Easter Eggs & The Boy Who Loves Chocolate

Ben apparently wanted to get an early start on Easter 2015 this morning by waking up before it was even light out (normally he sleeps until 8ish). Luckily for me, I'd already been outside hiding the Easter eggs in the backyard.

So Ben began his Easter with an egg hunt in the drizzly-wet morning, and then moved on to playing with his Easter basket (containing insect-shaped eggs, a set of mini plastic tools, bubbles, and CANDY). This was Ben's real first go at true, mass-produced candy and let's just say he enjoyed his chocolate bunny and marshmallow peeps even more than I would have (which is saying something).

After needing a good hosing-off from all the sticky food, Clay took him to the park to work some of the sugar. The excess craziness still hadn't worn off by this afternoon, though, because he spent a really long time talking and laughing to himself in his crib during nap time, but never did fall asleep. Apparently there is a good reason we don't ever give Ben candy.

This past week, Ben and I also had a lot of fun dyeing eggs with our good friend, Tina and her son. I think she and I got more pleasure out of the dyeing process than the kids did, but at least they (mostly) let us dye in peace. I also found a couple of good "hacks" for Easter eggs online: using a baby nose-suctioner for blowing out eggs, and putting a hard-boiled egg inside a whisk to help a toddler dye with less mess. This year I turned the blown eggs I dyed into birds for my Easter tree, which was a lot of fun too.

 

  

...AND some wildflower pictures, too

 "Let's go catch some!"

Hearts, mountains, & Cannons

cookie decorating with Gramma

Ben and I just wrapped up a week of fantastic Cannon-family visits. Last weekend my brother, Matt, and his wife, Sandy, came to visit. Saturday was chilly and rainy, so we went to San Antonio's new aquarium. We especially enjoyed the parts where (for an extra fee) you can feed the animals. We fed the (tiny) sharks, the tropical fish, the goldfish, the lizards, and a tortoise. The very best part is petting the sting rays, though.

about to dig in!

His Royal Ben-ness, being carried around the zoo

Then on Sunday, we went on what Sandy calls "a real Matt adventure": heading off for a climb that we thought would last a few hours, but really took the better part of the day. We went to Enchanted Rock, but instead of just climbing the big dome mountain, Matt had found a really pretty and interesting climb between the two domes and around the back of the big dome. Ben walked/climbed most of the first leg of the hike, which Sandy's Fitbit said was 22 stories! (Matt carried him most of the way back.) He and Sandy sport-climbed up the mostly-sheer face of the mountain (with ropes and harnesses, etc.).  Those two are pretty amazing and daring!

enjoying the decorations with Uncle Greg

Montessori-inspired heart activity

Ben and I stayed at the bottom while they climbed, and he jumped in and out of puddles and helped me build "houses for Eeyore" out of twigs. It's funny, for all the rocks Ben climbed over and the steep slopes he mastered, what actually ended up making him trip and fall (and skin his elbow) was a tree root on perfectly flat ground... and then that same elbow met with a cactus on our way out of the canyon. Poor little buddy. He hardly cried at all, though, and I think he has an accurate understanding of "cactus" now!

climbing "The Big Hill" at Memorial Park with Uncle Greg

here there be dragons w/Grandpa

Matt and Sandy had to go back to Houston late Sunday, but Ben got more Cannon family time on Wednesday evening, when he and I flew to El Paso to visit my parents and brother, Greg. (Clay had to go out of town for work.) We spent a lot of our time puttering around my parent's backyard, playing with toys, and eating my dad's incredible cooking. We also had an (early) Valentine's Day party complete with all sorts of heart-shaped activity fun, decorations, and Ben's first cookie-cutting & decorating participation. Once he discovered the true nature of icing (it's delicious-ness), he had a hard time moving from one sticky cookie to the next, but we all had fun anyway.

feeding the tortoise

garden fun w/ Grandpa

We also went to Memorial Park (my favorite childhood park), where Ben pretended to feed the large tortoise play-structure with leaves from inside the "troll cave" (that's what Ben called the area under a near-by bridge). The EP Zoo was a our final activity; and even though Ben tried to insist he be carried most of the time, it was a still a lot of fun.

I'm afraid my meager company won't be enough for Ben this week! :)

Matt & Sandy examining the next climb w/Ben as their guide

hiking, hiking, hiking!

feeding the goldfish at the Aquarium

petting a stingray at the Aquarium

And a little Mama-bragging from last week:

Ben pointed to the stop sign on my t-shirt and said "hex-gon"

Not a baby any more

I don't want to jinx things around here, but Ben has been doing a lot of growing up in the last month or so.

For the first time in nine years, we are not using any baby gates in our house (pre-baby we needed one to keep The Colonel from chewing our shoes). This means no more middle-of-the-night stubbing of toys or stumbling through the house! We had been keeping a baby gate up at the entrance to the bathroom to keep my sweet little scientist boy from experimenting with the toilet or investigating the cat box. However, these days instead of wanting to touch everything, Ben now is more discerning in what gets his interest. (Luckily at the moment the bathroom isn't very interesting to him-- unless I'm trying to use it, of course.)

"BIG push, Daddy!"

Another fabulous change in our house is that Ben no longer uses sippy cups. Sometimes he still spills a bit of milk or water by accident, but there is no willful pouring of liquids and very little sticking his hands into his cup. For the boy who loved to joyfully bash his bottles and sippy cups upside down until they leaked (leaving little puddles on windowsills and bookshelves), this is a real leap forward. Plus, no more sippy cups means no more sink full of items that had to be specially washed with bottle soap every evening (since we don't have a dishwasher). The counter top near our kitchen sink is fantastically empty of needs-to-be-washed and drying baby stuff.

tea party with a triceratops

We've also eliminated Ben's milk-with-sleepy-time association. Previously he had a sippy cup full of milk before nap and at bedtime, but now he just cuddles his favorite stuffed tiger toy and listens to the nap/bedtime stories like the incredible little boy that he is. With the help of some watermelon-flavored kids' toothpaste, Ben also now happily allows us to brush his teeth at the bathroom sink.

The next truly drastic hurdle we're going to cross is potty learning... I've got several good books on the process, bought some cool undies for him, and I am going to do a 3-day potty camp in a few weeks.... when I get my courage up. 

book I made to help Ben with his new "big boy" routines

his special "Benjamin" cup from Aunt Sandy & Uncle Matt

<3

my little archeologist (@ the new SA Aquarium)

showing great restraint & not trying to leap into the Riverwalk Museum Extension

All I want for Christmas...

Christmas with a toddler is pretty amazing. The pretty lights, the decorations, & the family: in Ben's words "it's so wonderful!" <3

Yule log cake: a new family tradition

dino-tastic additions to Ben's stocking I made this year

Somebody looks more like his daddy every day

"Ben-proofing" already "shatter-proofed" ornaments

hamming it up with decorations at the zoo

felt board fun

 This boy knows how to enjoy everything!

 

Halloween, SMASH!

Ben likes Halloween almost as much as I do (it's impossible for him to like it quite as much as I do because he hasn't tasted candy yet). He loved dressing up as "green monster"/The Hulk, and was distraught every time I took his costume off. He was so fascinated by the Halloween decorations, I ended up buying double of a lot of decorations, just so he could have one (giant spider, plastic bat, etc.) to play with and one to display. He also got a huge kick out of the whole trick-or-treating process, although he doesn't understand what candy is yet).

Trick-or-treat!!!

Hackett Avengers: Captain America, The Hulk, and HawkEye

vampire kitty, and Ben's "monster" drawings

all lit up

However, I think his favorite part of the weekend was having his Uncle Matt and Aunt Sandy (& her dad) come visit. (Sadly he can now say "Uncle Matt" instead of "Unk Matt", which was much cuter.) They were in town for the last of the Dia de Los Muertos scooter rallies that Clay and his buddies are throwing, and having them in town made the weekend so much fun.

I think celebrating Christmas with my enthusiastic, wonderful little guy is just going to be awesome!

Pirate Uncle Matt. and Cheshire Cat Aunt Sandy

...and a train ride