Conversations

Parker walks half way up the staircase and stops, hand on the rail, staring straight ahead. After about thirty seconds, I enquire,

"What are you doing Parker?"

she turns to me and says "I'm on the escawaiter (escalator)" and turns back to stare straight ahead.

I'm telling Fin about Aunt Mimi's new house.

"But why is Mimi and Willy moving?"

"Well, because they need more room, Lily needs room to play like you do"

"Oh," he nods knowingly, "'Cause Nanny won't scoot ober?"

We were watching the Oscars last night at my parent's house and John Legend is performing. My sister Sarah asks me, "What's his name again?"

Parker (who is sitting between us) says, "I don't know. He wooks wike Bawack Obama."

After dropping Fin off at school Parker says the longest sentence I've ever heard her say

"I'm getting bigger and bigger and I'm a go to school and get a new shirt and go to karate and say KEEEY-EYE! Yeah, wike Pippin."

Josh is carrying Parker upstairs, but he has her under her arms, with his arms completely straight out in front of him and she's facing away from him. She throws her arms back and says, "I'm a banoon (balloon)! I'm fwoating!"

Petite Picasso

A Dog

A Collage (stickers and a figure)

A Snake and Two Bugs

At the risk of totally being that parent that thinks that every little thing their kid does is pure genius, I'm throwing this out there:  Parker is an artistic genius.  

Okay, so maybe she's not shattering any records or really doing anything WAY outside the norm for her age group, but check out these drawings.  Even when she was super tiny, she would sit forever just scribbling on paper.  It amazed me then, and amazes me still the amount of concentration and time she puts into her little art pieces.  I think I'm really amazed because Fin never wanted to color for more than oh, thirty seconds.  I'd have to cajole him into drawing with me, and then he'd scribble something real fast on the paper, and go OK! I'm done!  That was fun!  He did like painting, but more for the sheer fun of making a mess than to try to actually create something.  Which is totally fine.  He has started to draw figures and objects and he can write his name, so he's right on track, maybe even ahead of the game a bit.  But Parker, at two, is already drawing more complicated figures than Fin is doing now.  Even when we do stuff like make collages, she carefully places all her pictures just so, and if I give her some stickers and paper, you can bet those stickers will be very carefully placed neatly in a line.  One of her favorite things to do is sit backwards on the stairs, so her feet dangle (the backs of our stairs are open) so that one step is her seat, and the next one up is her desk, and she'll take a pad of paper and a pen and doodle for over an hour like that.  Sometimes she tells me she's "writing wetters" other times she's "drawring."  This is not the mad scribbling Fin would do at her age, its very precise and methodical.  She loves to draw with her Daddy, and just about made his week when, after seeing Josh draw a jellyfish, the next day she drew one, and told me, "see, wike daddy!"  Its a sweet bond they share, and Josh is already talking about how we're probably going to have to support her so that she can get her career as an artist going.  I think maybe we could wait to talk about that, oh I don't know, sixteen years from now.  

But should she become the next great American artist, just remember, you heard it here first.

My sister Sarah and I were just talking about these videos last week, and when I stumbled upon them today, I had to put them up.  Forgive the poor quality, it was done with my digital camera (which is practically an antique at this point).  The song that is playing Fin used to love when he was little (and I mean little, he's around 12 months or so here) and it would crack us up, because he just instinctively seemed to know how to dance like a hip-hop star.  He would grab the mike and bop his head up and down, and get this tough guy look.  In two of the videos you can see him kinda go off camera.  Thats when he decided he'd punch Auntie Sarah. :) Enjoy!

Valentines Ice Cream

So I don't know who's more amused by this, me or the kids, but I love this lil thing.  I made this last night for Parker, and after I post this I am going to start on Fin's.  I don't have a sewing machine OR a pattern for this, so I kinda made it up as I went.  I've found out that felt and embroidery thread (and a smidge of hot glue gun) are the BEST for impromptu projects!  I planned on giving it to them for Valentines Day, but someone woke up last night and saw everything, and wanted to know as soon as she woke up "Where da ice cweem at?"  And I couldn't help myself.  Oh well.  Maybe I'll make them some happy cupcakes to go with.  :)

More Photo Fun

Poladroid's picture conversions seem too fancy and new-fangled for you?  Have no fear, I've discovered another conversion website, except this one makes your pictures look 100 years older, not just thirty.  No downloads necessary for this one either, just upload your pic and hit convert.  Change all your pics here.  And don't be scared off by the Japanese, there's instructions in English too!