Random Updates

Ellie is a stubborn little thing. There's tons of words we know she knows, that's she's used perfectly well in the past, but she just refuses to use most words to communicate. She's an expert nonverbal communicator, and she seems to be OK with that for now. And, it's not the biggest deal, but now that she's over 18 months old, we feel like we should start being a bit more 'encouraging' of a wider vocabulary. (Oh, and she is like a Smurf though -- where she has one word that means EVERYTHING. It's "nana". Which gets confusing, 'cause that's what she calls Annie. But it can also mean, here, there, look at that, wow, dog, bike, ball, toy, banana, strawberries, toast, high chair, crib, ANYTHING. It's versitile. Little smurf.) We're trying to push it a bit more, without making complete nuisances of ourselves, but dang, she is stubborn. For example, the word 'more'. We've been trying to get her to ask for more food or drink or something with the word 'more'. A word she has effectively used in the past. "Ellie, do you want more of Mom's ice cream?" "Yeah." "OK, say 'more'." "Yeah." "No, say 'more'." "Yeah." "No, more." "Yeah." "If you want more, you have to say 'more'." "Yeah." This can go on indefinitely.
On one hand, I know it doesn't matter that much. I'm not at all worried about her developmentally. She's a smart cookie, who has proved she can communicate masterfully, and has used (at least once or twice) dozens of words, and it was the 20-24 month stage where Annie's talking really exploded. I just keep thinking that if there's words she knows, why in heaven's name will she just not use them!? Is it just to complicate my life? :-) Have I made things too easy on her? I notice with Greg on occassion where she'll point out something and shout out an accompanying "zebra!" or "giraffe!" while asking for those particular toys. She'll never 'name' things for me like that. I wonder how much of it is Mom's mega-psychic abilities, that since I understand her nonverbal communication so well, she saves her rare displays of verbalness for those who may need the extra help.
But, then just when I'm convinced she'll never really speak, I'll hand her something, and she'll turn and grin and say, "Tank ew!" (Thank you.) Awww, then I melt.

Ellie seems to be a big fan of Christmas -- the lights and decorations and music. She's in awe. Call me cheesy, but it just makes everything seem so 'magical' to see everything through her little eyes.

Annie cracks us up every day, with her imaginative and creative play and conversations. I really wish I was better about getting more of it down. One thing I thought of though was when in the car the other day when she got into an arguement with Doh-doo and Iah (her imaginary friends . . . she still does talk about/to them a few times a week, but they're not as regular a part of her life as they once were.)
"MOM!" she shouted from the backseat, "Doh-doo is saying that "Cow" starts with a "K"! I told him it starts with a "C", but he doesn't believe me!"
So, I have to mediate. "Sorry Doh-doo, but Annie's right on this one. Cow does start with a 'C', not a 'K'. But that can be a confusing letter sometime."
A minute later. "MOM!! Iah is saying that cow is spelled 'K-A-H!' I told her it's 'C-O-W!'"
This turned into a game that for 20 minutes had Annie pointing out random objects along our drive (houses, cars, lights, planes, roads, ducks, etc.), and letting me know all the silly ways her two friends were spelling them, and us correcting them. It was the most time she's spent figuring out how to sound out words with me than I can remember in a long time. Made me so grateful her imaginary friends were so incompetent. :-)

Annie's newest number related hobby is counting how many toes are in the room. This one sounds odd, but it came from her learning to count by tens, and what better way to count by tens then to count toes (and fingers in a room.) She'll go around the room, pointing once to each person and counting, "10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100! 100 toes in the room!" We'll count fingers and toes if there's five people or less there, but she has a hard time going above 100 for now.

She's gotten really into card games lately. She makes us some hilarious ones, with long rambly rules that basically mean she wins every time, plus she just loves some old standbys like 'Go Fish', 'War', and some kind of slapping game my Dad taught her that I don't remember.

She turns her little sister into random characters and props for her little 'plays' she puts on to amuse herself. Earlier I saw her run across the room, happily calling behind her, "Bye Skuttle! Thanks for all your help!" She turned to me when she saw me watching and smiled and quietly said, "I'm Ariel, and I called Ellie 'Skuttle'. How cute is that?" :-)

She's become a little party planner. She'll spend an hour or so making invitations and telling me all about the party she wants to have, and who she'll invite, and how she'll invite Kian but she doesn't know if he'll really want to be at a Princess Tea Party, but she'll let him know that he can have the 'Cars' plate if he does come, and what music they'll have and who 'll be able to make it, and who won't because they'll be busy. It's funny to watch her mind work away at these 'events.'

I had an ultrasound yesterday to definitively date the pregnancy. I'm 10 weeks now . . . which means I'm hoping the horrific morning sickness goes away sometime during this next month. I was gonna scan in the little ultrasound picture, but it's fairly blurry and unrecognizable as anything, so turning on my scanner AND running downstairs to get the picture off the fridge just seemed like more effort than I wanted to take. It did make me amazingly grateful to be able to see and hear the beating little heart (the doppler hadn't been able to pick up the heartbeat clearly yet). The ultrasound tech cooed, "Awww, it's little hand is up by it's face!" But frankly, I don't see those kinda things until the 20 week ultrasound, when the features all make a little more sense to me. But it sounded sweet. (Greg is like the ultrasound genius though -- in the past he's been picking out stuff that amazes the techs that he's able to identify without years of training. I'm more of the, "Oh look, it's the baby's face! Or butt?" one at our 20 week ultrasounds.) I also met with one of the new midwives I'll be seeing this pregnancy. I loved the experience, spending over an hour talking about my last two pregnancies, births, and children . . . and what my expectations, fears and hopes were for this pregnancy, birth and child. It just made me grateful to be in a place where I have great medical care, and the medical care of my choosing, with so many options laid out before me.

Last night I got to go to the Festival of Trees opening night with my Mom and sisters. It was a blast (and since I wore sensible shoes, I wasn't even whiny by ten o'clock at night), we loved looking at the amazing trees, talking about all our own grand visions for our own beautiful trees one day, eating over-priced-but-for-a-good-cause yummy treats, drooling over the amazing and varied nativity sets. There is a "Labryinth" tree this year y'all. LABRYINTH! With David Bowie. "Power of the babe. What babe?" I was practically giddy. I loved the amazing upside down "Nightmare Before Christmas" tree. Not to mention just all the gorgeous, "I could never in a million years decorate something like that myself" trees. And there's the kids playhouses with Christmas trees and televisions in them. Plus fudge. Mmmm, fudge. Festival of Trees is a total 'rite of Christmas' kinda thing for me, and I had such a fun time just doing it as a girls night . . . I'll hit it again with my kids and husband later this week, if anyone's interested in coming along!

Oh, and unrelated, but what freakishly tasty chemical is added to Handi-Snacks, Cheese and Breadsticks, that make them so darn good? And is having four of them for lunch a bad thing if they are the only thing that doesn't sound vomit inducing?

Happy Birthday Baby Nathan!

We don't get to see Annie & Ellie's only two cousins all that often, being that they live far, far away. But Annie talks about Connor and Nathan ("Baby Nathan" is the only way she'll refer to him) all the time, even getting 'reports' from Doh doo and Iah about their visits to Indiana to see her cousins. We look at lots of pictures, watch and rewatch as many videos as we can get our hands on, and fortunately Annie seems to have a strong attachment towards her cousins, no matter how little we actually get to see them in person.

Well, today is Nathan's first birthday, and we got out some pictures to show Annie of when he was born, the last time he was here, and we pulled up an email of the most recent pictures we've gotten of him. Annie is very excited, and wants to make cupcakes. I'm cool with this, 'cause I love cupcakes. "He is one years old like Ellie!" she exclaimed. (Ellie is 8 weeks older than Nathan). I definitely wish we got to see them more often, but what an amazing time we live in, where we're able to talk and share info and pictures so readily, that sometimes it feels more like they just live across town than across the country.

All of us are very extremely excited that Nathan & Connor are coming into town and we're all going camping in August. Annie's been picking out 'matching' Disney Princess and 'Cars' sleeping bags and camping chairs for her and Connor ever since she found out we're going and that such products exist. It'll be fun to see how big the boys have gotten, how much they've grown and all that they've learned. We may not get to see them as often as we like, but how cool is it that we get to create memories that'll last when we do!

Happy Birthday Nathan!
And I can't wait to see my only two nephews next month!

Here's Ellie (8 weeks old) and Nathan in the hospital when Nathan was born.
It was pretty much the last time she was ever bigger than him. :-)

New Years 2008 . . . Nathan was definitely the happier of the grandchildren at this (and every) family event.

January 1st, 2009. I love how much they just 'look' like cousins in these pictures . . . almost the exact same hair, chubby cheeks, adorable 'chewing' habits.

Look at those cheeks people! It does not get much cuter than that!

Here's Nathan a week or so before his birthday. What a cutie!

I can't wait to get new pictures of all the kids together in August. If Annie has her way, Connor and her will be toting matching Disney backpacks and water bottles. We may have to keep that girl away from the stores until after we get back from vacation!

Liz -- The Trailblazer (and Birthday Girl!)

I've mentioned before that I won the marriage lottery. Well, not only did I marry my perfect partner, but I married into a wonderful family who has been supportive and loving since day one.
It's a weird experience 'becoming' part of a family. I had it easy though. Greg's family was accepting, excited (I think) and wonderful about me suddenly being a daughter and sister. I feel it was made especially easy, because Liz came first. Liz and Greg's brother Chris, were married almost two years before Greg and I. Liz is so loved by, and so natural and comfortable in, this family, that you would never be able to guess that she hadn't spent her whole life with them. It meant the world to me, to watch Liz interact with my new family, and seem so at ease. It made me confident that this new family of mine would be just as much my family as the one I was born into.
There were times, early on, during dinners where people were laughing and talking and telling stories, and all I could think of is, "I have NO idea who they are talking about or what they are talking about." And, I have to admit, I felt like a bit of an outsider. I remember telling Greg once, "I'm excited for when Andrea gets married, so I won't be the 'newbie' anymore. I'll actually know more than someone else!"
But Liz was always there for me . . . I could ask her later, or email her about it, and just be like, "OK, what's up with that story?!" or "Who were they talking about?!" Sure, I could've asked Greg, but have you ever tried to get background information a guy. It's like when your husband finds out about friend's new baby before you do. "Oh, that's great! How'd delivery go?" "I don't know." "But, Mom and baby are OK?" "I don't know, probably." "Well, was it a boy or a girl?" "I don't remember." "How big?" "I don't know." "Are they home from the hospital?" "Ummmm . . . ?" So on, and so forth. And for a girl like me, who grew up in a family of sisters, it was wonderful to have Liz, and Greg's sister Andrea, who knew 'girl' information, and could fill in the vast amounts of missing information one encounters when they enter a new family with nothing but a husband to guide them. (I can't imagine how lost I would've been if Greg hadn't had at least one little sister and one married brother to bring another girl into the family. Growing up in my family, I'm not that used to all that testerone and less-than-delving conversation.)
Liz and I could also figure things out together. Put together whatever little information we could get from our husbands, and be able to collaborate and be like, "OH! That's what they were referring to!" or "Oh, THAT relative! I get who we're talking about now." And I swear she did a better job than Greg in letting me know who everyone was at family parties. Greg was more like, "Oh, they have TWO kids? Huh, I didn't know that." Liz knew actual names, and approximate birthdates! (Trust me, Greg knows a lot more about the going ons of his extended family now that I'm in the picture than he ever did before I was around.) Liz was just as adored, and a part of, Greg's extended family as she was his immediate. She was my guide a lot of the time. She taught me how to be a part of the family. To just go with it. Get into it. Go ahead and don't bite your tongue when you have the perfect comeback. They'll respect you more. :-)
I think one thing that has meant the most to me though, has been the opportunity to share pregnancies and new motherhood with Liz. Liz and I are both oldest children (another thing that bonds us), and none of our other siblings were married for awhile after us. I always pictured my kids having lots of cousins, but as it turns out, there won't be many their ages. But, Chris and Liz have two little boys, born the same years as our two girls. (Sure, they dragged them off to Indiana so Chris could a world class education and provide well for his family and all that, but my girls love their cousins, love to watch videos and look at pictures. Annie often tells me her imaginary friends have gone to Notre Dame for a visit. She even told me once that Doh doo was from Indiana!) But, when Liz and I were pregnant with our first children (and before that, getting ready to get pregnant) we would email back and forth, almost every single day, about the whole experience. Just everything we were going through, thinking, dreading, anticipating. And we were doing it together. And I can't imagine this journey into motherhood without Liz. Since none of my own sisters have had children, it has been an incredible blessing to have Liz to go through it with. Not everyone understands what it's like to be living life with a baby and a two year old, and yet here I have Liz, who is doing it too. I have her to assure me I'm not as crazy as I feel, if I totally lost all my cool with a two year old who threw her plate of veggies across the kitchen. Or, at least that I'm not alone in the craziness. We talk often, sometimes for hours, about motherhoods ups and downs, challenges and amazing rewards. We marvel together at all our children are doing and learning (Connor, for example, is months younger than Annie, but can name all 50 states, and spell ambulance and bridge to name a few of the words off his amazing spelling list. I have genius nephews!)
Liz is a smart, well spoken, supportive, opinionated, passionate, giving, amazing woman, and I love talking with her. We don't always agree on everything 100%, but we share so many core values and there is a definite respect there, and there are few people who's opinions I value more. She is well read, well traveled, well versed . . . just well rounded, I guess. She is loving and accepting of people of all backgrounds, firm in her faith and beliefs, passionate about her causes and a wonderful wife and mother to her family. The women of Greg's family (Liz, his sister Andrea, his Mom, several of his cousins) have been wonderful examples to me. They are passionate about a huge diversity of interests and ideas, and I have learned so much from them. Being a part of another family has opened up eyes and doors for me.
And today is Liz's birthday (which means she's also a Gemini! Another great quality to add to her list of virtues!) Happy Birthday Liz. Thanks for coming in and blazing the trail for me . . . you are a wonderful example. You are loved and adored by your husband, your children, your family, and your sister in laws! (I'm gonna go out on a limb, and assume that Andrea will agree with me on this one!) :-) I can't imagine my life without the sisters I gained through marrying Greg. You really would've thought four sisters was already enough, but apparently you can never have too many!

Happy Birthday Liz!
Happy Birthday to a great exmaple. A supportive, loving wife. An amazing Mom. Far better than she even realizes. A true friend, amazing sister, aunt and daughter to those who are fortunate enough to count her as such.

Liz with my very squishable nephew Nathan. Don't you just want to 'pillsbury doughboy' that belly!?

Liz and my other nephew Connor.

Here's Liz and I with our first babies . . . this was right before Chris & Liz left for Notre Dame (at a going away party at Murray Park).

Liz and Connor at Murray Park.The trailblazing begins . . .

(James, Andrea, Chris, Liz, Ruth, K.C. and Greg)

More Conversations with Imaginary People

"Hi, Doh doo? Yeah, hi, this is Annie. Yeah, is Iah there? Oh great, yeah . . . Oh hi Iah! How are you doing? Oh good. Good. Yeah . . . oh sorry, I can't talk, I'm on the other line. OK, talk to you later! Love you! Bye!" Why call just to tell her you have to go because you're on the other line . . . it's like a ploy to prove her popularity among the imaginary crowd or something. :-)
Then a minute later, "Hi Iah, it's Annie again. Yeah, it is so great to see you. Um, yeah. I was calling, I want to know if you and Doh doo want to go in the van with us to the store. You two can sit together, in the middle, and I will sit in my seat, and Ellie will sit in the other seat. Oh, yeah? Great! See you soon!"

On the sleeping front: Annie refuses to sleep in her princess bed now, for the last several days. The new bed. We bought for her birthday two weeks ago. That she loved more than life itself. She's told us that her bedroom just "isn't princess-y enough". So, obviously she needs to sleep on her bedroom floor, rather than in her princess bed, with princess bedding, princess pillows, princess dolls and a princess canopy. Obviously. Sigh. Stubborn little thing.

On the potty training front: Things had been going really well. But, as will happen, Annie had an accident. The really gross kind. But, being the resourceful little thing she is, she got disrobed and into the bathtub without any help from me. Which isn't actually a good thing, since I now have to bleach the heck out of my entire bathroom, especially the tub. Ewww. But, while in there, I could hear her talking to herself . . .
"That is not good Annie. Not good. It's rude even. Mommy is going to tell you that we don't poop in our panties. We should be bigger. This is miserable. Miserable. Princesses don't poop in their panties." I almost felt like I needed to go in there and cheer her up and keep her from getting too down on herself. When I talked to her about it later though, she seemed to have gotten herself out of the shame cycle, flippantly informing me that she's pretty sure she will stop pooping in her pants when she's a little bigger, like 8. That's reassuring.
This accident was a little disheartening, since it's the second in as many days. We only had one accident all of last week, and then she peed (at dinner) at Grandma & Grandpa's house yesterday, then this today. I was really shocked when she had her accident at someone else's house, it was very unexpected since she's shown such promise away from home . . . she's asked us to find her a bathroom at stores, even while driving, and LOVES using the potty at my Mom's house. She informed Greg and I, as we were cleaning her up in their bathroom, that she refused to use the potty at Grandma Ruth's house, and "will only go potty at our own house!" The problem here was we were both pretty convinced she wasn't 'done', and worried about her having another accident. I explained firmly that if she wouldn't use the potty where we were, and had another accident, she would have to wear a diaper whenever we left the house. She cried and cried and whined and whined and insisted she would only use "my own potty at my own house!" I think my in-laws probably thought we were beating her in there. Eventually, she calmed down, but despite spending a good 10 minutes on the potty, did stick with it and refuse to pee. Of course, this all just meant that on the drive home we had to pull off the freeway and find a gas station for a potty break. Sigh. Really, really stubborn little thing.

On the adorable front: After getting out of the tub (so that I could bleach the grossness out of it), Annie went into her room to get panties and an outfit. But what she came back with made me laugh. "Mommy!" I heard her excitedly shriek as she came crashing into my bedroom. "Mommy, look, my baby and I are matching!!!" And there she was with her My Little Pony baby, in cute little winter hats (and nothing else). She was so excited, gushing, "It's like we're twins!" Sigh. She may be stubborn, but she endlessly delights and amuses me.

Behold the Cuteness

Tongue Talkin'

Ellie's become a big 'tongue talker'. All day long, she has long flowing conversations where she just smacks her tongue around in all directions inside and outside of her mouth. OK, I don't know how to describe it exactly. Which is why there's video.

New Birthday Dress

Annie was beyond adorable this morning for Church. When she woke up I asked her what she wanted to wear, and she said, "My baby and me want to wear our matching ones." Annie's Grandma Ruth, being infinitely more talented then me, had made Annie a beautiful floral dress with an adorable pinafore . . . and there's nothing Annie loves more than twirling and dancing as this dress beautifully moves along with her. Grandma had even made the new Madame Alexander doll she gave Annie a matching outfit. I took a few pictures of Annie in the dress, with the doll . . . then also let Annie sing and dance around a little on video. And sorry, but parts of it are incomprehensible, since she loves to sing (and sometimes talk) in random syllables that don't resemble anything you or I know as the English language. Don't worry, I don't understand what she's saying either.

Chicken Walker

Ellie, much like her big sister, is kind of a chicken. Annie was like this with everything too . . . they both can know how to do something, be quite capable of it, weeks (sometimes months) before they'll let loose and just do it already. :-) So, Ellie's a little chicken walker . . . she took her first steps back in April. Daily now she's taking a few steps here and a few steps there, but all in all, she won't really try it very often. Because of her 'I may try this once a day, but you won't know when it will happen and there sure as heck won't be a repeat performance' attitude towards walking means I've gotten very little video of her attempts. Until yesterday. It's not much, but it's recorded.

And last, but not least, a few Annie stories from today . . .

On the car drive to Grandma's house for dinner:
"Did you know that cars park in garages and that airplanes and helicopters live in a big garage too, 'cept it's called a hangar. I don't know why it's a hangar. [Sigh] I just don't understand." This is the deep thoughts of a three year old who spent the previous day at the air show with her Aunt Talina and Uncle David.

On the drive home:
Annie asked to borrow Greg's phone to take pictures. She had been playing for a minute, when she handed the phone back up front and asked for help. She'd taken a picture and was trying to send it to Doh doo and Iah; she had filled in the phone number, typed a hundred characters or so into the message box, and wanted it sent. We told her we took care of it.
A minute later she commented about how she was worried they hadn't gotten the picture, and wanted us to send it again. Instead I suggested she go ahead and give them a call and ask them if they'd gotten it.
The one-sided conversation that followed was pretty funny. Unfortunately, I only remember parts of it, but it was basically a very apologetic Annie making one excuse after another . . . they didn't even make sense or 'flow' or anything together, it's like she'd just taken every single excuse she's ever seen anyone make and use it in one conversation (and literally, there were a dozen and a half or more of them, "I so sorry I didn't talk to you before, I was busy . . . I forgot to call you back . . . I sorry, I couldn't hear you . . . I know, I was thinking about it, but then it didn't happen . . . I'll have to call you back . . . Did you get the picture? I thought it got sent . . ."
Then, the statement that made both mine and Greg's ears perk up, "Doh doo," she said firmly, "you really need to start treating Iah better!" What-huh? Where did she even get that from? And should I be worried that her best imaginary friends, who are a short married couple, also seem to have a dysfunctional marriage? :-) Was he in the background making snide comments or something that required Annie to chastise him. I'm so confused. Imaginary friends sure are high maintenance.

Conversations with Imaginary People

Annie's been talking on the phone with her imaginary friends a lot lately. Oddly, she's transitioned from Doh doo to Iah. Everything used to be about Doh doo, but she rarely talks about him or with him on the phone anymore, most of her conversations are with Iah (although, when they 'come over' they tend to arrive together . . . the other day during dinner, Annie made Greg get up and go and answer the door 'cause they had arrived. I tried to tell her to call them back and tell them to just come to the back door, but after a quick pretend phone call with them, she insisted they were waiting out front. So, Greg got up, during dinner, went and answered the door and let them in. Then we never heard anything more about them the rest of the night. For all I know, they're still wandering my house aimlessly.) :-)
Anyway, Annie was on her toy cell phone the other day, talking with Iah, when I suddenly heard her gush, "You know Iah, it is so great to be able to talk to you and to get to know you better!"