Staircases are all the rage in my house

Lately Asher is enamoured with the staircase. He pulls over toys that are tall enough for him to stand on and then climbs over the baby gate. The problem is that he usually chooses this toy:

Notice the lack of brakes or kickstand...basically anything resembling something that would disable it from actually SLIDING out from under him when doing this:

You can see how safe and man-like this option is, so...I decided that I'd start letting him go up and down the stairs locked in between the upper baby gate and this lower one so he could get used to it. His sister, after all, was a stair climbing pro by his age, but she also didn't have some kind of death wish like he seems to, she only used them when she needed to. Ultimately, I think it'd be safer if he could get used to the stairs versus him utilizing all kinds of toys and then potentially killing himself when falling onto the concrete floor.

While letting him practice this morning, he and Ayris decided to play a game where they would take turns being "caught" in the net and yelling "HELP" while the other would come down to rescue them. It's all very dramatic (notice how Ayris even grunts as she "struggles" to save her brother). Also notice that Asher is less inclined to help his sister when the tables are turned. He takes his sweet time before even coming to her rescue and then when he finally gets down there, he decides he'd prefer MOM! save her!

What looks out of place in this picture?

Ayris likes to sort things like crazy. If you'll notice, the giraffes are all together, the lions/tigers, all the baby animals are together in their groups...even the rocks and tress go together instead of being spread out amongst the animals to keep them warm (I was told that that is what rocks and trees do...they keep the animals warm), so when I looked down to see a furry chick in with all of the plastic zoo animals, it didn't seem quite right (considering Ayris' standards).

I asked Ayris what the baby chick was doing mixed in with all of the other animals and she told me, as though it should have been obvious to me, that the baby chick is the one teaching them all how to sing. She even had a pink plastic tube thing for the chick to use as her baton. I often wonder where she comes up with half of this stuff. To my knowledge, she hasn't seen a choir perform with an instructor holding the baton to guide them...it's amazing how much they pick up.

My short lived cowgirl

First off, I'm trying to figure out how to get the header picture just right on the blog when Ayris comes walking down the staircase in her underwear, cowboy hat, pink bracelet, little blue purse with a yorkie puppie in it, a book, and her cell phone (all a little girl needs in life right?).

So after snapping a picture:I went back to working on the header picture and all of a sudden I hear this conversation she's having with Grandma Callie on the pretend phone:

"Yeah, I'm all dressed up as a cowgirl"

A short pause...obviously giving Grandma Callie her turn to respond...and then Ayris continues:

"That's right, I'm a cowgirl and nothing can get in my way!"

About 5 minutes later, Ayris decided she was tired of being a cowgirl. Which is pretty appropo considering her brother is about to wake up any minute. About that time, she'll put on her "pay-attention-to-me-and-only-me-since-I'm-oblivious-to-the-little-man-in-the-diaper" hat and everything will resume getting in her way again.

Asher is into kissing

"NO" is a new favorite in our house...

Ayris has decided that not only is she more intelligent than possibly everyone on the planet but she's also quite adept to decline any type of instruction.

Ayris, put on your clothes = NO!
Ayris, quit playing with your food = NO!
Ayris, it's time for bed = NO!

Tonight was no different...she didn't want to turn off her show, she didn't want to go to bed but I finally bribed her by saying I'd tell her a really awesome bedtime story...and I did. I'm not creative like Chris but I went all out tonight. In fact, my story was so good that she requested a repeat performance.

"Um, no thanks, mommy is tired...it's time to turn over and go to bed"
"NO...NO....NO...NO!!!!"
"Okay, I'll tell you another story but it's not going to be the same one I just told you"
(Ayris gets all excited that she's won this battle...)

"Once upon a time there was a little girl named Ayris. She liked to tell her mommy "NO" a lot and her mommy didn't like that. Her mommy decided that Ayris was going to start getting time outs if she continued telling her "NO" and if the time outs didn't work, then she might have to restort to spankings. Ayris was a smart girl so she never did end up getting any spankings, just a few timeouts. THE END."

At which point, my daughter exclaims:

"I sure am going to like saying YES from now on!"

SERIOUSLY, could she BE any smarter? =)

Who am I kidding...I should be asking if I could BE any dumber...by this time tomorrow she will have told me NO about 25 times I'm sure of it.

In addition to this post, I have to give credit to all the children out there...I think it must be awfully difficult to be a little kid trying to grow up in the world, all to have someone who is bigger than you trying to tell you how to live your life. Put on your shoes, go eat your breakfast, don't run out into the road and take my hand while we walk across the street...that MOM SONG that was so popular...all it is is about a million different instructions that mothers dole out on a daily basis for the love of their child. And it's hard work doing that day in and day out, 24/7...but just as it's tiring to be the one giving the orders, I'm sure it's just as tiring to be the one on the receiving end. There are some days, when it's negative 24 outside and I pull into the driveway looking at the trashcan that needs to be rolled in...and I sit there thinking about how wonderful it would be if I could be the one back in that carseat and my mother was the one that was going to be freezing while she lugged the trashcan in. At this point though, Ayris doesn't realize the responsibilities of being an adult so probably the worst that could happen to her at this point is being told everyday, all day long, what she should be doing...and that to me, sounds pretty difficult in itself...it's all relative no matter what age we are...so from time to time, I might have to give in and let her win...

Especially when at other times, she's like this:

Maybe it's not quite time to start potty training...

So...I ordered a Peter Potty...it looks like this:

It's supposed to shave off like a million months when training a boy so I figured it was a good investment.

HOWEVER, my son thinks that it's something you go "poo poo" in...granted, in his mind, poop and pee are two in the same but, if he were to use it like he thinks he should, it doesn't matter how many months it shaves off potty training, because not only are other men going to look at him weird when he uses urinals but it's also going to create more work for whoever has to clean up the pee, and in this house, that would be me =)

I'm going to post a video that I'm sure Chris would object to but I think it's cute...

As I was waiting to upload the video above, Asher found a new way to use his toilet...

I can tell this toilet is going to get a lot of use...it might not be the use it was intended for, but use none the less.

Vintage Ayris

I've FINALLY ruined Ayris' life!

I really didn't think that I would be ruining Ayris' life as early as 3 BUT, she is advanced so...
When we were leaving Grandma Sooner's house she didn't want to leave as usual (I feel it important to note that Grandma Sooner has 6 yorkies, 4 of which might as well be puppies be it that they're so small...and at our house, there are NO dogs). I picked her up and carried her off to the car anyway. As soon as she was buckled into her carseat she decided it was a good time to let me know that her life was ruined and that she didn't like her family anymore.

That was last weekend.

This weekend she basically issued the same performance but this time adding that she didn't love her family...not mommy or daddy or Asher!


LUCKILY, we have one child whose life we haven't ruined yet...

This is a definite positive of having 4 children...I figure at any given time, there will be at least one child in the family who still loves us and by the time the last child is in their hating phase, hopefully the oldest...

Will be back to loving us...

(P.S. When I was writing this blog post, I got out my camera and asked Ayris to make her "mad/angry" face to the camera...I got three pictures, two of which are above...I'm going to post the last picture below...look at the sequence...it's kind of scary but as the pictures progress, she starts to look a little like "Chucky"....anyone remember him?

I think it's in the eyes. Just because I have the distinct feeling that Ayris isn't going to appreciate these pictures when she gets older, I'm going to post how beautiful she really is:

George Harrison circa the 60's versus my faux-hawked little man now...

I was trying to decide whether or not to let Asher's hair grow out (think Ryder Hudson) but I just couldn't stand THIS stage:

Looking more like a Beatle than a boy...
Finally looking like my cute little baby boy! What a difference a haircut makes!

Missing Daddy Already...

I believe this picture was taken last week when Chris was going away for work...I had a heck of a time trying to figure out how to get the stupid thing off 5 hours later when she decided she was done with it. Glad I don't have to wear ties!

Starting over...

I decided to switch my blog over from tumblr to blogger. Tumblr just wasn't very user friendly IMO. I've carried over some of the quotes from Ayris on the last blog and perhaps the old videos will show up later on...for now, I've posted some new videos and a couple of new pictures. I plan on trying to update the blog more often than what I had before. If you want to get notices for when a new post is put up, just click the follow button in the right hand corner.

Thursdays at my house...

On any given Thursday, this is what my house looks like...minus one little one (Kalven) that's not jumping on the couch...

Does no one but me see the resemblence?

Unfortunately, I could not find a picture that had Jack's famous stare along with his normally winged out hair...so I settled for the stare...

He's Well Trained

Dirty Face, Big Smile

Are naps really worth it at this point?

For months now my children have been waking up crying from their naps. It’s always been a little annoying to me because honestly, what’s a nap worth if they wake up in a worse mood than when they went down? Lately, I’ve been taking a nap with them and I’m beginning to understand why they wake up so cranky. I’m actually convinced that someone is secretly sneaking in during naptime and hooking us all up to some sort of morphine drips because I kid you not, when Ayris woke up beside me today, I literally felt as though my entire body had been stapled down to the bed and it was going to be near impossible to move at all. I managed to free one hand in order to turn on the T.V. in the bedroom for Ayris and then I went back to my drug induced coma. It wasn’t until about 15 minutes later that I heard Asher screaming (probably from the effects of his drip!) and realized that drugs or no drugs, motherhood continues….bleh…some days you just need to stay stapled to the bed!
P.S. Upon coming downstairs, I’m also questioning if this secret person who drugs us all in our sleep, is also messing up our downstairs living room because I’m pretty sure it wasn’t this messy before =P

It's not poop...it's just gum.

“ Ayris: “MoooOoOOmMMMMM!!!!” Ayris yelled frantically from upstairs…
Mommy: “What!?”
Ayris: “I was just choked.”
Mommy: “Um, ok. Come down and show me.”
Ayris: Walking into the kitchen at this point “Someone choked my leg”
Mommy: Trying to find Asher some Sponge Bob fruit snacks…”Let me take a look…I don’t see anything on your leg Ayris (the kitchen is dark)”
Ayris: Trailing me as I leave the kitchen, “But mommy, I think my leg tripped over some of Asher’s poop and got on me! (Still a little frantic about her choked/pooped on leg).
Mommy: “Okay, come over here so I can see it better…..Ayris, it’s just leftover gum (yellow wrigleys gum covered in lint so I can kind of see how it MIGHT have looked like Asher’s poop)”
Ayris: “OH” (starts to play)
Mommy: “Ayris, where is the rest of the gum?!?”
Ayris: “Oh, I don’t know”…nonchalantly…
Mommy: “UGH!
UPDATE: I found the remainder of the gum that night when I started my nightly ritual of running my fingers through Ayris' hair =)

Because I'm lazy!

So some parents need to worry about watching what they say when it comes to their language…I don’t have that problem, I just have to worry about the things that I say that could later be used against me.
Somewhere along the way, Ayris decided to become *lazy* like her momma. On very limited occasions (and by limited occasions I mean at least 2-3 times a day) I’ll be engrossed in something (like a mommy blog) at which point, I realize I need something…in the past, I could get away with sweetly asking Ayris if she’d just get it for me (nothing major like running to the store or anything…just simple things like grabbing the wipes or bringing me a toy that Asher wanted, etc), she would comply, all without my having to stop what I was doing. THEN SHE ENTERED HER WHY? PHASE…
Mommy: Ayris, can you bring me the wipes?
Ayris: WHY???
Mommy: Because Mommy is lazy right now.
Ayris: OK.
It continued like that for a while…she’d still *help me out* but as of about a week ago, the conversation is more like this:
Mommy: Ayris, can you get me the wipes?
Ayris: NO.
Mommy: WHY? (Now I’m the one asking why!!!)
Ayris: Because I’m lazy right now.
Seriously, it’s not even that she’s being a smart*ss because she’s not old enough for that currently. She’s just picking up mommy’s bad behavior! Shame on me.
In addition to this thought, I’ve never believed those hollywood moms that say they got their bodies back after children by actually chasing around their children…but now I’m wondering if maybe they just aren’t as *lazy* as I am =)

Lessons Learned

Mommy: Ayris, I’m sick of your whining and crying when you don’t get your way. Knock it off! Ayris: You’re sick of my whining?
Mommy: Ayris, when you’re brother was little and didn’t have an opinion, you could watch and do whatever you wanted, but now that he wants to have a say you have to learn how to share with him. Share your toys, share the t.v. Asher asked to watch Dora so we’re going to go downstairs, watch Dora and then we can watch/do whatever you want to do next.(At this point, Ayris climbs into my lap and throws her arms around me)
Ayris: I’m just going to hug you all day long…(tears building up in my eyes because generally when I’m trying to teach a lesson, it’s not this easily learned, nor rewarding for me!)
Ayris: Do you know WHY I’m going to hug you all day long?
Mommy: Why?
Ayris: Because I love you soooo much!
(Seriously, I don’t think I could have been blessed with a more special daughter…)

Covered in Stickers

The thing about Ayris is that she’s insanely intelligent for her age. When I’m not taking into account her imaginary scenarios, dancing and singing on the couch and running around half naked all of the time, it’s easy to forget that she’s just my 3 year old little girl…every once in a while though, she reminds me that she is indeed…just a little girl:
Mommy: Ayris, you’re so smart, it’s scary.
Ayris: Why is it scary?
Mommy: I just meant that you’re so smart that one day you’re going to be this amazing woman who will become whatever she wants to become. You could be a doctor, or an artist. You could be a nurse or a singer. You could be a dancer or an actor. You can be whatever you want to be but you’re going to be amazing no matter what.
Ayris: I think when I get older, I just want to put stickers all over my body.
(My intelligent, yet funny, little girl who is going to be amazing even if she’s just a woman wearing stickers all over her body! )

The cold weather is getting old...even the sun is trying to get away.

Ayris: Mommy, where’s the sun?
Mommy: I don’t know, maybe he’s still sleeping?
Ayris: I don’t think so. I think he just decided to go somewhere else…somewhere where it’s warm.
Ayris noting her surroundings on the way to Target.
(She’s always very occupied with the sun and the moon and when they are(n’t) out at what she deems the appropriate times).