18 May 2011, Day 70

I left Kaylee in the kitchen playing with her tinkerbell doll and a dog food bag

while I went to feed baby Ben.

Little did I know that dog food girl would emerge from around the corner (after bumping into a few walls).

Oh wait, it's just Kaylee in a dog food bag. Silly mama!

17 May 2011, Day 69

We did nothing exciting today, which would normally mean I'd post a glamour shot of Kaylee, but someone developed a case of camera-shy.

16 May 2011, Day 68

Kaylee had a playdate with her bestie Hannah today. For the first time Kaylee was the little chatterbox and Hannah was quiet as can be. Kaylee dragged Hannah down to the basement , up to her room, and the into the den to show her all the toys and tell her all about each one. It was very cute!! I really hope Kaylee doesn't forget Hannah when we move!

15 May 2011, Day 67

This is how Benjamin looks most days when I go to get him from his nap. I can't wait til he figures out how to roll the other way.

Ben would like to add that real men wear pink!

14 May 2011, Day 66

The tower of foam exploded all over our dining room table!

13 May 2011, Day 65

One of those great warm days where all you need is a onesie and a bib!

12 May 2011, Day 64

The other day we got rid of cable as one of the many cost saving measure we're taking to save for the short term until our house sells. So, you will be seeing many pictures of us here:

At the library, where the toys and rental DVDs are plentiful.

11 May 2011, Day 63

I'm proud to say that this is day 2 of Josh being in Mexico and not only did I take the kids to the park, where Kaylee did not leave the swing:

and Ben did not leave the stroller:

But, they also got baths. Not so bad for being home alone with them.

10 May 2011, Day 62

Wow, it's been a while since I've posted, but I promise I'm still taking pictures. Life has been a hectic and stressful mess, but we're all doing just fine with it.

Baby Ben is really mastering his jumperoo and can even turn himself in it a bit.

9 May 2011, Day 61

Kaylee insisted on putting the pink bunny hat on her little brother today.

As payback Ben insisted that I take a plumber's crack picture of her!

8 May 2011, Day 60

Happy Mother's Day! We spent most of the day playing outside. Mainly blowing bubbles, cause nothing makes Kaylee happier when we're outside! Josh spent the afternoon cleaning out his grill. We never managed to get it down into the garage so it served a useful purpose over the winter as a home for a mouse family. He had to clean out the nest (which still housed quite a few mice and was made out of insulation taken out of our home) and then do a through sanitary burn with some leftover charcoal. Kaylee was very interested in everything going on and loved seeing the mice.
However, Cooper was far more interested and kept looking for the mice all night.

Ben spent all day rolling over!! He's mastered rolling from his back onto his belly but he just can't seem to get rolling back the other way. I'm sure it will come soon enough, but until then he's just rolling onto his belly and getting really pissed that he's stuck there!

7 May 2011, Day 59

Baby Ben looking just as handsome as can be in hand me down pants that Aunt Glory knit for Kaylee:

Kaylee is still enjoying her pink balloon. The balloon is quarantined in her room since Trapper is a bit obsessed and will bark incessantly at the balloon. He doesn't seem to know it's in the house either cause he would be barking at her door if he knew what was in there. Yeah, there's something wrong with that dog, but we still love him! Anyway, we spent a whole lot of time in Kaylee's room today playing with the balloon.

6 May 2011, Day 58

We were on track for a rough day. Nothing seemed to be going the way Kaylee wanted it to and she let me know all about it with quite a few tantrums. She refused to nap and after spending some time in her room (both quiet time and time out time) she finally conked out on the couch around 4pm.

We woke her up when Josh came home to go to the town's First Friday event (a little free block party like event in the town square the first friday of every summer month). We're driving down town telling her all about how she's gonna see rabbits and llamas and the balloon guy will make her a balloon animal, she requested a blue puppy, and then we got there and it was empty. It seemed as though the threat of rain kept everyone away. Ben quickly fell asleep in the stroller so we were free to spend some time walking around.

We walked to the bookstore to visit our neighbor and surrogate grandma "Lolo". Lolo made everything all better by giving Kaylee a pink balloon from in front of the store. Then we met Mother Goose and she told us that everything had just moved a few blocks down the road because of the threat of rain. Thank you Mother Goose!! Kaylee got to see the rabbits, goat, sheep, and llama.

And she was so happy with her pink balloon that she didn't even want to stand in line to get a blue puppy! What a great end to a miserable day. Oh and the best part, we just made it in the door as the sky opened up and poured buckets.

5 May 2011, Day 57

Thank you Erica!! My wonderful friend from graduate school had some pink yarn and thankfully thought of Miss Kaylee Bea. Now Kaylee has a beautiful new handknit sweater to wear on chilly nights and I didn't even have to knit it for her!

At the young age of 4 months, I can already tell that Benjamin is going to be a handful. He's started trying to escape from his bumbo seat and has been far too close to successful for me to let him use it anymore. I see other people's kids in these things at 6, 7, 8 months old, but it looks like we'll have to retire the bumbo after only one and a half months use.

4 May 2011, Day 56

We ran errands in downtown today. Unfortunately it seems like every time I turn around another store is closing down. Luckily the bookstore has not been one of them and hopefully never will be! We always seem to find something in there. This is a make your own bookmark kit from Melissa and Doug for a whopping $4.50. Can't beat that value when it keeps her entertained for well over an hour!

3 May 2011, Day 55

I'm feeling a bit sentimental about leaving our amazing house where our kids were born. One of the things that I will miss most is our wildlife. After growing up in the suburbs of Long Island where the extent of wildlife is the occasional raccoon living in your chimney, we were both amazed when we moved here and had deer walking through our yard. Kaylee absolutely loves the deer too and she gets very excited when she sees them. This is her watching the deer from the kitchen window and drawing pictures of them.

Today was a big day for big Ben:

He starts on solid food. And doesn't he look oh so happy about it! He wasn't so thrilled with the runny rice cereal.

2 May 2011, Day 54

Lots and lots of cuteness today! We pulled out Kaylee's old jumperoo for Ben today. Of course Ben couldn't sit in it first thing in the morning thanks to his acid reflux so Kaylee decided she just had to sit in it!

Ben finally got a turn in it. Kaylee was more than willing to show him how all the toys worked. Ben doesn't seem all that happy in this picture, but I love that you can see his big ole cheeks and multiple chins!

And here's just a classic Benjamin look, when he's not flirting he can be very serious. And you can really see how much he's starting to look like his Daddy!!

After all the jumperoo fun we had Ben's 4 month appointment. The check up went very well. Ben is in the 50th percentile for everything. He's 14.8 pounds now!!

Big sister Kaylee had a blast since we were in a new room this time and there were some big bright murals of fish, dogs, cats, and rabbits. She almost named all the colors, she still has a tough time with orange, red, and green.

1 May 2011, Day 53

I managed to catch some early morning cuddles.

30 April 2011, Day 52

We had to be out of the house for 2 hours this morning while there was a showing at the house. For the first time during a showing, it wasn't raining! So, we went for a nice long walk with the kids and dogs.

I absolutely love my phil and teds stroller! Best stroller ever!

Daddy broke my cardinal rule of no getting out of the stroller and let Kaylee run around. Luckily there weren't many people on the trail and she was very well behaved.

She did want to take a few breaks. How could any 2 year old resist these benches. But she did manage to walk about a mile and a half. She took a nice long nap afterwards!!

29 April 2011, Day 51

Benjamin is 4 months old today! It sure has been an adventure!

28 April 2011, Day 50

Baby Ben got a new toy today. . . Sophie the giraffe. I've heard lots of great stuff about this toy and it was definitely on the expensive side. I think $17 for this toy. It got here today and it's basically a dog squeak toy. I expected a hard rubber teething toy. Oh well, he still enjoys it.

27 April 2011, Day 49

Kaylee is going through a not so fun phase where she refuses to take naps. She throws a tantrum when I try to put herin her room for a nap, then she doesn't nap the whole hour to hour and a half that she's in there, and then she's absolutely miserable to be around the rest of the afternoon. Then at 4pm she falls asleep on the couch:

And then you forget just how miserable that day was!

26 April 2011, Day 48

"I wear the black for the poor and beaten down" and because I just look like a bad ass!!

25 April 2011, Day 47

Kaylee is getting more and more daring while playing with Ben. She's figured out that when she lays on top of him he usually just laughs at her. That makes it pretty hard to punish her for it!