The Cosmos Have Come Together!

So! We're back in Colorado, and have been for over a month. Over Christmas we finally bought our first computer(YAY YAY YAY!) AND at the beginning of February we subscribed to an internet service for the first time in our marriage! So I've been meaning to update the blog (like, the first night we had internet), but then at night when I finally had a chance to use it after the kids went to bed Tyson was on it. . . and the next night. . .and then other stuff came up I had to do. . .but the cosmos have come together and I'm finally doing a blog!

I really want to catch up but I'm going to post a lot of random stuff before I forget:

Jeffrey. Continues to be the star older brother. Amazing at sharing, helping, pushing the stroller, doing dishes, cleaning up, trying to cook, etc. He's still quite possessive of Jacob. Today I was in nursery for a few minutes and another boy came up and put his hand on Jacob's car seat. Jeffrey took off running towards the boy and tried ripping his hand off of the car seat. He gets mad at me if I'm holding Jacob (or feeding him) when he wants a turn.

Favorites of Jeffrey--

Favorite Apostle-President Uchtdorf

Favorite letters--T for train, Y for yo-yo, and A, just because it's first in the alphabet. Thanks to starfall.com he recognizes almost all the letters-usually he justmixes up D and P and d and b.

Favorite colors --blue or orange. Those are the colors he always guesses something is when I ask what color something is (he is still working on learning his colors)

Favorite thing to pray about--the car. When we were stranded in Utah we said a lot of prayers about the car, and after returning to Colorado, when he started saying prayers on his own, they went something like this:

"Heavenly Father, Thank thee day. Thank thee food. Bless Andy. Car car car car car car car car car car car car car car car car car car. . ." you get the idea. He repeats car until I just finish the prayer for him then he says Amen. No matter how much I prompt him to say something else, he just repeats car. Now Amri does it for her prayers too.

Favorite number: 2

Favorite scripture: 2 Nephi 2:25 We repeat it at night before going to bed. He can say the first half by himself. His favorite part is the end. It goes something like this
C: men

J: men

C: are

J: are

C: that

J:that

C: they

J: they

C: might

J: might

C: have. . .

J: "JOOYYYY!" punctuated by a big smile and fists in the air. Very cute. Amri does it too.

Favorite toys: trains and cars, but he likes most things. . .even playing dolls with Amri. He loves being outside and playing at parks. Still gets really excited seeing dogs, cows, and horses.

Most requested song: Dumbo elephant

Something funny that happened with Jeffrey recently:

His Uncle Colby got him into music that is, perhaps, more rambunctious than I would play for him-aka Shrek soundtrack. Anyway on Friday I had the soundtrack for "How to Train Your Dragon" on and then it switched to different music. We had a conversation that went something like this.

J: Mommy, Dragon music-boy music!

C: Dragon music is boy music?

J: Yeah! Mommy, I want boy music!

Something cute that shows his personality:

Tonight I looked over in the kitchen and Jeffrey and Amri were both standing on a chair together in front of the sink. Jeffrey turned on the water and got his hand wet. Then he turned to Amri and started washing her face off with his hand. Amri, who usually resists when Jeffrey tries to help her, calmly stood motionless for him while he did it, looking towards the sink. It was so adorable. We love Jeffrey so much!

Amri. Just turned 18 months on Friday. I finally got a sweet video of her repeating the alphabet and our nightly scripture. We've tried before but she usually refuses to do things if you're trying to get her to do something. Her vocabulary is too huge to try and list. She can say anything she wants to say (but not when WE want her to say it). A couple of weeks ago we found a picture book that had been lost for a few weeks that she and Jeffrey got for Christmas. Tyson had never seen it before. He was doing homework and Amri came up and plopped it on his lap.

"JELLYFISH!"

Tyson looked up and she WAS pointing at the jellyfish. When he told me that I was surprised because she hadn't seen that picture of the jellyfish in weeks.

She moved her little finger "Cwab! (crab) Tuh-tle! Shark! Do-fin! (Dolphin) Star! (starfish) Eel! Whale!" I think the only thing she didn't know how to tell Tyson was the lobster. She knows almost all the common animals kids know and likes to do growling sounds for lions and bears.

Favorite letter: W

Favorite toys: Dolls and Carebears. She and Jeffrey sometimes fight over the Carebears when they go to bed. Speaking of which, they officially share the same bed now (or packnplay, in this case). Jeffrey just always climbed in with Amri no matter how many times I took him out or tried to teach him to stay in his own bed. We finally folded up his little cot into the closet. I have to put them in separate bedrooms for naps (which means Jeffrey now naps in our bedroom) or else I hear giggling for two hours and then have cranky kids when they come out because they had no nap. At night we hear giggling for about 30-40 minutes before they go to sleep. But they are really good friends. When Amri takes her morning nap, Jeffrey is always asking for Amri, and when Amri wakes up from her afternoon nap and Jeffrey's still sleeping, she asks for him and wants to wake him up. They are best friends and partners in crime quite frequently. For example: Jeffrey frequently wakes up at early morning hours and goes "exploring" in the house, mainly the kitchen, trying to find things to get into that he shouldn't. We're still working on getting a lock on his door (basically we have to make some adjustments on the door before putting the lock on). He'll push chairs around and climb all over the stove and counters getting stuff. Last night Tyson and I left a bowl of popcorn in a corner of the counter that I didn't think Jeffrey would find. He did. This morning I found the bowl upside-down in the packnplay. . .popcorn in the bed. . .in Amri's hair. Whatever they do, they almost always do together. They just now got caught eating some forbidden cookies.

Favorite activity:books. She LOVES books. She's also really liking coloring. It's just bad when she combines the two (coloring IN the books. . .that happened once or twice)

Favorite word to say in a growly voice: Tractor

Amri's personality: She is very easy going and very happy. She usually happily goes about doing her own thing, she doesn't need a lot of adult suggestion/direction to find things to do. If she's not tired for her nap time, I'll hear her playing in there by herself quietly for up to an hour, making her dolls talk to each other or something. When she and Jeffrey want to play with the same toy and Jeffrey takes it aways, she'll let out a scream for about 2 seconds then promptly goes to find something new. Or, if she wins the toy from Jeffrey and he's throwing a fit, she'll play with it for about 20 seconds then give it to Jeffrey to play with. She moves on quickly when faced with disappointment/conflict. She's really a good little girl most of the time. Everyone that's cared for her, like babysitters or nursery leaders, say that she (and Jeffrey, for that matter) are so great to watch because they are so easy going.

Someone once described Amri as being a "social laugher". It describes her perfectly. When we have other people over for dinner (which we do about at least once a week) and all the adults laugh at something, when we stop she'll suddenly throw back her head and laugh--even though she has no idea what we're laughing about. Then we usually all start laughing at Amri because it's so funny.

Amri is also adept at getting her own way. She doesn't get upset at much, but when she does, watch out! She'll throw a huge fit complete with shrieking, screams, and sobs. Then suddenly she'll stop and through her tears look up and say in a small voice with big blue eyes, "Cookie?"

Her happy-go-lucky attitude gets her in trouble sometimes. Jeffrey has always been great at listening to me--or at least acknowledging that I was talking to him, whether he chose to actually obey or not (and he usually obeys). Amri, on the other hand, will completely ignore me. Once a couple of months ago I was nursing Jacob at my mom's house on the couch and Amri and Jeffrey were playing on the floor a few feet away in front of me. Suddenly there was some kind of conflict (which is pretty rare), and Amri started slamming a little metal toy train in Jeffrey's face over and over again. I couldn't jump up and stop her, and I kept yelling "Stop!" while Jeffrey was bawling and Amri was laughing hysterically, totally ignoring me, and still hitting him. After about 10 seconds of this, I did the only thing I could do--I grabbed a throw pillow from the couch and chucked it at Amri. It hit her in the face and knocked her backwards on the carpet. It didn't hurt her at all, but I think she was kind of stunned and trying to figure out what happened. And then she got distracted looking at the ceiling and totally forgot the whole incident.

That kind of thing happens pretty often. I tell her to do something and she pretends she didn't hear me (I know she CAN, otherwise there's no way she'd have such a vocabulary). Or she thinks it's hysterical to do exactly the opposite--like running into the road. And then as I'm chastising her she's laughing with her head thrown back. I put her in time out in her bed and she'll be crying until I leave the room--then she starts entertaining herself somehow. She's a very easy going child, but there are a few little things that she seems bent on always doing her way--like taking food from the kitchen over to the couch, for example (strictly forbidden). But most of the time she really is a very good little girl. We love her so much.

Jacob: very smiley, content, cute laugh. I feel like he knows me so well--way better than Jeffrey or Amri did. That's not putting it right--Jacob prefers me more than the other two did. A lot of times I felt like Jeffrey or Amri didn't care who was feeding them or holding them, just as long as someone was but they didn't prefer me above other people. Not Jacob. He's an angel for me, but my mom informed me several times he always knew exactly when I'd leave to go somewhere--and then he'd cry the whole time I'd be gone.

I can be across the room, and he'll be playing with his hands or a toy or something, and I'll call to him and he'll look up and get the HUGEST smile on his face. I love it. My baby knows me.

He sleeps much better when he's swaddled and usually wakes up only once a night and then 6:40am to eat. He's good at recognizing people. Jeffrey loves him so much but there are times when Jeffrey isn't as soft as he should be while trying to play with him, and then next time Jeffrey comes up to Jacob he gets a little look of terror on his face, so Jeffrey plays with something else. Jacob also enjoys being outside in his bouncy chair and stroller rides.

That's about it for our family. More updates should come soon. Below is the video of Amri on her 18 month birthday on Friday repeating the alphabet and scripture. Excuse her messy hair--she had just pulled off her head band (she likes pulling out whatever I put in to pull her hair back). You can also see how she likes the letter W as she keeps repeating it at random times. I should have told her to say tractor.