June 23 - 29

On Monday Bennett was coughing a lot and wasn't interested in dinner.  He ended up having an early bed time.

On Tuesday he woke up feeling warm but didn't have a fever.  However, by late morning we got the call from school that his temperature was up to 101 and we had to pick him up.  After lunch he napped and then spent the afternoon watching movies.

By Wednesday, of course, he was better but still had to stay home from school.  Due to work commitments Chris and I split coverage.  However, due to how we coordinated things Bennett ended up only getting about a 10 minute car nap.  I tried getting him to rest longer at home, but no luck.  Instead we went outside to play.  Here his is making "pancakes" on his slide.

We also went on a pretend trip to Sturbridge.  We got our stickers at the ticket window, went to the tin shop (where Phil was working making lanterns) and then Bennett realized he'd forgotten his backpack.  So he went back to the car to get that.  Down at the farm Dave was plowing with Lance and Henry.

On Thursday Bennett's listening ears stopped working, and I think they stayed off through the weekend!  He watched Curious George while Daddy made dinner and I went out for a run.  When I got back we all ate and then Daddy went back to work for a few hours.  Due to the lack of listening Bennett didn't get to play during his bath, no book at bedtime, and he even lost his stuffies (a last resort for us) before the lights were even turned off.  Normally they get taken away if he spends too long talking to himself after the lights go out.

I think the lack of naps caught up to Bennett on Friday.  He fell asleep in the car on the way home from school at 5:30.  He woke up a couple of hours later pretty disoriented, but he then went back to sleep and was fine until morning.

On Saturday we had our weekly OSV trip.

As we arrived right at opening we were able to see the sawmill running.

Victoria was cutting profiles again, so this time I had one done.  Now Chris just needs to have a turn.  :)

After Sturbridge we headed off to a birthday party and then when we went got home Bennett started working on her Derby car.

Waiting for Daddy to get everything ready.

Cutting out his car.  He got bored after the first cut.

Sanding

On Sunday we went food shopping and then Bennett started painting his car.  At least someone in the family isn't going to be working at the last minute!

Next we went to Uncle Andrew and Aunt Gentry's for a housewarming cookout. They recently got chicks and Bennett was giving naming rights for one of them.  In the past he had suggested "chicken" but then when we asked again he started saying nonsensical two syllable names.  When listing off names he happened to say "yummy".  I think that's a fun name for a chicken!

After a late nap he played in the pool for a while and then we went for a bike ride.  Oh and those listening ears?  Still not working!

Daddy Daycare and Weekend Fun

Daddy Daycare-
Chris has July (mostly) off from work so is watching Bennett a couple of days a week.  The other days Bennett goes to school and Daddy stays home and works on his etsy business.  One of the benefits of Chris being home is that I get texts throughout the day letting me know what's going on.  Below are some of the texts and photos that Chris has sent to me.  Comments from me are in parentheses.

Friday 7/5

• 99 big yellow hats on the wall, 99 big yellow hats.  If one of those hats should happen to fall...  It takes that many hats to get to the country house.  (This is a Curious George reference.  We find it odd that sometimes they live in the city and sometimes in the country.  The books are this way as well, with no explanation of them moving or getting a vacation home.)
• Now we're doing Legos.  He's building a "house".  Pieces that don't fit are "bad".

•  "my lunch"

• Just read the Sandra Boynton collection.  This was after reading the other half of the bookshelf.
• He's washing the table with his squirt gun.
• Ice cream soda.  Literally.

• Clifford is attacking me.  Just in case you wonder why I'm not here when you get home.
• Bennett would like to go to the store with you.  He wants corn on the cob for lunch.
• I have to make hotdogs outside.  And he didn't mention going outside until I asked if he wanted a hotdog for lunch. (You can't make it on the stove?) Nope.  Outside.  (Have fun with that.  Maybe he'll run around a bit and tire himself out for nap?)  I'm doing them inside.  (Wimp. )  I'm caving. (Ha.  He's whining, isn't he.  "My want outside.")  No. Just politely insisting that hotdogs go outside.
• "I need shoes.  Get those.  Go outside.  I need hat."
• Apparently the leaves all over the deck are the result of "Daddy make mess outside."
• We're using the umbrella.  Cause we also have to eat outside for hotdogs. (which in the next few days prompted multiple conversations where Bennett asked why Daddy opened the umbrella.)
• George is going to Scotland.  To play golf.  At the Uncle with the Green Tam's Castle.  The Man With The Yellow Hat (TMWTYH) has a brother who has to show the deed on the castle every year or pay the back taxes.  400 years worth.  Otherwise he has to move out by 3pm.  TMWTYH was wearing a kilt.  Yellow of course.  No tam.

Wednesday 7/10

• Your son took out his umbrella and held it over his head on the way in to Wegmans.  Then put it away when we got inside.  (He doesn't have an umbrella, so this was all pantomimed.)
• He pinched his neck in the car.  He said "kiss my neck when get home.  Give me big hug and kiss."  I said sure thing.
• (He then sent this photo, which I recognized as being a "house".)

• Everyone is sitting down to watch the movie.  Curious George of course.  That uses all of the Legos.  The ones that don't have wheels anyway.

• Ate half of a hamcheese (this is what Bennett calls it) sandwich.  Left some of the cheese, which is weird.  Took it apart and ate the ham, then some cheese and then ate the bread.
• (@1:40) Went up at 1.  He's still talking.
• (@2:40) He just pooped so maybe now he'll sleep.
• (@3:04) He finally fell asleeo shortly after the poop.
• And we're outside in the pool.  (It's that nice out?) It was kinda nice.  Then the rain started.  He wasn't happy about having to come inside.

Friday 7/12

• Mummy, I waked up.
• (Absolutely GORGEOUS weather!  Cooler temperature and very little humidity.)  Almost let him play in the pool this morning.  But I think we'll wait until this afternoon. (I was wondering about that.  Still a little cool for the pool.  Did you empty it?  And if so, did he freak out?)Nope.  He actually wanted to help.
• Pumping up bike tires. We may need to go for a ride later. (OK.  If it stays this nice, I'm game.)

• He's helping inflate tires.  It's very tiring. (It's good to put him to work.  Hopefully he gets more air in the tires than he lets out.) He didn't help for long.  But now he wants to go for a bike ride.  And I'm not up for that right now. (That was your fault for working on them now.  I could have told you he would want a ride now.) But that's what's been stopping us, right? (Yes, but you should have been prepared to do a ride right now.) Nope.  Teaching him about being patient.  And we don't want to prevent Mummy from having fun.  
• (This photo of Bennett in a pirate hat sweeping around the garden.)

• He's kicking his soccer ball around the garden.
• And now we have a cape and going up the rock wall.
• (after nap) And now for the pool.

When I got home we did go for a bike ride.  He was very excited!

And now for the weekend recap.

On Saturday morning Bennett went to Nana and Grandpas.  He mentioned numerous times how we walked with Grandpa to the playground and his shoes got all wet because he jumped in puddles.

After nap Bennett started working on some puzzles.  These are a couple of Curious George puzzles that he's working on.  He's done them so many times he almost has them memorized.  

We went to Toys R Us looking for some more challenging puzzles.  We weren't thrilled with the selection, but we spent a while exploring the store.  He did really well and didn't get too upset when we had to leave.

On Sunday we went back to Sturbridge.  I'm wondering if we're now averaging 3+ visits a month.  Last year we went about every other week.

In the visitor's center is this display on the wall explaining how to direct the oxen.  I think Bennett may need some lessons.

While taking a ride with Pete and Jim Bennett started waving and saying hi to the horses leading the stagecoach.  So we asked our driver what their names were- Worthy and Barney. (Shown here are Pete and Jim.)

I made a book of photos from the first year of our OSV membership.  Bennett loves looking at it.  I've already started one for his year as well.  I decided that it should have a "meet the animals" page, so I took a number of photos of the animals.  Here's the new calf, Summer, who was born on the Summer Solstice (June 21st.)

On the daily agenda was "Meet the oxen".  Since it was down at the farm we thought it would be Lance and Henry, but instead Doc and Blue came up the road pulling a wagon of teasel.  We told the farmer about how Bennett was directing imaginary oxen around the house and he thought that was funny.  He mentioned that his son sometimes uses these types of commands (gee, haw, ho, etc.) to direct him around the grocery store.

After lunch Bennett participated in the French and English tug of war.  He was on the English side, but unfortunately they lost. Maybe because right before they started pulling Bennett ran off to the water pump.

That's right, filling his hat up at the pump and dumping it on his head was much more fun.  At least it cooled him off a bit.

Here's Worthy and Barney.  (Worthy is on the right.)

Why yes, I do have my son pose as girls.

And that pretty much wraps up our week!

Stunning Summer!

It's time for the weekly recap!

Puzzles continue to be an almost daily activity.  He zips through them pretty quickly now.  Time to either mix them up a bit so that he isn't doing the same ones all the time (tricky since he likes these so much) or get him some more difficult ones. 

This week he wanted to play wiht his LEGOs again.  He hasn't used them in a while. One night he built a fence and then got the horses from his Little People farm sets to put behind the fence.  Cute! 

Silly glasses from school got played with.  Given how cheap they are and the fact that the lens from one is popped out, maybe it's time they got relocated to the circular file, but Bennett doesn't seem to mind.

For a while now I've been thinking about getting Bennett a child-sized carrier so that he can wear his dolls.  I wasn't sure he would be into it.  But then one night we wrapped George on his back with a towel while Bennett was on his way to bed after his bath.  Ever since then, Bennett wants George on his back after bath.  So maybe he would like a carrier after all.

I went ahead and got one for him and when it arrived he happily tried it on.  But then after a couple of minutes he wanted it taken off.  Apparently, in his mind, the Boba (this is the brand) is only for use at Sturbridge.  I guess this kind of makes sense since that's pretty much the only time that I wear him in my Boba.

So on Saturday when we went to Sturbridge we brought the Boba Mini and George along.  He was very happy to wear George!  He took George off for potty breaks and at lunch but then happily put him back on again.  Now we just need him to use the Boba at other times and maybe it will really have been worth the expense.

Speaking of Sturbridge, here's our traditional photo in the cut-out.

Doc and Blue, the two oxen shown below, were out and about when we arrived.  Bennett was very excited to see them and showed off his knowledge of which one was which.  We were told that they needed a bit more cart training, so they had the lovely task of hauling some manure. 

For months we never went in Cooper shop. Then a couple of months ago we went in and now Bennett always wants to go in and try out the draw knife.

Betsy had a calf her day before, right after closing time.  She was keeping her distance from everyone.

As we were leaving I put Bennett up on my shoulders.  The only thing that could make it even cuter would be if George was on his shoulders rather than his back.

We forgot to take this picture on Saturday so we were a day late.  (Which is better than I've done in some previous months.)  Bennett is now 33 months old.  I like that he has the Curious George book in his lap.  Very fitting of his life right now.  Thought about switching Paddington for CG but decided to stick with the traditional stuffed animal.  And since Bennett is such a creature of habit, he may not have even allowed me to make the change.

On Sunday morning we went to visit Mimi.  Before we left I was cleaning up the front hall and came across a picture of a giraffe that Bennett had colored.  I suggested that he bring it to Mimi since she likes giraffes.  He was cool with that and then he ran off to get a library book of his (Cecily G and the 9 Monkeys) since it was about a giraffe.

After our visit we came home for lunch and nap and then headed off to Auntie Mel's house.  The boys played outside for a bit and then we headed off for the pool.


I think I have this less than awesome expression on my face because I was getting splashed.  The downside of Bennett still being pretty young is that I had to get into the water more quickly than I wanted.  But he was rushing in, so I had to keep up with him.

 

He had a blast jumping off the side of the pool!  Sometimes I held onto him and sometimes we just let him jump on his own.  He kept jumping over and over again. 

After the pool we went back inside, got changed, played outside a bit longer, ate dinner, and then headed home for a late bedtime.  It was a great summer day!