warped medicine

so you know that clip in "my big, fat, greek wedding" where the father sprays windex on everything wrong? and then on her wedding day, the bride really buys into it and puts windex on her pimple? that's so going to be my children...

i have found myself in the past months talking ellie into putting baby lotion on EVERYTHING - from scrapes to bruises to sore fingers. my standard answer has always been, "let's wash it really good in the bath and then look at it afterwards. i bet some lotion will do it lots of good."

this week, though, we might have crossed the line with crazy medical advice. ellie woke up in the middle of the night friday night/saturday morning with a tummyache. i did the mommy thing and rubbed her back while she fell asleep again (didn't work) and talked her into trying to go potty (didn't work) and laying on her back (really didn't work) so eric ended up sleeping in her room with her. in the morning, we were talking about how this was not going to be a normal occurrence, daddy sleeping in her room - and ellie said something about how when daddy came in he turned on the fan (what she doesn't know is that this was for personal comfort for daddy, not necessarily for ellie comfort) and that helped her feel better. so we suggested she sleep with the fan on from now on. "so my tummy won't hurt." right, ellie, so your tummy won't hurt...

she slept great saturday night! all the way until 7am sunday (hasn't done that in months)! and when nap time came saturday afternoon, she woke up and told me her tummy hurt. "really?" i said. "yeah, we forgot to turn on my fan." right...

and a few pics of the great weather we've had to spend time outside:

ellie shaking her bubbles. likes them to stay inside the container for less mess...

kaleb charging the grass...he quickly had dirt in/around his mouth. such a boy!

my container herb garden!

parsley, basil, and rosemary

kaleb stepped in the puddle of bubbles that were spilt by ellie. she's concerned. he thought the gushing mud between his toes was cool :)

the start to a home garden. we thought pots would do us. but they just don't hold much. eric has given me a 4' X 4' area of the back of the yard to till up and then plant with veggies. i am so excited! we've got some cedar to frame the 'garden' once i get it all tilled - about 2/3 of the way done now. and i broke a tine on the pitch fork. oops. i am so excited about the possibilities to grow our own fruits/veggies at home! ellie and i had a blast last spring watering and de-weeding and checking on our tomatoes on a daily basis, so we'll expand a bit this year and see what happens...

ellie's playhouse is now being used equally by both kids. there are fights over who gets to use which food and plates and utensils. ellie uses them for cooking and serving make-believe food. kaleb uses them as chew toys. they cooked me some mac 'n cheese tonight. it was delish!

we're loving the warmer weather and longer nights...many more opportunities to get outside and run about! looking forward to spending a bit more time out front to meet more neighbors as we take ownership of our house. so blessed to be living here!

dimples the clown

i know 2 posts in 1 day seems slightly obsessive, but i've got to show off my cute little girl! we got to celebrate jonah's birthday with his this afternoon - jonah is one of the little boys in ellie's class, and his sister, sadie, is also at school with the kids, and ellie talks about jonah and sadie a lot.

if you can a boyfriend at this age, i suppose he's ellie's...they hold hands occasionally at nap time, they play house at recess and jonah and ellie are the daddy and mommy (to 2 other kids, who don't pretend to be kids but rather cats), and jonah was the infamous one who ellie reported to me one afternoon, "he eats stinky glue at school." all things good to know, i suppose :)

and yesterday, jonah turned 4 - so today he celebrated! and we went to celebrate with him. there were several kids from class, and a couple of neighborhood kids, too. lots more girls than boys. and yet ellie (as shy as she was) was still the one jonah would run to and stare down until the whole group ran off chasing one another around the yard again.

dimples the clown made a guest appearance as well. he sat down right next to ellie, and as expected, she was not pleased with this stranger next to her. she stared for several minutes at him as he talked about face painting and told the kids to pick out a picture and even started painting jonah's face. ellie stared long and hard at him. kind of that stare, cacky and aunt b, that she gave the chick-fil-a worker that day - the one that reads, "you are really bothering me, now, go away!"

but she watched several kids have their face painted. jonah had a batman mask. santiago was a tiger. and all the other little girls who went before ellie (4 in all) were purple kitties. ellie's choice? a dalmation! she sat very still while he did his work, and when all was done, she posed for the camera!

and then on one of his trips to check on her, jonah paused for a picture with ellie...perhaps batgirl would have a been a more appropriate choice?!?

Darla Nitelight

Meet Darla Nitelight:

eric says that name sounds a little shady, but indeed, it's just the name of ellie's new dragonfly that hangs above her bed. when i was growing up, i had gill the gull above my bed - much similar concept...pull the cord and he "flies". the last time ellie was at mom and dad's she played with gill gull. she loved him! and thus, cacky found gill a long-distance friend :)

in other news, it's rained since friday morning, and we're just now seeing a bit of sun and not gray sky - it's amazing! we needed the rain, though. and it's kept us in the house doing things we needed to do anyway. this morning, eric vacuumed upstairs, which happens to be one of kaleb's favorite things to help with. in his room, he watches from the crib:

in all the other rooms, he follows the vacuum and holds the cord. such the helper! we've also cleaned out the garage and organized it a little. we're taking 2 carloads of stuff to goodwill this afternoon. everyone's laid down to at least rest (maybe not actually nap, but close) since we woke up this morning and discovered we lost an hour somewhere overnight - that's right, turn your clocks forward if you haven't already!

eric and i decided the first spring after ellie was born, though, that springing forward was MUCH easier than falling backwards after kids were in the picture. toddlers/infants don't much know how to sleep an extra hour when it's given to you, but when one's taken away, they sleep the same amount they always do, thus giving you a bit more time in bed! both kids woke up about 7am, new time, and we snuggied as a family in bed and watched sesame street until almost 8am. great morning!

and to round out the day, we've got jonah's birthday party after lunch (which will be an interesting test of a no-nap day for ellie) and then church tonight, and then daddy's headed to a concert tonight of a church friend who's playing downtown. way fun sunday! way busy!

9 months of goodness

my sweet kaleb hit the 9-month mark friday...can't believe it! he'll be forward-facing in the car before we know it! here he is:

asleep as can be in my new garage-sale-found chair ($10) for my craft room. he approves! (and yes, it's been cleaned and febreezed and aired out on the back porch; he's sitting in a clean chair!)

so some milestones he's accomplished here recently include:

• graduating from the baby classroom to a mixture of baby/toddler classrooms: i was informed friday afternoon that "he just wants to do more!" can't agree more with them - so kaleb will be visiting the toddlers (18-24 months) for play time, but still do meals/snacks and nap time with the babies. 
• "permanent" car seats: no longer are the days of toting him from car to restaurant/mall/etc in his carseat. eric's got his carseat permanently in his car, and i've got a convertible one that is rear-facing for now but will convert to forward-facing before we know it. when you weigh 22+ pounds, you can't expect anyone to tote you plus the weight of a carseat resting so (un)comfortably in the crook of their elbow.
• eating more big-people foods, including shredded turkey, grated cheese, cheerios, bananas. that list looks shorter now than i imagined it! i think we've regressed, actually, since having ellie. with her, it was all about getting her to eat what we were. i pureed spaghetti, we mashed EVERYTHING so that she could try it. with kaleb, he's so easy-going that cheerios and puffs satisfy him, so we just don't push him to eat anything else. and clearly by weight/appearance, he's not lacking nutrition! this stage, i will note, is eric's least favorite thus far because of the HUGE mess associated with kids learning to feed themselves. andy (the dog) is a pretty good helper, though, i must say.
• cruising the house on foot - not ready yet to take steps without support, but will cruise anything he can use to balance himself. this afternoon, kaleb found ellie's shopping cart and took off from playroom to living room and returned. he's also learning to balance. once he's got a toy or two to put in his mouth, he tends to let go of stabilizing support and balance rather well while chewing whatever it is in his hands. sometimes he even throws in a squat or two so as not to fall down or lose grip of the toys - pretty impressive!
• sleep is sometimes a feat and sometimes an utter failure...most nights, he's sleeping from about 7.30pm to 6am. some mornings come as early at 4.30 or 5, which we try to talk him into returning to sleep, but most of the time are unsuccessful. sorry, eric, for the loss of sleep.  thanks for taking these early mornings for the team! tonight, kaleb put himself to sleep after his bottle at around 7.10...could be a REALLY early morning.
• baby babble continues with "ma ma ma" and "da da da" and "ba ba ba"- mostly. sometimes we'll get some other sounds, but mostly just those 3. and as if there were any doubt that he was boy, in the evenings after dinner, as he plays in the living room, he grunts repetitively. can honestly say ellie never did that one!
• tooth #7 is finally coming in - this will make 4 on the top in addition to 3 on the bottom. slowly but surely he'll have something to eat with!

my sweet boy is the best snuggler - i was so worried in pregnancy that he wouldn't snuggle like ellie, and actually, i think he likes it more than she ever did. she was a mover - always wanted down, away, to move on her own. he will sit for half an hour after naps just waking up in my arms. and at bedtime, he'll eat his bottle and then turn over to lay on my chest, burying his head into my shirt. at this point in time, kaleb's really about being held and giving hugs - he's a good hugger, too! this afternoon he was fussy, so i picked him up and patted his back. he patted mine in return!

kaleb loves bath time - and is so adventurous in the water! ellie was (and still is) pretty timid about getting her hair/face in the water. not so my little man! he lays on his tummy and crawls from one end of the tub to the other, over his sister many nights, to get just the right toy (which these days is a tiny plastic water gun that invokes tears when it's taken away to leave in the bathtub after bathing has concluded for the evening.) he drinks from the cup used to rinse shampoo out of hair, and gets put out when it's used for that purpose and not available for quenching his thirst!

i couldn't imagine 9 months ago how it would work to love two kids so much and so equally, and i still don't have any better answer than, "you just do it," as my mother told me when i asked how she did it with my sister and me. and my heart melts watching my children together. ellie is the only one who can repeatedly make him laugh on command, even when fussy and tired, even when hungry, even when mad - he changes into smiles and giggles for her. she is motherly in her concern for his boogies and his spit up, willing to wipe both away if we're in the car and i can't reach him. she finds his plugs when he's fussy, reloads his tray with cheerios at dinner, and hugs/kisses him goodnight just about every night. at school, she is so proud to show off her brother to her friends when everyone is playing outside. (i'm sure all this will change in a few years, but for now, i love it!)

i am blessed to get to care for these 2 kids, to attempt to join eric in raising them to love Jesus and love others. i am having a blast doing so - and all this said after a rough evening of fussiness and (a few) tears because of no dessert (we had toast and jelly with dinner; i think that's dessert enough) and of many scratches from sharp fingernails (which got clipped before bed). times can be rough, but nothing takes away from the heart God has given me to love these two with a love like none other. and to grow my love for their father as i watch him parent alongside me. God is good to let me love my family!

crafty night

so the first project wasn't actually done tonight, but over the weekend...totally inspired by pinterest:

that's right...a necklace holder/organizer in my closest.

and that's right again...that's a toilet paper roll.

pinterest said to use a towel rack, but my closet doesn't afford me such width anywhere convenient, so toilet paper roll it is! and it works quite well with the shower hooks on it.

altogether cost of the project: $20 - can't beat that!

and now for the real craft:

i've completed my 1st robot for kaleb's big-boy quilt! i'm so excited!

the pattern called for something like 30 robots of varying patterns, and as i started to cut out the pieces for the first one i realized that it was A BUNCH of TINY pieces to cut and assemble, and that it would take me forever...and it wasn't going to be much fun but mostly tedious work.

so i adapted the pattern to my liking. and i blew up the patterns for the 5 different robots so that the same size quilt (to fit a twin-sized bed) will contain 6 robots (one gets to be repeated once). and i'm super-excited to be 1/6 of the way to completing these little guys...he looks so cute!

right now, the robot's just laying on top of the white fabric, but when he gets sewn on, he'll have some puffed-up parts and some stitching details (like pupils). can't wait to see it come together!

and the best part is, i only have to half-way pick up because it's all contained in my craft room :)