Snippets from our homefront: half-birthdays

Graham is officially halfway to 3. wow.
He keeps us on our toes by the minute, there's no doubt. And is constantly cracking us up with what comes out of his mouth. Today at lunch he suddenly fell over sideways onto the floor. I think even he was surprised. We had a good laugh at that one. Usually when he falls, he pops back up and says "i'm o-tay. i'm a real man." (thank-you daddy.)

Some of our favorite phrases of his include:
be right back. As in, I'm going to the store, I'll be right back. thankfully he hasn't actually left the house yet. =)
I need to check something.
allright,thankx. He uses this phrase after almost everything you tell him. Graham, you need to go sit on the stairs for a time-out. allright, thankx. Maybe he doesn't understand the true meaning of thankful yet. :)
Come on guys, follow me.
Ready? Ready? When he wants dinner or we're leaving for somewhere, this comes up a lot!
WHY? oh my, we're hearing this word never-ending! Someone once told me that little ones use this because they want more information or to keep the conversation going, but they don't know what else to say. So for me, that has helped me be more patient in explaining details, plans, etc.....

This is a face we often see.

I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but he now calls me "babe" almost all the time. It started as him hearing it from Andrew and at first I corrected him and so then he called me "mommy-babe". Andrew & I were just discussing whether he calls me mommy at all now. Maybe I should be correcting him. But I know that all too soon this phase will pass and I'll probably miss it. :) He often calls Andrew "buddy" as well!

When he really wants my attention its "babe, babe, mommy-babe, babe, mommy-babe...."

I'm sure people in public are not sure what he is saying!
dancing with mommy-babe

When we tell him no for something, his new favorite is to come back with "but mommy said or daddy said....." where did he learn to do that?! Or my personal favorite {after trying to use the bathroom on the front lawn again}, "Avalon's mom said I could." Well, mister, I spoke with Avalon's mom and she has no recollection of this chat. Crazy kid. =)
I think Andrew's face says it all.

He is SO much into pretending right now. It's quite funny to hear him playing and hear him injecting pieces of our lives into whatever scenario he is doing. He loves to pretend our couch cushions are surfboards and tells many elaborate stories with his much-loved matchbox cars.
We are heading to the beach in a few weeks and when I told him, he immediately said, "bring my shovels for the sand and see Mama & Papa". I was quite astounded seeing that it's been almost a year ago that we went to the beach! He doesn't forget anything.
Golf & tennis are his current favorite sports! Since he has discovered daddy & mommy have golf clubs and that he can use them in the backyard, he has been very excited.

After we moved, he went through quite the rough patch. It was definitely our most challenging parenting moments {weeks!} so far. He has never been a melt-down kid, and suddenly we were having meltdown upon meltdown upon meltdown. Thankfully, he seems to have moved past the worst of it, but I think I am now understanding what they mean by the terrible twos. =) Praying for grace & wisdom as we seek to train him to love God & love others.

We love you, Graham Owen.

Just as God's love never wavers for us when we sin, so our love for you never wavers. But some days we have to ask for your forgiveness, because our patience does.

We love all the "jokes" you tell and hearing you say "that's silly, babe."

Another struggle that has suddenly come upon us is sibling jealously. I think you try to prepare for it when you know a baby is coming home. Overall, Graham seemed to transition very smoothly. But in the last 2 weeks, we have seen some very sad behavior. He will walk by and hit her or try to poke her in the eyes or push her over. It's made me so sad and I feel so protective of my little girl! What I've realized though is this: in the last 2 weeks she has become an independent sitter as well as started to eat solids and so suddenly she is playing with "his" toys and eating with "his" tableware. I think this is VERY upsetting to Graham and so he is acting out because of it. Like "well, she can live here, I guess, but what? use my spoon? no way! =) So we're talking a lot about love and hurt and kindness these days.
I am starting to see some signs of improvement. Eden loves to watch him. If you haven't seen the video on facebook of her cracking up at him, it's very sweet. Check it out here.

And then our Eden-girl is 6 months! What a fun age! She has taken up a new favorite past-time which is squealing. Gracious, that girl can screech. :) Seems to be in good fun though.
She loves, loves, loves her toes. They come in very handy when mommy doesn't have a toy nearby. :)

She is loving life, loving sitting up to play, loving gobbling foods.....life is pretty good!

She loves blowing raspberries. When she is upset she trys blowing rapsberries to comfort herself and sounds a little like a woman in labor. =)

Her system is still getting used to the new foods and she's still figuring out to pass them, so I think she's had some upset tummys in the past few days. :( I'm so thankful to finally be beyond cleaning diapers of the runny kind! Oxyclean has been a very close friend the past 6 months. =)

She's thinking about dropping that 3rd nap she usually takes around 4:30. It's only been about 15 minutes the last few days, so she's probably ready to drop it. Other than that, she takes a great morning & afternoon nap and usually sleeps 7-6:45. She's woken up at 4am the last 2 days, I am guessing 6 month growth spurt. Hopefully it is short-lived!

She really doesn't like to be left alone when I have to tend to Graham for something. That's usually the only times she really gets upset.

We are so excited to have retired the swing & boppy! It's always nice to be able to put away some of that space-cramping baby gear.

are those some serious ankle rolls I see?!

One of her most favorite things is to play peek-a-boo. I started doing it by covering my eyes and now when I lay her on the changing table she immediately covers her eyes with her hands!

I love this pic of her & my sister!