Best Friends

It's a funny thing to watch your babies make friends. I've been trading babysitting in exchange for piano lessons for Cole, so every Thursday, Kenny comes to our house to play. Rylan looooves Kenny. He lights up when it's time for Kenny to come over.


And what's amazing to me is that they really do play together. Not just play side by side as two-year-olds usually do, but these two play together.

I hope they can be best friends for a long time to come.

More Snow

Enough this time to build a snowman. I mean, Michael, Cole, and Eli built a snowman. I sat inside where it was warm, and only went outside long enough to take a couple pictures.












And Rylan watched from the porch..."Uh, uh, Momma. I'm not going out in that."

In other news, I took Rylan to the ENT for a hearing test on Friday. He passed the test, but the doctor looked in Rylan's ears and mouth and announced, "This kid is sick." Really? He has NO symptoms. Except apparently he has fluid in his ears and enlarged tonsils. We're supposed to give him some antibiotics and then take him back in a month to see if the fluid in his ears is gone. If it isn't, then we'll know Rylan's speech issues are caused by a hearing problem. If it is gone, they'll redo the hearing test and then we'll start speech therapy.

Eli the Artist

When I was growing up, I hated art because I thought the important part was producing a beautiful finished product, and that wasn't something I was very good at. Since becoming a parent, I've discovered the philosophy of art as "the process not the product." In other words, it doesn't matter what your end product looks like, the fun is in making art - trying out different mediums, using different materials, letting your creative juices flow without regard to whether or not it "looks good."

I still don't think I'd like to create art in a grown-up setting, but I absolutely love doing art projects with my kids. I've tried to supply them with every art supply their little hearts could desire and to store the supplies in an accessible location so they can create to their heart's content. When Cole and Eli were younger, I only bought permanent markers (not washable) because they work better, but that meant they walked around half the time with permanent marker splotches all over their face. Secretly, I loved that.

I think my kids probably started off with some natural artistic talent with their Grammy and Uncle Josh being excellent artists and Michael and me not sucking too bad at it. But they also draw a lot. I can't tell you how many times people have asked me, "Did Cole (or Eli) draw that all by himself?"

I always thought Cole was an extremely talented little artist, but lately Eli has been blowing me away.

Here he's working on a snowman craft for Joy School. One of his favorite themes is drawing "snowman bands," so in this picture, the snowman is playing the drums.



When he finished, he asked if he could flip the paper over and draw some more on the back.


Continuing the snowman band theme, he added an upright bass and a harp.

I know I'm their mom, but still...I have some talented little boys!