Birthday Parties, New Teeth and Crazy Sleep

Dear Kiddos
Last Thursday marked the last day of Ducks/Tigers class. Nathan officially graduated from Pre-school.

Sept 2017

May 2018

The ceremony was very nice. I teared up the moment you all started to line up. (I'm not even a crier!)

The entire class sang a few songs, and then you all lined up to receive your diplomas. 

 Afterwards your teacher held a little celebration ceremony for the combined classes. Each student received an award. You received the confident leadership award.

On Friday, we spent the whole day home and had a friend come over to play in the morning. In the afternoon, we made shake and bake chicken. You both showed off your best shake and bake dances. 

Then, this weekend was birthday party extravaganza. We had 3 (technically 4) birthday parties to attend. We went to the playground for one, Stubbs graceland for 2, and then a jumpy house for the last one. 

 Auntie Momo and Ama also came to visit. Auntie Momo had to go back to finish off the school year, but Ama will be staying with us for 2 weeks! Life is already exponentially easier with her here.

I have extra help with dinner prep...

 But we are still having schedule time in the afternoon, which takes up about 2 hours.
Hannah, I love how you will just go off and do crafts on your own. This was such a sweet moment I just had to snap a photo.

Our neighbors gave us a huge bag of legos. Nathan, this has been keeping you quite busy. 

Hailey, girl, what is going on at night?!?! You will fall asleep without a problem during the day, but at night, an hour after I put you down (sometimes 30 minutes) you will wake back up. And sometimes, this repeats itself until about 1 am. 1 am! This is starting to be a nightmare for me! Last night you woke up at 11:00 and you didn't go down until 1:30! 

You may be going through another leap. Growth spurt? I don't know, but you really need to be sleeping more. Your averages are slowly dipping lower and lower. 

Otherwise you are such a happy baby. You are almost never fussy. You will play on your own. You love to pull yourself to standing and will find my hands to grab onto any moment you get. It's actually pretty cute.

You are getting pretty good at your pincer grasp and you are really steady as you sit up. Sometimes you will lean forward and start to rock back and forth. I know crawling will be in your future soon, but you need to spend more time on your belly before you will crawl.

I am trying to treasure these precious night time wakings, but it is so tough when I am just exhausted and want to sleep. I pray that this sleep regression/leap/teething; whatever it is, resolves itself really soon.

Well, that's about it for now.
Love,
Mommy

To My Pre-School Graduate Who Also Lost a Tooth This Week

Dear Nathan, 

Tomorrow you will be graduating preschool. I think back to your first day of preschool 4 years ago. You were so tiny and you had just started to talk and you are still as active as ever. 

You love Legos and board games. Actually, love would be an understatement...you are obsessed with Legos and board games. Your independent activity of choice is Legos and your activity to do with parent is a board game. And because you want to play "adult games" you are very motivated to read. I had gotten this book "Teach your child to read in 100 lessons." I kind of expected it to be like pulling teeth to go through the lessons, but instead it's the complete opposite. You have to pull my teeth to keep going. One day, you wanted to keep going through 6 lessons. 

You are reading simple 3-4 letter words and I can tell as the lessons are getting more difficult, your interest is waning. Now you only want to do 2 lessons before you want to stop. After a month, we are a little over half way, so I'm thinking we will just stick to 1 lesson a day. 

Recently we have had a chance to hang out with all of your first friends: Birthing group friends 

 and Chinese class "twin." People used to think that you two were twins. I'm sure if we went out now, people could still think the same.

You are also getting to be quite the artist. Your pictures are getting more detailed, and you can color inside the lines! Very impressive. 

 So this week you lost your first tooth. It actually came out on Monday during gymnastics. You were on the bars when you realized that it fell out.

Naturally, the tooth fairy paid you a visit and exchanged your tooth for a dollar and an encouraging letter. 

 Yesterday, to celebrate (and to use up brown bananas) we decided to make banana bread, but this time around, I let you take over the whole process. From measuring out the ingredients, to cracking the eggs and mixing the batter (Hannah helped you with that part) you did it all by yourself. I just retrieved the ingredients for you and told you how much.

While you did that, I got to prep dinner.

 Well, in the end, the banana bread tasted amazing! You both requested to bring it to school. You had an idea to make sandwiches with it, which makes sense because it is called "bread." But we stuck to regular wheat bread.

Well, that's about it for now. I'm sure I'll have lots of pictures from graduation. We have a busy summer ahead of us.

Love,
Mommy

An Ode to My Baby in Her Golden Age of 33 Weeks

Dear Hailey, 

You are now 7.5 (almost 8) months old. This is the golden age. This is the baby stage that I absolutely adore and will treasure forever. Knowing that you are most likely going to be our last baby, I'm starting to cherish all the small moments: breastfeeding, cuddles, changing your wiggly bottom, baby giggles and crazy flailing. 

This month you seem to have just perked right up. You are way more interactive with toys, grasping, picking up and exploring with your mouth. 

 You are a champ at eating. You love baby mum mum crackers, cheerios,

 an assortment of veggies including Indian bitter melon...

 You love gnawing on bones to pick off the bits of left over meat.

 You will eat anything fed to you in a spoon...

 You love an assortment of veggies (even brussels sprouts)

 and you will suck down pouches like a kid with a milkshake. I've been blending up dinner for you before I add salt and most of the time you will eat it. When you don't like what's being served to you, I simply add some applesauce to the puree and you will gobble it down.

As of you 6 month appointment, we were concerned about your weight gain. We weighed you and you are officially back on the 25 percentile growth curve! Yay! I'll continue to feed you pouches at the beginning of your meal and then give you finger foods at the end.

You LOVE to pull yourself to standing. Sometimes you will whine to let me know that you want to pull yourself up with my hands. All I have to do is extend my fingers out for you to grab a hold of and then you will pull yourself up to standing. Then once you do, you squeal with excitement and joy as if you are so proud of your new accomplishment. It's really too adorable.

You are sitting up very steadily. I can feel pretty confident to drop you down anywhere. Ionly have to worry about you falling over if I set you down on an elevated surface. 

 You are starting to get more interactive with those around you. You grab for you siblings, Teddy, and toys. When people talk to you, you almost always flash them a little smile.

 Our bedtime routine involves a nursing session, 3 books, lullaby, and if you are crying after I put you down, we'll do another quick nursing session, and then lullaby before you go back down.

 You love peek-a-boo books and books with dogs.  You are sleeping for about two 3-4 hour stretches, waking up in between for a 30 minute nursing session and then from there, you'll wake up for the day at around 7:30 (although today you slept until almost 9).

Two hours after your wake time, you'll go down for another nap. Sometimes that nap is 45 minutes, sometimes it's 2 hours. Regardless, 2 hours after you wake up from your nap you are ready to take another one. This usually occurs after pre-school pick up and will usually last for about 90 minutes. If it ends up being a short nap, I'll have you go down for a quick 15 minute snack nap to tie you over until 8:00.

Everyone you meet comments on what a happy baby you are. Most people are perplexed about who you look like. They say that you definitely have your own look and don't resemble Nathan or Hannah much. We'll see who you turn out looking like.

I know in a bat of an eye, you will be big and going off to kindergarten like your brother. I pray that time slows down these next few months so I can enjoy the extra snuggles and baby giggles.

Love,
Mommy

Ode to our Threenager

Dear Hannah,
You are now a bit over 3.5 years ago. We don't go through a day without some sort of challenging moment. I'm trying very hard to see you as an individual, but sometimes things just don't make sense to me.
Today, I came across this list that someone posted on Facebook. As I looked at the title of the list, I scoffed a bit, thinking that you probably would only have 1 or 2 of these off the list. To my surprise, you actually have most of these qualities and perhaps I'm crushing your spirit by making you conform to how I think a 3 year old should behave.

I'm going to comment on your qualities as a 3.5 year old girl. One day, when you read this, I hope it come across as funny and adorable. Well, here goes:

Personal Qualities not measured by Tests 
Creativity
You are very creative. I don't know anyone else who can take a popsicle stick, some sequins, googly eyes and make a whole family of people. 

Critical Thinking
You are a problem solver. You will not accept mediocre answers from me. For example, as I was filling your plate with dinner, I purposefully left out fruit. You asked me why I didn't put any fruit on your plate and I told you, "there's just no more room," and then you showed me how I could scoot some food to the side a bit and make more room. 

Another example is that you are always coming up with tools that we could use to get a job done. You rely on scissors too much. I actually have to put the scissors high up, because you are actually really good with scissors and really like to cut things like tags and tape to fix something. 

Resilience
We've been calling this trait "brave." When you fall, you bounce right back up. At first thought, I always feel like you are not very resilient. You don't like to stray off the plan, but once you understand why we've deviated from the plan, you usually go along with it. 

Motivation
You are highly motivated. Especially when it comes to food. I'm not sure if you are going through a growth spurt, or you are just bored, but you are always saying, "mom! I'm hungry, I'm still hungry!" You are motivated by being able to do thing things Nathan can do. I sometimes forget that there is an entire 23 month age gap between you and your brother and I expect you to act like him. But you are not and I need to be reminded of that. 

Persistence
Persistence, ah, that's a nice way of saying stubborn. [cough cough]. That you are. I have a theory that you refusing to go to the bathroom when we see you do the potty dance is a sort of "persistent" behavior. I still don't understand the rationale behind all of this, but one day you'll get it, I know it. 

You know what you want and you are OK with going ahead and doing something about it. One day I was taking a snooze on the couch and you wanted a mango. I told you that I would cut one up for you after I wake up in a few minutes. You took matter in your own hands and washed the mango, found a plastic knife, got a cutting board and proceeded to eat the mango at the table. At this point, I was faking sleep to see how far you would get in this process. You finished the mango. 

Throwing a tantrum in the car because you wanted to get your own cup for water. We gave you a cup, but you wanted to physically get the up by yourself. And then when we got into the car, you are refusing to buckle your straps. 

Curiosity
You are definitely curious. You are always asking, "Mommy, what are you eating?"
You are kind of destructive, but most of the time, you are taking things apart to figure out how it was put together. It drives me nuts, but I know that's what you are doing. 

Question Asking
Having a brother who asks 300 questions before breakfast leaves you pretty much knowing everything already. You don't ask a whole lot of questions right now. I expected the "why" phase to be annoying, but you never went through this phase. 

Humor
Girl, you've got a sense of humor. You catch onto jokes pretty easily and will repeat them, sometimes putting your own spin on the jokes. 

Endurance
This one, we have to work on because unless it's crafting, you've got the attention span of a fruit fly. Also, when it comes to playing games, I'm always encouraging you to just finish. With the right encouragement, you will be able to do anything.

Reliability
The only thing I can rely on you doing is putting your shoes away when we come home. That is something you just do automatically, but with everything else, I have to remind you at least 3 times. 
Enthusiasm
You show enthusiasm just like a Disney princess. You shriek with joy, say phrases like, "Oh, I'm so excited" and I know you are really excited about something is when you tell Nathan about it. 

Civic Mindedness
We are working on this too. Currently Nathan and I are trying to make you less wasteful. We are trying to cut back on straws and disposable cups. The only thing that gets you to consider not using a straw is the phrase, "whenever you use a straw, you kill a duck." I know, random, right? But we showed you guys a video of straws littering a beach and talked about how the ducks could eat the plastic and choke or die. That's where that came from. Right now you always say you will wash the straw, but you are very unreliable about that. 
Self Awareness
I think at this age, you are a bit hyper-self aware. The world is centered around you. Unfortunately, I am starting to see you be affected by society's gender expectations more and more. 

Self Discipline
Yep, here's something else we need to work on. You are still very impulsive and if given the opportunity, will eat an entire watermelon. You once ate an entire quarter of a large watermelon in one sitting. Right now, you depend on us to set limits. I need to make an effort to start to let you be able to set those limits for yourself very soon. 

Empathy
When apologizing, you are always really great at finishing this phrase, "I am sorry because I know..." You know how your actions affect other people. When reading a book, you will often make a comment about how a character might be feeling right now, given their circumstance. 

Leadership
At first I was concerned that you would find it difficult to catch up with the other kids at school because you would be one of the younger ones. But your teachers at school tell me that you actually will help other kids. Sometimes, you can come across as bossy, so we'll be working on that a bit too. 
Compassion
You love and adore your brother and sister fervently. You love babies and younger kids. You will sometimes turn down hugs, but most of the time you are happy to give them. 

Courage
You are one of those kids who can face anything, as long as you know what you are up against. You are big picture kind of person. I find that I often need to stop and just explain things to you, afterwards, you feel more comfortable and will take more risks. 
Sense of Beauty& Wonder
You are a "Stop and smell the roses" kind of gal, and me being a task oriented person, I am always rushing you along. I can see how you can get frustrated if you are not able to fully appreciate/admire something beautiful or wonderful. 
Resourcefulness
You are a problem solver and your slight disregard for the rules make you very resourceful in that you will figure out a way to get your way. 
Spontaneity
While Nathan is content with staying home and playing with toys, you always want to be outside and doing something. You like going on "adventures."

Humility
Being a little sister, you fully understand that you "are littler and can't do that yet." That doesn't keep you from trying, but in the end, you are ok with not being able to do something...yet. 

So after writing this post, I've come to realize that you are a pretty decent human being. I just need to remind myself of your developing qualities and stop to smell the roses with you. Soon this threenager stage will pass and you will enter into the fantastic four stage. 

And then I have to brace myself for the terrible two's soon afterwards... 

I know I am too hard on you sometimes and that you desperately seek my attention and approval. I will be trying to devote more one on one time with you from now on. You are very special to me and I love you very much. I know you are a very spirited individual, I just pray that I don't clip your wings and prevent you from flying. 

Love,

Mommy 

A Catch Up Post

My dear little humans, 

I apologize for not updating in 2 weeks. In the history of this blog (besides when we are on vacation overseas) this does not happen. It's just been such a busy 2 weeks. As the school year comes to a close, there's just lots of things to take care of, but that doesn't mean that we missed out on family time. That, I'm still keeping a priority. 

 Hannah is starting to practice bike riding. We are going to take the pedals off so that you can start riding the bike without pedals. This idea sounds simply ridiculous to you and you throw a tantrum every time Daddy tries to remove the pedals, but trust us, this is the fastest and easiest way to learn to ride a bike.

 The weather has been pretty awesome the past 2 weeks. Hailey has been generally taking a nap around pick up, so on those days that she falls asleep in the car, I'll roll down the windows and let you guys just play a bit longer before we head home. There's this tree stump at your gymnastics school that all the kids just love to climb.

 Academy 4 (the mentoring program that I've been helping out with) ended today. The days leading up to the big event has been crazy. But luckily, I have great helpers that will help me stuff envelopes. I paid you guys a penny for each envelope that you stuffed and in the end. It ended up being a pretty good impromptu lesson on money.

Hailey, you are quite the eating machine. Now that you will eat purees from a pouch, mealtimes have gone much faster. Besides acidic foods, your body will tolerate most foods. I say most, because I think you may be sensitive or allergic to egg white. I had given you little bites of egg white and you seemed to not have any reaction, so one day I decided to make you scrambled eggs. A few minutes after you ate the eggs, you started to have a rash on your face and chest. I quickly cleaned you off very well and started to observe to see if your reaction got worse. Luckily it did not and by the afternoon, the hives on your chest had disappeared. 

So during the day I'll give you a pouch and then give you finger foods for you to practice eating. 

 You enjoy chicken, fruit, crackers, pretty much anything.

 Even bitter melon (which no one in the family likes except for me). I had actually given you just a small piece to see what your "yuck" face would look like, but you really liked it and kept grunting for more every time you lost the piece in your hand.

 Hailey, you are sitting up pretty well too. Now I feel pretty confident to just plop you down somewhere and know that you won't fall backwards.

 You are also very destructive. You love to knock over towers and take things apart.

 And about 2 days ago, you discovered your hands. Like you will carefully examine them in front of your face as you move your fingers around. It was very cool to watch you make this discovery for the first time.

On Saturday, before grandma and grandpa came, Daddy took you two to Home Depot. There we saw Nathan's best friend from when you were toddlers. 

 That afternoon, you all drove up to Temple with grandma and grandpa to the air show.

 The coolest part was a pearl harbor demonstration where there were airplanes zipping around and bomb sounds going off...so I heard.

Hailey, you must have gone through a major mental leap, because now you are a giggling machine. Almost anything silly that Hannah or Nathan does will solicit a giggle from you. You go bizerk when Nathan will throw himself on the ground.

You love just playing next to Nathan and Hannah, watching them and occasionally screaming at them.

 This is such a fun age. We are just having a blast and enjoying this stage in your life. Your sleep...is a different story. I'm not sure what happened, but you've been waking up 1/2 hour after you are put down at night and then you pretty much scream and scream unless I go and nurse you back to sleep. You have a slight runny nose, which I hope is the cause of this craziness, but I'm praying for a longer stretch of sleep. I need it. You need it.

 At preschool there was a special mother's day celebration. We had tea, snacks, did a craft and took photos. I asked both of you Nathan and Hannah whether or not you wanted to take a picture with just you and me, or if you wanted to include Hailey too. As you can see, both of you made the same choice, which I think is so sweet.

 As I sigh a big sigh of relief after a busy week, I have to stop and think about how blessed I am. Maybe one day I will write a separate post about it, but I really thank God for many opportunities for growth in the past few weeks. I have to continue to remind myself that God is in control and I need to trust Him more.

Well, that's about it for now. I'll make another post on Wednesday to get back on schedule.

Until next week,
Love,
Mommy