going crazy

Sophia has been falling behind on her sleep lately, mostly because of the fact that it's light later in the evening and the sun comes up way too early for her. And it didn't help that the kids stayed up past their bedtimes while my sister and her husband and baby Emma were in town over the weekend. Needless to say, Sophia has been extra drama this week, even though we remind her that since she is now 3, her minutes in time-out have increased 50%. Anyway, last night, as I was mustering the energy to get upstairs to help Greg get the kids to bed, Nicholas turns to me and says, "you know, Mom, when the baby gets here, you're going to go crazy with all of us."

Thanks for the vote of confidence, buddy. Funny, because I agree with him.

who does nicholas look like?

My sister had done this and I thought it would be interesting to see what happens...apparently, Nicholas looks a lot more like me than Greg. Funny, since we all think Nicholas is a miniature Greg in his looks and mannerisms.

sophia is 50/50

We always thought Sophia looked a lot like me, but she is equal parts her mom and her dad. I think the results would be different if we used different pictures. The program wouldn't pick up the picture of Greg I wanted to use, so I had to use another one.

nicholas does the conga

Nicholas's school had a Latin Dance Festival and the kindergarten classes danced the conga. The kids had been learning the dance and practicing it for weeks and Nicholas had been very excited about it all. So all three class...about 90 kids total...did the conga. One of the classes was up on the stage and the other two classes danced in the front and did the line up the auditorium. The dance was pretty short, and there were lots of parents trying to get pictures, so there were there best. It was super cute to watch them.


After Nicholas's program, we had to leave and pick up some tasty Kosher treats to take to Sophia's preschool class to celebrate her birthday with them. We ended up with chocolate covered donuts and chocolate chip cookies. Greg forgot the camera, so we had to borrow Sharon's camera and took a few pictures of her class singing to her. I'll have to post those later if/when I remember to get them from her.

Then it was off to work. Three more weeks of work left. Not that I'm counting or anything.

the princess party

For the past few months, Sophia has asked to have a princess party for her birthday with some of her friends from nursery, including one of her teachers, Cami. So this past Saturday, that's what we did. Everyone showed up in their finest princess wear and we started out by making some princess accessories: tiaras, bracelets, and necklaces. Sophia also insisted on having her favorite princess movie playing while everyone was playing. Then we had a little lunch and finished it off with cupcakes and ice cream. The cupcakes had pink and purple sprinkles, of course, at the request of the birthday princess herself.

After everyone left, Sophia opened her presents and loved everything she received. After all, most of it was pink and purple, or about something pink and purple. What's not to love, right?

new wheels

Until about two weeks ago, whenever we called Sophia a "big girl," she would get a bit irate and tell us very firmly that she was NOT a big girl, but a baby girl. Then about a week ago, she would distinguish when she was a big girl (usually when I told her that something Nicholas and his friend David were doing was for big kids only) and when she was a baby girl (e.g., when she got hurt or when she didn't want to walk). Then after our trip to Arizona, presumably upon seeing how she really was a big girl compared to Emma, she decided this week that she was a big girl...except when she was in her room.

Anyway, this weekend, the kids got new bikes for the summer. Nicholas was promised a bike for his birthday back in December, so was ready to go shopping. His first bike was a Batman bike that he rode all the time last summer and was really too small for him by fall. For his new bike, his criteria was that it had a kickstand, mud guards on the back wheel, and no characters. And since Sophia wasn't too keen on pedaling on her push trike, we decided that perhaps she was ready for a real bike with training wheels, too. One trip to Toys 'R Us and we came home with two bikes.

Sunday after church, the kids went out for their inaugural ride. Unfortunately, we didn't get any pictures of Nicholas who was (1) too fast and (2) not particularly interested in his parents chasing him and trying to take his picture while his friend David was admiring his new wheels. Sophia, who wanted a purple princess or Barbie bike settled on a Dora bike since the others were too small. She loved going around the sidewalk and came in and said she was a big girl because she had a big girl bike.

meeting baby emma

This past weekend, we went to Arizona to see baby Emma and be there for her blessing. It was a very fruitful trip - Greg had a conference in Tucson at University of AZ that he was presenting at and it was also Mother's Day. It was great to spend my sister's first mother's day with her and my mom. I don't know the last time I was able to spend Mother's day with my mom.

Even though Emma is now twice her birth weight at almost 8 pounds, she still looked teeny tiny to us. And she was super cute. She's a good mix of Hyeson and Curtis. Nicholas and Sophia just ate her up and couldn't get enough of her. (And as you can probably tell from the photo above, Emma apparently could get enough of her cousins jiggling her around.) I decided that as big as my babies--ok, maybe just Sophia--were at birth, my baby in utero is probably just as big, if not bigger than Emma. Or I could just be feeling that big. Everyone keeps telling me that I should take a picture of myself while I am pregnant so I remember, especially when they find out that I never really took pictures of myself while I was pregnant the last two times. Perhaps one of these days when I am not grumpy or feeling marginally not huge, and the camera is nearby, I will. I digress.

It was 97 degrees in Arizona - while I know that the weather in Chicago was about half of that over the weekend, I couldn't help feeling that it was still a little too hot for me. I'm not sure I'm cut out for desert living. The kids, on the other hand, loved it. My sister and I took the kids to the park on Friday while Curtis was at work and Greg was finishing up his presentation and it was so nice to hang out with her and watch the kids play. It made me wish that we lived close to each other that such an outing was an everyday thing. Later in the afternoon, we all took the kids swimming and they had a great time. Ok, maybe 97 degrees wasn't so bad after all.

Hyeson and I went shopping for a brunch that she was having for family and friends who were coming to Emma's blessing on Saturday. As I was waiting for her to get ready to go, I realized I had forgotten how long it actually takes to leave the house when you have a newborn. Everytime she got done nursing Emma and tried to put her down to get showered and dressed, Emma was ready to eat again. And Emma likes to eat--often and long. But she's so stinkin' cute, it's hard to be mad at her, even when she get all fussy. And when she spits up all over her auntie.

My parents got into town Saturday night and they were excited to see all their grandkids, minus the Shanghai bunch. Hopefully we'll be able to get together as one big bunch over the summer. Emma's blessing was lovely - Curtis and Hyeson were a little worried that she might cry through the whole thing, but she was mostly asleep and very quiet, just as we suspected. She's a good baby. We miss her already and can't wait to see her again! And when we got home from church, we had a chance to take some pictures--it had been a while since we actually took any of all of us together!