3 great things about Eleanor as she turns 3

Eleanor is so confident. She'll tell anyone who asks: she is a princess, she is a doctor, she is a good mommy to all her babies, she is a good sister to her brother. She's already ready to take on the world, and we can't wait to see how she does it. When we went to the zoo, she was at the front of the crowd at the snake show to see the snakes up close, and the first to the giraffe area to try to touch a giraffe. She's eager to take chances, eager to experience everything she can.

Eleanor loves to teach and explain. She's always telling us about what she's learned, or what she's watched, or what she's pretending, or what game she's playing, in a very professional, professorial tone. Our car rides to and from school every day are punctuated liberally with a very pedagogical "So." (And yes, I know EXACTLY where she gets that one.) I love hearing the let's-pretend games they come up with together in the back seat, where they decide which character they're each going to be, and what situation they're going to be in, and how they're going to help each other get out of it. Ellie has also been, this week, very into donning her doctor coat and explaining the checkups she's doing (on me, her brother, her baby dolls, the dog, etc., etc., etc...) in great detail. Her details may be a little mangled, but they certainly sound official!

Eleanor is a facilitator. She's glue. She's the person in a group who will make sure that the natural leader isn't getting too far ahead of the natural loner, and that everyone's playing together. She's the one that makes everyone want to play nicely, and if they don't, she'll come up with some rules and get everyone to follow them. I think that's why, when she talks about her (and every other 3-year-old's) favorite movie "Frozen," she associates herself most closely with Anna, rather than Elsa - she doesn't care so much about the cool (pun intended), flashy power; Ellie's priority is family and bringing people together. 

3 great things about Steven as he turns 3

Steven is so full of joy. He has an infectious laugh, and frequently has his whole class rolling on the floor. His parents, grandparents, and teachers love to find activities that will get him excited because it's so much fun to see the way he nearly levitates with glee when he sees a toy car launch off a ramp or blows a particularly big bubble. In ballet class, he's remarkably good at mimicking the teacher's movements, but occasionally feels the need to take off on his own for an impromptu jazz/funk solo around the room.

Steven is a wonderful brother. He loves spending time with his sister, and one of the most common things to hear around the house is "Ella! Come play with me!" - that is, if they're not playing together already. A recent favorite game is to play "going to bed" on the stairs - each stair is a bed, and they find pillows and blankets and babies (or pretend pillows and blankets and babies) and tuck each other in and sing songs and tell bedtime stories, and can keep their game going for hours.

Steven is such a sweet, sensitive kid. He picks up on everything (a liability sometimes - we have to be careful what we listen to on the radio) and processes everything and understands so much more than we realize sometimes. Somehow, at the same time, he's beautifully unselfconscious. He has so much innate confidence, once he decides on something he'll carry it through with no consideration whatsoever to what anyone else thinks of it - as long as it makes him happy, it's good. He has this very particular, wonderful way of speaking - there are still a few baby-isms in it, like "wallypop" and his cousin "Ay-vwee" - but there's also a funny adult precision sometimes that almost sounds like he picked it up from an old silver-screen movie star. "Cost-yume" and "SOW-lad" - really, he's so careful and precise about even his "baby" words, they sound very grown-up and considered. "Can you put the swob-bies in dee-air?" (the strawberries in there) Steven always makes you want to stop and listen to what he's saying and make sure you understand.

Playing catch-up

So, as it turns out, the more you have going on, the less you have time to write about it. Funny how that happens. Since the last time I blogged, we've done quite a bit!

We were (almost) all in Aunt Suzy and Uncle Jim's wedding, which was absolutely gorgeous and fun. The kids were wonderful, even if they were a little nervous (Eleanor ran up the aisle to Grandma and forgot to drop any flowers),

and I was glad that Chris was sitting where he was with them so that he could get such great pictures of some special moments during the ceremony.

The food was the best I've had at a wedding - they booked a couple of gourmet food trucks to park outside the venue - and I think the kids enjoyed it quite a bit too.

Oh... did I mention that the men and boys wore kilts? Because they did. Wear kilts. And it was ridiculously adorable. On the boys at least. And ridiculously... manly on the men. Yes. Manly is the word I'm looking for, not adorable. Nope. Not adorable.

After the wedding, as promised years ago, we had our Wizard of Oz Halloween.

Don't tell Steven, though - my gentle boy is terrified of the Cowardly Lion and refused to dress as him for Halloween. He did, however, run to this costume while I was looking for a grey Tin Man-suitable sweat suit at the store, shout "LION CUB!" (what they call Simba) and refuse to take it off the rest of the day. Whatever works, I say...

We had a gorgeous Christmas season this year. All of the grandparents and Cousin Georgia came to the kids' first school program, where everyone sat and waited for them to start singing and then realized that the recorded songs we'd just listened to were the songs they were supposed to be singing along with... it was fun, though, and the kids were all dressed up and adorable, of course. We took them out to lunch after, and to see Santa. They were SO pumped to see him until the time came to actually sit on his lap, at which point, well...

you'll notice who's not actually sitting anywhere near Santa, or anywhere that he could conceivably possibly even touch them. Oh well. Ellie's waving at Georgia, who was making a valiant effort to at least get them to both look in the general direction of the camera.

Christmas Day itself was a lot of fun - we got to see lots of family and friends, and the kids kept very busy with some pretty high-level toddler engineering.

We also made it to Northpark to see the trains (and hey! Mommy made it into a picture!):

Since the new year started, we've started a new semester of school, and we took a weekend trip to San Antonio. I was so impressed with the kids - we did a lot of walking, and they were such good sports! They loved the Riverwalk and the Children's Museum (and especially, once we kind of figured out how to use it, the Daniel Tiger-style trolley we took to get to everything), and Grandma Lindy and Grandpa Buz came down to have lunch with us and see the Mercado.

It's hard to believe we're coming up next week on our third Unbirthday, and shortly after that, their third birthday! It's been almost-three amazing, action-packed years with two little people who keep me on my toes every minute. I can't imagine life without them.

Speak Softly

And don't worry so much about the stick.

I've realized recently that there's something I'd love to be able to learn from my son. He has this very soft, very sweet voice, and uses very deliberate (even when wrong) diction. When he speaks, anyone around has to listen very attentively and very careful to what he's saying, and while he occasionally shrieks or screams as any two-year-old might, it's his gentle enunciation that really grabs your attention. I know, as he grows up, his voice will change and he'll learn to pronounce all his words correctly, but I hope that he can keep that very rare quality of quiet command.

The Poetry of Two

We've hit this golden stage - and part of me hopes it will last forever - where the kids have enough vocabulary to describe just about anything, but not enough to know the actual names for everything. Steven in particular comes up with these amazingly apt workaround descriptions for things. On the drive home one day, he was excited to spot the "light moon" - the full moon visible in the daylight sky. He went on from there to sing a little song, "Moon inna daytime, I put in my backpack. Moon inna daytime, I put in my backpack."

Eleanor makes up little songs, too - today it was "Oh no! He's rollin' (holdin'?) my toe!" to a very catchy little tune.

They have utterly eloquent little narratives about how the rain lives in the clouds and comes down sometimes with a "boom," and today after Sunday School they told me the story of Anna and Baby Jesus and... the guy holding Baby Jesus (Simeon), and Baby Jesus's mommy and daddy.

I heard a funny conversation going on the other evening while I was making dinner, so I stuck my head through the passthrough from the kitchen - Eleanor was on her toy phone, having a lengthy conversation with Jimin (their Korean aunt).

A few minutes later, they were crouched together over a broken pinwheel, trying to put it back together to "make a craft" for her. (If you read this, Jimin, WE MISS YOU!)

Apropos of nothing, I'm actually really proud of that haphazard-looking stack of books on the shelf in that picture. Because Steven picked up all those books and put them away himself. I'll take that any day!

A Sweet Summer

This isn't from today, but it could be.

I love days when we're home together and I manage to get us out to do enough stuff to get the kids thoroughly worn out.

Since my last post, the kids have taken a week off from MDO to take swimming lessons, which they loved:

Learned to buzz a trumpet mouthpiece like Daddy:

Had a crash course in air hockey:

(The Stevens)

"Attended" Vacation Bible School (ate dinner, got the t-shirts, hung out with Mommy at the registration table):

Been slightly traumatized at Chick-Fil-A:

Built elaborate cities because what other possible purpose could there be for this big board and length of blue fabric:

Made progress on the climbing wall:

Learned to sew:

Eaten a lot of ice cream:

And enjoyed each other.

It's been a good summer so far!

Mean Mommy

The truth is, I have a feeling my kids won't even notice that I did this. But it's making me feel like the meanest mommy. See, most of their toys are currently in these bins, in this closet:

The playroom has been seriously out of control, to the point where they were having trouble walking through it. They don't really seem to play with most of the toys, at least in the way they're meant to be played with... most play in the chaos has been just sort of dumping things from whatever container they might be in, and dumping things into other things. And on a more selfish note, I've found myself moving them to a reasonably uncluttered background while they're doing cute things so I can take pictures without being completely embarrassed by the stuff surrounding them... even cropping doesn't help much any more. For instance, this was the cleaner-background-but-not-out-of-her-mind-thrilled version of the photo that I put on Facebook:

While this was the real reaction to the doll, but the floor was just too awful:

I decided to try to just... pare down a little, and contain things in a way that I can bring out a little bit at a time, and not bring out more until the first bin is put away. I actually started filling the bins while they were eating dinner, and the minute they were done with dinner, they ran into the playroom and... dumped them out. Not to get to anything in particular, but just for the joy of dumping. Sort of confirmed my plan. I recruited them to help me re-fill the bins, then spirited them away into the closet as they were filled. I did leave one bin, the cradle of stuffed animals, and all the books and crayons/paper, although I also brought down their bookshelf to see if it'll help keep them under control a little better than our previous non-system.

I'm interested to see whether they notice tomorrow - I honestly think there are enough toys in here they might just notice it's cleaner without missing anything.

In related news, anyone interested in a re-decorated magazine bin? It worked great for a while, and is a little shabbier-chic now, but still very cute.