Photo Shoot

Her best bud Bears. They fight over toys some and need their space, but other times it's just so sweet to watch them learn how to really play interactively.

Laura took these pictures for us.

This one makes me laugh. She's doing her Jack Nickleson impression.

Getting tired of taking pictures.

A final burst of energy at Laura's request, really doing her best.

Her hair just keeps getting more curly as time goes on. I wonder if when it gets long it'll straighten out. I love her blonde poof.

Mother's Day

A bit of trivia, the founder of Mother's day regretted having founded it just a few years after it became a big thing. She hated how commercialized it had become.

I feel torn about Mother's Day. I like the part where when your kids are old enough, they make you little crafts and attempt to do sweet things. But not he part where it becomes blown up into more than that.

The main thing that rubs me the wong way is the idea that mother's need to get something in return for being a mother. We tried for a year to get pregnant with Kins, and I was afraid that I might not get to experience motherhood. Getting pregnant and having kids who love me and show it every day, well, there's not a lot they could do on one day to make my life more meaningful. I'm not sure I like the idea that I should be rewarded by them for being their mother. Being a mother is something that not all women are able to do. It's something that I wanted badly, and that I'm very appreciative of.  Kids, if you're reading this in the future, a craft, a phone call, a poem, I would like any of these things. But, I'd like 'em just as well on any other day.

Kins and I putting our feet up out on the porch.

Cowboy.

I love seeing the land around the path get green.

 

One of Big Mac's favorite games. Yanking out vents and shoving himself into the holes. Another new game is pulling out kitchen chairs and using them to climb up onto the table. Then being very upset when I discourage him from doing this.

Big Mac was shoving wood chips through the holes in the steps. Kins thought it seemed pretty fun for awhile. He loved that she played his game with him.

Pics

 Didn't look very comfy, but apparently it was. Kins insisted on getting into the playpen with books during this workout and she read the whole time I worked out, while Bic Mac slept. A very enjoyable workout for me.

 

 Big Mac is always insisting on doing things that will result in falling and hurting himself if I don't catch him. He's toppled off this chair on several occasions, but still, he can't resist the allure. He looked very pleased with himself right up until I got out the camera. It would appear the danger of his situation has just occurred to him.

 Kin's enthusiasm makes me happy. After arriving at the park, "I'm sooo excited!" She wasn't lying either.

 Just finally got around to baby proofing the non toxic stuff around the house. Everything that Big Mac could get into trouble with has been baby proofed since we moved in, but I finally got tired of picking up the hurricane of items he constantly pulls out of all the drawers/cabinets. I should have done it a long time ago.

Laying on the trampoline in the back yard. There's no way to put into words how thrilled I am that the weather is getting warm.

 Pumped about finding this stick. He is a big fan of finding long pointy items and carrying them around while running unstably at top speed. I am constantly confiscating items. He's a tough one to watch. He's doing or trying to do something potentially fairly hazardous to himself at least 75% of the time.

 They like to share a tub. When given two tubs, they still share. They're really starting to be buddies, it's very sweet.

I'll end with a kin's says. After I suggested she use her kitchen stuff to "make" food in her sandbox, "That would be amazing!"

Luckily, Kins seems to be over this fear already. But, I made a joke that I immediately regretted about losing a body part, and she got very worried about making sure everyone had all body parts for several days after. I was touched that she was mostly worried about Big Mac's parts specifically. If he made a fist, she would yell, "He doesn't have a finger???" And she would quickly pry open his hand to make sure that was not the case. He fell over hard while drinking his drink and smashed his face against his cup. His mouth started pouring a mixture of blood and drink that was pretty alarming in volume. She caught a glimpse and, horrified, screamed, "He doesn't have an eye?!!" She was ok again as soon as she confirmed the eye's presence.

Big Mac had his 1 year appointment, and he has dropped in weight percentile from 50th all the way down to 10th. I knew he'd dropped, because he is looking much more slim. It's doing him favors physic wise in some ways. We used to laugh at his little bum because it blended in perfectly with his thighs, there was hardy any way to differentiate between the body parts. He lost a lot of leg fat, but kept a cute little baby bum. I am offering him a little more fatty stuff though, just to make sure I'm not starving him terribly by mostly feeding him fruit and yogurt. He is still nursing too, for another 6 months or so probably.

Big Mac learned how to play the recorder. It's so cute to see him walking all around the house blowing on the recorder, thrilled with his musical skills.

He's such a social butterfly. He begs nearly everyone he encounters to pick him up. He runs to them and wraps his arms around their legs, peering up at this with a huge grin. Often, they oblige. He gets the most self satisfied expression when that happens, it's a real thrill.

Kins is getting really good with conversation. It's so much fun to be able to talk with her better. Yesterday I explained to her that the noise she was hearing was two tree limbs rubbing together. A few hours later, she recounted the incident, explaining back to me how the noise was made, and following up by asking, "Do you remember that, Mama?"

She's potty trained for pee now. Poop has been harder. She really prefers waiting until bedtime when I put a diaper on her, and then pooping. I can usually expect to hear her calling me a few minutes after she goes to bed, "Maaaaammmaaaa, I poooooooped! CHANGE me!!" I sometimes can bribe her with toys from the garage. But, even those won't do it most of the time.

I'm 2.5 pounds away from my ultimate goal weight! I feel really good about it. I've been tracking all my calories and working out at least 6 days a week since January now. It's been hard, but it's incredibly rewarding to be almost to my goal and to have my clothes fit correctly again. I haven't been my ultimate goal weight since college. I put on a couple pounds when I got a desk job after college, then a couple more on purpose just in case that was the issue when I was trying to get pregnant with Kins. Looking forward to being able to just maintain, which seems pretty easy compared to keeping up a constant deficit.

MacKinisms

Big Mac's brain is working in overdrive. I remember it was like this with Kins at this age too, this age must be about the fastest kids ever learn. It's cool to witness. In the last few days he's learned to say uh oh, open and close, and he tries to sing twinkle twinkle. I know he's trying to sing the "up above the world so high" part when he starts repeating bup over and over in his singing voice. It's also clear that he is using dada correctly now. It's so cute, when he hears Tim he stops what he's doing, gets still and focused, and starts calling loudly, "Daaaa! Dada!" He also rushes over to Tim's office door during the day and calls for him. I thought I heard him say Kins name too, but her name is a lot trickier to say.

He has become very interesting in imitation. He sweeps with the dustpan brush, brushes his hair, throws things in the garbage (not always garbage...), tears off toilet paper and puts it in the toilet, you get the idea. He sees, he does.

Kins just about has daytime potty training perfected. She goes longer inbetween, and she doesn't usually need reminding any more. Today is the first day she has said she wants to try leaving the house without a pullup diaper on, if she manages to stay dry then I'd say she's got it down.

The past few nights Kins has been going to sleep without calling me back into her room and she's been hardly calling me into her room in the middle of the night either. Just once in the past 4 nights, pretty good. I'm dreaming that whatever fears were going on have passed.

Potty Trained and MacKinisms

Kins has been a tough one with the potty training. I have mentioned it quite a bit, offered every bribe I could think of, but not put much pressure on her. This is because I think she and I both have enough of that me pressuring her dynamic going on with getting her to eat. I didn't want to add more into our lives.

A few days ago, she asked for one of the toys in the garage that I've offered her for using the potty for months now. There were two big boxes of my old toys that my mom had brought over just waiting for her to start earning them. Like I'd done many times before, I told her that she could have it if she peed on the potty. She announced that she wanted to pee on the potty, and she did. This had happened before, she would usually lose interest in keeping it up after a couple of toys earned and she would never agree to wear underwear for more than a couple of minutes without then demanding to put her diaper back on again. This time, she wanted to wear the underwear, and she was having fun peeing every 10 minutes and then requesting another toy. She had a couple of big accidents the first day. The second day she had a couple of tiny ones, where she would realize that she was getting wet in time to stop and finish on the potty. The third day she had no accidents at all. I'm not asking her to sit on the potty as often anymore, I just remind her that she should when she needs to, and she is getting good at doing it on her own now. I'm still putting her in diapers overnight and when we go out. I think she is about ready to go out diaper free now, I will probably try it today if she wants to.

Big mac participates in kisses now. When you say kisses, he leans in, huge open mouthed smile on his face, tongue sticking out, and he slimes you.

He says I love you back. He doesn't quite have the whole phrase down, but he is close enough that I can tell he's copying saying it.

He initiates playing peek a boo. He hides behind his hands for a few seconds, then says peek a boo!

He makes himself laugh often. Lately when I'm rocking him before bed, he will blow raspberries and then start cracking up.

Kins is getting good at not throwing fits leaving places when she is having fun. For awhile, I couldn't get her out of a fun place without tears. Now, she understands the concept of being good so that she can reap the rewards by returning to said place later. She also does seem to want to make me happy, and she tries to be good for that reason too.

She started a new dance class, it has a lot more kids than her first dance class. She was overwhelmed at first, and watched from a distance sitting in my lap. She participated some of the time near the end. Not exactly doing what was asked of her... but she was with the other kids anyway. Her bff Bears is in the class too. The class is for 3-5 year olds, so they're both on the young end, but they both were clearly the least cooperative of any of the other 18 children. *sigh*