Eleanor Climbs Stairs and Cuddles

We are loving the sunshine and springtime activities. In the past few weeks we've started climbing stairs (Eleanor) picked up a Winnie the Pooh obsession (Bradley) and gotten a ridiculous amount of baby cuddles (me me me!!).

HURRAY cuddles!!

Eleanor has finally developed some separation anxiety ... and I LOVE it. I get so many cuddles, which never happened with Bradley. He's cuddly once in a blue moon and I savor every second of my Bradley snuggles. But Eleanor gets a bit nervous around new faces these days and burrows into me while peeking out her head for shy smiles now and then. She has the ladies at the church nursery wrapped around her little finger. She's just so sweet.

This face!

She's sweet ... and mischievous. She progressed to legitimate crawling a few weeks ago (no more army crawl) and with her newfound mobility she hunts down kitties like it's her job.

Eleanor has much better luck with the kitties than Bradley. They seem to begrudgingly tolerate her for at least a minute or two while they just run away from Bradley, much to his delight. Chasing after kitties is great fun. I tried to let him give Meg some kitty treats the other day and it did not go well. He'd get so excited when she'd start eating a treat that he'd jump up and down and shriek with delight. Meg thought that no treat was worth that amount of trauma.

Casually hanging out by Meg. Meg continually has the trauma.

But the real achievement is her newfound stair climbing abilities. She went from climbing her first stair in the morning to taking on the whole staircase by the time Daddy got home.

She's not quite 10 months old.

Look, Mom, no hands!

Exhausted from climbing all the stairs

We took her and Bradley in to the pediatrician for well checks a couple of weeks ago.

Bradley gets his super focused look on his face whenever he's being examined. It's a bit funny and very adorable to watch.

Despite thinking that Bradley was finally getting almost kind of skinny, he came in at 82nd percentile height (almost three feet) and 96th percentile weight at 34 lbs.

But you can see ribs here! Isn't this what skinny looks like?

Bradley says if I think he's too skinny perhaps I could be less stingy with the cookies. Here is a video of my parenting abilities as I try not to make food into a battle but I just want him to try the darn quiche that was the hit of the church function I recently went to. A hit, I tell you! I think I'm going to call this round a draw. (Spoiler: he gets the cookie in the end)

Eleanor surprised us at her 9 month check up by coming in at a paltry 28.5 inches which is only 72nd percentile and 19 lbs 12 oz which is 59th percentile for weight. Skinny. I have a skinny child. Perhaps if she wasn't constantly crawling around or climbing stairs she could keep a little weight on. She certainly eats enough.

Happy after a successful eating session

However, nothing rivals Bradley's dedication to food. This picture is of his third muffin. I had given him two mini muffins prior to this and he kept hollering "big one, big one!" until he got what he truly desired.

Bradley also recently had to eat a packet of jam while we were on a Costco trip to keep his strength up. Jam packets are all the rage at the Scott household these days.

This was while we were in line for a hot dog in the food court. I hadn't realized he knew how to open the jam packets he likes to carry around. Oops.

One thing that these kids have in common is they both do a last minute grab for food when you're wiping them down after a meal. It cracks me and Nathan up.

Eleanor adores Nathan. I think it might be mutual. Here they are goofing off with Nathan's hat after a meal.

Poke!

And once in a while Daddy gets the Eleanor cuddles I've been hoarding for myself.

Bliss!

My favorite times at home with the kids continue to be when they're playing together.

Eleanor watching and learning. We love Bradley's birthday blocks from Grandpa Dan and Grandma Kati!

I have two imps. They are so funny.

I tested out the two of them sharing a crib after one of Bradley's naps. They're probably not ready to share a bed anytime soon.

Nope. It's just too much fun! How could we ever sleep?

Bradley has been really funny about his truck lately and likes to ride on it with a buddy.

Sometimes Bradley has trouble finding a willing partner. Eleanor says no most of the time now and his friend Eli was less than thrilled by the chumminess when he was here to play the other day.

Baby skin! The only thing cuter than two little kids playing together is two kids with no clothes on playing together.

Eleanor insists on being involved in any activity that Bradley is engaged in. Playdough was interesting the other day. I told Bradley that Eleanor couldn't have any of his playdough and I didn't want him to share because she would eat it and that was ick ick ick. Next thing I knew I looked over and Bradley was licking the playdough and grinning at me. How did I end up with such an imp?

Oh, and Eleanor absolutely got her hands on some of the playdough and ate a little. Bradley needs to work on his vigilance.

Couch buddies!

And here is an extended video of the two of them being adorable together in our basement.

It's been great having the two of them play together because a lot of times I can do things like cook dinner and clean up a bit while they're having a good time. However, the other day I left them downstairs together unsupervised for literally three minutes while I put the rice on the stove and had to run back downstairs when I heard Eleanor hollering. I found her with no pants and an innocent looking Bradley standing by her. Sigh. 

I put her pants back on and soon got to see Bradley's method. You just grab a pant leg while the baby tries to crawl away. Hopefully I've put a stop to removing baby clothing for the immediate future.

Bradley has a host of new and adorable quirks these days. He yells "hat off" at me whenever I try to put a baseball cap on inside the house now. No idea why he dislikes it so, he doesn't do the same thing for Nathan. I wear a baseball cap pretty much all summer, he better get used to it!

Cool girls in hats!

He also insisted on wearing Eleanor's baseball cap the other day. She disapproves of gross boy hats.

And made a big fuss over an ouchie on his knee for days and days and hollered at me whenever I put long pants on him so he couldn't see the band-aid. This was awkward at night when I had to put him in footed pajamas.

He also had to holler when I put his battery toy in the dumb bubble blower toy ... the bubble blower toy is awesome. Batteries are inanimate. I did not understand the allure.

We also may not be on the path to weaning Bradley from his pacifier. Is more pacifiers in the mouth at the same time the correct way to go? Sure hope so because Bradley thinks it's hilarious!

Hiding has got to be the biggest new Bradley trend. He loves it and it's mostly really funny.

He'll yell out "hide!" and then shut his eyes or hide under a blanket.

Hiding at the dinner table

Sometimes he's a little too good for his own good. This one took me a couple minutes because he was so quiet about it and it was a bit unexpected. Such a stinker.

We still go to the library on a regular basis to play. I've yet to read a book to one of my children while we are there.

But we love to have books read to us! Bradley has been a champ ever since we promoted him to toddler story time. Look at this kid, sitting nicely and listening! Big boy!

We've also been visiting our friend Olivia's house. I like to take a lot of pictures of Bradley with his little lady friends just in case he ends up doing the right thing and marrying one of our friend's kids.

Olivia being cute and sharing bubbles with Eleanor.

We went to Bradley's friend Eli's birthday party a week ago and had a great time.

But the best part may have been the car ride home. GREAT party Eli! When everyone is so tuckered out that they fall asleep on the ride home you know you've done things right.

Grandma Colleen and Kerry are visiting us for Easter weekend which is a lot of fun! Bradley is loving having books read to him.

Eleanor has fun getting in on the action too.

We had a really good time painting a ceramic bunny for a special art outing. And it turns out that I'm a sucker for Bradley is a paint splattered apron so we'll definitely be going back!

How could you not LOVE this?

Bradley was unsure about the painting process at first but with Grandma's help he was soon pretty enthusiastic about the whole endeavor!

Eleanor got to do a little hand print tile! Not to compare children, but the time I tried to do this with Bradley at a little ceramic cafe in Seattle we had to leave in shame because he screamed bloody murder the whole time and I couldn't get him to do either a hand print or a foot print. Eleanor was not really sure about painting her hand but she put up with it like a champ!

Cute!

Eleanor will also sit in her high chair and wait for food without screaming at us to feed her feed her feed her instantly. Perhaps this is why she is in the wimpy 59th weight percentil instead of 90th. Nothing matches baby Bradley's dedication to food.

We've been spending a lot of time running around at the park. We're looking forward to the Easter activities tomorrow!

Love this big girl so much! I can't believe she's just two months away from being a whole year old!

One last little story about our two little bugaboos. Nathan reads to the kids before putting them in bed every night and often little Eleanor falls asleep during one of the books. And then Bradley likes to hold her hand. This is so typical of sweet Bradley. I love how rough and tumble he can be but that he's also just a sweet little love. The terrible twos aren't so bad so far!