Cereal

Brandon was ready for his first taste of real food this weekend. We are supposed to start him with cereal, which makes sense since breakfast is rumored to be the most important meal of the day.

My idea was to start with Lucky Charms. Not only are they whimsical, but they are also magically delicious and would give him a good introduction to the cereal food group.

Apparently the marshmallows are a deal breaker (says Steph) so I changed my vote to Trix. Not my favorite, but fruity and colorful nonetheless. And, of course, Trix are for kids.

Older kids I was told. Whatever. All she had to say was that she would rather not start with a sugar cereal. How about Mini-Wheats? They're mini. No? Fine.

We went with the classic "Single Grain Rice Cereal for Baby." More like a porridge than a cereal if you ask me...

Anyway, Brandon loved it. I think practicing his chewing while watching us at the dinner table helped out. He ate the whole bowl (all two tablespoons worth, anyway) except for the drips that made it down to his chin.



We'll save the Fruity Pebbles for another day.

Dueling Pianos

Evelyn and Brandon each received a piano for Christmas. Well, technically they are keyboards, but each has a button that makes it sound like a piano. And they're much lighter than the real thing.

Brandon's piano has four keys and can help him learn colors and shapes, too.

Evelyn's piano can play twenty well-known songs in five musical genres, has keys that light up, includes a microphone and a detachable iPod-like music player, and can sound like ten different instruments.

Usually they tickle the ivories (OK, plastic) individually, but sometimes they play dueling pianos. It's not what you think - they both just play different songs at the same time. The only audience participation is covering your ears.

Our living room can get quite noisy, but I'm pretty sure it's better than dueling tubas.

Animal Buffet

Brandon's first time in the ExerSaucer turned out the same as Evy's first ExerSaucer experience. He got in, grabbed the elephant, and started biting its ears.



Next he sampled all of the plastic animals on the top and even did a few spins of the rolling fruit monkey barrel. Then he turned back to the elephant.



Yummy!

Construction Manager

Evy has seen and documented a lot of construction projects in the past few months. Since they won't let a three-year-old drive the cement truck or work the backhoe controls, she is content with being the construction manager.

It's a perfect fit, since she likes to watch equipment and workers, take pictures, and tell people what to do.



You can see all of the EvyCam construction photos on Flickr and read about our [neighbor's] backyard project on the sinkerbeam blog.

Happy New Year!