Katharine Lange: Arwyn Week 77: Tree Decoration Time!

Arwyn's current favorite things to do are washing her hands and brushing her teeth. If she see's anyone washing their hands, she makes such a fuss until she's allowed in on the action. And anytime we are in Leia's bathroom, she climbs up to the sink and starts using the toothbrushes. She likes it when I brush her teeth at night too, but mostly just to suck on the toothpaste. When I insist on actual brushing, she tries to hide her mouth from me. But she always comes back because she just loves that toothpaste flavor too much! Arwyn's been having fun at Leia' swim classes. She watches patiently for the first half hour in anticipation of the "free swim" to follow, where she can get in the pool too. I've been putting her in the life jacket, and she loves to "walk off" the edge of the underwater bench, because she automatically floats up onto her back before being flipped over onto her tummy, and then I grab her and pull her up before her face gets plunged under water for too long. She loves the whole process and does it over and over! Arwyn has been really fussy about eating this week. Even if she seems like she's interested in eating what I've made, if I try to put her in the high chair with her bib, she puts up a fuss, starts whacking away the food, and freaks out until I take her out. Then she won't sit anywhere or eat anything until I just let her sit in my lap to eat. Very frustrating! She's been talking so much this week; it's so fun to have little conversations with her. I don't understand it all, but she's got enough words these days that often you do get the gist of what she's talking about. She had so much fun helping us decorate the Christmas tree too. She liked ripping open all the boxes and wrappings of the ornaments, pulling stuff off the tree, and whacking the ornament balls together. She only broke one! Her favorite ornament was, of course, the little ceramic baby shoe, and she kept trying to put it on her own foot..she loves her shoes that kid!

Leia continues to crack us up with her big girl phrases. This week she pep-talked herself while trying to do some task: "That's it, now I'm getting the hang of it!" It was so funny. She's getting really close to being able to write her own name. She's been able to spell it for awhile, but now she has a shape to go with each letter. These shapes do pretty much resemble the letters, but even though she can spell it in the right order, she doesn't really write it in the right order. The weird thing is, she's much better at writing each letter properly if she's not trying to string it together into her name. Clearly she'll put it all together really soon. Leia has the funniest names for us (me, Arwyn, and Daddy) when we are playing make-believe. She likes to call us either "Sala", "Sula," or "Hala." Of course, whenever she's having a baby in her tummy, the baby's name is always Arwyn. She still loves to talk about all the stuff she did "back when she was big." She really did a lot of cool stuff then. One bit of great news is that Leia has been using her sleep pillow quite often these days. It tells you stories and plays music for about 20 minutes before bed, but it only works if your head is actually on the pillow. She got it for her birthday, but wasn't too interested in it at the time, but recently she's used it almost every time she goes to bed. It's great because it makes it much easier and faster for us to get out of the room, and she kind of thinks she's getting away with something (like not actually going to bed right away)...clearly it's a win-win! She and Arwyn have been playing really well together lately too. She had us all come to a slumber party, first in the living room, then in Arwyn's room, and she set up blankets for us on the floor. This is the game that Arwyn plays the best. Mostly she doesn't understand what the heck Leia is always bossing her around about, but she will almost always lie down for pretend sleep on command. It is the cutest thing ever! We also inherited my and John's old sleeping bags, so Leia was really excited to use the "camping bags" and have a campout in the living room. That really worked out great for me one cold and tired morning when lying down in a sleeping bag seemed like the best solution! I had one major meltdown this week, which was of course brought on by Leia not cooperating while in parking lot. She wouldn't sit and wait for me to go get the car, but she was too tired to walk and I had Arwyn and couldn't carry both of them. I got so frustrated because I couldn't see any good solutions, and then some cars started driving around and she wasn't paying much attention. That's when I lost it. I did learn several good lessons from this: 1. I'm grateful to live in the mountains where it's mostly safe to have situations like these, 2. It was actually my fault for not being prepared for how tired swimming class makes her, 3. I will not be so unprepared in situations like this in the future (that's why we have wagons and strollers!), and 4. Next time when she doesn't cooperate, I'll just ditch the bag (again, I live in Tahoe, it will probably be there when I get back), then I can at least drag her with my one free hand!! Ok, enough about that, on to the pictures!

Don't know if I've properly documented it before, but check out the cool leather crown that Josh made for Leia with all his leather stamps and tools and dyes.

Grrrr, tough girl!

I love catching these moments when Arwyn likes to snuggle up right next to her big sister and be a part of what she's doing...such adoration!

Love these two cuties.

Passed out with a water bottle on her face...that can't be comfortable!

Ahhh, a moment of silence for Mommy while the Squeezie Sisters suck and ponder life.

Checking out what life is like when you walk in your big sister's shoes.

Now that it's getting cold out, we have a whole line-up of Aunt Joanne hats to model...this cute one matches Arwyn's favorite blankie!

Doesn't like to be left out of a photo opportunity, but doesn't like to smile or model either...acting silly here!

Might be hugging, might be wrestling...either way, there's lots of love at this little slumber party!

"Ok, time to sleep!" says Leia.

Baskets make great hats and necklaces.

Gangsta cowgirls ride mouses.

Another day, another hat, and another great smile!

Arwyn at 17 months walks farther than Leia at 3.5 years...she's a walking machine!

The best part about snow is getting to eat it!

A little cousin play time!

Hard to contain all that excitement about the new Christmas tree being put up!

Out little Christmas fairy zipping past!

Lots of laughter on Daddy Days.

Heading to Nana's on a yucky, rainy day, but Leia couldn't be happier to have this excuse to use an umbrella!

So glad that Aunt Joanne took up knitting again...she threatened to stop for a bit, but I guess she's back at it and creating beautiful new hats like this!

Finally got the courage to ask for a ride on the silver saddle...only took 3.5 years.

It's the snuggle monster!

Decorating the Christmas tree for Arwyn involved opening up all the boxes she could find and ripping up the paper...at least she's really good at cleaning up after herself...always happy to help pick up and throw away!

Decorating the tree was quite a flurry of excitement this year, boxes and ornaments were flying every which way!

Leia was actually able to properly hang ornaments this year, although she preferred to keep most of them as toys rather than sacrificing them to the tree!