Larvae and Ladybugs

The most exciting thing going on around here is the presence of larvae and ladybugs in our back yard. Last week there were tons of leaves with ladybug eggs. This week we've been watching as the tiny larva are turning into bigger larva. The girls can spend hours catching the larva and letting them walk all over their hands. Then, they always put the larva back onto the raspberry bush so they can eat the aphids. (I took some pics of the eggs and larva but you can't see them in my pics.) I can only imagine the squeals of delight when the larva start turning into ladybugs.

School uniforms, black eyes & laughter

Olivia's school uniform for next year came in. She was so excited and tried it on as soon as we got home. After I took the picture she even went and got her knee high white socks and runners and put them on. I'm not sure how she's going to feel when she has to wear it everyday.

Alexis has a little bit of a black eye. She was spinning around in Pa and Avo's living room and bonked her face on the coffee table.

Cassidy is one happy baby. She is always smiling and laughing. I mean seriously laughing, even cracking up! I sure hope this is part of her personality and she's just a happy, easy going girl.

Graduation Day!

Olivia has been looking forward to this day for awhile now. She's been practicing all of June. I was so proud of her up on the stage, sometimes singing but always doing the actions. She looked like a little doll. Lexie and Cassidy were very well behaved in the audience too.

Updates!

I guess we've been too busy to blog! Here are some random updates:

Olivia and Lexie are really into imaginary play. They especially love playing with dolls. Olivia is really into making up words. "Dakoo nanoo" is what babies say and I hear that ALL day long! "Putreous" means beautiful. Even though I told her putrid meant nasty, she still insists that putreous means beautiful. Who am I to argue?

Ballet- the girls had their last ballet class on Sunday. Since it was Father's Day I gave Dan the day off and took all the girls with me. Lexie is the star of her class. She is so well behaved, follows directions well and is the only one who answers the teacher. I am so proud of her! Olivia's class is much different from Lexie's. All the girls in the class seem to have the same personality type as Olivia- loud, a bit silly, and not the greatest listener. The poor teacher!!! The girls would all be running around screaming and she would be saying "get into a circle" over and over again! Olivia did have moments where she was calm and listening to the teacher. I was so proud that Olivia was not the most hyper one in class!!!

Backyard adventures- the girls have been spending tons of time in the backyard. Our strawberry patch is huge! The girls pick strawberries every day.

Father's Day- On Saturday, I went to get my hair cut while Dan looked after the 3 girls. I left Cassidy a bottle of pumped milk, but she wanted nothing to do with it. That makes it 3 for 3 - none of the girls has ever taken a bottle! I'm not giving up on Cassidy though. I want to get my hair colored and that would take about 3 hours. We hung out at Dan's parents house and got sushi. Poor Jose didn't get to relax much though b/c they're doing work on the house.

Preschool is winding down

Olivia only has 3 more preschool classes then her graduation ceremony. This picture was taken in September of her first year of preschool. She would have been 3.5 years old and Lexie would have been about 14 months old.

This past weekend was another busy weekend. On Saturday we had a couple things going on. First we had an end of year BBQ at Olivia's preschool. We just love Killarney Park Preschool. They are run by a Mennonite church and they're just so welcoming. We each brought a side dish/snack and they provided the hot dogs and hamburgers. We just hung out by the playground and ate while the kids played. Then the older girls were off to a birthday party at Champlain Heights Community Center. Usually it's me who takes the girls to parties but Cassidy now has a set nap time of 2-4pm so Dan took the girls. It's a little out of his comfort zone but he did it for his girls.

Sunday was our usual routine of church and ballet. The girls have been pretty good at church lately. They love to get dressed up in their pretty clothes!

Sleep situation: Cassidy just went through her 3 month growth spurt. She had been sleeping through the night, and was even going longer than normal. But all of a sudden she's getting up once or twice to feed during the night. This went on for 4 or 5 nights. I was panicking and worrying that Cassidy was going down the path that Lexie had gone- sleep regression! Let me tell you about Lexie and her sleep issues. I had expected Lexie to be like Olivia- an awesome sleeper. But she was just okay. She had eventually started to sleep from 7pm to 3/4am at about 5 months. Then she got 1 tooth, then another. Then she got 4 more at the same time on top!!!! She started to wake up earlier and earlier until she was waking every 2-3 hours. She was eating solids so I had hoped she would stop waking at night to eat. But she was waking to nurse for comfort, not nutrition. So here she was, this healthy, chubby little thing and she was waking up every 2-3 hours to nurse. She also wasn't napping during the day. I was a mess and I had had enough. I took her to my dr. and told her I was going to let her cry it out but I had to know that she was physically fine. My dr. chuckled at me and looked her over. Of course she was fine but now I could let her cry and not wonder if something was bothering her. I got out a book from the library and made a plan. There's an actual sleep method called cry it out and the book is written by somebody Ferber. I started to read it and it confirmed everything I knew- at 9 months, Lexie did not need to wake up every 2-3 hours to feed. The first night she cried for an hour and a half. Keep in mind it wasn't 90 minutes straight. It would get really loud, almost hysterical, then it would peter out to nothing. There was even a period of 20 mins with no crying. All the while I would go in and check on her. I couldn't pick her up and I had to make my time brief with her. The next night when she woke up after only 2 hours of sleep I had to do the same thing. But the 2nd time she only cried 30 mins and that was the end of her nightime waking.

Big girls stats

Olivia- 39.5 lbs (40%) and 43 inches (58.7%)

Lexie- 30 lbs (50%) 37.5 inches (72.5%) another tall girl!

Olivia and Lexie are full of energy these days. I try to keep them busy but sometimes it's not enough. Olivia was supposed to have swimming tonight but we're keeping her home one more night to ensure the wound has healed well. Lexie isn't in swimming now because the class for her age is too easy for her. She has to wait until she's 3 before she can go in on her own. I hope all the rain in our forecast doesn't show up so we can get out for lots of walks!

Cassidy's update

Cassidy is now about 12.5 lbs which is right around the 50 percentile for 3 month olds. I measured her at the health centre and I read the number on the sliding scale but when I put it in the growth calculator she's at 90% for height! I may have gotten it wrong or I may have a really tall baby.

She's doing pretty well with her sleep. Hmm...maybe that's connected to her height? I read that babies do most of their growing in their sleep. She's been doing about 8:30-6:30. Of course she had to throw me for a loop last night and get up at 10:30 and then 4:50. Little stinker.

Big milestone: she has rolled from her tummy to her back! Lexie was with me both times and she got super excited.

Tia Elsa is visiting from Toronto this week and we went for a visit on the weekend. (Elsa, I hope you don't mind me posting the pic!) Lexie gets especially excited when Tia comes. For weeks afterward she'll talk about going over to see Tia.

Today me and the girls went to Akbar's for lunch with Aunt Laurie. I forgot just how much I love Indian food!!!! We had butter chicken, prawns in spinach, alu gobi (veggies), papadam, pakora and naan bread. Akbar's is fantastic! It's on Broadway, close to Burrard. The girls were really well behaved too- all 3 of them! There wasn't anyone else in the restaurant b/c we went right at opening. We left at the perfect time too, just as other customers were coming in. Thanks Auntie Laurie!

This is why you don't run inside

On Friday I was shopping in Superstore with Lexie and Cassidy. My phone rang and it was Mrs. Gelean, Olivia's preschool teacher. Olivia had fallen in class and cut her head. Mrs. Gelean said that Olivia's cut would need medical attention. I was kinda flustered and said that I was in the middle of a Superstore shop and I'd be there as fast as I could. I think back to my words and think that they must have thought I was going to continue my shopping! I just meant that I was in the middle of Superstore and it would take me a few minutes to get out of the store, get the girls into the van and get to preschool. I left my cart where I was and got to the van as fast as I could. It took m 17 mins to get to preschool from the time they called. Olivia was crying loudly when I came in and had a big gauze bandage on her forehead. I asked if she'd need stitches and both teachers said yes. I immediately took her and got going into the van without even looking at the cut. I phoned Dan's dad who phoned his mom at work at Mt. St. Joseph's hospital. I did not want to go to Children's Hospital. Last time I was there for an ear infection it took a total of about 5.5 hours. They rank your child on priority and I knew a cut would be ranked pretty low. So we met Madalena at Mt. St. Joseph's and got into the ER. We were seen right away and luckily Olivia didn't need stitches. She's got an adhesive bandage on her cut and we basically have to wait until it falls off. The Dr. said it would definitely scar and will be red and raised for a few weeks. Eventually it should fade away to barely noticeable.

It all happened b/c Olivia ran inside. She was playing in the housekeeping centre and her and some boys were running. One of the little boys accidentally pushed her and apparently he felt pretty bad about it.

Random Updates and Thoughts

I think (I pray!) we're all over the worst of our colds. We haven't done much but we've been busy- make sense? Olivia has swimming Wed & Fri and both girls have ballet on Sun. We go to church every Sunday and keeping the girls entertained and quiet is a totally work out! There's preschool MWF and of course all the shopping. I start my day at about 5am, then back to lie in bed for a bit until Lexie gets up anywhere from 6-7am. Then from there it's off to the races!

Sleeping- I'm super lucky with little Cassidy and her sleeping. She's still sleeping from 9pm-5am. But her naps are challenging. She can only tolerate being awake for about an hour. Then she needs to be asleep again. Sleep- simple right? Wrong. She doesn't fall asleep easily. And if I let it go too far past an hour she gets all wound up and overtired. I try to nurse her to sleep but that doesn't work often. I usually have to carry her around, which is killing my back, neck and shoulders. I need to start using my moby wrap again!

Housekeeping- I have to admit that I'm a terrible housekeeper. Okay, maybe not terrible but definitely not my strength. It is so low on my list of priorities right now and actually has always been! I hate cleaning. I'm trying really hard to get the girls to clean up after themselves but they hate it too. Still, I must persist. One day it will pay off. I once saw a saying somewhere on the computer. I wish I had copied it. But the gist of it was that if you have small children and you have a neat, clean house you don't spend enough time with your kids. So for now I just walk through my house saying to myself "Let it go, let it go...."

Makeover- I need a makeover! Someone sign me up for one of those shows that can make me over. I'm so embarassed to admit that I'm stuck at losing the last 15lbs. It feels like more b/c stuff has shifted around on my body. I've never had to try to lose weight before in my life. I know, boo hoo for me.

Save another date- I know you've already saved June 27th for Cassidy's baptism. The invitations will be out shortly. Now save June 24th (9:30) for Olivia's preschool graduation! Call in sick to work, take an extra break, do what you need to do to be there! (I'm just kidding!) I'll post pictures so you all can share in my glory.