Lacy's Birthday Interview

My name is: Lacy
I am 7 years old.
I am 51 1/4 inches tall and I weigh 58 pounds. 
My favorite color is black.
My favorite book is one with the main character of Lacy (we can't remember the book name)
My favorite show is Wild Kratts
My favorite food is cake
I want to be a scientist when I grow up.
My favorite subject at school is reading.
The music I like best is the music I learn at school.
My favorite thing I did last year was meeting my teacher
This year I hope I will watch TV at lunch again.
My favorite place to go is school.
My favorite thing to do is draw.
My favorite animal is every animal.
My favorite thing to do with Rose is play on my bed.
My favorite thing to do with Uriah is help him climb up my ladder.
My favorite thing to do with daddy is go to the little store and eat candy.
My favorite thing to do with mommy is go to the fair and sit in the ferris wheel.

Rose's Birthday Interview

My name is:  Rose
I am 5 years old.
I am 43 1/4 inches tall and I weigh 40 pounds.
My favorite color is purple and blue.
My favorite book is Pink Pajamas
My favorite show is Dora
My favorite food is spaghetti.
I want to be a doctor when I grow up.
My favorite subject at school is bringing muffins and cupcakes too.
The music I like best is violin.
My favorite thing I did last year was play soccer.
This year I hope I will make necklaces.
My favorite place to go is school.
My favorite thing to do is get balloons.
My favorite animal is horses.
My favorite thing to do with Lacy is play school and house.
My favorite thing to do with Uriah is snuggle with him.
My favorite thing to do with daddy is go to the little store.
My favorite thing to do with mommy is go the doctors and get a shot.

So how's the nightweaning going?

Well, it's going great!  Uriah was very unhappy at the idea of nightweaning.  At first.  The first several days were very, very hard, especially once I stopped nursing him at night altogether (night 4 and later).  I almost threw in the towel at one point.  Almost.  I think I was on night 5 or 6, and my lovely friends and family convinced me to keep on trying.  Guess what?  It got easier after that!  Uriah still wakes up at about 12:30 every night, but it takes about 2 minutes to get him back to sleep now, and I don't have to get out of bed or even hold him.  I just shush him (he likes the white noise), push down on the bed a little so he jiggles a bit, and maybe say a few soft gentle words while patting him, and he falls back asleep.  This would not have been possible a few weeks ago!  I am so happy that the nightweaning has worked!  I didn't follow Dr. Gordon's plan to a T this time, as I did with Rose, because Uriah was about 6 months younger than Rose when I nightweaned her.  I stayed on phase 2 for a couple of additional days, and we naturally and easily transitioned to phase 3 a few days later.

Nightweaning part 2

So I noticed a little bit of discoloration on Uriah's teeth recently.  I'm so frustrated.  I've been doing everything "right" this time- little sugar, hardly ever any juice (maybe 1-2x a month), teeth get brushed very well daily with no-fluoride toothpaste, but he also gets fluoride supplements every day. The theory is, if teeth are brushed well, breastmilk on the teeth does not cause cavities.  There is actually a dentist who has done extensive research on this matter and has come to that conclusion.  I'm starting to doubt that now because all 3 of my kids have had some amount of decay on their front top teeth. It may be somewhat genetic though, since I know plenty of other people who have much worse oral hygiene habits that have kids with perfectly beautiful and healthy teeth. I guess I have to be extra careful with my children to prevent this from happening.

So I decided that nightweaning is necessary to stop some of the decay.  I have a very fast letdown, and we cosleep, so I think some of the milk actually is pooling up in his mouth causing the decay.  I didn't nightwean Rose until she was older, and Lacy nightweaned out of necessity because I was pregnant with Rose, so her damage was less severe .  Uriah is 14 months now and perfectly capable of nightweaning.  It's a hard process though.  I decided to start it last night.

The first night is really hard because they've never had to be forced to do without nursing at night before.  You do allow them some nursing (2-3 minutes) but not to where they fall asleep again.  And this really upset Uriah.  REALLY upset him.  He woke up at 11:45 last night and cried and screamed and fought until 1:15 when I finally was able to lay down with him.  He woke up again maybe twice more, but it was easier to get him back to sleep then.  He woke up happy and smiling this morning, so no harm done!  We've just got to get through 9 more days of this.

Quack Quack by Louise Rupnik

I thought it would be fun to review Uriah's favorite book!  Quack Quack is a touch and feel book for babies, and Uriah absolutely loves it!

There are photographs of various animals in this book with little patches for baby to feel.  Uriah doesn't just feel these patches.  He bites them.  I guess this book is Uriah approved!  This is the only book that he'll sit all the way through.  He loves it!  He's not quite 14 months and I try to read a few books to him every day, but he usually gets bored halfway through the book.  

This is a good one for little babies because it's not too long and they like patting (or biting!) the animals in the book.

Sick

For the last week and a half.  Hoo boy this is fun.  Everyone else has already gone through it (and still have lingering symptoms- thank goodness the boy is still nursing because he can't keep anything down but mama milk) and finally today I notice a little drip from the nose.  Perfect.  Well, maybe hubby can pamper me for a couple of days while I recover.  Lacy has already missed 4 full days and 2 half days of school AND two violin lessons.  We are managing to get practice in most of the time, though.  Hopefully by this Thursday she will be 100% better and ready to fiddle again!

And I always start getting smug in late February that we didn't get sick this winter.  And then we get sick in March.  Never fails.  I'll stop being smug about our health next year.  If I remember.

The Monster Princess

Tonight we tried something the girls picked out from the library yesterday.  The Monster Princess, by D.J. MacHale, ended up in my bag from the new picture book section.  

Did you ever wish to be a princess?  Lala, the Rugabee, did.  A Rugabee is a type of monster that lives underground and collects a special kind of nut.  But Lala, a very talented and popular Rugabee, wanted to be a princess and live above ground and dance!

One day, she ventures into the castle and finds the princesses' room, where she tries on their dresses.  At first they are afraid, but they end up ridiculing her in public, which really hurts Lala's feelings.

When I opened this book and realized it was a rhyming book, I silently groaned to myself.  I am not a fan of rhyming books.  I've never really liked poetry (sorry, Mom, it's true, but I'll still recite poetry for your birthday) so rhyming books usually have a groan-inducing eyeball-rolling effect on me.  But The Monster Princess was actually not obnoxious rhyming, so it's one I could read again!  Most rhyming books aren't very cleaver and they try too hard.  I didn't feel like that with The Monster Princess.  The girls enjoyed reading it with me, so I officially declare that The Monster Princess will be renewed 3 weeks from now!  Unless, of course, somebody has a hold on it already.

All boy!

They say that boys and girls are equal and that we teach them to be boy-ish or girl-ish based on our own biases and expectations.  Well, I don't believe that for a second.  I didn't believe it when my first child was born and she gravitated toward girly things to do.  I did buy the gender neutral toys, and they have a box of dinosaurs and trains (Rose requested the trains, actually!).  Of course, the dinosaur gets dressed up in fancy dresses and Lacy parades the beautiful T. Rex around the house singing, "This is the dinosaur of the queeeeeen!"

Now I have a boy.  He turned 1 about a month ago.  I love him more than life itself and I would do anything for my little man.  I'm so glad I got him!  Of course, being a mom to a boy is a new thing for me, so I treated him exactly as I have treated my girls.  And the girls have put bows in his head more than once.  I may or may not have encouraged that.  Once I put a girly diaper on him and Dave wasn't too thrilled about that, but all my diapers were dirty and I only had a pink flower one handy.  What's a mom to do?

We're in the midst of a large amount of remodeling at our house, due to some unfortunate wind, ice and rain damage that occurred.  Because Dave is handy with this type of thing, he is doing the majority of the work himself.  My dad comes over and helps Dave often with the work that needs done, as he's pretty handy as well.  Uriah of course wants to be around all the action.  He loves hanging with the guys and is always picking up tools and trying to "help" any way he can! It's adorable!  At least, until he finds the razor knives and carries them around.

Twig

Looking for a sweet little book for your sweet little one?  Twig by Elizabeth Orton Jones is a good choice.

Twig was published in 1942, but even though it's going on 70, children today are the same as children 70 years ago, no matter how different we think they are.  They're full of imagination and can turn the simplest thing into a magical wonderland.  I know my own children will play with paper, cardboard boxes and fabric scraps for hours, coming up with all sorts of uses for them.  Twig is no different- she turns an old, empty tomato can into a fairy house!  It is just so amazing!

Your child will love listening to a book about a little child who has an imagination as big as her own.  You will love reading it to your child because the chapters are short!  Short chapters are a wonderful thing.  If you don't have much time to read because you've been busily running around all evenings, you can choose to read one chapter. If you have more time, you can read as many as you wish!

The language is simple and the characters are cute.  This is a good book to read aloud to kids who haven't had many chapter books read to them yet.

My favorite part about this book?  Twig looks a lot like my little Rosie!  I'll have to read Twig to Rose soon... I've only read it so far to Lacy.  Rose will be 5 in May and maybe she'll be ready to listen to it then.  I already call her Little Missy a lot, just like Mrs. Sparrow calls Twig Little Missy in the book!  Don't you see the resemblance?

The BFG

Oh, Big Friendly Giant, I am so grateful to you forever.  You finally got my Lacy interested in reading chapter books with me.  This was not the first chapter book Lacy listened to.  But this is the first one that Lacy actually actively listened to, enjoyed, and begged for more.  If you haven't read The BFG by Roald Dahl, you must go read this book.  Today, if possible.  It's worth it.

How did I get Lacy interested in reading a book about giants?  I told her there was a queen in the book.  And she was immediately interested.  This is such a great book for all kids, boys and girls alike, and I really wanted Lacy to hear this one and love it, so I used whatever I could to get her to want to hear it.  I'm glad I did- she loved it!

The two main characters in the BFG are Sophie and The Big Friendly Giant, or BFG.  He is the only giant who doesn't eat human beans.  Instead, he collects dreams and gives them to the little childlers at night while they sleep.  One night Sophie awakens during the witching hour and observes The BFG blowing dreams to boys and girls.  In order to protect his identity, he kidnaps her and takes her to his cave, where they eventually come up with a plan (this is where the queen comes in!) to rid the world of the disgusting, flithsome giants forevermore.

This book is interesting and fast paced.  This is an excellent choice for a first read-aloud chapter book.  Even if you don't have a child at home to listen to you read this aloud, you should still read this book if you haven't already. It is one of my favorite children's novels of all-time.

I just realized that I need to read more Roald Dahl to Lacy.  I've got to figure out my angle in order to convince Lacy that it's worthwhile to listen to... if it's not about princesses or little girls, she's really not interested.  We've read Matilda and she loved it, but I tried to read The Witches and she was not having it.

The Very Fairy Princess

Another picture book that we've recently checked out and read together as a family is The Very Fairy Princess by Julie Andrews and Emma Walton Hamilton.

Honestly?  Not my favorite.  It was pretty cute, but a little boring, to me anyway.  BUT the kids really enjoyed it, and that's who I'm reading for, right?  Well, to be totally honest, when I read to the kids, I want something that I enjoy and my kids enjoy.  I'm glad this was a library book because I was looking forward to not having to read it anymore!

The book is all about being a fairy princess, and how you need to "let your sparkle out."  She goes over all the qualities of a fairy princess ("Fairy princesses are very supportive" for example, when she gives encouragement to her friend).  It's a good message.

But the fact of it is, I read books to be entertaining and not to teach my kids life lessons.  As the mom, I teach them life lessons while they're living their life, not while they're reading a book for entertainment.  If there are morals in the story, I want them to not be detrimental to the plot of the book. There really was not much of a plot, which was why this book was so boring.

But, because my own daughters want to be fairy princesses themselves, I ended up reading it over and over (and over and over...).

Interrupting Chicken

I decided I'll start posting picture books that I read to my kids as well.  Rose really loves picture books.  Here is a fun one that we found recently.  Interrupting Chicken by David Ezra Stein.

Interrupting Chicken is a fun book for kids (I'd recommend ages 3 and older).  Both Lacy and Rose love when I read this aloud.  It won a Caldecott award and is fully deserving of it!  Such a fun read.  

Chicken enjoys getting a story every night from her papa.  Unfortunately, she gets a little too involved in the book and keeps interrupting Papa as she reads!  Finally, there are no more stories to read and Chicken creates her own bedtime story for her papa.  

Rose says:  "Funny.  Her father reads her a story.  The kid knows how to read."

Lacy says:  "I think the book is cute and funny and really silly.  The most thing I like about it is there's a chicken, and I like chickens.  They are so cute when they hatch!"

A Little Princess

Last night Lacy and I finished reading A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett.

It is written in really old-fashioned language and at times was tedious and hard to understand.  Especially on the day that I was so tired that I actually fell asleep while reading this to Lacy.  I said something about Sara having blond hair. Yeah, she's a brunette and I'm not sure where that came from.  Sleep deprivation is a scary thing.

To make the book more fun for Lacy, I had to emphasize my voice during certain parts.  She ate that up!  In the end, she really loved the book.  She likes the Little House books better, but she still really enjoyed reading A Little Princess with me.  She especially loved all the chapters about the magic, and she was so mad at Miss Minchen.  Well, she should be.  Miss Minchen is pure evil.

I'm glad I got to share my favorite childhood book with Lacy.  It was a difficult book for me to read aloud at times, and some of the chapters are really long.  Which is part of the reason I fell asleep that one day.  But she loved it, and that's what matters!  This book is a little hard for a 6 year old so when it's time to read chapter books with Rose, I'll probably wait until she's closer to 7 or 8 to read this book.  It's a lovely book, but it can be hard for the young kids to pay attention.

Lacy says- "It's cool and exciting.  I really wanted my mom to read all of it at the same day.  It was AWESOME!  It was awesome because I decided that I want to make another book of it- A Little Princess 2.  My dad said he would read any book I wrote."

Farmer Boy

I love reading to my children.  It is one of my biggest joys of being a mother- to read to my children and have them learn to love books.  

Last night, we finished one of my favorite books of all time-Farmer Boy, by Laura Ingalls Wilder.  It is one of the  books in the Little House series, written about her husband as a 10 year old farm boy in New York.  

Oh, we laughed at Almanzo's antics!  We enjoyed hearing all about farm life.  And how hard he worked, from sun up to sun down!  We were so excited when he won the blue ribbon at the fair, and then when he got $200 for returning a wallet- with some persuasion from a 3rd party- we were so happy for him!  The best part of all is when he found out he would finally be trusted to train a little colt!  What a wonderful ending to a wonderful book. 

Lacy and I adored the moments we had reading this book together. Every moment was entertaining and also educational.  

Yes, Lacy was thrilled when she got the box set of Little House books.  And she loves each book she's read. I do too.

Too grown up for her own good

Where did this kid come from?  She certainly can't be MY child.  I am not old enough to have such a big girl for a daughter.

...and he's off!

My 11 month old decided to turn the corner with the walking this week!  He's been taking steps here and there for about 6 or so weeks, but usually resorts to the Mowgli crawl after falling down on his bottom.  Not anymore!  He rarely is Mowgli crawling (which makes me sad because it is the cutest thing ever) and now is almost exclusively walking everywhere.  It is so adorable.