Officially Three!

Well, it has been a wild and crazy three years! The individual days are often stressful and long, but the years have flown by!  The Timehop app is a blessing a curse all at the same time – I love looking back at the baby pictures, but it reminds me how fast they are growing up.  The baby pictures also bring on the guilt at times because I don’t remember much about them being babies.  I have a few memories of individual moments, but there is a lot of survival mode involved with two newborns that causes you to miss out.  (To be brutally honest, I was also dealing with a rarely discussed “illness” called Postpartum Anxiety – this is a story for it’s own blog – but I am much more in control know and able to find the peace and enjoy the little moments.) This is my favorite age though as I love the conversations and interactions.  I love being able to imagine things with them and play games.  They are consistently making me laugh, sometimes making me yell, and always making me smile.  

There has been a little bit of a role reversal in the personality in the last month. Riley has become more shy and Landon is now the one that will seek out people to tell them “Hi, I Landon.”  I think Riley is starting to get embarrassed when you catch her singing to herself or dancing – so I don’t point it out because I don’t want her to stop.  Riley continues to be protective of Landon and seems to understand that Landon has a desire to be with mommy more.  She will “allow” me to carry him instead of her by saying “Okay mommy, you can hold buddy.”  They have developed a definite bond that I don’t think I will ever completely understand.  They are constantly asking about the other if they are separated – even if it is just different rooms.  They wait for each other when we are on walks.  Most of the time they play well together, but they also know how to “get” each other by taking toys.  You can see the genuine love they have for each other.  We celebrated their birthday by taking them to the Mr. Potatohead exhibit at Imaginon and did some birthday money spending with mommy.  Throughout the day they kept reminding me that it was their birthday and they kept singing Happy Birthday to each other.  I am sure that they aren’t always going to enjoy sharing their day, but for now they thought it was fun.  

 

“I am Landon, here I am.”  He likes to talk on the phone and this is his opening line.  He loved that my grandmother called to sing Happy Birthday to him and he smiled the whole time and then gave his line and proceeded to tell her about his day.  He was so excited for his party at Bounce U and being able to play with his friends.  He was excited to open his presents and would say “for me?” pulling a hand to his chest.  Landon spent his birthday money adding to his Rescue Bots collection and he has not put them down yet.  Rescue Bots is his current favorite show (it isn’t too bad and even keeps mommy entertained), but he still likes to watch Curious George and Paw Patrol.  His Rescue Bots are his favorite toys also and he can be found using them to rescue various toys around the house – often in joint rescue ventures with the Paw Patrol cast.  He will randomly tell me that he needs to “Power up and energize” while surging a hand into the air.  He has become a bit of a jokester and likes to make me laugh.  He has this new habit of not only telling me that he is hungry, but telling me where he is at when he is hungry – for example, “I am hungry in the car” or “I am hungry downstairs.”  He is a pretty good eater overall, but his favorite food at the moment is oatmeal and he would eat it for all three meals of the day.  He prefers to snack and isn’t one to sit down for a meal.  We has finally got all 20 of his teeth – the two year molars came in right before his third birthday.  He loves to play with cars and trains.  Most recently he has not stopped playing with the Imaginext fire station or the Paw Patrol lookout that I made out of a box.  He plays well with Riley most of the time, but he is pretty defensive of his toys and Riley likes to instigate him by taking the toys from him at times.  Pretty sure this is a typical behavior though – so I just remind them both that they can’t steal the toys and if it continues we use a timeout to calm down. 

It seems as if Riley has given up on the nap – and I really miss it! As I attempt to write this she is hanging on my arm making sounds like a monkey.  On the plus side, she has become very helpful.  On the negative, it means that she is always about 6 inches from me so that she can “help” me at any given moment.  She continues to carry around her white puppy (aka artic fox) at all times and if it isn’t that puppy it is another one.  She loves to care for her animals.  We also now have 4 fish in the house and Riley is typically the one that will tell me it is time to feed the fish in the morning, she seems to like the responsibility and it is her first “chore.”  (She is bouncing her stuffed puppy on my keyboard as I type this right now)  This little girl has no fear.  We had their birthday party at Bounce U and she wasted no time climbing to the top of the steepest slides and dropping down.  In contradiction though, she is the first one to give up on smaller tasks around the house – like opening a door.  She will say “I can’t do it!” and flop down on the floor.  She continues to perfect her flopping skills on a daily basis and I am feel confident that she will be an excellent soccer player in the future.  She loves to sing and dance and spin around.  If she is upset and I am finding it difficult to calm her down, I will sing “5 speckled frogs” to her and she starts singing along.  She loves story time at the library and has recently developed a love for “shopping” especially if it is a place that hands out free cookies.  Her favorite food continues to be cheese and she asks for it about 100 times per day.  She also now has all 20 of her teeth with only some minimal discomfort noted.  She also likes to watch the Rescue Bots and Curious George and has also unfortunately developed an affinity for those Surprise Eggs videos on YouTube.  She loves to paint and is persistent about painting once she has decided that it is what she wants to do.  She loves to play with her puppies and the Little People farm.  She pushes her baby dolls around in strollers.  She brings me books to read about 20 times per day and she wants to snuggle up in my lap while I read – so I don’t resist.  

 

As typical, we have been busy this month.  We kept them up for the 4^th of July fireworks this year and they did pretty good overall.  We went to the parade and events that morning, played in the pool all afternoon, and watched the fireworks until Landon informed us he was ready for bed.  We had their birthday party at Bounce U.  We have gone to Discovery Place Kids.  We have taken them on a few different bike rides and they love to ride behind Daddy.  There are a lot of pictures this month so enjoy!