Letter squares go Vrroomm!

We got this huge basket of letter puzzle squares, which Rychen P. just calls "squares" (or pronounces it "Fiers" like the German word for the number 4). Anyway he can lift this big basket on his own, and his favorite thing to do is to "drive the squares." We put Football in his "carseat" and drove the squares all over the house.

Feast!

We eat lots of fruits and veggies around here, so imagine our delight when Rychen comes home from a lunch seminar with 4 cartons of scrumptious food! Rychen Parker got really excited about the cut-up melon and insisted on having "Daddy's fruit" for dinner.


(That is Teddy Bear watching us!) Here's another picture of our fruity selves.

Videos: Spanish & Alphabet, Puzzle, and Goodnight Animals

This was just a lucky video, messing around, I started reviewing Spanish facial features with him. Whenever I teach him Spanish, he says "No!" And corrects me with the English word. But apparently he is catching on... (he then goes into naming letters of the alphabet, if you stay with us long enough)


Here is a clip of Rychen P. doing a puzzle. It looks impressive, but honestly we've just done it so many times that he memorized it. You can tell he really doesn't have very good puzzle skills...because he is oblivious to borders and other obvious clues.


This is part of our bedtime routine: Saying goodnight to the animals, hugging and kissing each one (sometimes this seems too ritualistic, when I get involved and we have to take turns kissing). My favorite part of this video is the elephant's sound effects!

More Fun with Rychen Parker

Rychen P.'s thing lately is cutting. He started playing around with my (harmless) craft scissors, so we made a special trip to buy his own pair. He'll sit at the table with his "dollar store scissors" and ask for paper, and just sit there and cut away--nothing in particular, just snip-snip. Then I gave him a glue stick so he can stick the odd shapes onto more scratch paper.

This was hilarious, so I grabbed the camera. He just comes up to me, pinches his nipple, and says "Look! Bubba have boobies!" Look at that grin! He is so proud.

The other day he was eating almonds, and said "Look mommy, I made a snake!"

And here is our experiment for Thanksgiving. A healthy, no-bake pumpkin pie. It actually has the right flavor and texture. The color is a little off, but other than that you can't really tell the difference. It's made with macadamia nuts, pumpkin, dates, vanilla and the usual spices. We like making various pies like this because it's dessert...or dinner! (squash and nuts...perfectly acceptable meal)

Singing Primary Songs!!

Here are some adorable videos.... We sing these songs before going to sleep, and bit by bit I have backed out so that Rychen sings most of it himself. His pronounciation of words is so funny. Risking irreverence, one example is how he says "this is my sacred booty" instead of sacred duty.

"I am a Child of God" song


"I Love to See the Temple"


By the way this makes going to bed all worth it. It's an hour-long process... eat, nurse, brush teeth, change diaper, read scriptures, say goodnight to animals, say prayers, sing songs, a round of "I'm tired," "me too," "okay then roll over and go to sleep please," a few minutes of silence, then "I want talk about amimals," "we'll talk about animals in the morning." "Where mine teddy bear?" okay we forgot teddy bear... "Please rub mine back." "Okay I will rub your back, no more talking, let's go to sleep now."

Catching Up

Alright it's been a while...life is busy but here are some random pictures from the past couple weeks.


Remember that "blasted train set"? Well the rain got the better of it (I'm glad) and the tracks all fell apart, so now we just play with them inside... so Rychen had a lot of fun building train tracks all across these alphabet foam puzzle peices. Yes, Rychen, NOT Rychen Parker. Here's the thriving metropolis:





Also Rychen coloring pictures to send to uncle Peter on his mission:



Here is Rychen P. posing at our favorite farm, in front of hundreds of melons!! We bought probably a dozen cantaloupes that day, and they lasted only a few days!




And last of our random photographs, this is Rychen's vegan pizza creation. He took such pride in it that he took like 8 pictures.

I DO IT ALL BY FELF! Videos

Can I just brag about my brilliant, adorable cutie pie? He does puzzles on his own but what's better is hearing him sing along to Courtney's (Rychen's sister) music. His favorite is the "See me song" but it wasn't available. This video highlights his puzzle abilities more than the singing, so I will try to capture him singing later.

FYI,
The script is: "I need this one. Also. (sings along) This one also. (sings) I do it all by myself!"



(By the way, this is Courtney's song "Sun in Every Skyline," one of my favorites. www.courtneyjonesmusic.com, myspace, itunes, rhapsody, cdbaby.)



Here's another video of him jumping on the trampoline, singing "Teddy bear, teddy bear, turn around. Teddy bear, teddy bear, touch the ground." Awww! I taught this to him because he has a teddy bear that he just LOVES! He usually sleeps with it, but if not, he'll wake up crying and say, "Teddy Bear??!" It's basically the boy equivalent of a doll. Teddy bear does everything with us. He eats food, he sleeps on a pillow, he nurses, and he watches us play. And he even juiced veggies once!

My Little Chu Chi Face!

Oh my gosh I have rediscovered the most hilarious, classic soundtrack song! Does anything compare to these odd characters, the mindless lyrics and cute choreography? Take notice, the husband is trying to kill the wife various ways throughout the song! And my favorite line is "wilts me down like meltedz spudder [melted butter?]"

And Rychen P. LOVES this song! He always asks me to put on "Chu Chi Face."