Chopsticks, Mispronunciations

Christian is a real whiz with chopsticks...

He's really good. He holds them correctly, or at least better than Dae does! (As Korean as Dae is, he does not hold chopsticks correctly)

Other news: Olin mispronounces a lot of words. It is hilarious!

"Boo-bay" = Broken, and I always think he is saying poopie for a poopie diaper
"Nom-as" = Thomas

Sometimes I will ask him to say random words just to hear what he comes up. I love it. On the flip side, he says some words with alarming clarity, like "church".  Just like Leelee, he really enunciates the "CH" sound well. (With that protrusive upper lip going full force :)

Coconut Water

Olin likes all kinds of adult things. Nuts, kombucha drink, kim chi, beef. Things we would never expect him to like he likes.

I guess it's not surprising when I gave the kids coconut water yesterday, leelee said "Yuck" and Olin kept asking for more. This morning he came to me in the bathroom carrying a bottle of coconut water asking me to open it for him.

His vocab is finally exploding! He knows the colors, animal, sounds animals make (cow = moo, pig = oink) and he conveniently eliminates the "S" in many words. "Snowman" becomes "No-man" and "Stop" becomes "dop". He kept saying "Noooo" when we had all that snow outside and I kept forgetting that he was actually trying to say snow!

Good Nights

We don't generally get a lot of good nights of sleep here. So Dae and I set up this incentive program for the kids (Leelee) to both 1) stay in his room all night and 2) if he has to come over, to not cry or scream when he enters our room. The first night he was promised Dairy Queen and that guy stayed in his room all night for the first time in months. So we got dip cones at DQ last night. Now we're back to stars for every night that he stays in his room.

So last night he came over to our room around midnight and quietly got into bed. When he woke up this morning, he said "Mom, what about my star?".  I said that stars were only given out if he stayed in his room all night. He said "But how about because I was quiet?" and I stalled for a minute but then stuck to my guns and asked "But, if I give you star for just being quiet, what do you get if you stay in your room all night?" and he said he gets Dairy Queen. So I was laughing and told him that we couldn't go to Dairy Queen every day since it was a really special one-time occasion and before I could continue he said "No, I think I should get a star, and actually it's a good thing that I didn't stay in my room all night because then we'd have to go to Dairy Queen tonight and we can't go to Dairy Queen every day!" The logic! (At time of press, he has not gotten a star yet)

He made this February calendar at school. Cracks me up. Well over half of his numbers are backwards. His teacher Karin assured me last year that writing backward was nothing to worry about and was not a predictor of dyslexia.

Snow, Continued!

Horsing around this morning

"Crazy faces" per Leelee's request

Walked to Yoke's pulling these guys in the sled. We took one spill and Olin landed with a full-on faceplant in the snow. The guy was beside himself!

Happy to be home (especially me). On the way back Leelee said it was "the best ride ever!"

Anniversary

It's Dae and my 6th Anniversary today! I think both of us almost forgot :) But we pulled it together and had a day filled with:

1. Sledding with the boys down Carmichael hill. And....(drumroll)....they hated it. haha! We picked too big of a hill for their inaugural run. At least I got the sleds on sale at Target...

Baby was done after one run. He just sat in this sled up on the sidewalk. Dae did force him to go one more time against his will.

2. Picking out appliances and plumbing fixtures (think toilets) at Bunch Finnigan and Home Depot. (Only romance for us today!)

For all our visitors, you'll soon be sitting on one of these beauties! haha!

Dae gets sold on the smallest, funniest features. He was excited about this little pizza drawer in the freezer, and was very, very excited about this chopstick tray in our new dishwasher. I was pretty excited about that too. 

This home remodeling thing is some serious business. It has been all-consuming. I feel like it's my full time job!

3. Dinner in the bar at Bonefish Grill, our new favorite hangout. We've probably come here 4 out of the past 5 date night and really like it. Cozy and laid back and they have Taittinger champagne. Yummy.

Non-anniversary related, Megan and I planned a one-night girls night on Monday in Seattle, so my mom watched the kids in Bellevue and I met with Megan downtown at a hotel. It was lots of fun, as always. I would say 50% of our nights end up with us at Walgreens buying either candy, cosmetics, magazines, or all 3, and this night was no different! We joked it was "Dentist's Night out" - getting wild and crazy!

I have been sick for the past 1 week and it has been no fun. I lost my voice in Seattle but felt fine, and thought that I was on the road to recovery - no such luck. Now, for the past 3 nights I have had the worst sore throat on my left side, so I am just hoping it bounces back so I can feel normal again! Baby and Leelee were also sick, baby still has a runny nose and both kids are coughing a bit. Olin keeps getting these bloody noses, poor thing.

Superbowl Sunday, Home Depot, Photons

Recent Leelee-isms:

"Mom, are you going to watch the super goal today?"

I told Leelee that Seattle Seahawks were playing football today and that Puo Puo lives in Seattle. Leelee asks "Is Puo Puo going to play?"

He asks SO many questions. He shoots them out rapid-fire. Tonight at bedtime I was reading to Olin and Dae was reading to Christian. All I hear is Dae trying to read the Planets book and Leelee asking a million questions. I didn't hear Dae's full response on one of them, but I did catch the word "photons" in his explanation. I looked over and Dae caught me looking and we started laughing. In what context does a 4 year old need to know about photons!

Home Depot fun

I took the kids on six errands in a row today. Call me crazy. Barracuda coffee, Michael's craft supply, Feser custom cabinets, Home Depot, Winco, and Office Depot. They did miraculously great!

Peanuts for Sale

Kids are so funny. The 7 kids (my kids, Ev's kids, Kelly's kids) went to Five Guys and while the adults were talking these kids de-shelled about a million peanuts, even putting the youngest guy Olin to work. In addition, they swiped a couple more 'carts' of shelled peanuts and set up shop outside our house selling peanuts. I missed the whole thing since I was meeting with the cabinet guy but Ev said she glanced outside and saw Didi sitting in the cart trying to sell peanuts. I guess they sold a cart to Jeff and a cart to the nanny. So funny.