Sitting is so yesterday

Just recently, we were forced to pull the gates out and begin to baby-proof our home since Caroline has decided that crawling and cruising is so much more interesting than sitting in one spot and playing with whatever was given to her. Unlike Ella who we remember was more hesitant and seemed to take a few weeks to master the crawl, Caroline didn't seem to need so much practice or encouragement (and trust us, we were not pushing the crawling thing!). One evening, she was just up on her knees and crawling away, almost as if she'd be doing it for weeks beforehand! And not within one week of crawling was Caroline pulling herself up on furniture and in her crib. In fact, Erika was quite startled to go into her room one morning to find her not laying down, not siting up, but proudly standing up and grinning from ear to ear. We've also noticed her take a new interest in some of her toys; she's understanding the concept of putting items in and out of containers or boxes and seems to grasp the idea that objects can stack as witnessed with one of her toys. Plus, she loves to clap her hands and will do so quite often to tell us she is happy! Music moves her too - she'll rock to the beat and pump her arms in the air to any and all types of music (including Erika's singing, which definitley isn't saying much).


This was the extent of her practicing...as much as she would lean forward, she never made it fully on her knees until she decided it was time to officially take off!


Here she is (6/30/10)on one of her first crawling adventures; we love how she sucks her lower lip as she learns to maneuver her new capabilities!


Now, when she's not crawling on the floor, she's crawling out of pools....


...and up the stairs or really anywhere she can go!


This was a sweet surprise! Look at me, she says! Good morning, I can stand!


And finally, she can join big sister Ella at the toy kitchen. Life doesn't get much better than this!




Say cheese!

Almost There

Phew! Alot has happened in the last four years since Erika first started her masters program with VCU. It's been a long scholastic journey and looking back, the last four years have yielded some pretty amazing accomplishments. Aside from the pending DIPLOMA (yeah!)which Erika will get in August after her summer internship, we not only moved two times but had two wonderful little girls, too. Keeping up with the demands of a masters program took alot of precious time away from the family and while Erika will miss learning in a structured classroom, it sure is nice to have evenings and weekends completely free with the family. Ah! The first weekend after the last paper was submitted, Erika admitted that by 1pm, she was "bored." What's to do when you don't have to make time for a husband, two children, a dog, and a ten-page paper!?!?!?


Thumbs up! Emailing the very LAST paper!


It's all starting to feel more real: Erika's receives her first congratulations card from Shea!


A little blurry, but Erika "walked" in May; for the ceremony, August grads were also honored.


After the ceremony, it had been a long morning and both kids were near their breaking point but we managed to get a family shot!

The Poo-Poo Tent

The potty training process, to no surprise due to Ella's severe case of stubbornness, has been a fairly lengthy process for us. After waiting for the "signs" (ie: does child show interest in the toilet? does child go long lengths of time without wetting the diaper? does child show discomfort wearing a dirty diaper?, etc), we decided to push for the potty training about, oh, months ago...I think we've lost track. So then, after repeated failed attempts, we consulted the books, hoping for an answer to our dilemma:

Suggestion #1: Using child's baby doll, show the child how the baby doll goes to the potty, "flushes", and washes hands. Child will then want to actually show her baby doll how it's done by actually using the potty.
Outcome #1: Ella: "Yeah baby! Yeah Kate! You did it! Now, let's put you back in a diaper. Oooh, stinky poopy. Mommy! Kate has a poopy diaper! Mommy, Ella changed Kate's diaper!"

Suggestion #2: Encourage your child to take interest when mother or father uses the bathroom.
Outcome #2: Absolutely no bathroom privacy for mother or father.

Suggestion #3: Children LOVE new things! Buy your child a new potty and new underwear. Make a big deal of it and praise them on the new gifts.
Outcome #3: New underwear continued to build up in the drawer, unused and unworn. First purchased potty began collecting dust (literally), and second potty got thrown on the floor and preempted a tantrum.

Suggestion #4: Allow your child to mess or wet their underwear. The feeling of soiled underwear will be too much of a discomfort so they will learn that it's better to go in the potty.
Outcome #4: Setting the scene....it's around 10am and Ella is off playing with her toys. She's awfully quiet. Erika grows suspicious and approaches her. The smell is almost unbearable. Erika: "Ella, did you go poo-poo in your underwear?" Ella: "No." Erika: "Um, yes. I can see it and smell it." Ella: "No." Erika: "Ella, isn't it yucky to be in dirty underwear?" Ella: "No." (nonchalantly) Erika: "Does it feel good to be sitting and playing in a dirty pair of underwear?" Ella: "Yes."

Suggestion #5: Bribe them. Find the one thing that will work and will get them to go.
Outcome #5: Candy? No. A trip to Target (she loves it)? No. (Apparently doesn't love it that much). A new water table? No. Hmmmm.


Given that each child is different and some are perhaps more strong-willed than others (Ella can be the poster child for this personality trait), we believe that it takes an even more strong-willed set of parents in addition to a very creative grandmother to get the job done. We knew the time had to come to really push it and luckily last night when Nanni was over, she had the absolutely brilliant idea of the poo-poo tent. Erika had been upstairs with Ella for 30 minutes (yes, 30 minutes) and still no poop when she was relieved by Nanni so she could get dinner fixed. Within 10 minutes, Erika hears applause and praise from upstairs - Ella had pooped! And the trick: the poo-poo tent. Thinking that Ella needed a little privacy (since she normally hides in the corner or ducks under the table to poop), Nanni created a tent around her and Ella with the shower curtain. Within seconds, voila! And since last night, we took Ella under the poo-poo tent for not one, not two, but three poops today! Hallelujah, she just might be potty trained! And, we went out twice today and no mess!

So, our suggestion: poo-poo tent.
Our outcome: You guessed it!


Three feet under under the poo-poo tent: Ella, Mommy, and "Kate"


Success!

Music Class

Today marked our last music class before Erika head's off to "work" on May 10th. We've enjoyed our Thursday morning outing for the past year and it's been amazing to see how Ella has progressed in her confidence and singing since we started when she was just about one year old! Now, she'll walk up to Ms. Beth to request a song or chime in with a animal for "Old McDonald Had a Farm." And, when the teacher plays songs on her violin, Ella is able to recognize the song. For the last class of the session, Ms. Beth brought out the parachute which all the kids love and after some singing and dancing with it, she let the kids sit on it for the remainder of the class. Here are a few of Ella's favorite songs (don't know all the exact titles!):

1. ABC's
2. I'm a Little Acorn Round
3. Row, Row, Row Your Boat
4. Itsy Bitsy Spider
5. The Old Gray Cat
6. Five Monkey's Sitting in a Tree
7. Open and Shut Them
8. All the Fish are Swimming in the Water
9. Ba-ba Black Sheep
10. Jack and Jill went up the hill

Now I Know My ABC's

Recently, Ella has really gotten into singing and we think it's definitely reflective of the fact that her confidence in her vocabulary is increasing. Her confidence started when she began "reading" books out loud, especially to Caroline. She might say the first sentence coherently and then the rest of the page sounded like a bunch of vowels and consonants strung poorly together but reflecting the changes of pitch, etc. But now, while she continues the reading (which is also improving thanks to 1. her imagination and 2. her ability to memorize her favorite books), she's picked up singing to her repertoire. This morning, she was heard singing the entire "Twinkle Twinkle" song to Caroline and totally mimicking the way Erika sings it to Caroline, using the hand motions and all. And today at lunch (probably inspired from music class this morning), she sang the "entire" (ok, so she might have missed a couple letters in there!) ABC song. She's totally into letters these days and takes great pride in letter recognition!





During lunch today, instead of EATING her peanut butter and honey sandwich, she decided to give her herself a "tattoo" with the peanut butter. All during lunch, "look mommy! Ella has a tattoo! Almost dry! Look at my tattoo!" God willing she never gives herself a REAL tattoo up her arm!



So after we cleaned up her tattoos, she decided to draw the letter "E" on her arm...again in the peanut butter....which should have been on her sandwich....which she should have been eating. Needless to say, she was pretty proud of the "E" and so was mommy!



And, here's a video of Ella singing her ABCs!

Toothy Grin

Not just one, but TWO teeth have started making their appearance! We figured Caroline had started to teethe a bit since she was drooling and really enjoying chewing on her toys but who would have thought they would peak through so soon! And since they've just started to come through, she'll have to flash you a big smile in order to see those bottom two teeth!

Candy Weekend

If you want to get on Ella's good side offer her some Pez candy. Or jelly beans. Or tootsie rolls. Or chocolate eggs. She has officially developed her sweet tooth and if she had it her way, she'd munch on Easter candy for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. She was caught this morning stuffing several jelly beans in her mouth and proudly shaking the empty plastic egg. Onto the next candy-filled egg! We're surprised she's still napping.

And finally, we had some beautiful weather for Easter and we took full advantage of it by spending as much time outside as possible. After Ella and Tim celebrated her friend Jack's 2nd birthday (Happy Birthday!), we headed to a neighborhood Easter egg hunt to get the Easter weekend started....thus began the beginning of the candy infatuation. On Sunday, we spent the morning eating more candy (oh, and a great breakfast thanks to chef Tim) and then headed to Easter mass. Later that day, we headed to Erika's parents house with some family friends and enjoyed Easter dinner..and more candy. So while Ella spent the weekend in sugar la-la land, Caroline is safe from the sugar overload, for now at least. She's been busy expanding her food repertoire but we're weary to break out the peas again...What she does like though are rides in the playground swing, putting anything and everything in her mouth, and her big sister Ella. She continues to laugh and laugh and laugh at Ella and it's really the sweetest thing. . . Easter candy can't compete with that!

On the flip side though, when either of the girls was sleeping, Erika locked herself in the basement and typed away at one of the last three papers she has to finish before finally (yeah!) completing her course requirements for her program. The first of them was finished last night around midnight so almost there......

After all the eggs were found, the kids were presented with neighborhood awards; here they all listening for the next name to be called

Caroline was very content in the swing while all the big kids chomped on candy

Tim sneaks up on Caroline who was busy figuring out how to take her hat off

So bright! Our eyes weren't used to the SUN!

I found one!

Looks like the Easter bunny found Caroline and Ella's rooms

And looks like Ella found the candy.....

Caroline was just content with a basket full of empty eggs and a stuff animal duck

After much coaxing, Ella was finally convinced to put down the candy (well sort of, what's that in her hand?) and give her sister a hug for an Easter morning picture. Can you tell she's totally not into it and can't smile because she's got a mouth-full of jelly beans?

Family shot after mass

Easter egg hunt with Jane at Nanni and Opah's

Eating candy again...to no surprise. At least she can manage a smile for this one! Erika ordered the matching dresses from Etsy (LOVE that site!)

When not on mom duty, she's on school duty. Working on her last clinical theory paper....now just two policy papers left. Gulp.