Water parks, messes, and smiles…

"I don't believe an accident of birth makes people sisters or brothers.  It makes them siblings, gives them mutuality of parentage.  Sisterhood and brotherhood is a condition people have to work at."
-Maya Angelou

We’ve been lucky so far.  Both the kids are happy to be around each other, and while I can’t say that this statement holds true 100% of the time, the bad moments are the exception rather than the rule.  By and large our house continues to be filled with a messy boy, a dancing girl, and a brother and sister who are learning what it means to be siblings.  It’s fun to watch.

We recently learned that there are several splash parks near our house, and we ventured out to find one this weekend.  The park we ended up at turned out to be great, with lots of water, screaming children, and a rather large and varied playground.  Ashlyn was slow to adjust to the craziness but had a fun time once she got more comfortable.  James enjoyed himself as well, although he didn’t care that much for the spraying water.  His main attraction was an apple that slowly became smaller throughout the park experience.

On Sunday we had a nice visit from PePa, who showed James the proper way to swing a golf club by demonstrating the technique with a Green Egg™ ash scraper and a piece of hickory smoking wood.  Later Ashlyn played mad scientist and James learned how to drink with a straw.  It’s a house of learning!

To conclude this week’s blog post, here are three random pictures that have nothing to do with anything really.  From left to right:  James hiding under a stool eating a banana, Ashlyn playing with water beans on the table, and James dancing with Elmo.

Walking and rainbows…

"Be thou the rainbow in the storms of life. The evening beam that smiles the clouds away,
and tints tomorrow with prophetic ray."
-Lord Byron

The rain of this past week kept the kids indoors more than they would like, but they still managed to have a good time.  Ashlyn danced, James walked, and then James learned how to turn off the TV.  He was very proud of himself.

Ashlyn was just over 13 months old when this picture was taken of Ashlyn stuffing half a banana into her mouth.

And James, a few weeks shy of this mark, wanted to replicate this achievement.  It’s funny how they both did this right around the same time, especially since James only recently starting liking bananas.  James has learned to say “all done” when he’s finished, but we couldn’t make it out.

At this point in the blog I’ll pause to show two strange pictures of a boy in diapers with a football and a hat.  James does not like hats.  We cannot get him to keep a hat on for more than 5 seconds.  As fun as it is to see James in a hat, he insists on taking it off and laughing at you for trying to put it on him.

When the sun was out, the kids were out.  They have the admirable ability to ignore things like heat and sun as long as play is involved, and so Mom and Dad sweated while the kids played.

After re-arranging some things upstairs we found ourselves with more floor space.  Not to let this situation continue, because heaven forbid we not stumble over toys everywhere we walk, Mom quickly setup a tunnel system for the kids to play in.  We may not be able to see the carpet anymore, but the kids enjoyed it so I can’t complain.

Ashlyn moved to her new Montessori school, and one of her homework assignments was to purchase a plant and bring it to school so they can take care of it.  One of the two pictures below is of Ashlyn holding her new plant.  The other was Ashlyn hugging James.  They have nothing to do with one another, so don’t read into it.

James is adapting to the idea of walking very quickly.  In the past week he has gone from taking a few steps at our encouragement to walking as an actual way of getting around.  He’s still crawling, but more and more he’s choosing two legs over hands and feet.

On Saturday we had rain come through our area, and the sun came out while the rain was still falling.  As soon as the rain slowed down, I took Ashlyn for a walk hoping to show her what a rainbow was.  This was the result, and it has quickly become one of my favorite photographs.

From water to water…

"Somehow I kept my head above water. I relied on the discipline, character, and strength that I had started to develop as that little girl in her first swimming pool."
- Esther Williams

Ashlyn was in good form this week, and we did our best to keep up and take pictures.  From left to right:  Trying on Mrs. Potato Head earrings, hanging out on the couch with a mask she made, and playing with James and an umbrella.

Before making a trip on Saturday, Ashlyn thought it would be fun to make a dessert.  So while Ashlyn and I made a “Peach Crisp” dish, Mom chased James around the house with the camera to capture him having Fun. I capitalized Fun on purpose, how could I not with that grin?

We had such a good time last week swimming at the pool that we decided an encore was in order.  Ashlyn jumped right in the moment the floatie was on, and before the day was out she was doing flips into the water from the stairs.  Both kids had a great time as you can probably tell from the last picture in the series below.

Sunday brought rain, not the pouring sky torn open type of rain that has you rushing to move your cars into the garage.  No, it was the steady all day drizzle that kept the sun behind clouds and us indoors.  Mostly.  Ashlyn didn’t mind the rain and spent some timing watching the water turn into fireworks (her words) on the trampoline while James played with chalk under the cover of the porch.