Happy Birthday to Ben!

Ben wanted power tools for his birthday this year, and he got what he wished for.
He got a circular saw, a sander, a router and a jigsaw.
I'm not sure if Eli or Ben is more excited.
Eli wasn't with us at Home Depot, but Ben made all of the power tool noises while selecting his new toys. Eli got to help open all of the tools once we got home, and promptly started making the same noises, it must be a guy thing!
Thank you to Ben's Parents and Siblings who chipped in to make Ben's birthday a happy one.

Playdough

Thanks to the Tonks for the toothpick idea!

Big Boy Bed

Eli moved to a big boy bed a couple of weeks ago and loves it. The only down side is that naps have become sporadic. He didn't take a nap at all for the first week, but then he settled in and takes a nap a few times a week now. I think 2 is way too early to give up naps, but I have to say bedtime is a lot easier. He goes down at 7:30 with no complaints on days that he skips naps, otherwise he's in his room fooling around until 9:30. If I wasn't so selfish maybe we'd skip naps everyday, but I just can't resign myself to never having another daytime break.

He loves his fishy music from Aunt Adrianna. We took it off of the crib and put it with all of the pieces in the hall while we were making the switch. When we got the bed all assembled we told him to hop up and try it out. He yelled "Wait!" ran into the hall and came back with the fishy music and said "forgot music". We put it on his big bed and he seems really happy with it.

More Good News

As some of you may know Ben's job is a temporary position that ends in June. We have been hoping since his initial hire that this would turn into something more permanent, but it's been up in the air for awhile. It seemed like we were on the verge of hearing good news a few times, but nothing concrete ever materialized. Last week Ben interviewed for two positions, he said he had a 99% chance of getting one and a 1% chance of getting the other, so this equaled a 100% chance of getting a job. Well today he got the good news, and he has a job! He'll be working in the Public Works Department for the City of Hillsboro. The nice thing for us is that his employer isn't changing so our insurance (very important at this stage in the game) and his vacation time won't change at all. We're hoping for a very seamless transition.
We want to say thank you to everyone for all of your prayers and support.
We feel especially blessed in these economic times to have employment.

It's a Girl!

We had our ultrasound today and are happy to report we have a healthy baby girl on the way!
She was much more co-operative than past children (we won't name any names) about having her picture taken. She was squirming all around and even gave us a wave.
We've been discussing girl names for awhile, since everyone but me knew it was going to be a girl. I'm voting for Lucie, but Ben likes Lillian better, Eli love Babbette.
We were going though names in the baby name book and Eli didn't seem like he was paying much attention until I jokingly called out Babbette. Since then he says it all the time, and if anyone asks him what the baby's name is he replies "baby Babbette". Unfortunately we've all gotten used to hearing it so much now that we don't think it's quite as bad as it first sounded. Ben says he likes Babs!

Parade

The St. Patrick's Day parade comes right down our street!
The Christensen's came over to enjoy the rainy fun with us, and Eli and Kylie loved it.
We saw horses, tractors, antique cars, police, a train, a few floats and Ronald McDonald.
Of course everyone threw candy, and there was more than enough for 2 two year olds.
The candy was mostly the "cheap stuff", but there were a few big items. I think Craig took the cake with a full sized Hershey's bar!

Daddy's Helper

Eli loves trash trucks and this obsession has extended to actual trash. He loves to help Ben sort the recycling, he actually says "recycling first, then trash", next he goes with Ben all around the house collecting trash. He helps Daddy bring it out to the barrels and wants to bring the barrels to the curb by himself, but isn't quite big enough yet. He's always asking if it's trash night, and if we ask him what day today is he always replies "trash day!". If only I could figure out a way to keep him excited through his teens.