Three and a half

As tedious as I find these updates, I know someday I will appreciate them.

Hair:
Their hair is slowly getting longer. I am not going to cut it again until it has the chance to get long. They have started letting me put it in ‘bunches’ and will tolerate some hair clips although they usually pull them out and lose them. Emma is always talking about my hair and wants hair like mine. Her hair is darkening up again this winter but it is still gold and I now have my doubts that it will ever be really dark. Leah’s hair isn’t as curly as Emma’s and it looks longer. Her hair is dark but it has a lot of red in it. I have started using adult shampoo/conditioner on them and I find their hair much more manageable. They both like it when I blow dry their hair and Leah’s has expressed interest in the flat iron…

Teeth:
They are getting much better at brushing their teeth. John got them Cinderella and Arielle electric toothbrushes and they have been a big hit. At Halloween they learned about getting holes in their teeth from eating too much candy and the idea has stuck with them and they rarely protest anymore.

Sleep:
I had them napping again in the summer but they were going to bed later and later. The week before school started we took away their naps completely, It was a rough week but they quickly settled into a new fall routine and a 7pm bedtime. They actually started going to sleep pretty quickly which made a huge difference in everyone’s life - especially Claire because she was able to go to bed in peace. John and I got some evening downtime again for the first time in months.

Things were going well and they were sleeping til 7:30am pretty consistently and then the clocks changed and it all broke. They started getting up before 6 and only recently have they started occasionally sleeping past 7am again. We put a digital clock in their room and told them they could not come out til 7am. We have messed with it but only by 30mins.

Toilet:
They night trained by accident one night when John forgot to put pullups on them. With the night training came screams of “I HAVE TO GO PEE” in the wee hours of the morning. It was tempting to pull up train them again but instead we stopped letting them take sippy cups to bed. It worked well. Every once in awhile we get woken up with “I’M THIRSTY” but it’s not that often.

I don’t remember the last time they had an accident. They go at school and the Y no problem.

In December we had issues with Leah holding her poop again. Thankfully we have  learned enough about that child’s bowels that we can fix her if we’re patient. I need to send a letter to Senokot with my appreciation of their product!

Eating:
Emma has turned into a very good eater. She likes a wide variety of fruits and vegetables in addition to meat, bread and dairy. Although Alphaghetti is hands down her favourite food, it is not hard to get a well balanced diet into her.

Leah on the other hand is really bad at fruits and vegetables. Her hands down favourite is…tuna. She has gone off bananas and lately will only eat applesauce. She will eat baby carrots and corn without fuss. The other stuff is deemed ‘yucky’ or ‘disgusting’ and there is lots of resistance. I try my best not to fight with her about it but I will admit it is really, really frustrating. While Emma is a good eater, if Leah declares her dinner disgusting, Emma usually agrees out of some twisted sisterly love. And then Claire refuses to eat. Those are the fun nights. I have bought a book on adding pureed vegetables to everyday cooking and I am getting some of it into them.

The are getting good at eating the main course and for the most part they eat what we eat.

Language/Imagination:
They can express pretty much whatever they want now. Sometimes they still get caught in the crying/screaming stupidity but they quickly recover when I remind them that I’m not listening til they use their big girl voice.

All our focus on manners has paid off and they are good at saying please, thank you, pardon me, and excuse me when they want someone’s attention. They are still working out that excuse me doesn’t mean instant attention.

Their imaginations are really fun these days. They make up stories and role play. They still prefer playing with each other over their toys. Their best stories come when you ask them what the dream about. Emma in particular gets very animated when she tells a story and feeds off your reaction. It’s pretty cute.

Getting Around:
 I wanted to write my dad’s observation that Emma runs like an athlete and Leah runs like a girl. Amusing but accurate.

The drop in they go to at the Y is usually gym time. They have a bouncy castle, mazes, all sorts of sports stuff, trikes, scooters etc, etc etc. It’s all about running around and I think it has been great for burning off winter energy. It has also been good for Leah and in watching her I notice that she is much more confident and coordinated than she was when she started.

Independence:
Emma is miss independent unless she’s in a needy mood. She can dress herself, go to the bathroom herself and always wants to try everything out herself before she wants help.

Until very recently Leah was happy enough having everything done for her. She would dawdle getting her coat on knowing I would just do it for her in the end because we needed to go. Recently she has started to want to do things herself.

Personalities:
I just read what I wrote when they were 3 and not much has changed.

The one big change since they were 3 is that they now hang out with kids their own age 4-5 times a week. Preschool has done wonders for them. While Emma had a really rough start, she has adjusted fine and overcome a lot of her shyness in new situations or around bigger kids. Just the other day one of her teachers was saying that Emma will now sit beside the little boy that tackled her and she has even told me that he was her friend. The thing that I was most proud of her for was that once I told her that the little boy didn’t have words and was just frustrated she accepted that and even started defending him when Leah called him naughty.

They have both done well adjusting to their teachers. I was worried that Leah might have a hard time with authority but after her I only want a yellow cup stupidity she has settled down and now understands that isn’t how it works. They love all their teachers but Erika is their favourite.

School has also introduced them to the concept of friends beyond each other. They were both quite taken with two little boys in their class but one of them stopped going after xmas so now they have both settled on one little boy. According to the little boy’s mom he talks about them all the time. He lives right up the street from us and I’m sure we’ll have to have him over soon. When I found out he lived near us I remember Leah trying to convince her blind mom she’d seen him across the street on Halloween night and me humouring her…

They both seem to have a thing for older boys and they can get quite silly about it. They laugh and giggle and hang on every word. We don’t really play with many older girls so I’m sure (this is what I tell John) that it is just an older kid thing!

Playing/sharing:
For the most part they play really well together. Considering they are always together, they don’t fight all that much and are never ‘mad’ at each other for more than 1 minute. I find the biggest problem is that as they get older I have a harder and harder time listening to them fight. Growing up pretty much an only child I have no experience with just how easy it is to push your sibling’s buttons. It makes me want to scream. I can’t even imagine what it will be like when Claire gets in on it.

We’ve let them have princess stuff and they do spend somedays in costume. I refuse to get the shoes and they both improvise by walking around on their toes because they have ’shoes with sticks at the back’

We aren’t doing as many crafts at home since they do them at school. Both girls love to colour and they can now draw simple pictures. I need to scan more of their drawings since the detail is different with each passing week. They know all their letters and can spell their names and write words if I tell them the letters. We have started working on sounding out simple words and they are starting to learn some words by sight.  

They can count no problem and are ok with number recognition but the interest isn’t there just like it wasn’t with letters awhile back. I now just accept that they won’t learn something until they want to and it’s not worth the frustration of trying to teach them. They can do simple math if it involves treats or timbits- they know if they each get two how many I need to order and then can figure out how many if I wanted two etc. See what I mean about motivation

They know all their colours and have picked up (maybe at school) that you can mix colours to get new colours. They know all the days of the week (and which days their daddy stays home) as well as the months that have passed since they’ve been in school. They have learned quite a bit at school and should be well prepared for kindergarten. Did I mention that I enrolled them…and that I’m separating them?

And thanks to Dora they know their colours, can count to ten and know quite a few new words…all in spanish. I’m sorry that I was mean to you Dora. I should have been more focused on Disney.

That’s all I can think of for now. There’s lots more but I’ll just get this up so it’s not forgotten!

 

Catdoor fun

Another one from before Christmas. Claire giggling away.

 

Carwash

This was taken on Dec 1st on the way home from John’s work party. It was the first time we’d taken them through a carwash and since I had the camera handy I decided to catch their reaction.

 

Sweetness

Napping for Dad

 

Jack and Jill

Tonight after dinner Emma and Leah decided they were Jack (Leah) and Jill (Emma). Claire was their kitty - named kitty. For an hour they ran around downstairs herding their kitty and going up the hill to fetch a pail of water… As usual we were not allowed to call any of them by their real names.

 John brought them up to bed and they decided that Jack and Jill had to sleep in the same bed. They have slept in bed together before, but this is the first time it has been premeditated. There was no talking them out of it.

Jack and Jill

 

Claire - 1 year

I can’t believe how fast these kids grow. It seems like just yesterday that I was 37 weeks pregnant and coming back from my ob appt with a scheduled c section. I still find myself saying her birthday is Jan 9th - I don’t think I ever quite wrapped my brain around that last minute change of dates. I will never forget that feeling of panic that came over me when the nurse called at 10pm on Saturday night to tell me they’d changed the date to Monday morning. It is nice that all three girls were born on Monday mornings within 2 hours of each other. It will be easy to remember in my old age!

I also remember the drive to the hospital that morning. It was warm and pouring with rain and I was relieved that it wasn’t snowing. John and I were nervous but still talking about names. I knew it was a girl and I had been waffling about Kate for months. We both really liked Kate but there was some concern over our last name. The week before we were back to Claire and on the drive it was decided. For boys I agreed to Lucas. The other name was Aidan but I thought it was too popular. 

Then there was that lady in labour in the assessment room, me puking during the spinal and finally the somewhat surreal section birth of Claire. After that we spent our 4 luxurious days enjoying a full term baby at what we called the North York Hilton and then came home to our family of 5.

Having a full term baby brought many experiences we never knew we’d missed with her sisters. I know I’ve said this before but I remember a NICU nurses telling me that the one nice thing about preemies is that they’re babies for a little bit longer. This is definitely true with Claire. I look back at the pictures and she’s always looked the same. I had a hard time ordering her pictures for her 1 year album! She did everything (except eat…and sleep) when she was supposed to and it has all seemed to go by so quickly.

This coming year will bring about many more changes. I am starting to realize that we haven’t yet experienced what it will really be like with three kids quite yet. Once Claire can talk and have an opinion (…and whine), things are going to be interesting for everyone. Here’s hoping she’s an easy going toddler!

Hair:
Light brown with lots of copper in it. Getting longer and scruffier. If I had to guess, she’ll have wavy hair like Leah’s.

Teeth:
She got two more bottom teeth this month for a total of 8 - 4 on the top and bottom. She does pretty well with teething and once again I didn’t even know she was teething til they were cut. She does get a diaper rash when her teeth come in.

Size:
Weight: 19lbs3ozs
Height 28.5 inches

Eating:
She continues to be on the schedule I posted last month although her bedtime is sometimes a bit later depending on her naps. The antibiotics she was on and the pain meds tend to wind her up so we have to make sure we give them to her well before bedtime or else it can be a late bedtime.

She is still taking 2 bottles through the night but every so often she only has one and we get our hopes up. She can’t seem to go more than 8 hours without food and I’ve tried giving her more during the day or settling her without a bottle in the night but no go. Maybe if it were just Claire I would try harder but she gets very angry and I start to think she’ll wake the neighbours up nevermind her sisters.

She is still not overly excited about food. She’ll eat up all her mush now but she’s very skeptical of anything solid that isn’t bread and will just sweetly pick it up and drop it on the floor. Her 1st bday cupcake and cake were dropped on the floor even after she tried the icing.

Sleeping:
Well she made it to a year without sleeping through the night. Her longest stretch was 7 hours and required soother help.

She is an extremely light sleeper. I’m not sure how that happened since she slept in the middle of the action for the first part of her life. She can do without sleep and if there’s something better going on she wants no part of sleeping.

She is geting better about settling at night but we have to wait til she’s tired. If she plays happily on the ground then she’s not ready. The minute she does the stiff leg when you try and put her down or crawls after you trying to climb your leg you know she’s ready.

She’s usually pretty good about settling after she eats in the night. Every once in awhile she’ll be up for 2 hours in the night (yes, it’s always 2 hours). She is happy and wants to play but usually she poops or teeth come in a couple of days later so there is usually a reason. She’s just really not a whiner about not feeling well - if only it lasts into her toddler years. 

Napping is going well in the morning. In the afternoon she naps when we’re in the car.

She is still in our bed although don’t worry Mom, things have changed in her 13th month.

Getting Around:
She is really steady on her feet now and can bend over and pick things up as well as get back down gracefully. She can stand on her own and clap and dance without losing her balance. She can’t stand up on her own, she lets go from a standing position. She has taken a couple of steps but she’s not steady enough for walking solo. She can walk holding on to just one of your hands and when you give her both hands you can feel she’s just using your fingers for comfort rather than for balance.

I finally let her on the stairs and now she’s a speed climber. She loves stairs and we have to be very careful about the gate because she’s quiet until she gets to the top and starts giggling.

Things she’s saying:
It is safe to say that she can say 5 things and her mom won’t be getting her put into speech therapy. Actually, I am thankful for the experience I had with the NICU follow up clinic with Leah and Emma. I feel totally confident that I could flag an issue for the first 2 years of development. Unfortunately, I don’t have the same confidence in the 2 min checkup we get at the doctor but then maybe that’s because they also get the sense that I know what I’m doing.

My favourite thing she does this month is sing (ahhhhhh) on command. It’s pretty cute. She also started calling John’s mom Nana over Christmas and then called my mom nana as well when she was here. She also says Emma but I don’t think it’s specific - she yells it when she can hear her sisters but can’t get to them. She can say backpack (E and L are always talking about backpacks) and baby (baba) and dance (dan dan). She just comes up with random things everyday like ny ny for good night. So far it seems the constant chatter is helping her rather than hindering her speech.

Fun things she did this month:
-taking care of the baby. Giving it the soother, hugging and kissing it, and patting it to comfort it.
-Dancing. She gets pretty into it and bops up and down if she’s on her bum or bounces if she’s standing. She waves her hands and squeals “dan dan”
-trying to walk and taking a couple steps. She is so proud of herself and loves the attention we all give her when she tries.
-talking on the phone, pointing the remote at the tv before she presses all the buttons
-There are so many things she can do now. It’s like she just went from baby to toddler all in one month.

Personality:
One year later and Claire is still a happy and easy going baby. She has started the frustration cry but it passes quickly. We are now also able to hurt her feelings - if my tone is too sharp with her she pouts her lip and starts to sob. It’s hard not to laugh at her.

She is a very social baby and adjusts well to new people and surroundings. She continues to go into her weekly 2 hours of daycare with no issues. They love here there and they are always saying what a nice little baby she is.

She is extremely stubborn and hard to sidetrack. If we are somewhere that has stairs she will be on them or trying to get to them for the entire visit. She gets increasingly annoyed when I move her but then she figures out that silently finding the stairs is the best strategy to try and trick me.

She loves her sisters and they continue to be very good to her even now that she really messes with their stuff. They sing to her and try and make her laugh. We have had no jealousy issues and if all goes well we can keep this streak alive. The will say things like Daddy will play with them and Claire can play with me so that might be interesting. I am still number one with baby Claire…I think I might have another couple of months tops until the daddy adoration starts.

 

Rick Mercer

John and I went to see a taping of Rick Mercer Report last Friday. I took an early train into the city and we went for a nice meal and then to the taping. I had been looking forward to my big night out in the city since October and it didn’t disappoint.

It’s on tonight if anyone is interested. There was a funny segment on him doing the Polar Bear dip in Lake Ontario on New Year’s Day. It was at the park on the lake in Oakville where we take the girls in the summer.

 

Happy 1st Birthday Claire

Claire was one last Tuesday. We’ve had a busy week celebrating and enjoying her…and taking my usual 400 pictures that now have to be sorted.

My mom is here so on her actual birthday we decided to take the three of them to Ikea. It was a nice warm day so I didn’t start the van before loading all three of them. It wouldn’t start. I called Ford roadside and 45 mins later the truck arrived and revived the battery. As instructed, I let it run for 30 mins then turned it off since we weren’t ready to go. We then loaded up the girls again (do you see where this is going?) and of course it didn’t start again. I spent the afternoon of Claire’s 1st birthday getting towed to the dealer and then begging them to fix it quickly so we could take her out. No luck, it was in overnight. They had no car that could take 3 carseats so I got a loaner Focus, picked her up a birthday cupcake and then went home. Thankfully she had no clue. Her sisters were a little bummed they didn’t get an Ikea cinnamon bun but the excitement of Mr Ford coming to wake up the car and then tow it away was enough to keep them laughing.

When John got home from work she got her cupcake. She enjoyed smearing it in her hair more than eating it. Leah and Emma then helped her open and play with her gifts. She refused to go to bed at 7pm and was up til 10pm with what I thought was a sugar rush.

The next day she had her 1 year appt. She got weighed (just over 19lbs) and measured and then he checked her over before giving her the shot. Turns out she had an ear infection. It explained a lot of her recent sleeping and clingy habits. Poor thing. She can’t get her shot until her ear is cleared but she screamed bloody murder just getting looked at. Even the dr commented on how she was out of sorts compared to her usual sunny disposition. I think he remembers her from when she tags along for her sisters appts. Claire has never liked that paper they put on the examining table. 

I had my internal debate over antibiotics for the usual 3 mins and then picked up the prescription. She’s still pulling her ear alot and is not entirely back to happy. We’ve figured out pain meds wind her up so she gets them at dinner time rather than before bed.

We had a small family party for her on Saturday. She did really well. I remember when the girls were one I was so worried about them missing their nap and being disasters. Claire got a bit tired after lunch but she had a bottle and rallied. She finally passed out around 4pm for an hour and then was right back into party mode.

Her 1 year update is first on my list.

She’s really interested in standing on her own and taking steps.

Bye bye van.

Smearing cake

Great Auntie Bonnie’s cake

Party of five

Claire and the fam

Starting to work out this present thing

 

Happy New Year

Being the boring parents of three that we are, John and I decided to invite a few of our university friends over for New Years Eve celebrations. We had planned on spending the evening with Coby, Carrie and Ronan and I waffled on inviting our other friends. My main sticking point was that I had no intentions of being awake as the clock struck midnight. Finally I just sent out an invite and with brutal honesty told our friends they had to be out of our house at 10pm so I could go to bed. Surprisingly people came and those that didn’t were either out of  town or suffering from pink eye.

We had a nice and relaxing evening. At some random time just before 8pm we put on a fake New Years for the kids. They all thought it was fun.

I have written a few of these New Years posts. Every year I go back and look at my resolutions for the year before. This time last year has some good reading as we were exactly one week away from Claire’s arrival. There wasn’t any snow on the ground, I was getting anxious and I was starting to wonder how we were going to manage a baby with 2.5 year olds. It was the calm before the storm that didn’t turn out to be that bad.

And I actually did quite well on the resolutions part. I did breastfeed Claire, I did buy a treadmill (and ran my first 5km), I did start to take better care of myself and take the time to enjoy my children more.

We are very lucky in that again this year we have a lot to be thankful for. Last night, after I kicked all our friends out, John and I had a quick year in review. The highlights from the year  - Claire, my section recovery, John going back to Deloitte,the second car which gave me some freedom, preschool, Drew and Jen getting engaged,toilet training and the end of the afternoon nap come to mind. John’s addition of his TV made me laugh.

You just have to look at Claire to see how much can change in a year. She has gone from a tiny baby to a fully functional member of our family. Sometimes it just floors me that we are a family of 5 and other times I can’t remember a time where she wasn’t around. Leah and Emma turned 3 this year and became big sisters. They are growing up by the day and I am getting more and more paranoid about losing my digital memories of all three of them.

2008 is shaping up to be another exciting year. Leah and Emma will start school in September and Claire will learn to walk, talk and, if we’re lucky, sleep through the night. Hey, I can officially say I didn’t sleep for 8 consecutive hours in 2007!

My resolutions for this coming year are both new and old. Here they are in no particular order:
-Exercise, eat right. 2008 will be the year of no excuses
-I will take time to enjoy the things I used to enjoy before I got sidetracked by being a mom.
-go on a vacation with John
-I will stop using tired and really tired as reasons for not doing stuff
-I will take my children to Centre Island on a day where it is operational.
-I will be a better cook
-I will try and be upbeat when I put my girls on a bus and send them off into the unknown.
 

Wishing you all a happy and most of all healthy 2008.

 

Christmas 2007

Leah and Emma really got Christmas this year and it was a lot of fun. They have had an ongoing holiday theme at preschool so there was no way that Christmas could sneak up on us this year.

The official holiday started on their last day of preschool. They had a holiday party where their families were invited. For 45 mins they did crafts then sang us all the songs they’d been taught (including my favourite, Feliz Daddydad). Claire really enjoyed the singing and was clapping and rocking away. At the end of the party I got two really nice (I’m serious) wooden trees that they’d worked on. The whole day was really nice.

The build up to Santa was pretty fun. We drove around admiring xmas lights and the girls really got into it this year. Last year they’d point them out but gradually lose interest. This year they were directing John down the street and squealing with excitement every time we found a good house. Unlike their neighbours, 3 year olds really appreciate those houses that really do it up with blow up Christmas characters and as much tacky crap that you can shove on your surburban postage stamp lawn. At least we had lots of snow to brighten it up.

They also learned all about Santa this year and were very excited about Rudolph and Christmas Eve. They settled on their gift from Santa in early December. Leah wanted a Dora Mermaid doll, Emma wanted a baby doll, and we were told Claire wanted a toy dog. Easy enough for Santa this year. They even told him he could find everything he needed at Costco.

Christmas Eve we went to Aunt Bonnie’s in Whitby to celebrate Great Grandpa’s 95th Birthday. The girls helped him blow out his cake and open his presents. We left there just before 8 and headed over to Great Grandpa’s house to get ready for Santa. They put out cookies and the reindeer food they made at school. They were easy to get into bed and Emma fell asleep quickly. Leah was up til 11 and kept on telling us she’d heard Santa and couldn’t sleep. Way too much excitement for Leah! John took 30 mins off their clock.

Christmas morning they woke up at 7:24 (6:54 their time) and sat in their room and talked. At 7am they started calling for us. They were super excited to see that Santa had delivered and were really excited about their stockings (which I had nearly forgotten about). They played with their Santa stuff and when everyone else was up we started to open all the presents. Needless to say they had lots of fun opening presents.

We all did really well with them this year and they loved everything they got. The biggest reaction was when they got a Dora DVD. They did a little touchdown dance and started screaming with excitement. It was funny.

Claire was really good and let everyone pass her around. She even managed to get a new tooth while we were in Oshawa and I didn’t notice til we got home. She really likes music lately and the maracas and drum set she got are a big hit.

All in all it was a very relaxing holiday. The girls enjoy seeing their family and we are happy to share them at a time of year that really is fun with kids around.