Armpit muscles and other such nonsense.

There has been a significant amount of discussion in this house related to armpit muscles. Agreed, most of it is to do with Mike's being tested furiously on all the muscles, nerves, arteries, bones, and knobbly "tuberosities" on the bones located in the armpit. But there's more.

Brittany: Are you almost done going potty so you can go to bed?
Katie: Nope! Hey Mommy, we have muscles to squeeze out our poops. See my muscles? My muscles are in my armpits.

Yep, that's Katie. Here's some more.

Mike: Hey Katie, is the refrigerator running?
Katie: No, there's our refrigerator right there!

Katie (Playing blocks): Look, sweetheart, I made you a present because it's your birthday!
Me: Oh really? How old am I?
Katie: Um . . . 32!

Mike: *Explaining all kinds of anatomy stuff of which I have no inkling*
Katie: That makes me sick!

Me: What do you do when you want something?
Katie: Um . . . do surgery?

And now, we're going to compare the personalities of my man children.

First, let's talk about their reactions when it's the other brother's turn for a bite of sweet potatoes.

Peter gets excited.

Joshy gets anxiety.

Next, let's talk about how they treat each other when I put them on the floor together.

This is what it's really like having a twin brother. (Hey Val, how ya doing?)

Next, let's talk (for real) about my silly boys. Also, remember that one picture up there of Peter in his seat waiting for his next bite of sweet potatoes? Well, I didn't make a video, but if I had, what you would hear is manic laughter. Like, manic. It's hilarious.

Also, when they're both done eating, and I'm burping them, Joshy gets a little bit sad and wants to snuggle. Peter, no matter how I'm holding him, wants to see. He takes, like, forever to fall asleep because he keeps fighting off every attempt to snuggle. Even when he's got enormous bags under his eyes. Little booger. But in all fairness, his fighting off sleep is not crying. He's blowing bubbles and giggling. I tend to think of him as more a free spirit while Josh is my snuggly boy. Yeah.

Last boy thing: whenever I stick the boys on the floor there are toys on the floor next to them. And occasionally, if they get upset, I will shake a toy over their faces to distract them. Now, you have to understand that there is a universally accepted toy that is the coolest (it's the jingly ball with grabby things on it, in case you're wondering). Say, perchance, one of them gets a hold of the universally accepted coolest toy. Naturally, the other one wants it. Here's how they react.

Peter: GAAAAAAHHHHHH! Give me that toy! (Manic hyperventilation) I want it! *Grab grab face pull ear grab snatch scratch grab grab* TOOOOYYYYY!!!!!!!

Josh: Oh Pete! That's a strange place to put a piano . . . *Sneakily grab the toy from behind my back and Peter is totally distracted the other direction*

This has happened. Multiple times.

Now, some commentary from me. I have begun official pumpkin season. I have made pumpkin cookies, pumpkin spice white hot chocolate (BAHAHAHAHAH! YES!!!!) and tomorrow will probably be pumpkin bread. I love fall. Fall is my favorite food. Also, it all has pumpkin in it, which is technically a vegetable . . . so . . . eating pumpkin cookies and pumpkin bread is practically like having a serving of vegetables. Yep, totally legit. We're sticking with it.

Speaking of food, here are a few pictures of food I have made recently just to make you feel all jealous and hungry. Buaha.

Yes. I made this. With a broiling pan! *giggle giggle*

These are the non-drug version of cocaine.

Rich chocolate cupcakes with raspberry cream cheese frosting. MMMMMMMMMm *drool drool*

Oh man. I think I need some more baked goods in my life. Bring on the pumpkin bread!

As promised.

Hey everybody. Today is one of those days that doesn't feel like real life. I'm not sure how coherent this post will be. I'm the only one who went to church yesterday because everybody's got the runny nose and stuffy sinuses and cough and gunk, and now my throat is starting to itch. I may not walk out unscathed.

But we shall carry on. Okay, guys. Pictures first? Or anecdotes and such? I choose anecdotes. The pictures are so cute that you won't stick around for boring words when you've seen them.

We were twenty minutes late to Katie's first day of preschool last week because she thought she would make a good first impression if she showed up wearing only her owl backpack.

Katie will now only eat sandwiches for lunch if I use a cookie cutter on them. We've had duckies, bunnies, ginger men, and cowboy boots. The ducky is her favorite.

Our kitchen is right above the garage, and when the garage door is opening or closing, it's loud. So last week, Katie was putting the silverware away while I emptied the rest of the dishwasher (she won't let me do the silverware anymore) when we heard the garage door open for Mike. Katie dropped what was in her hand into the drawer, flung her arms in the air, and bolted for the stairs down to the garage, screaming, "You do the silverware! Daddy's home!"

Remember the whole potty-training thing? Well, it's going rather well. But every night we spend a lot of time in the bathroom while Katie stalls bedtime by claiming she needs to poop. And when I get frustrated, I start saying, "Are you going to make a poopie? Or should we go back to your bed?" And last Thursday she responded with, "I am making a poopie. This big, like a coconut."

The other day, Katie left her cereal on the table almost untouched. I said, "Katie, are you going to finish your breakfast?" "No, I don't want to eat my breakfast! I'm hibernating!"

"I am a Child of God" is Katie's bed time song, and I've had to sing it rather a lot the last couple of weeks because she has refused to go to sleep on her own. But last week she started saying, "No, don't sing that, sing it in Pork-a-cheese." (Mike went on his mission to Brazil.)

This is a big one. Want to know why? It officially inducts the boys into the sticky-note club. The other day, I stuck the boys on the floor (both with binkies in mouths) to play so I could grab laundry or something. I heard crying, so I turned back around, to see that Josh was crying, and Peter had Josh's binky in his mouth. Peter's binky was thoughtlessly cast aside. (And by cast aside I mean way across the room where Peter had launched it.)

I saw a really funny article the other day about horrific things about raising twins you never see in the movies. One thing he brought up was that other people will see your twins interacting and say, "aw, they're so cute! They want to go down the slide together!" And really, they're both trying to be the first one down the slide, and now they're stuck wedged in like that because they wouldn't let the other one go first. This is SO TRUE. It's really cute when my boys hold hands or reach for each other, but I'm fairly sure it's more like arm wrestling or threatening. (Grabbing each other's collar during feeding like, "Watch it, buddy. This is MY mommy.")

And for my last anecdote, Katie took a time when I was really frustrated at her and ready to just leave her in her room all day to say, "I will always be your Katie. I will always make you better." Darn it, child!

Okay, fine. Pictures.

First, our 5 months photo shoot.

Ya know, a typical family portrait for my children.

And then I let Katie take the camera. (With the neck strap on, obviously.)

She made me take my pony tail out for my picture. Hence the wild and crazy mane.

You're never going to believe this, but I'm actually not offended at the picture Katie took of me. It's okay, despite the wild and crazy mane.

Now, for other pictures from the last month and a half or so.

This giant crazy thundercloud outside our back window had so much lightning in it that it was like a strobe light. Seriously.

Katie learned how to eat popcorn with her toes.

Handsome dudes in their Sunday clothes.

Don't you love Petey's giggle face?

Interpretive dance for the neighbors.

Look! Joshy won the rolling over race!

Homemade pizza night--every Friday!

Mike testing out his new blood pressure cuff and stethoscope.

He was quite pleased at the result of his diaper blowout. Peter was jealous that he couldn't be naked.

And, that's our life. See? I totally did a photo shoot of the boys AND did a kind-of photo tour of our house. Sort of.

TTFN!

And . . . we're back!

Hey guys. Sorry it's been so long. We've had a cuh-raaaazy week. But I gave my talk in church yesterday and that was the last check mark on my list of large stressful things to do, so we're all good now.

To begin, I will now announce that next week is going to be a picture post. Because it's been forever since I've done any serious photography and I need to post some adorable pictures online. Maybe it will (finally) be a photo tour of my (potentially) clean and decorated new house. Maybe I'll do a 5-month photo shoot of the boys (because they look totally different than they did at 6 weeks). Or maybe I'll go totally nuts and do both. You never know.

But now, time for the sticky note. (Which I think is going to be a real sticky note again after this. The notebook is just too inconvenient.)

Katie: *Bonk* Oh no! Now my bone is brooken! (or occasionally braken)

Me: *Playing "When Can I See You Again" by Owl City*
Katie: Is this the song from the Felix movie?
Me: Yeah . . .
Katie: Oh! I totally love this song! *Hippie wiggles ensue*
 (Note: She hasn't seen Wreck-it Ralph in several months. But she remembered that this song is in the end credits. What?)

Katie: *pointing to her ankle* Look! I have a cute malleolus!

Me: Please bless the food . . .
Katie: No, Mom! You don't help big kids say their prayers. We already had a talk about this!

Katie: *pointing to various parts of her body* These are my middle bones, and these are my hard bones, and these are my malleoluses, and these are my poops!

Katie: *Lying flat on her stomach* I'm a dead bug.

Katie: When I was your age . . . or, when I was a baby, I was still in Mommy's tummy. When I came out, I was Jesus's friend now!

Yesterday, after church, we were "racing" to the kitchen to eat lunch (aka trying to get Katie to come upstairs from the garage) and then Mike pretended to eat "all the lunch" just to tease her. Then she said, "No, I'm going to eat all the lunch!" So she went into the corner and started eating the wall. So, naturally, she and Mike started pretending to be bats and chasing me around the house. When they cornered me, Mike suggested that they tickle me. Alas, Katie was already licking my skirt.

And finally, I think I have an OCD girl on my hands. This has happened several times over the last week. Katie walks into the family room, which has blankets, toys, burp clothes, and stories on the floor, and then she throws her hands in the air and says exhasperatedly, "I just cleaned up this room! You ruined my family room!" She then proceeds to push all the blankets into the corner (she hasn't quite mastered folding), put all the books on the shelf, put the baby toys in their bucket, put the wipes on the shelf with the diapers, and push all the burpies into a pile under the swing. She even puts movies back where they go and puts her toys next to the stairs to go back up to her room.

She's two and a half. This is the best day of my life.

In other news, Katie is on her way to being totally potty trained. For the last month or so, she's been in big girl underwear all day and a pull-up at night (she's still not good at it and I'm just not into doing her sheets every single night). And she's been doing really well. But for the whole month, she would NOT poop in the potty. She would hold it all day and then wait for her pull-up. I even tried holding chocolate in front of her face, but it didn't work. So, naturally, we turned to My Little Pony.

Last week, finally, she did it! And she got a little Pinkie Pie (I know in my previous post I said Rainbow Dash, but she changed her mind when we got to the store.) But here's the next step. I only let her get a little bitty one. She wants a big one. The big one is waiting for a whole week without having an accident. And you know what? She went three days. (Yeah, so she had an accident this afternoon. But she's working on it.) She knows she wants seven green check marks on my calendar. We're almost there!

Also, she is starting preschool this week. (AAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!! MY BABY!!!!!!!!!!!!) But it's going to be totally cool. We're doing it with three other kids from her nursery who are almost the same age as her (I think they're all within a couple of months). And it's going to be AWESOME.

Um, I think I need to go make sure those noises from the family room are ticklish giggles and not the sounds of being strangled by an older sister. See you next week! (And maybe you'll see me!)