Spring is springing!

Today was an awesome day! The gorgeous weather did wonders for our spirits. We took a family trip to the park for the first time in months, and it felt amazing. We have had such an incredibly lovely winter, but the promise of spring always feels so nice.



A quick Elijah funny before I forget.. Instead of saying "yesterday," he says, "last year." So, conversations like this one occur regularly:
"Mom, last year I drew a penguin at school."
"Do you mean 'yesterday'?"
"No! Last year!"
"Oh, ok."



Today Elijah had his good friend Paigey over for a play date. My camera is 10 feet away (way too far to retrieve), so I will upload pics from the day tomorrow. They had such a good time playing together! It is cute to hear them talking when they don't think we are listening. I love that they have basically grown up together at daycare and know each other so well. At one point we were talking about favorite colors, and I asked Elijah what Paige's favorite color was. He said, "Mom! It's pink and purple!" So cute. When her dad came to pick her up, Elijah immediately started saying, "I want Paigey to come back!"



Sammy Jammy is just as cute and snuggly as ever. He is definitely in a sassy little phase right now, but he is still the sweetest little guy. He takes his brother's "abuse" in stride and loves all of us so much. He has been saying so many new words lately, too. He has started saying BYE-BYE and HOME and HI and many other cute things. He is still so particular about certain things, like which books he will allow us to read to him and where and when and what food will be served to him. He is constantly rooting through our pantry for snacks throughout the day, which obviously affects his meals. We've had to start telling him NO, which doesn't go over very well.



Elijah's behavior has been a bit off the charts for the past few weeks, which caused Dan and I to have an Elijah Behavior Conference last night. We came up with a solid plan and implemented it today. Elijah did NOT like it, but we loved it. It was a lot more work for us up-front, but at the end of the day we were so much less stressed. He is such a smart boy and he has a very strategic little mind, so we need to constantly be thinking ahead of him. One of the things we have decided to do is completely ignore his "bad" words. He 100% uses them as a tool to get under our skin, so we refuse to allow that anymore. A couple different times today he spewed a string of CR*Ps, and we acted like we didn't hear him. He started looking around like, HEY! Listen to me! We are hoping and praying for a change for the better in his behavior, all around.

That is all for now! Tomorrow is supposed to bring beautiful weather, as well, so we are hoping to get out of the house again and enjoy it. Thanks for checking in on us! Have a great rest of your weekend!