A Few Forgotten Moments

Here are some photos I intended to post, but skipped over for one reason or another. They speak for themselves, I think. :)

About Ivy

I meant to do a post about Ivy right after Sophie's birthday to record her development and such -- because she turned 18 months in May. I'm only a month behind. And besides, it's not like she's growing leaps and bounds. (Physically anyway. . . she may have broken 20 lbs, but it's still uncertain.)

Ivy has changed a lot in the last six months. She hardly seems like the same clingy baby who had to be held most of the time and woke up 3 times a night until she was one. The biggest shock for me was when she started going to nursery last month. (The "sunday school" class for 18mo - 3-year-olds at church.) I thought it would take months for her to adjust being there by herself. Not so. The very first time we took her in, she was holding hands with Sophie and they both walked in and never looked back. No crying. Ever. The second and third week was the same. Of course if Sophie wasn't in there with her, it would be an entirely different story.

Yes, they're outside in their pajamas. That's what happened when I told Steve to get a picture of them in their new pj's from grandma. He let them loose outside. My favorite part is the socks and jelly shoe combo. Fabulous.

Sophie and Ivy play together better with (slightly) less crying. Ivy's pretty patient with her "second mommy" bossing her around and loves to be taught by her. Sophie's always trying to get her to say words and taught her a couple of colors (purple and yellow). They read together a lot, like I've mentioned before.

She goes through phases of favorite books and a few weeks ago The Monster at the End of this Book was the one. This book has special meaning for me because my grandpa would read it to us before we went to bed when we stayed at their house -- complete with animated voicing and tickling. I tickle her, too, and she even tickles herself when she reads it alone . . .

Ivy's a little climber. I can't leave the dining room chairs pulled out even 6 inches or else she manages to climb up and squeeze herself through. She also likes walking up and down the stairs, climbing on the toilet, the back of the couch, the piano bench and onto the kitchen table to play in the fruit bowl. She has no fear. It scares me a little.

One recent development . . . she finally can have pigtails! She may or may not be in the mood for them, but it's possible now.

"Mom, take a picture of me doing this!"

Um . . . OK. Back to what I was doing.

I'm still not sure how we ended up with a blondie. My hair was lighter when I was younger, but I'm not sure if it was as light as hers.

Ivy's getting better about communicating what she wants and has learned lots of new words lately. I posted a video of her finishing the phrases to "Jesus Wants me for a Sunbeam" a few weeks ago. Well, that's become a very common thing for the girls. Every night when we put them to bed, I hear singing coming out of their room. . .

Sophie: "Jesus wants me for a sun . . . "
Ivy: "Beh!"
Sophie: ". . . to shine for him each . . "
Ivy: "Duuuuh!"
Sophie: "In every way try to please . . ."
Ivy: "Uum!"
Sophie: "At home, at school, at . . . "
Ivy: "Puhh!"

and on, and on....

Ivy does it with a few other songs and can hum the melody to about a half dozen others. She also likes to mimic the chorister and wave her hand around during the hymns at church.

Ivy's a little champ at the dinner table. When she first started solids she was extremely picky (opposite of Sophie at that age), but gradually we've gotten to the point where she'll at least try almost anything. (Now the opposite of Sophie who has to be tricked, bribed, and negotiated with at every meal.) She often eats more than Sophie does. I'm not sure where she puts it, though. And she loves cheese. LOVES cheese. Every time I open the fridge or start making something in the kitchen, she begs for cheese whether she can see it or not.

We're really enjoying the stage she's in right now. She's so easy-going and aside from a tantrum every now and then, pretty mellow. I heard a saying once that easy babies are hard toddlers and vice versa. It seems to be the case with mine so far, but Ivy's not two yet.

P.S. No developments made in potty training. Sophie's decided to wait until Ivy's ready.

Next On the Chopping Block

We've lost a lot of friends around here during the past six months, but that's how it is when you live around a bunch of students and everyone finishes school during different quarters. Most recently our next door neighbors left.

Poor Ivy has said good-bye to two little boyfriends in the last 4 months. That's more than an 18-month-old should have to deal with.

I loved seeing little Stetson wander over to our yard and knock on the door. He loved playing with the girls and they loved him, too.

These two are only two weeks apart, too, so it's been fun seeing them grow together.

(Yep, we saw that.)

I lost a good friend, too. (Good luck Wade's!) The day after they left, I was walking down the street, and I realized that all of our friends (student and not) who where here when we moved in nearly 3 years ago have since moved. We're next to go. (Theoretically. . . we have no plans yet, remember?)

Home Again

We got back yesterday from a 5-day trip to visit my family in Utah. Despite the continuous rain and the flu that got passed around (that I started... oops) there were a lot of good things.

This tiny 2-week-old Lydia belongs to my baby sister. My baby sister. It's still strange to me that she has a baby. She's still like, 13. (Sorry, Hills.) I didn't get to hold her though because I didn't want her to get sick. She came away from the weekend unscathed, fortunately.

My girls got to spend time with my parents and grandparents, who they don't see very often, and we got to stay at my brother's house.

The girls had lots of fun with little Carter, and much to my brother's dismay, taught him all about dolls, jewelry, & pedicures. None of his toenails were actually painted, but boy, did he want it.

Those orange overalls kill me. He loves orange, so when grandma saw them there was no question.

Oh yeah, and this happened:

I'm not sure what made me do it. Maybe because I just barely had some decent profile pics taken (thanks hon!). Maybe because I turn 30 this summer, and I'm getting the jitters. Maybe because I only have time to make my hair look wavy and cute about 2 days a month. Maybe because I'm tired of pulling hair out of the drain, off the sink, off my clothes, off my children, and out of my food (heh. joking. sorta.) I donated my hair 2 years ago and thought I'd never do it again. Guess I thought wrong. Anyhow, a humongous thanks goes out to my brother's wife, Andrea. I love it!

Now we're back home & back to the grind. Steve has a three-week break from school, but he still has to put in clinic hours. We get him for a few extra hours in the morning, but he's gone until his usual 7 or 8 most nights. He starts his last quarter of school in July, then he's done. Forever. In case you're wondering (we get asked a lot), we have no idea what we're doing after that.

Two Very Different Weekends

Weekend #1: Without Children (Yes, it IS possible.)

Over Memorial Day weekend we had Steve's sister Kimi take the girls back to Sacramento with her on Friday when she came to see Steve in the clinic.

Two days without children. I could hardly contain myself. We (I) thought of all of the things we (I) wanted to do while we've been here, but would bore the kids to death. By the way, Steve was a really good sport. He let me drag him where ever I wanted to go. I like him a lot.

After a session at the temple (on the list of "things that are really hard to do once you have kids"), we stopped by a farmers' market, grabbed some garlic cheese curds (ACK! so good!), bummed around San Francisco for a while, then went to Mill Valley.

Why Mill Valley? Because I wanted to go HERE:

Tyler Florence (if you don't know) is a celebrity chef who has a show on the Food Network. He lives in Mill Valley (a swanky little town just north of SF across the Golden Gate Bridge) and has a store there. Tyler Florence is probably on my top 5 favorite chefs list, and I've always wanted to go to his store (and camp out all day there in the hopes that he'd wander in). I found out that he was going to be there on Memorial Day doing some demonstrations and that he usually does some during the week. I was so close. Maybe we'll get a chance to go back and see him. I may just keel over from excitement if I ever do.

That picture of me in front of the store was the best we got. I should have ran across the street and got a shot like this:

image courtesy of flickr photographer "rocor"

. . . but I hate feeling "touristy". I'm regretting it now. We had lunch at a little organic flatbread joint (it's a bit crunchy up there, but the "I only shop at Whole Foods and my home furnishings look like they came from an 18th century farmhouse" version of crunchy.)

And then we left San Francisco. . .

to head home and purge/organize the girls' toys. Best to do that while they're not around.

Then we went and got the girls after church on Sunday. (Um, church was nice, but sorta boring. After being released from the Primary presidency AND not having two toddlers to chase during Sacrament meeting, it was like going back to our early years of marriage. Nice, but not nearly as interesting.)

Yes, I missed the girls, but then I had to live through a 3-4 day "attention and wide-open spaces" hangover. Just in time for this weekend.

Weekend #2: Without Steve

Steve's been in Philadelphia for three days (he gets home tomorrow, yippee!) finishing up the last seminar for his wellness certification. And because it's such a long trip home (9 hours of travel -- ugh) he couldn't get a flight out until tomorrow morning. He had Sunday afternoon to kill, so he hopped on a tour bus. When I found out he was going to be wandering around (without kids) snapping pictures of the Liberty Bell and eating cheesesteaks, I got a little jealous. No, a lot jealous.

So I decided to do what I've been wanting to do for the last couple of months, Steve or no Steve. I took the girls to the beach.

We hopped in the car yesterday morning and drove an hour down to Santa Cruz and hung out for a few hours. It only took one trip down to the water for them to decide they never want to go near it again. They stayed right by me the entire time and played in the sand. They only got their feet wet once. I wonder why I even bothered to put swimsuits on all of us.

We've had a lot of other things going on this weekend with friends, so the girls have been going almost nonstop since Steve left. Despite a serious regression in potty training (AHHHHH!!) things have been going well. Considering. I haven't entirely lost my mind either, but there are still quite a few hours left to go.

It's Nice to Know . . .

that if we ever run out of shampoo, we have other options.

Like bubble solution.