Preschool: Long Post!

I'm a little late posting this, but Ben had his first day of preschool last week. This year he is going 3 mornings a week instead of 2, and both he and I are very happy with that arrangement:) I think he may be somewhat in the minority, but Ben has never had a problem going to school. He truly loves it, and has never acted like he didn't want to go. In fact, I wish I had signed him up for more preschool "camps" over the summer, because most days he would ask, "do I have school today"? I don't know what that says about my parenting skills or lack thereof, but I'll choose to not be offended!

Inspired by a little survey I saw on Pinterest, I thought I would ask Ben some questions to commemorate his first day. My plan is to ask him the same questions every year, and then compile them all along with the first day of school pictures into a book to have as a keepsake. Here are his 3 year old preschool favorites:

T.V. Show: Veggie Tales
Song: Take Me Out To The Ballgame
Food: Oatmeal (this is true, believe it or not)
Candy: Bunny teeth (these are some sort of gross gummy concoction he got at his preschool Easter egg hunt)
Toy: Green trash truck
Activity: Riding my big wheel with Owen

And as a bonus, yesterday we were taking a little nature walk down our street and had this conversation that came about after discussing the leaves changing colors:
Ben: My favorite color is red.
Me: Oh really? That's a good favorite color. I like it too, but my favorite color is orange.
Ben: Yeah. I think your favorite color is blue.
Me: Oh...okay.

This summer has been a big one for Ben. He grew a little over an inch, and went up a whole shoe size. He adjusted to being a big brother and after a little bit of a rough start he is really starting to have so much fun with Abe. His capacity for learning has become so much greater, which means we are enjoying longer books during our reading time. We even made a little foray (accidentally) into reading non-picture books and Ben was able to keep up with the story for quite a while before needing a break. This lets me know that he is capable of hearing the words and then drawing from his own experiences to imagine the scene on his own. Big stuff for a three year old.

Our reading has invited a whole bunch of questions regarding how to to spell various words and write certain letters, so we've been forming letters with play dough. He has taken an interest in learning how to write and likes to sit down and practice his Bs and Ss! He also likes to count and assign a number to groups of objects. I know they don't really work on number or letter recognition at his preschool until age 4, so this interest is entirely his. Ben seems to be pretty left brained and he is a very visual learner, so it makes sense that he enjoys the orderly aspect of letters and numbers. And having a father who is a mathematician, an uncle who is an engineer, a grandfather who is a geologist and two great-grandfathers who were talented carpenters certainly means he comes by it honestly!

Basically, Benjamin is growing into being a fun kid. He likes to climb the highest structures and ride the fastest bikes, and barely makes a fuss when he falls or wipes out on his big wheel. He likes to make friends with everyone, doesn't need a whole bunch of attention and is great at entertaining himself in a constructive way. I mean, 3 year old boys are also pretty frustrating and Ben can drive me cah-ray-ZAY sometimes but I'll avoid the complaining in this post!

I used to think that how a kid turned out was entirely dependent on parenting, but now I'm not so sure. I think parenting has a huge influence on how a child turns out, but I also think you can just get a kid with a combination of personality characteristics that just makes them close to awesome. I just happened to birth a child who is friendly, inquisitive, easy-going and independent. And when it comes down to it, I think Ben is pretty cool little dude. Watching him grow these past few months makes me excited about the coming year school year.

Update

Wow. Long time no blog, huh? I can't even give an excuse and say this summer has been so busy, because it actually WASN'T that busy. We spent a lot of time hanging around the house and adjusting to being a family of four. With a baby on an ever evolving nap schedule it was hard to really make plans, so we usually ended up spending our days reading books and riding the big wheel. I was so lazy, I didn't even use the "real camera" to take pictures, but whipped out the phone whenever I needed a pic. Here are some random phone pictures from the last month.

We did take a break from our slow days to take a weekend trip to the farm in VA. Here are Ben and his (2nd) cousin Logan.

Ever since he was a tiny baby, Abe has LOVED to have his hair blow in the wind. One of his favorite things to do is crawl over to the air conditioning vent and enjoy the breeze!

Ben and Joel visited the beach to watch the waves the day before Hurricane Irene blew in. Ben COULD. NOT. understand why he wasn't allowed to swim, and promptly jumped belly first into the water. I think this picture was taken right before that incident. He looks pretty mischevious:)

My two little helpers. I've recently started giving Ben his own chores around the house. Besides being in charge of picking up his toys and putting away his laundry, his job is to unload the silverware from the dishwasher. Sometimes it's SOOOOO frustrating because I could unload it in half the time, but I think it's important for him to understand that we all have to help out. Sometimes he wants to do these things, and sometimes he hates it. The other day he told me he was "too busy" to unload the silverware. I guess he was too busy climbing on the couch and throwing the pillows on the floor! He eventually acquiesced.

Abe is completely obsessed with the dishwasher. The other evening he was happily playing with some toys on the floor of the kitchen when I opened the door of the dishwasher. I heard the LOUDEST crash and turned around thinking, "what in the world..." and saw that Abe had literally thrown his toys on the floor, and was crawling towards the dishwasher as fast as he could. The flair for the dramatic is what was so funny. Like he couldn't just think, "oooh, the dishwasher. That looks like fun." He had to be like "DISHWASHER!!!!! WAIT! WAIT! DON'T CLOSE IT! NOOOOOOOOO!" Ben loved the dishwasher also, (I think most babies do) but I don't think he LOVED it like Abe. Silly boy.

I'll be back soon, (really, I will) with more pictures and updates. Ben started 3 year preschool last week, and Abe will be 10 months tomorrow! So much is happening with our family right now and I need to be better about documenting it. I'm slowly coming out of my post-baby fog and starting to recover some of my pre-baby energy. See you soon!

Little Guy on the go!

Abe recently became more mobile. Here are some examples of how he's passing the time should mommy and daddy termporarily break their vigil.

MMmm shoes!

Something hanging down? Abe's on it!
Abe exited the blanket last weekend at the beach and gobbled two or three handfuls of sand before mommy and daddy could even shrug their shoulders.
Brother's asleep? Abe makes a bee-line for the toys.
Abe loves to inspect the dishwasher.

Greetings and happy summer!

Good morning everyone! Here are a few pictures from our trip out west. We were gone for 10 days and arrived back home last Monday. It's taken us at least since then to recover. During our trip we were able to stay a night with some friends in Tulsa, stay with my parents in Tecumseh and visit Salina for a couple of nights to see my sister Catherine and some friends of mine from high school. This involved some long plane rides and more than a few extended car trips. Needless to say, the boys were sleep deprived and cranky by the time we landed back in North Carolina. Schedules were thrown out the window and we just went with the flow, but that can only last so long before 3 year olds start to act out maniacally, babies start to cry at the least provocation and parents finally snap. Ahhhh....vacation. However, I can honestly say we DID have fun (all of us) and it was nice to see family and friends. The picture above was snapped from the car window while we were just a little lost making our way from Tecumseh to Salina. Taking our "detour" ended up being a positive experience since I was able to relive just a piece of my childhood, plus show Ben some combines. It had been a LOOOOONG time since I last drove down a dirt road in Kansas. That area of the country was in the middle of harvest, so the roads were full of wheat trucks. It had also been a LOOOONG time since I had been nearly forced off a dirt road in Kansas by a huge wheat truck barreling along at 50 MPH. Good times.

Ben and Abe at mom and dad's house. Abe is getting some long locks but it will be a while before we have the first haircut. Some parts are down to his shoulders which is quite a follicular achievement for a 7 month old. People ask me nearly every day if he is a boy or a girl. Such a difference from Ben, who was the recipient of the exclamation, "look at that little old man!" at the same age. I think they're both pretty darn cute!

Ben and I (and Abe) at the River Festival in Salina. Ben had never had a corn dog, so we had to remedy that situation right away. And I had to have my Kansas special, a home brewed root beer and a bierock. They were both a little disappointing. I think I might try to make homemade bierocks sometime soon.

Another midwestern treat...snow cones! We don't have snow cone stands here in NC. Why is this? I have no idea. Someone is really missing out on a great business opportunity.

We saw a lot of tractors in Oklahoma and Kansas. I never noticed them when I lived there, but now when I visit I feel like it's all I see. Not that people don't drive tractors here in the South, but there's just not as much farmland, at least not in our part of the state. Seeing all of the tractors, combines and trucks was pretty exciting for Mr. B.

Now that we're home summer is in full swing. It's so hot. Like, miserably hot. I know it's hot everywhere, but here the high is supposed to be 97 with 65% humidity. See what I mean? Absolutely miserable. Add in a few hundred mosquitos and various other bugs, and basically I don't want to go outside until September. Plus, every time I venture out in the middle of the day I almost step on a lizard, or have a lizard run in front of me, or I reach out to open a door and don't see a lizard resting right next to the door handle. Now, lizards aren't dangerous at all, but they sure do scare me when they're jumping out at me all day. Normally we would try to get away to the beach a little more but beach trips are a lot more difficult for me with a 3 year old and a baby. So we just try to spend our time doing air conditioned activities between the hours of 10 and 5!

Ben is in vacation bible school this week, which is a nice break for both of us. I do wonder what they talk about though. I asked him if they talked about Jesus, God, if they prayed and if they sang songs, and he answered "no" on all counts. Is this what Presbyterian VBS is all about? Maybe I should have put him in a good evangelical Baptist bible school:) However, since he's only 3 and notoriously reluctant to answer questions, I don't think I should trust his version of events.

Well, Abe is up from morning nap and I still haven't brushed my teeth! I have more pics to upload but they'll just have to wait.

Sweet little Abey Baby is 6 months!

photo.JPG, a photo by annercampbell on Flickr.

I really can't believe it has already been 6 1/2 months since our precious little boy arrived. I feel like we're still in the adjustment period, but it HAS gotten a bit easier. Baby Abe has started eating some solids, gotten 2 teeth so far, learned to NOT cry in car seat non-stop, and is S-L-O-W-L-Y gaining weight and figuring out how to sit up without immediately face planting.

He likes:

Having his clothes and diaper changed. It makes him chuckle, every time.

Watching his big brother play, talk, run, eat, etc...

Sucking on fingers and toes.

Listening to mama sing.

Taking baths.

Looking at other babies.

He doesn't like:

Being taken out of his bath.

Eating. He basically only nurses when he HAS to...like, to not starve. This dislike of eating is why he weighs a whopping 12 pounds. Solid foods have been rocky so far. Three bites seems to be his max, but we hit the jackpot tonight with avocado.

Being in his high chair. See above.

Sleeping. What's up with this? It's like he suddenly forgot how to nap. NOT COOL. What do I do about this?

Being in his crib. See above again.

More pics tomorrow!

Ben turns 3

Whoa. I am waaaaay behind on this blog. I have a new resolution to post at least once a week. And maybe even twice! With that in mind, here are some pictures from Ben's birthday on April 12. Yeah, that was a long time ago.

His crown from school.

Leftover party cupcakes. Still as good 3 days later!

Lots of great gifts from grandparents plus a trike from Joel and I, complete with a bell that MUST be rung at least once every 30 seconds or so:)

Azaleas and Cupcakes, ya'll

Wouldn't that be a good name for a bakery?

Anyway....not to brag, but I made some DELICIOUS cupcakes for Ben's party. If you've been looking for an EASY, foolproof, go-to chocolate cake recipe, then I've found it here. I've made this recipe 5 times now, and it has turned out perfectly every time. It's got a good chocolate flavor, but it's not TOO chocolatey so you can use chocolate icing on it without going overboard. It has a great texture and stays moist for a long time. Just like a cake mix but without all the horrible stuff they put in those things. Some notes:

• The recipe I linked to is for the sheet cake version, but it works for any type of cake. If you're making cupcakes, bake them at 350 and start checking them around 20 minutes. I think mine took 23 minutes. It should make exactly 24 cupcakes. I also made a 9 x 12 cake, and it took around 33-35 minutes.
• I lieu of using real buttermilk I did the trick where you combine 1 T. vinegar for every 1 c. milk. It worked fine.
• Don't skimp on the coca powder. HEAPING tablespoonfuls.
• I didn't sift my flour beforehand and the batter had little balls of flour. It didn't affect the taste at all and I don't even think you could notice them, but it caused me some anxiety. If you have extra time I would go ahead and sift.

Now for the frosting!

I'm not a big fan of frosting and hate it when frosting overpowers the cake. Classic buttercream is good, but I wanted something a little different this time. PW has never let me down with her recipes, so I decided to try what she describes as "The Best Frosting I've Ever Had." I made a test batch and quickly realized it wasn't my first time eating this deliciousness. My mother made this frosting for nearly every chocolate and red velvet cake we ate while growing up. I've never had it anywhere else, and it never occurred to me to ask her for the recipe. My mistake, since I've obviously been missing out. It has a whipped cream consistency that's the perfect accompaniment for chocolate cake. Just one word of advice; you CANNOT over beat this frosting. When in doubt, keep beating. There should be no separation AT ALL. PW says it took her 45 seconds of hard beating to get the right consistency, but it took me 2 full minutes since I live in a humid climate.

Please try this frosting, then tell me how much you love it:)