Papa Mustache!!

Papa Mustache is here for a visit and took 3 days on the train to get here. The kids are so excited to have him here and this photo says it all. They wear you out Y'all!!

Poker Face

Papa (Tom) just emailed this picture to me. It cracks me up!! Lily plays cards with Grandma the whole time they are in LA. She gets sooooo excited when she gets a match.

New words..and sounds

Ben is learning so many new words. (dump truck, firetruck, big truck) :)
He's also learning a lot more animal sounds. It's so fun to watch him try to talk. He tries so hard and we're all working hard to understand him. Lily taught him *yellow* and he says it all the time. He can easily pick out yellow crayons, etc., so we know he understands what yellow is, but he's still generalizing it. He uses it for all crayons and for popsicles. It's so cute. When he's done with dinner, all you have to do is walk toward the fridge and he'll shout LELLOW!!!!!!! (Even if you give him a blue popsicle) Lil also was trying to teach him the signs of colors today. She'd run and grab a red puzzle piece and then say RED, BEN and sign red to him. He thought it was hilarious.
Ben has a book of farm animal sounds. You see the animal and then lift the flap to read the sound it makes. He makes every sound now, my favorite being the red rooster. He says, "DOODLE DOOOOOOOOO!!"
I remember Lily having a rush of words at 18 months, but it is still amazing to me how many words he has learned in the last few days. Hooray for Ben! :)
Lily has been singing Baa Baa Black Sheep and puts her own spin on it. She sings it like this:
"Baa baa black sheep, have you any wool? Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full. One for my neighbor, one for my dad, one for my little boy and one for that lady."
Oh yes, the other day, I asked Lily what she wanted for lunch. Her reply, "what are my options?"

A few more from the superbowl

Superbowl Part 1:

Rachelle invited us to a superbowl party, thrown by people she works for. It was up in Bel Air ("in west Philadelphia, born and raised") and I had no idea how crazy it would be. Valet parking, security, list to get in, full arcade, face paint, balloons, coffee bar, mini donut cart, ice cream stand, craft area, air hockey, photo booth, climbing wall, bounce house, bounce slide, bounce obstacle course, green screen where they put your face on animated dancers, dessert bar, taco bar, 2 bbq bars, salad bar, panini bar, bar bar, the list goes on. It was f'n insane. Needless to say, Lily had a great time. I left feeling thankful for what I have. It seems to me that the more you have, the more you have to worry about. Everyone has personal assistants though, so maybe they do the worrying for you.

This slide was so fun. We went on it like 10 times in a row.



The girls eating mini donuts on the porch of one of the playhouses. It has it's own stainless steel grill on the side. It also has a flat screen t.v. inside and a phone.



This one too. I could stand up inside of it. Flat screen, etc.



Actual cakes



This is the green screen thing. You could get in there and make a video. It looked like the dancing elves email thing. You also got a dvd of it.

Superbowl Part 2:

This is the crazy couch area. The pool is covered over and there are at least 100 couches and 20 flat screens.



I love this one. At one point, the little girl was standing in front of and looking up at the giant security guard. I think she was on the list. :)



This is Lily's attempt at climbing the giant palm tree. We couldn't let them climb higher than arms reach because they didn't weigh enough to set off the pulleys at the top.



Lily and Bella took their craft very seriously. Apparently, the craft lady comes to the house once a week to do art projects with the kids.



This is the kitchen where the desert caterers were set up. I took this for Rebecca. Lily is sitting in front of so many sweets in the picture. There were some amazing, beautiful creations and I had no desire to eat ANY of them! :) Love you Becky!! :)

Skirball Part 1

We really don't go to museums this often. There just happened to be a field trip for school to the Skirball center last week. They have an amazing exhibit of Noah's Ark. It is completely kid friendly and interactive. The kids can run around, touch everything and be a part of everything from making it rain, to building the ark, to sweeping animal droppings! We'd been before, but Ben was tiny and slept the whole time. We spent a lot more time there and needless to say, Ben was very awake and ecstatic.

Skirball Part 2

A storm's brewin'!
Lily making a tornado in the wind tunnel.



Makin' it rain: it sounds like rain and makes the arc float. So cool.



Ben didn't like the 2 by 2 bit. He thought the alligator should be with the horse, etc. I don't think the horse liked the idea.



Ben and Maddie are way up high in the cat-walk of the arc. I am behind them sweating from the climb up with 2 toddlers.

Backlog

These are a few weeks old, trying to play catch up!
Matt and I were trying to play backgammon, but were interrupted. We used to play every day at lunch when we were at Northwestern. We play cut-throat, thank you Nana for the years of kicking my ass and Terry Flynn for teaching Matt how to play so that he can beat me once in a while! :) We seriously played a game 5 minutes before Ben came into the world. (I won) So, yes, I will beat Lily over and over and NOT let her win so that she learns to play just like her mean old mama!



Lily and I went to a concert on campus with Becky and Allison. It was awesome!! (Matt and Ben were napping) We got to hear Mozart, watch dance and hear beautiful singing. Lil was SO into the performance. She loved every bit of it. It's days like that when I am extra thankful that we live next to a University. The nights where we are woken up by the sound of students puking out of the neighbors toddler swing, not so much. :)
This is Lil, Allison and Clara (Allie's BFF) on a cookie high after intermission

The Getty: Part 3

Such a girl



Look how pretty she is!!



This was the running. His face said: WHOA! I'm going so fast, I don't know if I can stop.....I love it!!



Whoa, I can't stop!!



And the rolling. Can you hear me laughing through the picture??

The Getty: Part 2

Little Miss Lily



Ben after we doused him in the fountain. It was hot.



This was the sequence of the day:
Ben grabs stuff



Ben breaks stuff



Ben falls over

Post 100

The Getty: Part 1
I had a free Friday and decided to take the kids to the Getty. Erin gave me some free parking passes before she moved and it was a beautiful day, so we went. We ate lunch in the gardens and had a blast in the children's area. The best part was Ben in the gardens. I let the kids run down the big grassy hill. It was so hysterical. Lily is a champ, but Ben is new to this fast running thing. He was going so fast and doing his mini-laffer giggle. At one point, he fell and just kept rolling. It was one of the best things I have ever seen. Ben thought so too. After running up and down for a while, we tried to go up through the garden walk. Ben had to touch EVERY mechanical looking anything. He was all over the place, trying to remove metal fixtures of one kind or another. Lily was in a magical fairy land waterfall scene and couldn't hear me within that bubble, but at least she wasn't breaking anything and she's always in my sights. Ben is TRYING to break things and get as far away from me as possible......so he can break more stuff. He's a nut. It was really a great day with my two very different children.

Lily saw this guy taking a picture with his phone and thought she should do the same.



This is in the children's center. It is so cool and hands on. The kids can actually sit on a replica 15th century bed. I don't know about you, but I always want to get on the stuff in museums!! I totally had to restrain myself at Versailles. So the kids really enjoy getting to touch all the things that you normally say no to. Lily liked writing on the wall. If you look closely, she wrote Lily and Dad. :)



Also in the kids spot, the giant noodle things can fit into any of the holes on the wall = Ben heaven