Last Days of Summer

A few shots from the final week at the Connemara condo. It was by far the hottest week of the summer (go figure), so we took breaks from packing by hitting the pool to cool off. The last shot is my favorite: Eli, our little monkey, confident he can make it over those table legs, which of course he couldn't. Notice the wall-to-wall boxes surrounding him and the table--a sight I hope not to see for a very long time.

Eli's Dance Fever

There's nothing like an eight month-old baby shaking his booty to diffuse the stress and irritation of a bad day. Eli has turned into quite the little dancing monkey lately: any time he hears music, and I mean any time (sacrament hymns & sirens included), he begins to move his body and bob his head to the beat. My favorite is when he's mad or crying about something and then hears music: tears are streaming, lips are pursed in a pout, but those hips--they're still going. In fact, he and Bennett have started their own daily dance party, typically in the morning while I get dressed and listen to some tunes, and they are hilarious to watch. Bennett runs and spins and throws himself on the floor, while Eli just stands there shaking his little hips.

Vinyl through the ages

I teased Stephen when we got married for keeping his eighties' stereo for over twenty years. It's very old school with two tape decks, a record player, two big speakers and button controls for radio, volume. etc. (not a dial to be found). Little did I know just how much we would use that stereo. Not only has it provided a more than decent sound system for movies and TV, but even the phonograph has come in handy lately. We came into some old kids' records recently, and while they brought back memories from my own childhood, I figured they'd be nothing more than that--sentimental relics from the seventies. With DVDs and kids' shows galore, I didn't think Bennett would take an interest in them. Wrong. Bennett, and even Eli, have loved listening to those old records: the voices, the songs, the sound effects have captured their attention in a very different way. Last week we listened to "Jungle Book" and "Mickey and the Beanstalk," yesterday it was "The Rescuers," and today it's "Pete's Dragon." It's fun to see my own boys listening to records with the same rapt attention I did as a kid. Life really does come full circle sometimes.

Summer Lovin'

I guess it should be the other way around, since we're the ones who've been loving summer lately. We've taken to our patio this weekend for some sidewalk chalking, bubble blowing, and basketball playing to Bennett's happy approval. We used to do a lot of fun stuff outside (painting, watering, collecting, etc.), but not so much since little Eli came along. Nowadays we get outside for walks/jogs and the staple trike rides, but that's about it . . . so it was good to remember just how rewarding such simple summer play can be.

Game Boy

Gone are the days of needing our help on the computer. Bennett likes to play his computer games (boomarked websites: pbskids, nick jr., thomas, bob the builder, etc.) all by himself now that he's figured out the mouse, the back button, the arrow keys, and most of the navigational symbols on the kids' websites. And while the first few times I felt a tad guilty leaving my two year-old alone with the internet, that guilt quickly faded as I discovered just how much I could get done while he played!

Whatever it takes

"Scripture Dancing" as Bennett calls it

Looking chic in his Lamanite moving garb

After a month of trips, visitors, and vacation from daily routine, it took some work to get Bennett back into the groove of family scriptures. We had to get creative when he began refusing to participate, so we started pairing activities we knew he'd love with daily scriptures. One day we did playdough, where we sculpted the boats Nephi built after reading about them, while the next day we colored pictures of planting seeds in the promised land. Then Bennett suggested dancing to a scripture story. Little did I know this would include costumes and very dramatic interpretive dance (participation mandatory, mind you)--and of course he wanted to repeat "scripture dancing" every day for the next week.