wednesday 4/17: the aquarium of niagara touch tank came to the kids' school today. malloy was so excited and planned her whole sea-themed outfit. she wore her sea creatures shirt, her pants with stars (starfish), blue socks, shoes, and headband for the water. i added some fishtail braids to top it all off! 

i co-oped in rex's class today, so i got to see rex and malloy touch/hold all the sea creatures! malloy wanted to hold everything. rex held a sea urchin and clam and then when things started moving, he crawled up on me and sat on his hands! i can't blame him - the horseshoe crab was creeping me out! 

holding a clam

poking at a hermit crab

starfish! 

bubbles!

thursday 4/18: it was a nice day out! we spent most of it outside!

 saturday 4/20: malloy made a new friend at the gym. his name is wyatt and she is completely smitten with him. when i went in to get her on friday, she was running around with him. they were chasing each other, giggling and hugging. she gave him a big hug goodbye. she was blushing when we were leaving and was so excited to tell daddy all about her new friend wyatt! she was so excited to go to the gym again to see him, and she did!

trying out pop rocks 

cuddles

sunday 4/21: we had a nice sunday at home!

blue nails! 

rex got green thumbnails and some green toes :)

 monday 4/22: i was very sick with a stomach bug and spent all day in bed so neal was in charge. the kids got to spend the whole day with daddy! he got to take malloy to school, take rex to the store, and then took the kids to the park and to pick up dinner in the afternoon. they had a blast!!

tuesday 4/23: recovery day! i spent most of the morning on the couch and the kids watched tv and played fairly well together. malloy came out during quiet time and gave me a nice picture. she told me she drew it for me to make me feel better and then gave me the most gentle hug! it was so sweet, it brought a tear to my eye!

"a lot of colorful balloons" to cheer me up! 

 wednesday 4/24: i pre-registered malloy for UPK this morning while the kids were at school. i left with a tear in my eye! i can't believe she's old enough for all of this! the biggest thing is that if she gets in the school (there's a lottery system), she'll be taking the bus to school!!!! that's a huge step!!! i just can't imagine putting her on a bus and having her get off the bus, go into school and find her classroom all on her own!! ahhhh!!!

thursday 4/25: we visited the aquarium of niagara today. rex was a little nervous about the big fish - some of them were bigger than he was!! the aquarium didn't take a lot of time to go through, the kids had more fun running up and down a wooden ramp and playing in the shark cage. the sea lions were MIA today :(

4/26: the kids had school in the morning. nothing too exciting today!

walking around in mommy's shoes. silly boy! 

saturday - the kids woke up at 6am and played for an hour or so together nicely before asking for tv or food. they made a fun fort with neal and told scary stories while i was at the gym. both kids were exhausted and needed to nap but neither one did. neal and i each tried to lay with rex to get him to sleep - stinker! we went out for mexican for dinner and to anderson's for ice cream with uncle ryan! the kids were excited to see him!! malloy and rex were so cute with their ice cream. once we got our ice cream and sat down at the table. they were immediately sharing. malloy asked "would you like to try some of my ice cream?" and fed some to rex. then he did the same to her. it's so neat to see them interacting like big kids!! 

today we just hung out at home. we played with playdoh in the morning, among other things! rex has been obsessed with birthdays and birthday parties since malloy's party. he will randomly just start talking about his birthday party and then give every pretend balloons, pretend cupcakes, and pretend presents. sometimes he had hulk birthdays, sometimes superhero squad, sometimes green lantern. he gets so into it!! today he was planning a party and had malloy go to it. she played along and played party for a bit. 

 i went to the gym and neal put the kids down for nap. malloy slept, rex did not. he was banging on his door and finally figured out how to open his door. he was so proud of himself when he came out! i made him go right back in and he cried until he woke malloy up. it was a not-so-quiet quiet time today! 

this afternoon, we cleaned and rearranged malloy and rex's bedrooms! since the weather is getting warmer and their heads won't freeze if they're against an outside wall, we moved the beds so there's more room to play. both of them loved their "new" rooms and played in them the rest of the afternoon.

*potty update* rex is doing great with the potty! he goes pee on his own quite a bit. he can get his pants down, but still has trouble pulling them back up. and he'll sit on the potty when he had to poop. it's fantastic! now we need to work on getting out of those pull-ups at nap and night time!

all decked out in her jewelry 

happy birthday harris style!

dancing

 monday 4/8 - it was back to school today for malloy! after school, we went to the park to play - it was so nice out!!!

tuesday 4/9 - happy birthday, grandma tappy! :) 

 the kids had dentist appointments this morning. they were SO excited to go! i've really never seen two kids so excited to go to the dentist!!! (wish i had some of their enthusiasm about it!!!) they did great - all clean, no cavities. when we got home, our friends safina and emery came over to play for a bit - fun!!! 

 wednesday 4/10 - we celebrated malloy's birthday in her class today. she requested cotton candy flavored frosting. they were a hit! she loved wearing her crown she decorated and being the birthday girl for one more day. at one point, the teacher had a letter M and she said "M for monkey and moon." malloy pipes in "um, you're forgetting something else that starts with M! the birthday girl!"

 in the afternoon, we watched safina and emery. they came in their pjs in case they stayed late and they just happened to be pjs that malloy had, too! of course, she immediately put them on with a pink headband that matched safina's! the girls had a great time playing! rex was feeling a little left out so he and i did stickers together for quite a while. then it was dinner time! we had pancakes and sausage. and then cupcakes. and then popcorn and mary poppins!

emery found cupcake on rex's chair. she was very happy! 

i was trying to take a picture of malloy and safina - emery runs in between them yelling "cheese!!" 

eating popcorn in between dancing to the songs.  emery kept putting things inside malloy's crown  and thought it was hilarious!

 4/11 thursday - it was a rainy, lazy morning! the kids played so nicely together with these little people houses (they've been in the basement for quite some time - i got them out because i thought emery would like them - malloy and rex loved them more!). this gave me some time to drink some coffee and wake up a bit. then we continued to lounge in our pjs and watch a movie. we finally got out and went to the gym at least!
when we got to the gym, next door duff's was gearing up for the lunch crowd. malloy sniffed the air and said "it smells like chicken wings. can we get chicken wings for lunch?!"  it was really hard to say no! daddy ended up bringing chicken wings and pizza home for dinner!

he looked so big here

 playing some dress up! rex put the patch on and then said "ARRRRR maybes" 

lounging

malloy had left her doll in the van. when she saw her she said "awwww she's just so cute! i wish i had my camera so i could take her picture!!" so i let her use my camera. 

she took this one of rex, too 

some more dress up! 

friday 4/12 - the kids went to school and then we hung out at home for the rest of the day. daddy was home sick with a bit of a stomach bug today and the kids were so concerned. the first thing rex asked when he woke up in the morning was "is daddy's belly still hurtin'?" malloy asked about every 5 minutes if daddy was feeling better.