Soap in the Mouth

It is becoming a tradition to watch "A Christmas Story". This year we really couldn't resist since the kids are getting a bit more into non-animated movies AND there is a home very near us that has a "sexy leg lamp" in it's window. There is one part of the movie where Ralfie said the big "nono" word and got soap in his mouth. Annah was very attent during that part of the movie apparently...

The other day we were packed into the van and I said "Darn it, let's (whatever it was)".

Annah: What did you say?

Me: I said a sassy, no-no word. Don't say "darn it"

Annah: Well, you need to get some (soap) in your mouth.

The boys thought that was funny. Annah didn't laugh until she heard her brothers.

Annah: That was really funny!

Little Monkey!

I have this VERY annoying but cute & fun saying I tell Andrea. "Are you a monkey (high pitch on monkey throughout)? A little monkey? A silly monkey? My little monkey?" So, she is my monkey. We are starting to dabble a tad with foods. One of the greatest invention is the banana. She is a bit young for it because it is harder on her stomach but she really only sucks on it for a little bit. And we may just have to declair the banana the most perfect food...portable & all parts are useable. The skin works great as a little "soother"...something she can grab and suck on when I am nearby. Yup, she is a little monkey!

Swirleys

The two favorite things in our house are legos and drawing paper. This weekend the kids went through a lot of paper. While they use both sides it makes a mess and then I feel guilty for not saving it because it is paper after all! But I try not to worry about it too much. This morning I was picking up the paper on the table and deciding which drawings to save and what would be recycled. I came across a pile about 30 pieces thick. Each piece had a single swirl drawing on it. Samuel! He had been into drawing swirls over the weekend and had us playing guessing games to find out how many he'd have on a single sheet. But a single swirl to a single sheet of paper was just too much. And that is when all I could think about was what I was told in school and at home growing up. "Do you know where paper comes from?" Yes, we have doodle boards but nothing beats a clean sheet of paper...as long as it is used wisely.

Running on Empty

Monday ended up being a big day. Returning to the office after a 5 month maternity leave, wrestling sign up for the boys, tuition due for Ale, general running and an appointment with the speech specialist at the elementary school for Ale. After work it was off to the bank. Time would be tight but we'd make it to the school ontime for Samuel's dismissal and the appointment. Time got tighter when I realized there was very little gas in the van. The display showed 4 miles and then trickled down to 2 miles. When I got to a station the meter displayed ZERO miles to empty as I pulled up to the pump. I had about 6 minutes to get to the school so only filled the tank 3/4 full to save a couple of seconds. Then I see this note saying if I don't get a receipt I need to pay inside and kept on hearing announcements for other pump numbers to go inside and pay. I was already under the gun and the kids were in the car and I was praying my receipt came off. It did! 4 minutes to spare and I finally arrived to school about just 2 minutes late.

It's Raining Cats and Dogs...No....I mean popcorn!

I never get tired of the first snow fall of the year. And the kids get equally excited. They wanted to run outside and get a "taste" of the snow with their tongues. Annah went outside too and you could tell by her expression and body that she did not remember snow. She is just under 2 and 1/2. She exclaimed "It's raining popcorn". What a cute expression!

So it has been fun telling that story until last night. The boys went to scouts so Annah was home with Andi and me. We were watching Jon and Kate Plus 8, one of her favorite shows when we transitioned her from our bed to her own shortly before Andi was born (she calls it "Babies"). A commercial came on for Netflix. The girl goes outside with a bowl. It was literally "raining popcorn" and she went inside with a full bowl shortly after and sat down to watch a movie.

What a spoiler! I will still claim the phrase to be an "Annah" original even though I admit she may have just seen it on TV. Hmmm, I wonder when they debuted that commercial. We may have a little creative genious on our hands.

You've got Mail!

Annah delighted me with what she calls "E-mail" all day yesterday. She kept on delivering these to me when I was on the computer:



If you cannot make out the picture they were just envelopes which she always has taken from a little basket we keep by the computer. She started doing that when she was a baby. The one in the picture has a little brush in it.

Passport patience

We've done this three times before. It isn't hard to follow directions and have everything in order when filing for a passport. The first fun thing is taking an infant's picture. From past experience we stick with the post office for that to ensure the size is just right. Birth certificate? Oops. We had to go and retrieve it and return. Of course the officer had 2 other appointments booked so we prayed she'd squeeze us in, which she did. No bother that not only did we have to return but Ale & Annah were squirmy and then I had to run out to the van for the checkbook. And THEN hand the check to her only to have it returned because I forgot to fill in a line. No amout of organization would have prevented it; that is just how it is sometimes. So we are ready to go and there is water on the floor by where Annah is standing. Armando whispers..."Did she pee?" Woudn't that be icing on the cake? Whew, just my wet shoe prints from the van run in the rain.

When animals mix

Annah: "I'm a bunny...ribbit, ribbit, ribbit", as she jumped on the floor.

Mami: "Don't you mean a froggie?"

Annah: "No, I'm a bunny ribbit"

My Mami Superpower...I make milk

I don't like bottles and I don't like to pump. Maybe it is because of my nursing experience being cut short with Samuel (another story) or maybe it is because there are so many pieces and the time and effort to keep things stored and cleaned isn't worth it. I haven't pumped at all since with the other children even when I pumped they wouldn't take a bottle. That and my milk supply increases way too quickly when I pump.

With that said Andi is now 3 months and I have never pumped. She has been left once with my mom for an hour and did okay. Next week I am going on a field trip to the pumpking patch with Ale. I did the same field trip when Samuel was in 4 year old pre-school and Annah was just 2 and 1/2 months old; also my first time venturing away from my "baby".

Last night I pulled out the pump and expresses about a 1/2 an ounce just to see. The kids watched. I opened the single bottle that has been stored in the cabinet to which Ale asked, "What is THAT?". Funny what you hear in a non-bottle household. They watched in amazement as the milk came out and we put it into the bottle. Did Andi take it? Not really. She just gnawed with the right side of her mouth and sampled but no sucking.

So I will pump a bottle for my venture out. While I don't expect her to take any while I am away it puts me at ease that she has it even though she will be like her brothers and sister and prefer to wait. I suppose we could try a little dropper too but for her it is probably more about me than the milk and vice versa. She will be fine, right?

Mami

Where the dinosaurs roam freely

Last Christmas we went to see "Walking With the Dinosaurs". It turned our household into dinosaur-mania. I thought it would phase out after a couple of months but we are coming up on a year and they are still the hot item in the house (besides Leggos). We have a full collection plus some of Imaginext. And when Annah was barely walking the boys would play keep away and she would make these aweful dinosaur sounds and chase them. Now Andi makes here little noises and it isn't uncommon for the kids to have a good laugh because they think she is trying to sound like a dinosaur.

Baby Hugs and Kisses

Babies naturally root. When Andi's three older siblings went to the hospital to meet her we told them that Andi gave kisses. They put their nose close to her mouth and she would latch on. They thought it was cute how she gave them "kisses". Even since Andi was little I also liked to hold Andi's little face up to mine. That evolved into her "face hugs". And now sometimes we play and give her big kisses on her cheeks and she opens her little mouth and latches on just for a second, her little kisses.

My 3 month old has an online friend!

Andi has an online friend at the age of 3 months! It is one of her little buddies that was born just before she was. I am in a group with his mother and Andi saw a clip of her little friend online. None of us have never "met" but everytime she sees the clip she interacts with him. It is so sweet watching her move her arms and make little noises and smiles. AJ calls him her little "virtual friend".

Table for Six..Dining out with the kids

When we dine out we like to find places that are kid friendly. Our children seem to have a tolerance level of about 45 minutes from start to stop. I think we only made it to about 29 minutes yesterday.

We went to Outback as we haven't been there in a long time. Annah has been doing great with potty training and hadn't had an accident in about a week. However while waiting for our food she had an accident. AJ took her to the bathroom to clean her and returned to the table with a half naked child. We wrapped one of Andi's blankets around her legs and he went out to the van to get a fresh change of clothes.

Shortly thereafter Andi needed a diaper change as well. I had been thinking about changing her diaper size for a week or so but we hadn't. Beautiful yellow poo up the side of her sweater onesie. AJ changed her and brought her back to the table NAKED! Another trip out to the van for fresh clothes.

By this time we had been served but the food was getting cold. The kids all ordered broccoli soup to which only Samuel ate. Ale wasn't interested and Annah does what Ale does so all they had in them was bread. Okay, whew!

Something then happened. What? I don't really remember but Annah started to cry which in turn made Andi cry (she does whenever her siblings do). Enough was enough. I gave AJ & Samuel to finish eating and he requested that the rest of the food be bagged for us while we waited for him in the van.

Mooooooommmm!

I never thought I'd hear my own child call out my name as I have heard so many other children do to their mothers. But MoooooommmM! Or Mooooooom, with a raise and lowering of the voice. The first time was last year when I sent Samuel to school with a dress hat on the wrong day. The kids were excited to learn about his sombrero, at least. And I did it to him again just last week.

Samuel bikes to school and we follow behind & accompany. The other day we met him at the park behind school so the kids could play on the equiptment. Andrea needed a diaper change and since I am not big on diaper bags or purses I used the front pocket of Samuel's backpack to store the soiled diaper (only #1, by the way). Samuel came home from school the next day telling me how he went to check his bag for an afternoon snack only to pull out a dirty diaper. Oops, don't know how that one missed me!

Two right feet

Ale likes to be barefoot; he always has. He has also always forgotten where he puts his shoes even after infinitive reminders to put his shoes in the closet. The newest rule in our house is that he cannot get into the van without his shoes on. Yet it is a bit difficult for us to manage and on several occasions we have arrived at a destination only to find Ale barefoot! Today was no different with the exception that I broke the rule and knowingly allowed him into the van without shoes as we were going somewhere that was "barefoot friendly".

After our visit we ended up going to the local five&dime. Ale gets out of the car and....NO SHOES! Samuel had a pair of his shoes in the van for some reason and we also managed to find one of Ale's shoes in there. Ale ended up wearing his shoe and one of Samuel's. He insisted that he should wear one with one of Samuel's; who am I to argue? Thankfully they were the same design. He looked like a duck waddling into the store with two right feet, one a couple of sizes bigger than the other one.

Multiple uses for a rolling pin!

Dear Diary,

Today I found yet another use for a rolling pin.

The set-up: We have been walking behind Samuel to school in the morning however today I rode my bike with him, leaving the three others at home with AJ. It was a lot quicker. Then I thought...I have been walking a lot and would like to start biking some more. It definitely felt more free biking now than when I went around the block with Samuel when he was starting to learn early this summer and I was almost 8 months pregnant. I decided to buy a bike trailer. I should have held onto the one my sister gave us just before Samuel turned one but there was no need. Anyhow, I found one on clearance and had to put it together.

The conviction: The trailer is supposed to be put together without tools but, of course, the pieces don't fit exactly how they need to and some pounding is necessary. I managed to get everything together with the exception to the 2nd handle. It just didn't line up right. So I go to find a "pounding tool". Too lazy to search downstairs. We do have a tool area but it isn't ontop of my organization list right now. Why not use a rolling pin? Good idea.

Pound, pound, pound. It is working! Okay, a couple of dents in the wood but that would give me a nice story when I'd use it some other day to make crumbs or roll out some dough. That handle sure is stubborn. Pound, pound, pound. Do I see the rolling pin falling apart? Yup! I had bought it at an estate sale shortly after getting married over 9 years ago. Fell apart? Yup!!! Oh, well. I guess I really didn't like that the rolling pin had handles on it anyway. It served it's purpose yet again and the trailer did get put together (in the kitchen, by the way). And now I have my "handle-less" rolling pin.

Potty Training 101 & the Three Day Rule

We have a method that works well when it comes to any kind of training or weaning. We call it "The Three Day Rule" which basically is to wait until there is a window of opportunity. There is no sense training/weaning when a child is not willing. You have to catch it just right. The first day always requires a lot of attention and perhaps distraction. The second day is a continuation with the understanding that there is no turning back. The third day reality sets in and it becomes much easier from that point. It just works.

At least I thought that. Maybe we just aren't catching Annah at the right time. She has never liked to poop. That is from birth! She does poop on the toilet, however. Now tinkles? We are still getting there. I am starting to wonder if her training is going to be more gradual. She has a strong personality and with Andrea only being 2 1/2 months may be using that and withholding. Granted she is just over 2 herself and there is plenty of time. I guess time will tell. We may have our first non-three-day-ruler....but probably just the timing isn't right yet.

(I need to mention here that she calls Winnie "Winnie the PooP". It makes me chuckle. And what parent cannot hold a conversation about tinkles and poopies?

BWA

BWA..Baby Wearer Annonymous. Yup, that is me. It all started with a Bjorn over 6 years ago. And from there I have been out of control. My favorite is a mei tai however with Andi I have also grown partial to the sling. And there should be a BWA since it is a true addiction. I probably have too many carriers and it is pretty obvious since now Samuel has asked to "wear" Andi. It sure is a life saver and I wouldn't have it anyother way. You do adjust to doing things in a different manner. It's just the way it is.

The tech savy 6 year old

Or should I say 6 and a half year old since at that young age you count the 1/2 years too. Samuel just got his first e-mail address. He named it himself... "samuelsfirstemail@.......". It made me chuckle. I am amazed at what he learned on the keyboard at school already. He sent a message to Buppa (grandpa) asking him to ride bikes with him and another one to Papi.

Weight resistance

I started on the elliptical again 3 weeks post partum. With the exception of taking the week off while my in laws were here I am back on. Now 7 weeks post partum I am actually starting to feel some muscle aches. That is a good thing because at least I know I have muscles...those abs and thighs. Or perhaps my muscles are returning since I have added resistance to my workout; my daughter. And the good thing is that she is gradually getting heavier which is more natural resistance!

How many people can you fit....

It almost sounds like a joke. How many people can you fit into two double beds? Well, a couple of weeks ago we went to pick-up my mother-in-law and overnighted in a hotel. Even though there are six of us I see us as a single entity. We got to the hotel and then realized that seven people in 2 double beds would be a tad mooshed (even though 4 were children). But we made it happen. Perhaps it was due to all that training had when we promoted ourselves in our house to a king size "family" bed that we made it work. AJ, the two younger ones and myself on one bed (the youngest one is nursing). "Abuela" and the two boys on the other bed. Did we sleep? Yes. Was it comfy? Um, do I need to answer?

FORE!

The kids like to go to N&B's (Nanna and Buppa's). Besides swimming they take the golf cart out with my parents and go out to putt or just for a drive. Yesterday my parents took Ale & Annah as Samuel played with his Razor scooter in the front yard. They came back and we all had a good laugh. They had one of those moments where you wish you had a camera with you.

They gave Annah her little putter and were on one of the greens. Everyone got out of the cart and Annah had this shiny little black purse with her. She reached her hand inside and got out a golf ball (she had several stashed inside). A perfect way to carry golf balls around for such a little lady. One of the balls she had had an "eye" on it so she held it up to her eye and walked around saying "eye, eye, eye" (my father has a machine that instead of dispensing bubble gum dispenses golf balls and the kids enjoy putting a quarter in and getting a ball out in return; that is where she got the ball). Onto putting...Annah was going to putt. She held the putter sideways so was hitting the ball with the edge of the club instead of the side. One time, okay. Two times, okay. Enough is enough! Annah will be two in just under a week. She thought it through....this is taking too much time! The next stroke she decided to not use the club at all but instead kicked the ball. The perfect solution for such a delicate game!

A little of this and a little of that!

Ale likes his water warm when he bathes. He also likes his food warm. But warm does not exist in his vocabulary...yet. Right now, according to Ale, he likes his food (and water) "a little bit of cold and a little bit of hot". Another thing that makes me chuckle.

I'm dook!

Children's language ability amazes me. The amount of rules that they learn and then the acceptions to them. And then if they are learning more than one language....

Samuel was a very clear speaker from the beginning. He had little/no trouble distinguishing Spanish from English. I remember he used to play with this little train set and their was a mummy. He would call it a "mami-O" instead of a momia. He'd do the same thing (flip a word) when we'd read "The Hungry Little Caterpillar". It was a "pater-killer". Samuel picked up this habit somewhere along the way and he'd also add an /s/ to anything that began with a /th/. Oh, "sthank you". It was just that, a habit. When he was four it took little effort for it to be corrected.

Now Ale is four. You can tell he has a worldwind of information moving around in that little head of his. There are sounds that he cannot pronounce yet like the /s/ and there are others like the /l/ that he can but by the same habit that Samuel had with the /sth/ he will correct soon enough. One of the cutest things he does is when someone asks him how he is doing he replies "DOOK" which is "good". The logic is astounding. When I listen to myself and others speak from here many substitute a /d/ at the end of the work with a /k/ so that makes complete sense.

Of course, now we have two little monsters that say "dook" as Annah is all monkey-see-monkey-do. And now if we ask Annah what she is doing she says "I'm doinK". It makes me chuckle.

Paulino

So, who is Paulino? The children's cousin is PaulinA. Yes, with an "a" at the end as in she is a little girl. When we found out we were expecting we told the kids the names we had picked out. Andrea if we had a girl and Joaquin if we had a boy. Ale wanted the baby to be a boy and wanted to call him Paulino. We couldn't figure out why but then it came to us. Alejandro's cousin was born a week after he was and her name is AlejandrA. So naturally since his cousin's name was PaulinA there needed to be a PaulinO.

The kids now have added a 7th member to the family. You guessed it, PaulinO. They carry him around the house and even took him to the outdoor theatre with us last night to watch a movie. Here is a picture of Paulino. He was made for us as a gift (adopted, I guess) from a family friend in Mexico when she found out we were expecting Alejandro four years ago.

Four little ducklings and a dog

Yesterday I decided to go for a walk. I left the house with the 4 kids. Andrea just turned 3 weeks old and I had her in a wrap (wearing her). Samuel was on his bike and Ale on training wheels. Annah was in the stroller. And we were off.

Well, almost. I grabbed the house key and checked it to make sure it worked on the inside garage door. Great. Then I exicted through the garage as the kids waited for me in the driveway. The door closed behind me and I noticed my sister's dog was sitting in the driveway. Since I thought taking the 4 kids would be more than enough I wanted to put the dog back inside the house (I was dog sitting). I use the key and it doesn't work! No way! So I ended up putting the dog in the storage compartment on the stroller.

I noticed as we walked people would stare a bit. Sometime after Ale was born, however, I had learned to semi-ignore people otherwise I don't get things accomplished that I need to because if my attention was distracted one of the kids would need my attention or the baby would need to be nursed or whatever. Anyhow, there seems to be some sort of shift from having 3 children to having the 4th. I sort of feel like the mama duck with her baby ducklings wadling behind her. I also noticed that people watching probably get that same image...oh, look...there is one more! And the dog, of course.

We walked to the office which is just a mile away from the house and AJ was there (so we got the house key). It was a fun adventure on the way. Ale does what Samuel does. Samuel learned to ride his bike earlier this year but we are still working on the rules and crossing streets. Between making sure the dog didn't jump out of the compartment and making sure the kids didn't get too far ahead (it only happened once but thankfully they stopped at the train tracks) or waited before crossing the street, there was plenty of entertainment if anyone was watching. When we got to the office I took Andrea out to nurse her and there must have been a marshmallow from a box of Lucky Charms that one of the kids had eaten near the wrap. I had a rainbow of colors in the middle of my shirt but it came out with a little of water. Oh well, that is life, I guess. There always seems to be more moments after you have just given birth where you are able to live in the moment and see the small details. That is what life is about.

On our way back to the house we stopped at a nearby school that had a playground and the kids had fun even though it was scorching heat outside. We made it back to the house with smiles on faces and to a very cool, air conditioned home. And maybe every Wednesday should be like yesterday without the worries of what needs to be done at home and just enjoying the day with the kids.

Little Mami

Over 7 months along now and I realize that I have a little mami on my hands already. At least that is what I like to call her, my "little mami". Last night was a light dinner for me...a salad with grilled chicken. I made what I like to call "chicken-changas" for the kids; a lightly wrapped & fried flour tortilla with chicken and cheese on the inside. "Little Mami" struck again and couldn't resist the temptation to do what I was doing and took my salad from me. And she isn't even 2! The changas were good anyway.

SNAKES!

What a little lady Annah is! A couple of weeks ago we took the kids to the park so Samuel could practice riding his bike. He had just mastered balancing and riding with two wheels. AJ was playing with Alex & Annah on the basketball court and there were worms all over the place because of a recent rain. Annah had managed to step in a big puddle a little earlier on on the walking trail so we had her barefoot with pants rolled up. She was back on the court and saw the snakes and started moving her little feet as fast as they could go up and down and screaming..Snakes! Snakes!! Snakes!!! Funny thing is she does the same thing anytime she drops a little bit of food or something falls on the floor "Mess! Mess!! Mess!! What a little lady.

Bubblegum Medicine

Sam came down with a double ear infection last week in addition to the chills, fever, amongst other symptoms. We normally don't dash into the clinic but he was misearable. He was perscribed a watermellon tasting antibiotic. NOT the bubblegum flavor he was hoping for. Night one I had to put pink dye into the medicine so he'd take it. Then he got creative and wanted to take his medicine in the bathroom. AJ suspected something was going on but we let him. I checked after and did see a little dab of medicine in the sink along the rim of the drain but thought there'd be no way he was so clever as to discard of the medicine without leaving a real trace. The next two times he had to pee at the same time he needed to take his medicine. So we enforced a no peeing rule. Then he just took his medicine religiously, always coming out of the bathroom with his nose plugged. This went on for five days until AJ witnessed him disposing of the medicine last night!

Sam is a "nice boy" as his teacher would say. But what a little stinker. Yes, we did grin and smirk a bit but the event could not go unnoticed so we had to step up as parents. And we both had a gut instinct that something was up but let it go...we know better for the next time. No television for Sam for 5 days. It was that or no bike but he just learned to ride and the exercise is something I really don't want to take away. Now, if it happens again!

Pillow Arms

It amazes me how the body reacts to pregnancy. Is there really a reason to gain weight in the upper arms during pregnancy? Does it accomplish anything? I ask myself this all the time as I am frequently annoyed by the extra fluff. But then Annah falls asleep at night and uses my arm as a pillow. While I don't care for my arms too much it sure gives me a reason to enjoy the extra fluff there for the moment.

We all scream for ice cream!

Two nights ago we heard the every so familiar sound of music coming from a couple of streets over. Unmistakeably the ice cream truck! We remembered chasing after it when it came into our neighborhood over the past couple of years with the kids, one time dashing through our backyard neighbors' yard while he entertained his cigar-smoking buddies. Last night we heard it again. The kids stopped eating; what a convenient time for it to pass right at dinner. Sam saw it go by our house; which was a suprise as our street is kid-quiet. We decided to splurge and took the kids across the street. It was so adoreable seeing the 3 of them sitting on the curb with their eyes wide open in anticipation that the truck would return and delight them with a treat. Of course, the truck made it's way around the end of the road and returned to three pleasant little faces. It was another "the best day of my life" moment, as Samuel would say.

A little Charmer~Dandilion Boquette

Ale just turned 4 a week ago. I normally don't like to receive flowers as a gift but it sure melts your heart when your child gives them as a gift. Nothing beats a little bundle of freshly picked dandilions.