paul the builder

On December 9th, "Paul the Builder," as we like to call him, and his crew were out to fix a few warranty items since we have been in this house for about a year. Both of the boys, but especially Zane, were super excited about this! We all did a walk through to go over the punch list, and Zane got to see them get started before it was time to go to school. They even came back again on Wednesday to finish up a few things they had started on Monday. I let Zane hang out and watch them for a bit, but then had to drag him away to get to school. It was a big event around here!


The picture above is of a new development/phase in their nightly game of chase, but you can see just how giant the stuffed animals they crash/belly flop onto are. The new twist was Zane giving Caden a ride on the giant dog. On a side note, I'm pretty sure Caden has started saying "dog," and he even uses it while pointing at Molly.

The highlight of the week for me was probably when Zane declared that he was bigger again for undies! Around the time Zane moved up to the big school, he regressed and ended up in pull-ups full time for almost a week and a half. Since all three of our kids (including Molly) are pooptastic, it was a messy period of time, hence the pull-ups! But that's how Zane handled potty training in the first place, and even moving to his big bed, so I should have just waited for him to say "I'm bigger today" instead of stressing over it. It's still not totally clear what was the reason behind it, but at least we are past it!


One day when I picked Caden up from school, he was fast asleep on the couch in his classroom. He and his friends had short naps that day, and around time for afternoon snack, he shook his head "no" to food, grabbed his lovey and laid down for a little snooze on the couch. It was pretty cute! Way to listen to your body, Caden!


The boys were pretty hungry when we got home that night, and we figured out that Caden could help with dinner prep if we used a chair for him to stand on. Of course, Zane got a chair too, which made him tower over the counter in comparison to his usual step stool. We made cheesy crescent rolls to go with our soup. Caden's were a little more originally shaped, and Zane liked to roll his "big," but they all came out yummy! We snacked on some clementines to tide us over while they were in the oven, and Zane was pumped to practice his new skill of peeling them all by himself (once it's started). They are both big fans of making food, even Zane who has become much pickier about eating.


That weekend we went to an ugly sweater party (and since I found out about it the night before, we sadly did not have appropriately ugly sweaters....), and on the way, we passed by the Great Wheel all festively lit up. We even managed to get Zane to wear a sweater (he's even more picky about his clothes than he is about eating veggies these days - soft pants with superhero/lightning McQueen/truck graphic short sleeve tees are in, and everything else is out!), and I can't believe I don't have a picture of it. That was no easy feat!