Blog Splatter

My little sister, Abi, sent me a text a couple of weeks ago that stated, "Dude last blog post! June 11!!!!". When I asked her what that meant she said that was the last time I had posted. This is how I'm always reminded to update our family blog :) You should know that I do think about blogging. I have a note app on my phone and have filled to capacity three notes with things I want to share on this blog. So, without further ado, and to appease my sister - though it's been a little while since her text - here are my 'blogging notes'.

 

I started doing freezer meals and love it very much.

 

Zac started saying, "I funny." while doing silly things about 3 months ago. He still does this and many other funny things like saying, "I a monkey." while terroizing the couch in his room. His language has been exploding recently. He's a chatter box

He loves doing puzzles and when he was first learning to do them I had to help him. I would say, "not quite" when he had the right piece close to the right area but couldn't quite get it. Once he started to do the puzzles more independently, I noticed that if he hadn't gotten the piece in the right place or needed to turn it around he would say, "Not quite." So cute and funny.

Zac took about 3 or 4 months to say thank you. When we first started teaching him to say thank you, he was about 13 months. He picked it up right away and said thank you without prompting for a half and week and then he stopped. He would throw tantrums when we tried to get him to say thank you. It was horrible. More than a year from that point, he really started to understand manners. Humorously, instead of saying thank you, he would say, "You're welcome." whenever we prompted him to say thank you. Then he started doing it without prompting. I'd hand him a snack and he'd spout, "You're welcome." It was so funny and frustrating. Now he generally says thank you but sometimes says you're welcome instead.

Zac thinks it's funny to hit and kick and bite. Especially when you are changing his diaper.

If Kate is napping after Zac gets up from his nap, he gets concerned and asks where Katie is.

Zac sleeps in a pack n play cause he will not stay in his toddler bed.

He wears footie p.j.s with the feet cut off backwards to bed everynight because if he poops in the night he puts his hands in it. The backwards footie pajamas are the only way we've found that works for him.

Zac has to have his Grammy blanket put on him every night before he'll go to sleep. This happens at nap time too.

Nathan was playing with the kids in their bedroom and he laid on the floor with his head on a couch cushion that was off of the couch. Zac sat on top of him and started trying to put Nathan to sleep. He stroked his face and kept saying, "Shhhhh."

 

 

 

 

Zac is a very loving little kid. Whenever someone around him is hurt, he comforts them by hugging, stroking their face, giving kisses and saying, "Okay, Okay, Okay." He also does this to Nathan and me as an apology when he gets in trouble. It's hard to stay mad at him when he does this.

 

 

Both kids LOVE to give hugs and kisses, though Zac is more affectionate than Kate. He loves to show love and comfort people.

 

Katie's ability to speak has increased exponentially since Zac has started talking more. She says but is not limited to:

-mama

-daddy

- please (sign language also)

-thank you (sign language also)

-more in sign language

-eat in sign language

-food

-cheese

-snack

- sky

-airplane

-car

-various animal names and their noises

-book

-movie

-bunny; her very, most favorite thing in the world

-diko

-dog

-kitty

-bird

-bike

-water

-baby

It's crazy to think that when Zac was 15 months old he would barely say Mom, Dad, Diko and please. She started walking just before she turned one.

Kate is a buys body.

She hoards toys and then forgets about them the next minute.

She is such a girl! My sister, Hannah, came to visit in July. When we picked her up from the airport, I told her that Katie was such a girl and she gave a look like, yeah right, Lizi. A couple days later and she was telling me that Katie is such a girl.

Kate screams soooo much. It's taught Zac to scream. They were both aptly punished. Since then, whenever Katie screams, Zac tells her, "No scream, Katie!"

Our kids nap in different rooms and if Katie wakes up first, she goes to Zac's door and screams and knocks until he wakes up and I get him out. Luckily, she has recently toned this down and just gets really, really excited when we get Zac up.

Kate is a horrible teether. She teethes for 4-6 weeks on one tooth and then it takes another 2 weeks for it to cute through. And she is grumpy about it the whole time. Once when she was teething and about 14 months olds, she was up in the night and Nathan was rocking her in the rocking chair and she asked for a movie. It was the first time she had ever shown interested in movies. Ever.

Katie loves to put the lids on the toy bins; or anything else that has a lid that is off.

She loves sitting in boxes (Like the old Dorff cats, Pounce and Moe).

Katie is extremely attached to stuffed animal bunny. It has a string thing you can pull and it plays the Rock a Bye Baby music. We were so proud when she learned how to pull the string for herself.

She eats more than Nathan everyday. She is seriously a bottomless pit. Everyone who is around her for a full day is amazed at her ability and need to eat everything.

 

 

 

 

 

Both of the kids LOVE Skyping with family. They particularly love seeing the dogs that my sisters play with in D.C. My sister's hide the dogs from the camera and then quickly move them into view and out again. Both of my kids exclaim, "Dog!" when this happens and smile really big.

 

One of my greatest joys in life is talking to my mom. She is one of my very bestest friends. I love talking about life and problems and joys and points of view. I love that she doesn't always try to solve my problems. She comforts me and listens and says, "Man this stinks." but in a much more mature way. It's nice to have someone sit with you through the hard times, not trying to fix you, just letting you be you. Also, funny thing about 'mature'. I say "ma-chure", my mama says, "ma-tour". Sometime when I was younger she told me that i would only really be ma-tour when I pronounced the word that way, that ma-tour way :) She was only partially joking I'm sure.

When I'm old I want to be the kind of woman who goes around helping everyone. I want to help out and support moms. I don't think that there is enough recognition about how hard it is to be a stay at home mom and how much support you need from friends and neighbors. When you don't get that support, you build walls to protect yourself and that ends up being very lonely. I realized that if I want to help everyone when I'm old I have to start now.

Some days I'm quite confident that I'm a good mother and that our kids will turn out well adjusted and normal. Some days I'm sure the only thing they're going to learn is what they watch on TV.

 

Have I ever mentioned how much Nathan and I love our bed? We aren't thrilled to go anywhere, even hotels, because we know we won't sleep nearly as well there as we do in our bed. Whenever we're traveling home from a trip, you can be assured that we mention how excited we are to sleep in our bed again several times.

 

I really think it's important to be most passionate about my husband and kids. I enjoy being passionate about lots of things and am highly opinionated, but I've learned that I should never be more passionate about a project - even if the finished product is for my kids to play with - than I am about my family.

 

I'm a fairly insecure person about who I was when I was younger. Whenever I see people from high school I quickly look away. I realized that I'm worried that they won't know who I am and it would be awkward for me to say hi. I think it's ironic that I'm very secure in who I am now, but being around people from a time period when I wasn't secure reminds me to be insecure again.

 

We went to Utah in June. I ran a half marathon and we particiapted in events surrounding on of my roommates weddings and saw most of my old roommates. That was amazing. I love them.

 

Maybe I'll blog again soon or maybe it'll keep until one of my family members reminds me to blog. Guess we'll have to wait and see.