Fight like Batman

Batman has replaced Thomas the train as the newest obsession in our house. Kyle has 3 batman shirts that are in regular rotation, and the only real way to get him to wear something different is to leave the batman shirts in the dirty pile (and sometimes even that won't stop a determined boy).

The first attempt at fighting like batman looked a little bit like a scary bunny rabbit

Put your head up Kyle! A little better....

 Double team!

Luckily no one got hurt during this lesson, and it ended with team photo opportunity.

The Connection Between Hutterite Chicken and Criminal Behavior

....or does Criminal Behavior Run in Families? Hang in there with me for a minute and the connection will be made clear shortly.

Being married to a chiropractor has many benefits, including connections to people around the state that we otherwise wouldn't have. For instance, I am now a true believer in locally raised, grass fed beef and doubt I will ever buy beef from the store again. We also have discovered the wonderfullness that is a Hutterite raised chicken. However, the privilege of having such delicious chicken available puts some serious stress on this Master Chef Wannabe. Hutterite chicken is so special that just roasting one in the oven seems almost criminal, and so I was on an internet search for the perfect way to prepare Beer Can Chicken as Kyle played on his Leapster and Emily looked for woosters in the back yard while banging away on some toys.

"Oh, no! Mama, look what Emmie did. Oh, no!"

No matter how important the perfect Beer Can Chicken recipe may seem at the time, experience should tell me that when my 23 month old daughter has not come to me in the past 5 minutes needing some attention, that I should probably be very worried, but the banging had been consistent, along with her girly jibberish that generally flows freely whenever she is happily engaged in some fun, and so I had no reason to think that I was about to discover what I discovered when I turned around.

I took a deep breath and slowly turned around. That tap-tap-tap-tappity-tap sound I heard earlier? Not a toy. That tap-tap-tap-tappity-tap was the sound of a lotion bottle being emptied, on the floor, on the wall, on the table, on the doll stroller, on my phone ~ pretty much throughout my dining room and living room. 

 "Oh, no, mama, all over your new rug!"

 Kyle was shocked! However, he quickly recovered and immediately began to "cwean up!" At 3 years old he still loves helping and he made sure Emily did her share.

The difference between Kyle's and Emily's forays into artistic expression with forbidden materials is that Emily doesn't enjoy wearing her art like Kyle did (thank you Lord!). But one thing they do have in common? A super cute "uh-oh, so I'm soooo busted" expression

I had to bite my tongue to keep from laughing out loud. The absurdity of the fact that she managed to wreak that much havoc with a bottle of lotion while Kyle and I were both in the room with her, combined with the look on her face as Kyle exclaimed "Oh, no!" again and again was just too funny. It all added up to the undeniable realization that I will never learn my lesson! Alas, it is just so much fun to leave things like diaper ointment, lotion and toothpaste within reach of my littles to tempt them and test their willpower. Besides, it all makes for good blogging. And besides, this one clearly wasn't my fault, it was the Hutterite Chicken's fault.

Kyle the Camel

What to expect from a group of 3, 4, and 5 year old kids? One of Travis's friends who has a son that goes to the same pre-school said that the program from the previous year was so funny that he laughed through most of it. I think the thing that set him off was a little boy who fell over when he got too close to the edge of the step he was standing on. You'd have to know Brandon to understand.

I had no idea that the kids were going to have costumes, and even though it is hard to tell from the pictures, Kyle got to be a camel. Yup, a proud, happy camel came marching down the aisle, stayed nicely in line and sang like his daddy does ~ missing about half the words, but singing his little heart out none-the-less.

There must be something about pre-school Christmas programs that just invites moments that make you want to laugh, but leave you feeling like you will be forever damned if you do since you are in a church when they happen. You may have noticed that "Mary" is missing from the last picture. That is because she also had an accident, just not the kind that the little boy had that Brandon laughed at last year. That's all I will say about that.... poor thing. 

Dunker Tookies

Last year we celebrated Christmas in the Mandan House. Grannie came over to make the traditional pfefferneuse cookies that I love, and the triple batch of cappuccino crinkles that papa and Uncle Mark enjoy. 

When a 2 year old scoops cookie dough, regular sized cookies morph into dunker tookies, a.k.a. monster cookies.

This year found us repeating the tradition, with slightly different results. Instead of putting Ky in charge of scooping the cookie dough, we let him roll the pfefferneuse in the powdered sugar. We'll just say it is going to be a very long time until all the traces of his handy work are cleaned up. 

Last year my itty bitties were, well, still so itty bitty

 

 This year my itty bitties are not so itty bitty.

Great grandma's buns make me happy too, Emmie!

As hard as it is to believe, we had the first decent snow fall of the year this weekend. While Grannie and I finished baking and tackled the clean up, Travis took the kids out for some winter fun.

There were many exclamations of sadness as the afternoon wore on and the snowman slowly lost his face as he melted back into ordinary piles of snow. It is amazing how quickly sad itty bitties bounce back when offered freshly baked cookies!

Halloween 2011

Halloween in ND can be a tricky prospect to manage. More times than not there has been at least one major snow storm by the time October 31st rolls around, or the weather is cold enough to require hats, gloves, heavy coats/snow suits or any combination of the above. Even if the weather has remained relatively "nice", any one who has lived here knows that we can go from "Indian Summer" to "frozen tundra" in the matter of hours, and so spending any amount of money on an amazingly cute halloween costume just doesn't pay, not even for the sake of super fun photographic opportunities. However, this year the weather has been amazingly wonderful, warm and sunny. One of the churches in town was hosting a party where kids could go begging trick-or-treating in the parking lot, where people had bags and bags of candy stashed in their trunks. Many of them had themes and were dressed in costumes and decorated their vehicles, adding to the fun.  

 

Apparently "Butt-man!"is more appealing to  3 year old than the itsy bitsy spider costume that I had bought for Kyle.

 Earlier this week poor Emmie had broken out in cold sores all over her mouth and throat, so unfortunately instead of the cute tutu princess she was meant to be, she was banished to her stroller to keep her from spreading the love.

By the time the evening had ended, all three kids had more than their weight in candy. Luckily they are still at the age when out-of-sight-out-of-mind works miracles, making it easy to stash away a majority of the goods and within a few days the candy had been forgotten.

Buttman, however remains at large.

Fun in the park

Daddy was gone out of town this weekend, so we headed to the park for a little fun to end the week. The weather was beautiful, the kids enjoyed swinging and running.

Kyle managed to stay on his feet when he didn't move out of the way quickly enough after giving Emily a "big, big, BIG" push. After a minor mishap in which the little Mr. got stuck on the climbing wall for a brief period, Kyle made it his mission to help Elowee down the slide as many times as possible before we left.

K-Y-L-E

Kyle loves going to preschool 3 times a week. According to his teacher, Miss Nola, he is nothing short of brilliant. Ok, my words, not hers, but she does say that he is a great little student and a whiz at learning his letters. Tonight he wrote his name for the first time all by himself, and the look on his face says it all!

 Emily wanted in on the action too, she's his biggest cheerleader!

 All the other marks on the page? Apparently he's developing his own written language. Pure genius, I tell ya!