Oh, Joel...

Seriously. Who is this child?
He says some of the funniest things!
Now that he is in big boy underwear (he is doing GREAT with the potty training. YEAH!), his latest great idea is to pull apart the two flaps that close in the front of the underwear so he can poke his penis through it. So...even though he has his underwear on, body parts are still exposed! He thinks it's hysterical!
Last night, Curt noticed and said, "Buddy, you gotta put that thing away!" To which Joel responded, "Don't worry, Dad. It's just a penis."
Curt, of course, had to work hard to maintain his composure as he explained that certain body parts need to stay covered up.
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Today, he simply refused to go down for a nap. He cried...he whined...he asked for water...he needed to go potty...his leg hurt because he pulled his band-aid off...he needed to throw his band-aid away...it just went on and on. Finally, I told him that if I saw him out of his room again, he would get a spanking.
He did stay down for a bit, but after awhile, I could hear him saying, "It's morning time! It's time to get up! The sun is shining." I told him to come out and asked him if he was done napping. He said he was. I asked him if he had slept at ALL. He said, "I slept a really long time." So I asked how long. "Sixteen minutes," he responded. Yeah...that sounds about right!

As a side note...we had his three-year well child appointment today. He was in the 5oth percentile for height and the 40-50th percentile for weight. Of course, his head circumference was in the 75th percentile. He needs room to fit all those smarts!
I also got a handout from the pediatrician explaining what to expect at this age. One of the bullet points said, "uses inappropriate language to get attention." Interesting.
Until then, if you see my son drop something or do something wrong...he may respond something other than "aw, shucks." Please don't judge me! It's just a stage! ;)

The Birthday Boy!

Well...Joel is three. I can't believe it. He's getting so big!
Yesterday morning Joel woke up and knew that it was his birthday. We've been talking about it for awhile now, and he was thrilled! We had lots of fun celebrating this weekend. Last night was a party with Grandma, Grandpa, Uncle Chris, Aunt Kara and Alyssa. Joel got lots of great presents and had a great time! Here he is giving thank-you hugs to Grandma & Grandpa DeBoer.
Grandma & Grandpa got him a pair of Cars pj's and boots (along with lots of other fun stuff). When Curt and I woke up this morning...Joel was climbing into our bed with his Cars t-shirt, a pair of big boy underwear and his cars boots. It was hysterical!

He also got a special surprise from Nonie & Pop Pop. We headed to toys r us to pick out Joel's first big boy bike...complete with training wheels! He had lots of fun trying it out on the driveway. It'll be great once it gets nice outside so that he can hit the road!

Today was a party with some of his little friends...Connor & Kaden, Layla & Skylar, Brady & Mady, Reagan & Mya, Ethan, and (of course) Gracie too! We went to Chuck E. Cheese to celebrate, and I think the kids all had a great time. Joel and Grace were exhausted by the time we headed out. Here he is with his CARS birthday cake!

I didn't want to leave Gracie totally out of this post...so here she is with her daddy at Chuck E. Cheese. Can you tell they are daddy & daughter?!?!

Well...that's the birthday weekend in a nutshell. Now I get to head out for a night away with my main man for MY birthday. Having a baby two days before your birthday really steals a little of your birthday thunder! I'm turning thirty tomorrow. Yikes.
I am really looking forward to a night away with Curt, though. Thanks Dad & Pam for watching the kids for us! We'll be sure to pick them back up sometime next week! :)

Wow!

I had the best surprise ever today. Curt gave me an early birthday present...A NEW CAMERA! And not just any new camera...my very first digital SLR. The one I have been reading about and looking at for months now. I am SO excited. It was a completely, totally unexpected surprise.
So, I'm feeling super thankful today and having tons of fun taking pics of the kiddos. I'm going through the manual page by page and getting excited about what this thing can do.
Here are a few of my first pics...

So...WOW. Have you ever received an unexpected or extravagant gift? As excited as I am about the camera (and let me tell you...I AM EXCITED!!!), the biggest thrill of the day was just opening up that box and realizing that Curt went out and got that for me just because he knew how much I'd love it.

Thanks, babe! You're the best!

Small Steps, Big Boy Undies and "Prubacy"

My baby girl is walking/running all over the place! I can't believe how big she is getting.

We have hit a milestone of sorts at the DeBoer house. We graduated Joel into the next level of carseat and Gracie is inheriting his old one. That means she will finally be facing forward! We even took a "maiden voyage" around the block once Curt got home from work. Joel is giddy with excitement because his new carseat has a cupholder in it. And according to Joel, cupholders "totally rock!"

Joel is also making strides with potty training. I'm just letting him go at his own pace. Some days he asks for big boy undies and he'll use the potty all day with no problems...sometimes he wants a diaper...and we've had a few accidents. I'm just happy we're moving forward. The countdown to THREE is getting shorter and shorter. As of his birthday, we are going full-on undies, so I'll have to let you know how it goes!

I haven't posted in awhile, so I thought I'd put up some fun pics of the kids.

Big boy undies. Hey! Hey!

This is Joel sitting on his "time out chair." I've noticed that lately, in an act of sibling solidarity, Gracie will go sit next to Joel and wait for him to finish serving his time. I'll pull her away and bring her by her toys, but she'll head straight back to her brother and wait patiently until time out is over.

BATH TIME!

We see here a picture of sharing...gone terribly wrong!
Another common sight at the DeBoer house. We refer to this move as the "strangle hug."

This is an actual picture of Joel talking to Nonie & Pop Pop on the phone. I love that he has the phone cradled in his neck while he reads his comic book! I don't know what my parents were saying at this point in the conversation, but Joel's response was, "Are you KIDDING me?!?!"

Here is Gracie hanging out with Grandma DeBoer at her big birthday bash.

Cuddling with Daddy...

We had some friends over last weekend. This is Brady, Joel & Layla all snuggled in Joel's CARS couch watching a DVD on our portable DVD player. They thought it was great!

This is the face I get when I ask Joel to "smile nicely for the camera."

Here is Joel holding his newest friend, Mya Kate Engbers. Congrats to Ben, Laurie & Reagen!

This is actually the first picture JOEL has ever taken. Gracie & I were leaning down to try and fit into the frame (he is still working on his aim!). Still, not bad for a first photo!

JOEL-ISMS:

Joel and Grace are constantly following me EVERYWHERE around the house. I bring clothes back to my bedroom....there they are. I'm cooking in the kitchen...they are standing next to me. I'm sitting down in the living room...they are climbing on my lap. I had to draw the line the other day when they both followed me into the bathroom. I closed the door and told them they would have to wait. I could hear Gracie screaming outside the door as she tried to get in. Then I heard Joel tell her, "Don't worry, Gracie. Mom just needs a little PRUBACY." (Joel and I have been talking about PRIVACY during potty training. I'm glad to see he gets the concept.)

Joel had an absolute meltdown in the McDonald's playland this week. He was halfway up the climby thing when he decided that he couldn't go any further...and, of course, he couldn't come back down either. I've put in my time climbing in, up, down and around that knee-breaking "FUN" land, and I knew he could do it by himself. After my calm approach, my encouraging mom approach and my bribery approach all failed (in front of the other thirty mothers who were there watching the spectacle), I grabbed my loving son out of that playland and quickly made my way to the car. He knew that I was NOT happy. As I was driving away in silence, he asks me with a giggle, "Mom, WHY was I crying in that playland?" Ahhhh!!!! The next morning, I asked him if we were going to have a good day or whether we were going to have a repeat of the McDonalds incident. He said, "Mom...some days our hearts are happy, and some days they're not. Let's try to be happy today, okay?" Okay, Joel.

Gracie is ONE!

Happy Birthday, Sweet Gracie!

I can't believe that we are celebrating Grace's first birthday today. The year has gone by so fast, and we are so thankful for a year of great memories, fun stories, and good health. Grace is such a joy, and we love to watch her grow each day. We celebrated as a family tonight by going out to dinner with just the four of us. We talked all about Gracie and the day she was born and how thankful we are that she is a part of our family. Joel has been singing happy birthday to her all day. She hasn't yet mastered walking, but she loves to cruise along the furniture, and when she's feeling especially brave...she'll take a step or two before she goes back to the trusty crawl. She's very good at finger foods, but as you can see...the spoon and fork have yet to be mastered. This was a fun dinner...
We love you, Gracie girl. We can't imagine life without you. Happy Birthday! JOEL-ISMS

Well...this is definitely a story for the baby book! Joel has been getting up early and coming into our room more often lately. A few days ago, I woke up and before I even opened my eyes, I knew that Joel had climbed up into our bed. I could hear him breathing and moving around waiting for me to get up. Without even opening my eyes, I said, "Good Morning, Joel. Did you sleep good?"

"Yeah," he responded.

"What are you doing in mommy's bed?"

"I'm putting sprinkles on you."
Still with my eyes closed and amused at his sweet toddler imagination I said, "Oh, yeah. What kind of sprinkles are you putting on me, bud?"
"Boogie sprinkles."
With that, I opened my eyes to see him picking his nose and crumbling his dry boogers all over me as I slept! I leapt out of bed and started shaking everything off as I tried to recover from being totally grossed out. Nice way to start a morning, right?
Joel thought it was pretty funny.
Also...Joel was introduced to Rice Crispies this week. He was amused by the characters on the box (whom he referred to as Crap, Snackle and Pop). Here he is listening to his breakfast. Very exciting stuff.

Why we call her Curtina...

Curt's Aunt Pam emailed me after the last post mentioning how the last picture of Gracie looked so much like Curt at that age. So...I decided to dig out some old pictures, and I now have hard proof that this girl definitely gets her good looks from daddy! This is why we call her "Curtina!"

Awww...wasn't he a cutie? Now here are some of our Gracie girl...

Anyway...I just thought it was fun to go through Curt's baby book and see little notes the Curt's mom wrote down like, "plays better with bigger kids-is mean to little ones!" Or the classic Grandma Knight note to Curt when he was three.

"Curt, Grandma and Grandpa went to Florida. 1982."

I guess they didn't want to get into TOO many details! On the upside, they did tape a $2 bill to the note. :)

JOEL-ISMS:

We drove past a horse farm today. I pointed into the field and told Joel, "Look at the horses, bud!" To which he replied, "Actually, mom, the small one is called a FOAL!" Oh. My bad.

After driving up to Wal-Mart instead of Meijer, Joel said, "This is not the right grocery store! We need to go to the other grocery store! I don't like Wally World!"

It's All Good in the Hood...

Well, my almost-three-year-old has an affinity for picking up on EVERYTHING he hears. Curt and I find ourselves laughing when we hear him say things like, "he shoots...he scores!" (while throwing out the trash) and "it's all good in the hood, dad!" Just for the record...both of those phrases came from Curt...not me! Although I will take responsibility for the exchange I had with Joel yesterday at nap time. We had talked earlier in the morning about telling the truth after Joel intentionally spilled his milk on table and then told me it was just an accident.
Joel: "Mom, WHY do I have to take a nap? I don't want to take a nap!!"

Mom: "Because you need rest and it's nap time. So, go back to bed."
Joel: "You tell me why I have to go to bed NOW and you tell me the TRUTH this time!"

How do you even respond to that?!?

Joel has also recently been introduced to the world of Wii Guitar Hero. Curt got the game the other week, and we also played it over at Todd & Lisa's when we were babysitting together. Joel is now constantly asking to go downstairs so he can "rock those guitars." While we were at Todd & Lisa's, Joel constantly had the guitar slung over his shoulder. He was seriously jamming...lips pursed and all! When one of our friends got up to take his turn, Joel said, "I'm gonna bust you UP!" (Again...he repeats everything he hears!) Here is Joel "bustin up" Uncle Curt...

And then there is Gracie...Gracie is a character all her own. We are just getting to the stage where she is having to hear the dreaded word "no," and she is NOT happy about it. She has a real affinity for standing up in her high chair when I walk away from her. So the other night, she would stand up...I would say NO! She would stand up...I would say NO! She would stand up....

You can see how this quickly became exhausting. She finally went to stand up and I stayed quiet. She stared at me like, "You DO see what I'm doing, right? So, what are you gonna do about it, Lady?" I decided to take her out of her chair, tell her no and put her in her crib for a minute to let her know that it's not okay to stand in your high chair.

She absolutely collapsed in a heap of sobs. It was unbelievable. Her head and arms went limp as her shoulders heaved with tears of disbelief. Of course, three seconds after I got her back out of the crib, she had a miraculous recovery!

In all seriousness, we love these kids! They make life more full...and certainly a lot more funny! Grace will be turning one next week (I can't believe it!) so we'll be sure to post some pictures of her big day. Joel is less concerned about her birthday and more focused on when HE turns three which is coming up on "twenty March!"

And I couldn't forget to mention that it's my dad's birthday today...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, POP POP! WE LOVE YOU!

Making Up for Lost Time

Okay...I let a month go by and then BAM! Two posts in one week. Gotta love it. Since the last post was mostly stories, this one is going to be mostly pictures. The kids are getting so big lately. They seem to stay the same for awhile and then it feels like you wake up one morning and they look so big! Here are my little darlins...

Good morning, Sunshine!

Joel playing around...

Gracie and her baby doll... Joel is excited to be turning three on "twenty March!"
Joel wrote his name for the first time!
(He said he wanted the top of the "J" to look like mountains...
just like Pike's Peak!)
Joel loves to help in the kitchen. Here he is making lunch with mom!

"So...what are we doing today, Mom?"

All smiles...

Cruising along the furniture...

Joel is constantly wearing a hat!

He puts it on in the morning with his PJ's!
Joel loves his Gracie girl! Puzzle time with Layla and Brady...