Where to start?

I never know where to start. Especially when it has been so long since my last post. Let me say for memory's sake that this has been the hottest, driest summer I can remember.

We obviously have been busy: Jake out of town for two separate one-week stints for work. Jake's brother and fam in town for a week in between. Jake is home now and I am so happy he won't be going anywhere for another year.

Sometimes (MANY times) with kids you make plans, not even big plans. Just something small, innocent. Like, "hey everybody, let's go to the pet store and look at cats!" And you load everyone in the car thinking that this was a good plan to pass some fun time together as a family. Everyone is smiling. Fast forward 10 minutes and you find Sister crying and brother screaming, and Dad fuming and Mom swearing... I've learned to not put too much expectation on anything because you just never know how those good intentions are going to turn out.

I am happy to say that today was NOT one of those days! We woke up this morning and decided to take the kids to Lake Ripley in Cambridge. We loaded everybody up, stopped at Walmart to buy swim diapers and a 'wacky noodle' and headed out, Jake and I keeping the "we'll see how this goes..." to ourselves.

What a nice beach!! Clear water, sand without rocks, a very gradual wade in-perfect for kids. We had such a nice time. It was like something clicked with us as a family. Since Jake has been home, I have just really been able to feel the family-ness of the four of us. I think now that the kids are just a little older I can really see how each one of the four of us bring something unique to the picture. It just felt like real family time instead of attempted family time. We even ended the day with a family walk and now everyone but me is asleep and I sit here feeling very grateful.

So on to updates about the kids...

Mr. Zeke. He just never ceases to delight and amuse us. His favorite toy currently is the blender. He carries it around the house. ( I take the blade out) and puts toys in it, or his blankey. He then says, "ready?" "be loud." like he's telling us it's going to be loud. Then he pretends to turn it on and makes a little motor sound while swirling his hand in the air over it (to mimic the stuff all mixing around inside the blender) Hours of entertainment, let me tell you. For him and us. This is totally one of those parental moments where you think, "Why do we even have toys?" He calls it the "bwendur."

What else?... his speech continues to amaze us. Just like big sister, his vocabulary and use of tenses and sentence structure is quite amazing for his age. He doesn't have the annunciation that Ayla always had, but that makes it pretty cute I have to say. Sometimes he takes my face in his hands and says, "you ok mommy?" And when I answer him, he says, "a good day mommy?" (Did you have a good day?)

He sings and sings. And not like little toddler, made up songs. But real songs. He picks them up so fast and remembers how they go and then sings the full song. His rendition of the Veggie Tales theme song is pretty funny. He breaks out into it quite a few times a day.

He's also really been using the word please. He tacks it on to the end of his request without a break. Very cute. "Mommy, I want rain branPWEEEZE!" "I want teddy gwamsPWEEEZ! "I want the bwenduurPWEEZ!" And he's very enthusiastic when he likes something (like the song 'Rockstar' by the Fresh Beat Band.) "I wike it that song," he'll say with vigorous head nodding, "I wike it!"

Gah. I always think of all the cute things he does/says that I want to document and then when I'm on here I can't remember any of them! Maybe if I didn't leave like three months between blog posts!

Ayla... I always feel a bit bad because Ayla has hit that age where her milestones are more subtle and spaced out. I fear someday she'll read this and be like, "man you guys only talked about Zeke in the blog!" So let me think...

Ayla really is good big sister. She encourages Zeke and looks out for him. She likes our family to be together. She likes practicing head stands, which she is really quite awesome at. She is a little singer, always singing... many times the story line of whatever she's playing is sung. She likes to be helpful. She like to ride her bike and is really good at that too. We have been really surprised at how quickly she went from riding her bike without training wheels, to being able to go for real bike rides.

Sometimes it just hits me how much she is really not at all a baby anymore. Look out world, we have a kid on our hands.

She still likes art, but doesn't draw nearly as much as she used to. She likes to attribute things to people, to draw connections. For example. this evening she drew 33 teal hearts on a piece of paper, 32 orange ones on another piece, 5 pink ones on a third piece, and 2 green ones on a last piece. "Because mommy's 33 and teal is her favorite color, Daddy is 32 and orange is his favorite color, I'm 5 and pink is my favorite color, and Zeke is two and green is his favorite color." I like how she thinks.

Alright, let's get to the good stuff...pictures!! (check back in a few days... we have lots more pictures to post!)