Happy birthday, Penny Jane!

Ahhh, how things change.

Penny's first birthday:

Penny's second birthday:

Last year we were hunting for sunscreen for the guests. Today we were making sure our pants were tucked into our boots so we didn't get snow in them.

We had a party planned for today, but because of the snowstorm we had to cancel it. Most of the guests were coming from either Denver or Colorado Springs, and snow accumulation here are really unpredictable; we didn't want any of our guests to get stranded on their way home. So the party is rescheduled for Wednesday, and today we just had our own little family celebration. PJ chose a double fudge cake and pink vanilla icing with sprinkles, and the girls helped me bake them, of course:

I'm not sure what made the difference, but WOW were the super light and fluffy. They were so airy that we ended up with 36 mini cupcakes and 23 regular sized ones! And I even forgot to follow the high altitude directions; usually when I do that they sink in the middle and are really dense. Weird.

After they were all out, we headed outside to frolic in the snow:

It was really nice out, despite the fact that it was still snowing. It must have been hovering just at 32* because part of the driveway was already melted and the snow actually packed! No powder! So that means we got to build a real snowman:

After I'd frosted them, I let Penny Jane decorate with the sprinkles. It was so cute watching her apply them tiny finger-pinch's-worth at a time:

And then, of course, this evening we did the candle and singing:

She blew out the candle all by herself on the second try!

So now I have a two year old. It's already proving to be a very different experience this time around. She is just *more* than Abby was in a lot of ways, behavior-wise. She's already throwing tantrums, already much more feisty than Abby was at this age. Three was the tough year for Abby. I think it's going to be this year with PJ. But with a face that cute:

giving you kisses (and occasionally licking you) how bad can it possibly be?

The Sensory Room

It was recommended to us by the folks at the STAR Center that PJ (and Abby, too) be enrolled in a gym class of some kind because muscle input can help with sensory issues. We looked into them and realized we'd be spending around $100 a month if both of them took classes, and that just seemed a little nuts. So we started thinking about it and doing a little research, and decided to build our own sensory room in the basement.

The STAR Center gave us a ton of handouts and recommendations for stuff to put down there. Jumping is a big help with sensory stuff, so we decided to go all out. For PJ's birthday we bought this:

Needless to say, this has been a big hit today.

And speaking of PJ, her language is growing by leaps and bounds. This is a conversation she had with Dan after her first round in the bouncy house. Dan was in the kitchen making a snack, and PJ was sitting on the floor watching TV. Out of nowhere she says...

P: I love my bouncy house daddy!

D: You do?

P: Ya! Thank you daddy.

D: You’re welcome darling.

P: Daddy hugs?

D: You want a hug?

P: Uhh. (This is her version of yes.)

D: Of course honey.

[wonderful hugging]

P: Happy Birthday daddy.

D: Well, it’s your birthday honey. Happy Birthday to you. Your birthday is Friday.

P: We have a party?

D: Sure we’ll have a party.

P: Hats?

D: You want hats?

P: Uhh.

D: Sure. I think we can find some hats.

P: Thank you daddy.

*melt*

The post in which I brag about how awesome my kids are

The girls are sick, again. Just colds again, thankfully--with PJ's exacerbated by some heinous teething--but regardless we've been sticking close to home to avoid spreading germs. I've been trying to take the kids out to places with indoor play areas at least once a week, but this week that obviously didn't happen. Both them and I were starting to get some serious cabin fever, so today I decided to figure out something we could do.

Normally if I'm looking for somewhere to go get a treat and hang out for a bit, we'll go to Crowfoot Valley. They've got a nice little back room with couches and toys, and the girls love going there. But again, because of the germs I didn't want to bring them there and have their snotty hands all over the toys. So instead I decided we'd bring our entertainment with us and go downtown to Dazbog. We packed up their backpacks--PJ's adorable ladybug one with the Nintendo DS and Abby's big-girl one with her Bugsby and book and her magnet dress-up bears. All three are toys that can each play, and they can both play with the bears at the same time, so I figured these would keep them both happy for at least half an hour.

We got drinks and muffins (one blueberry and one lemon poppyseed, yummy!) and set up camp in the back corner. Unfortunately, the only spot left with armchairs that actually had arms was right next to a lady sitting at a table doing a Bible study. I was worried we'd be distracting, so I pointed her out to the girls and we talked about how hard it is to think straight when kids are being loud. I figured if we had to leave, then at least we'd gotten out and gotten a treat and seen the light of day for once.

The girls hopped up into the two armchairs and took their plates on their laps. They both sat and ate for five solid minutes, looking around silently and occasionally drinking their little cups of water that I'd tucked next to them in the seats. When they were done, we swept up the crumbs (someone needs to invent a pocket-sized Dustbuster, I would totally get one) and got out their toys, and for the next HOUR they played quietly, sometimes together but mostly on their own, and they required so little from me that I was actually able to concentrate enough to work on learning a new crochet stitch. At one point the lady looked behind her at the girls, then looked at me and said, "They are so good!" I was so proud of them!

When it was time to go, there was no complaining, no pouting or tears. They helped me clean up, waited patiently while I gathered our trash and cleaned up their seats again (muffins are so darn CRUMBLY!), and followed me out like little baby ducklings. Into the car without a struggle, and home we came.

On the way to Dazbog I started wondering if I was nuts. Sick kids aren't known for their good behavior. Sick two- and four-year-olds are especially challenging when they're under the weather. But wow. I was so impressed and proud--and relieved. This opens up a whole new set of places we can go to get out of the house for a while. Suddenly all the days that we can't go out to 'kid places' don't seem to daunting.

Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum

(My apologies on the giant images--I'm taking them straight from the web since I can't download them to my computer, and no matter how I set the parameters they keep coming up this way. Sorry!!)


When we were here on vacation last January, Dan and I went on a drive with the girls one afternoon to sightsee in the mountains. We stopped in Golden, a little town with a quaint historic main street that holds restaurants, an indie bookstore, and one of only six quilt museums in the country, the Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum.


It might not sound that exciting, but wow, these are absolutely beautiful works of art. They have a permanent collection of over 300 quilts, and lots of temporary exhibits, like their current one, "Wranglers Among Us", which is made up of quilts made by men, from retirees to high school students. It's a small place, basically just one big room, with about twenty quilts on display (at least right now), but I could have stayed there for an hour. Unfortunately, we barely made it 30 minutes because the girls were not quite as enamored with the quilts as Dan and I were. (Sorry there aren't any pictures, they don't allow photography in the museum.)

Across the street and down the block is the Golden Quilt Company, a sweet little fabric shop with tons of beautiful fabric and quilts for sale on the walls. Between that store and the museum I was pretty darn inspired--inspired enough to let Abby choose her own pack of fat quarters to buy so she can start her very first sewing project. Hopefully we'll have lots of pictures of that to post someday soon!

Our morning adventure ended with a dead car battery that Dan successfully jumped in the midst of snow flurries with a booster pack he bought ages ago as part of our car emergency kit. Boy was I thankful for his foresight! (And for a product that did what it was supposed to with zero fuss.) Three cheers for handy husbands!

We definitely want to go back in the spring when the weather is a little warmer so we can wanders the main street and check out the museum again--WITHOUT the girls, if possible. Or at least with girls who aren't teething and whining about how hungry they are. :)

Abby is reading!!

What's really funny about all this is that, in the two days before this happened, I read two separate articles about children learning to read. They were both talking about how direct instruction of reading isn't always necessary, and that merely providing children with answers to their questions about language (what letter is that, what is that word, what sound does that letter make) and reading to them as much as possible will, in most instances, lead to the child learning to read herself.

And she did--in OfficeMax, of all places.

We were waiting for a fax to send, and the girls were wandering around the copy center area. The trash can was labeled TRASH, and Abby went over, looked at it, and sounded out, "T-R-A-S-H." We haven't done any letter stuff at all in weeks, so this came seemingly out of nowhere. "Good job," I said. "But when we see an S and an H together, they make a new sound, SH."

Abby looked at the letters again. "T-R-A-SH."

"That's right," I said, thinking she would move on to something else now. But instead, she sounded them out again, faster, but with the sounds all still separated. But then she stood up a little straight and said, "Oh--trash. Trash!!!"

After dinner that night, we started writing more words. Or, more accurately, *she* started writing them as I spelled them out for her, and then she'd sound them out. We did all the three-letter "ap" words (cap, sap, zap, etc.) and a few "ob" words (Bob, cob). Then tonight she asked to do more, so we did a few "at" words before she got bored and wanted to move on. But tonight's words came much more quickly and easily to her--she ran the sounds together much more readily.

She is so proud of herself, and I must admit I got a little teary watching my little baby read. On top of all this is the fact that we've started doing a children's catechism with her in the evenings, and she's already memorized all the answers to the first seven questions. That little sponge of a mind is working overtime these days!

Updates!

Sorry it's been a while, folks! Here are some updates...

PENNY JANE:
Oh, the talking! I think she's going to grow up to be a commentator. When we watch TV she talks about what's going on, constantly points thing out to you. "Awwww, baby! See? Sleeping. Awww. Cute. Look, Mama! Sad! Crying. Awww." On and on. It's hilarious. Though if you don't really look at the TV, and just sort of "Mm-hm" to her, she gets mad.

We get lots of spontaneous hugs with "I love you." (Though it's actually "I choo Mom." Yes. She calls me Mom. She's way too young to be saying that!)

She can count to ten now, though when she's counting "1, 2, 3, surprise!" she still says "1, 2, 1".

I think she's getting her two year molars. The last two days she's had four episodes of uncontrollable crying and furious screaming. Not fun, especially when it's 10:30 at night. :( I went to GentleChristianMothers.com to post and ask what was wrong, and found a post from someone else saying almost exactly the same thing. Everyone responded saying it sounded like 2 year molars. So out came the Motrin and we got a decent night's sleep.

The eating thing is still a problem. Sometimes she does really well trying lots of different kinds of foods, but then she'll go on a jag of only nursing and eating Cheerios. *sigh* Though she recently discovered clementine oranges, and holy cow, she LOVES them. Seriously addicted. She'll say, "Orangie?" and go crazy if I tell her no. (She adds "ie" to the end of everything. We're guilty of doing this with some words--sockies is a common one--but she tacks it on to everything. Nosie. Facie. Orangie.) She will "juice" each little section in her mouth, then cram the leftover pulp into her cheek. She had TWO ORANGES stuffed in there the other day. I told her she had to spit some out so she wouldn't choke and she got all mad and refused to--until she started gagging. Stinker.

She's still in therapy--group therapy now, one of four children, and she does really well. I'm always impressed by how well she participates and how unconcerned she is that I leave her there. WE're still waiting for the insurance to make up their minds about whether or not they'll bill the clinic with in-network pricing or not. If they don't then we'll be switching to the free therapy through the state. Please pray we're able to continue at the clinic.

She's getting very independent. She insists on at least trying to do things herself. She can peel her orange halfway on her own, she can put on her socks (Abby still can't do that!) and can almost zip her jacket (that either!). And she copies everything Abby says, which is sometimes cute and sometimes incredibly annoying. And she sings! On key! It's adorable.

ABBY:
Abby sings all the time, nowhere on key, but still extremely cute. She has a great imagination, and is constantly engaging in little games of pretend and talking to herself. Very cute. She doesn't dance as much as she used to, but she still does now and then. The rec center has a new kind of dance class, a creative movement class that is much more unstructured and focused on just having fun with dance. I'm going to enroll her in it soon and hopefully that will give her a more positive class experience than she had with the ballet class.

We've cut way back on the paci--it stays in bed about 90% of the time and she's learning to get through bouts of upsettedness without it, though she doesn't like to. But her teeth have already shifted where they were misplaced by the paci, so that's encouraging.

She still talks about missing California, and liking our house back there better than this one. We're joining two new playgroups, and I'm really praying we'll meet some kids in those that she enjoys (and whose moms I like). Chloe is still her favorite friend, and we try to see them every couple weeks. We met her and her family at the museum Wednesday night for a special members-only night and had a great time. It was the first time Dan had been there, and we ended up finding a whole new section that Christina and I had never gone into with the kids. We had a great time, and the girls were, as always, not happy about having to part company. If only they didn't leave 50 minutes away!

She asks questions all the time. When we're driving, she'll ask what every sign says, where every other car on the road is going, why we're turning here, why aren't we going that way. Sometimes it's fun--we get to explain all sorts of things. Sometimes it's annoying, like when it's the same question she's asked for the last ten car rides. I have to keep reminding myself that this age learns best with and is most comfortable with repetition.

Recently Dan, PJ, and I all had the stomach flu. Abby somehow managed to escape it, and my parents took her one afternoon to give us a break while we were feeling miserable. They took her out for lunch and kept her through dinner until bedtime, and she did *great*. Didn't ask for us once! I knew the day would come eventually. :) Now if we could just get PJ weaned, Dan and I might actually get some time to ourselves!

Abby's first haircut!

Some of you have heard/read my complaints about how our stupid carpet sheds little fibers that end up in drifts all over the house, as well as settling into the bottom of Abby's curls. It usually takes me about 20 minutes to comb her hair out after a bath, because of all the fibers tangled in it--and that's AFTER spending a good five minutes pulling out whatever I can before she even gets in the tub. VERY frustrating for both of us. Well, either from my finger nails constantly scraping through her hair to get the fibers out, or because of the shampoo we use, or because she's never gotten her hair cut at all, the bottom bit of her hair in the back was just fried. So when I went in for a cut on my birthday, I lamented to my awesome stylist Alisha, and she said to bring her in and she'd trim the back for free!

So I took Abby in last week, and she sort of freaked out. But Alisha, being totally awesome, totally backed off and offered to take us on a tour of the spa. (The salon is part of an Aveda day spa in downtown Castle Rock.) We were the only people there at 9 in the morning, so she took us all over--through the locker room, through the nail salon where the girls played on the big massaging chairs, through the massage rooms, and then down to the salon to play on the twirly chairs. Abby loosened up a bit during the tour, and when we got back downstairs I really thought she'd go for it. But she didn't. So Alisha made a deal with her. She gave her two of the plastic claw clips they use to pin your hair up when it's long, and told her we could play salon at home until her next appointment, and when she came back she could trade in the clips for some nail polish. Brilliant.

So since then we've played salon, using our playsilks as capes and pinning each other's hair up with the clips and pretending to cut. (Though I actually did cut Abby's hair at one point just to show her it doesn't hurt, since she refused to believe me). And then today we gave it another shot. And it worked! Granted I bribed her with a trip to the coffeeshop for a muffin if she cooperated--I really need to stop doing that.

So when we got there Alisha surprised Abby with one of those washcloths that's all compressed into a little cube. She let us come into the back room where they mix hair color and stuff, and Abby got to sit on a stool and play in the big sink while the washcloth hydrated.



Then we went back to Alisha's station and Abby decided she wanted to stand, while holding my hand, and that I should be the one wearing the cape. So that's what we did! PJ sat on another chair and played with Abby's Nintendo DS the whole time. And when I went to take pictures, Abby was content to play with her new washcloth.



When we were done Alisha admitted she'd forgotten the nail polish, but I promised Abby we'd go down the street to Walgreen's and pick some up. (We did. Hot pink. With sparkles. I'll be sure to get a picture of her nails up soon.) So, knowing she was promised both nail polish and a muffin from the coffeeshop, Abby was calm despite Alisha's blunder.



(Note PJ with the comb--I think she wanted a cut too, actually.)

So when we were there last week Alisha recommended cutting off about 2 inches. When we went in today and she got a better look, she recommended more, given just how damaged it was. It was growing in a V--very long in the middle, and tapering up towards the sides. After promising me the curls wouldn't disappear if she cut off that much, she ended up cutting it even with the shortest pieces that were still in the back. If I'd been thinking I'd have gotten a "Before" picture so you had a good comparison, but I didn't--you know Abby and pictures, they're nearly impossible to get. But just look at how long it still is (and how curly still!) after about THREE inches were removed from the longest pieces:



So now she's got some quality shampoo that should last us quite a while, and I'm praying we'll be done with the carpet-covered curls now that the ends aren't so frazzled that they'll snag anything that floats by them in the air. I can't wait to see how it grows now that it's all even and healthy!