Glamour

Yesterday I painted Charlotte's toenails. I expected all sorts of admiration and gushing from her about how beautiful her toes were. Instead, the first thing she said was, "Mommy, I want my toenails back."




I have thus far avoided tackling the job of using polish remover on her because I want to enjoy her cute little pink toenails for another day or so. At the rate we're going though, it will all be chipped off by tonight. Hey, I may not be the world's best hairstylist, but I was hoping I could gain a little notoriety for my toddler toenail painting skills. Looks like I'm going to have to find a different model.

Peter takes grooming into his own hands

No longer satisfied with my lack of hairstyling ability (or the fact that a comb hasn't touched Peter's head since, oh, birth -- because he doesn't need it!), Peter has recently decided that his food makes an excellent substitute for the styling products I am denying him. Today at lunch, he tried cheese sauce and bananas. You may need to click on the photos to see them big enough to witness what little baby-fine hair he has all styled up like Albert Einstein.





It may come as no surprise to anyone who knows me well that I have discovered letting the food dry in his hair and then combing it out later actually works far better than trying to mop it off in the immediate aftermath of the event. It should not, however, come as a surprise that Peter is attempting to style his own hair. A quick review of the terrible hairdos I have given Charlotte must wait for another time, though.

Fun with laundry (aka who needs toys?)

Why do I even TRY sorting laundry with these two around?

Who's that hiding behind Daddy's gym shorts?



It's the Laundry Pile Destroyer! Notice her sidekick, the Laundry Pile Mangler, crawling around in the background.



She almost looks like she's helping in this picture, but...



...the armful she was holding ends up on top of her sidekick instead.



Whew - mangling piles of laundry is tiring work. The Landry Pile Mangler takes frequent little rests with his head on the nice stinky laundry.



Aaaaaand this is what my neat piles of color-sorted laundry looks like after the Destroyer and Mangler are through with their dastardly deeds.

A photo I should have posted of our Adonis...

... and his amazing physique!

Petey Pie at 9 months

Tank, aka Peter, weighs a whopping 20 pounds, 7 ounces! How on earth is that only the 50th percentile? His height (28 inches) is also the 50th percentile, but that seems a little more reasonable. He had a blast at the doctor's office, even when they did the pin prick to get some blood to test his iron. Unfortunately, it took a ridiculous amount of time to stop bleeding and we got it all over the place (including my clothes, his ear, his clothes, the exam table, the mirror above the exam table, the wall, his face, the diaper bag, the Kleenex box, the floor, and some other places I'm sure I'm forgetting). Otherwise, it was a great check-up with no shots. Dr. Hood said Peter looked "perfect". What more could a mother ask?

The handsome baby in the mirror is always a big hit.



Why do they even bother giving us a pad to put the kid on? He only stays there for 1.5 seconds and then the pad is trashed.



QUIT LICKING THE MIRROR!



What? It tastes good!

Charlotte's dental adventure doesn't exactly go as planned...

Charlotte visited the dentist for the first time this morning. Although the hygienist and the dentist were each able to coax her to open her mouth just long enough for them to get a quick peek, there was no way in heck Charlotte was going to allow anyone to clean her teeth. I guess it's still a little too scary for a two-and-a-half-year-old!





The monkey was the only one who got his teeth cleaned today!

Peter earns his keep

Between diapers, formula, and miscellaneous clothing items, Peter is costing us quite a bit of money to keep in the lifestyle to which he has become accustomed. We told him he needs to enter the workforce and start contributing to the family coffers. Daddy took him to work today to begin his apprenticeship.



(Is anyone else worried about Corey's ability to make it out of the office past those mountains of files in the event of a fire?)

Thank goodness the weather finally cooled down!

More shots from the day we went to the playground all decked out from head to toe in Michigan State gear:



It took a while to convince Charlotte that the slide wasn't too hot to touch. It's been a long, hot summer here. After she finally believed us that the slide wouldn't burn her bum, she went down it about 149 times. After every single time, she exclaimed how fast she was going down the slide. She even told other little kids about it. They looked at her like she was nuts.




Peter wanted a turn.



I helped him slide down, but then he just laid on the bottom of the slide for a while acting a little stunned.



Spartan boys.



Petey Pie does his "bear crawl" whenever he deems the surface unfit for his knees. Apparently bark chips fall into the category of "unfit".



Hey Uncle Andrew -- do you think you could give us some lessons on these big drums?

Shrimp & grits

Before Brian and Melanie drove back to Indiana, we met them and Jordan for brunch. The shrimp and grits skillet I had was to die for, and Melanie has something amazing called the Bubba Skillet. No joke. The kids were a little wiggly, but we still had fun. Peter was a whole heck of a lot bigger than the last time Brian and Melanie saw him.



They loved how Peter posed for the camera. He's such a ham.



Charlie Jo had fun coloring with Jordan in her coloring book before our food came. Afterward, she counted in Spanish for him and pointed out her family members by name. Jordan tried to teach her that Melanie's name was "Crazy Lady", but luckily CJ didn't buy it.

The only good reason to wear purple to a Vanderbilt football game

Corey and I had an amazing time last night with my mom's cousins Brian and Melanie at the Vanderbilt-Northwestern football game. They were so sweet to get us tickets to sit with the Northwestern football team parents so we could see their son, Brandon, play for the very first time!

It was a little strange wearing Northwestern purple to a Vanderbilt football game, but Melanie and I sure looked good in it!



Even Jordan flew in all the way from Seattle to see his younger brother's debut. Brian and Corey look like Jordan's security detail, don't they?



I got a shot of Brandon on the sidelines, but the old camera we brought to the game pooped out before Northwestern did bad enough to need Brandon's punting services. Here's Brandon chilling out before the game.



None of the shots we tried to take with cell phones of Brandon punting during the game were any good, but here's one from Corey's phone of a practice kick. Oops, I mean punt. I kept getting all the terminology wrong.



Brandon did a great job. Thank you so much, Brian and Melanie for letting us share this experience with you!

GO STATE!

Charlie Jo and Peter are rooting for MSU today!



Charlie is sporting her standard-issue MSU shirt.



Peter and Dad discussing the upcoming game.

Gridiron girl

Charlotte is SO EXCITED that college football is back. She was galloping around the house shrieking "yea football!" over and over again. Corey was trying to teach her some football concepts at dinner, but so far all she seems to understand is that tackling is something like tickling. She is very concerned about the players helping each other up after knocking each other down. She likes that the players wear helmets so they can be safe like Dora and Boots (from "Dora the Explorer"). We were also obligated to get down a little Tennessee state flag we have in the play room so she could run around waving it and cheering "yea football players!"

What did Peter do? He drooled on the football and watched his goofy sister with a smile.

Here is Charlotte, showing off her newly trimmed bangs. She thoroughly entertained the hair stylist by singing songs and wolfing down Dum-Dum suckers like they were going out of style. She didn't even mind when a little hair dropped on to the sucker.