Today we ran to the commissary to pick up a few things we were out of and I guess God saw that it was my turn to be "that Mom" in the grocery store. I figure we all have to be "her" at some point. Christopher is standing up and reaching for everything saying we needed it. I'm going down the baby aisle to try to find diapers in his size and he grabs a bag putting in the cart. I'm a few feet away looking at a new one and tell him we don't need it and it's not even his size. So, he just picks it up and throws it on the floor. I'm still trying to look at the new diapers I'd just picked up and so I will get to it in a second. An old woman (yes, she deserves to be called "old") is walking by and gives me this look while picking up the diapers my son just threw down b/c apparently I'm too lazy to do it myself. Not an emergency in my opinion, but in hers I'm a bad mother. You can see it in her eyes. I finally grab the usual diapers and keep going. I get to the baby food to grab a little more for Sophie since we are headed out of town this weekend. And Christopher, again, says we needed the one he was reaching for and as soon as the words "NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!" come out of my mouth, the glass jar of baby food in his hand, the bottom one mind you, knocks the top one crashing to the floor. Baby food everywhere and another old couple walks by giving me a bad look. I'm not sure what was going on today b/c usually we can't get through the store without at least one or two sweet, sweet senior citizens stopping to gush over how adorable my children are, stopping every time we pass each other. And I love them for it! But today they were not so sweet. Finally after using the last of my baby wipes to try to clean up the mess a man says he'll get someone to come clean it up for me. Minutes later I hear, "Clean up on aisle 10!" Now I can say that I've joined the grocery store division of the "that Mom" club.

Brandon came home this morning and was up for going to the store with the kids and I. While he was walking around Target with Christopher they wandered into the toy section. Christopher kept finding things he wanted and would take them to Brandon saying he needed it, wanted it or they just needed to pay for it. Brandon tried to explain to him that toys cost money and knowing that a two year old doesn't understand that, he thought he'd ask Christopher how much the particular toy in his hand cost. His response was, "45." Brandon tried really hard to not laugh too much, but it was hard. Where he got the number "45" from we have no idea.

This afternoon Christopher woke up from his nap and saw the new Thomas the train bubble bath on the counter. He climbed up on the stool to reach it and tried to figure out how to open it. After a minute or two he says, "Mommy, need impact hamber." I said, "You need what?" He says, "Impact hamber. Open this." For some reason he now says hamber instead of hammer. You could tell he'd been watching his favorite digger movie earlier.

Here are a few funny things Christopher has said over the weekend:

#1 - Sophie bumps her head trying to pull up on the swivel chair at the desk for the 20th time and starts crying. Christopher comes running up and says, "Sophie come to my room feel better." I asked him if she'd feel better if she went to play with him in his room and he said, "Yup!" and took off running to his room turning to see if she was coming.

#2- Brandon is on call Sunday and Sophie is crying about something (probably bumped her head again) and Christopher says, "Sophie wants MY Daddy." Still hasn't figured out that they have the same Daddy, but I'm not quite ready to have "the talk" yet and I don't think he is either. I'll just let him keep thinking Daddy's name is My Daddy.

#3 - We went for a walk after dinner last night and used the double stroller b/c we didn't feel like stopping every time Christopher found a rock and after we are a couple houses down he says, "Where'd venture go?" I told him we were on an adventure and part of that means you are looking to see what you find. He says, "Gonna find al-gator." (I forgot to mention that he talked about finding an alligator on our adventure earlier that morning. Not sure where it came from.

He is definitely getting a broad imagination now b/c he is starting to talk about things or people that haven't happened or don't exist. I'll try to keep track and let you know the next time this happens! It's pretty funny!

There are yard sales here on base it seems like every Saturday morning, but we've never driven around to see what they are selling. This morning we decided to check them out. We told Christopher we needed to get some money and that we were going on an adventure to see what we can find. We loaded up in the van and took off. Christopher kept asking us, "What my doing?" and when we'd ask him he'd say, "Go on adventure!!" We drove past one, but it didn't look like they had much, so we kept going. We saw another house, but figured they were moving in/out and went past it as well. Then we saw a sign and realized the house we thought was moving was actually a big yard sale. So we go back and check it out. She had a lot of stuff and several great mirrors, but I didn't have a single place to put any of them in our house. (She didn't either and that's why she was selling everything.) She did, however, have 2 fake trees that were just what I'd been looking for. I've been trying to fix the house up a little more and the den just needed something else. I asked how much for a tree and when she said $10 I chased Brandon down and bought it. Then we drove around some more and couldn't find anything. Christopher started asking where the adventure went and so we decided to go back to the first one we saw and see what was left. They had a few things for kids left and when they came out they told us to just take everything for free. We took the two games they had, Hungry Hippo and Don't Break the Ice and paid them $2 for both. We didn't want Christopher to think he could get things for free so we made him pay the man. So we were very happy with our little adventure this morning and I think we might go on more of these in the future!

This morning, Brandon let me sleep in and suddenly Christopher comes running into our room telling me to wake up. I get out of bed and find out I've missed out on all the excitement. Brandon tells Christopher to tell me what they found this morning and he says, "Frog!!" I asked where he found it and he said, while pointing, "In toilet!" I look at Brandon and he said that they went in there this morning to go to the bathroom and when he opened the lid they found a huge frog sitting inside the toilet.

Here's the conversation Brandon said went on between he and Christopher about what to do:

Brandon: "What do you want to do with the frog?"

Christopher: "Flush him down."

(They attempt to flush him, but the frog refuses to go down and stays in the toilet fighting to get out.)

Brandon: "Oh no, he stayed."

Christopher: "Catch him Daddy! Dump him out."

Brandon: "You want me to catch the frog?"

Christopher: "Uh huh. Dump him out... in a tree... he make a nest in tree."

(I explained that was what the spectacaled bears do in Diego. But when they are retelling me this
story his answer was not to put it in a tree but to, "Kill it!")

Brandon: "Ok, what's his name?"

Christopher: "Pluto." (this is his name for any pet)

Brandon went and got a grocery sack and picked up the frog (after taking photos first) and they take it outside and set it on the ground and here's that conversation:

Christopher: "Daddy, he's looking at me." (sounding scared)

Brandon: "The frog's looking at you?"

Christopher: "Uh, huh. He's waving at me."

Brandon: "Ok."

Christopher: "I want to dig with crocadilly." (he's picked up a shovel by now and thinks it's a crocodile.)

Brandon: "It's a frog, Christopher."

Christopher: "Oh."

So, Christopher has always been kind of silly, but lately he's said some really funny things and I thought I'd put them on here to share, and so I don't forget!

#1 - We've been trying to get him to repeat prayers after us to help teach him how to pray. When Brandon's parents were here we told him to put his hands together to say the blessing, here's what happened:

Brandon: "Dear God... Christopher, we are praying now. Dear God."

Christopher: "DEAR GOOOOOD!!!!!!" (with his head turned up towards heaven)

Brandon: (trying not to laugh out loud) "Christopher, say Dear God,"

Christopher: "DEAR GOOOOOOOOOOD!!!!!!!!!!" (head still facing heaven)

Brandon: "Thank you for this food."

Christopher: "DEAR GOOOOOOOD!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Brandon: "Amen."

#2 - When Sophie does anything great he tells her he thinks so by saying "Good job, baby girl!" or when she wakes up from her nap he runs into her room saying, "Hey baby girl!!!" My favorite was when loading him in the car this morning he told me to "go get the girl" and when I came back with Sophie he said, "there's the girl!"

#3 - Monday night while sitting down for dinner we tried saying the blessing again. Here's how it went this time:

Brandon: "Dear God,"

Christopher: "Dear God,"

Brandon: "Thank you for this food,"

Christopher: "Thank you food."

Brandon: "Amen."

Christopher: "All aboard!!!"


Here are some funny words he says that will help you if you ever need a translator:

"bull bozer" = bulldozer

"e-on-a" = Fiona, from Shrek

"itty, bitty eyunch" = little bitty lunch = lunchable

"punk man" = pumpkin

"fwing" = swing

I know he's said some other funny things, but these are the ones that stand out the most. I'll try to do better to keep them posted on here from now on.

Here are a few photos of Sophie from last week. She's trying to do everything her brother does and it's really cute to watch her get around!


Here she is trying to get out on the patio where he is.

Every now and then she'll get up on her hand and toes and just hover for a little while. Sometimes she gets mad, other times she just gets back down and starts "worming" again.

Now she's figured out how to get up on her knees and pull up. Pretty exciting!

This week has been really good so far. Christopher is his funny self again and Sophie has learned how to pull up. She's been trying for a while and finally got it this weekend. Now she's trying to pull up on EVERYTHING! She's so proud of herself and I love it! She also got up on her knees and crawled a little, but gets around better like a worm. It's just a matter of time before she's up and running, I know it. On Monday I was highly motivated to get things done around the house that have been driving me crazy and I was hoping I could get it all done over the week, but God was good to me (like He always is) and Sophie slept for over an hour in the morning, instead of the 30 minutes she usually naps, and I got almost everything done in that time. Christopher found his finger paints and wanted to play with that, so I sent him on the patio to paint away. I pulled up the carpet we put out there so he could make as big a mess as he wanted and he had a blast. Then he wanted to take a bath to clean himself off and played there for a while. Sophie woke up and we had lunch and played a while before taking our afternoon naps. When they woke up we painted some more and then it was time to clean it up. Christopher loves water and cleaning anything, so he was more than happy to help. I had to take a couple photos b/c it was so cute. Then they found a sack of Halloween bibs and clothes that a friend passed on to us and they had to try them on. It was really funny!

I feel like there are so many thing to write about since the last time I was on here. Let's see, our little trip to the lab last Monday turned out to be nothing, so that was good. Then Tuesday I went to my first ever MOPS meeting at the church we've been attending and the kids did great in the nursery. Not that they have a hard time going there, but I wasn't sure how Sophie would handle being with strangers for that long. I laughed when I picked her up and they said she wanted everyone's bottle after finishing hers. That didn't surprise me. Wednesday - Christopher went to his first Wiggles & Giggles class at the church. He's pretty shy when he's put into group settings, so we just kind of walked around trying different things, but he warmed up when it was time to climb on the mats and jump off or run laps around the gym. Sophie, on the other hand, is going to be our little social bug b/c she was into everything and didn't care that it wasn't her class. She climbed onto the big parachute with all the other 2-3 year olds and then crawled under it. Christopher just stayed next to me and helped move the parachute up and down with the other parents. But he still had fun. Thursday - is our playgroup day, but this time we didn't meet in the morning b/c we were going to go see Sesame Street at the base theatre that afternoon and we needed to do early naps. It was a free event that was put on by USO and was awesome!! They gave each kid a free dvd of their choice, a light-up spinning Elmo toy (you'd pay $15 for one anywhere else!) and a piece of candy. They had lots of information for the parents about how to handle loved ones being deployed, the theme of the event. We got there early to get a seat and it was a good thing. The kids had a blast! It was very cute and lots of fun. We ended up having a reporter for the base paper sit next to us and Christopher kept pointing Elmo out to her. She thought he was funny and got our names and asked a few questions and tried to take photos, but Christopher would never look at the camera. I keep grabbing papers to see if we made it or not. I'll let you know if we do. Friday - Christopher goes to Mother's Day Out at our church and I spent the whole time running errands and made it back just in time to pick him up. He'd had a bit of a rough day and later found out he's cutting some teeth. Not fun b/c I think Sophie is cutting more as well. Saturday - Brandon is on call and my friend Rebecca is in town with her husband and new baby girl, so we meet them in Destin for lunch. It was great to finally meet Leighton and get to see Rich and Rebecca again. The kids did great at lunch and let me visit and do a little shopping too. Sunday - I wasn't up for trying to do the whole getting ready for church alone thing, so we went to hang out with our friends, Melissa, Landon and Kylan, who's husband/dad was taking over for Brandon at the hospital. I told Melissa about the great sales and we decided to load the kids up in the van and head back to Destin to shop some more. We had a lot of fun and were able to get some cute things for the kids. We picked up lunch on the way home and then hung out with Brandon after he woke up from his nap. It was a very busy week and I think it was more than Christopher was ready to handle, so I'm going to try to spend more time with him one on one to help him ease into our new schedule. I thought it was a great week and I think the kids did too. I'm going to bed now. I'll be back later with more updates and photos.