WEEKENDS ARE FUN!

What do you do for fun in the winter with 2 kids under 5 yrs old?

Sea Life adventure toys (Sarah S)

LET IT SNOW indoors (flour)

Everyone needs mommy at the same time today? No problem!

Make a twinkle cave (idea courtesy of PAHM blog: http://playathomemom3.blogspot.com/)

Blow bubbles inside of bubbles inside a cute plate

Play with Spaghetti (and, incidentally, eat it for the first time)

Play dress up with daddy

Fold laundry with mommy

Mia is 3 years old!

A Party of Ps:

Painting, Pizza & Presents!

This is the first year Mia did not celebrate her birthday alongside Randall, her cousin that is only 9 days younger than her. They had just visited for Christmas and it was too much to ask of them to come down again yet it was our turn to host the birthday since last year it was hosted by Matt and Harold. Instead, we were happy to welcome my Aunt Gee Gee, cousin Jami and her two boys, Trey and Jayden along with my mom and dad and Kim (from Binghamton) to join the festivities. Thanks y'all for traveling so far to be with us!

In thinking what to do for Mia I considered her favorite things: painting, pizza, and reading. At the time I was brainstorming, The Color Kittens (by Margaret Wise Brown) was Mia's favorite book (she has a new favorite every week actually. Right now it is tied: The Paper Bag Princess and Courdoroy. So I commissioned my coworker, good friend and baker extraordinaire to make a cake using The Color Kittens book as her muse. Then I arranged two activities: painting and make-your-own pizza (which is like edible painting). We read The Color Kittens before painting to inspire the kids to mix colors (the book is all about how to make other colors from the primary ones). I think it worked because many had mixed and mixed until their posterboard painting was all brown! :) Balloons and Mia's trampoline were big hits too!

Birthday decorations (set up the night before as she slept)

Mia walking through the birthday streamers with a new tradition in hand. A brand new birthday outfit (Mia picked it out just days before)

The scene from behind (mommy, Gavin and Jami in the foreground). Gavin pleasantly surprised us by being Mr. Social despite the loud noise and over stimulation and his recent I-only-want-mommy-or-daddy phase.

Making pizza (yes, they did use the veggies and yes, they actually ate them. Note to self: Apparently when THEY decide to bake a pizza with veggies eating them is acceptable)

Painting (Mia flanked by Trey and Jami across from Jayden and Emra) Notice Mia's 3 ponytails? "Mommy I want 3 pony tails today because I'm 3" was what she told me in the morning. Bear in mind, this child doesn't usually let me even step near her with a brush.

Presents (this is Mia's new friend Leah who celebrated her 3rd birthday just 2 days after Mia's. Leah is Stacie's coworker's daughter)

The cake! (is that Brush or Hush? I'm still not sure but when asked later what her favorite part about her birthday party was Mia said it was this cat. Yep folks, I let Mia consume this pure sugary feline. When her friend wanted to share Mia ripped the head off and pleasantly gave it to her.)

I'm not 100% sure but I think this may've been the first time Mia sucessfully blew out her birthday candles. 1 yr old = too young, 2 yrs old = she had just taken a tumble off the bench moments before blowing out time and her cousin Randall helped her as she was too shaken up, 3 yrs old = took several tries but she got each and every one out.

Here are all the family who traveled so far to be with Mia on her special day. Thanks guys!

Mia updates:

• Mia is at the 89% on weight for age (almost 36 lbs), 62% on height for age (3'2").
• Mia is in 4t clothing but can sometimes fit a small size x-small.
• Favorite activities: playing doll house, house, trampoline, arts/crafts, reading (as always)
• She has been taking shorter or no naps lately but is generally good about staying in her room for a quiet hour when she can't nap. Although sometimes she still takes 3 hr naps.
• Unfortunately, Mia has begun lying. We are really emphasizing that telling the truth makes us happy instead of punishing the lies. Sometimes I think her lack of understanding for the passage of time is at fault (example: Mia, did you go pee pee? Yes mommy (and by yes, she means 5 hours ago!)
• Mia has taken a liking to talking back and being fresh lately but we usually curb it by giving her a warning or two before time out, which she usually never gets to. Often, I find we just have to remind her that she is the kid and we are the adult and she can't tell us what to do.
• Mia has her own laptop and loves playing on www.starfall.com Here she learns about letter sounds and listens to nursery rhymes and so on. Recently, she started pointing to words on papers and saying, for instance "that starts with a "G" so it must be Gavin" or she will randomly say "banana starts with B" and then she will list like 5 other things that start with B. She has recently begun to accidentally (in her scribbling) make letters or numbers and then worked hard at recreating them. Here are the letters/numbers she has taught herself so far: M (though it sometimes looks like a backwards N), i, P (though it looks like a lollipop), a, o, and she can do the number 7 and of course 1. So she obviously has all the letters it takes to do Mia but if left to her own devices she puts them in any order and announces that she has written her name :) cute! she doesn't realize how critical letter order is to writing. Mia can also draw a tic tac toe board and although she knows the point of the game (3 in a row) she can't seem to think ahead enough to win often.
• Mia continues to be a great big sister and although you can often times hear her saying, "no Gavin" or "don't pull my hair" she has NEVER EVER hurt him or yelled at him and lets him play alongside her even though he gets her toys drool-y. When I hear him waking up in the morning after she's already up she loves to be the first to run in there and greet him. She likes to put his paci in his mouth (even though we remove it when he's not sleeping, she insists he wants it, which is true). Mia will alert us to when Gavin needs milk or if he yawns and if we go away to the bathroom or somewhere quick, Mia will keep an eye on him (we ask her to) by sitting behind him.
• Oh and how could I almost forget! Mia is using "big girl toothpaste" (with flouride) now, on the promise that she will spit and rinse every time, which she has been great about.

Mia, my dear sweet Mia, I still remember that day 3 years ago when I thought I was just going in for a 38 week prenatal visit and I was told that I was not going home without my baby. When I first held you, when you first (finally) latched and nursed, how you would sleep on my chest and rise and fall with my breaths, I still remember when you first stood on your own and how much you used to fall when walking. Now, a little self-proclaimed lady, with pink purse in hand (thanks Vicki!) you commonly correct me where you would have been clueless in the past. I dare not change even a word in your bedtime book because you know them better than I do. Yet, despite your ever increasing intelligence, you have moments like tonight--where you were searching for the letter "u" and I was teasing you saying "you need me?", "no mommy I need U"--that let me know I still have my little baby who is growing up at just the right speed, not too fast and not too slow. I love you sweet Mia!

Love,

Mommy

Bubbe and Pop Pop visit

Books and cuddles in the morning:

An active and playful Mia with Bubbe:

Tea for Two Ladies

The Rittenhouse hotel is just about the fanciest place you can stay in Philadelphia and Mia and I had a date for just this place on Saturday January 7th at 4pm for afternoon tea in the Mary Cassatt Tea room. Before we left, we did our hair, put on our fancy clothes and we even put a spot of perfume on our wrists AND wore special necklaces (my Omi's).

Waiting patiently for our tea service.

Mmmm eating the chocolate cake with cocoa powder on my lip.

"Just us girls" as we like to say

Good to the last drop! I can't wait to do this again Mia, and again and again and again one day as fully grown women perhaps.

Thanks Dave, this was the best daughter/mother x-mas present ever!!

Gavin is 8 months old (oh and it is also 2012: the year of the apocalypse)

Taking monthly pictures with the sign showing how old he is is getting challenging. Either we have a hand in the photo, which is holding the sign or we prop it up and he wants to eat the prop, and if we don't secure it in some way. . .

he eats the sign!

This month has brought a lot of changes! Gavin is now standing up on his own muscle power with only balance assistance (under the arms or holding onto a table he is set at) for about a minute.

Gavin is now king of shaking his head no. It started off during our solid food feedings as a way of escaping the food when he was all done, then he used it to say “no” when he was all done and since we laugh at how cute this headshake is now he does it just for giggles and sometimes even when no one is looking (I think he likes the mildly dizzying feel of it).

Gavin had his first finger foods (sweet potato puffs) and rapidly went from what Dave called a “proto-pincer grasp” to a perfected pincer most of the times. In the middle of December Gavin started drooling and spitting (blowing raspberries) like crazy going through bibs in minutes.

Less than a week later his first tooth made a mark on his gums and 3 days after that it fully erupted (his bottom right). Just a week and a day later he got the bottom left tooth in too. He needed a bit of Tylenol during those weeks and definitely had a bit of trouble sleeping, had congestion and mild fevers. Because I knew he was sick and teething I nursed him whenever he woke and I believe this led to him learning to cry for me because after the teeth were done and the congestion cleared he started crying when we put him down for the night even though everything was fine. Fortunately letting him cry for 5 minutes at a time (mixed with soothing in between) never had to go on for more than 10-15 mins total crying and he is soothing himself to sleep nicely again. This month Gavin FINALLY (6 weeks after he first said “dada) said “mama” and now can’t stop saying it. He was also caught saying “Gogo” and “wawa” once each in appropriate contexts (looking at the cat or water) but we are not fully convinced of anything yet (n = 1 just don’t cut it!). New foods this month were: beet, parsnip, cheerios, prunes, homemade teething biscuit, and broccoli although he took a break from solids during the teething weeks.

This month Gavin stared at his hand and arm while rotating them, continues to put everything in his mouth, splashes in the tub with his sister in the absence of the baby tub, has even said “dada” once when Dave entered his room, laughs easily at his sister’s antics, fallen while reaching for a toy and found himself in a hands/knees position briefly before realizing he hated this and celebrated his first Hannukah, Christmas and Christmakah (see other posts).

2012

Oh and as for New Year’s Eve. . . the fact that the “celebration” was tacked on to the end of this post exemplifies the lameness of our 12/31/11. My family was sick (Dave = stomach bug, Mia = nose stuffed shut, Gavin = teething) and while I had the health and desire to go out partying I thought this was not the nicest idea so instead life continued as usual. I think we let Mia stay up a bit later and watch Dora and Dave and I watched the ball drop on a live feed on his lap top in bed moments before going to sleep and moments after I had just soothed Mia back to bed because her sickness kept waking her up. Perhaps, if we are all still alive 12/31/12, the party will be monumental (and in Boston!!).

Mia and Gavin on New Years Day morning (Mia was still very congested and uncomfortable)