Miracles in Casa de Phillips

Two miracles happened over here at casa de phillips today.

Miracle Number One: The children sat still and actually smiled for the camera...together.

Today was the Easter Egg hunt at Isaac's school, which meant mommy needed to snap a few pictures before we darted out the door in our weekly attempt to be first in drop-off line (we weren't, due to some person obviously unaware that a green light means "go". Rather we sat stuck at a stoplight while a friend whizzed past us, beating us to preschool. Next week, my friend.). Isaac's school has a "no-parent at parties" rule, so I always try to get a few pictures of him before such big events. His teachers take pictures at the actual parties (and make a scrapbook at the end of the year), but I like to have my own photos as well.

Because aren't my children's lives going to be a little less meaningful if they don't have a picture representation of every. single. event. they have ever attended? :)

The stars must have aligned just right because both kids sat together on the fireplace (standard phillips family location for all indoor photos), managed to smile, and no one "accidentally" let their hands venture into someone else's space.

There was never any simultaneous looking in the same direction, but I figure something major such as the end of global warming would have to occur before Isaac and Evelyn manage to both look and smile at the camera on cue.

The egg hunt was a success and Isaac carted home even more plastic eggs to add to our growing collection (can you recycle plastic eggs?). He was especially excited over the two quarters he found in one egg and never noticed that his candy stash was a KitKat short after naptime.

Doesn't he just look old? A new favorite thing of our boy is to inform Evelyn (or me on some days) that certain things are "just for three and 1/2 year olds", therefore not appropriate for the likes of his little sister. Handy. Such things that fall into this category are:

1. The eating of chocolate

2.The playing of Hi Ho Cherry-o

3.Holding the desired toy of the moment.

Things that do not fall into this category include:

1. Sisters being asked to do something for big brothers, such as retrieving shoes or cleaning up messes.

Highly convenient.

Miracle Number Two: This little girl gave up her bottle tonight.

In case you forgot, Evelyn has still been taking a half bottle of milk at night (see number 3 here). I knew she needed to give it up...about 11 months ago...but really had been fearful of the tantrums that might result from bidding her beloved bottle farewell.

Evelyn is known for the ability to throw a good tantrum and I am known for being able to handle them most of the time...with the exception of having to deal with a screaming, snotty, overtired baby at the end of an already long day. Needless to say, I was a bit nervous about what might happen when the bottle was given up.

We have been prepping for weeks that E. is starting to become a big girl and big girl's do not drink from bottles. We talked about how her friend Baby Madeline might like a bottle and it was soon going to be time to send E.'s bottles to Madeline.

Today while in the store, Evelyn noticed me eyeing the sippy cups. She said, "Give bottle to Baby Madeline. El-len get princess cup?"

I believe I heard angels sing over the muzak Tom Thumb was currently piping into their store at that moment.

I said, "Yes, baby girl, we are sending your bottles to sweet Baby Madeline today. Pick out a new Princess cup."

And that was it.

Tonight at bedtime there was no crying from the girl who typically cannot wait long enough to get her PJs on before grabbing her bottle. She talked about sending them to Baby Madeline a few more times, took a few sips from her sippy cup before tossing it in the sink (although we did allow bottles well past the age of one....we never have sent the kids to bed with milk), and went to sleep.

End of story.

...well, except for the fact that I now feel a little bit sad about seeing the bottle go away. I have washed bottles every night for almost four years. Sigh.

(By the way...we are not actually mailing our dingy old bottles to precious Madeline. Don't think she even takes them anyway. Alison...thanks for letting Madeline be our weapon of defense in Operation: Bottle!)

**I am having such issue with blogger and paragraph spacing. Either the spacing is out of control or there is simply no spacing at all. Sorry, readers, for this headache of a post!