Family Fun Night

The RHS Music Department hosted Family Fun Night tonight at school.  It is a really fun way for the kids to earn money towards their band/choir trip to Disney World next spring.

As we have the past 2 years, Annah and I ran the cupcake walk.  It is always fun to do this together.  This time, some of Annah's friends stopped by at various times throughout the night and helped.  

In the gym, there was face-painting and many other games and stations.  These Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are pretty good pals of ours.

Sylvia and Caeden got to buy some tickets and have a little fun at the various stations.  Caeden's favorite is the bounce house outside.  He also won a Gatorade at the ring toss.  Then he came back to me and begged for more money.  When I told him he had to wait until the second hour to get more, he got angry and I told him he then had to wait 15 minutes more because of his attitude.  He continued to get angrier and kicked his bottle of gatorade.  I texted his father to come pick him up, and he did not get to enjoy any more of the fun because of his terrible attitude.  He has to learn that begging, getting angry, whining, and complaining will not get him what he wants.  So frustrating.

Sylvia ran out of tickets and decided to go play outside on the playground with Morgan and Katelin, Ella, Reece, and Zach.  They played tether ball and basketball.  Her friends were very surprised at her complete lack of knowledge about basketball, but they were very patient in teaching her and letting her play with them.  She had fun.  Oh, and last night she baked some of her excellent Pioneer Woman Chocolate White Chocolate Chip Cookies for the bake sale tonight.  She was very thoughtful to set aside some for her band and choir directors too.

Next year, Annah won't be raising money for her trip anymore, because it will be over by this time.  Sylvia will have her turn.  I could potentially be running the cupcake walk for 4 more years.  :)

My boy

It has been quite a week with my boy.  

Monday, when he got home from school, he was awful to me--talking back, refusing to do anything asked of him, just being rude.  I yelled at him.  Too often the only way I can get him to stop and listen  to me is to be louder and scarier than he is being. I hate that.  

I had to take the girls to rehearsal before Jeremy got home to take Caeden to wrestling, so he was home by himself for a little bit.  When I had dropped the girls off, I tried a FaceTime call to the computer at home to see if he would answer.  He did.  And right away he apologized for how he had acted earlier.  And so did I.  And we had a good talk about being respectful, and listening, and getting rid of self-pity and having a servant's heart.  And he understood how awful he had been.

And then we made silly faces at each other and I took screenshots.

Wednesday evening, Caeden was upset because a flyer was passed out at school about football sign-ups coming soon.  He knows we won't allow him to play (for reasons I won't write about here, but are not his fault at all).  He has asked to play the last couple years, and was pretty bummed that we won't let him.  We had a long talk with Daddy this evening about why we don't let him play, how to let that teasing roll off him, and what's really important in life.  It's so much bigger than football or 4th grade or kids teasing him, and I think he's starting to get that sometimes.  

We were able to talk tonight about how being a Christian should look different than "the norm" in our society, and how if he continues to be kind even when others are not, eventually he will become known for who he really is.  Sylvia was able to share with him how that played out for her just today.  These days of growing up are so hard emotionally and spiritually, but when we can have these tough talks and pray together as a family it feels good to end up with God's peace that passes understanding holding us up.

Thursday our afternoon/evening schedule was a bit different than usual.  Sylvia didn't have a cello lesson.  The guys didn't have wrestling practice.  So, we had a few minutes to take Caeden's guitar to get new strings.  While we waited for it, I took him to get a haircut--wayyyyy overdue.  He looks so much better, and is happy about it too!

Tonight, the guys did have wrestling practice.  I dropped Caed off and tried to get a picture of his funny pants.  All his sweatpants were in the dryer, and he grabbed a pair of size 8 jeans (He is growing out of 9's right now.) to put over his shorts to get to practice.  He could barely get them up past his knees.  Silly boy.  

It is a wonderfully difficult privilege to be a mom.

Does this make me look smarter?

Annah finally has her first Scholastic Bowl meet this evening.  (She would have had a few already, but...snow days and cancellations happened instead.)  She is enjoying this new challenge.  She is having to sacrifice some violin lessons in order to be part of practices and meets over the next few months, and is doing some extra sitting and waiting at school since we can't always get to her right when practice and meets are over.  Honestly, this is a difficult adjustment for Momma, but we are hoping it will be a positive growing experience for Annah.

We're only a few months into this parenting a teenager thing, and I'm already feeling inadequate.  This week she secretly gave herself bangs.  It doesn't seem like a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but other things had control of my emotions when I found out and I knew I wouldn't react well.  I chose not to discuss it or deal with it right away.  By the time Jeremy got home that evening, I had also discovered she had broken some of the email rules we've set.  Fortunately, Jeremy handled it without me even asking him to--and with much more caution, gentleness, and love than I could have in the moment.  

Spelling Spat

We are trying 4:00 violin lessons this Fall. The kids get off the bus at home at about 3:33, so I have to pick them up at the stop with their instruments and take the fastest route to town to get to lessons about 2 minutes late, whew! Usually I bring a snack for each of them, but today was stopped by a neighbor as I was loading the car and didn't have time to go back to get them snacks. 

When we got to the music shop, it was time for Caeden to practice his spelling words for the test tomorrow.  Spelling is easy for him, and he knows the words.  But we always make the kids study whether they feel they need to or not so they will develop good study habits for the future. Today, Caed tried to tell me he was so tired and hungry that he "had no brain power" to practice his spelling words. He whined, whimpered, complained, protested, and generally acted ridiculous during the 20 words... 

Here's the proof:

Here's the kicker... I discovered as I went to check his words over... 

He spelled every single word wrong ON PURPOSE!!!!  

He and I went for a walk out to the car, where we both sat in the backseat and I explained that he would now write each word 10 times tonight and until each of them were spelled correctly and neatly.  

I won't analyze this situation any more here, but this boy is definitely the reason I am re-reading Journey of  Strong-Willed Child these days.

THAT kind of day

Today was just "that" kind of day...

It wasn't anything big or life-threatening, but I just felt emotionally under attack all day long!

It started out with an email conflict that was my responsibility to resolve.  Ew, I don't like being in the middle of conflict.  (Who does?)  But, I took it to the Lord and prayed over it.  (Yep, Jesus even helps me send email!)  :)  Still, I felt uneasy (and quite honestly, was a whiny mess) while it was left unresolved...

Next, I fought with my son about tying his new shoes.  He is such a back-talker, and wouldn't stop arguing with me about how he "can't" tie his shoes!!  (Oh my goodness, I remember him tying other kids' shoes in kindergarten--two years ago!!)  I told him he would be practicing tying them over and over this weekend until he could do it easily.  He went out the door to school crying, pouting, literally dragging his feet and walking as slowly as he could toward the bus after yelling, "You never listen to me!!" Even knowing that the truth is that it's the other way around (He doesn't listen to me.), it still really stunk watching him go to school upset.  And that icky feeling stayed with me...

Then I went to get my hair cut.  I had it cut about 6-7 weeks ago--about 5 inches chopped off.  I haven't been liking the length it is, because it sits right at my collar and flips up at the bottom, no matter what I do.  I also decided I wanted bangs again.  So, when my stylist (I love her.) asked me what I was wanting, I told her I wanted bangs, and that I would like the angle of my hair to be more dramatic--longer in the front, so that it wouldn't flip up around the bottom.  She asked if she could cut in more layers and make it a little shorter in the back.  I agreed, and then watched her chop, chop away.  It turned out much shorter than I wanted, and that disappointment added to my already distraught state of mind for the day...

This afternoon I baked brownies to take to the women's event for church tonight.  I took them out of the oven just as the kids got home.  Of course, they asked if they could have some and I had to tell them, "No, you may not have any.  They are for the ladies at the event tonight.  Do not touch them.  DO NOT TOUCH THEM!"  

Perhaps, I was a little too specific?  Do these brownies look untouched to you?!?!

I knew right away who was the culprit, but my son had the audacity to run into the room with a look of [fake] shock on his face!  He then proceded to lie to my face as I asked him if he did this!  I was so upset that he deliberately disobeyed what I had told him and lied to me!!!

It really was one little challenge after another today, where I felt like I could actually feel Satan following me around picking on me and then trying to make me to feel sorry for myself.  Ew, it was nasty!!

Fortunately, I was able to recognize that there was spiritual warfare going on around me, and I sent a message to a friend this morning asking her to pray for me throughout the day.  I knew my attitude was on the edge of ickiness, and I knew I needed some extra prayers to get through the day.

God is so good.  Even when I am not feeling happy, he is faithful to remind me to stay close to him.  My friend agreed to pray for me.  My pastor called to check in on me and encourage me.  My mom comforted me over the phone, even in the middle of dealing with a real problem of her own.  My husband was not annoyed with me when I called him at work to tell him about my stinky day and ask for a "hug" over the phone.

The email situation from this morning was resolved in a gracious way, I'm sure because it was prayed over.  And another [completely unrelated] email conflict occurred this evening and was immediately resolved and I was encouraged by it as well.

I helped Caeden practice tying his shoes when he got home from school, and encouraged him that it wasn't as hard as he thought.  Once I reminded him that he did know how to do it, and showed him how to loosen and tighten the laces, he felt successful and isn't afraid to do it himself anymore.

When I calmed down from the "brownie situation" enough to think of a rational punishment for my son, I told him he would not be getting ANY sweets of any kind until after Thanksgiving, which is a week away.  He told me, "It wasn't worth it."  I'm glad I was able to choose a punishment that made him realize it is disobedience is not worth punishment.

I had time to bake a second pan of brownies for the women's event, and they were still warm when I arrived there with them.

Several lovely ladies complimented my haircut, and I realized it's a blessing that at least it is a nice cut!

Even though I hadn't really felt like going to the women's event, my soul was refreshed by fellowshipping with my sisters in Christ who are walking through life with Jesus as well.  

There was even the glorious blessing of getting to cozy up by a fire in the fireplace at the event!  Oh, that just made my day!

I firmly believe that because I cried out to Jesus over each little thing that could have dragged me down today, He lifted me up tonight and encouraged me through it all.  Each little situation (And I do recognize that each of these things is nothing more than a mere annoyance!) that got under my skin today was resolved into a blessing before 24 hours had passed!  God is so good at sticking with us through it all--no matter how big or small the "things" of life might be!  Praise His Name!!

 "Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.  Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.  Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom.  Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up."

- James 4:7-10

Baked Macaroni and Legos

Every Tuesday this school year, Caeden has had a story in his reading book to read out loud at home for homework.  

Probably about 2 months ago, I made baked macaroni and cheese for supper one night.  It had lots of cheese, bacon, creaminess...yummy!  Caeden took one look at it and decided he hated baked macaroni and cheese and refused to eat it.  He threw the biggest, most ridiculous, toddler-sized fit at the table for two hours.  He was so disrespectful and disobedient that, at one point, Jeremy marched upstairs and took away ALL of Caeden's Legos.  It was  not a happy night for any of us.

But tonight Caeden got the Legos back.  He and the girls spent as much time as they could rooting through them and coming up with creations this evening.  I have to admit, it's nice to have that noisy Lego rooting sound back in the house.

Sylvia chose A Chair for My Mother for our bedtime story tonight.  She started it, and I finished reading it to the kids before tucking them in.

"You were shown all this so that you would know that God is, well, God. He's the only God there is. He's it. He made it possible for you to hear his voice out of Heaven to discipline you."

 - Deuteronomy 4:35 MSG

Cheating and Apologizing

Well this was a challenging day for me as a mother!  I really do learn as my kids learn.  And, clearly, sometimes I forget to teach them things until after they learn the lesson the hard way on their own--by making a mistake.

For me, it all started today when I was sitting at the piano at the school, helping the 6th grade choir during their class rehearsal.  Someone came into the room, and even out of the corner of my eye, I was pretty sure it was Caeden's teacher.  She knows I am at the school on Thursdays helping in the music department, because I have helped her during my in-between choirs time, so I figured she was probably there to speak with me.  Mr. M. stopped the rehearsal and asked her how he could help her.  She asked to speak with me in the hallway.  

As we stepped outside the classroom, I could tell she was upset.  She began to explain that her class took a math test today.   She said that during the test many of the students, including Caeden, were having a lot of trouble with one particular problem.  Apparently she was watching Caeden and saw that he figured it out.  

She said she had told the students 3 times before the test not to look at each other's papers.  But she saw Caeden, after he figured out the difficult problem, start to explain to another student how to do the problem.  Uh-oh.

She explained to me that it made her very angry because, to her, he was giving the answer to someone because he liked the person.  She was visibly upset, and I was a little taken aback by that because I was pretty sure Caeden didn't realize trying to explain an answer was cheating.  She said she moved his discipline meter to yellow.  (Think stoplight order, here.  And, if it were me, I would have moved him straight to red to make the point!)   I asked her what Caeden said to her when she disciplined him, and she said he didn't really say anything.  No apology or acknowledgement of having done something wrong or of feeling guilty, from her standpoint.  I told her I was sorry, and tried to explain that we probably haven't talked with Caeden yet about looking at others' papers or sharing answers or cheating and what it involves.  I assured her we would.

So, when Caeden came home from school, I talked with him privately about the situation.  He acknowledged that it happened as his teacher had explained to me.  He told me he had no idea that what he did was cheating, and that he was just trying to be helpful.  (The boy can be a real rascal, but I do trust that he would not knowingly cheat or cause someone else to.)  He did admit that he knew it wasn't right to be talking to someone else during the test and looking at her paper, and said he was very sorry.  He felt horrible to realize that he had cheated, and now understands not to ever do it again.

As his punishment, he had to write apology letters to his teacher, and the friend he helped to cheat on the test, and verbally apologize to them both as well.  

Another part of his punishment was that he had to explain the whole situation to his daddy too.  I think that was the worst part for him, because he told me he was afraid his daddy would kill him.  I assured him that his daddy would not ever hurt him or anyone else, but he was pretty afraid to get yelled at.  I was able to warn his daddy over the phone that there was a serious situation to be dealt with, and that he needed to be prepared to be gentle and give mercy.  Caeden was able to explain to Jeremy what happened, and they talked about the seriousness of it all calmly.

The boy is really learning how important it is to make good choices.  And we parents are learning how important it is to remain calm and discipline with patience.  

This Boy

Oh, these days, this boy can really upset his momma.  He whines and complains and disobeys, is loud and destructive, and is even disrespectful to me at times.  But, he is also conscientious, and sweet, and snuggly, and humble, so funny, a great singer and dancer, and a precious soul entrusted to my care.  

When he makes a mistake or a sin, he knows he doesn't deserve forgiveness, and is even reluctant to ask for it and accept it.  But, I can see God growing his heart, and I will not quit asking Him to draw him near.  I love this boy so much!

Mean Mommy

Since the girls only had half day of school today, I hadn't finished my to-do list by the time they got home. There were things that absolutely needed done, so I enlisted their help. The kitchen floor was high on the list of HAD to be done!!

Annah was happy to use the Super Broom and sweep the floor.


Scrubbing the floor by hand allows for more helpers to be involved...


Even Caeden joined in the scrubbing fun!


Seriously, they were super excited to be allowed to do this. I kept thinking I must be some kind of really mean mommy to make my kids scrub the floor by hand! But they really thought it was fun and a great privilege to get to help!

Making time to play, even on a busy day

We filled the last day before school with a lot! Here's how it went:
1) Stop at bank in Arrowsmith.
2) Visit Daddy at work.
3) Get Annah new school shoes at Stride Rite.
4) Eat lunch at Carlos O' Kelly's.
5) Go downtown to the county Board of Health to get Sylvia's (and Caeden's) official birth certificate that she needs in order to start kindergarten tomorrow!
6) Play at the sprinkler park!
7) Go to Meijer to get Annah a bigger backpack for school.
8) Come home and collapse.
9) Eat supper. (Daddy grilled burgers for us!)
10) Baths for all kids.
11) Spend an hour and a half trying to get the girls to sleep! We are all excited about the first day of school tomorrow!

It was a splashing way to end the summer!

Um, someone got a little time-out for spitting water at his sister...

I think he was trying to do a "cannonball" into the sprinkler...?





Sylvia got the others going on the fun with these fire-hydrant things. The top circles all the way around, and they could kind of "shoot" water at each other...



This was cracking me up, when they climbed up on them to sit and fire at each other or Caeden when he went by!

All in good fun! We had a great time!

a little longer...

We decided to stay a little longer in Indiana. The reception we were going to attend on Saturday was postponed, and Daddy is studying for a test tomorrow. So we stayed until this morning and arrived home around 1:00 today. It was nice to have some extra time to relax and hang out with Gram & Grandpa, Travis & Erin, even though Grandpa gave us all a big scare yesterday. He was having some strange symptoms, which we all thought could quite possibly be stroke-related. So, he spent the day at the hospital along with Gram and Travis, having all kinds of testing done. We are very thankful he did not have a stroke, and are praying that he will quickly be relieved of the symptoms of Bells Palsy that are making him quite uncomfortable!

All week the kids rode the big wheel and bike several times a day. If it was cold and/or wet outside, they rode in the garage. If all three of them were playing, one would have to wait their turn and play with the little broom in the meantime.
Sylvia: Look Mama, no hands!
Sometimes the kids didn't do so well with sharing/waiting for their turn. Once on Friday, Sylvia announced she was going out to ride the bigwheel. She put on her shoes and coat, and a few seconds later Caeden followed suit. Next thing I knew, I heard him screaming, "Get off! You get off! Get off! Get off!..." When I opened the garage door to make him stop, he told me Sylvia hit him. So, I made them both come in, take off their shoes and coats, and sit in the chair with their arms around each other for 5 minutes. They decided they did, in fact, love each other, and could work out a way to share and wait their turn.
Yesterday, Caeden and Gram were putting together a puzzle of the USA. Caeden picked up the piece of Florida and told Gram, "This one is a pewer!" (Or maybe that's spelled pyoo-er? Yeah, that looks better.) She asked him to explain what a pyoo-er is, and he held the puzzle piece like a gun, pretended to shoot it, and said, "Pyoo! Pyoo!"
Last night the little broom was a pyoo-er.
Yesterday morning the kids "helped" Gram bake oatmeal scotchies! Mmm!
Aunt Erin helped Caeden put together his Tootle puzzle--again.

Even thought the weather wasn't (and still isn't!) very springy, we had a great time over spring break. Thanks Gram & Krampa, for letting us stay, and to everyone we got to visit with!

there is goodness and sweetness too

After the post I wrote last week about Caeden's being so strong-willed, I wanted to add...He's not like that all the time! He has some moments of real sweetness, and even snuggles in him if you catch him when he's sleepy or while watching a movie or reading a book. And recently, he's starting telling us "I love you!" many times each day, which of course we love!

We are working really hard on being consistent with our words when disciplining him without emotion and not giving in. I think we are already seeing a difference. When he is really tired and upset, he will say, "I'm not gonna obey you!" but, he is learning to choose to obey rather than receive a spanking or some other punishment.

Rough Mommy Days

Some days lately I've had a rough time being a mommy. Today was one.

Have I mentioned here before that I've decided my son is definitely a "stong-willed" child? Well, I have recently come to that conclusion. I used to wonder what that term really meant, but I am beginning to see it more clearly with each passing day! Caeden definitely fits the bill. He will do the exact opposite of what he is told. When he doesn't get his way, there is an uproar of some sort...nasty words towards the one (usually me) who won't let him have his way, or a tantrum, or literally running from me, screaming, hitting/punching/kicking, threats...things I never would imagine a little child would have in his/her soul (or even just their mouth!) without being taught them!

Let's have a little example...

Today, Caeden and I were grocery shopping at Wal-Mart. As soon as we entered the store, he said he didn't want to ride in the cart; he wanted to help push. I reminded him that if he disobeyed, he would have to ride. 15 seconds later he was taking off with the card, heading towards a display rack at full-speed. I had to force him into the cart and buckle him in while calmly explaining why as he screamed and kicked, saying, "I don't like you!!" over and over for the next 5 minutes.

After we had been in the store a while and I had not allowed several things Caeden had asked for, he asked for something else and I told him no. All of a sudden he was saying, "Mommy I don't want to live with you any more. You don't belong to me. Die. Die Mommy. Go away from me. Mommy, go die. Die Mommy. Die Mommy...." I know at least one store employee heard him, because I saw him looking at us. I stopped the cart at the end of an aisle and walked down the aisle as Caeden continued hurling horrible words at me. I went around the end of the aisle, where I could see him, but he couldn't see me, and walked back up the other side of it. He had stopped by the time I got to the cart. I'm sure it wasn't the right way to handle the situation (yes I could see [and hear!] him the whole time), but I had to step away for a second.

Caeden has recently started telling me several times a day that he doesn't like me. He says all kinds of awful things that I am always shocked to hear come out of his mouth. I know he is trying to think of the worst possible things he can say to show how upset he is, but wow, it can get to a mommy's heart!

There were lots of [my] tears and prayers in the car on the way home from the store today. I can see I have my work cut out for me with this boy. It is a constant workout and battle of the wills. Too bad for him, I am pretty stubborn too and will not let him win.

A friend recently loaned me Kendra Smiley's book Aaron's Way, which is about raising a strong-willed child. She also loaned me Dr. Dobson's book, Bringing Up Boys, which I haven't started yet. I did spend some time on the Focus on the Family site today, checking out some articles about the strong-willed child.

I need to pray more fervently for my children. And, with Caeden especially, I need to learn to discipline without emotion. That is hard for a girl who wears her heart on her sleeve and also breaks into tears a few times a day! God give me wisdom...!

Potty Training Time

Caeden went tinkle in the toilet at home tonight for the first time! His babysitters have told us he's gone for them, but he's never done it at home, so it was very exciting! We'll see if it becomes a trend. I'm so dragging my feet with potty training him!

kids say...

Just so you know, we don't think our kids are perfect. Our kids say and do some really annoying things sometimes. And they drive us up a wall sometimes. But, I don't like to remember those times, so I usually don't include them here.

Today was Sylvia's day to celebrate her birthday at school. This includes bringing birthday snacks (She chose lofthouse cookies with pink icing and sprinkles.), getting to be line-leader (always an exciting honor), receiving a book from her teachers (SO nice!!), and having Mommy come to school to read the day's book to the class. Well, months ago Sylvia decided she wanted me to come sing songs with her class instead of reading a book. So, that's what we did.

She chose two songs she wanted me to sing. Blow The Balloon, which we learned from Mr. Rogers. And, The Lollipop Tree, which I learned in elementary music class. These are two songs we sing around home, and Sylvie thought they would be fun for her class. They did seem to enjoy them, and I certainly had fun singing with them! We took lollipops to give the kids too.

Meanwhile, Caeden was going all over the preschool getting into things and being VERY distracting. (Now, maybe he wasn't all that distracting to the kids, but he was making me crazy!) The teachers were very understanding and patient with him, but I reached a point where I drug him out of the school, and we sat in the car for the next half hour waiting for the end of school.

I wasn't yelling at him, but he knew he was being naughty. As we were going out, he said, "Momma, I am a good boy now!"

Yeah. Sure.

Crime & Punishment

One of the common forms of punishment I use for the kids when we are at home is to make them stand with their toes and nose on the door with their hands in the air for a few minutes without talking. As you can imagine, they do not like this!

Today Caeden opened the 'fridge, took out the box with the rest of Annah's birthday cake in it, put the box on the floor, opened it, took the cake out ,sat it on the floor, grabbed the cake server, and was ready to dig in! (Jeremy asks me how come he is unsupervised long enough to do this, but I'm telling you the kid is QUICK!) Needless to say, Caeden was punished for this!

Yep, we're still waiting

I am 39 weeks, 2 days pregnant, and  yep, we're still waiting. We've had a nice weekend though. Yesterday, we did some errands and took the girls to the park with McDonald's [food] for lunch. Annah has been asking for the baby to be born every day for about the past 5 days. She is getting pretty anxious. We're not sure if she is more excited about meeting the baby, or the fact that grandparents and other family will be coming to our house soon. ;-) 

Friday night, Annah flooded our upstairs bathroom again. For some reason, she didn't turn off the water after washing her hands, and it was about 15-20 minutes before we went upstairs and found the situation. She felt really bad, and we were just glad we don't have carpet!

Sylvia has finally started to say, "I love you." It sounds more like, "ahfoo," but we love hearing it!!!

It's such a beautiful fall day today, we had to get some pictures in the pretty yellow fallen leaves of our front yard tree. 

Ornery Annah

Sylvia went to the doctor for her 4-month well-baby visit on Wednesday. She weighed 14 pounds, 13 ounces, and was 26 inches long. She had 4 more vaccinations, but did only cried for a few seconds. She slept a lot the rest of the day and the following day.

 The thing that has probably bothered her the most this week is her sister... Annah has been quite the character this week. On Tuesday night, I was giving Sylvia a bath and noticed some strange little marks on her knees. Upon closer inspection and interrogation of her big sister, we discovered they were bite marks! The next day, I caught Annah biting Sylvia's knees again, and also her toes and wrist. We're not sure if she was trying to hurt her, or if she just thought it was a fun thing to do, but we're definitely trying to nip that problem in the bud right away! Yikes!

 One night this week, I was up late, and heard a thud upstairs. I thought it sounded like Annah might have fallen out of bed. After about a minute, Annah started sobbing, so I sprinted upstairs and found her and her bed gate on the floor. Apparently, it took her a bit to wake up enough to figure out what had happened. She likes to sleep smushed up against the mesh gate, and must have wedged herself between it and the bed far enough to scoot it out and herself onto the ground.

The next day, Annah was playing with her doll baby, whom she sometimes calls Sylvia. She was pretending to change her diaper, and didn't realize I was watching her as she pretended to feed her baby the way Mommy feeds Sylvia. She even burped her too.

 Yesterday morning, I was in the shower, and Annah came into the bathroom carrying the cell phone telling me it was ringing. Then I heard our home phone ring. After four rings, our answering machine will pick up, but this time it only rang twice. So, I called Annah into the bathroom. She came carrying the phone and said, "Mommy, it's Gram!" I was pretty sure it wasn't Gram, and got the phone from Annah and apologized to the [chuckling] nurse from her obstetrician's office who was returning her call. That was the first time Annah had answered the phone on her own, and I didn't expect her to!

Daddy hanging out with his girls

 We are relieved to know that Snickers has a new home with a very nice couple who live near our parents. Even I admit to missing him a tiny bit, but we are sure he'll get more attention and care with "Big Bob" and his wife. A big thank you to my parents for taking care of him for the past few weeks and finding him a good home!!