a stand-off and then the squirrel jumped at Ryder and chased him!  Ryder thought that was hysterical.  Ryder liked the Swanboats and the duck statues, but we had to hightail it away from the duck pond because we were worried that Ryder was going to fall in while he was trying to pet the ducks.  We had a little time left before we went back to the train, so we stopped at a playground do Ryder could go down the fire pole a million times.  Then on the train on the way home, Ryder played conductor.  He found a bunch of tickets on the floor of the train car and then was handing them out and yelling just like the conductor.  Luckily it was Sunday and the train wasn't that full!

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Enjoying the view

He liked to have his own seat

On the Swanboats

"Feeding" a duck

Catching a ride on Mama Duck

Sitting on a little duck

 Mama Duck again

Checking out every fire hydrant in Boston

Having a seat at the playground

29 Months!

Spring is finally in full effect here and Vivi is loving it.  She wants to go outside all the time!  When we go outside to get in the car before work in the morning she and Ryder run right out to play in the yard and neighborhood.  They chase all the bunnies out of the yards and instantly start playing in the numerous puddles that pop  up in the potholes on our street.

Vivi has been eating up a storm this month.  Shortly after breakfast, she is already requesting her lunch!  She is eating more than Ryder right now, not at every meal, but overall definitely.  She still loves bananas and apples, but doesn't really like many other fruits.  She does eat a wide variety of foods though; she eats pasta dishes and soups and tacos/burritos with all kinds of different vegetables and flavors in them.  Tacos and meatballs are the overwhelming favorites at this point.

One night this month Janda was out for the evening at a baseball game and by some small miracle, I got the kids ready for bed and all tucked in by 8.  A few minutes later, I hear Vivi yelling to Ryder from the next room.  All of a sudden I hear Vivi say "I have a good idea" followed by a loud bang.  I hear a few other suspicious noises, so I went to investigate.  Unbeknownst to me, Ryder had snuck into Vivi's room and he had helped her out of the crib and now they were both on the stairs!  So, now Vivi can escape from her crib (but not her room which has a locked gate) but she hasn't really done it often.

The most fun thing that we did this month was take the commuter rail to Boston to go to the Public Gardens and see the ducks.  The train ride was an event in and of itself.  Vivi loved riding the train in and had a great time looking out the windows and testing out the different seats that were near us.  Once in Boston, we walked to the Common and had a picnic before riding the Swanboats and visiting the Make Way for Ducklings statues.  Considering all of the walking and excitement, Vivi was very well-behaved.  Of course, she slept almost the entire train ride home!

Enjoying the view

Amazed by the train car

On the swanboats

Feeding the ducks some leaves

Riding a duck

Sitting on a duck

Sitting on the Mama duck

4 Years +1

This was an interesting month at our house.  Christmas decorations started coming out and being put up all over the house in weird places.  Last year Ryder started trying to get ready for Christmas in June; this year it's April!  Some of the decorations were stored next to the stairs in the basement where he could just get his arm in and yank them out.  Consequently we had a very strange assortment of random Christmas stuff and Christmas lights all over the house.  The lights were even "strung up" and lit up!  It's going to be a long 8 months!

Ryder is still loving dinosaurs.  There is a paleontologist on his dinosaur TV show and now he has been digging up fossils all over the place.  He found a paintbrush and got some digging tools and starting extracting and cleaning fossils all over the place.  There are 12 inch holes everywhere and piles of fossils all over the yard.  The best day was when he brought in a bunch of fossils and cleaned them in the middle of the living room floor!  

As he is every year, Ryder has been a big help in the garden.  He loves to plant seeds and pull weeds.  He knows all the plants that we have growing around the yard and he loves to make the rounds with me to see what has grown and how much.  He gets super excited when the tiny seedlings appear!  He takes his job as chief rabbit chaser very seriously too; he loves to run outside and chase the naughty rabbits out of our garden.

Ryder's favorite new snack is popcorn.  There have been a lot of rainy days here so far this Spring and on a few of them, I've made some popcorn to eat while we watch some shows.  I always seriously overestimate how much popcorn that we need and make a huge bowl.  Ryder will just sit and chow it down!  It is the messiest food ever though- when we eat it, it actually gets everywhere.!

28 months!

Vivien is still the sweetest little mama's girl in the world, but she has started throwing temper tantrums.  This is a lot earlier than Ryder, I feel like, but she has been watching Ryder throw them for a year...  She does the typical yelling and crying and she also goes limp in your arms when you try to pick her up or console her.  It doesn't take very long to distract her or comfort her, though, so it's not that bad.  Once she's been comforted and has stopped crying loudly, then she holds on to my neck for dear life and buries her face in my shoulder.

It is crazy how much she talks now and most of it is comprehensible.  She does have her moments where we can't understand a word of what she has said and we just smile and nod!  My favorite phrase this month is "I love you so much," which she says fairly frequently.  She especially lavishes me with love when I come to pick her up after school.

The past month two new molars erupted, so there were quite a few nights where she woke up in the middle of the night and slept with us.  Thank goodness she is much better to sleep with than she used to be.  Now she just settles in between us and puts and arm or a leg on me and sleeps through the rest of the night.

At some point in the past month we found a bottle of bubble bath that had been gifted to us ages ago and now bubble baths are Vivi's favorite.  She already loved bathtime funtime and now she loves it even more.  If you even mention bath time, within minutes Vivi is in the bathroom getting ready! 

Vivi loves to play outside and now that the weather is better, she asks to go outside constantly.  Her current favorite thing outside is the mud puddle in our driveway.  The minute it rains and starts to fill back up, she's over there poking the mud with a stick, burying toys in there and even sitting in it! 

This goofy girl rarely just sits still

What a sweet little face

She's always good for a big smile!

Being silly

A good jump but a blurry photo!  :(

Exploring the great outdoors

Now that's a walk with a purpose

Examining something she found