Two Years Old!

Richard had a nice, but low key second birthday.  Of course, he didn't exactly know what a birthday is, but he loved his "new to him" tricycle and blowing out the candles on his cake.  He liked eating his cake even more.

He is still stunningly tiny.  His 12-18 month clothes have plenty of room in them!

The rest of him is plenty caught up.  He's got full sentences, including "Anthony takey me's cranberries."  Yes, second child can clearly tattle!

Christmas Morning

 Fortunately the boys didn't wake up TOO early!!!

Santa was overly generous as usual!

We had a light breakfast and then a large lunch at the Fairmont Hotel in San Jose, followed by exploring Christmas in the park.

Christmas Eve

Don't the boys look so handsome in their Christmas sweaters?

We enjoyed the 5:00 church service, as Richard napped through the earlier service.  Richard even went up front with a few hundred other kids for the children's time.

We came home, ate dinner, set out cookies for Santa and then EVERYONE headed off to bed.

Feeding Time for Blue Bear!

Make that Blue Bear #3.  Blue Bear #1 is "Big Blue Bear" and #2 lives at daycare for naptime.  This particular blue bear is technically Anthony's.  Richie has latched onto it.  He's not completely attached, but he is quite fond of it.  Its made for a few sibling squabbles.  I generally take Richie's side.  Anthony never played with it, and Richie adores it.

Scouting For Food

Scouting for Food is our annual big service project.  We put door hangers out in our designated neighborhood last week, and this week returned to collect our goods.  I was expecting return to be quite low, so overall I was pleasantly surprised.

Anthony's block started off poor, we were nearly down the block before we came upon any houses with donations.  Then we saw someone outside and asked her.  She came running out with cans.  The going back down the street the other day we hit the motherload of cans--someone had clearly gone to Costco directly after getting our Scouting for Food flyer!

Police Station Tour

I just realized, I don't think Anthony's little face made it into the group picture.

Our Cub Scout Den toured MVPD last week.  The boys had an amazing time.  We met the chief of police, saw the dispatch center and got a full tour of the booking area and holding cells.  The boys asked a lot of really nice questions.  Anthony asked about what food people get when they are in jail.  The answer is that they aren't in the holding cells here for very long, but if its over a mealtime, they can get what they want, within reason.  NO dessert.

Everybody's favorite part, by far, was the stainless steel potty.  They were fascinated!

This picture was taken in the booking area.  Yes, its on gigantic mug-shot.

Speaking of mug shots.  Bob met me at the station to take Richard home.  As he left work early one of his colleagues asked where he was going.  His response was that he was picking his kid up at the police station.

22 Months!

Richard turned 22 months old on Halloween!

Here he is showing off one of his favorite activities, zooming around on his riding toys.  This weekend he rode his car toy all the way to the park, did a zillion laps around the park and rode home.

He can also jump off objects with both feet, AND jump up and down.  He uses 2-3 word sentences, but you really have to pay attention to understand him.

And he sings.  He loves to sing "Let It Go" from Frozen.  He'll also sing the "Happy Snowman" (pronounced "Hap Do") from "In Summer" and assorted other lyrics.

Richard has a pretty good temper.  When he gets mad he'll even stamp his little feet.  Probably shouldn't laugh at him, but I can't help myself.

Still tiny.  He is wearing, but nearly outgrowing his 12-18 month clothing.  Some of it.

Bad Squirrel

 Anthony was quite upset.  Fortunately he didn't make the connection that Daddy was too busy taking pictures to scare the squirrel away from his pumpkin.

Halloween!

The boys had a great Halloween!  I played hooky Halloween afternoon so that I could watch the costume parade and help out at the class party.  It was fun.  There were a number of Harry Potters, but there were far more Frozen Princesses!

Richard was Mickey Mouse.  I was contented to have him wear a hand-me-down costume from a neighbor, but Bob pointed out that Richard knew who Mickey was.   Sure enough, when I showed Richie his reflection in the mirror, he pointed and said, "Mickey".

Anthony trick-or-treated with his gal Pals C and K.  Richie tagged along for quite awhile.  He had a grand old time.

Prize Winning Pumpkin

Every year our Cub Scout Pack has a pumpkin carving contest.  Anthony and I made his carved like the three headed alien toy from Toy Story.

Obviously I did the knife work, but Anthony helped scoop out the goopy stuff (against his will) and poke out the pieces I carved.

His pumpkin actually won a prize.  Good thing.  In the car driving over I asked him if he was going to cry if he didn't win.  He truthfully answered yes.  We're working on better sportsmanship!

Harvest Fair at Ardenwood Farm

Our family had a great time at Ardenwood Farm for their annual harvest fair.  We picked plenty of corn.  This year we didn't lose any children in the corn field!

Anthony's favorite part by FAR was touring the historical Patterson house.  We could go from room to room at our own pace, with docents in each room to answer questions.  We probably stayed in the kitchen through three different groups.  He was so interested in all the different gadgets.  When the docent picked up the ice tongs he knew EXACTLY what they were from watching Frozen a million times.  She then showed them the ice box and explained how it works.  He remembered an amazing number of details from last year, including the memorial displays woven from human hair.  He also really enjoyed watching the women from the quilters guild work.

We didn't spend too much time with the animals, but we did enjoy watching the pigs wallow in the mud.

School Walk-a-Thon

Anthony had a great time at the school walk-a-thon.  I took a half day at work to join him!  He walked 38 laps, which was significantly fewer than his stated goal of all 75.  He was proud of his efforts, as was I.

No pictures, but Richard also walked a handful of laps.

Anthony's Birthday Party

 As you can tell from the cake picture, Anthony had a Harry Potter birthday party!  I made the cake myself, I'm still quite proud of it.

  His party was your basic party at the park.  Despite scheduling it for the hottest day of the year, everyone had a great time.

  I had a custom pinata made, meant to be the Golden Snitch.  Anthony originally didn't want a snitch pinata.  The Golden Snitch, you see, is a VERY tiny quidditch ball, and he wanted his pinata to be BIG.  One we clarified that he could have a BIG Golden Snitch, Anthony was fully onboard with the idea.

  The pinata store made our pinata especially rugged.  After each kid had several turns, Bob went at the pinata as the children all cheered him on.  It was really quite funny.  Evidently it made quite an impression.  The majority of the kids wrote their Monday essay at school about Anthony's Daddy breaking open the pinata.

Rock Stars

The boys have a new favorite activity.

Rock Star Video

For those who aren't up to date on their children's music, this is the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse soundtrack.  Richard LOVES it.  Pretty much every time he goes into Anthony's room he runs straight to the dresser and points and grunts for Anthony to turn the music on.  Anthony will, of course, and he turns it on LOUD.  If it isn't the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse CD, Richard wails until Anthony changes it for him.  Of course, Anthony always does, because it makes his brother so happy.
 

Early Birthday Party

The last night of our trip my parents took everyone to Farrell's ice cream parlor for dinner.  Farrell's is one of those places where birthdays are accompanied by singing and drumming, so we had to celebrate the September and October birthdays there.

While we were waiting for out table, Anthony and Felix (the classroom's traveling rabbit) tried on some funny sunglasses.  It was a LONG wait for dessert!  Anthony eagerly waited and watched other people have their celebrations, and then finally it was his time.  (We were celebrating my sister's birthday, too, but she let Anthony hog the spotlight.)  He was a little embarrassed at all the fuss, but I know he enjoyed it.  He also enjoyed his ice cream sundae.  I don't think he's ever gotten an ice cream that big before--he gets the child size at Baskin-Robbins.

Poor Richard had a bit of a melt-down.  He started off happily eating vanilla ice cream from our sundae.  Then he asked for seconds, so I gave him some.  Then he had this massive meltdown and we couldn't figure out what the problem was.  We even gave him MORE vanilla ice cream and he wouldn't stop fussing. 

Then my sister had a stroke of genius and brought him some chocolate ice cream.  And the child was happy.

More of Disneyland

I just love Disneyland.  We've only been twice with the kids, but both times we had a really good day.  This time as we walked into the park, Anthony commented how nice it was that we were together as a family.  Last time we went, the baby was in the NICU!

Each person in our family gets to pick one thing they want to do most.  After that, its all up in the air.  My pick was the parade, Bob's was the Indiana Jones Ride, Anthony's pick was the Matterhorn (with a visit to Elsa as a second pick).  We decided to wait awhile and see what to pick for Richie.

As we walked through the gate, who did we see but the Great Mouse Himself.  Bob immediately declared that was Richie's pick.  Richie actually enjoyed Minnie better, she was a flirt!

Bob and Anthony went to ride the Matterhorn (twice), while I stood in line for a FastPass to see Elsa.  We did the storybookland boats, then Richie slept in the Ergo for awhile while we all rode the Alice in Wonderland Ride and Mr. Toad's Wild Ride.  Yes, the baby slept through Mr. Toad's!

Everyone did get their favorites in.  We all enjoyed the parade after Bob and Anthony waited in line over an hour to meet with the princesses.  During that time I took the baby to ride the carousel and the Casey Jr. Train.

I have to say, Disneyland is by FAR my favorite amusement park.  Yes, its got the magic and all that.  But its more.  It is perfect for our family!  Thanks to the rider switch passes, both parents were able to ride the roller coasters easily.  But even more than that, the baby could ride EVERYTHING, even while sleeping!  Well, everything except the roller coasters.  He's old enough to know he likes rides, and old enough to be sad if he misses out.  At Disneyland, he didn't have to miss out.  (Unlike Legoland, the park that claims to cater to small people and has TWO rides that the poor kid can ride.)

Disneyland Trip

 We took advantage of a three day weekend at school for a quick trip to Disneyland.  Daddy flew us down after school got out on Thursday.  I wish I could say the flight was uneventful.  Turns out that Anthony really does need dramamine before flying!

  Despite a long pause to clean up the airplane (and many other things) we arrived at Disney in time to meet my parents for dinner at Goofy's kitchen.

  We weren't sure how the baby would be with the characters.  He's generally brave, but most babies have the common sense to be terrified of oversized strangers.  Richie was quite distrustful of Goofy, as expected.

Minnie walked into the room as we were eating dinner.  Richie went APE!  He screamed "Mickey" repeatedly at her.  I didn't know he knew who Mickey was, let alone that he knew the word!  She finally made her way over to the table and they had a great time flirting with each other.  When Dale made it to the table later in the evening, Richie knew exactly what to do.

Anthony enjoyed meeting with the characters, including Princess Aurora.  He didn't eat any dinner, but I certainly didn't push it.  He certainly put away dessert, though.  So did the baby.  Turns out he gets a little twitchy when he gets a tiny bite of someone else's dessert.  He wants his own whole serving, thank you very much.

 

First Haircut

This post is a long time coming!

When Anthony had his back-to-school haircut last month we decided it was time for Richard to get his first haircut.  Honestly, I'm surprised he was ready for a haircut so soon.  Poor thing was bald for a very long time.  I kind of miss playing with his long hair in the back, but I'm glad his bangs aren't in his eyes anymore.

Being a second child and all, instead of going to the overpriced children's hair salon, we went to Great Clips where Bob and Anthony get their haircuts.

Richie  got kind of nervous when they first put the drape on him, but he settled down pretty quickly.  Like Anthony when he got his first haircut, he found the whole thing quite interesting.  He didn't sit still very well, but at least he didn't scream his way through the cut, either.

When all was done he got a lollipop all to himself.  Sweet child immediately turned to share it with me!

Cub Scouts

 Monday night was Anthony's first Pack Meeting for Cub Scouts.  While I was waiting in line to check in, Anthony rapidly ran off to join in the opening games.

He started getting scared when it was almost time for the parents to go into the back of the room to talk business (Mommy, don't leave me he cried), but a Scoutmaster brought a big kid over to be his special friend and he pulled it together.

While I was off volunteering to be a den mother (surprise!), He was happily creating a catapault.

He looking forward to getting his uniform and is excited to sell popcorn, too!  (Other activities to look forward to include camping and an overnight on the USS Hornet.)

Ice Cream Social

 Saturday night was our neighborhood's annual ice cream social and movie night.  Even though movie night ended WAY past Anthony's normal bedtime, we let him stay for the show again this year.  This year's movie was "Bedtime Stories" with Adam Sandler.  Fortunately Bob was willing to stay with him, because Adam Sandler gives me hives.

The ice cream social part was fun.  Richie was thrilled to get his very own (melty) ice cream sandwich.  At one point even though his fists were full of ice cream, he was still trying to pick up a piece he'd dropped.  He just couldn't bare to lost a bite of that creamy goodness.