Bradley Questions Death, Eleanor Couch Gymnastics, & Sick Patrick

Bradley has been asking me a lot of questions about the specifics of death and going to heaven for at least the past six months or so. It pops up at surprising times, like the other day when I gave him a hug and told him I thought he was pretty wonderful. He replied "I don't want your body to get washed out to sea. I don't want your body to go away EVER." (This teaches me for mentioning once, just once, the ancient practice of burial at sea).

It also comes up at Costco sometimes. Went there a few days ago and while the two youngest children were sitting in the cart and clinging to me and crying for cuddles Bradley started yelling "Mommy, I don't want you to die and go to heaven!"

Delighted with clipping princess dresses all over his clothes. It's a very good thing Eleanor didn't see this.

Bradley is rather mommy fixated these days. We've been making him sleep on his own a bit lately because he and Eleanor have been a bit too wild at bedtime and are not going to sleep until late if they are in the same bed. But it backfires on us because if Bradley wakes up and is alone in the night he comes and finds Mommy to cuddle with. Patrick has been having a rough go of it for the past week or so with a cold and teething so mostly Nathan has been sleeping in his room with him on a twin bed but I finally took a turn two nights ago. I was a bit confused when I heard someone opening the door at 4:30AM and thought it was a cat until a very happy Bradley hopped into bed next to me. I finally booted him out to sleep with Nathan and saw that every door upstairs was open. I realized he had checked both the master bedroom and Eleanor's room until he finally found me in Patrick's room. What a sweetheart. We're letting the big kids share a bed again now. We want sleep.

Bradley and Eleanor had their preschool Christmas program and it was beyond adorable.

Nathan and I got to have a cool grownup date night at the Burns & McDonnell holiday party. I had a sparkle dress and fun friends to hang out with, it was very good times.

I'm going to have Nathan scan copies of these pictures later. I thought we were getting digital copies at the event but they fooled me and gave me a gif link instead! I'm too old for your gifs. I blame the kids in their 20's for this nonsense.

We know the kids had a good time at home with the babysitter because Nathan walked in after we got home to check and make sure Eleanor was under the covers and she was asleep with a princess book with the light on. We're not sure how late she stayed up reading but she was quite tired the next day.

Bonus sleeping pictures of cute children:

Naps with Daddy are still the best thing ever.

Patrick saw the Daddy snuggles and yelled at me until he got in on it.

Patrick's Daddy obsession is fairly ridiculous. Here are a couple videos proving it.

The time between naps and until Nathan gets home can be a bit long if you're a little guy.

Patrick loves his daddy.

Sometimes Daddy gets too much love from both boys and can barely eat his dinner.

Okay, Patrick loves me too.

And the lucky kitties:

And it is a privilege to get to cuddle next to him at shows.

Sometimes the love can be a bit much - he's so lucky to have such a nice big brother.

A few days ago I was doing dishes in the kitchen and Bradley had opened the door to the basement in order to block my view of whatever he and Patrick were doing in the office together. So I said "Bradley, why is the door to the basement open?" Bradley replied in a cheery voice "Because we want to have some good fun and we want it to be a surprise!"

Bradley's imagination is one of my favorite things about him. We were doing stamp drawings the other night while Patrick was being read to for bedtime and Bradley made up quite the elaborate spider and monkey scenario.

Patrick is finally holding hands when we walk through parking lots ... just not with me.

No other child has been this obstinate about doing what I say. We've been having some battles over wearing a coat, which isn't that big of a deal until it's 5 degrees out and you have to wear a darn coat, kid.

Yes, we took our kids out to play in the snow when it was 5 degrees. It was as warm as it was going to get and it was the first real snow of the year so it was very necessary to play in it.

You'll be happy to hear that Eleanor isn't letting the cold weather keep her from keeping active.

Last night I had just changed into a t-shirt and pajama bottoms when Eleanor walked into my bedroom. Eleanor took one look at me and said "That isn't a girl shirt." I laughed and asked what I should do with it and Eleanor said "Give it to a boy." So I switched into a different shirt and asked if it was acceptable. There was a long pause and then Eleanor said "yes." She also told Bradley tonight after bath that she was his mommy because she was wearing a dress. I can tell I'm going to have to up my game when it comes to my appearance around here, I have quite the judging audience.

Eleanor has a "good foot" and a "naughty foot" in the bath and one foot likes to be washed but the other one doesn't and usually has to have a lengthy talking to by the good foot (and sometimes some threats from Mommy) before it will allow itself to be washed.

There's a bit of sass from sweet Eleanor girl these days. She gets away with a lot of it by being cute and having a smile on her face while she says somewhat ridiculous things.

Her class posted what the students answered for the prompt of what they would give baby Jesus as a present. I like all the answers and am not at all surprised by Eleanor's. Her best friend in the class is the girl who said she would give Jesus a My Little Pony. No wonder they get along so well.

Poor Patrick has been go go go these past few weeks and teething combined with a cold has made him feel very tired and sick.

Happier times with a giant chick-fil-a shake

Keeping up his hoops game

Being naughty touching buttons on the electric fireplace in the basement. If you look closely you can see that he managed to set it for 12 hours at 90 degrees.

So Nathan and I have been getting some fairly amazing Patrick snuggles with all this going on.

We stayed home this morning instead of leaving the house (I HATE staying home so it never happens) and the kids did "art" aka a game of see who can stack the markers the highest and cut up the most paper into little bits all over my kitchen floor.

I got a snoring baby on me during some morning shows that he still won't watch. It's ironic that the healthy kids are getting to sit and watch shows while the sick one plays basketball with me until he passes out on me because he's so tired.

But we finally figured out how to get him to sit still for a show. Well, it lasted as long as the popcorn did.

We are so happy that we're getting all of the sick out of the way now though before family comes to visit for Christmas! The kids are talking about seeing grandparents more than I hear about Santa Claus, we're really looking forward to having a cozy Christmas at home with wonderful family. We are so blessed!

Luminary Walk and Santa

Three year old Eleanor is really a treasure trove of amazing quotes these days. A week or so ago she held a spoon up to Bradley's face while they were eating lunch at the island and she said to him "Look in the mirror! You look boring." It's my new favorite burn. Sign this girl up for middle school, she's ready.

And a few days ago she told Bradley "If you don't listen to my words you won't go to heaven." This was right after we got home from the church Christmas program. Don't mess with Eleanor, she doesn't pull any punches.

I took Eleanor shoe shopping with me a couple weeks ago and taking the shoe obsessed girl into DSW may have been an error.

I didn't put any of these shoes on for her. Eleanor requires no assistance when it comes to high fashion.

She found a new pink wallet to love as well. DSW really has everything.

Eleanor loves to steal my shoes and tried to make me play prince and princess with her when she found my tan ankle boots. Guess who was supposed to be the prince (not Eleanor).

It is also amazing to play a game of Jenga with her. She ended up knocking the tower with her head on this particular game. Not on purpose.

Nathan attempting to make his move with a little girl draped all over him

Obviously the best manner in which to play Jenga

Eleanor enjoys games but Bradley often has to draw cards for her and move for her in Candyland because otherwise we have to remind her each time it's her turn. He's so competitive. I love it.

At a classmate's birthday party at the gym

We had a lovely Thanksgiving with Colleen and Kerry, we're so grateful they made the drive down to see us. I managed to cook a turkey and at least Patrick was very appreciative of my efforts.

Cozy couch time with grandparents is the best

And a trip to the Ferris Wheel at Scheel's! That's all it takes for a trip to be a success.

After they headed home we started in on decorating for Christmas. Bradley and Eleanor and our sweet neighbor girl put all the ornaments on the tree so they all started out on the bottom half.

And then ball obsessed Patrick struck again and again and our tree now looks like this:

In case you're wondering, it's a pretty hilarious process to remove all the ornaments one by one from the bottom of a tree over the course of a couple weeks and hang them up out of the reach of the naughty toddler.

We went on the Luminary Walk at the Arboretum on Thanksgiving weekend and had a blast. We were lucky and the day we went had a high of 60 degrees so we didn't freeze to death while out on our walk. Hurray for an incredibly mild fall!

It's so pretty and fun at the Arboretum. We had a pretty excellent time.

And the kids even got to see Santa! With little to no wait! This is the best Santa ever, Eleanor ran ahead of another family and hopped on his lap (Nathan and I were occupied with the boys at the time). Bradley was NOT okay with Santa last year but was excited to chatter away about Christmas presents. And even toddler Patrick was okay with the rather intimidating stranger. Anything the big kids do he wants to do, he bustled his way up to get to sit by Santa and looked very pleased with himself.

And then they called Patrick back for bonus time with Santa. We LOVE this Santa.

Patrick is a giant, it turns out. I took him for his 18 month checkup and he's off the charts at just shy of 3 ft tall. But he's only at the 98% for weight at 31 lbs, does this mean he's skinny?

Patrick is such a little goof these days. He had been waking up in the night because of teething so Nathan and I decided to put a twin bed in his room that he'll transition into eventually but that parents can use for better sleeping conditions while stuck in a room with a sad toddler in the nighttime. However, he was having a tough time going down for a nap one day so I tried to bring Eleanor in with me to cuddle and sleep on the bed while Patrick went to sleep in the crib. It may have been a bit too exciting for all involved.

Eleanor was SO happy to be in the new bed and in the baby's room and she started to try to sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star to him with a lot of discussion of the particular verse or words she was saying which piqued the baby's interest and so he got up and started jumping in his crib.

I had to boot Eleanor out of the room (mid lullaby, she couldn't believe the negative turn of events), and then Patrick thought it was his turn to sleep in the cool bed. So I thought I'd give it a go. It did not go so well.

Naps did not happen on this day and I ended up just letting Patrick throw stickers all of the kitchen floor because it entertained him for five minutes. Is it clear that I have thrown in the towel on most parenting battles?

Ignore the naughty three year old girl jumping back and forth from the couch and ottoman in the video below and focus on the cute baby trying to figure out the microphone so he can sing "Let it Go"

Patrick is lucky that his brother is so nice to him.

I'm not saying that Bradley is the world's biggest sweetheart, but it says something that our biggest problem with him around his younger siblings is to get him to hug them a little gentler and less frequently. "Hug and release!" is a frequent saying around these parts.

Patrick can play catch like a champ by the way

Bradley is willing to tolerate most things if it means his little brother is paying attention to him.

Patrick may be a bit enamored with his wonderful big brother and will follow him around and copy everything he does. We're still working on holding books right side up.

The best reading location is obviously on your big brother's back.

Eleanor is fortunate enough to be the recipient of a fair number of cuddles herself. She wanted to lay her head on Patrick at Costco the other day and he could not contain his delight at unexpected sister affection.

Sometimes Patrick cuddles err on the side of intrusive, especially when big kids are trying to watch shows. They really are remarkably patient with the little stinker.

We did discover that little Patrick will deign to sit still and watch a show for as long as he has a bowl of popcorn to munch on. In the picture below he ate two full bowls and then got down and demanded I play basketball with him.

I'm really enjoying this kids these days. They're all at pretty fun stages.

FYI, the best way to get benevolent looks of love from your children is to pile them all on an office chair and spin them around wildly.

Sweet Bradley had a bit of an existential crisis the other day when he started asking about going to heaven and was horrified to discover that he didn't get to take his body with him, not even his head. To be fair, I can see how that would be tough news to take at first go.

Poor little guy.

However he recovered quickly enough when he discovered that he had a hangnail. I was a bit frustrated with him for stomping around and roaring one day during the other kids' naptime until he explained he had a hangnail so he had to be a robo monster. Duh, Mommy. It's hard to argue with such sound logic.

Bradley with his best sleeping buddy, Eleanor. Her sleep poses are truly impressive, no wonder she's been complaining of a sore neck on a more regular basis (although she may just be saying that in order to be able to score Daddy's cool neck pillow).

Cute pics of adorable Patrick boy.

Daddy is at an all time high of popularity with the children, especially with Patrick who says "Daddy Daddy Daddy" nonstop when Nathan gets home from work and generally meets him at the door to the garage, bouncing up and down in excitement. 

The Umizoomi seek and find book is a favorite. Good luck reading it to Patrick. The only page that matters is the page with all the balls on it.

And we discovered that the YouTube hit "What Does the Fox Say" exists in book form.

We all like the weekends because of all the bonus Daddy time we get.

Bradley at 4.5 years old is pretty much the best little guy to hang out with. Here he is posing with the "one" toy he wanted from our trip to Scheel's.

And he is always looking for an opportunity to be a cute little stinker.

Bradley has the best jokes.

 Eleanor fashion. My mom has been on a roll with the homemade dresses lately, we get compliments all the time and Eleanor literally has a closet full of dresses and a better wardrobe than I do.

Have I mentioned how fun it is to have a little girl? She wouldn't wear this fancy Mini Boden dress until I called it her Runaway Bunny dress and now she asks to wear it every time she wants to curry favor with Mommy.

Eleanor raided my closet and found my wedding shoes the other day so I let her play with my veil as well. She was pleased to say the least.

Wish me luck this winter, hanging off the counter and wearing little to no clothes seems to be Patrick's favorite pastime.

He is quite adamant now in his hatred of all coats, which is a bit of an issue for a Midwest winter. I'm at the gym cafe right now typing this up and it's snowing outside. Guess which child still refused to put on his coat on the way in? I had to hold it over his back while he snuggled into me. Sighhhhhhh.

He used to be okay with the coat when it was novelty item. Below are some pics of the crew hanging out while Bradley was at speech therapy. Notice which child was allowed to ditch her shoes and climb on a heater in order to stack blocks? YOU try arguing with a three year old about these things.

 Patrick now yells in order to get attention and sadly for Nathan I find it hilarious.

Our house may not be known as the "quiet" house.

Like, seriously.

 And here is Patrick with his friend Mabel at a birthday party. It's so fun now that he actually has little friends he gets excited about seeing. Although he and his buddy Marcus did start a yelling battle during the prayer prior to the Christmas Program at church ... friendship has its costs for the parents at times.

And I still need to download all the Christmas Program photos and video but here is a sneak peak of the children singing Christmas carols. Eleanor has the best lyrics.

These cute kids. It's just so fun watching them be such little buddies.