Lisa n Tom (n James n Joseph)

Lisa writes: It's spring, and that means baby animals. Two sweet little lambs were lying down near the fence, close enough that boys could pet them. James kept saying, "They feel like a carpet!" (He has a wool carpet in his bedroom and, he's totally right. They do.)

Lisa write: Miss Sandy just forwarded me a bunch of pictures of the boys that she had on her phone. They have fun with her.

Lisa writes: Joseph is like, "You're seeing this, right?"

Lisa writes: Snow day! It's been a long, dry winter. This was only the 2nd (and it turned out, the last) real snow we received, and it wasn't much. James and I made the best of it at the neighbor's semi-annual, spontaneous, snow day chili dinner. I am really, really,  almost seriously considering buying some sort of winch to haul preschoolers on sleds up the small hill.

Lisa writes: Joseph has become a new baby in the past two weeks. He's bigger, stronger, and more determined to do everything, and much too daring for his own good. Yesterday, when I went to pick him up, he was sitting on a little see-saw, energetically rocking back and forth. He was happy to see me and happy to be picked up ... for a minute. And then he was trying to wrench himself out of my arms so he could toddle over to a tricycle. I was surprised at how strong he was. I set him down, he got on the bike, backwards, and then tried to stand up on the seat. I talked him out of standing up and turned him around. I let him play for a couple of minutes, then it was really time to go. I had to peel Joseph off the bike, finger by finger, with him screaming on protest. This is not the baby I had two weeks ago. Amazing.

Lisa writes: As a fun family activity, we went downtown to see the dinosaurs on Saturday. We really gotta start planning these fun family activities better. Turns out the dinosaur hall has been closed for two years and will be closed for another year before opening some sort of spectacular, amazing, never-seen-before explosion of dinosaur-wonderfulness. In the meantime, they have two skeletons on exhibit. And when you're three, two really, really big dinosaur skeletons is enough.

Lisa writes: An update on the impressive speaking skills of our 3 11/12ths year old and 16 month old children. Joseph says dada . baba , and nahnahnahnah (no no no no no) and he means it. He randomly says mama , but it doesn't always seem to mean anything. He once said hi clear as day. He possibly maybe said helicopter and dog once. And today in nursery I think he said bubbles . (There were bubbles.) James says poo poo. He has discovered the power of the forbidden word to elicit a swift and immediate reaction from adults. He's tried, "Poo Poo Mama," "Poo Poo Joseph," and "Poo Poo Dinosaurs." (The dinosaurs don't particularly care.) After many careful explanations about why poo poo needs to stay in the bathroom, he's discovered a loophole. "Mama," he begins, very sweetly and sincerely, "I won't call you poo poo anymore. Okay? I won't call you poo poo. I won't say poo poo anymore. I won't call Joseph poo poo...

Joseph is only 16 months old, two months too young to start Nursery, but he's an honorary member since I was asked to assist in Nursery. He's fitting in well. He did this today. I think this is the age where they suddenly start doing things you didn't know they knew how to do.  Before you get too impressed by Joseph's skills and dexterity, I should point out that he also did this.

Lisa writes: James chose the theme and helped place a bunch of the chocolate chip toenail claws, green dots and the blue spikes. (T-Rex's do not have spikes. We know this. But the cake pan didn't.) James also ate a tremendous amount of raw cake batter. James was exceptionally helpful when it came time to blow out the candles.  Happy birthday, Tom!

Lisa writes: Sandy reports that James has a new friend, Lucas. James reports that Lucas is fun and doesn't hit. Win win!

Lisa writes: It's been a month since the latest school mass shooting. I work right next to the NRA headquarters, an organization that has spent millions of dollars over the past twenty years in campaign contributions and lobbying to prevent any gun control legislation from being passed and to prohibit federal funds from being spent on gun violence research. As part of a #imwiththekids movement, a group of my coworkers went over to join the protest. I joined them. I don't know this woman, but her sign made me cry. These two in the middle are my coworkers. The one holding the sign that reads, "Are guns more precious than kids?" is from Kabul, Afghanistan, and now lives in Fairfax with her husband and three little boys.