Almost 3 years old.

Hailey decided to fix her own plate of food for breakfast.

We had a great time out to dinner with Steve's side of the family to celebrate Evan and Steve's upcoming birthdays.

During dinner Evan climbed under the table and started opening presents. He was so excited to get legos and some Star Wars shirts. 

His coordination is improving by leaps and bounds. 

Nana made the coolest jello legos!

Evan could hardly wait for the cupcakes. 

More Legos

The kids were so excited to get the Lego trains out.

Steve added all the castles (4 of them) and plants and animals to fill up the table.

We just started getting a CSA (community supported agriculture) box.

Produce from our local farm. We get a little newsletter telling us what's going on with the farm and a new recipe. Sometimes we forget how much work it is to produce food because we just run to the store and pick up what we need when it is convenient.  There is nothing worse that tending to a seed for a few months only to come out the next morning and find some bug ate it for dessert last night.

I didn't know what to so with that swiss chard so we put it in omelettes and it was delicious.

He really loves the Lego Hogwarts Castle...... though he is not supposed to play with it unsupervised. Sneaky little boy!

Got to play Star Wars Legos before Steve leaves for work.

Steve told the kids he was going to build them a surprise for when they woke up.

Lego Hogwarts

Three times this morning I caught Evan trying to scale the bookshelf in my room in an attempt to get his Dad's Hogwarts Castle. I will give him extra points for being persistent. So now I am working as the Lego Police at the kitchen table - so far no missing pieces. Evan is happily lost in his own little world of good guys vs. bad guys.

We only got out a few parts of the castle.

And when that kitchen timer rings in another 20 minutes this party is going to be over.

Steve said he has a whole other Lego castle set he can build for Evan to have free reign in playing with.

Spaghetti Squash

Trying spaghetti squash.

Hailey has to at least take 4 bites of everything I cook. If she doesn't like it, as long as she has taken her 4 bites, she doesn't have to finish it.  Because Evan is 2 he has to take at least 2 mandatory bites.  For a while last year my children got really picky They would take one look at something I made and tell me it was gross and they weren't going to eat it. I decided I was not going to be a short order cook anymore. Both of my kids went to bed hungry a few times.  They are much better about trying things now. There are still plenty of nights that it is a struggle to get them to try something new.  It is usually followed with gagging and crying.

I find that having an occasional small dessert or treat after dinner is a great motivator. We like to talk about what certain foods do for our bodies and why we should/shouldn't eat them. The last thing we did was let the kids pick out new things to try at the grocery store or give input as to what they are interested in eating.  They have picked out several things we would not normally buy or cost more than we want to spend. Most of the time I bite the bullet or try to reason with them.  "Let's trade that super expensive fish for one of these other fishes that is just as yummy & less expensive."

      

There has been plenty of Lego building going on.

Evan likes the "pirate" ship.