Almost summer again

Matilda will turn two this Saturday and Rowan has about two weeks left in Kindergarten.  This year really flew by, especially compared to last year.  It’s kind of funny, because not a whole lot changed – except, obviously, the kids.

Jumping up and down in muddy puddles!

I love the reflection in this picture.

Expressing themselves

Matilda is at an adorable stage in language development – she can usually make herself understood and almost everything she says is super cute because it’s still a novelty, her little voice is so dear, and she doesn’t argue yet.  She often pipes up to call our attention to something and then almost always speaks in the format (Thing), (Addressee), (Thing!)  For example: “Plane, Daddy, Plane!” or “Eat, Rowan, Eat!”  Her sweetness is also enhanced by frequent and plaintive cries of Oh, dear! and Oh, no! and Come on!  She also heavily favors hooray, yummy, and delicious!  She still never says "yes" - only "uh-HUH" or "mm-hmm."

Rowan has always been a very capable speaker.  He never needed any speech intervention and has no noticeable impediments.  He learns vocabulary quickly, often based on hearing it in context.  Of course, he sometimes gets vocabulary usage wrong, usually with hilarious results.  He also uses funny phrases like “Trust me!” and “I’m almost afraid to ask, but …”  Despite his capabilities, lately we’ve been struggling with “baby talk,” usually directed at Matilda.  It’s probably not a big deal, but it really gets under my skin.  Ben and I often remind him that he is a big kid and Matilda won’t learn more words if he doesn’t talk to her like a big kid.  Breaking the baby talk habit will likely be Rowan’s next sticker chart goal.

They both love music, but Rowan is especially capable at learning rhythms, beats, and lyrics.  They both play with the electronic drums a lot, and the other day Rowan had one of the demo beats playing and was running around making up his own song.  I’m so sad I didn’t film it, but I was laughing too hard!  It was hilarious and amazing – he was perfectly on the beat!  I’ll have to make sure I have the camera ready if he does it again. They’ve been listening to (and clearly inspired by) the 5.6.7.8s lately.  Ben says they often have morning dance parties to “Woo Hoo.”

Extremely accurate.

Spring Break & the sleep saga continues

The biggest event over Spring Break was transitioning Matilda out of her crib and into a big girl bed.  Rowan got a new twin bed with a wooden frame from Lauren and Kevin, so Matilda took his old one.  It’s a good starter bed since it’s quite low.  We also jettisoned the changing table.  Her room feels much more open now and she can use it as a play space.

Although the bed didn’t seem to freak her out at all, she is still struggling to settle into a sleep grove without a ton of a support from us.  She still requires a bedtime bottle and usually falls asleep while being rocked.  Occasionally I have had luck just lying in her bed with her until she falls asleep.  Naptime usually requires a bottle and/or a ride in the van and often she doesn’t manage to nap at all.  Sometimes Ben can lay her down on her big “crash pillow” or even in her bed and she’ll sleep on (or immediately wake up.)  She still has sporadic bouts of waking in the night, but at least sometimes she can get back to sleep on her own.  She is also able to get out of bed and come to us, which seems to be keeping her from quickly escalating to full-blown panic.  The twin bed also allows one of us to go lay down with her (relatively comfortably) on the occasion she needs extra comfort.  And sometimes she just wants to be in our bed (thankfully, it’s not all the time.)

In other words, no, we have not yet reached our goal of normalizing Matilda’s sleep schedule or nighttime routine.  At this point I doubt her nap routine will ever flourish – she’s on track to just outgrow naps all together before she manages to master the concept.  We need to ditch the bottle sooner than later, though.  She’s just clinging to that routine SO tightly! 
 

We had a really nice Easter in Fredonia.  The weather cooperated and Mom and I were able to hide eggs outside on Easter morning.  It was adorable watching the kids hunt for eggs.  It was also hilarious because Rowan was still waking up and kind of sleepy-confused-disoriented and Matilda found chocolate in the first egg and just plunked down to start eating.
 

Wait, what are we doing again??

OH, I get it now!

Easter best! <3

This boy really loves his Grandma Judy!

That evening we went to Kelly's for Easter dinner and another egg hunt.  The kids knew what was up at that point.  We had a great time, but I was seriously wiped out that night.  It will be wonderful one day when Ben can finally stop working weekends.

Jedi Matilda.

Fearless & magical

It’s funny how needy Matilda is when it comes to sleep, because she is fearless when it comes to just about everything else.  We are eternally grateful that she and Rowan love to play together and she can keep up with him.  Yet they are so different!  To illustrate: A few weeks ago, my friend Rachel was visiting and the kids were playing upstairs.  We hadn’t checked on them for several minutes (another side-effect of two kids – we always had eyes on Rowan!)  Rowan wandered downstairs and started talking to Rachel.  I called upstairs to Matilda and in reply heard a very faint, almost far away-sounding “Mama?”  I thought, huh, she must’ve closed her door or something.  I went upstairs and saw her door open so I called her again.  When she called back I finally realized she was in the attic.

Ben was horrified by this stunt, but I couldn’t stop laughing.  Never, ever could I imagine Rowan doing that – even now at almost 6, but definitely not when he was under 2!  Matilda is hilarious, in all her stomping, growling, climbing, silly glory.

A rare dinner outing.

She’s usually a good counterpart for Rowan and they encourage each other to have fun.  Rowan is more likely to become upset (and stay upset) than Matilda, but he’s also easily enchanted.  He’s always full of big ideas and loves to make up adventure stories.  He loves novelty, which is a bit of a conundrum sometimes because he tends to want us to provide it – it’s hard to explain to him that we have other (boring) things we also need to get done each day (making meals, cleaning, etc.)

CHEESE!!!!

Rowan was SO proud of his school project, a seal habitat.

Rowan’s obsession with novelty becomes especially challenging when he is disappointed.  Almost every time we go on a new “adventure” or he begins a new idea, game, or story, something will inevitably go wrong and he becomes completely derailed (train pun intended.)  And once Rowan becomes disappointed he has a really hard time turning it around without a lot of help or some new novelty.  We encourage him to try to solve his own problems and we frequently discuss focusing on what’s right instead of what’s wrong, but it seems to just fly over his head.  He gets so immersed in his imagination, it only takes one small thing to devastate him.

Ladybug magic!

I do what I want.

But luckily, he has his fearless and affectionate sister to help him out.  In case I haven’t made it abundantly clear, Matilda LOVES Rowan.  If he is upset at all, she immediately runs to him for hugs and assurance that it’s okay.  Maybe one day our resilient girl will be able to help re-direct her sensitive brother.

As always - she's paying attention, he's daydreaming.

Playing nicely together ... for the moment.

Memorial Day & new camera skills

We had a pretty quiet and restful Memorial Day weekend.  I took the kids to my parents’ house for the weekend.  The weather was beautiful and the kids played in the backyard a lot while my folks and I relaxed and visited. 
 

I brought the SLR with me and on a whim, I gave it to Rowan to take some pictures.  In the past, he has struggled with the concept of photography.  He’s not super patient, so he never wanted to listen to directions and would take fuzzy pictures of the floor or ceiling.  However, he actually listened this time – I had the camera set to autofocus, so all he had to do was look through the viewfinder and press the button.  He took a bunch of fantastic pictures and was very proud of his work.  We’ll have to add photography practice to our summer bucket list!

Rowan took the two pictures below (I added filters.)  
I took the picture of my parents' amazing trees of which I am extremely jealous.

P.S. They are gigantic.