For three weeks Celia had t-ball lessons! Should have been four, but she had a fever the first week so I kept her home. This information is _way_ old, but I’m so far behind, that’s where I am. She did this for the month of October. Celia loved her lessons and boy did they keep her running. A favorite of the coach was to name a child, hit a ball way out in the field and tell them to go get it. Celia occasionally would find a ball closer on the field and bring it back, not quite understanding that the coach wanted her to run, not just get him a ball.

Otherwise they did catching and throwing exercises, took a turn batting and fielding grounders. Celia got together with a few other girls and tended to dig up the pitchers mound when they were supposed to be fielding. It is pretty slow waiting for 12 kids to take their turns hitting! Celia wasted no time whenever she was up at bat, in fact the picture below is the only one I got of her batting because she’d just walk up and swing before I’d manage to get ready most days. Josie and Ewan watched with me but as the weeks went on, Ewan was desperate to get on the field and proved he had been paying attention at the end of the last practice by taking a turn swinging the bat. Celia had a great time and we’ll be signing her up again given the chance to play ball!

Merry Christmas from our bunch to yours, may it be a peaceful day.

Thankful for happy belly laughs, which will hopefully soon be returning once we’re all healthy. Also thank you to you my blog readers even though I’m about three technology fads behind (facebook, instagram…)

This little boy is a huge bundle of energy and curiosity racing to get out into the world! He is climbing up, over and onto anything he can manage, including the table and all over the playground structures. He also likes to lean out over openings and call to me just to torment me on them! He loves to move, run, ride and climb. He’s getting a tiny bit more careful with running and hasn’t fallen in a few weeks too badly, one week he ran and just went splat face first into the pavement and got a big bump to go with it.

Most of his favorite games are movement games. Ride ride to boston, the nobel duke of york and just flat out dancing, spinning and rolling. He’s working on his somersault now, but it goes over to the side. We’ll sign him up for gymnastics before too much longer! He still loves music and regularly asks for it to be turned on so we can all dance together. He also loves to be swung around much to the chagrin of the folks in my grandmothers old-folks home watching me do it.

His biggest developments have been in his teeth and his language. He’s gotten all his first set of molars and now the eye teeth are coming in too! Poor us and his lack of sleeping. At least we know there is light at the end of the tunnel before too much longer and we should get a break from teething for several months once those eye teeth are in. Ewan’s receptive language has really blossomed, he understands now much better when I say what we are about to do. He runs toward the door when I talk about going out or to the park (even if he’s not wearing pants, which is most of the time). He understands some body parts, such as nose, ear and belly.

He’s turned into a big hugging machine now and will hug when asked most of the time. He gives great morning hugs and tackles Celia for some love. He also talks to us in his baby language like we’re stupid idiots who should be ashamed that we can’t understand what he is obviously saying to us with his words and pointing gestures.

When he’s inside, Ewan loves to get into whatever we’re doing. He also loves to do art. He enjoys crayons, stickers, markers (mostly taking the caps off and putting them on), playdough is a new one and paint. Every day he’s over at the art supplies asking to play and make a mess. He has mostly stopped eating crayons thankfully. He’s also started to do some wooden puzzles, but still has trouble if he has to twist a piece a lot to make it fit yet.

He’s quick and sneaky, he knows when he’s doing something he’s not supposed to do and does it very quietly and when I’m not looking. I always know I need to hunt him down when the house is suddenly too quiet. He’s always looking to keep up after Josie and Celia too, even trying the potty now (especially wants to do it at preschool) with occasional success.

He also got a haircut this month which he found to be a horrible horrible thing to have done to him. You can see the mullet was removed between the two photos below. He had tears streaming down his face for the entire time and even the balloon wasn’t enough of a good reason to stop crying until I got him out of the shop. I may try to cut his hair myself again after having gotten to see someone else do it, mostly I’d say her ‘skill’ was just doing it really fast, it’s not a super-awesome cut, but it got done!

Bath remains one of his favorite things and it’s a great spot to keep him out of trouble while getting the girls ready and the house cleaned up for the night. He’s just started to try to say some words that sound close to what they might actually be, like ‘cookie’ and ‘carrot’ were perhaps heard today! The next couple of months should bring some fabulous communication that we all look forward to! He also uses his sign language much more clearly although he doesn’t have many more words than ‘more/i want, water, eat, and all done.’

• Size/weight: 18 months clothes
• Favorite food: breastmilk, cheese, pasta, banana, blueberries
• Favorite toy: ball, whatever his sister has
• Favorite book: the foot book
• Favorite activity: dumping things and playing outside
• New game: playing with a baby doll
• Sleeping: bedtime ~8:15; one short nap at 1:30; gets up 7am
• New skill: more words and sign language
• Teeth: 13
• Vocalizations: tries to yell boo! imitating more sounds and lots of babbling

Happy Halloween from our fairy, cow, and scary bumble bee! Ewan enjoyed his first Halloween where he had a clue what was going on. He was wary at first, but eventually he was charging ahead after his sisters unwilling to be left behind for anything! A few times he gave them candy from his bin, instead of the other way around. Jordi got to take them around, and Ewan had to skip every other house to be able to keep up, but he still filled up almost the whole pumpkin with candy.

I did a reshoot of this photo that was our holiday card a few years ago but with a new kid, should have used the same fleece! I’ve still got it.

Back in August we threw Ewan his first birthday party! We kept it simple, yummy and fun at a local park with bagels, coffee, cake, and fruit in the morning with several families. We met up at a really cool playground with a zipline and funky merry go round plus a perfect play side for little kids. Ewan was thrilled to play for the morning with lots of his favorite people. He also had his first juice box which he quickly devoured. He wasn’t so interested in the cake. I made some cake cups (basically a cupcake with extra middle layer of frosting, inside of a cup so it’s easier to eat at a park) and he wasn’t so excited about that. We tried really hard to light his candle on fire for him, but it was too windy and we couldn’t do it!

The rest of the kids had a great time eating up huge amounts of fruit, juice, bagels, cream cheese and cake! We were so happy to see everyone who could come celebrate with us. Ewan went straight home and took a great nap.

Well I’m still a bit late to this party, trying to catch up but time keeps flying by and our evenings are short. So here I go for another better late than never edition of life with my kids! Ewan is so not a baby anymore. He’s up, he’s running, he’s climbing, he’s into everything. He uses a bit of language and sign-language and expects the world to obey his every command. Watch out if you’re not obeying fast enough. Thankfully he’s still pretty easily distracted, but he has figured out now that we sometimes have the nerve to understand yet not comply with his requests, and that makes him mad.

Ewan’s favorite toys right now are balls, bean bags, books, things he can throw basically. He kicks the balls too after watching Josie play soccer. He’s also quite fond of sticks, rocks and wood chips, pretty typical for a toddler. He likes to build towers a couple of blocks high, but mostly prefers to knock them down, especially the ones that I build.

He loves to go outside and can clearly signal that he’s ready by pointing to the door, or sitting down, pointing to his shoes and lifting his foot up at you. He loves to play at waldo park watching the other kids and just these last few weeks he’s learned how to climb up the stairs, slide down the slide and last week he went up the chain ladder for the first time. So basically the playground is a good workout for me now too. He loves to dig, push and fill and spill. Swinging is also popular and can even convince him to walk all the way to Waldo on his own two feet.

Ewan understands when we ask if he wants a book and will pick out one (or a few) and bring them back and sit with you. He won’t let you turn the pages yet and generally won’t listen to more than a few pages at a time. He also likes me to stack up books so he can knock them too.

Ewan is always up for dancing to some music, by again pointing to the ipod and doing a little dance. He’s so very pleased with his communication abilities now and all his new skills. He can also say a handful of words including ‘hola, push, hi, mama, more/mas, out, cat, hello, bye’. He is a fantastic hugger and always looking for the silly side of life. He’s most pleased with himself now when he shows that he understands how the world works, such as how to stack up library books (out of his reach), pushing the button for the cross light signal or even our own doorbell.

We had a bad several weeks with new teeth coming in, now he’s got the top molars on both sides partway erupted. I won’t be sad once they’re all through, he wants to eat food that requires chewing with them (like lettuce and red peppers) but can’t do it yet. We’re hoping they’ll all finish soon and we can get back to some good sleep for everyone. He gets himself very tired with all the climbing!

• Size/weight: 18 months clothes; 20 lbs 9oz, 31 inches tall for his one year checkup
• Favorite food: breastmilk, cheese, pasta, banana, raspberries, blueberries
• Favorite toy: ball, whatever his sister has
• Favorite book: baby cakes
• Favorite activity: Pushing things and playing outside
• New game: stacking the blocks, controlling the world
• Sleeping: bedtime ~8:00; one short nap at 1:00; gets up 7am (on the good days, 6am on the bad)
• New skill: more words and sign language
• Teeth: 10. Top molars are part way in!
• Vocalizations: lots of mama yelling along with the girls, plus the words above!

Above shot is from his actual birthday, below is recent with him telling me what he wants to do with my camera (touch the lens).

This August we got to make a fun trip up to storyland with our friends Sarah, Alex, Anna and Sophie. We drove up on Friday afternoon and the kids did pretty well, Ewan slept almost the entire time and the girls made it through the long drive with only one stop for Panera. We checked into the condo hotel and headed right over to storyland to blast off for some awesome rides. This year Celia was much bigger than two years ago and so she could do almost everything, and Josie was big enough to do every ride she wanted to do, most of them she could do alone even.

First off Celia was mesmerized by the animatronic fruit and vegetables in the front. Sophie and Anna decided to spend their money on storyland drivers licenses. Up we went to the clock-cups ride. The first time we took the bigger kids, and then I tried with Celia and Ewan. Ewan tried to explore the door, Celia grabbed him because she didn’t want him to do that, and then bonked his head on the black center wheel. So before we even got moving, he was off.

The train was interesting for all, just Ewan’s speed and helpful for getting around the park for those who didn’t have to push the stroller!

On the way out of the park we met up with Cinderella to say goodbye!

That first day was short because we went for the deal where you buy a ticket in the last three hours of the day, and you can come back the following day. The next morning we were up bright and early and got to the park way before everyone else. Because I mis-read the opening time, oops 🙂 So we had a bit of time to kill and muddled around outside the gate.

Once we got inside we ran for the antique cars and enjoyed a shared loop around with Josie and Celia driving. For some reason this is the only ride that their height charts are messed up, every other ride Josie was over 48 inches, but apparently she had shrunk overnight and then grew again. Soooo some of the favorites of the day were the polar coaster (Celia and Josie), the new roarosaurus (my favorite) and the farm cars (Ewans). Josie has also taken a new liking to the tilt-a-whirl (called the turtles here) which was a favorite of mine as a kid. Now apparently my inner-ear fluid is solidifying and that ride comes close to making me sick. But of all four adults, I was the only one willing to go on spinning rides and roller coasters, so I got to go on a lot of rides! I let Jordi do the wet rides though, and went with Ewan to have some fudge and explore the nursery rhyme section.

In the early afternoon we also had booked tea time with Cinderella! She had a whole lot of tables all set up with tea and a rice krispie and talked with all her guests before reading them a story, taking a picture, and giving out a coloring book. It was very sweet

At the part and all weekend we had a great time, ate some ice cream, and took it easy back at the hotel. The less fun part was coming home, Ewan came down with a fever later on Saturday which came back on Sunday. When we stopped for lunch at a brick-oven pizza place, and were seated right next to it, it made his fever spike even higher and caused a febrile seizure. I had the hostess call 911 and I went with Ewan to the hospital in the ambulance where it took him a long time to feel better. Eventually Jordi and the girls caught up with us after finishing lunch and we kept waiting for him to smile but the poor kid wasn’t feeling so good. About 3 hours later he did finally get his fever down fairly low thanks to tylenol and motrin and we were able to bring him home. So the memories of the weekend are a bit overshadowed by the big scare, but they said that the fevers won’t hurt, and aren’t likely to happen again.