Smart Girl

Olivia LOVES to be outside.  She gets angry when I quickly go outside to throw something in the recycling or to get something from the garage, without letting her outside to play.  Yesterday was no exception.  I had put a bucket outside and closed the door before she could even get close to it.  I then grabbed some breakfast and sat at the table to eat.  It had only been a couple minutes when I see Olivia walking to me with her crocs.  She had gone through her basket of shoes and brought me a matching pair, which was quite impressive.  I picked her up and sat her on my lap, and put her crocs on because I wanted to see what she would do.  When they were on, I put her back on the ground.  She immediately walked all the way to the back door and stood there looking at me!  What a smart little girl!  I did let her outside :)

Olivia is 11 Months Old!

Olivia, you have finally done it!  A day after you turned 11 months old you finally realized that walking is a quicker way to get around than crawling.  It's exciting!  On the rare occasion that you do crawl, all you need to be told is to "stand up and walk" and you do!  It's still exciting for Nathan to see you walking, "Mom!  Olivia's walking by herself!"

You have quickly become my little daredevil child.  You are a climber.  None of your siblings were climbers, so this is new territory for me.  Your favourite thing to climb is the ladder of the bunk beds.  Yes, the bunk bed ladder.  And you do it with ease!  Your smile when you get to the top is just priceless!  You are so proud to be up there, and you love laying on Kayla's blankets and touching her stuffed animals.  Thankfully, Kayla enjoys following behind you as you ascend the ladder and doesn't get mad when you touch her stuff.  I have to try to remember to keep the bedroom door closed so that you don't have access to the ladder.  You also enjoy standing on top of the kids picnic table, standing in your high chair at Grandma's, and standing on the couch while bouncing up and down.  You are such a daredevil!  You will likely be our first child to break a bone...

You also are SO dramatic.  When you are having a meltdown you allow your body to go completely limp in my arms so that I have to lay you on the ground.

At eleven months old you weigh 22 lbs.  I love that you weigh more than Kayla did at this age because it's allowed your clothing seasons to align perfectly, even though you were born five months later in the year.

You are becoming really good at following directions.  You 100% understand when I tell you to, "spit that out of your mouth.  Yucky!"  Your favourite things to put in your mouth are rocks and magnets from our magnetic boards.

You are a great eater and are great at drinking from your sippy cup.  You LOVE fruit...especially blueberries!  I have to make sure you eat your meal before you even see your fruit because otherwise you will stick your tongue between your lips and refuse to eat more.  You only get one bottle of formula a day, right before bed.  All of your other bottles are homo milk.

You have begun to sleep through the night...it's probably about 50% of the time right now.  So nice!  I was actually sick in December from exhaustion, and then I noticed the symptoms this past week so I managed (with the help of your Grandma and Dad) to take two naps that day and so that prevented me from actually getting sick again.  A whole year of not sleeping through the night takes a toll on everybody eventually!

Your favourite thing to do is SWIM.  You don't care what the temperature of the water is...you just love to swim!

Olivia, I can't believe that you're almost one!  You're my little baby girl!  You're so determined to grow up that time is going by extra quick.  Time to start making some birthday party plans... :)

Big Changes for Us

A lot of decisions have been made this past little while for us over here.  I hate decision making, can you believe it?!?!

Change #1:
Jon applied for and got a continuing contract position with his favourite high school, which means that it's his position unless he wants a change!  Another bonus?  One of his best buddies also got a continuing contract position there, too!

Change #2:
Jon has always said that he wanted to complete his Masters of Education one day, and so we decided this past fall that he would apply and see if he could get in for this coming September.  Our theory was that the sooner he did it, the sooner we could reap some financial benefit from it.  We found out last month that he was accepted into SFU!  It's a two-year program, and so for the next two years he will be busy, and thus I will be a little more busy.

Change #3:
Jon has always been completely supportive over if I want to work, and how much I want to work.  I've always worked while on my maternity leaves, and have always returned to work after my maternity leaves.  This time, however, I did not work while on maternity leave, nor will I be returning back to work.  I knew pretty quickly after Olivia was born that I did not want to return to work for the two days a week that I had previously been working.  It wasn't an option to work for one day a week, so Jon and I decided that we will see how it goes with me not working at all.  I've been tracking our spending on a spreadsheet for the last 6.5 years, and I think we will be able to afford for me not to work until Olivia is in Kindergarten, so hopefully nothing too out of the ordinary comes up!  If I miss working too much (because we all know that I LOVE to work!) or if our finances aren't going as expected, then we'll have to figure something out.

Change #4:
In light of the above three changes, Jon and I have decided that we will not be trying for another child.  Jon has always known that he does not want any more kids, but I've had a 'head/heart' struggle.  My head tells me that having more kids is completely irrational: we have the perfect gender balance in our house, our kids are already all sharing bedrooms, our vehicle isn't as usable for a fifth child, and our finances could not handle it.  However, my heart tells me that I'm not quite ready to give up cuddling my own babies.  Nothing permanent is going to be done for a few years, just in case my heart doesn't catch up to my head, but I've already started selling our baby gear and will start with the baby clothes too.  If things change, then I can always re-buy.

**

It's really quite amazing when Jon and I look back at our married lives how God was completely behind the timing in everything that has happened.  He knew exactly when things should happen, even if we didn't and struggled because of that.  Everything from the timing of us having kids to Jon's schooling to buying our house to each of Jon's teaching placements.  It's crazy!  It makes decision making less stressful because I know that ultimately, it's not us that make the decisions anyways.  It's what has made change #4 above "easier", in a sense.  The timing with the first three changes is pushing me to trust and believe that this is what God wants for us.  Now, my heart just needs to get on board with that idea :)

Love my Kids!

 

Matthew, my "best big boy".  He is my go-to for a big hug or a big laugh.  He loves to make people laugh, and loves to laugh at people.  His laugh always puts a smile on my face.  No one can make Matthew laugh harder than Kayla can, though...and she's not even that funny!  It's must be their twin-connection or something because most of the time she's just being a little weird when he's laughing :).  Matthew loves to play games.  He doesn't care if it's a card game or a board game, if you're willing to play with him, he'll play whatever!  Matthew also loves to ride his bike.  Even after his big bike crash a month ago he wasn't afraid to get back on his bike.

Kayla, my "best big girl".  She is my mini-me, in personality.  Although she is technically our second-born, being a twin makes her have a shared first-born status...and she fills that role perfectly.  She likes things to be clean and organized.  She likes to think of good rules that would benefit our household: "Mom, how about a rule that if you are done playing with something you put it away before you play with something else?"  She loves to try on clothes, to see which are too small and which now fit (which is a fantastic quality because her wardrobe is 96% second-hand so we get them bags at a time).  When she has a melt-down, she absolutely loses it.  Her melt-downs rattle everyone because 99.999% of the time she is a great kid.

Nathan, my "best little boy".  He is my go-to for sarcasm.  He also likes to think things through and asks a lot of questions, which is also just the stage of development he is at.  Ever since my brother got married on the May long weekend Nathan has been talking about weddings and who he can and cannot marry.  He first wanted to marry Olivia, but I said no, because she is his sister.  He asked about Kayla, and I said no, because she is his sister, too.  I said he had to meet a different girl, when he was bigger.  He asked if he could marry me, because I'm a bigger girl.  I said no, because Daddy already married me.  "Did he give you your rings?" he asked.  

Olivia, my "best little girl".  She is trouble.  She is very independent and does not require much attention from me at all.  She likes to test her abilities, to see what she can and cannot do, but is also cautious and so she hasn't had too many big falls yet.  She completely knows how to walk, but usually chooses to crawl instead of walk so she is not a "walker" just yet.  She hates strangers, so please, don't say hi to her if you happen to see us because she will scream in fear.  She loves me though, and that's all that matters :).  She has slept through the night 5 of the last 6 nights so I think she's going to be completely done with that middle-of-the-night bottle soon!  I think I will miss it, though.  Not much beats rocking in a rocking chair with your baby.

Nathan is 32 Months Old!

Oh, Nathan.  You are so cute, yet you are so frustrating.

The most exciting news first:  You've learned how to ride a two-wheeler!  You've just learned how to start yourself, but I would still like to practice that more before assuming you can always do it.  Now you just have to learn how to use your pedal brakes rather than stopping with your feet!

Potty training is still an on-going thing.  I think it's myself that is trained to get you on the toilet at regular intervals, because if I don't, then you pee in your underwear.  Correction, you pee in your pull-up.  I gave up on having you wear underwear because you were having far too many accidents and it was stressing me out.  Now, if (when) you do have an accident it's not a big clean-up deal for me.  You are not even close to being poo-trained.  It doesn't even bother you when you've gone in your pull-up.  You don't even stop playing to do it!  I've tried to think of ways to convince you to at least tell me when you've gone but I haven't been successful of finding one yet.  You are so different than Matthew and Kayla!  On the bright side, when asked/told to, you are very independent at going to the bathroom.  You only use a toilet now, too.

Other than being frustrating with toilet training, you are a fantastic kid.  You love to make people laugh by teasing them.  You say things like:

"You're the best day ever, Mom!"
"You're the best little boy ever, Mom!"  (Because I always tell him he is my best little boy.)
"I'm sorry...I'm being Jackson, Mom."  (Said to make fun of his cousin who is super polite.)
"Grandma's the best!"  (Because he knows that I give him a hard time for not saying me!)

You love to sing, especially your ABCs.

You like demand to be fed by me (ie. I put your food in your mouth for you), but are fully capable of doing it yourself because you usually take over half-way through the meal.

With the hot weather and busy days spent outside, you often fall asleep in the car on our drive home in the afternoon.  Once a week you'll continue to sleep on the couch for a bit, but either way, you always ask for a sippy cup of apple juice to drink before you get off and play.  It's like when you napped: you always had a sippy cup of apple juice as soon as you woke up.

If you wake up in the middle of the night you like for me to lay in your bed with you.  You even have an extra pillow on your bed, just for me.

You love to give me hugs and kisses.  Every single time I pull up your pull-up you hug and kiss me.  Every. Single. Time.  I hope you don't outgrow it!

When you smile, your eyes twinkle/shine.  I can't help but not smile when you are smiling.

You have a great relationship with Matthew and Kayla.  Considering you guys make for an odd-numbered group, you usually play very well together.  You even are given the chance to lead the play, too.  Your favourite thing to play right now is 'Babies'.  Matthew is the "Dada", Kayla is the "Mama" and you are "Baby".  You also love Olivia, dearly.  You often are in her bubble which drives her bonkers (and so it's drives me bonkers, too!), but you mean well and that's what matters.