The Pencil Did It!

Last week, during some no-pants time, Oliver grabbed a pen and sat down quietly near his doodle pad for a while. Jenny and I soon discovered that he'd been decorating himself. When we asked him what happened, he said, "The pencil did it!"

Because kids are drawing all the time, I think I need to control my inclination to save and post every scribble my kids make. Right now I'm fascinated with Oliver's evolution from scribbling madly to suddenly (and compulsively) creating shapes and now even little characters. More carefully defined in the last couple weeks, his people and animals generally have two eyes and two legs. This morning, he added shoes to this one below (but not hands).
A makeshift finger painting studio over the bathtub (for easy clean-up!)

We've dreaded the infamous "terrible twos" but now that the tantrum period is here, we're learning to navigate them. Basically, our happy and bright-eyed kid can turn into a monster of negativity and kicking and screaming and "NO!" It's usually set off by our overriding his control, such as dictating that it's time to change his clothes, time to get in the car, time to put away his toys, etc. We're trying to let him expend his energy and to let him know that we understand that he's mad or sad. Sometimes, his outbursts lead to a time-out. They almost always end in a hug, and then we're back to playing games and smiling until the next round. Soon enough, we're all pretty tired.

The sun is out and Spring is here. Here are some of our activities:

• Riding a tricycle around the block


• Crawling into the dark closet and playing with flashlights


• Watching Chris and Nate practice for t-ball


• Looking for worms in the back yard


• Drawing


• Playing at the park


• Stacking videotapes like blocks


• Open play time at the community center

Meanwhile, "little sister" is still kicking and wriggling. We can't wait to meet her!

Here's a video from last night about language development, gender confusion, dancing, and nose-picking: