No. No.

We went to the park today with Brittany and Savannah. Savannah is about 2 months younger than Evan, but he takes the age difference very seriously. After all, that's over a whole year older in dog-years.

Savannah was playing with a drain covers. The same kind of drain cover Evan and I have had a number of discussions about putting fingers in strange places. So he decided to impart some of his wisdom on Savannah.

He went up to her while she was playing with the grate and wagged his finger at her and said, "No. No."

Close Call

Today we had the closest call we've had yet.

Evan and I were just about finished getting ready to go run errands. He was dressed, my hair and makeup was done. All that was left was for me to put my shirt on. I went into the bathroom to put my shirt on and that's when it happened…

One of Evan's favorite things to do is play with my jewelry. Much to Brad's dismay, I even bought him his own because I was tired of him breaking mine. But apparently mine is better than his plastic Mardi Gras beads. So he continues to try to pilfer my jewelry chest. I actually don't even know what to call it. It's bigger than a jewelry chest, it's an entire jewelry dresser. If you are ever in the mood to rob us, don't bother with the big jewelry chest. Go for the smaller white one piled on top. That's where all the real stuff is – far out of Evan's reach. I should have known better than to leave a precariously piled jewelry box stack with a toddler around. But it was one of those things where it's been there for so long, it's become part of the scenery. I just don't even see it anymore. Rest assured, within a week of Evan crawling, I had Brad bolt all bookcases to the wall. I'm not sure how the jewelry box tower escaped, but it did.

I don't know how Evan did it or what he was trying to do when it happened, but Evan pulled the whole thing on top of him. I heard a crash and that dreaded "real" cry and ran back into the bedroom to find Evan pinned under the dresser.
I turned my back for ONE SECOND, and my kid pulled the one thing down on himself in the entire house that isn't bolted down.

Although many a silent prayer of thanks went up that day, the most notable one was this:

Thank you God that we were getting ready to go somewhere. If I have to show up at the doctor's office and explain to them that I'm such a bad parent, I left something dangerous in my house and my kid found it, Thank You God, that I didn't have to do it in my pajamas with no makeup.

Evan's only injury.

TV Head

I've created a monster. Evan wakes up saying "T.T." For those not fluent in Evan, T.T is T.V.

He's discovered TV and its better than dog food. But not just any kind of TV. He's very particular about his television. Football and baseball when Brad's around, and Santa Buddies any other time of the day. He's watched his Santa Buddies movie so many times I have it memorized. I go through my day with the songs playing in my head. For those of you not familiar with Santa Buddies, it's a movie about six talking dogs that save Christmas and it's a force to be reckoned with. That movie goes on and Evan doesn't move for an hour and fifteen minutes. I hate to admit it, as much as I hate how much he loves TV, it's become very useful for me. It's amazing how much you can get done when your toddler is occupied for a full 75 minutes. I wish it was at least an educational show so I could delude myself into believing he was actually learning something.

So my kid's brain is rotting, but my house is clean, my family is fed and the bills are paid.

Fair trade.

Right?

Withdrawals

Evan has been having withdrawals of epic proportions. Attention is a drug and my son is an addict. It's not like we ignore him. He gets plenty of attention. But nothing I do can possibly compete with the full throttle adoration of four new people simultaneously. He's lost his audience, his fan club, his reason for being. He doesn't know what to do with himself now that the things he does are back to being normal rather than everything he does being extraordinary. He's lost without his people.

Evan Update

Evan is proud to share with you his latest tricks...

First, he is always happy to show off his skills at blowing out a candle - with his nose.

He's also very proud of his abilty to blow raspberries.

Very wet ones.

In other news, Evan has developed a taste for dog food. If we're anywhere near Friday's food and I hear Evan walking around saying "Mmmmm," I automatically hold out my hand and he reluctantly spits the dog food pebbles into my hand. The other day when we were reading Clifford, The Big Red Dog, he pointed at the illustration of Clifford's food and said "Mmmm." He's an addict.

Evan has continued his fascination with chickens. Without fail, when we're at the ranch and we ask him if he wants to go say hi to the chickens, he immediately jumps up yelling "balk, balk," and runs to the door. I think he's begun to make the disturbing connection between his friends and his food. When I opened the fridge and asked him what he wanted to eat, he pointed to a cooked chicken and said "balk balk."