The Fight Club

It's started...those moments I've been dreading: the sister fights. It feels like my new job is keeping these two at separate corners lately. Being the only girl with older brothers, I was totally unprepared for the sister fights. I always longingly imagined that if I had a sister that we'd be best friends...I longingly imagined my girls would be that way: share secrets, play together, etc.

But, no, I don't think it's going to be that way. Lately these two fight over everything. If one of them has something, the other one has to have it. Lydia could be quietly playing on her own and Evelyn will start playing with a toy and not 30 seconds goes by before Lydia saunters over and grabs the toy away from Evelyn--starting a lovely round of crying, biting, shoving, and wrestling about on the floor that I have to come break apart. Evelyn starts plenty of these fights, too. They also fight over food...I have to give each of the exact same thing AND the exact same portions. Otherwise, they start grabbing food off of each others trays, and well, you can imagine the messy food fight that follows.

If they're this way at one and three, what are they going to be like in the years to come?!?

Photojournalist in the making

As you may have read in an earlier post, we got Lydia a camera for her birthday. She's been taking pictures of everything since. I'll admit most of her pictures are dark or blurry, but some--though fuzzy--are good and tell a little story of the world according to Lydia...

Self-portrait with Mommy... (I helped her hold the camera, but she pushed the button!)

Family car trip--no wonder she doesn't see half of what I point out to her!

Gotta love the kitty...

And always love the fish! (she stood on her chair for this shot.)

Repetition

Our summer has been one of repetition. Lydia and Evelyn over and over again do the things they enjoy. Some of the repetition is great: the hugs, the kisses, playing together, playing outside, splashing in the pool, and more. Some of the repetition is about to drive me mad.

About a month ago, Lydia and Evelyn discovered "Finding Nemo," and my life hasn't been the same since. For now, at almost every opportunity, Lydia is asking to watch "Fish, Fish, Fish" or "Nemo...Coral....Dory...Whale" her names for the movie. She no longer wants to watch her favorite two shows (Curious George and Sesame Street) now all she wants is to watch Nemo. It is a good movie, but I now unwillingly have the entire dialogue committed to memory.

You learning things after listening (I'm usually cooking dinner or something) to a movie over and over. The first time I saw the Nemo, I didn't realize that Dory never called him by name...after several viewings it struck me that she calls him every "O" ending name out there: Fabio, Bingo, Ringo, Elmo, etc. And other little subtle nuances you just don't get with a single viewing.

Oh well...there are worse things. It was actually quite cute and handy the other day when we went to the "Fish Store" (Lydia's FAVORITE destination) she pointed to and named almost every fish in the store. She knows her clown fish from her tang. I must run...someone's tugging at my leg, asking for "Fish! Fish!!"

Summer Rain, Playtime, and a Date!

Sometimes I love living in the woods. Like yesterday when we had this gorgeous downpour with the sun peeking through behind the clouds.

Before the storm, we played on the deck...the girls LOVE playing in their paddle-pool.


But the best part of the day was when my nephew, Liam, came over to babysit, so we could go out to dinner.

I just love the simple things and the good things life offers me: the infectious laughter of my girls playing, the beauty and passion of a summer thunderstorm, an awesome nephew who babysits, and a terrific husband to go out on a date with! Life is good...

Fieldtrip: Our Local Airport

Daddy J and I had a great time taking Lydia on an airport tour with a group of friends this week (Thanks Holly!!). We had a blast checking out all of the airplanes and helicopters. The weather was absolutely perfect: seventy degrees, sunny, and a gentle breeze. This was also the first time in over a year that it had been just the three of us--little Evelyn got to stay at home and play with her Granny. The only drawback was that my camera batteries ran out after my first few pictures, so I had to resort to the camera in Daddy J's cell phone--not too bad, though.

On a side note, I just realized that I have unintentionally made us sound like a rapper family with my Mama C and Daddy J.... : )

Mountain High

We had a great week visiting Cousin Jean at her farm in the mountains. (Thanks, Jean!!) We started our week there with a long car ride. We stopped at the National D-Day Memorial along the way--it is a great memorial--Lydia and Evelyn were quite taken with the main waterfall display and the airplane display. We eventually found ourselves on one of the most twisting, turning mountain roads I'd ever been on--2nd gear was definitely my friend on this road! When we finally pulled down Jean's long drive, we were delighted with the beauty of the place. We spent the week playing in Jean's creek, bothering the cows, climbing the mountains, and enjoying a great visit. See below for pics of the scenery and of the girls playing in the creek.

Glamour Girl

Lydia got some jewels for her birthday...what a little glamour girl!

By the way, for those that have asked, Lydia isn't really perpetually injured--she just likes "boo-boo stickers." I think it adds a little something to her glamorous look, don't you?

Night Visits and High-Stepping

I haven't mentioned Evelyn for a while it seems. She's such a sweet, quiet girl--who's learning to walk!! She hasn't gone solo yet, but she's been cruising around furniture and walks across the room using a push-toy. When she's not walking, she does this crazy "spider crawl" with her cute little bottom up in the air.

Lydia is on to new craziness this week. We just moved her to her "big girl bed," and boy, do I miss the crib already. I never realized how the crib contained her so well!!! It now takes two or three tries to get her to stay in bed. She goes to bed at her normal time just fine, but about 45 minutes later she gets out of bed and comes to find us. We put her right back in bed--plus a few extra toy passengers. Then around 3:00-4:00 AM she wakes up and goes exploring AGAIN. She doesn't come to find us; she finds her toys and starts playing. I don't know how long she plays, but I eventually hear her and wake up--and put her back to bed. Again. Then she finally gets up for the day at 6:30-7:00 AM and comes to our room to wake us up. I have a feeling she's probably been waking up at these times all along, but she couldn't escape her crib and would play there and eventually go back to sleep. Ughhh...I am so tired...I know she needs to grow up and learn independence, but I sure do miss the crib!

Happy 3rd Birthday, Lydia!!

It seems so hard to believe that three years ago today (at 3:28 AM, actually!) I became a mother to sweet, little Lydia. She weighed in at 6 pounds, 12 ounces and was 19 1/4" long.
I've been looking back at those first pictures of her--she was so tiny and delicate. Now Lydia's about 24 pounds and almost 36" tall! I know she's not very big for most three-year-olds, but she's a big girl to me! It's amazing how much they change in those first three years... Lydia's gone from being totally dependent on me to being so very, very independent (with occasional pit stops of dependency.)

As it seems with most kids I know, we're having several birthday parties...so, in between a grandparent's birthday party yesterday and a big family birthday party (with cousins Griffin and Lila who also have birthdays!) next weekend, she's spending her day today doing whatever she wants. You know what she wanted?? To go to the fish store with her Daddy! Lydia LOVES going to the fish store and today she's taking pictures! Yep--we gave her her very own kids digital camera. She's already taken about 200 pictures with it--see below for some of Lydia's first pics--and some pics of her party yesterday...

She's very serious about unwrapping...

Evelyn's thinking: "Hmmm...she's not looking, I'll just scoot over and start playing with this toy..."

Lydia loves her new camera...

"Say cheese!!!" has been the phrase of the day...didn't she take a great pic of Granny?!

Lydia's picture of her birthday cake...notice the icing is gone...

Lydia's first artistic pic--her toes and mine!

Lydia's been taking pictures of EVERYTHING, including her toys...

and a picture of herself!

I seriously want to give my cat away!!!!

I just had to write (aka vent) about this. It's 9:00 PM, the girls are in bed, and Jer and I are enjoying a few minutes of relaxing on the couch with some mind-numbing television show. When I hear it. This little thump, thump, thumpity-thump.
"What in the world?" "What's that goofy cat doing now?" Yes, we knew it had to be the cat--we'd just heard him come inside through his cat door. I saw him at the door of our half-bathroom, almost guarding it, and I knew another critter was inside.
Jer grabbed his trusty critter-grabbing gloves (they're actually work gloves, but all they seem to do lately is grab critters) and went to investigate. He slipped into the bathroom and shut the door behind him--lest the critter escape and run amuck through the house. More thumps...a small crash...the sound of Jer grumbling...then he emerged with his hands carefully holding a little something.
"Come look, " Jer said and held up the cutest, softest, and likely most terrified little bunny-rabbit. He wanted to keep it, but I declined, so the little fella was released back into the wild.
We settled back down and both wondered, how did our fat, lazy cat catch a BUNNY? Seriously??? A bunny?? We've now had every kind of critter brought into this house by our cat: bats, birds, bunny, mole, chipmunks, field mice, snakes, and lizards. While we begrudgingly love the little fella, I think it's time we got rid of his cat door. Of course, then he'll probably go back to doing what prompted us to get the cat door in the first place: climb up on the roof outside our bedroom window and jump at the window in the middle of the night--meowing.
Sigh.... :)