Evelyn FINALLY Walks!

It has been like pulling teeth to get Evelyn to try to walk.  She has been an avid crawler for quite some time now, but just seems to lack the motivation to walk, even though she has pretty good balance and strength.  It has been (and continues to be) a bit maddening, because we go to playgrounds almost every weekday, and it would be so nice for her to be able to walk across the mulch or mud instead of crawling through it (not to mention that she is wearing out the knees of all of her pants).

A couple weeks ago, we finally got her to take 5 or 6 consecutive steps without falling.  It was so fun to see her finally take some solid steps.  But in the past couple of weeks, she has probably done this less than 10 times, and every time she does it we have to coax it out of her.  She seems to consider it on her own every now and then, but then she just drops down to her knees and crawls to whatever she is after.  She seems to have figured out that crawling will get her there more quickly, and she seems more interested in efficiency than advancement (which isn't incredibly surprising).  She loves to walk behind things, but just still doesn't take initiative to try to walk on her own much.

So she can virtually quote Shakespeare and sing an opera (well, her language isn't THAT good yet), but she won't walk.  I guess everybody has to be bad at something.  :)

Potty Training

Potty training has been... well, unpleasant for all of us, I think.  Twins give you twice the love and fun, but also twice the opportunity for potty training accidents and twice as many pairs of pants and underwear to pull up and down and up and down.  They also give you twice as many diapers, though, so getting out of diapers was high on my "to do" list.

After quite a few months, we're virtually accident-free with pee.  That's incredible, because for a while there, I thought we would never arrive at this place.  Vivienne even went #2 in the big potty yesterday (which was the first time EVER)!  Whoohoo! 

Both kids love their little potty., but honestly that thing just grosses me out.  Pouring their business into the toilet to flush it and then cleaning out the little potty is not my favorite thing to do.  However, if that will give them enough of a thrill to use the potty, then I will gladly deal with it instead of dealing with their diapers.  But I'm glad to see that we're getting closer to more use of the regular toilet.  Maybe someday...

(I literally just heard, "Mommy, I need to go poopy!" from the top of the stairs.  I went up and she went again on the big potty!  Make that TWO times that we have poop in the big potty!)

Miles still insists on pooping in a diaper.  This is frustrating for me, but I think this is fairly common and the general consensus seems to be to not make a big deal out of it.  He should outgrow this eventually. 

So, we're getting there.  I have to say that potty training has not been fun, but I think we're past the hump. 

Happy Halloween 2013!

Halloween this year was an absolute blast.  Evelyn wasn't too keen on it yet, but Miles and Vivienne were very aware of what was going to take place and they were ridiculously excited about it.  Leading up to Halloween, Miles decided that he wanted to be a space shuttle.  (He will literally watch about 45 minutes of real space shuttle launches on YouTube and then ask for more.  Can we say "obsessed"?)  I spend a few nights making Miles a homemade space shuttle costume, and I think it turned out great.  I even put the flag backwards on the right-hand side of it.  And it said "Miles" on the right wing where the names of the shuttles usually are (well, depending on which shuttle pain job you referece... on the Endeavor, for example).  While he refused to wear it at first, he quickly warmed up to it and absolutely fell in love with it.  I put it a lot of time into it, and it was so nice when people complemented me on it.  Quite a few people told me that they thought it was the best costume they had ever seen.  It made me so happy that it made him so happy.

Vivienne said that she wanted to be a princess, so I bought her a box of princess dress-up clothes on Craigslist for $10.  Of course, the day before Halloween, she watched a Dora Halloween special and was inspired to be a bee like Dora.  After chasing down a bee costume, she decided to stick with princess for the morning and Piglet (loaned from a friend) in the evening.  For her princess costume, I curled her hair and pinned it up (first time wearing hair pins) and put on a *tiny* bit of mascara and blush.  She looked adorable.

Halloween morning, our friend, Julia, had an amazing party at her neighborhood club house.  They had ghost bowling with pumpkins, a bean bag toss into a pumpkin and a costume parade, not to mention a ton of delicious Halloween treats and story time.  Julia is an amazing photographer and got a beautiful shot of me and my kids (a rare treat, seriously like a once-a-year treat).

 After the Halloween bash, we came home for naps.  Then I woke Miles up a little early (because Viv and Evelyn were ready to go) and we went to Jason's work to trick-or-treat at the cubicles.  The kids had a blast and loaded up on tons of candy.  They really liked being at Daddy's work, and they really liked the candy.

Then we came home and were greeted by Grandma, who is probably their favorite person in the world, so that made their day.  They played with her and showed her their costumes for a while before we headed over to Hippsley Manor (our new neighbors from Ireland) for a little pre-trick-or-treating fun.  For the evening events, Vivienne decided to dress up as Piglet (who is the same character as her precious lovey, Bea).

Then Jessica and Nathan came over to join us for the biggest event of the day - trick-or-treating.  Miles and Vivienne were absolutely delighted to run from house to house and get their treats.  Miles kept his space shuttle costume on the entire time, and he would run back from a house and show us his pumpkin and say, "Mommy, Mommy!  I got MORE candy!"

This photo is terribly out of focus, but you can see the joy in her face as she runs.

Eventually Evelyn tired out, so Jason brought her back home for some one-on-one time with Daddy and bedtime.  Miles, Vivienne, Jessica, Nathan and I made the round until about 7:45.  One of the last houses we went to had a really spooky voice and a guy that jumped out of the bushes, and that was about enough for Vivienne.  By the time we got home, the kids had probably walked about a mile (with Miles wearing his space shuttle nearly the entire time).  Their pumpkins were so full of candy that they asked us to help them carry them. 

Halloween this year was probably one of the most fun days that the kids have ever had.  It was a blast all day for them, and Miles woke up this morning and asked, "Can we go trick-or-treat again?"  Next year, buddy.  Next year.

Evelyn is 15 Months!

I just took Evelyn for her 15-month checkup yesterday.  I can't believe we're about to celebrate her second Halloween (but her first with an actual costume - fun!).  She's a pretty big baby.  Here are her stats:

• Height:  31.75 (85%)
• Weight:  23 lb. 4.5 oz (77%)
• Head Circumference:  18.4 in (78%)

She has lots of words now.  These are the words that we're fairly certain she knows the definitions of (because she points to them and says them without prompting or us saying it first).

• dog
• bird
• cat
• fish
• bear
• duck (which she also uses for chickens, but she can't say "chicken" yet... poor chickens)
• light
• mama
• dada
• grandma
• up
• milk
• pumpkin (though this sounds more like "punk")
• bye bye
• ball
• book
• shoes
• grass
• baby
• purse

I'm sure there are some other words, but I haven't understood them yet (or I can't remember them now).

She loves to feed herself with a spoon or fork now.  She isn't coordinated enough to scoop things up well, unless it's something like applesauce and she can just kind of slop it up with a spoon.  If we load her spoon or fork for her, she eagerly puts it in her mouth (and she will often eat things that she will not eat without using the utensil - I think mainly because it has new novelty with the utensil).

She still doesn't show any signs of walking any time soon.  She has great balance and very strong legs, but just seems more comfortable crawling for now.  And that's just fine with us.

She is a very adventurous baby.  One of her favorite things to do is to go into the bathrooms and climb up on the step stools so that she can see herself in the mirror.  It's fun to watch her do this, but I also try to keep the doors shut because I am worried about her falling from the stool and hitting her head on the tile floor.  Evelyn also enjoys playing on large play structures, often climbing the biggest slides and sliding down them (usually on her belly).  She romps with her older siblings in the sand boxes and loves to swing and doesn't seem to notice that she is a baby.  (I will still call her "baby" until she is at least toddling.)

Her hair is pretty long now, hanging way down in her eyes.  She usually pulls out clips, so I'm resigned to putting her hair in a ponytail on top of her head.  It is super cute, but she sort of looks like she has a hair umbrella on her head.  She has 8 teeth that are all the way through, and I have no idea if there are any molars back in there because I never remember to check.

Evelyn loves to eat meat and beans and cheese.  She also likes almost any fruit, but she doesn't care for many vegetables these days.  We completely skipped purees, which was marvelous.  She went straight from breastfeeding to drinking out of a cup with a straw, so we completely skipped sippy cups with her as well.  Feeding her has been a piece of cake, and I'm thankful for that.

Evelyn is a super easy-going kid, and has been from the day she was born.  She is full of giggles and grins, and very rarely cries (usually only when someone has taken away her beloved bear or when she is hurt).  She is just full of joy and warmth, and I'm so glad that I get to be her mom. 

Monkey Hear, Monkey Do

Evelyn has gotten very good at saying quite a few words.  Often, we will say a new word only a few times, and she will correctly say it back to us.  It's unclear whether she realizes what all these words mean, but I think she has the right object-word association on most of these words and can say them:

• duck
• truck
• light
• mama
• dada
• bear (her lovey)
• book
• bye bye
• dog

She also has what almost sounds like "milk" and maybe "water" consistently, but we're not ready to call those yet.  When she says "duck" and "truck", she even pronounces the "ck" sound on the end.  I'm fairly certain that when Miles and Viv were her age, they would mostly just say "du" instead of "duck."  Evelyn definitely seems to be picking up language faster.  However, she seems to have no interest in walking (though she does walk behind walking toys very enthusiastically and has excellent balance).  We make very little effort to encourage her to walk, but I think it will be fun when she eventually picks it up and starts toddling around the house.

First Salon Haircut

A couple weeks ago, we decided to let the kids have their first salon haircut experience.  Miles hair continues to be a challenge for me (even though I have cut Jason's hair for over 5 years now... he has not been to a salon once in at least five years).  So I thought I would leave it to the professionals.  The kids were both really excited to sit in the big chairs.

And Miles looked ridiculously cute with the smock over him.

The hair dresser did a great job with Miles' hair, and I asked her a few things to help me with the next cut.

I have no idea what was happening here.  I guess Viv was making faces in the mirror?

And Evelyn seemed a little sad that she wasn't joining in on the fun.

We were going to have the lady pretend "cut" Vivienne's hair so that she wouldn't feel left out, but we decided to go ahead and let her have a real haircut, too.  She was tickled pink.

Oh my goodness, this was just cuteness overload.

Seriously, this post is becoming a Fantastic Sam's commercial, isn't it?  We left with two very happy kids with lollipops to boot.

TotFusion Yoga

Miles and Vivienne have been taking a class called TotFusion on Fridays.  It's a kind of yoga class for preschoolers, but also includes music and books.  Miles and Vivienne really enjoy it, and it gives me a wonderful opportunity to take Evelyn for a run in the stroller and get some fresh air.  Today we did just over 3 miles while the kids were in their class.  Last week during our TotFusion jog, we saw a bald eagle (the first one I have ever seen in the wild), and it was the highlight of my day.

Here is a photo of Viv in savasana.  She's one cute little leaf, if I do say so myself.