Sign of the Times

You know something is amiss when even the baby doll is being put in time out.



Emilia, why is your baby in the hall?
'Mout.
Ohhh. And why is your baby in time out?
Hit me.

Also, after taking this picture, I realized how dirty my walls are. The boys hold on to the wall here when they turn the corner. I didn't realize how bad it was. They're clean now, but they sure look gross here!

On a happier note, Emilia was my helper in the kitchen today. We made rolls for dinner (Audra cooperated by napping the whole time!). Emilia likes playing in the kitchen, so while there was already flour everywhere, I let her play for awhile. These videos of her doing her thing in the kitchen:

Please excuse my talking in the first one...I was on the phone, but not wanting to miss the moment, I videoed anyway.

{this moment}

A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. Happy Friday!

Our Girls

Back in the day when we only had boys, John would always say that he wanted to have a little girl. I repeatedly warned him that he didn't really realize what he was getting into. I tried to let him know how much attitude just comes naturally when you're a girl and that being a teenager is....WHOA. I was a (comparatively) good teenager, and I wouldn't have wanted to be my parent! I had more attitude than I knew what to do with and shared it freely and liberally--especially with my dad! I tried to warn him. I tried to tell him how good we had it with the boys. However, God has plans for our family and those plans include two adorable little girls. Don't get me wrong, I am THRILLED to have two girls. I LOVE our two girls. But, I know it's not all going to be twirling and painting nails and singing silly songs.

And ALREADY we're starting to see the sass that girls can have. ALREADY.

Oh, the attitude our little 2 year old has. Like John said tonight, she's 2 going on 14.

Yikes.

This is our bedtime routine:
Emilia and I put the boys in bed, give them hugs and kisses and Emilia draws their "goodnight signal" (to which she always wants me to add a "shunshine"). Then we go to her room, rock to one song of her nightime songs, I put her in bed, give her covers and kiss her goodnight. Each step of this process is important and if we skip any of them, she gets a bit out of sorts.

But, she is 2, and "No" is one of her favorite words. I hear it A LOT. Everyday. Today was no different. By bedtime I was over it. I told her it was time to go to bed. She said no. I told her if she was going to draw the signal she had to come now. She said no. (I put the boys to bed alone...it felt strange!) I stood in the hallway and told her if she wanted to rock she had to come now, that if I had to come to the living room to get her she was going straight to bed with no rocking. She didn't come. She went straight to bed.

She SCREAMED.

For 30 minutes.

I went back into her room, picked her up off the floor and held her for a moment.

She said, "Rock?"

I said, "No. You chose not to rock tonight. You have to go to bed. It's bedtime now."

I put her in bed. I asked if she wanted covers.

She, rather disgustingly, said, "Sure."

I gave her a kiss and told her I love her.

She huffed and said, "Ever." (as in "whatever")


If she's doing this at 2, how am I going to survive those teenage years??!?? Remember in my last post when I said I wanted time to slow down just a little bit? Today was one of those days when I was glad that never happens. I didn't want today to last one millisecond longer than it did. But it's all good. After all, tomorrow is another day. :)

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Our other "little" girl is growing like a weed! She had her one month appointment today and the doctor said she's perfect, but we already knew that. At her one week check she was down to 8 lbs 13 oz, but today she was 11 lbs 13 oz--she gained 3 lbs in FOUR WEEKS! She's almost 23 inches long now, which puts her at the 97% for weight and height.

She's such a great little baby. I guess she doesn't have much choice with being the fourth and all, but she really is a good baby! She sleeps up to 5 hour stretches at night and hardly ever cries (though Micah has been spreading the rumor that she cries alot). She loves to snuggle in and sleep on someone's chest and she also likes to watch the madness and chaos that is our home. She's the perfect final member of our family and I couldn't love her more!

What's Super Special About YOU?

Micah: That I'm cool!!

Actually, THAT I'M FUNNY!!

Josiah: Ooooh, I'm going to have to think about that.

That I think before I do things. Alo...sometimes.


What's super special about Molly?

Josiah: That she's a good sister

Micah: That she's silly--like me!


At this point, I lost their attention, so I didn't get to ask about Audra, but there's no doubt that she's super special, too!

She's TWO!

Remember this post? Can you believe that was already TWO YEARS AGO??

That's just crazy to me.

And yet, if I were to go down the hall and into her room (which I would never do right now because she's sleeping!) I would find a beautiful two year old in my house. Oh, where does the time go?? I tell ya, with having had my last baby and seeing her fly through the newborn days faster than my heart can handle and then having my baby girl turn two, I just can't stop thinking of how fast my kids keep growing up and wishing time could slow down just a little bit (I dont want it to slow down TOO much, or my kids and I might not make it through some of our days alive)

But since that will never happen, let me tell you a little about this awesome two-year old I've got (who is currently full of the two-year old attitude, fyi...)

Emilia loves to have her nails painted. Almost every day she walks up to me, holding out her hands and says, "Fix it?" and then we fix all the chips from the day before. When we first started painting her nails a few months ago, she liked having flowers on her nails, too, but now she just likes having the color on them. Mostly she picks pink, but sometimes she'll go for purple or blue (and those are currently our only "Instant Dry" options)

As you've seen, she gets to choose her own clothes. Although she still likes stripes, she's been choosing flowers for the last week or so. And she's into the layered look (that sounds nicer than saying she can't decide on just one shirt) because every day she wears at least one shirt, sometimes three.

She doesn't like having her hair done lately. Which is really too bad because her wispy mullet is starting to hang in her eyes, but she wont let me put a clip in her hair to hold it out of her face. She did wear pigtails for about 30 minutes yesterday, but that was the first time in about a month that she let me do pigtails. I'm going to try making some fabric headbands and see if she'll wear those.

We've been trying to potty train because she's been dry at night for almost 2 weeks now. That's not been so successful. She REALLY resists the potty. She doesn't even want to sit on it. I've bribed her into going on the potty a few times, but mostly she just screams, "NOOOoooooo!" at the mention of the potty. We've tried pullups and training pants and are making no progress. Yesterday, she got so upset about sitting on the potty that as she was trying to climb off, she slipped and fell and her arm went in the potty and then we had the trauma of having to change her 3 shirts....I've decided to postpone potty training for awhile.

Emilia L-O-V-E-S her sister. I mean, *LOVES* her. I think she gives Audra about 100 kisses a day. Everytime Audra cries, Emilia says, "Kisses?" and gives her kisses. She gives kisses when Audra's sleeping and when I'm rocking her and when she's getting a clean diaper and when she's swinging (those are interesting) and when she's just sitting...LOTS of kisses. :) Emilia likes to help burp her and likes to sit and hold her. As a matter of fact, right now she's sitting with Audra (in John's lap) and saying, "Audra. Awww, Audra. Mile. Mile, Audra."

She obviously has older brothers because she'll pick up one of their light sabers (she calls them "savers") and come up to you and growl, "Fight." And she knows that if there is a disagreement about a toy that it is much more effective to clutch the toy to her chest and say, "FIRST!" No one cares about "mine" around here, what matters is if you had it first!

If the old adage "You are what you eat" is true, then we can expect Emilia to turn into a yogurt fruit bar (NutriGrain Bar). Almost every morning (it was EVERY morning until recently) she asks for a fruit bar for breakfast. She asks for one for lunch, snack and dinner, too, but usually only gets them for breakfast. As for the yogurt, well, she'd eat that any time, any day. Sometimes, she gets so insistent about having one that she goes into the fridge and gets one herself...as if that would change my answer. :) Now, she likes fruit bars and yogurt A LOT, but what she really LOVES is chocolate, particularly my grandma's brownies. (And why is it that I can't make brownies that taste like hers? I use the same recipe!!) We eat at my grandma's every Friday, and one Friday my grandma got the brownies out a little too soon...Molly was chewing a bite of broccoli (which she does like...I think it's her favorite vegetable) but once she saw that brownie container the half-chewed broccoli was spit out on her plate and pushed away to make room for the brownie. As far as she was concerned, lunch was OVER. It was really funny, and we've never made that mistake again!

She is very into playing with her baby dolls. I expected that, since everyone said it would happen when we had the baby. She changes their diapers and rocks them to sleep and puts them in the baby swing and holds them close and says, "I gotcha. I gotcha." Her babies get almost as many kisses as Audra and get burped (probably a little harder than Audra). When they are sleeping, we have to be quiet...although I'm not sure what Emilia thinks it means to be quiet, because when I ask her to be quiet she says, "Ok" and then goes and says something at normal volume directly in Audra's ear (usually, "Kisses."). But then, this morning when we were leaving John had to go in her room to get her jacket and she ran after him saying, "Baby sleeping! Shhhh!"

She really likes music. There are a few Sesame Street video clips that we watch on a regular basis. One is "Everybody's Song" and the other is a clip with Elmo and Whoopie Goldberg. She "re-enacts" these with our little music instruments. The Elmo clip has a drum and she uses our tamborine and two sticks to be her drum and sings the "La-la-la-la" part repeatedly. :) I've tried to video this several times because I think it is just so cute, but like all good children, she stops the performance as soon as the video camera is out.

And there you have it. My sweet and sassy two-year old. I love her to pieces. She is such a gift from God and has added so much to our family that I can't imagine us without her. We are so blessed to know her and to have her in our family. She has a huge heart, the sweetest smile and big ole blue eyes that you could get lost in. She is awesome. She is funny. She is a goober.

I still can't believe she's two.

First Bath

Emilia talked me into giving Audra her first bath yesterday. I mean, REAL bath, not the sponge-off kind they get until their umbilical cord stump falls off (Audra's fell off on Tuesday--I think it was Tuesday, could've been a different day). Last night I told Emilia it was time for a bath. She looked oh-so sweetly at me and said, "Both??" (and looked at Audra)

Ummmm...Ok?? (WHAT am I getting myself into?)

Acutally, it wasn't too bad. It was a little tricky getting them out because once Audra was out and dressed she was ready for bed, but I couldn't leave Emilia in the tub, so...Audra ended up crying for a few minutes while I got Emilia out and dressed, but other than that, a good time was had by all!

Audra in her first bath



The girls in their pink tub...Emilia helping me scrub Audra :)
(and yes, Audra's skin really is that red)



After I got Audra out, Emilia got in the baby tub



She thought she was sooo cute



And just because I thought this was way too cute not to share...I was taking pics of Audra laying on the floor the other day. When I picked her up, Emilia layed down on her blanket and said, "My turn?" That's when I snapped this beauty. If you ask me, this one is definitely a keeper (even if it is a bit blurry).



Ahhh....my girls. I love my girls. (I love my boys, too!) In two days my big girl will be 2 years old and my baby girl will be 1 month old. Where does the time go? It reminds me of the first post I ever made on here...Time is a circus, always packing up and moving away. Somedays I want to scream with frustration, but mostly I just want it all to slow down and bit so I can treasure each moment a little bit more.

Question

Can anyone explain to me why Emilia calls her boogers "flowers"?????

Close Call

Doing the dishes seems like a simple enough task, right? And yet, nothing is simple these days. :) I turned the water on to wash dishes this morning, thinking everything else was under control. (Why do I ever think that??) Not more than 5 seconds later, Audra was crying and Emilia had spilled her bowl of cereal. Our hot water runs R-E-A-L-L-Y slow, so I left the water running while I took care of the other issues, knowing it takes forever to get enough to wash dishes. I went and got Audra and cleaned up the spilled milk....and in the process TOTALLY forgot about my plans to do dishes, let alone the fact that I had left the water on! It was at least a couple minutes before I remembered. I ran back in the kitchen and found this:



And we have deep sinks! For the first time ever, I am thankful that our hot water runs sooooooooo slow, or I would have had a HUGE mess to clean up.

And why am I blogging about this? I mean, do you really care that I nearly flooded my kitchen this morning? Well, probably not. But I do. And this blog is as much for me as it is for you. This is one of those simple moments that I worry that I'll forget about my life with little kids. I want to remember that, yes, it actually is possible for me to forget--in a matter of less than 2 minutes--that I turned the water on and intended to wash the dishes. I want to remember the craziness of my days because it is my life right now and someday (all too soon) these kids will be grown and gone and no one will be here to distract me from washing the dishes and I just might not be able to fathom that I would have ever been as absent-minded as to forget what I was doing 2 minutes ago. I love my kids and I love my crazy life. I want to remember as much of it as possible because I know I'm going to be sad when these days are over. So there you have it. My almost overflown sink. And my heart so full of love for these little munchkins that I even want to remember my sink looking like this.

{this moment}

A Friday ritual. A (sometimes) single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. This week I couldn't decide on just one photo...so you get several. Happy Friday!

Yikes! Stripes!!

These are from the same day...slight outfit change. She's got a thing for stripes (that's a bit of an understatement).





Niiiiiiiice. Reminds me of my sister :) I can still hear my brother when we were kids, "I am NOT sitting by her....I don't care, mom, I WILL NOT sit by her. I am not going to let anyone see me with her."

So far, Emilia's brothers couldn't care less. We'll see how they feel when they're in middle school. With any luck her fashion sense will have matured a bit by then. But you never know, marching to the beat of your own drummer does run in the family!

Oh, and do you like the sharpie half-mustache? She's got a thing for markers, too. I usually keep them out of reach in a cabinet, but you know, every now and then I actually need to use a sharpie...and every now and then I forget to put it back. She's got a sixth sense about them and ALWAYS finds them. Not too much damage this time, just a little half-mustache--to go with the stripes!

{this moment}

This is an idea from SouleMama...A new semi-regular Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

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Not My Best Moment

This morning, Audra was peacefully sleeping BY HERSELF, the older kids were happily watching TV, so I thought, "Perfect! I'll get a few things done while the kids are all occupied." Silly me. I should have known that was a recipe for disaster.

I came back out into the living room to find Emilia playing with a wad of yellowish stuff in her hands. She sweetly looked at me and said,

"Poopy."

No question. It was a statement. She knew exactly what she had.

That's right, my friends, she had gone into her room, dug one of Audra's poopy diapers out of the trash, opened it up, used about half a pack of brand-new-just-opened-this-morning wipes to "clean" (her words, not mine) the diaper (left the wipes scattered around the room) and then played with the poop like it was play-doh.

The good news is that my food processor is a dream when it comes to shredding cheese and we have a casserole ready to bake for dinner tonight.