Rocks and Manners

Yesterday we had our first incident of having an object stuck in a nostril.  It was fun.  I was on the phone with Ryan and was about to try to figure out how to get Eva from school and get Eli to the doctor to get the object removed, when Eli started sneezing... and sneezing... and sneezing.  And then, out flew a big rock from his nose!  I'm pretty thankful that we did not end up making a trip to the pediatrician just to have that removed.

Every month at Eli's school, they work on a character trait and for the month of November, they worked on being polite.  So his manners, which were already pretty good, have gotten exceptional.  It is the funniest thing to us.  He went from the simple "Please" and "thank you" to things like "excuse me" and "Nice to meet you,".

Which brings me to my next Eli story:  This weekend we were out running errands and the boys had reached their limit of cooperation.  I told Ryan to run into the last stop real fast while I kept the boys in the car.  It was unseasonably warm, so we were sitting in the parking lot with the windows down and Eli's sliding door was open.  As we waited, a worker from the store came out to collect the shopping carts from the return next to where we were parked.  As he walked up, Eli said, "Um, excuse me. Whatcha doin'?".  The guy looked at me and asked what Eli had said, when I told him, he just laughed and then explained to Eli what he was doing and asked Eli if he wanted to help!

Then, at church on Sunday, we were walking through the halls and Eli started telling every person we passed, "Hi!  Nice to meet you!  Hi!  Hi!  Hi!  Nice to meet you!..."  He has also started saying this to people out in public.  It's so funny to see people's responses to him.  Even the most stone-faced person just lights up when Eli greets them.

We have been calling him our little politician lately.  I obviously have no idea if he will be a politician someday, but I do think God has very big plans for that little guy.

Eli also now responds to me with a "Sorry mama" if he doesn't want something I'm offering or suggesting.  Such as, "Eli would you like some milk?"
"Uh, sorry mama."
"Would you like to go play with blocks?"
"Uh, sorry mama."
It totally cracks us up.