Miscellaneous

Grandma and Grandpa K sent us some valentines last month. Here's a picture of Summer filling them out. They were the Fun Dip sugar candy packets. Most of them didn't make it to their destinations. Sorry guys.

Just a cute picture of Claire.

A few weeks ago, we got snowed in. Rhett's work called and canceled for the day, and Gonzaga shut down too. That evening, a bunch of us went sledding. It lasted about fifteen minutes. It was sooooo cold! Claire and I actually stayed home, but Summer and Dad had a good time.

Summer
Summer is really starting to sing a lot. She sings quite often throughout the day. Sometimes she'll sing common children songs, other times she'll just make up her own words and music. One of her favorite songs to sing is "I know you onnnnnne daaaaaay." (The Sleeping Beauty song, "I know you. I walked with you once upon a dream," learned from Dad.)

"This yucky thing (pronounced "sing") is . . . uh . . . yucky."

"Uh oh! The big dinosaurs are coming to get us! The big dinosaurs are coming to the door! The other dinosaurs are going to save us. The big dinosaurs are not going to eat Claire. The big dinosaurs are not going to eat my head. The big dinosaurs are not going to eat your head, Mom." (And then randomly throughout the day, she'd run into her room, or come running out of her room--"The dinosaurs are coming!")

At a restaurant, while Rhett was asking for the check, Summer stood up and said, "Hey girl, I want more peaches (mandarin oranges)."

Common Sayings:
"That is soooooo cute."
"That is sooooooo fun."
"That is sooooooo funny."
"It's really (reary) scary."
"That sounds good."

Claire
New Words:
"eh-koo" Thank you
"ook" Look
"Nowm" Down
"Maaaaaaaaa" (sounds like a bleating lamb) Mom
"mama" More
"Daddy"
"Joo" Juice
"ookie" Cookie
"guck" Stuck
"idee" Hiding (Anytime I ask her where anything is, she says, "idee, idee!"

Claire can also say "Potty." We discovered this a few weeks ago after Summer had done her business in the bathroom, Claire said, "Potty. Potty." So I put her on the toilet too, and she went. It happened twice that day, and almost two times every day for the next week. Since then, we've had quite a few false alarms, but we are proud of Claire. She is such a big girl!

We've also discovered that she is highly sensitive to cinnamon. Any time she eats it and gets a little on her face, her skin welts up almost immediately. The problem is, she really likes cinnamon. Guess we'll just have to save those cinnamon bears and hot tamales for mom . . . hehehe.

For Noah

A few weeks ago, Rhett and I went to a Gonzaga game (we got the tickets for suuuper cheap--and they were great seats!). Well, I don't know where everyone got these little white hand towels, but every once and a while, whether cued by the band or something else, everyone would stand up and twirl the towels around. Every single time, I thought of how much Noah would have loved to have seen it!

If only . . .

If only we had a boy and I could crochet . . .
Image Source: from etsy found here.

I don't know if it's legal to post this, even though I added the source cite. Rhett's gone to Moscow to take a test, so we'll find out when he gets back.

Claire's Birthday Movie and Our Daily Activity

Our sweet little friend Lyla had her one year birthday party a few weeks ago, and Rachel, her mom, had put together a little movie of pictures from Lyla's first year. We watched it, and I got to thinking how I never posted this. So here it is--

How do you compact a whole first year of life into two or three three-minute songs? You really can't. That's why this is THIRTEEN minutes long. But it's full of cute clips and good music. If you want to actually read the credits (Claire's one year stats), you might have to pause it as they scroll. I couldn't figure out how to get them to slow down. (You'll notice a jump at one point where Claire has no hair and then she has a ton. We lost some of our clips and pictures when our hard drive crashed.)


Lately, Summer just wants to put her dresses on and dance around. She's talked Claire into doing the same thing. Here's a clip of them "dancing" (running in circles) with their babies. (When Claire says "Baba," it means baby.)

And since Claire needed another baby, we pacified her with the panda.

Peanut Butter

Today, for lunch, the girls had peanut butter and honey sandwiches. (Well, soy butter, not peanut butter. We don't have any peanut butter since I'm allergic. But the girls aren't, so we just call it peanut butter around here.) Anyway, after their sandwiches, Summer asked for a spoonful of peanut butter. So I got her one and one for Claire too.

An hour later, Summer said, "Look mom." I was doing something, so I didn't look up, but I said, "What is it?" She said, "It's peanut butter from my ear." Yuck. How did it get there? So I walked over to her and asked her where it was. She had dropped it on the carpet. I picked up the tiny chunk of hardened peanut butter and realized it was a HUGE chunk of ear wax! Yuck!

Good thing she didn't eat it!

For the First Time EVER!

For the first time ever, I sat down at the piano to run through a few songs and the girls did not swarm me. In fact, they had disappeared. (Hopefully they weren't running from all my mistakes!) I played the song once, then decided they were being too quiet to be safe, so I went to find them. AND--they were in their room playing! (Cue in: "She Doesn't Need Me Anymore," by Peter Cetera.)

Is this a good or a bad thing???

Back on our Feet

We have finally made it through the yucky stomach flu and recovery period. The girls are now eating better, sleeping better, and feeling much better. We had a doctor's appointment just last Friday. I was worried that their weight would be super-low since they hadn't been eating very well, and also because of their occasional puking. Well, Summer weighed in at 23 pounds, and Claire was 17! We were so excited. That's the most that the girls have ever weighed. We are so happy with their progress.

The doctor's appointment was for Summer to get her ears checked--a checkup on her tubes, etc. The doctor said her left ear looked really good, but when she tried to look in her right ear, there was too much ear wax and it blocked her view. So we took Summer to another room where the doctor could scoop it out. Summer was pretty nervous. When we put her on the chair, she started crying. Then she started yelling, "I want to wait in the car! I want to wait in the car!" She tried coming up with anything to say to get out of it. Then she said, "It's Claire's turn! It's Claire's turn!" It was a quick procedure that didn't hurt, but we were sure glad when we were done!

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The girls have been doing a lot together lately. It is so fun to see them play together and interact with each other. Summer is definitely quite motherly, while Claire is just trying to gain some independence. My favorite is when Summer makes Claire laugh, which makes Summer laugh, which makes Claire laugh again, and they laugh and laugh. They are becoming good friends.

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Rhett is doing well. He got a little bit of the stomach flu too (to be honest--it almost wiped him out!), but is feeling better now. Right now, he's preparing to go to San Francisco next weekend to compete at the Saul Lefkowitz competition. We are excited to see how well he does, along with his team. He's also still looking for employment for after graduation. Anyone have any IP contacts out there? Know any Trademark/Copyright attorneys? Let us know!

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The other day, Rhett and Summer were playing. Rhett said, "You can't pass the bridge without paying the tolls!" Summer looked at Rhett and said, "Dad, I have toes!"

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Claire hasn't quite--but almost--figured out how to eat with a spoon. (Love those blue eyes!)

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I've been entertaining a few random hobbies lately . . . I signed up for a community fiction writing class where we meet once a week from 6-9pm. Since Rhett gets done with class at 5:50, I meet him down on campus with the girls, switch vehicles, then go to my class where Rhett takes the girls home, feeds them dinner, and puts them to bed. We only have two more weeks, but it's been a lot of fun.

I've also been substitute piano teaching. There is a Family School of Music about twenty minutes from here--an office building with a whole bunch of rooms where music teachers go and teach music. That way families can bring their kids and get all their lessons done in 30 minutes. They've needed a sub lately, and I've filled in for them.

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Claire now says "Ow," "mo" (more), "baba" (baby), "apple," "up" (help), and "Buzz" (Buzz Light year). She has the necessities down.

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Summer's been on this kick about putting things to bed. A few days ago, she made this bed out of blocks for her fish. (Notice the pillow!)
And a few nights ago, before she went to bed, she said she needed to put her sheep to sleep. Later, we went into the kitchen and saw this (complete with a binky and bottle).Just today, I was doing laundry and she grabbed her pile of underwear and put them to bed--on her pillow and under the blankets. Good thing they were clean!




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