Zoo Day

We're in the middle of two weeks of school holidays, so all our normal activities are on hiatus. I've been keeping the kids busy with playdates and our favorite one last week was at the zoo. We met 3 other moms and their kids for some fun at the zoo and even though we didn't see a lot of the animals the kids had a great time. I never had to worry about Ben because Brynn held his hand the entire time.

We found the kids activity area with some coloring and crafts.

Alex did a little coloring but was more interested in climbing in and out of the chairs. This little guy walked until his legs just couldn't go any more and he finally let me push him in the stroller.

Lunchtime! We all had a picnic together. Australians are big on bringing their own food and drink, which I love, but I did think it was a bit weird to find a coin-operated breathalyzer next to the main picnic grounds. Somehow I don't picture the zoo as a place to get drunk.

Alex, Malcolm, Brynn, Ben, and Austin. We were missing Brynn's sister Ansley but 5 out of 6 kids sitting and looking near the camera isn't bad!

The fall weather here is absolutely gorgeous. It's in the high 50's at night and mid 70's during the day. It's already too cold for swimming or the beach but perfect for picnics at our favorite playground on the beach.

We hand fed a lot of the more daring pigeons and Matt picked this one up.

Alex stayed busy chasing the rest of them away.

Somehow the kids always manage to find any place to get wet, dirty, or wet and dirty. Alex was washing his feet in the tiny trickle of water leaking from the foot shower.

Two of my guys walking home.

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter to everyone! Hope you had some time to celebrate a living Savior with family and friends.

It's been a busy week around our house. The boys were head over heels for the toy guns that Daddy brought home from London. We were all pretty excited to have Daddy home.

It was the end of Term I here in Perth and Ben's school had an Easter celebration and tea on the last day of class. It was so precious because it was the first time Ben had been involved in a performance at school and he kept turning around to say hi to me. We missed all the Christmas programs in Singapore because we were always gone in December.

Alex was sitting behind the parents and couldn't see anything. Let's just say he was less than thrilled by the singing.

My little bunny! He's such a good boy at school and loves going. I can see so much progress in his speech and socialization now that he's back in school again.

We missed all the official Easter egg hunts when we went to Margaret River but did get to have one with friends yesterday. We spent the afternoon with three other Houston couples and their kids. Ben is absolutely in love with Brynn, the adorable little 5-year old blonde. She was teaching him how she plays with her webkinz...guess we'll be doing that sooner or later, too!

We got to see our first rainbow of the year. It's weird having Easter in the fall and knowing that a cold, rainy winter is fast approaching. The days are still pleasant but it's cooling off and getting chilly at night already.

The kids enjoyed cookies and watched the Barbie movie. Ben and Alex loved it.

Then we had a little Easter egg hunt for the kiddos and Alex had a great time finding eggs.

As soon as he realized there were treats inside the eggs it was all over.

Look at that chocolatey mouth!

In other everyday excitement, the boys made the most out of the latest diaper boxes. It does seem like a waste but these boxes come in quite handy for a variety of uses like making trains.

We planted some tulip bulbs (I give them about a 50% chance of seeing spring considering the help I had and that we planted them all with the kids' plastic shovels) and the fun in the dirt didn't stop there. They got so dirty I just turned on the sprinklers to clean them up before they came inside.

Ben always had a thing for my shoes, especially heels. Alex prefers bigger shoes to fill!

We've been playing more on youtube. Their current favorite is two cartoon babies farting in the bathtub...thus the big smiles and laughs.

This is one of my favorites. This little boy can dance! Alex loved watching him and was trying out some of the moves.

Ben-isms

I had almost no experience with babies or little kids before having my own, so it's been so much fun experiencing their stages of development. Speech in particular has been particularly fascinating. One word at a time, then a few strung together, some phrases and sentences, and now for Ben, long stories and endless questions. He can recite entire books and recount situations that happened months or years ago. At nearly 4, his vocabulary is enormous but if he doesn't know a specific word or tense he'll just make something up so it's led to some interesting conversations. And of course you never know what's going to come out of his mouth in any situation. Here are a few of my favorites from the past couple of days:
-The boys were both running up the stairs and then Ben arrived at the top and Alex was a few steps below crying. I asked what happened and Ben said, "I winned!". I assume that means he pushed by Alex to get to the top first.
-We've all had some allergy problems the past few weeks and Ben has been waking up coughing several nights in a row. I tried to explain that he could drink the water by his bed to make the cough go away and he said "I like my cough. I want to keep it."
-I have moved their carseats several times lately and don't really care which side each boy has in the car when I put them back. Ben now has a preference for the left side and asked me to move his seat back. I asked him why he liked that side better and he said, "I want to sit on that side because it makes me a better person." If that's all it takes, maybe I should be sitting on that side too!
-The boys love, love, love running around naked after bathtime. It looks like their favorite time of the day. I always laugh at my "naked bottom boys" while they're doing it. Ben walked in the other day while I was changing my pants and called me a "naked Mama boy". We're still trying to teach the difference between boys and girls and he/she since he seems to get them backward all the time.
-Last night Ben cut his toe and was bleeding quite a bit on the floor. It must not have hurt because he didn't notice until I saw the blood, then he started screaming, "my toe is leaking!!".

I think he really talks all day unless he's sleeping or watching TV. It's really entertaining but the questions do get exhausting sometimes. Lots of why's and why did you say (blank). But I love that he's so interested in the world and learning so much about everything so quickly.

Alex is talking more each day but still gets so frustrated when he can't communicate what he wants and I can't guess it. Lots of screaming and throwing himself on the floor so I'm looking forward to him growing past that stage but can't imagine what it will be like with two little boys talking all the time! Alex did say his first real phrase (putting together his own words, not just repeating a phrase we say) when he climbed in my bed at 6am and said "play cookie". He wanted a toy that had been in our bedroom for several days and had been moved. I love these little guys!

Getaway to the Farm

Matt is still traveling for work so I packed up the kids and we took a little holiday to Margaret River. Most people go for the wineries and food but this time we went to stay on a little farm and let the kids run wild. I'm not sure who was more excited though...I get pretty thrilled about playing with animals myself. We rented this little cottage at Sunflowers Farm for two nights.

The kids LOVE staying in hotels. From the minute we hit the door they go crazy. Alex's latest obsession is this bucket, sometimes used for carrying his blankies and paci, other times for a handy helmet.

Ben was beyond excited to sleep in bunk beds again. This bedroom was pretty small so Alex's pack and play ended up right next to Ben's bed and that little monkey figured out how to climb out and get in bed with Ben. I'm finding fewer and fewer things that can restrain this child.

Their next favorite hotel pasttime is wrecking the couch and watching Dora. For some reason that's a show we only watch when we travel and never at home.

But the major portion of our time was spent outside, getting up close and personal (and dirty!) with all the animals. This place was great and very child-friendly so we were there every morning and afternoon to feed and cuddle the animals. The pictures aren't in order because I took so many so here are the highlights.

Ben's favorite place was the chick incubator. He keeps claiming he liked the joeys the best, but we spent the most time here playing with the soft little chicks.

Alex kept saying "chick chick" and "touch!". His touch knocked over lots of chicks so I didn't encourage him to pick them up. Ben is much gentler and could handle them with care so he held lots of them.

This pig was BIG. That face scared me a little but Alex went right up to say hello.

We met some big sheep....

...and some small sheep.

How precious is this little guy? He was just over a week old and had a little jacket to keep him warm in the morning.

There were several orphaned kids and lambs and we helped bottle feed them twice a day. Too bad human babies don't take their bottles this fast...they were usually done in less than a minute.

The boys also got the chance to ride the pony, Basil. Alex did really well and had a great time. He looks so big on the little pony!

Ben, on the other hand, wasn't a big fan and asked to get off after about 10 seconds. He liked petting the pony but was not interested in riding again.

We met lots of free-roaming animals around the farm. This little goat was like a puppy following us around and trying to steal food out of the boys' buckets. The black and white magpie also took a liking to us and wandered around next to us.

There were lots of ringneck parrots mixed in with the farm birds, like these turkeys.

These Ibis kept their distance but didn't mind picking up any scraps the kids dropped.

Alex was oblivious to the sneaky chook (as they're known in these parts) that kept stealing bites out of his bucket.


We took a tractor ride around the pastures of the farms and spotted some kangaroos.

These farms dogs were terrific. The white one was an Italian sheepdog and the black one was a border collie, and both were so sweet and calm around the kids.

Love this haircut on the alpaca!!

Alex was the only one brave enough to feed the big geese. I was proud of the boys because they got a few bites on their fingers but never slowed down. Once I watched Alex offer a plain finger to the chicken coop and take a nice peck without even wincing.

Ben said his favorite place was the joey pen (even though we visited the chicks a lot more) and I agreed because they're just so cute! These were also orphans that the farm had adopted. A few were old enough to be released but apparently liked the farm and came back.

They're so adorable.

We couldn't go in their pen because two of them like to box and we did get a little show, but not while they were busy eating.

Ben lined them all up and coached them on how to eat. He made sure they ate all their veggies, kind of ironic since he rarely eats all of his. But I guess that's like me telling him to finish his vegetables since I rarely finish my own.

There was a great little playground as well.

This really was a kiddy heaven!

These boys have endless energy!

Hi Mama!

Wouldn't you love to know what's going on in that little head?

The guinea pig hut was a lot of fun. We managed to coax them out with some grass but couldn't catch any of the little rascals, even with all my mouse-catching experience. Didn't help to have four little hands scaring them off, though.

Alex didn't know what to make of the noisy magpie that seemed irritated by us but refused to leave us alone.

The big emu was a lot of fun. Apparently they can make a kind of hissing/growling sound and so can kangaroos, as I learned when I watched them fight over some food.

I learned a lot about the boys' personalities through their buckets of food. They each got one at the front door every time we went into the farm. Alex would dump his entire thing at the first or second animal he encountered, then steal from Ben's bucket when he wanted to feed something else. Ben would carefully dole out his food to each animal and wanted to make sure everyone got something to eat. His food could last an hour or more. It made me laugh every time because my older sister and I were exactly the same way with everything! She'd carefully ration things and I'd blow everything right off the bat and beg her to share.

This beautiful horse was more than happy to help Alex empty his bucket anytime.

The view from the kitchen window was great - a hillside covered in wild kangaroos every morning and evening.

All in all, it was a great getaway. Nice to change things up for a few days before I got too crazy by myself at home, and relaxing to play with the animals and let the kids stay up late and watch too much TV. We did manage to hit the other important places like the chocolate factory, one winery (where I just tasted the one wine I planned to buy), the venison store, and Providore. It has all kinds of jams, jellies, oils, and dips, so it has baskets of little tasting spoons and trash cans to toss them. The kids caught on to the idea immediately and went down each row tasting every jar and throwing their spoons away. They are so funny. But still pretty exhausting. We are very excited that Daddy is on his way home this afternoon!