The 2nd Floor

Here is the latest on the 2nd floor. The new subfloor is in, additional support has been added to the roof in Max's future room and Dada has begun to add the 2" foam board to the ceilings for a water resistant insulation.
Believe it or not, one day soon the area between the knee walls in the above photo will be Max's room, and the area to the left with the big pile of foam board will be Charlie's room. In the photo below, the same pile of foam board is on the right. The goal is to have them up there this June - go Dada go!

Cheese!

It should never be said that Max doesn't like the camera, nor that the camera doesn't like Max.

Look at all the colors!

Max LOVES playing with playdough. I have been making him the homemade kind for a while now (Thank you Caroline and Emmely for the recipe!). Each time we get it out I make him a new color. We started out with blue, green, red, and yellow. This morning I asked him if he wanted orange and got an enthusiastic 'Oh-nch!' in return. About 10 minutes into his playdough time he finally got his newest color. Then after putting Charlie down for her nap I asked Max if he would like some purple. He was just as enthusiastic and actually asked for the purple a few times while I was making it. Once he had the purple, he had to have the colors lined up on the table in just the right order.

The new style

Yesterday morning Max's friend Mary Kate came over to play (and her mom Kristin was here to talk mother-talk with the Mama) and Max figured out that the crawler track off of his little tractor almost fits on his head. Yes, that's right, a crawler track. He was SO proud of himself and vamped it up quite a bit for the cameras. Mary Kate just looked at him in wonder and smiled. What a trend setter.
Side note: Aren't Mary Kate's pigtails so cute?!? I am so looking forward to Charlie having enough hair for them! Well, at this point even enough for a barrette would be a huge improvement for bald little Charlie... ;)

Olives

Another quirky thing that Max just loves is green olives. Dada enjoys them in his martini and thought it would be funny to see Max make a face from eating an olive, but just the opposite happened! Now it is assumed by all that if Dada is having a martini, Max gets a little plate of olives all to himself. He eats them right up and usually asks for 'more ovilsa pwease!'

Pay attention, Mama!

This morning as I was changing Max's diaper I was talking to him about going in the potty like a big boy and went on and on about when he needed to go he should tell me and we can run to the bathroom, and I guess I should have been paying better attention to what I was doing when putting his pants back on him...

It's a little hard to walk when both legs are in the same pants leg! He didn't say a word to me about it. I set him down and he toppled over when he tried to walk. I was laughing so hard I had tears streaming down my face! (Good thing he was laughing too!)
Of course, what would any person do upon discovering this? You mean you wouldn't say, 'Stand up Max - Mama has to go get the camera!'

'The' House Revisited

Isn't it amazing what can be accomplished in one week? The sign went out front of the house on Friday. Whew. Now we just need some nice people to move in!

Charlie-girl

The kids and I were up at Grandma & Grandpa's house yesterday and I was working really hard to try to get a photo of Charlie smiling. She would look at me and smile, I would bring the camera up and try to get her to smile again, but she just looked at the camera like it was an alien. Then she would look away and smile, as the photo below.

'The' House

I took this one this morning of the house across the street - that has been in the process of being built since we first began looking at our house last January (yes, 14 months ago) - because I had to document the huge mess that is directly across the street from us. The latest on the mistake list is the ripping up of the front walk because it was poured too narrow. So the excavator was brought in, the walkway ripped up and then, on an extremely rainy day, plastic sheeting was rigged up so that the new one could be poured the same day. This after no work at all was done 3 out of 5 days last week. The entire project has been like this. No work for days, weeks, months on end, and then crews are there over the weekend and in horrible weather to get things done last minute. Also of note is the trailer full of trash to overflowing just to the right of the house in the driveway that has been there for at least a month. We are really looking forward to the house being done and some new neighbors moving in!

Face Shot

I was trying really hard yesterday to get a shot of Charlie smiling to see if I could get her new teeth. She would smile until I brought the camera up to my face. No dice. But I did manage to get a great shot of her beautiful blue eyes!

2 of a Kind

I found the boys looking at a truck parts catalog. Not something the Mama would willingly look at, but the two boys seem to be fascinated by it!

Bathtime Fun

To say that Max is an enthusiastic bath taker would be an understatement... Dada ends up this drenched every time!