Ballerina Rachel

Rachel's ballet class came to a close last week and they had a their performance on Friday night. Rachel did a great job and had lots of fun. Their first dance was A Whole New World from Aladdin.

 

 

Rachel is on the far left in the front row.

 

Annie loved the dances (at least for the first half-after intermission she was a little more distracted). Every time a new dance started, she got this look on her face and was entranced until the dance was over.

 

The second dance they did was a Hawaiian one that is on Lilo and Stitch.

 

 

Rachel was in the back row for this one, with a red flower in her hair.

I love how that girl in front of Rachel was totally distracted by her skirt for the last half of the dance. And I love Rachel's enthusiastic hula dancing. So awesome. :)

 In the fall we'll put Rachel in the 4-5 year-old class (she was in the 3-4 year-old one this time because the time worked best). It's amazing to see the difference between the 3-year-olds and the 4-year-olds. Attention spans really do make a difference. :)

Annie's animals

I've been meaning to get Annie on video with some of the words/animal sounds she says for a while, and on Saturday we finally got around to it. My favorite is the noise she makes for both frogs and pigs with her tongue.

More pictures

Baby prep is in full swing. We're pretty much ready. The freezer is stocked and we're ready for weeks of food without cooking more than sticking something in the crockpot or oven. And now the cameras are empty ready for more pictures (though we probably better make sure they're charged). So here are some of the pictures we downloaded:

After Cari left we left the blow-up mattress in the room for a couple of days as a fun trampoline/playground. The girls had fun jumping together, and climbing on each other.

Both Rachel and Annie LOVE the iPad. Rachel likes all sorts of apps, including Angry Birds, various coloring book-type apps, a couple book-reading apps, and other random games. Annie equates the iPad with birds (which is why she is signing bird in the picture below). Angry Birds, Early Bird, and her favorite, Who's Hiding, which is a great toddler game that you tap the screen to uncover various animals (including birds). We have had to discontinue family scripture reading on the iPad because Annie just spends the whole time in anger that we aren't letting her touch the iPad.

Annie being a cutie with her hat on:

Annie not only loves hats, she's also quite a fan of sunglasses. And goggles are apparently close enough to count.

We would always say, "Cool, dude!" whenever she would get sunglasses on. So now anytime anyone puts on sunglasses she says, "Dooo!" (as in dude) with her lips sticking out in a pouty face:

Here's a "dude" video:


Saturday Jake and the girls were having fun playing on the beanbag chair, having tickle fights, being eaten by the beanbag monster, and falling asleep. When they were pretending to go to sleep Jake and Rachel would fake snore, so Annie picked up on the snoring and would lay down and stick her lips out and go "shhhhooo" as if she were snoring, too. It was pretty funny.

Random Pictures

I thought I should add a few pictures to the blog, so here are some shots of the lovely ladies in my life.

One of the fringe benefits of pregnancy is that you have your own built-in snack tray.

Annie is a cutie, especially when she smiles.

Rachel knows what cameras are for.

Annie is eating (and wearing) some bread with Nutella on it - a favorite treat of both Annie and Rachel.

Aunt Cari's visit

Cari came to visit for a few days last week. It was fun having her here. Rachel and Annie had a blast, though Cari may have been grateful when it was time to head back home because the girls didn't let her have a moment's peace.

We started our adventures with a trip to the park to fly a kite. The kite flying was successful, but short-lived, as 4-year-olds don't have an incredibly long attention span. And the playground was beckoning, so we headed over and Rachel and Cari played on the slides and swings, while some vulture kids honed in on the kite and did their best to mangle fly it under my supervision.

Rachel found a stash of pine cones that she just had to bring back with us.

Rachel had a good time showing Cari Starfall and her mad reading skills. (And Annie loves anything that involves the computer or a screen, so she had to get in on the action, too.)

Before Cari came I asked Rachel what she wanted to do while Cari was here. Her response: "Go to the zoo! Since she showed us her zoo, we should show her ours!" So we did. One of the tigers was sleeping right in front of the glass window, and the other was pacing back and forth in front of the other window. Later Rachel told me, "The tiger was trying to figure out how he could eat all us kids!"

I wonder how many pictures I have of this elephant....

It was giraffe feeding time, so Grandma paid the $2 each for the girls to feed them a handful of carrots. Annie was a little intimidated. She wanted to feed them, but when the tongue started reaching out for the carrot she would freak out a little and drop the carrot, or retract her arm. But she thought they were really cool. We had a hard time pulling her away from the giraffes.

This is pretty representative of about half of the time Cari was here:

Rachel was on a coloring/painting kick, so they colored and painted, and colored and cut out, and colored some more. Cari was such a good sport doing whatever Rachel told her to.

We also got some games in, like Hi Ho Cherry-O and Uno Moo.

(You can also see my basketball belly and my new haircut that I got Saturday--it's a it-doesn't-matter-if-you-don't-have-time-to-shower-for-days kind of haircut, in preparation for the baby.)

We were going to go on a little hike, but a meltdown shut that idea down. Instead we had a picnic at the park and enjoyed the swings a bit more. Then for dinner we barbecued some chicken and hot dogs. And Rachel, Annie, and Cari made a lovely "cake" out of lawn trimmings, rocks, and whatever else they happened upon in the back yard.

We had a lot of fun and enjoyed having Cari visit, though we were pretty boring after the girls went to bed. Rachel was so distraught over the thought of Cari leaving that she had a hard time falling asleep, finally falling asleep in our bed, so as to not wake Annie while she cried herself to sleep. Then when Rachel woke up at 4am and Cari was already gone (she and Jake had to leave at 3am to get her to Mesa in time for her 6am flight) it took an hour of singing to her and telling her stories to distract her enough for her to fall asleep again (again in our bed).

I hope we didn't scare Cari away for too long what with the girls running her ragged, not leaving her alone for a minute while they were awake. :) We tried to provide some lovely weather at least, as a nice contrast to the Rexburg winter. Thanks for coming, Cari!

We love visitors! So come visit!

Photography skillz

Rachel loves the camera, both posing for and shooting pictures. Here are some of her recent snapshots:

And some self-portraits:

Last week we went out to enjoy the beautiful weather with a picnic at the park. After eating and playing on the slides for a little while, the girls wandered up to the baseball fields and found a puddle to play in that was way more fun than the playground equipment.

When it was all over, though, Annie didn't really like being wet up to her thighs.

Both girls rode home in the car pant-less thanks to the puddle. I guess that means it was a successful park outing?

In our preparations for the new addition to our family we recently borrowed a crib from someone in our ward, since we figured 16 months is much too young to expect Annie to move to a toddler bed, for the sake of all of our sanity. We also got a dresser off Craigslist for the girls to share, and moved around Rachel's room a little so things would fit a little more nicely. So last week we put the crib together, and bit the bullet, putting the girls in the same room. We figured it was probably a good idea for them to get used to sleeping together when I'm not completely sleep deprived in case there were a few sleepless nights in the adjustment period.

They woke each other up a little early the first morning at about 6:40. That is pretty typical for Annie, but about a half hour or more early for Rachel. Not too bad.

The next night they slept fine, but Annie woke them up around 5:30 or 5:45. Normally Annie will find a binky and go back to sleep when she wakes up at that time, but Rachel came in and informed me, "Annie was crying, so I gave her a binky, and sang a song for her, then stared at her in her crib in case she needed anything else." Needless to say, Annie thought that meant it was time to play. We got up, got dressed, ate breakfast, and were all laying down napping again by 7am.

The third night Rachel woke up with her foot hurting, and her crying woke Annie up. I ended up rocking them both at the same time, singing a couple songs before they were quiet enough to fall back asleep. As I rocked and sang to them I imagined how fun it'll be when the baby is here and they all want to be held/rocked at the same time. Won't that be fun? At least Jake will be around for those middle-of-the-night crying sessions.

The fourth night the girls slept great and woke up at their normal time: a little after 7am. I declared the experiment a success. One night may not mean complete success, but at least there is hope that it won't be them disturbing my slumber every night. They can leave that to their little brother. :)

Another lady in the ward gave us her crib mattress that she no longer needs, along with some blankets and crib sheets that are boy-colored, and some clothes, including a cute monkey Halloween costume that is size 3-6 months, which, is about how big Ryan will be when Halloween rolls around. Rachel thought the monkey suit was so cool, and decided that sizes are irrelevant.

If a 4-year-old can "fit" into a costume designed for a 6-month-old, I guess we can count on it fitting Ryan, even if he's an extra chunky baby. :)

Climbing

Annie is at that lovely stage of toddlerhood where the main goal of everything she does is to get as far off the ground as she can. Climb, climb, climb. She mastered Rachel's bed and the couches a while back, but now she's moved on to climbing higher on the couch backs and arms, climbing on the chairs, trying to climb over the back of her highchair, and most especially, climbing onto the kitchen table.

I feel like I am getting her down from the table at least a couple of times an hour all day long. I have tried taking most of the interesting things off the table, but that only helps marginally. Her number one goal in life is to stand on the table and dance. Though, like I said, anything is fair game. After I emptied the dishwasher the other day she grabbed her binky, blanket, and sippy cup and decided the dishwasher door was the place for her to rest. Of course I reinforced her idea by snapping a picture of her before I got her off, so she tried a couple more times that day to try to make me laugh.

Rachel is often the police if I'm in a different room, announcing that Annie's on the table again. But last week when Rachel was gone at preschool I realized I hadn't seen Annie for a minute or two, and went to find her punching the buttons on the computer on the kitchen table. I got her down, closed the laptop, and brought her into the bedroom where I was getting things organized. A few minutes later she wandered out again, and after another minute I followed to find this:

I sure am glad I closed that computer before she got to the salt, otherwise there would be salt stuck in the depths of the keyboard forever.

And yes, the salt shaker was completely empty when I found her.

Today I had Annie outside with me while Rachel was inside painting with her Aunt Cari who's visiting for a few days. Rachel and Cari came out to join us, but of course after a few minutes Annie headed inside. When I went to check on her I found her at her favorite place:

After getting paint on several of her fingers she noticed the cup of water they'd been using for the paint and tried to drink it. Yum. :P

Thankfully there have not been any major injuries yet, and I hope that continues. She does fall, however, occasionally, and tile is not the softest ground to catch her. Last week there was one day I was sure would end in a concussion, with her falling off the ottoman that she had been standing up dancing on, landing right on her head, according to Rachel, then that same day having a chair slip while she was trying to bridge the gap to the table and falling instead onto the tile floor. Sometimes I wish for those docile children I see sitting in their mothers' laps for all 3 hours of church, or even just 15 minutes. For now I suppose I'll enjoy the 2 minutes of cuddling I get before putting her down for a nap or bed. That's about as long as I ever see her hold still. And hopefully for now we will avoid the ER despite all her climbing adventures.