Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Why Do They Have To Grow Up?

Our Little 7 1/2 month old J-dub has decided he doesn't care to sit still anymore. His current obsession is pulling himself up on things:s:
He's been working hard at this little trick, making life a little difficult as of late. Within minutes of putting down on the ground he will crawl to the nearest potential climbing spot. He loves the stools even though he tends to pull them over onto himself if I'm not watching. He loves the Roomba because if he's lucky he'll push the button and start it. I can't leave socks on his feet because his feet will slip and he'll end up doing the splits. It scares him but it makes me laugh. He has had several bonks and bruises just today. On the one hand, I'm sad he's growing up so fast. On the other hand I wish he would get the hang of it already so he stops toppling over all the time. There is just no stopping this kid. Here's a little video showing how happy this guys is when standing.



Any bets on when he'll be walking?

Saturday, March 12, 2011

Seven

Little S has been learning to count objects and deciding how many things are present in a group. He's good at one and two. He sometimes can even get three right. But any group of items more than that he declares consists of seven objects. If asked how many garbage cans were on the street "Seven!" How many crackers do you want "Seven!" How many jelly beans do you have? "Seven!'

I see a new nickname being created...

Friday, March 11, 2011

And Then She Was Six

Our Kiwi girl turned 6 two weeks ago. It seems that with her being the only girl and all, birthday lasts a lot longer. First there were cupcakes a few days before the day. Then a visit with G & G Evans on her birthday complete with hamburgers, balloons, and gelato. This was all followed up by a friends birthday the week after. Unfortunately, mommy promised a friend party this year but didn't get her act together in time to do it her actual birthday weekend. So, a week late, but I managed to keep my promise. Now I think I have to plan a three year old party in April because some little boy thinks he gets a party now too.
All the girls gathered around the cake.

No birthday is complete without balloon art supplied by the oldest brother.

This year marked the first time her birthday happened on the same day of the week she was born. I went to bed the night before remembering the feelings I had 6 years earlier going to sleep on her due date without a baby still. No contractions and no idea when I would ever get to meet my baby. Little did I know she would be born within four hours. I love my little Kiwi girl.

Tuesday, March 1, 2011

What we remember

I went to a youth activity last week and the leader handed a paper out to the girls with different ideas of things to write about in a journal. Some of the ideas included:

Tell about your favorite food or recipe
Write about your favorite hymn or song
Write a letter to your spouse and children
Write about how you felt during the day even if you don't think you did anything momentous
Tell a story your mom or dad has told you about when you were a baby
Pick someone who is a hero in your life and write about him or her
think of a book you've read and explain why it has made a difference in your life.
Describe your earliest memory

There were a bunch more and I will probably will write about a number of the prompts somewhere else. I like to keep myself to myself and try not to get too personal on the family blog. But I have to write about the last one. Mostly because the memories I came up with are funny and I wonder what other people remember from their childhood.

I consider memories to be early ones if they happened at our house we lived in on Delta. We moved from there when I was around 4 1/2. Here a re a few memories:

My brother being born (my mom was wearing pink and he had dark hair)
Peeing in a tree well.
My oldest brother sticking a grape in his nose and pulling out his ear (seriously, I really thought he did it and contemplated for year why he had a tube running from his nose to his ear).
Eating a lawn mushroom because the neighbor boy dared me and getting horribly sick.
A road runner running through the backyard.

I often wonder what my kids will remember from their childhood. I hope they are good things. I want to have them start writing them down so I can know what they consider momentous. Two of my memories were major events, but the others were just random things that happened on a random day that I'm sure my siblings or parents don't even remember. It's amazing what stick with you.

Snow Day 2011

How often does it snow in the desert? More than I would have thought. We have been in Tucson for 10 years or so, and we are up to 2 days of snow, at least the measurable kind. Grandma and Grandpa came down for a short visit (aka Gelato Run), and I was worried that there might be snow when they returned to the north county. But, that didn't stop Grandpa from playing with the kids:
On Sunday morning (2/27/2011), I woke up, and looked out the window:
It was already melting by the time I woke up (yes, I slept in to 7). No, there were no canceled church services, but it was fun to see for the minute it lasted.