Monday, November 30, 2015

Fish Lately


This is extremely late -- he is already 22 months and I will probably be doing a 2 year update.  But I feel compel as I did one for Finn last month.
  • Fish is weighing in at 28.2 pounds and is 34.5 inches tall.  He is currently in 2T clothes.  I like to tease that he has little chicken legs.  His feet and his hands are still big.  He is wearing almost a size 8 and he is not even 2 (Finn only wears a 9 and she is three years older)!  But one of his big issues with shoes is that he has a really high top arch -- like his feet are really tall (if that makes sense) and they have always been really tall.
  • This boy is the apple of my eye.  He is amazing sweet (except for when he isn't).  If he feels like he has hurt you, he instantly turns around and starts smacking his lips to give you a kiss to make it feel better.
  • Fish is a big sleeper.  He always falls asleep within 5 minutes of laying down for the evening and is always one of the last ones to wake up.  He also still takes a nap during the late morning/early afternoon.  His average nap is about 2 hours long.  Somedays, he can nap for up to three hours!  And he is a natural born snuggler.  He loves snuggling when he gets tired.

  • Fish is also a big eater.  He loves to eat and he eats a lot.  He hasn't started to become picky yet.  But he does watch his sister and if she refuses to eat something, he will spit it out of his mouth and say "yuck" even if he has been eating it for the past five minutes.  His current favorites are grapes, yogurt (ultimate favorite), baked beans, & peas (!!).  We just found out a couple of days ago that he loves peas -- he even asks for seconds!
  • He is a very mobile boy.  Lots of running and jumping and climbing.  He learned who to pedal a tricycle last weekend.  He doesn't quite have the smooth circle motion, but he knows that if he pushes with one foot, he moves.  And then he will push with the other.  Another one of his new obsessions is climbing onto the island or the table from his chair.  He likes to splay himself out on his belly on top of the surface.  He grabs for things sometimes, but not all the times.
  • He is behind on talking.  He likes to tell stories, but it's all jabber.  He does say words, but his annunciation is a little off (as to be expected from a toddler trying to learn his words).  Words that he currently says are bye-bye, more, please, no, ball, doggie, cat, "ready!", "okay!", bug, truck, and car (although a lot of people wouldn't know the difference between certain words, ex: truck & car).  He knows the animal sounds for quite a few animals (cow, sheep, goat, cat, dog, pig, chicken).  And the kid understands EVERYTHING.  I think alot of his being behind on talking has to do with the fact that he doesn't want to do it.  If I ask him to say something, he will say "no".  I have taken to using it as a way to not give things to him he is doesn't try to say the word or at least try to say it (like a yogurt from the frig).


  • He completely adores his sister.  I like to "monkey see, monkey do" and it fits him perfectly.  If she is doing something, he must be doing it as well, even if two seconds earlier I had asked him and he said no.  One example that sticks out in my mind:  We were going on a long trip and I asked him once he was buckled into his car seat if he wanted his shoes off.  He said "no."  And I asked Sister if she wanted her shoes off.  She did and I took them off.  Then a racket began on the other side of the car bc Fish wanted his shoes off as well.  This is cuter than a puppy until she begins to play with a toy and he decides that he either wants to play with that same toy or that he wants to play with her.  Finn sometimes doesn't understand that at times he wants to play WITH her, which causes great angst.
  • His current favorite is trucks, but not just any trucks -- BIG trucks.  When we see construction vehicles or semis on the road, he gets so excited.  On our cu-de-sac, our neighbors have different garbage companies, so we have multiple sightings of garbage trucks.  We have to sit out on the porch (or watch from the window on yucky days) and watch the truck until it leaves from sight (if it's a good week, we can catch four garbage trucks -- two garbage and two recycling).  We also went to a Touch-A-Truck event and he was thrilled.  The event had tractors, fire trucks, semis, ambulances, cop cars, all sorts of construction vehicles and even a helicopter!  And the kids got to sit inside them and sometimes honk the horn! He had a great time!


Thursday, November 12, 2015

Finn Lately



  • Finn is currently 3.5+ years old, 33 pounds and 40 inches tall. She is fitting in 4T clothes quite well. We switched over sizes in September due to all her pants becoming high waters.
  • She is NOT a sleeper.  Girl is up at 7:00-7:30am every day -- no matter what time she goes to bed.  We are usually in bed and done with books by 8:30 (on a good night) and she still doesn't fall asleep until after 9:30 (unless we did something major that day and she is physically exhausted).  We have officially given up our naps.  Womp womp.  She will only nap once every week or two.  I have pushed and pushed for her to keep these naps because I feel like near the early evening, she is like Linda Blair in the Exorcist.  But even when it is time to go to bed, she doesn't fall asleep easily.  I think that she is just being a three-nager.
  • Speaking of being a three-nager, the girl definitely is a Sass Master Flash.  We are currently trying to work on realizing that just because Fish doesn't play exactly the way that she wants him to or that he is touching toys that she deems unacceptable, the world will not, in fact, end (although she honestly thinks that it will).  


  • She has a mean independent streak, until she doesn't.  She doesn't want help with anything if she says that she is going to do it herself.  But then the times where she does require assistance, if you are not jumping like your feet are on fire, then you are doing it wrong!  And she will tell you that you aren't going fast enough to help her.
  • As you can tell by the last two bullets, tantrums & sass are a mainstay in our house.  But when she is not unleashing her beast, she has such a funny side.  She tells the funniest stories.  And while she thinks that her jokes are marvelously funny, we need to work on her delivery.  An example of her current joke repertoire:  "knock, knock..."  "who's there?"  "Orange."  "orange who?"  "orange you glad that it's not banana?"  (I'm sure you've all heard the original knock knock joke before)  Another favorite?  "knock, knock..."  "who's there?"  "Nothing."  "nothing who?"  "nothing, nothing"  One of my favorite things is to try and eavesdrop on her conversations that she has with either her toys or Fish.  Her imagination is something else.
  • My only quibble that I have with her really is her eating habits.  She used to be an amazing eater, eating anything and everything.  But when I had Fish, we went for what was fast and easy and I think that it was right around that time where little toddlers' taste-buds should be experimenting, not getting the same thing over and over again.  Because after that time, she not refuses to try anything different.  We make her have a single bite out of something, and it's a chore for her.  She basically eats yogurt, cheese, milk, applesauce, meat, chicken nuggets, & donuts.  She used to LOVE bananas & oranges. This morning, she ate her obligatory bite and that was it.  I don't get it -- because even when I offer sweet food that is good for her, like the banana or orange, even after the bite, she won't eat it.  Frustrating.


  • Finn is very smart.  She is currently in preschool three mornings a week (MWF) and she loves it.  The goal of her school year this year was to be able to write her name.  When they tried to write their names for the first time at school back in September, she was able to write the first four letters of her seven-letter name.  She can now write her entire name and is just working on the form of each letter.  Her school also offers "after school activities".  Once a month, there is Tales & Treasures.  She can stay for lunch with her friends and then they read a book and make a project.  The school also offers a four week "class" called Fun Frolics.  In it, they have lunch with friends and then stay and learn about an extra subject.  We missed the first one as I wanted her to adjust to school and not inundate her with too much school.  But once she was acclimatized, I always ask her if she wants to participate and she always seem to want to.  She is currently in the "Art" Fun Frolics, where they are learning about art and artists such as Henry Matisse.  Her next Fun Frolics which starts at the beginning of December is going to be Yoga! But she is most excited for the cooking Fun Frolics that will be sometime in the spring.
  • She is very good at math already (for her age, obviously).  She can do rudimentary additional and subtraction (all under 10, so she can use her fingers).  But she understand the concept of adding and taking away things.
  • Finn is also really good at recognizing letters, letter sounds & numbers.  If she doesn't know the letter or number immediately, she knows to go through her numbers on her fingers or her alphabet and in counting or saying the alphabet, she will recognize the letter/number.
  • Her memory is amazing.  We read lots of books in our house, at least six a day (two before nap and four before bed).  And once I have finished reading the books, she will get to pick a book and read it to me.  She can read books that we haven't read in a long time to me, using a lot of the same words.  And if heaven forbid while I'm reading to her, I miss a word -- she will stop me and correct me.  And it's not like my flub will have changed the context of the sentence dramatically -- it's like me saying "in" and it should have been "on".
  • I know that it sounds like I was tooting her horn this whole time, but we are very proud of her and if I can't toot her horn, who can?  Amiright?!?!?

Tuesday, November 10, 2015

Cue Linus & Lucy

Okay, it's actually Skating by the Vince Guaraldi Trio.  But we have come to that time of year, where the leaves are lightly falling off the trees like snow.  And while this song also reminds me of snow falling, when the leaves start fluttering down off the trees, it's the first time of the year that I start thinking about that song.  Then it sticks in my head until after the New Year.  

  • We never made it to a pumpkin patch this year and I feel like a terrible mother.  Nor did we carve pumpkins.  Eeeeeeeeeek!  I feel like I've ruined their childhood for not keeping up with one of my favorite traditions of Halloween.  But weather and time factored into the demise of my envisioned pumpkin patch trip.  So to negate the awful feeling, I took the kids into our backyard (okay, not really our backyard, we made our way over by the goats, sheep & Mrs. Elderberry) and snapped some photos of them amongst the fall leaves -- our "autumn" photos this year -- not pumpkin photos.  Womp womp.
  • I'm going to be posting updates on both kids tomorrow and Thursday.  I haven't updated on their personalities and development in ages and I feel almost back to our old selves after the move.  And the kids have really been neglected here.
  • I have realized that I put too much on my plate in our move.  Reupholstering my entire living room might have been a little much.  But now that I'm down to one chair, which is naked now and only needs the new material put on, I see the light at the end of the tunnel.  I'm super excited about the living room -- like pee-my-pants-excited.  Once I complete it, I'll be posting some photos of the new house.  A virtual house tour, if you will.
  • If it's not one project, it's another.  It seems like I also bit off more than I could chew in projects in the recent months.  Fish & Munk's Halloween costumes were completely made by me.  I made Fish's military jacket and hat from scratch, which I'm really proud of.  But those suckers took me a long time to figure out.  And with the furniture that in the living room and our Christmas card outfits, my sewing machine has taken up permanent residence on our kitchen island.  Hopefully in the next two weeks, that sucker will be put away -- at least for the months of Christmas.
  • We are still home owners in Cleveland.  Our house just didn't sell this fall and I'm afraid that we are going to be sitting on it until spring.  Cleveland isn't the greatest place to want to move to in the winter time.  It's been pretty stressful trying to keep up with the two houses and as much as I don't want to let go of our old house (the home that I will always hold in my heart), I'm ready to see it belong to someone else.  Tears well in my eyes as I say that (as I have a hard time letting go of all the memories), but it's time.  New homeowners, come find us!
  • I can't tell you how excited I am to break out the Christmas decorations!  Probably next week if I can get the previously mentioned projected finished.  E is definitely NOT excited about it.  But the kids and I are going to love it!  Especially now that I have a new house to figure out where everything is going to go...

Monday, November 9, 2015

A Week in the Life (v.2015.14)

Lucy the Piggy before Halloween.  Someone wasn't too happy with me. 

School Daze 7.1
It was "wear orange to school" day.

Hot Mama heading to school 

School Daze 7.2

School Daze 7.3
She obviously chose to dress up as Anna.



Finn's Halloween "concert" & parade

Finn was invited to trick or treat with a friend from school.  They had a little party and then trick or treated through their neighborhood.  She was really excited and we had a great time!

Fish was really tired near the end of trick or treating, but he wouldn't quit.  If Sister was going up to the next house, so was he!

Monkey see, Monkey do.  This is their silly faces.

School Daze 8.1

Reciting some school poems

Walked into the kitchen to find this.  He pushed the chair over to the frig to get food out.  Must lock the frig now...

School Daze 8.2

School Daze 8.3 (and yes, she did wear the tiara to school that day)

He is adorable when he is getting yelled at.  I didn't get the best footage as the beginning was more of the first couple of seconds, but he is so adorable, it's hard to stay mad at him.

This is how we watch the Iowa football games.  Mom of the Year Award right here.  As long as I can see the TV, we're good.

Flag on the play!  Blocking foul!!!!

'Tis the season!  Living room is almost done and a grand house tour will be posted soon.

This is how I came upstairs and found them sleeping.  He is such a snuggler.

But this photo is proof that he loves to snuggle.  She moved away from him and he immediately moved into this position.