A penny for their thoughts

today i watched jordyn (i go to huntington beach to babysit her 2-3 times a week). she is 3 months younger than malachi and about half his size but she does pretty well holding her own. they have a lot of fun together but they are also very normal 1 year olds which means they are very preoccupied with determining what is theirs. "mine" is a key word in their vocabulary. Out of fairness to jordyn however it is usually my sweet darling son who is 'stealing' the toys.

however there are those very cherished moments when i see them working together on something. today it was with the blocks. mind you this is HUGE considering the blocks are very often the objects being fought over. nonetheless...

i was in the kitchen doing some dishes when i realized i did not hear either one of them which of course usually means they are getting into something they ought not. something that also happened today when they decided to open the wine fridge and proceed to take out all the beer cans, but that is another story. anyhow since it was quiet i checked up on them.

when i walked into the living room i saw them taking turns, let me say that again Taking Turns!, to take some blocks out of a container, walk about five feet away to a rocking snail and dump them into the back pocket area. then as soon as all the blocks were in the rocking snail they proceeded to return them, two or three at a time, to the container. they continued to do this in silence for about 5 minutes! how sweet it is to see two little ones working together for one common goal.

now if only i could figure out why this was so intriguing to them...

Potty Mouth video...thank you Cristina!!

so thanks to the brilliant cristina i have now figured out how to put videos from my camera on here. the world has just opened up to me in a whole new way :) here is the video i referred to in my previous post.

The Aquarium

we met up with some friends on sunday after church to go to the aquarium. we actually got 2 free adult passes in our utilities bill and malachi is still free so it was a FREE outing which is something we always like. malachi loved looking at all the fish and especially enjoyed touching the animals in the touch pool, which had a lot more than hermit crabs like we've seen at the tide pools.

Malachi's Second Christmas Tree

we have not yet gotten the chance to decorate the tree so those pictures will come later.

if you have been unable to reach me...

...the reason would be due to the fact that malachi destroyed my phone. i hope to get a replacement in the next couple days but until then the best way to reach me is via email.

Songs

it's a great thing that malachi doesn't mind the fact that i don't sing all that well (or at least he hasn't commented on my poor singing abilities yet) cause he seems to be in this stage where he wants me to sing with him. He sings a word here and there.
big ones these days...

if you're happy and you know it - he can do the clapping, stomping and shouting hooray parts but also interjects the word "face" at the appropriate times (with a slight pause from me)

the wheels on the bus - he likes the 'sh' part best, 'the parents on the bus say sh, sh, sh..."

row, row, row your boat - for malachi it sounds like "row, row, row...boat......eam..., m?&%#, m?&%#, m?&%#, m?&%# (he's not cussing i just can't figure out what exactly he is saying while i sing merrily...that looks funny but i spelled it correct, i looked it up on wikipedia :)

i really need to build up the repertoire (yes, i looked up the spelling on that one too) of songs.
so here is an opportunity for people to participate with my, i mean our family blog. Any suggestions for other songs to sing with kiddos. and by the way anyone should be able to post a comment since i changed to setting for that.

i will anxiously wait for the comments to come pouring in ;)

what a bummer!

i had this awesome video i wanted to post on here, went through the whole process on you tube and got to the end and it couldn't download because our camera saves it as .avi
it is a fabulous video of malachi (surprise, surprise) cussing. well, he is actually meaning to say 'truck' but somehow his /tr/ sounds very much like /f/. so if anyone knows how in the world i can change the .avi to .mpg (if that is in fact even what it is supposed to be) and you can explain the process to me in terms i am able to grasp maybe i will be able to show off my sons potty mouth video :)

since i have no video i guess i will update everyone...all ? of you...on the olson haps.

kurtis is lovin' his new job. we are soooo grateful for everyone who prayed for us during the job hunt time and praise God for providing this when he did. it is challenging (which is one reason he likes it) but he also loves the people he works with. you can continue to pray for him as he settles into a groove and builds up his client list. we are praying that God connects him to the right people in order that he can meet his goals.

kurtis is still finishing up a few contracting jobs, this is proving to be very tiring and frustrating. he would like to just be able to focus on the new job but instead is finding it necessary to be putting in many more hours in order to finish this other stuff. as i write, in fact, it is 9pm and he is still not home. last night he didn't get home till 11pm. he has been leaving in the morning around 6am and working weekends. pray for God to give him strength and perseverance to finish well.

malachi is doing well. he is becoming more and more independant and learning new words every day. he is missing his papa though so he will be glad, as we all will be, when kurtis is just working the one job. i can't say how many times i have thought of single parents or families where one parent is gone for extended periods like those in the military, then i figure i don't have it bad at all!!

as far as i go...well my stomach is getting bigger every day it seems. i have been able to feel baby zoe (as malachi likes to say...we decided to name her zoe esther; zoe means life and esther is after kurtis' grandma) moving since about 16 weeks but i have yet to feel her kick from the outside. i am anxious for that to happen mostly because malachi is so intrigued with her and tries to feel her move every night before he goes to bed.

ma-chi and gee-dee..

...that would be malachi and jordy (short for jordyn) in malachese...or would it be malachian? :)

BlackBean Blot Test

malachi is a rorschach copycat. :)

Tide Pool Visit

last weekend malachi and i went with some friends to see the tide pools at crystal cove state park. the hermit crabs were interesting but malachi seemed to enjoy playing in the wet sand just as much.