Playing with the boys

Joey and Ben crack me up on a daily basis. Joe worships Ben's every move and wants so badly to make Ben smile and earn Ben's approval. There are two places in our house where Joey's Ben shadowing has become particularly evident: in the kitchen, and in the bathroom. Joey has been a fickle eater his whole solid-eating life, but in the past week we have had a major breakthrough in the eating department. When challenged by Ben, we have discovered that Joey will eat. The boys will go head to head eating vegetables with Dean and I cheering wildly along with each and every bite. Our veggie eating face-offs often result in impromptu song and dance and dinner time is probably quite a site for our neighbors to witness!

The other male bonding location is the bathroom. We finally broke out the big boy potty a couple weeks ago after Joey kept tring to take his diaper off when he had to go to the bathroom. So far he has not produced anything in the potty, but he does follow Ben in everytime he has to...um...have a sit down and enthusiastically has his shorts and diaper removed and grabs some reading material to join his brother! So funny...and such good blackmail for the future.

This past weekend we went to my cousin, Mackenzie's, high school graduation open house. Ben enjoyed playing volleyball with the big kids and Joey managed to squeeze in some corn hole with Dean, Uncle Craig, and Uncle Clint. The boys' big 3-week-old cousin, Brookie, was at the party too! Pictured below with her adoring Nana.

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