Some Josh Funnies

I have mentioned several times that Josh loves to imitate his sister but it doesn't just stop there. A couple of weeks ago, we lost power during one of the storms that came through. After the tornado sirens stopped sounding and the kids were back in bed, I called the power company to report the outage although I know I wasn't the first. Some time early that morning before the sun came up, Josh ended up back in bed with me and once he woke up, I decided to check the status of our outage. Josh sat there and watched me holding the bill while dialing the electric company on my cell phone. Once I was done, Josh decided it was time for him to play with the cell phone. He has a lot of people to check in with! Anyhow, he got off the bed to get the phone and then wanted back up so I obliged and lifted him back up. Immediately after I put him on the bed, he was down again. He went right over to where I had the bill sitting, picked it up and asked to get back on the bed. Now armed, he picked up the cell phone, looked at the bill and noticing that it was upside down, righted it and then proceeded to call the electric company! Too cute!

This morning during breakfast, Emma told me she was cold. I asked if she wanted her hoody and then went to get it and put it on. As soon as I walked back in with her hoody, Josh took off his bib and started saying "I col, I col." I asked if he needed his hoody and he responded with an emphatic "yes." Whether he was actually cold or not, which I sort of doubt, he had to be just like sister. It is definitely clear who is going to be one of his best teachers!

Not really so much a funny but just a cute story that Emma told us on the way home yesterday. She said that when her class went out to the play ground yesterday, Josh's class was still out there. He came running over to her and then saw some big trucks and had to go investigate. In Emma's telling, "Josh asked me 'What's that?' so I said 'big truck' and then Josh asked again 'What's that?' so I told him 'big truck.' I was helping my brother." Josh is a lucky boy to have such a wonderful big sister!

Disney Princesses

Last weekend, I took Emma to see the Disney Princesses on Ice: Princess Wishes with special guest starts Tinkerbell, Mickey, Minnie and Goofy. We had great seats with unobstructed views (please excuse the quality of the photos).

Emma was so excited and I was able to get a couple of photos when the show started. She had been waiting anxiously to see Tinkerbell and Tinkerbell did not disappoint!

After Princess Jasmine and Snow White, it was time for the Little Mermaid. Ariel was definitely one of Emma's favorites and I think Ariel must be one of the favorite princesses overall because she had several more songs and more ice time than any of the other princesses.

The show was rounded out with appearances by Sleeping Beauty, Mulan, and Cinderella. When we asked Emma later who her favorite was she responded with Tinkerbell, Ariel, Princess Jasmine, and Sleeping Beauty but really, I think the entire show was a hit. As a note, this was the first time that I have taken Emma to a show or movie that she didn't ask to leave halfway through. I would say that the price of admission was well worth the look on Emma's face!

20 Months

I am determined to post this on time this month. Of course, I was already thinking I was behind yesterday; I sometimes get confused about who is the 26th and who is the 28th. I was thinking about it yesterday and they could have both easily had birthdays on the 27th since Emma came just shy of the 27th and Josh came just after the 27th. Would have made things easier but I digress. Now, on to the reason why I have called you all here today. Josh is 20 months old today and as I do every month, I will once again question how that can possibly be?

The big man has really made some leaps and bounds with his vocabulary over the last month. We are hearing new words all the time and he is really trying to repeat what we say more often. He also loves to sing and thanks to Emma for interpreting, we can figure out what some of those songs are. By far though, his favorite song right now is "Jesus Loves Me" just like Emma around the same age. As soon as he hears the opening words, a huge smile comes over his face and he tries to start singing along. Josh is also great about praying at meals and when we say the prayer that they use in his class at school, he will fill in a couple of words. The prayer goes "God is good, God is great, let us thank Him for this food. Amen." Josh usually supplies the good, great and Amen! Josh is usually quite polite and his "thank you" is about the cutest little thing around! In addition to his politeness, he is also quite interested in his personal hygiene and is always wanting to wash his hands. We have to be careful though because he will get up onto the toilet to reach over and turn on the water but the closest handle is for the hot water.

Josh can be a total copycat especially when it comes to big sister "Memma." Most of the time, she is good with it but some times, it drives her nuts. Also, you can just call him Mr. Independent because he certainly thinks he is bigger than he really is a lot of times and many problems stem from the fact that he wants to do it himself and gets frustrated.

We had our last swim lessons last month and as I mentioned before, Josh came a long way from when we started. In fact, I dare say that he grew to love the swimming pool. Hope he still feels the same way this summer. In addition to the last swim lessons, Josh also put an end to teething for a little while I hope. Those pesky canines finally all popped so he should get a little break before starting on those 2nd year molars.

A few of the things that Josh loves currently include his toy cars. He loves to make them go "vroom, vroom." He also loves to climb and has mastered getting up onto the chairs at the kitchen table. Mind you, it is a high top table so I am real thrilled about him getting up on those. One day last week, Josh and Emma disappeared into the kitchen momentarily. Emma came back and I asked what Josh was doing. She responded that he was getting onto the chair. Well, I walked into the kitchen to find him sitting on the table just pleased as punch with himself. Josh has also picked up a love of rocks and now I am usually finding them in the washing machine. Note to self to start checking all pockets before doing laundry.

Last month, Josh got to take a quick trip up to Missouri for the baptism of our newest nephew and cousin. Josh also celebrated his second Easter complete with not one, not two but three different Easter egg hunts. Josh really wasn't so interested in hunting eggs until he realized that they held candy and then he still really wasn't so interested in hunting eggs because he just wanted to eat the candy. Have I mentioned that the boy definitely has a sweet tooth!

Wordless Wednesday

*Note - While it may seem like it from recent posts, Emma is not always wearing this hoody!

Wordless Wednesday - Movie Time

Thursday was Rough!

As Brad put it so perfectly:

Gravity: 1
Josh: 0

Poor guy took a fall off the slide this morning at daycare. He hit his head pretty good and to make matters worse, scraped the entire left side of his face. Doesn't he look so pitiful and in need of Mommy or Daddy? Even though he was getting plenty of love at daycare, we decided that I should head home to be with the boy for the day and make sure that he was okay. Thankfully he showed no symptoms of head trauma but was very happy to cuddle up with Mommy when I arrived to pick him up. The trauma of the morning must have worn him out because after we had some lunch, he took a three hour nap. Hopefully he won't look too rough as he starts to heal. Above all, we're just thankful that he is okay!

Ready for Summer!

We finished up with swim lessons last week. All the games and activities that they had done in Emma's class finally made sense to me as I watched her using a swim stroke with her legs stretched out back behind her. Emma definitely made some great strides and hopefully we can keep moving forward throughout the summer. As for Josh, the boy we couldn't get into the water at the first lesson, we couldn't hardly keep out of the water before his class last Saturday. If their had been an award for most changed, he would have had it hands down. Both Emma and Josh did great and I know they are going to have lots of fun in the pool this summer. Here are some photos from our last swim lesson.

Sickness and Silliness

We have had a sick little girl on our hands this week. It started Sunday morning with a low grade fever so we left her home from church with Grandma who was visiting. By the time we got back, her entire body was burning up and at one point in the afternoon, her temperature essentially reached 105 degrees. After a fairly restful night, she was back to normal Monday morning only to have the fever come back throughout the day. Brad made a doctor's appointment for her where they ruled out strep and chalked it up to a fever virus that has been going around. Bad news is that it can last up to 4-5 days. We've been through three and I'm hoping that things will turn around today. Other than Sunday, you wouldn't really know she had a fever since she won't sit still long enough to realize that she is sick. Unfortunately she also had to miss picture day at school yesterday but insisted I get a photo of her and Baby Lily Honey Chip Bear Clipper Bubba; don't you love that name?

On an unrelated note, Josh just kills me sometimes because he is so silly. Yesterday afternoon, Emma was giving me her scary face. Josh saw it and had to try to "scare" me as well. Here is the best attempt to photograph his scary face.

As I noted previously, it has been a struggle recently to get Josh to eat veggies or even food in general. It seems we found the culprit. His bottom right canine finally popped the other day and just like that, he wanted to eat again...veggies and all! It was a modern day miracle!

Spoke too Soon!

As they are wont to do, Josh had to prove me wrong. While I noted in his 19 month post that he is picking up words here and there but not really using them consistently, there has been a change in the air this week. It seems to me that another lightbulb has gone on and Josh is trying more and more to repeat words that he hears. He is also using his words new and old more and more to point out things that he sees or things that he needs like a spoon to eat his bowl of cereal. He is definitely making a better effort to communicate and clearly has lots of words stored up in that head that he has just been waiting to use. Last night I asked him to close the dishwasher and he said "OK." At bedtime, I asked if he wanted a book so he said book and then said Bible since that is by far his favorite book. Like everything else, Josh is just picking his time but I think we're going to start hearing more and more actual words from here on out.