Sammy is 8 months!

Oh, man. Eight months is super cool. Sammy is really on his way to walking, he's not even as interested in crawling, just standing. He wants to be standing whenever possible and this month he's much more steady. (Let's just say that last month, his balance wasn't so great and he fell over more than once.) All this moving around really works up an appetite so he's been eating lots of solids and less nursing.

Unfortunately, all of the eating during the day isn't helping his sleeping at night. He's taken to waking up at around 3 a.m., wide awake and ready to play. This past Saturday night, I was pleased that I'd had the foresight to records an episode of Saturday Night Live to watch as I rocked Sammy in the deep dark hours of the morning.

Alas, it's hard to be angry at the little guy. He's too cute. (An elderly lady in the store told Chris tonight: "You've got a good looking boy there. When he grows up, he'll be a real heart thumper.") Of course that red hair makes people oooh and ahhh, but I especially love his little smile and the way he shakes his head like he's saying no, but maybe he's thinking: I'm a little rock star. He's definitely a charmer: Last month he also said a distinctive "Dada" but this month, he's added "Mama" and usually he's looking for or at me. *Sigh*

As for Olivia, she's awesome as always. We'll have to update on the 19th. In the meantime, here she is at around 7 months and Sammy at the same age and wearing the same hat. Love these two!

7 months!

Mr. Sammy is 99% cuter than last month, if that's even possible. He's taken on that chubby baby look and it really suits him. This month has been all about FOOD. (Perhaps you can see the remnants of a banana on his chin above?) Sammy is like his father (and his Grandpa Jerry) in that he'll try anything and pretty much likes everything. It helps that Sammy's becoming more agile with his fat little fingers and can pick up food himself, though it's more of a mashing than a graceful entry of the food into his mouth. He's still nursing, but he's not a gentle nurser, much to his mother's dismay. In fact, the other day, Olivia was listing what all of the family likes to do: Mommy likes to draw, Daddy like to play guitar, Sammy likes to attack Mommy when he's nursing... It seems that Mommy's not exactly stoic about things.

In other news, Sammy's two little bottom teeth are just visible below his gums and he's always rubbing his little gums on something. It doesn't seem to hurt, but we're keeping the baby asprin handy just in case.

Sammy's also very, very active. He likes to be standing (with help) most of the time. He will, however, sit unassisted while playing with his sister, as demonstrated here:

One of his favorite tricks is to climb up on the base of baby exerciser which is about 6" off the ground and then come through the other side. It's his own little obstacle course.

Oh, and then there's the yelling:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBkqg4c8eYo

It's sweet to be seven months!

4 years and 2 months!

 Here is our girl Olivia yesterday. She told me that her eyes were too sunny and needed to use my sunglasses. This month has been an adventure in cuteness, I tell you. Here are some of her drawings: 

 Her drawings are almost always of people, especially families like the one on the bottom right. That picture has, as Olivia explained to me, a brother who's a bunny, a little sister, a mommy with long hair, a daddy hiding in the hair, another brother who's got whiskers and a dot. Another popular thing she draws are flowers with their eyes closed. (See picture, bottom left.)

One new thing this month is that her letters have turned from chicken scratch to actual readable letters. Here's her grocery list from the other day:

She's learning early what the necessities in life are: coffee, milk, and ice cream.

We had her four-year-old Well Child visit with Dr. Carol who pronounced her a very healthy and smart girl. When she was getting her shots, I thought that I needed to sing in order to distract her from all of the needles. I started singing "Jingle Bells" a little manically and the nurse asked if I needed to leave the room. Olivia didn't cry or seem upset at all about the shots, it was just me.

In other news, Olivia is enjoying Sammy more as he's able to interact with her. Several times a day she asks if she can hold him. Here's one such moment:

I'm so thrilled that Olivia is constantly changing and growing. She has her moments of frustration, but she seems much more able to verbalize and talk through issues. Last night, I accidentally nearly closed her foot in the car door. This precipitated a long and thorough line of questions by Olivia of Why I had nearly closed her foot in the door, that I hadn't meant to do it, that I was very frightened by the thought of closing her foot in the door and possibly lopping it off, but that she wasn't scared and in fact was quite brave. It was the cutest thing ever.

4+ years is super cool.

6 months!

The little guy is six months old! He just had his checkup so here are his stats:

Height: 71 cm (91%)
Weight: 16lbs 7oz (29.4%)
Head Circumference: 17.32" (67%)

So, he's still on the same trajectory: tall and skinny like his dad.

This month has been all about food and Sammy's love of it. Here he is pondering when he might get some more food:

 I also wanted to get a photo of his hair color which is reddish-auburn:

 And his sweet face that says, I love the heck out of you:

 I love this toothless grin face:

He's been crawling and moving around so much. We've also discovered he very much enjoys gnawing on wooden things; it doesn't matter what the wood is or what it's attached to. I think it makes his gums feel better since his teeth are threatening to come out any day.

We love Sammy!

Sammy on the move!

We first noticed Sammy doing a sort of Navy Seal crawling thing last week, but the day before yesterday I caught it on film. He's highly motivated to capture the most potentially dangerous toys, especially balloons.

Four years and one month!

This is Olivia. She's four years old. She's having a little nap inside the tent Chris and I made for her birthday. She looks so sweet and yet full of ideas, dreams, deep thoughts, people to be and places to be. Her absolute favorite thing to do these days is to play, but more specifically to create a situation and assign roles ("I'm an evil princess, you be a dragon.") and then use props, sing songs, and make up dialog for all of the players. It's pretty funny and never really goes more than one scene before characters are changed and sets are replaced. Chris is much better an playing in these one-acts than I am. I'm not much of a thespian. I can never think of good dialog beyond "You will never live in the castle again, evil princess!"

Other than the dramas, Olivia makes up songs (tunes and lyrics), stories that basically follow pictures in her books, and tons and tons of drawings. In fact, she's so prolific that I've taken to making little books of her drawings and giving them to strangers. (Not really, but I might have to soon.)

In her outside of the home life, she's enjoying her time at Little Lights where she's made friends and admirers. We're thinking ahead to kindergarten and starting to research different schools and programs that she might enjoy. We still have time, but it's good to see what's out there.

Some challenges have been getting ready in the morning and helping to clean up toys and messes during the day. I've found that if I can make it into a game or laugh about it, she is much more receptive. But, I'll admit, most of the time I get all General Patton on her ("Put on your coat now, because I said so!") and shockingly, that approach never works or ends in tears. So, I'm aspiring to make helping a positive thing in the new year.

Four + one month is fortunate.

My favorite picture

This picture kills me for many reasons: first, it's rare to get a smile out of all three of these folks at once. I mean, look at Sammy! What a cutie-pie! And Olivia with the outfit he picked for herself in the dead of winter: purple shorts. And Chris, what an awesome dad.

As 2013 comes into view, this is what I'm grateful for.