Taste of The Terrible Twos

Joey woke up on the wrong side of the bed yesterday.  If he wakes up fussy (which doesn’t happen often), we always know we’re in for a rough one.  Yesterday took the cake!

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After getting Joey up, we got Benji dressed.  When Joey saw that Benji was wearing Elmo,  reached through the crib, grabbed Elmo from Benji’s shirt and pulled.  He pulled so hard that Benji got pulled up against the crib…Suffice to say, I’ve packed away all of Benji’s Elmo clothes to pass along to Baby Burnett.

Elmo 🙁

I was hoping for a fresh start at breakfast but Joey had other plans.  He insisted on eating waffles for breakfast (even though I made him eggs, “sausage”, and toast.  He wouldn’t even wait for me to toast them and ate them frozen instead.

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My next genius idea was to bake cookies with him for his upcoming play date.  We had fun rolling out the dough and I even cut a football-shaped cookies.  He tried eating the dough a few times but nothing major.  When I took the cookies to put them in the oven, he lost it!  Despite me trying to distract him, he cried for 15 minutes non-stop while watching them bake.  About a minute before they were finally done, he got bored and went to play trains.

About an hour (and many tears) later, I threw in the towel and let Thomas take over (I have no idea what parents did before television!?)

Fortunately, Joey was back to his happy self today!  He was a pleasure all day long, which made for a very happy Mommy 🙂

Giddy Up!

Righty

Benji’s “happy place” is his changing table.  It travels through the house with me because its the only place I can put him down without him fussing.

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Our cutie pies!

Joey was very decisive about what he wanted for afternoon snack.  “Cereal Milk Spoon” he kept repeating, until I filled his request.

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“Hey Mom, can you clean the lint out from my hand?”
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Goodman boys hanging out

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Benji is LOVING his new play mat from The Fines!

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“What’s up little bro?”

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Super-Jew, Joey

Joey REALLY loves wearing his kippah.  He found his favorite one tucked away in his arts and crafts drawer this weekend and insisted on wearing it ALL DAY long!

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Even while playing trains, the kippah remained on….

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Superbowl Sunday

Greg has been pumped for Superbowl all week!  We planned to stay in so Joey could get to bed on time and Greg could watch the game from the comfort of his own couch.  
We even came up with a plan for Joey to eat dinner in the living room so we could keep up with the commercials!

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Joey and Benji didn’t think too highly of our game plan and came up with one of their own.  They decided they wanted our constant, undivided attention throughout the entire game!

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After several hours, Benji finally fell asleep…
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We gave in and let Joey watch “Thomas” while we watched the game….

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Greg says we’re getting a sitter next year….

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“Dining Out” isn’t always easier…

We decided to take the night off from cooking and head out to dinner Saturday night (sounds relaxing, right?).  Alex leaves for AZ this week so we wanted to spend some quality time before then.  We headed to Francesca’s with Abby, Alex, Cari, Joey and Benji.  Just as Joey finished dinner, he choked and started coughing.  The bread came right out, but the coughing continued and I knew what was coming next…Seconds later, Joey’s entire dinner came up (and covered both of us).  I no longer carry a back up outfit for Joey in the diaper bag, so we changed him into Aunt Cari’s tank top….

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By the time I returned from cleaning myself up in the bathroom, Joey had learned a new word…

What did you do?

We decided to stick around, as Joey needed to eat dinner (again)…He didn’t skip a beat, even having some dessert!

Dessert

To top the night off, we almost burnt the place down when our bag of leftovers lit on fire….Abby, Cari and Alex found dinner to be “so entertaining”.  Greg and I, not so much!

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Finally some snow!

Nanny and Poppy came over this morning and cooked us breakfast!  Mmm, mmm good!  After breakfast, it was time to check out the snow!

Benji was happy to suit up,

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but not so happy to actually be outside!

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Greg encouraging Joey to check out/touch the snow

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Happy guy!

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Our sweet, sweet 20 month old!

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Trains, trains, trains….

The train obsession is still going strong….

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He still loves lining them up…

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…and hiding under the table (so he can converse with his trains in private)

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Quick break to say “hi” to Benji!

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Brrrrr……….

Despite the cold weather, we’re managing to stay busy!  Maternity leave is SO much fun!  With Breanna still working in the mornings, I have the flexibility to spend time with each of the kids one-on-one.  I also have some time for myself, too!  Here’s photos from the last few days….

Wednesday morning gym class (Joey LOVES it!)

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After gym, I took Joey to Target.  We had a blast naming a million things throughout the aisles.  His vocabulary has exploded these last few weeks.  He is constantly surprising us with new words, way too many to count anymore!  He also loves repeating what we’re saying now, too (now we really need to watch what comes out of our mouths).

We were having a blast until it was time to check out and Joey had to leave the trains he was holding behind.  Fortunately, an escalator ride was all it took to cheer him up.

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We also spent about 2 hours playing trains in the afternoon….

Serious about trains!

Joey tried relentlessly to turn Thomas on the TV (no such luck!)

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When its time to nap, Joey collects all of his trains and tries to bring them to bed.  As he climbs up the stairs, he typically drops all but two.  We then have to distract him to get them away before he gets in his crib….

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I took Benji to work to show him off yesterday….He was pretty fussy (he has been for the past few days/nights), but still managed to capture everyones hearts!

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Last night, I took the boys to “open gym” at Gymboree.  Joey had a blast running around and Benji was happy in the carrier.

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Benji even managed to feed himself (I propped the bottle up against me in the carrier)

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Friday nursery school

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Always the first at the table to celebrate Shabbat!

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Time for some music!

We came home and made fresh challah with Breanna

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Tummy time!

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Hanging as a family of 4!

“Put the camera down, Mom”

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Our happy 6 week old 🙂

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High fives!

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Smiles for Daddy

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Hugs for Benji!

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Already looking out for Benji…

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Dizzy Dancer

Notice he can only turn right….

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Celebrating Sopharella and Aunt Deb

We spent yesterday celebrating two very important people!  I had Sophie’s baby shower in the morning, thrown by Vince’s mom.  She did a beautiful job and really nailed all of the details:)

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Sophie was perfectly behaved the entire time!

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I got back downtown just in time to celebrate Aunt Debrah’s birthday!

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Abby and Alex stopped by after dinner to get in some quality time with boys…

Who is Abby?

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Posted in Abby, Alex, Benji, Debrah, Joey, Sophie, The Burnetts, The Panozzos, The Waxs | Leave a comment

One-on-one with Joey!

Joey has had a pretty busy maternity leave, too!  He’s been able to get out of the house a lot more than he does when I’m working.  Before heading out yesterday, we checked out the snow.  Joey was so confused, not knowing if he could even walk on it…

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After hearing the commute would be an hour, we ditched nursery school and headed to Pump It Up.  I thought he would be a little young for it (he was), but he did great!  It took about a half hour for him to warm up to the place but once he did, he had a blast!

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Very unsure…

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Warming up to the place…

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He loved the basketball bounce house, even though he was way to small to make a basket.

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Climbing up the giant slide all by himself (it even made me a little nervous)

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Ready to go down!

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After Pump It Up, we headed to Lester Lampert to pick up a repair.  Joey loved checking out all of the diamonds and getting his fingerprints all over the glass!

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Next, we were off to Aunt Val’s for brunch with Val, Ali and Jackson.  Val had quite the spread, per usual, and Joey took full advantage 🙂

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Jackson is just ADORABLE!

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After brunch, Val and Joey stacked (and knocked down) the nesting cups

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Bubbie came over for a visit yesterday afternoon.  We were planning to skip out on Shabbat so she wanted to see her boys.  Just like Joey, Benji fussed when Bubbie held him (Joey did this until he was about 11 months).  Hopefully Benji wont take as long to come around!

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Bubbie asked Joey if he wanted to go to Shabbat with her.  He couldn’t run to the gate and climb down the stairs fast enough.

Off to the Panozzos they went!  Aunt Lori and Uncle Vinnie were such great hostesses, unwrapping a bunch of Sophies toys to make sure Joey had enough to do!

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Shabbat at the Panozzos

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Joey finally said “Vinnie” and “Ricky”!

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Joey was looking through Uncle Dickie’s wallet and said “Go Bears” when he saw this card.

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The rest of us took it easy and stayed home.  We texted them at 8PM letting them know we were already in bed and to see if Joey could spend the night….

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Joey came home with $20 in his pocket this morning.  Uncle Dickie and him had been betting the night before and I guess Joey came out ahead…

Posted in Benji, Cari, Joey, Shabbat, Sophie, The Panozzos, The Silvermans, Uncle Dickie | 3 Comments

Joey at home…

Joey and Breanna are having so much fun together.  Their typical day consists of at least an hour of “train play.”

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Believe it or not, they do other things as well.

Baking brownies

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Joey is getting an early start on his Valentines, as he has so many people in his life who love him!
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Thursday Play date!

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