Two and a Half

Is messy.

And crazy.

And loud, Loud, LOUD!

Did I mention the messy part?

They can't ever be left alone with a pencil, crayon or (Heaven forbid!) a marker. In the time it took for me to walk down the stairs holding hands with Logan, pencil in hand, I dared to look down at my feet. In that split-freakin'-second, he wrote on the wall. They can't be left alone at the table for any length of time with food. In the time it took me to leave the table to go get Emma some milk, in the very next room, one or the other (sometimes both) will flip over their bowl or plate or cup and then I'm cleaning up crumbs/noodles/Cheerios. Again. You can't leave them alone in the bathtub (Not that I'd ever walk away, into the hallway and put laundry in the washing machine that's right IN FRONT of the bathroom door. Nuh uh. Not me.) or there'll be a bucketful of water all over the floor and toilet seat. Mind you, they don't have a bucket in the bathtub for that very reason, but four arms and four legs can move a lot of water when they want to.

They can't seem to remain seated and eat at the table. Thus the trail of crumbs everywhere. Honestly, we should have an entire army of mice living inside our house. It's completely astonishing to me that we don't.

They like to tear their room apart. That cute little nursery we put together? Now has tension rods holding the closet doors closed, the dresser is bolted to the wall with straps holding the dresser drawers shut when the safety latches weren't enough to keep them out. All of their toys and books have been removed from their room when ripping, tearing and shredding all occurred. Their doorknob has the spinny safety knob on it. As does my room, Caitlin's room, the hall bathroom and the linen closet. And there's a latch on the washer and dryer doors to keep them from pushing all of the buttons and washing/drying nothing or interrupting a wash load (or two, or three...). Basically, if there's a button on something, they want to push it. If it can be broken, they'll try to break it (Goodbye CD and DVD collection!). If it can be climbed, they will climb it. If there's stuff in it, they want to pull the stuff out and throw it around.

They talk a lot.

Well..."they" is mostly Emma. Logan mostly screams. And sort of mumbles and grumps semi-intelligibly. He'll say "Peeeese!", if you force him to and will tell you "Want pep-puh." pretty regularly, but three words together? That's about two words too many. Emma says "please" and "thank you" and "bless you" and "That's so pretty!", all on her own. As well as about a million other things. She only stops when she gets shy. Logan is a boy of few words, but many sounds. Mostly they sound like "Ap-pull! Ap-pull!" at midnight. He knows a lot of food words, but doesn't generally ask for anything in full sentences. Emma is a champion, full sentence user. Of course, you don't necessarily want to hear all of her sentences..."Dat's MINE! Give it back to ME!" or "No! YOU stop it!" are two of my least favorite, but they seem to come with the precocious 2.5 year old territory.

Don't get me wrong: these two are as cute as the Mother Effin' Dickens (The Dickens are Very Cute, indeed.), but they are so much work that many days it's hard to be happy for the cute when the messy and the destructive take up so much of my day and night. Yelling at two and a half year olds to Sit Down! and Eat Your Dinner! With a FORK! were not how I planned to spend my 40s.

Yes. I do yell at my kids. (As for the folks in the NY Times that say that Yelling is the New Spanking, I would agree. However, they can BITE ME if they think I'm not gonna yell, when yellin' is called for. I'm not a friggin' saint.) I don't want to, but Logical and Calm Mommy hits the road when Squealy and Smashy come to play in my house for extended periods of time and the sleep deprivation fiends aren't kept at bay. Short of duct taping them to their chairs, I don't know how to get them to stay in their seats while I get up for the umpteenth time to fetch more milk, apple, noodles.

Let's just say that I'm looking forward to the Looking Back On All This and Laughing years. Totally.

In the cuteness department, they're total champs. Logan's hair is getting longer (Note to self: needs another trim!), so now he peeps up at you under his bangs with his trademarked Charming Smile. They love to wear our shoes around the house and go clomp-clomp-clomping around. Mine, Eric's, Caitlin's. They don't care. Big shoes, much clomping. They love to dance on my feet, ride around horsie or piggie style. They love to be chased around during diaper changes with me hollering "Nakey butt!" after them.

Yes, yes they do.

They turn into splashy fishes in the bathtub and while they can't make fish faces themselves, they do try and love to be kissed by a fish faced mom or dad. Logan still hates having his hair washed, but is getting better about turning his face up to the ceiling and not screaming about it anymore.

Emma has come all over girly suddenly and has Opinions about her clothing. She absolutely refuses to wear certain shirts (Sorry Janet, your blue shirt with words on it has been rejected repeatedly.) because there are no flowers on them. Or they're the wrong color (i.e. blue). Fortunately for me, she loves to wear jeans because if she went through an All Dresses stage, we'd be in trouble. She has, however, figured out how to take off all of her clothes which has led to little "surprises" after nap time. Naked baby over here. Poopie diaper over there. And...there. Ugh. And...there? Arrrrgh!

Both babies like to be flung through the air, flipped upside down and spun around madly. Perhaps they'll join the Cirque du Soleil when they're older? Emma, especially, loves to be spun around until fall-down-dizzy. Logan loves to be tickled.

As far as photographs go, I don't have any for this post...yet. They're down to only one nap a day, so considering that it took me all day to write this and it's already a week late...photos will have to wait. I just wanted to get this out there and let you know they're still breathing.

And probably breaking something.