Beach Holiday

After Christmas, we packed up the car and headed for South Padre with Brad's family. Beach weather it was not--mid-50s, windy, and some rain--but the kids had a blast playing racquetball, working puzzles, playing board games, watching movies, sword fighting, and, of course tromping to the beach in winter attire to feed the sea gulls! Goggles afforded much-needed eye protection from the blowing sand.

Christmas Cheer

Christmas Eve with my grandparents

Christmas PJs

Christmas Favorite--American Girl Doll

Christmas Favorites--Sword, belt, Lightning McQueen slippers

Playing Abby's new game

The Great Gingerbread Collapse '09

For Christmas 2005, my mom and I started a gingerbread-house-making tradition with Abby. And we haven't missed a year yet. Of course, when Will came along, he gladly joined the tradition because it's really all about eating the candy that doesn't somehow become fastened to the houses fast enough! The kids have great fun, and the adults do too--I don't know who looks forward to the event more!

Will really got into decorating his this year. In the past, we mostly did it ourselves with him in our laps just eating candy. But, this year, he put the candy on all by himself and just directed me where to squirt frosting.

He was so proud! 

But then . . . the roof started sliding. Abby's was so well designed and engineered that she had no problem. (And she very artistically decorated the house almost entirely on her own--she's getting so big!). Will's started sagging just as we finished decorating. You can see the worried looks on our faces in the background of Abby's shot. I was trying to hold up the roof to let the frosting dry and set. Then, we took it apart to add MORE frosting to get better adhesion. And I was still holding it up to help it set.

Then Brad offered to take a turn holding it. The engineer in the group managed to snap one side of the roof clean in half. More frosting. More holding. After 20-30 minutes of salvage operations, we couldn't sit and hold it anymore. So we got the bright idea of propping it up. If only something were the right size. I know, how about a hunk of Velveeta and some Starbucks cup holders? Needless to say, that didn't last for long, so we just had to let it collapse. Sigh.

We all agreed that it was better to have happened to Will's house than to Abby's. She would have been in tears. We thought he might not even notice. So we let it slide and tried to keep the attention elsewhere. But eventually, Will saw it. I don't think he had any idea what was happening to it earlier, but he knew now. He said, very affronted, "Hey, who broke my ginger boy house?" Luckily we averted his meltdown by letting him eat a piece of it. Too bad we couldn't prevent the house meltdown so easily!

Another Berger Cousin

November flew by, right through Thanksgiving at the Bergers. 

A week later, the kids were blessed by the arrival of Carson Edward Berger, two weeks early and still 8 lbs. 3 oz.! Abby didn't like holding him too much! That makes 4 grandkids for my parents, but not for long . . .

Will's World

Time to catch up on our little man. He turned 3 in October. I guess that makes him a big man now. He's fully equipped with Star Wars figures, a transformer, baseball gear and his own light saber. Look out world! He also walks around in these cute hand-me-down cowboy boots. He gets so many comments on them and he absolutely LOVES them! I don't think I ever would have even gotten him any.

He's full of antics and craziness. No idea where he gets it. :) One day, he took one of my elastic headbands and wore it around his eyes telling me it was his bonehead. I had no idea what that meant, but he kept saying it over and over so I took him at his word. He took it in to preschool to show his teacher. He is known around Bethany School for always walking the halls in the morning with a new show-and-tell item from home. It's been everything--a water gun, a glove, an umbrella, a tent pole, a stick, and now . . . a bonehead. He kept talking about his bonehead all day and I had not a clue. A few days later, Abby was searching through the toy basket and she said, "Aha, here's my bonehead!" What?? Her too? Apparently, that's what they call one of their toy dinosaurs that has a bony plate on its head. I'm not sure HOW on earth that one had slipped by me. Suddenly, everything became so clear!

Will has an interesting kind of imaginary play. Whereas, Abby had dolls who became real actors in her shenanigans, Will uses pretend real people! For instance, he blames Luke Baldwin for many things in our home. Luke is a preschool friend. There are 2 Lukes in his class, hence the use of his whole name. Several times, Luke Baldwin and Cousin Phillip have "messed with his things" or "woken him up in the middle of the night." One time, Luke Baldwin even tinkled in his pull-up! 

One day, we went to the preschool playground after school, Will was chasing around an older boy (probably around 5). He kept calling him Todd and yelling for him to chase Will. He came over to me and told me that the boy was his friend Todd. Then, he'd go back over to play with him. When I heard his mom call him James, it all made sense. No wonder he wasn't responding to this overzealous 3 year-old. Turns out he didn't really know him at all! The next day, there was a new Todd at the playground. Would the real Todd please stand up?

What a funny guy! Before I sign off, and because they are so funny, here are some recent Willisms. Oh how I wish I could remember them all:

He runs around the house and has some fantastic collisions with walls, furniture, etc. Unlike Abby, though, he doesn't seem phased by it at all. He usually gets up and shakes it off, saying "good thing I was wearing my helmet [or shin guards]," despite his lack of either piece of equipment.

Emily: Will, what would you like to eat for lunch?

Will:  A tornado.

Emily: Well, it's kinda hard to eat those. They might blow you over. How about some peanut butter, or a banana, or yogurt?

Will: Nope. I want a tornado.

Will: Does God love storm troopers?

Emily: Yes, God loves everyone. Even bad guys. He might not like what they do, but He loves them.

Will: No, I think he only loves yogurt.

Will: Do transformers wear clothes?

Emily: I guess they don't. They're robots and they don't need clothes because they are made of metal.

He now uses the above obscure interaction to justify constantly taking off all his clothes as he streaks throughout the house. He says, "Autobots don't wear clothes." Sneaky little booger. We've had to set certain limits, like no answering the door and no going outside completely naked, but otherwise, we let him get away with it. For now. Besides, it helps with potty training.

Re: aforementioned naked jaunts, he was running around one day and peed on the floor. Abby came running in to tell us:

Abby: Mom, Will tinkled on the carpet!

Emily: Will, did you tinkle on the floor?

Will: No, it was the penis.

Another time, he was actually wearing a pull-up:

Emily: It looks like your pull-up is wet. Did you tinkle in it?

Will: No I didn't. It must have been somebody else. Maybe Luke Baldwin did it. Or Phillip.

At church, they sing "I've got the Joy, Joy, Joy, Joy Down in My Heart." He always sings the other songs, but sits mute during this particular one. When someone asked him why he doesn't sing along with this one, he told her point blank, "Joy makes me sick."

And last, but not least, he has talked a lot about the new baby. He has told the childcare workers at church that his mommy is having a brother AND a sister. In October. Yikes! I can't imagine. I'm not sure what exactly he thinks about the baby, but he KNOWS it's a brother. Every time someone mentions it being a girl or him having a little sister, he says "No, it's a brother." I even asked him about it a couple weeks ago:

Emily: Are you excited about having a new baby sister?

Will: No, it's a brother.

Emily: But, what if it were a sister?

Will: I already have a sister. I need 2 brothers.

And so it goes.

Fall [was] in the air

We finally made it to the Sweet Berry Farm fall festival this year. I've been meaning to do it for about the past 3 years and we've never gotten around to it! This year, I made it a Girl Scout outing, so I had to go! We had 2 of the other Daisies join us with another mom, so that was fun. The kids always enjoy horseback riding, hayrides, and games. They also painted pumpkins, which we realized we had left behind only when we were halfway back from Marble Falls. Luckily, we warded off any major meltdowns by reminding them that we could do our own pumpkins at home for Halloween. Phew!

For Halloween, we had another princess on hand. This time, she was accompanied by Spider-Man. They made a perfect team, along with 3 witches, a black cat, Bo Beep and her sheep, all from the neighborhood!

Both kids participated in the 1K fun run at Abby's school for their annual Fall Festival. Such serious competitors!

Later in the morning, Will won the cake walk and picked this huge cake decorated as a pumpkin. Had we thought about it more, we might not have chosen to START the festival there, but who could know we'd have to carry around a pumpkin cake all day?

Part of the festival is a kids' auction. Kids put tickets in bags for each item, to be selected by raffle later that day. Abby preferred to play the games with her tickets, but she did put 1 ticket in each of two baskets. Will put at least 7 tickets in the "Cars" extravaganza basket. He didn't understand why he couldn't walk away with it then and there. For 3 days, he kept asking if anyone had called to tell us that he won the basket. 

And then, the call came. Abby had won the Barbie basket. Great. I tried to be nonchalant about it when I went to pick it up but, of course, I had to take him with me. And, of course, the other 3 year-old boy who actually won the basket had to be in line right in front of us claiming his prize. Poor Will lost it all over again. I reminded him about winning the cake, but somehow that didn't make it any better. Life just isn't fair sometimes. Especially when you're 3.

New Car

After months of telling Brad we wouldn't need to buy a new car to get a 3rd car seat in the second row, we tried out the set-up. Just as I suspected, we got all 3 seats across. Haha. Vindication. We even got the 2 big kids in their seats comfortably. Now, buckling Abby was another matter since she uses the regular seat belt with her booster. We tried it for about 2 weeks until all of us got fed up with the hand scraping, seat climbing, and otherwise general madness that ensued every time we got in the car.

So, we bought a new car. On Ebay. Now, that's a trip! Well, it actually turned out to be a dealer in Houston, so we finalized everything over the phone, but we bought it sight unseen. Except for the 40+ pics on the Ebay listing! That's probably a more thorough look than we would have taken anyway! 

It turned out to be several thousand cheaper this way, so we were happy for that after the year we've had. We've now bought 2 cars and 2 front teeth, replaced 2 roofs and 2 partial fences, painted a house, and replaced a water main line this year. All before Christmas! But, I digress.

So, we had to figure out how to go get the car. Not as easy as it might sound. We had to pick it up within one week of purchase. It made the most sense for me to try to go during the week, but I couldn't just drive because then I'd have 2 cars to manage. A one-way plane ticket would cost $50 if I could wait 21 days, but on my timetable? $150. How about a car rental? Only $30 a day unless you want to drop it off in a different location. Then it's $140. Really? It costs them $110 to have a vehicle dropped 180 miles away?? Okay, we could just ship the car, right? $400. Again, 180 miles away, really? In stepped serendipity. Brad was asked to go meet with some guys at Rice for work. He had a co-worker that was going too, so he could just drop Brad off at the car dealer in time to pick up the car before his meeting (insert heavenly bell chorus and "Hallelujah" here). Done.

Abby Buchanan, Age 6

Abby is loving first grade. She's a rule follower, a people pleaser, a hard worker, and a good listener. School was absolutely MADE for kids like her. She received a good behavior award in the first month. She is really enjoying reading and math--and becoming quite good at them too. I don't remember such academic rigor when I was 6.

She's often the first one up in the morning. She will sometimes even get dressed, make herself breakfast, make her bed, and brush her teeth before we even roll over. Her new-found independence is a very welcome blessing in our household! The only hole in her strategy is that now, when she asks for help getting dressed or making her bed because she "can't do it by herself," we know otherwise!

There's a whole herd of kids on our block after school (usually about 7-10). Our backyard has become the place of choice for their general merrymaking. They sometimes even try to convince Abby to play out there when she doesn't want to. But, usually, she's more than happy to oblige and play hostess to the whole crowd. After all, that puts her in charge. Even with the older kids. And, Will loves joining in the fray too, so it's nice to have them all in one place under her watchful eye!

She's still enjoying Girl Scouts (I think!) and she's joined the Children's Choir at our church. When she turns 6 1/2, she tells me, she'll be ready to try piano lessons, but not before. So, we stay pretty busy without losing sight of the all-important after-school play time which so many kids don't get these days. It's good for the soul and the imagination, both of which she exudes with abundance.