Goodbye, Hair! Hello, Fall!

Beckham has been back from New Orleans for a few weeks now so I have some catching up to do.  His trip lasted for ten days, from September 6th-16th.  He mostly stayed with Joshua's parents who flew him out there, but he also spent a couple nights with my mom and Huey.  I was really nervous about letting him go because those who know me well, know that I struggle with a lot of anxiety when it comes to my children.  The closer the trip got, the more worried I became.  However, as a mother, there will be many times in my life that I will have to make sacrifices for my kids, and I was well aware that this was one of those times that I needed to sit back and do this for my son.  Despite all of the fears that were running through my mind, I did feel a ton of excitement for Beckham.  I was so happy that he was going to see all of the people who he dearly misses, and that he was going to be able to attend his cousin, Daniel's first birthday party where I knew he would see all of his other cousins who he had not seen in over a year.  I couldn't wait to hear all of the stories of his trip "home". 

Before we left for Vegas, Beckham had gone two straight weeks with no potty accidents, but I was a little concerned about how he would do without me with him in New Orleans. Of course, when he got there, he immediately began testing his boundaries with Joshua's parents... with the potty and with his attitude. My son is a very strong willed person who knows exactly what he wants and he makes no secret of his wishes. He tends to be very bossy and demanding; and although we mostly have it under control at home, I knew this would be a problem during his stay back home. It takes constant positive reinforcement to keep him on track, and he will no doubt test his limits in a new household. The first couple of days with Donna and Gene, Beckham clearly made it known that he wanted to be in control. He finally had a breakdown which resulted from him demanding that Donna pick up his cup that he threw. After throwing a long fit because she refused to pick it up, he finally fell asleep and let off on the control a bit. This behavior continued when he went to my mother's house too. He was trying to tell everyone in her house what to do and would kick people out of the bathroom when he was using the potty. Apparently, he would only let Myshie help him in the bathroom. He ended up giving her so many problems with the potty that he mostly stayed in a pull up at her house.

Once he returned home, I had my hands full. The first few days, he had several potty accidents until he finally got back into his old routine. However, over the last two days, this has suddenly become a problem again. There are times that I feel like I am starting all over.  And it is simply a control issue. When he came back from New Orleans, he was sassier than ever. If I were to say, "Please pick that up." He would reply, "No, you pick it up." Just the other day I told him, "Only Mommy can correct Brother." And he said, "No, only Beckham can correct Brother." And if we fuss him, he speaks angry gibberish and swings his hand. Now, he has gotten much better over the last few weeks because all of this was just simply to see what he could get away with. Like I mentioned before, every time he goes someplace new, he feels the need to test his boundaries again. It only took about a week for him to get his attitude in check here, but now I'm going to have to figure out what's going on with the potty situation.

Here are some pics of Becks in New Orleans with some of his family:

Here are some pics of when Gene and Donna brought Becks back home.

Beckham can be a handful at times, but he is mostly a sweetheart with lots of great things on his mind.  Here are some funny things he's been saying:

*Beckham stacked his cup on top of his snack bowl and said, "Look, it's a Eiffel Tower!".

*One day the boys and I were hanging out in Beckham's room and Everett walked out so Beckham yelled to him, "Everett, come back here!  Someones gonna take you and run away with you!  You don't want someone to take you and run away with you."

*Beckham once asked me out of the blue, "What we gonna do now that we need help?"  So I asked him, "What are you talking about?"  He replied, "I don't know what I'm talking about."

*Another time he told me, "Excuse me, Mommy, my son."

*One afternoon Beckham was riding around in his "Fire Truck" car and when he got out, he walked to me and said, "That was a little weird."

*Recently, I said that I wanted a muffin, and Beckham asked "From a Muffin Man?"

*Everett screamed so Beckham told him, "Everett, don't scream in the house!  You're gonna have to go outside in the dark!  You don't want to go outside in the dark.  It's dark in the dark!"

*I told Beckham that he was too much, and he replied, "Too much?  I ate raisins too much."

While Beckham was in New Orleans, Everett was figuring out who he was.  It was his first time as an "only child" and he began testing his boundaries too.  Our backyard is not fenced in and I never had a problem letting the boys play out back while keeping only "an eye" on them.  Well, because Everett was free from his brother, he seemed to think he was free from everything.  He kept running away!  He also transformed himself into a little monkey.  I don't care how cute of a monkey he is, I'd rather my son be a human.  He climbs onto the table outside as well as his toddler table inside.  He also climbs over the gate in front of the stairs now with no problem.  We have also had to pick up our bar stools because the little monkey uses them to climb onto the kitchen counter!  And as I mentioned in a previous blog, he has climbed out of his crib.  He also doesn't have a problem climbing onto the top bunk in Beckham's room.  And now he is climbing on top of the kitchen table!!  As I am writing this!!  This is the first time I'm seeing him do this.  I literally have to take him to the bathroom with me because I have no idea what he will be climbing on while I'm in there.  All of this is really a pain for Joshua and I as parents, but I must admit that there is a tad bit of cuteness in it all... when he climbs to the top of things, he yells "Get dooooown!" over and over!  LOL

Everett repeats just about every word now and he has a very large vocabulary. He is always pointing to things and saying what they are. He has a very raspy voice and he says most words with a "G" though. For example, "Binky" is "Geeky". But my favorite word that he says so far is "Bamama" or "Bagama" = "Banana". He is a motor mouth though. When he is not saying actual words, he is speaking some kind of gibberish.  

Evie tries to count everything, but most of the time it doesn't sound like he's saying numbers, just sounds. But he points to things and uses the same tone as when we count to him. There are times when he definitely says numbers, but they are usually not in order.

 

Everett mimics our expressions! This is seriously the cutest thing that he does. He mimics the surprised face, angry face, sad face and happy face. And when he hurts us (on purpose) when he pinches or hits, he makes a face as though he was hurt!  

Beckham and Everett are so sweet to each other sometimes, especially in the mornings.  This morning Beckham said that he wanted to lay by his brother, and then started rubbing Everett's back.  Other times, I find them hugging and kissing each other.  And one of Beckham's favorite things to do to his brother is give him raspberries which makes Everett crack up laughing.  But boys aren't always nice.  Sometimes Beckham yells to Evie to get away, and Everett has totally picked up on this.  When Beckham is laying on the couch watching TV, Everett walks up to him and yells, "Go waaaay!" and then Becks yells back, "You go away!" and then Evie yells it again, "Go waaaay!" and so on.  It's quite funny, but I have to hide my smile because it's just not polite.  Haha! 

I mentioned in a previous blog that I planned to work on having Everett out of his crib while Beckham was in NOLA.  I ended up deciding that I wanted to just slowly move him into Beckham's room which is where I've been planning on having them both sleep.  So I felt that there was no point in me getting Everett used to sleeping in a toddler bed in his own room when I would soon have to get him used to sleeping in Beckham's room anyway.  Well this was the week that I began working out my plan, and so far it has been going great.  I've been having both boys napping in Beckham's room; and once Evie is done teething, I plan to move him in there full time.  Everett hasn't been much of a problem with nap time.  He does try to climb out of the bed several times before giving up and going to sleep, but he doesn't cry at all.  Beckham seems to be the bigger problem though because it takes him longer to go to sleep so I catch him talking to himself and playing which makes me afraid that Everett may get woken up. But they are cute in there together.  Becks sleeps on the top bunk and Everett sleeps on the bottom.

Everett has been known for his long hair, but the time has come to chop it off.  It was only curly when he was right out of the bath, but that was at night so he would sleep on it and it would end up being flat and messy the entire next day.  Joshua cut it in the backyard like he does with Beckham, and his haircut came out so cute!  My hubby definitely has a talent for cutting hair.  Everyone thinks the boys look so much more alike now, and we are just loving Evie's new do.

After Evie's haircut, we met up with Tasha, Frank and Isaac at La Jolla Cove aka Seal Beach where everyone had a great time, and I was able to get some cute pics of the boys.  Unfortunately, I only had my crappy camera with me so the pics could have been so much better.

We are in the middle of my favorite season right now... FALL!  And Fall makes me feel all crafty.  I've been waiting for Beckham to get to a good age to do some projects with me, and I could have actually started earlier with him.  But better late than never!  Everett is still a little too young for most of the things we've been doing though.  I often try to get him to participate in the beginning, but he ends up throwing everything and getting angry.  He's growing fast so he'll be getting crafty with us soon enough.  Here are some stuff we've been working on!