Tuesday, January 26, 2016

Arwyn Week 31: 7 Months Old and Getting Cuter by the Second! - 1/21/2016

Arwyn continues to prove that she is one tough cookie!  She had her second of two flu shots this week, and when the needle went in, she didn't even flinch.  No instant tears, no delayed tears, no tears at all; it was like it never even happened!  Go girl!  She was playing with her crinkly newspaper at the time, so clearly the distraction helped too (Thank you Auntie Jen!).  She also continues to be such a happy girl, and now she doesn't just smile, but she actually laughs now too.  It is so cute to see her laugh!  Leia also likes Arwyn's smiles and laughs, and if she isn't smiling (which pretty much only happens in the morning when we are driving to school and she's tired and ready for her nap already), Leia is always saying, "Smile Arwyn! Smile!  Mommy, Arwyn's not smiling."  It's what we expect from her, so clearly disturbing to Leia when she's not.

As usual, Leia impresses us with her intelligence and logic, but now she's even starting to display a little reason...both logic and reason type, as well as the "being more reasonable" about day to day negotiations type.  The other day she was able to reason that love means you do things for others: "Daddy, you love me so you have to sing!"  (That was also the first time she's used love as an excuse for something she wants!)  She also made me laugh with another one of her morning monitor call outs when she wanted to get up: "Mommy, Daddy, everybody wake up now!"  She finally acknowledged and reasoned that we might actually be sleeping when we aren't just coming to get her right away!  I also took her out skiing again this week, and despite the fact that we weren't able to go until nap time so she was clearly already tired, she did fantastic.  She skied down by herself a bunch, she agreed to let me pull her by hanging onto the ski pole finally, and she even walked onto the magic carpet all by herself!  She was definitely wanting to do a lot of things "by herself," including getting on the chairlift and skiing down the steep part of the run.  I didn't let it go that far.  It was fun to watch her make choices about whether we would go on the Magic Carpet or the chairlift next.  But the funniest part was when she was skating over to the lift, she hit a slight incline, and stopped being able to make forward progress.  In the true ski racer spirit, even at the ripe age of two, she instantly blamed her faulty equipment rather than acknowledging that it might be her skills!  (See video below.)

I'm 7 Months and happy to be here!


I have a serious side too.

But mostly I like to smile.

Hmm, and ponder about life and what makes my sister tick!

Oh I'm just so happy I could burst!



Aghh, got you with my tongue!

Ok, I'm still cute and happy, but I'm done with this...time to rock and roll!


See, I'm still cute on my tummy!

My Rico Suavé look!

How cute are these pouty lips?

The jaw jutting smile means she's really happy!

Love those sweet cheeks!

So busy these days...always rolling, reaching, and scooting for something!

Come on, who could say no to that face?

Ha ha ha, now that was funny Mom!

Look at me, up on my knees and pumping!

Pre-downward dog?

Ok, now we're just getting silly!

Grimaces and gags on all the delicious food I try to give her, but loves the plastic chicken and croissants that Leia serves??

Who me? I do nothing wrong!

Aghhhh, got you!

What's up with the Transue tongue thing?  Looking cute at another successful haircut!

Learning the art of the double mirror, back of the head viewing!

Baby Mozart, she's brilliant!

Password = Arwyn



She takes such good care of her little sister!

Monkey snuggles...and I love how Monkey actually snuggles back!


Finally figured out it's ok to let Mom tow you!

Password = Leia




Really fun Mother-Daughter ski day!

Sunday, January 24, 2016

Arwyn Week 30: Reverse Scooting - 1/14/2016

In her quest for movement, Arwyn has added pushing and scooting in reverse to her repertoire. I'm still used to her not moving, so it keeps surprising me when I put her down and come back a few minutes later and find her in quite a different spot. The other day I put her in the middle of her room, and she managed to reverse herself into the corner and get stuck under the swing! It was pretty funny for me, but she was sure annoyed. She's still fighting the whole food thing. I tried giving her soft sticks of food, a technic called Baby Led Weaning, and she did like picking up and chewing on the soft carrot and pear sticks, but in she still spit them all out. So weird! The 10th of January marked the first time that she actually slept on her tummy for a long stretch of the night. She's about 50/50 back vs. tummy for sleeping now.  And, I was really excited because she started sleeping through the night again, but it only lasted a few days and then she was back to one wake up. She's keeping with her motto of being consistently inconsistent! 

Even though we should be concentrating our efforts on Arwyn, we've decided to make another big push on expanding Leia's eating habits. And low and behold, it worked...she actually ate a turkey burger this week! We've had a couple occasions recently to adventure up the street to Jody's house, and it's now one of Leia's favorite things.  Partly because she really likes talking to Jody, and partly because she gets "red nuts" every time we go. In case you were wondering, red nuts are actually red jelly bellys, and she only gets 3, but they are very special.  It's almost more important to keep them in her pocket than to actually eat them...such a crack up!  Leia is also on a cleaning kick these days. She pulls out her Swiffer mop, puts on her cleaning gloves so she won't get blood on her hands (not sure if she's really talking about blood or blisters here), puts on her special cleaning slippers, gets me in a matching "uniform," and them we "clean the hosipol." She even stands on the edge of the mop and pushes with her foot to get the extra leverage on the tough floor spots, just like they really do at the hospital. They do take regular walks through the hospital at school, but it just seem possible that she'd have been able to study their cleaning technics down to such detail; Josh and I are absolutely amazed!  Last funny Leia story happened one morning when I was letting her stay in bed to talk/play by herself awhile before getting her up.  She's usually pretty happy to do that, and just calls us when she's ready.  This day she calls out, "Mommy, Daddy, You miss me, I've been sleeping all night!"  I just had to burst out laughing because it was so funny even though it was true, it's something I say to her sometimes, and it was a perfectly legitimate reason to give us for why we should get moving and come get her!  She just amazes me how she comes up with this stuff.


I don't know about this Mom, it has more flavor than the plastic varieties I usually prefer.

I'm not really digging this orange one, maybe that white one will be better.

Oh Mom, you tricked me!  This is yucky food in cool shapes, not the plastic toys I usually like to eat!

I've got a secret....!



So busy and always on the move these days, but never too busy for that sweet smile!

Who could resist that little face?

Password = Arwyn



Taco Tuesday!

Sleeping on her tummy!

Don't eat yellow snow Leia!

Snow play with Daddy!

Happy and rolly!

So psyched to be able to get herself around!

All snuggly in a bean bag chair and ready to spectate at gymnastics!

Ball pit!

Where's Leia?

Wow, actually learning some cool gymnastics positions this week!

Climbing the ladder!


Helping Arwyn participate in Circle Time.


Reading a book to Arwyn.

It's amazing how in sync she is with her sister and how she can read Arwyn's mind: "Arwyn wants to wear bunny ears!"

Password = Leia



Animal hoods from Uncle Cody!


Panda Dad?