A tendency towards violence?

Recently, for reasons unbeknownst to me, Allie has shown an interest in minor violent tragedies. Here's the evidence:

1)While coloring in a large holiday coloring book, she worked diligently on a reindeer picture. She brought it to me and I saw several dark red scribble spots, lots of jagged edges on the reindeer legs and some black & purple circles on his body. Then the reindeer was covered with leftover address labels from Christmas. She says, "Mommy, the reindeer has a lot of hurts. These are cuts with blood and these are bruises. I didn't have enough bandaids (address labels) for these cuts on the bottom." Obviously, this got my attention, so I asked what happened to the reindeer. She said, "He just got really hurt."

2)While working on a stamp collage, she used an aviation stamp that had a plane propeller. The top half of the page was covered with these propellers. Then intermittently, there were kitties & ducks & puppies. She said, "Mommy, look, the pets got chopped up in the propeller." (omg!)

3)We made some sidewalk chalk body outlines, which were funny to me as an adult because the driveway looked like an episode of CSI. However, this is not the kind of scene that children would recognize. Allie colored her body outline and made her hair pink. I said, "Wow, I like your pink hair," to which she replied, "Mommy, that's not my hair. It's blood. I'm bleeding."

4)She brought home a coloring page that had a boy running across the street. She colored him really well and there were a few stickers and random crafty things glued to the picture. The boy had a green "eye" (those glue-on eyes where the iris moves around inside the clear plastic circle) glued to the inside of his mouth. I didn't say anything about the eye, but she quickly informed me that the boy had eaten his mom and that was her eye. (by the way, in case you were wondering, I do have green eyes. ...)

She doesn't seem upset by any of these things and is very matter-of-fact about them. I think I might've started this a few weeks ago when she was fussing about a minor finger cut (less than a paper cut) and I told her that it isn't worth crying over. In fact, I think I might've said, "Allie, Zachary got hit in the head with a metal golf club. THAT is worth crying over. What you have here is NOT worth crying over."

This post is making me laugh!

I don't know.

Zachary has started a whole new level of question-asking and I don't have the answers!

It started like this:

Zachary: "Mommy why is it called 'breakfast'?"
Mommy: "Well, a long time ago, workers would take a quick break to eat. So, take the word 'fast' & the work 'break' and you get breakfast."

Zachary: "Mommy why is it called a 'driveway'?"
Mommy: "Well, it's a short distance that you drive right in front of your house."

And now we're here:

Zachary: "Mommy, why is it called 'chalk'?"
Mommy: "Um....I don't know. That's just the English word we use for this stuff."

Zachary: "Mommy, why is it called 'metal'?"
Zachary: "Mommy, why is it called a 'brick'?"
Zachary: "Mommy, why is it called the 'sun'?"
Zachary: "Mommy, why is it called 'food'?"

Still here!

I've been neglecting my blog! Yikes!! We started January off with a bang and have been running full speed ever since. (I also no longer have a functioning camera, so pictures are happening on my phone only!). Here are some recent pics of the kids taken while out & about.
Love their boots:

Cuties still wearing their Christmas jammies!:

Playing together. Polly pockets on the army tanker. A nice compromise!

Allie girl trying on a super cute hat at Charming Charlie's:

Allie & I have made a little tradition of stopping by Dunkin Donuts after we drop Zac off on Tuesday mornings. Love this sweet girl!

Zachary eating some yummy BBQ:

Allie being her goofy self:

At the grocery store! It's very random who ends up in the cart and where. So silly!

Fashionista?

Todd & I let our kids dress themselves. We agreed on this philosophy probably 2 years ago. But now that they're both old enough to really understand their own preferences, it's been a fun way to see more of their personalities.
Obviously, there have been many times where their choices are not the same as what we'd choose, but does it really matter?! Kids are so creative and interesting! I LOVE watching them create their own little looks.
We do have a few conditions - 1)They can't wear pajamas out of the house, 2)They have to dress for the weather, 3)The clothing has to fit (I know that sounds weird, but kids will put ANYthing on if they can get their arm/leg through it!), 4)They have to wear their own clothes (not each other's).

Allie is the most creative with her looks. And she really puts some thought into her outfits. Usually she'll have some accessories in her hair or on her arms. She also LOVES to wear skirts. She'd wear some kind of skirt every day if she had enough of them. She'll wear skirts over shorts, skirts over jeans, etc... She also likes to wear t-shirts (that's something she probably [likely] sees me do), but she'll wear them in a dressy way (not something I do!), which I love.
Here are some of her recent looks:

Allie's 1st teeth cleaning

Allie had her first teeth cleaning this month. She's been to the dentist once before, due to a chipped front tooth (after falling face-first on the basement floor!).
She's a little trooper and the dentist said she has perfect little teeth!

Cliff Hanger!

We started 2012 off with a new family gym membership, which has definitely been great since January is such a chilly long month! Along with the membership, the kids can take some super fun classes. Zachary started a rock-climbing class this week. He LOVED it!! I was surprised at how brave he was! He climbed that wall like a monkey! Even his instructor was impressed with his eagerness.

What a cutie!!:

He was a little pro. Seriously. It was like he knew what he was doing.

Look at how high up he is!! Several times, he'd get about 10 feet from the very top and realize how high he was. He'd look down over his shoulder and then just freeze! The instructor & I were laughing because he'd literally stop, stare and say nothing.

This is how he got back down. Apparently the learner-ropes/attachments have a bungee-like feel to them as the kids repel down the wall.

Later that night, he said, "Mommy, I love rock-climbing! I can't wait to go back next week. Thank you for signing me up for that class!"

What more could a mother ask for?!!