Two

Evan has been TWO for a week now, and I must say that he is really embracing it. He's delightful, he's soul-killing, he's sweet, he's vicious, he's persistent, he's ... persistent. Honestly, I don't think his behavior has changed from the past couple months but now I am able to keep it in perspective: well, Evan bit Ethan while he was hugging him... but he's two. Ha ha ha AAAHH. When he is being adorable, though, he is seriously adorable. His favorite book right now is Big Red Barn. Sometimes he brings it over and snuggles next to me, listening raptly to each word. Many times a day, he just wants to talk about his favorite page: The geese and the donkey/ the sheep and the goats/ were making funny noises/ down in their throats. "Goke?" he asks, pointing to the goat. "Cah-coh (scarecrow), gaw-kee (donkey)." He loves animals; he bounces up and down in his carseat shouting "Cow! Eat!" when he sees cattle grazing (which as you can imagine is not a rare occurence around here). He feeds the dogs and cats 135235 times a day and carries them around as much as they will allow. He often sets his little animals around food (or something representing food such as an ice cube or lid) so they can eat, then tucks them in under a wipe or dish towel, pats them, and says "Nite-nite."

Cow! Eat!

Evan's favorite game right now is Ring Around the Rosie. He communicates that he wants to play by waving his arms in a circle and saying ohsie, asses. It took me a while to figure THAT out, but did I mention that he is persistent? He doesn't seem to have a favorite food; he eats everything, even "picy" stuff that Ethan won't go near. His favorite number appears to be eight; one day I counted something up to seven, then he said eight and I nearly had a heart attack. Then I realized he counts like this: ah, ah, ah, eight, ah, eight, eight, ah.

He loves to sing. He sings along with everything, and often he actually comes pretty darn close to the real tune. It is so sweet I can't even write about it without getting all teary-eyed. I have yet to capture it on video though because as soon as he catches sight of anything in my hands he shouts Mon! Mon! (mine!) and tries to wrestle it away from me. And not just me, of course. Anything, anyone is in possession of suddenly becomes vital to his health, happiness, and national security. So sweet.

So, we will keep him. Happy birthday, my darling boy. May God bless this coming year and all the years of your amazing, magnificent life. I am so glad to be a part of it. I love you so much.

Update

Well, we survived our time without Matt. We cheated a little; we spent Tuesday night at a hotel for a little mini-adventure, complete with pool time and Chinese food food delivered right to our door. On Wednesday, Matt's sister watched the kids while I worked and we invited ourselves to crash there Wednesday night. It was very nice to get out of our big, dark house for awhile. Matt came home at 4:45 AM on Friday morning and insisted that the boys stay with him while I went to work. We all slept really good on Friday.

As a reward for keeping us safe and warm all by myself, Kirk and Kasey came for the weekend. Oh, they also came so Kasey could finish her rural hospital experience in Broken Bow, but mostly they came to distract the boys long enough for me to take a shower.

Here goes

Matt is on his way to Racine, Wisconsin for tractor school, or something, and the boys and I are are staring down the barrel of a week of single parenting. In the spirit of positive thinking, I decided the pros of this arrangement are 1) a menu plan consisting of pancakes and grilled cheese sandwiches and 2) okay, that's all I've got. The cons are EVERYTHING ELSE. We passed the time today by going to a birthday party and doing an art project that turned out, surprisingly, nothing like the picture in the magazine. Twelve hours down, INFINITY to go.

Still catching up

When we were at my parents' last month, Mom brought home an Animal Sounds Bingo game to play with Ethan. She humored Evan by giving him a card as well, but to our surprise he played like an old pro and really got into it. The look of concentration on his little face was priceless, and Ethan sweetly shared his expertise as needed.