Quote of the Day

Actually, these are just a few of the current Henryisms we hear on a regular basis. His vocabulary and sentence construction are just exploding and it is (in my unbiased opinion) absolutely adorable.

Efetant = Elephant

Bargage Truck = Garbage Truck (He has a favorite matchbox car that is a recycling truck.)

Right there! (He uses this a lot to point out anything and everything.)

Ar you? = Where are you? (As in "Worms, where are you?", when we are in the garden.)

Henny = Henry (And, this is clearly because we call him Henny Penny Coco Puff -- we should probably start using his real name more, eh?)

Nory Cake = Eleanory Ellencake (A nickname we sometimes call Eleanor, he has shortened it down, nice and neat.)

Florida Follow Up

It has been about a month since we got back from Florida, but we had a fantastic time and I wanted to post a few shots from our trip.

Henry at Gumbo Limbo Nature Center down by the Intercoastal:



Eleanor checking out her shadow as she runs like a little sandpiper down the beach:



Enjoying the back yard at Nonna and Grandaddy's:



Pancake breakfast at the beach:



Piano with Nonna:



There are a bunch of other pictures, including our fabulous family meal, others from Gumbo Limbo, and plenty more from the beach mixed in with some other springtime photos here.

New Do

After many long months of holding her hair out of her face or patiently (sometimes) allowing us to put it up with a hair tie, Eleanor got bangs. She looks like a totally different girl, so grown up. I can't believe I waited so long, she seems so happy with the ease of her hair now. Here are a variety of dinosaur scary faces to show off the new cut:





And, my personal favorite, complete with flailing dino arms:

Quote of the Day

After pretending it was Henry's, Giraffey's, and my birthday by singing over various "cakes" with "candles"...

Eleanor: Mom, I don't have any more pieces of cake for you, so you can just hang out with a full body.

(I had "eaten" five or six pieces, after all!)

Happy Spring!

We are having a chilly but gloriously sunny first day of spring. We even got the first part of our garden in this afternoon -- lettuces and peas. The kids were super big helpers and they LOVED it. I think the garden is going to be much more successful this year for several reasons -- 1) the kids are totally into it, 2) I have been reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver and it is very inspiring and 3) I have been reading actual "how to" garden books so I have a better idea of what I am doing.

Pictures to come. I swear. I am about 500 pictures behind -- I don't even have our Florida trip up yet, for goodness sake!

Lavender

We have a lovely lavender plant on our dining room table right now. Eleanor takes great joy in rubbing the leaves between her fingers and smelling the lavender's gentle fragrance. So, this morning while the kids were eating some granola, I stepped out of the room for a moment and as I came back down the hallway, I heard, "Now Henry, put this up your nose..." What? I rounded the corner to find Eleanor holding a small lavender leaf to her brother. I promptly grabbed it and explained to her that we don't stick things up our noses, at which point I noticed that she was trying to stick her finger up her own nose. I realized that she had probably tried this out on herself first. After a couple of minutes of me holding one nostril down and her blowing, the little green culprit made its way back out. Kids can get into things faster than you can say "Jack Robinson."

Singing, Dancing and Other General Fun

We woke up this morning to Henry serenading us with "baila, baila baila!" Our Music Together class gave us a 20th Anniversary DVD featuring the original band and singers that play on their CDs. "Uncle" Gerry does a very lively rendition of "Don Alfredo Baila" on the DVD and Henry has been obsessed with it ever since.

I haven't written in a while, there has been lots going on though. We took a trip to Florida to visit Nonna, Uncle Bobby and Uncle James (pictures soon). We have been preparing for the annual Puppet Show fundraiser at Eleanor's school, which is today. We have been battling coughs. We have been dreaming about the garden and searching for wiggly earth worms in the dirt. Eleanor has been going to school and dance class. Vince has started tennis lessons. I have been playing basketball. We have been cooking, baking and doing some crafty projects. We just had a visit from Mu and Tada to celebrate my birthday.

The kids are working on lots of developmental milestones as well. Eleanor is using the potty about 50 % of the time, when she feels like it. Henry is also able to use the potty, maybe he will be easy to potty train! Henry is talking up a storm as well. He will repeat absolutely anything anyone says. This is very cute and often hilarious.