Journey & Willow

Of all the kids, Journey has loved having a new baby the most.  For the first four or five months, she would fight me over who would hold him more.  Like, literally, try to pull him from my arms if I wouldn't hand him over and wanted to snuggle him myself.  She just couldn't get enough of him!

She is such a little mommy.  Totally loving and protective.  She can make him laugh and smile way more than any of the rest of the family can (including me, sniff!).  


I've also seen such growth in her relationship with Willow over the past year.  It makes me so happy to see them playing nicely, and actually having fun together.  This has definitely not been something that has just evolved or happened on its own.  Journey has a very independent personality.  She is completely happy playing on her own in her own play world.  In fact, every afternoon while Willow and Teague nap, she has her quiet time downstairs where she listens to Bible tapes and plays.  Occasionally, I will go downstairs to clean up or do laundry.  It really bugs her if she feels like I'm hanging around too long.  She will stop her play and wait till I leave.  If I don't leave quick enough, she will say, "Mom, when are you leaving??"  haha  

Willow has her own, shall we say, slightly challenging personality.  Definitely the strongest personality of the kids.  She is funny and witty.  She is loving and silly.  She loves to cuddle and is very affectionate.  She tells me all the time that "Mommy, you the best mommy in da whole world!"  She has the craziest sense of smell I've ever known someone to have.  She is fearless.  Completely fearless.  A couple months ago, (at 2 1/2) she decided to try out Journey's bike, jumped on and figured out the pedals.  Now it does have training wheels, but it's completely different and much bigger than her little trike. She took it to the top of our driveway (which is sloped), got on and pedaled it as fast as she could, then stuck her legs out and rode it down till she hit our car at the end of the hill.  Yep, she hadn't though about figuring out the brakes!

Aaaand she's moody and fiercely stubborn.  Dear Lord, she's stubborn.  When she's in a good mood, life is great.  When she's not, well, it's incredibly frustrating.  When she is in one of her "moods", there is nothing, nothing we can do to pull her out of it before she wants to.  Spanking, moving her to the bathroom or her room, taking privileges, nothing works until she chooses to let go of her bad mood.  It's very frustrating because the worst fits show up most often at bedtime....when we are tired and ready for quiet and to be done for the night.

Before we moved, each of the kids had their own rooms, so bedtime was never really an issue.  We would just shut each of their doors and let them talk themselves to sleep.  Now Journey and Willow share a room, bedtime has been an issue almost every night.  They talk to each other, Willow will get out of bed, run around the room, jump on her bed or change clothes.  When we go in to put a stop and hand out some discipline, it all goes downhill from there.  About a month after we moved, I realized that their closet was big enough for Willow's small mattress.  That has become her "bedroom" more often than not since then!  Not perfect, but it's a good consequence, and helps Journey to be able to tune her out and go to sleep.

So anyways, back to Journey and Willow developing a friendship....  Their favorite play right now is Mama and Baby.  Journey is the Mama and Willow is the Baby.  In the "baby" mode, Willow likes Journey to baby her and tell her what to do (perfect!).  They also have fun dressing up and pushing their babies or animals around in their strollers.

All dressed up for the wedding  :)

One day, Journey and Willow came upstairs completely dressed up, including extra bows, scarves, multiple dresses and tutus.  Journey informed me that she was getting married and Willow was in her wedding.  When I asked her who she was marrying, she said "Aspen!"  He (quite indignantly) said, "no you aren't!", where in she clarified that she was pretend marrying him.  Oh man, that kind of stuff just kills me, love it!  :)

I really feel glad that I didn't put Journey in preschool.  I think that just the sheer amount of time they have together everyday has lead them to developing a friendship, not to mention the "guidance" (and lots of it!) from Mommy in learning to treat and talk to each other nicely.

Aspen

So it's been a long time since I've done an update on each of the kids.  I have so much in my head, and am constantly telling myself not to forget this or that detail about one of the kids....Uggh.  Trying to remember the things I told myself not to forget is impossible!

Aspen is 8, and just finishing up 2nd grade at Portland Christian.  I think I forgot to do an update about how we ended up moving him from Scouters Mountain Elementary 2 weeks after school started last September.  Basically, his class had 33 students in it, and after looking at the school calendar for the year, it averaged out to 4 day school weeks.  Knowing we were looking at moving, and with the large class size and budget cut days, we decided to change schools.  He has done incredibly well.  He is at the top of his class, and really loves his school.  He has made huge strides this year specifically in handwriting and reading.  His teacher does not let him get away with sloppy work!  He's always been a good reader, but hasn't loved it.  In the last month, it's like he's just caught on to how much fun reading can be.  His favorite books right now are the Diary of a Wimpy Kid books and comical books like that.

There are so many great qualities I see in Aspen right now.
Protective - he's very protective of his younger sisters and brother.  It freaks him out if he sees Willow doing something he feels could be dangerous.  He also watches over Teague when he is home to make sure Willow or Journey aren't being too rough with him.

He is incredibly loving toward me.  He tells me every day, multiple times a day how much he loves me, that I'm the best mom/girl in the whole world, and that he will never stop loving me.  Sometimes I feel like I need to pinch myself or soak in the moment, or something to freeze and remember how he is right now.  Sadly, I know it won't last!  At least, not the way it is now.  I don't remember being that openly loving as a child.  I feel so lucky and often surprised at how uninhibited his is in his love.

He has a great attitude.  There has only been once. ONCE.  The entire year that I've picked him up from school, asked him how his day was, and he said he had a bad day.  And that one day he got into the car pissed!  The girls (usually Willow) now often ask him how his day was when he gets in the car.  It makes me smile every time to hear them ask him how his day was because by their tone of voice you can tell they really do care about how it went.  It usually prompts him to in turn ask us how our day was.  I love those small details.  It always makes my afternoon!

Each month, the school focuses on a different character trait, and honors one student from each class at the end of the month at a chapel.  This month (June) Aspen was chosen for Patience.  I'm not going to lie, Mark and I were extremely proud of him at the chapel.  Like beaming, and trying not to cry proud, haha

His teacher had 5 boys from his class come up and help give the award.  They each read one of the following about him:
A - always has a great attitude
S - smiles show his kindness
P- polite and respectful
E - enjoyable to be around
N- never complains

Honestly, parenting is hard work.  You put so much time, energy, effort and passion into doing your best.  Him being recognized like this is kind of like being given an award as a parent.  Like all the work and effort you have put into training him have made a recognizable difference.  Also when I thought about it, this really is a very fitting character trait award.  He has three younger siblings, not to mention all the younger cousins that have helped develop patience in him.  He is really incredible with Peyton, in particular.  Aspen is over 3 years older than Peyton and about double his size, but they just love each other.  Aspen is so patient and helpful with him.  I love seeing them together.

One other thing that I have to say about Aspen is that he is super helpful around the house and just loves his little brother.  He gives Teague lots of attention, and tells him all the time how much he loves him that he's the best little brother ever :)

March 2012

Oh gosh.  I'm sitting here at my computer, and it's now June.  I can't think of anything from March.  What the heck did we do in March?

Unpack.
Oh yeeah, unpacked, set up the house, and set about exploring our new neighborhood every nice day we had.  I've been blown away at how friendly the neighbors are.  We've had many neighbors come over and introduce themselves to us, and people walking by the house are always introducing themselves to us if they live in the neighborhood.  I love that!    We lived at our last house for over 9 years, and literally only knew the names of our next door neighbors.  Nobody was friendly (including us).  Such a different culture here in the city, and we are loving it.

Teague's Allergies
This was again a huge part of my life.  Cutting out all dairy, eggs, wheat, soy, nuts, coconut, beans, corn and bananas, and then trying to figure out what to feed myself and feed the family was extremely difficult and stressful.  Most of my free time in the evening and nap time was spent trying to get educated on all things eczema and allergy.

Spring Break at the Beach
We took off for the beach for 4 days for Spring Break.  We hadn't been there since December, and had missed it!  It was a great time to get away and relax, and we wished we could stay longer.


Dropping Weight
The only, and I mean ONLY good that has come of this crazy-stressful diet I've been on is that I've finally been dropping my pregnancy weight.  I dropped the first chunk of weight after delivery and in the first two weeks.  Since then, it's been excruciatingly slow to come off.  In the first 2 weeks after going on this diet for Teague, I dropped 5 pounds, and was down 8 by day 16.

One Diet Cheat Night
I broke down and checked Facebook for any other highlights I couldn't think of, and found one more....
The one night I broke down and cheated on my diet.  Three weeks in, and I just couldn't take it anymore.  I was missing real food, and cooking with Mark SO much.  One of the things we love to do together, maybe 2-3 times a month, is have a date night in.  We feed the kids their dinner and put them to bed, then pour ourselves some glasses of wine and make dinner together in an unhurried and uninterrupted way.  It's so nice to slow down, have a drink together, enjoy the view, and talk while we cook together.  Yes, we don't end up eating until maybe 8 or 8:30pm, but it's SO worth it.  And it was especially so that night in March.  I really needed a night free of stress with my hubby, and it felt amazing after the stress of the move and diet!


So there it is.  All the highlights of March 2012.

Oh wait, just thought of one more.  Teague's NOT sleeping through the night anymore.  :(   I'm not sure if it's the move, the drastic change in my diet making my milk not as rich, stress, teething or a combo, but he's now up 3-6 times a night.  He's still an amazing baby.  Super sweet and laid back so I have nothing to complain about.  Sometimes I think him sleeping through the night when he did was just God giving me what I needed when I needed it - God's grace to get me through the move.  Regardless, I'm incredibly thankful for the time I had to get good sleep!

May 2012

Highlights:
Teague much less reactive and sensitive to everything.  Teague's face has cleared up almost completely, and I have been able to cautiously add back a lot of foods.  So amazing!

Mother's Day

Ava's 5th Birthday Party at Mt. Scott Community Center

Start of fishing season with halibut.

Memorial Day at the Beach