2 years + 10 months

We have had a busy and fun month OUTSIDE!  The weather has been nothing short of amazing, and Lincoln's knees prove it.  He has worn shorts and a t-shirt for five consecutive days and has scraped his knees to the point of bleeding at least once each of those days.  He also has bruises on his shins and blisters on his ankles from running around in Crocs with no socks.  The poor kid is not going to have any skin left by the end of the summer!

He loves the "digger stickers" (i.e. Bob the Builder Band-Aids).  They really became stickers, too, because we received them as part of a picture hanging kit for a wedding shower gift 9 years ago, so there wasn't a whole lot of "stick" left to them.  Plus, whenever I gave one to Lincoln, he'd tear off the small gauze pad in the middle and just put on the sticker.  I started giving him as many as he wanted and let him stick them wherever he wanted (see picture on left).  However, after three more scrapes in one evening that resulted in some pretty bloody and raw holes, I finally got out some large square patches and made him wear them to give his knees a chance to start healing and to just plain protect them (see chair picture)!  Fortunately, Lincoln is really tough and barely even cries.  As soon as I pick him up he's fine.  It obviously doesn't slow him down much (see picture on right).

Lincoln has made the transition to his big bed better than I expected.  I spent the first few days/nights laying down with him for naps and sitting in a recliner chair in his room at bedtime until he fell asleep.  I didn't get much done (other than playing lots of Words With Friends and reading a short novel on my iPhone in the dark), but it was kind of nice to be forced to sit and rest.  But I can't do that every night, so I had to slowly wean Lincoln of my presence.  I spent some quality time sitting in the hallway for a while, but he quickly adapted.

We have developed a pretty good bedtime routine that includes Emily, too.  Sadly, it doesn't include snuggling in the chair together while reading books anymore, but it's working.  I'm still not sure how Lincoln would do having someone other than me put him to bed, but we'll cross that bridge when we get there.  We have the video monitor set up and have kind of gone the same route as we did with Emily.  After being put to bed, the kids can do whatever they want quietly as long as they stay in their rooms.  It's kind of amusing watching Lincoln's antics.  For some reason, he also tends to occasionally enjoy sleeping on the floor.  I would say about 25% of the time he ends up on the rug with his Thomas pillow, blanket and pacifier.  This often happens after he has stripped his bed as shown in the picture.  I'm sure it's just a phase, so we just smile and shake our heads.

I also want to note that one of my biggest fears about moving him to a big bed was that he would drop his nap completely like Emily did.  While he might occasionally skip it or we have something that prevents it, he still needs it.  When he's really tired, he actually goes upstairs and puts himself down for a 3 hour nap while Emily & I finish eating lunch.

Lincoln continues to try hard to keep up with his big sister.  There are a few easy iPhone apps that he enjoys playing (a little too much perhaps).  However, I've noticed that he has begun to recognize individual letters such as A, T, O, W, X, etc.  He also does a pretty good job counting out a small number of objects (six or less).  He mostly has the basic shapes down, but we're still working on colors.

One cute thing Lincoln has really gotten into lately is praying before meals.  His prayers are becoming more intelligible, but are still a lot of mumble-jumble.  He starts off by saying, "Deah God, tank you for da beau-ful nice day" and then proceeds to list some things we have done or are planning to do that day.  He ends with a big "Amen!"  I think it's funny that he also calls pears, "pway-ehs". 

Another sort of cute thing is Lincoln's frequent request to "Hold me!"  This is directed only to me and is used when he's hurt, tired or just wants a little love.  It's nice to have a snuggler, but it kind of gets in the way when there are things that have to be done, like cooking supper and doing laundry.  It's a lucky thing that Lincoln is still lightweight for his age, so it's still a possibility to pick him up and hold him when he needs it.  I love my little cuddle-bug!

Princess Party

The kids were invited to a princess birthday party today.  Emily was very excited and wore a dress for the the first time since last summer (along with some stunning rainbow-striped tights and sparkly Hello Kitty shoes).  There were lots of other pretty dresses to try on, balloons to dance with and a yummy lunch with fun party favors.  Lincoln got a few pirate accessories and had fun dressing up as a dragon.  (But he's a pretty friendly one.)

Picnic supper

With the fabulous weather this week it was time to scrub down and fire up the grill.  We enjoyed a beautiful picnic supper on the deck.

Cuts

Emily finally got a long overdue haircut.  Neither of us will miss the tangles of longer hair.

Lincoln managed to get his first skinned knees of the season on the first day wearing shorts (not that we're complaining about wearing shorts on March 14).  He was very excited about getting "digger stickers" (i.e. Bob the Builder Band-Aids), although one knee required a large patch at first. 

Kites **Updated**

We had a play date today and the kids made a fun homemade kite craft.  The wind was a little unpredictable, but the kites worked amazingly well.  I didn't get great pictures on my phone, but here are a few.

Here are a few more pictures from the hostess who has a better camera and more photographic knowledge and skill.  Also, the link to the kite project can be found here.

Rice mess

The rice box, and thus the rice mess, has returned.  It happened after Lincoln decided to play digger man in the potted plant in the living room.  I figured rice on the basement floor was better than dirt on the brand new carpet, so I dug out the original container and emptied a new bag of rice I still had in the closet.  Lincoln was in heaven.  He has literally spent hours sitting in the box with his various vehicles and has had to be hauled kicking and screaming upstairs on more than one occasion.  His clothes get covered in rice dust and rice comes out of every nook and cranny and ends up all over the house.  Plus, the basement has proceeded from this...

To this...

To this...

 

It is currently a serious safety hazard on the slick tile, but I haven't had the mental or emotional energy to deal with it yet.  I'm working on a plan for some kind of containment solution.  Any ideas?!?

Purple watch

It was a big day for Emily.  She made a big decision and a big purchase.  Since learning to tell time she has been hot on having a watch.  I had dug an old one out of my jewelry box, but it ran slow and was a silver clasp band that was way to big for her wrist.  She has been diligently saving up her "spend" money for a couple months.  Her goal had been a Hello Kitty cooling fan with candy in the handle from the check-out lane at Fareway that cost $4.  But this week we took a trip to Wal-mart to see what they had for watches.

Emily had a total of $4.86 in her spend jar.  Wal-mart had some plain purple digital watches on clearance for $3.00.  They also had some cute Hello Kitty, Dora, Disney Princess, etc. watches for $6.88.  She had to decide whether or not to get the plain watch now (and have a little money left over) or wait 4 weeks until she had enough money for the prettier watches.  It took her a day to decide, but when we went back to Wal-mart with her purse full of money she had settled on the cheaper purple watch.  It turned out to be a great deal because the watch also has an LED backlight button and a stop watch feature, which Emily is thrilled with.  I now know how many seconds it takes me to clean a toilet, clean the mirrors, dust the living room and how fast Emily & Lincoln can run races through the house. ;o)

I'm proud of Emily for making a wise decision and for purchasing a useful item rather than a cheap piece of plastic or candy.

An early spring day

I had been looking forward to this day for a week, and the weather did not disappoint!  It was a gorgeous 68 degrees.  We enjoyed playing outside without coats, but definitely needed rain boots as the last traces of snow were melting around the yard.  I put all the swings back out on the swing set and untied the twine holding down the sandbox lid.  The kids were in heaven!

There are also bulb plants poking up all over.  I actually spied some of the first ones as early as Feb. 2, but I think they've decided it's finally safe to come all the way out!  I can't wait until they start blooming!

Big boy bed

We finally took the plunge and moved Lincoln from his crib downstairs to a big boy bed in his new room upstairs.  I have been dreading and procrastinating this move for a long time, but it had to happen before March 21, so I made a snap decision that today was the day. 

We have had a bed with all the bedding set up in the upstairs room for months.  It was more a matter of moving other things like clothes, toys and books and Austin dismantling his work desk and reassembling it downstairs in what will be our new home office.  I decided to put very few toys in Lincoln's new room for now to try and encourage staying in bed at night & nap time.  We also moved the recliner chair from his old room to his new room, although I think the days of snuggling in it before bedtime have come to an end. :o(

Overall, the first night went well.  We did his normal bedtime routine in his room, and then he joined Emily & I for Emily's bedtime reading in her room.  Then I ended up sitting quietly in the recliner chair in his room until he fell asleep, which wasn't until 9:30pm.  He slept there all night, but was up with Emily by 6:30am the next day.

Ethiopian cuisine

One thing I have been super excited about is having our Wartburg international students cook for us.  I was especially excited about doing this with Rahel because Ethiopian food is much harder to make/come by, and I have some connections that I truly believe were divinely arranged.  Through a friend from church, I got teff flour, berbere and a very specialized pan, as well as a sour dough starter to make the staple food of the Ethiopian diet--injera.  It's a multiple day process, so I had Rahel do the first step before we left for Coralville on Tuesday. 

On Thursday afternoon we picked up "the gwil-els" (as Lincoln calls them).  This time it was Rahel and one friend.  After a quick stop at Fareway for meat, onions and jalapeno peppers, the girls spent almost two hours in the kitchen mixing and chopping and cooking.  We were all very disappointed when our injera did not turn out.  The girls made it exactly like they do at home.  After a call to my friend, Laurie, we tried an American adaptation, but it still didn't work.  I think we might have given up too soon.  I later spent some time doing some research online and am eager to try again.

The meat dish they made was spicy, but excellent.  The berbere sauce was a little too much for me.  Since the injera didn't turn out, I made some rice to eat like a stir-fry.  The girls made a sauce out of olive oil, red onions, tomato sauce and berbere to put on the rice like they do at home.  That was also delicious.  There wasn't enough time to make alecha wat, but you would really need injera to eat with it.

Trying new and exotic foods is a bit of a step for me, but it was fun.  Austin & the kids were good sports, although the kids mostly just ate the rice.  We had some nice dinner conversation and found out some really fascinating things about Ethiopian culture.  I look forward to Culture Week later this month and another attempt at injera in the future!