Kiddo Craziness

There is never any shortage of laughter around here, and God has a way of supplying humor just when I need it most.

Like Mr. Moo's attempts to play a little plastic recorder we got at a white elephant gift exchange. He "hums" into it, so you hear his weird little voice and the high-pitched notes from the recorder at the same time. The best part is the self-congratulatory smile that consumes his face afterward. One of his very favorite things to do is to start smacking his tummy with both hands as soon as he's naked. And when he's trying to tell me he wants something and I finally guess the right thing, he just goes nuts, laughing and dancing around. (Although I can never get him to be happy in a picture.) I'm just thrilled he's finally learning to feed himself with a spoon!

And then there's our bizarre second son - the best bear-hugger in the world - who makes me wet myself (it actually doesn't take much) at least once a day, with his unique dress-up concoctions and the even more unique noises he constantly feels the need to make. I recently found out that he told his Sunday School teacher, "You can call me Beef Man". Talk about a compliment! I'm not putting any up pix of him in action for this post, because for his 5th birthday, at the end of March, I plan to treat everyone to a collage of Zekers craziness. You won't want to miss it.

As for the girls . . . Rachel is just becoming a little sweetheart, and so independent. After begging for weeks and weeks, I finally caved and started allowing her to walk home from the bus stop this week. It's 4 blocks, and she has to make some turns and cross some streets, so I haven't been comfortable with the idea until now. She's just so little. But she's done great all week, and looks so grown-up bopping up the sidewalk toward our house. She loves to read and write, and composed her own book today, entitled "Whar Do I Sleep?" I also found a journal entry she'd done a while back about Mommy going to a "confrens" and hearing some "peple spek" and then getting hit by a deer.

Poobly- Boo has more quotable quotes than anyone I've ever met. The other night at bedtime she said a heartfelt prayer of thanks for "Mommy, Daddy, Rachel, Zeke, Malachi and President O-Bottom". I confess, in spite of almost superhuman efforts, I couldn't stop myself from howling with laughter, which kind of ruined the rest of the prayer time. Today, I sent her to time-out on the sofa 3 times in one hour for screaming loudly enough to burst our eardrums. The 3rd time, as she walked past me on her way to time-out, she rolled her eyes and said, "I give up!" And then there was the other night when she went with me to JC Penney and on the way back we stopped at Broadway Joe's. We chatted over cafe carmela (me) and a cookie with sprinkles (her). The conversation had me chuckling more than once. Suddenly she stopped in mid-sentence, got a sheepish grin on her face, and decided to announce to the whole place, "Whoops - I just tooted!"

I can't wait to see (hear) what they come up with as they get older.