Two and a Half

Asher is now two and a half years old and quite the little force around our house. Asher's favorite words seems to be "No". He says it to us all the time even before he stops to think about if he really wants the answer to be "yes".
Asher loves destruction, which drives me crazy. He loves to just dump things out for the sheer pleasure of watching them come out. Sometimes he plays with the toys he dumps out and other times he runs off to find something else. He loves to rip the blankets and sheets off of our bed right after I make it in the morning. I used to re-make the bed, but he would just rip them off again. So now I've learned and sometimes the blankets just stay on the floor until bedtime, but that kind of drives me crazy, so sometimes I sneak in and make the bed then make sure he doesn't get back into our room. Remember the cute little box car I blogged about a few days ago? About 20 minutes after I posted that, we were sitting in the living room all together and Asher started ripping off the wheels, lights, and license plate I had taped onto the box. The whole time he was doing it, he was looking at me and saying "oh, no, car is broken". I have been trying to work with him on the difference between broken and ruined. He thinks that he can just break things and daddy will come home and fix them. I want to teach him that some things can't be fixed or won't be the same when they are fixed. So now when he starts destroying things, I tell him that they are ruined instead of broken. We'll see if he catches on.
Despite his destructive side, Asher is a pretty good little helper. He will go around with me while I vacuum and pick things up for me. I started doing this mostly to distract him from wanting to vacuum himself, but I keep doing it because I think its good for him to follow directions and help clean up. He also loves to help make mac and cheese. He likes to carry the box to the stove, pull up a chair and pour in the noodles to the boiling water. He then stands on the chair and watches the noodles boil for 7 minutes, stirring every now and then after I do. I put the butter, milk, and cheese in and he gets to help stir, then he and Leif eat it all up.
Luckily for Asher, his half birthday falls on Austin's birthday, so he gets to have fun activities for his half birthday. This morning we made crepes for Austin's birthday breakfast. The boys loved to help me mix up the batter. These are the only photos we got of Asher today, but they are pretty cute :)