Summer Travel Series: Hawaii

Yesterday we started something new per Cruise and Jett's request: traveling the world in our living room! It all started when I purchased a couple maps from Costco last week and hung them in their playroom. They have been so fascinated with geography lately, so I thought they would like looking and studying the maps. They then started asking me where certain countries/states were like Hawaii, Texas, New York, Mexico, China, etc. So we made a list of places they would really like to visit and then I made them some awesome passports that I found here. The first place on their list was Hawaii.

While I was out grocery shopping, I stopped by the PartyLand and picked up a couple leis and grass skirts for the boys. In the evening before dinner, I told them it was time to go to Hawaii! So we got on the "plane" and Cruise not only played pilot, but flight attendant as well.

My in-flight snack.

Our pilot told us we landed in Mexico, so we needed to get on a boat to Hawaii. We finally got to Hawaii and the boys got stickers in their passports. I then whipped out the leis and grass skirts and they reluctantly donned them. I put a video up of Pearly Shells for them to learn. Cruise was the only one who really got into it.

Finally, we talked about Hawaii's volcanos and made a volcano in the sink. Then they got to watch some video footage of an active volcano. 

I forgot to get a pineapple, but they wouldn't have eaten it anyway. 

And that was Hawaii!

10 Months Old!

Every time I sit down to write one of these posts, I can't believe another month has gone by. Miles is 10 months old now and doing awesome!

Miles has gotten really good at crawling and is super fast! Especially when it comes to stairs. If you forget to put the gate up, he is up those stairs in just a few seconds! He is pulling himself up onto furniture, but gets a little scared to get down. He loves to play in water, especially Lucy's dog bowl, so we have to put her food up away from Miles. When he hears a bath running, he immediately books it to the tub and tries desperately to crawl in, baths are his most favorite thing!

Miles loves his brothers and likes to follow them around and mess up their Lincoln Log buildings or terrorize their game of castle. I don't know what he'd do without Jett because Jett, of anyone, can get Miles to laugh. It doesn't really matter what he does, he just looks at the kid and he is hysterical! 

Of course, Daddy is his favorite. He cries when he leaves the room, he cries if Daddy enters a room and doesn't acknowledge him, he cries if Daddy even turns away from him! Just like all the other boys, he is definitely a Daddy's Boy! 

We've discovered that Miles loves to eat new foods. He grows tired of food if he's had it more than a couple times. However, we did find that he really likes to munch on pickles and jerky! With one tooth, I've been pretty impressed at how much he can chew! He really enjoys foods that have a lot of flavor to them. So far this week he's tried blueberries and raspberries and really loved them! He cried when he'd run out of berries. 

Developmentally he is doing pretty well. I have noticed that he is a huge sensory seeker, hence the enjoyment of flavorful foods and the need to drink his bottle as he is hanging upside down. He seems to be pretty social and his social smile is improving. He still looks at my mouth a lot when I talk, so we'll be keeping an eye on that over the next couple of months. He has started smiling with his whole face! Like, wrinkle the nose, show that one tooth, squint the eyes kind of smile. We call it his cheese face. I'll have to get a good picture of it sometime and post it. 

I sure do love watching this kid grow!

Family Pictures

Last month we were lucky enough to get family pictures taken by Cruise's teacher, Mr. Harris. The boys were super wild, which made it really hard to get cooperation and good pictures. But there were quite a few we like.