Crash Pile

Today we decided to get a little extra energy out by making a Crash Pile. I think I saw this idea on another blog not too long ago. Unfortunately, I don't remember which blog. The gist is that you take as many cushions, pillows, soft blankets, etc. you can find and dump them in a giant pile on the floor. Then, you take turns jumping into it. Bennett loved it. His eyes lit up the second I jumped into it and he realized what it was for.

After we took the cushions off of the couch we realized how badly the couch needed vacuumed. It's been a while...I got the vacuum out and Bennett immediately ran and got his toy vacuum to help me. He was pretty excited when I let him help with the real vacuum.

Feeler

Bennett is definitely a "feeler". I don't really mean that he's sensitive about his feelings necessarily, probably about as much as anyone is, but that he's super sensitive to others feelings. Even when he was six or seven months old, he would cry and cry when the little girl I babysat would cry. If she was crying in the crib while she was trying to go to sleep, he would crawl to his room and knock on the door to try to get to her. I'm sure this probably isn't a whole lot different than a lot of kids, but it warms my heart to see my little boy caring so much about others.

*Yes, please notice our tin foil on our antenna. You would do it too if you didn't have cable/dish and only sporadically got major networks (&even then not all of them. ABC? What's that?)


Tonight, he was shuffling through our stack of movies when he brought me Madagascar 2. We've "watched" this movie before (you know, as much as an 18-month-old watches a movie) &I knew that Bennett really loved the music in it. We hadn't watched much TV today, so I put the DVD on and helped Bennett get settled in his chair. I had some things to do, so I left him and went to the other room. Pretty soon, I hear him crying freaking out like he'd been hurt or something. I came back in the living room to find him pointing to the empty zoo exhibit with people crying and mourning the loss of their zoo animals who were missing on the screen. I reassured him that everything was going to be okay and left the room again. Soon, I hear him crying again and he comes running into the bedroom. We returned to the living room in time to see the baby lion floating in a box in the ocean after being separated from his dad. About this time I decided that the movie was (apparently) too scary for Bennett and we just turned on the music videos.

I had no idea that at 18-months-old, Bennett could understand so much about a movie! I know a certain 7-year-old sister-in-law of mine reacts the same way to the scary parts of Disney movies. Okay, okay...maybe I react the same way, too. There is a reason that Dumbo & Bambi aren't allowed in this house.

I Said What?! Wednesday

Here are some things that I couldn't believe I said this week:

"I just want to poop alone!"

Bennett got a Tow Mater sticker from the Dr.'s office & was trying to talk to it.
Matt: "He can't hear you, Bennett. He's a sticker. Stickers aren't like you and me. They can't hear."

Apparently, we didn't say too many rediculous things this week! Although, at this exact moment, Matt is talking to Bennett like Elmo. I think that counts. Here's an picture to make up for the lack of craziness. It's a picture of Bennett eating a "burger". He just looks so big here!

*Sorry if this shows up in your Google Reader again. I guess I didn't read it before I posted it and there were just too many errors for me to leave it alone!

18 Months

18 months? Really? Yesterday Matt & I were talking about how it doesn't seem like it's been 6 months since we celebrated Bennett's 1st birthday. It's only going to be 6 more months until we have a 2-year-old. That just seems crazy to me. I mean, I know it's half a year, but time is just going way too fast.

Bennett had his 18 month well check up today. Here are his stats for this month:

24 lbs- 25th Percentile

33 inches- 72nd Percentile

Bennett Likes:
Balls
"Playing" Football
Cars & Trucks
Mowing
Rock music (like hard rock...blech)
His independence


Bennett Dislikes:
Naps
Singing bedtime songs
Eating what I want him to eat
Holding hands to pray


Triumphs this Month:
Talking even more
Really understanding what we say/directions

Struggles this Month:
Naps
More defiant when he knows what he wants

Happy, Happy {half} Birthday to YOU!

Today is Bennett's half birthday! Growing up, I always thought it was neat thinking that I was halfway to the next age. I used to give my friends a hard time when they would forget my half birthday. Jokingly. I mean I really don't seriously expect people to celebrate my half birthday. It's August 10th, by the way...and none of you remembered.

Now that we have a child, I think we're going to celebrate half birthdays in this family. I'm not going to go overboard or anything. I mean, no decorations or gifts, but I definitely think we can have cake. We didn't do that last year when Bennett was six months, obviously, but we're starting today.

We have our small group from church at our house tonight, so Bennett helped me make some cupcakes to have as a snack. He loves to help with anything, so he was pretty excited to help his mama mix up treats. &yes, we used a boxed mix (look away, my cupcake snob friends).

Bennett was too excited to start helping to be bothered with smiling for the camera.

The lighting in our house is basically nonexistent.

It's so hard to wait for them to bake!

He was so excited &proud of what he made that we let him have half of one early. Oh, and he just got out of the bath, so his hair is wet.

I frosted the cupcakes during Bennett's nap. I figured he had already taken one bath today. We really didn't need frosting in our hair. Maybe next year he can help with this part. He'll be so excited to share them with his friends tonight!

I Said What?! Wednesday

Today Bennett decided not to take a nap. He just laid in his bed for hours talking, singing and occasionally crying. Matt was home today and ended up going in Bennett's room to see if he could get him to sleep. Within minutes they were in there laughing together. Not a big deal, I mean what is life without bending nap rules every once in a while? Unfortunately, Bennett was actually really tired. He spent the rest of the afternoon trying to stay awake. Meaning running around like crazy, not stopping for a second save trying to convince us that he needed to watch "Coo Coos" (Blues Clues).

We tried taking him on a long walk to see if he'd fall asleep...uh, no. Then when we got home from the walk he became naughty-tired. At one point he picked up the pie pumpkin (little pumpkin for those of you who think I'm nuts for calling it a pie pumpkin even though the sign clearly says PIE PUMPKINS...but that's another blog post) from the side table and threw it on the floor. Luckily it didn't split open or anything, but enough was enough. So, my sweet boy got his first time-out.

Hold the phone. He's nearly 18-months-old and this is his first time-out? Yeah. Yeah, it is. I couldn't figure out a good place for him to take time outs. I haven't felt like he would understand that he had to sit in one place, so that left out any place that he wasn't confined. I don't want his crib to a place of punishment and the only other place that leaves is his high chair. That didn't make sense to me either. So, we've found other ways to discipline until we felt that he could understand that he had to sit in one spot for a time-out.

Anyway, I picked him up and put him on the couch, quickly shoving anything exciting that was on the couch (remote, pillows, etc.) out of the way and told him sternly that he had to sit there for a little while. Amazingly, it worked. Poor baby cried with his bottom lip out. He looked so pathetic. I had to stand there and sit him back down a few times, but man-oh-man he sat there for a whole minute. There was something about the poor look on his face and the ridiculous things that I was saying to him that made me want to laugh, but I managed to hold it in. I found myself saying things like, "We don't throw pumpkins when we are upset." & "You need to tell Mommy that you're sorry for throwing a pumpkin."

It got me thinking about the things that I've said in the last 18 months that I would never have said without Bennett. I'm sure that other moms reading this can relate, so I think I'm going to start a feature "I Said What?! Wednesdays" and post crazy things that Bennett has made me said throughout the week. I'm sure I won't have too much of a problem coming up with material. But since I just decided to do this tonight, I only have two to share tonight.

"We don't throw pumpkins when we are upset."
"Lets not drive the car on the guitar."

**Sorry for the lack of photos...

PSA: Back Up Your Pictures!

Ugh! Saturday night, I was online and an alert popped up in the bottom right hand corner of the laptop screen. It said something about an issue that it wanted me to deal with right then. I had no idea what it was, so I just exited out (mistake #1). About a minute later, a blue screen appeared saying that there was an error & then the computer shut down. Oh. NO. It spent the rest of the night trying to restart & fix the problem on it's own, to no avail. I eventually shut the thing off manually, stupidly thinking that maybe if it was off overnight it would fix the problem.

Sunday afternoon, we turned the laptop back on and it was still doing the same thing as the night before. Surprise, surprise. We tried a few of the options that the computer was prompting us to do, but none of them worked either. The last thing it suggested was to run recovery...so we did (big mistake #2). As it finished running recovery I got a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. I was just sure that it had erased everything. &what do you know? It did. Oh yes, I was soon greeted by a friendly screen welcoming me to my "New HP Computer!" Blah. After I set up my "new computer" I confirmed that everything was gone. Everything. All our documents, pictures, videos, music....everything.

I had a lot of pictures on facebook & several videos on youtube, but definitely not even half of them. There are no videos before Bennett was 3 months old. I made a video for his first birthday...it's gone. All of those adorable videos of newborn Bennett cooing at us...gone. breaks. my. heart.

End of the world? Well, no. But what happens when I can't recall those videos in my memory? Seriously. I can't stop kicking myself.

Moral of my sad, sad story? Please back up your pictures & videos. Music & documents for that matter, too! You can bet that I'll be backing all of mine up each and every time I put them on the computer.

Depressing post. Here's a picture to cheer me  you up.