Play Expansion

Over the past month or so it has been fun to watch the babies play start to expand.  They are really starting to play with the baby dolls they got for their birthday and it is really cute.  The babies like to give the babies hugs and kisses and Avery likes to rock her babies. It cracks me up to see them lifting their babies up and putting them on their head or holding them upside down.  I joked with Michelle that if someone was evaluating their play with dolls they might not get credit for the pretend play skills like feeding and caring for babies (though they do like the hugs & kisses), but they actually do a great job imitating what we do with them!  I'm always tossing them up in the air, putting them on my head, and flipping them upside down. =)  Now, I don't typically carry them by one leg upside down like they often do with their babies (okay, maybe it's happened once or twice!), but it is funny to think about the models they have for how to interact with babies. =)  We play "blast off" with our kiddos where we hold them by the hips and count down before blasting off and lifting them up.  And they will now do that with their dolls.  We can say "do you want to play blast off with your baby?" and they will all lift their babies up in the air.  It's so cute.  We have started modeling feeding the babies over the past couple weeks and now they like to pretend to feed the babies with little forks or spoons.  Although as soon as I gave them little bottles to feed the babies with they spent the majority of the time with the bottles in their own mouths! 

Isaiah hugging his baby

Avery's baby getting a BIG kiss!

Ellie giving the baby a bottle

Here's a video of them pretending in the bathtub the other day.  They all wanted to get in the tub at 3:30 the other day and that isn't bath time so we just put them in with all their clothes on.  They thought it was hilarious.  We had to give them the ideas for pretending, but it was still fun to watch them try to do things sans water!

They've also started to show interest in "dress up" and wearing silly hats.  When we pulled out the Christmas decorations we put the Santa hat and reindeer antlers in their play area.  They all wanted to wear them and tried hard to figure out how to put them on themselves.  It was hilarious to watch them try to figure this out.  

Avery wears the hat the longest

Ellie trying to get it on herself...so close =)

"I know Mom put these on my head somehow..."

tricky antlers!

He was so happy to wear this hat even though I didn't catch it on camera!

Ellie has been particularly into wearing things and loves to try to wear whatever she can find.  She loved getting into the swim bag and trying to put on our swimsuits.  The other day she was parading around the living room wearing a ring sling baby carrier like a princess sash.  And the   girls have been loving crawling and walking around the bedroom wearing their hooded towels after bath time.  The orange bucket in the playroom often ends up on someone's head too.  Not sure what it is about buckets that draws kids to put them on their heads, but their big cousin Abigail loved wearing a bucket on her head too!

Ellie sporting Mommy's swim top

Sooooo happy

parading giraffe

Ellie put her towel on by herself...
checking herself out in the mirror

PJs half on & a towel...good look bud!

happy little dude in silly glasses from Auntie Jess

little Miss Buckethead

They've also been initiating a lot more social play with each other and us.  They like to play peek-a-boo with us and eachother and have been really cute looking at each other in and out of the little tunnel.  They have also started initiating rough and tumble play and tickling by "getting" us or each other.  When they are "getting us" they will just come up and dive onto us.  This doesn't always go over very well when they do it to each other, but there have been times when the recipient (usually the baby laying on the floor for a diaper change or when getting jammies on) actually enjoys being gotten and will crack up.  We are still working on the idea of appropriate places to get and tickle each other (i.e. not on the face!), but it is pretty cute to watch them initiating this with each other!