4 month old Aaron

Aaron, if you're reading this as an adult, you can thank your Daddy for putting Celia's tinkerbell sunglasses on you. ;)



Aaron is now 4 months old and he's still such a sweetheart. His pleasant personality has stayed the same since he was born. Sometimes to me he seems older than he really is - kind of like he really understands what is going on. Sometimes Aaron gets a bit fussy if he is over-tired and I can look at him and smile or make him laugh and he stops fussing. But, he is a real baby and sometimes he does cry for real when he's tired or hungry. ha ha
Nicholas is just enthralled with him lately. Nicholas will come up and just kiss him over and over and hug him. Celia is currently mimicking me and playing with her play doll which she has named 'baby Sammy' (her newest cousin's name).
But when I put Aaron down and say "I want to hug my Celia and Nicholas" they smile and I know they were craving some mommy-time. They are still babies too . . . even though they are closing in on 3 years old (which is hard to believe)!!



I guess babies typically go through a 4 month old sleep regression where previous babies sleeping through the night start to wake up more somewhere between 3-5 months old. Aaron was going for 6-7 hours some nights between nursing and now he's going about 4 hours and then 3 hours and then 2 hours during the day. I really think it must just be a long growth spurt or something. It doesn't bother me though. It's so easy to nurse him at night and i know eventually he'll sleep more at one time.

He is getting stronger with his sitting. Maybe by 5 months old he'll be sitting on his own? N&C sat right at 6 months old. Here he is sitting a bit with the boppy pillow - he was watching Nicholas jumping on the trampoline nearby so that threw his concentration. I know... excuses, excuses. ha ha





And Aaron being his giggly self...

Scissors and Glue

Recently with all the back to school sales, I bought some children's scissors, glue sticks and crayons. So, one morning I had Nicholas and Celia try using scissors. It will take some practicing to get them to hold them accurately. For now, they are cutting 2-handed and I keep helping them hold them one-handed sometimes for practice. They love cutting with their scissors. They like to rip the paper too, which their Grandma Maus would say is a good skill based on her experience as a Montessori Kindergarten teacher. After they rip and cut they use their glue to make some masterpieces. It's a lot of fun to have them work on things like this. If I could get my stuff together, I'll start trying plan activities to do during the week. It will involve me searching through my teaching materials and getting things set - which all of it is still buried from our basement remodel. Good luck Jill.




Celia is recently loving to color with markers more. I love to see her taking this new interest. Nicholas actually drew a person this weekend! He drew his circle and 2 eyes and a mouth and then Grandma Maus and I asked him where different body parts were: nose, hair, hat, ears, belly button, arms, legs and toes. He put them all in accurate positions (this is a great skill that he has already). I LOVE watching children's art progress and the teacher in me evaluates their development based on their work . . .can't help it. ha ha

Celia's work:

Nicholas' face (in right-hand corner) * may need to click to enlarge, but it will still be tough to make out without me pointing to everything - but it is there! lol

Drool

Nicholas and Celia were never much of droolers, but Aaron has made up for their lack of saliva as a baby. He isn't teething, its just a decent amount of drool. Then again, Nicholas and Celia were avid pacifier lovers and Aaron doesn't like them, so I suppose they were swallowing a lot. Aaron likes to pull a blanket up to his face (we use the muslin or knitted blankets so they are easy to breathe next to) when he is falling asleep and in the bath he will grab a washcloth and chew on it, but he doesn't much like plastic things like pacifiers, bottles. Sometimes he will chew on some plastic toys. He will be 4 months old this friday. I can't believe how fast time is going.

Grandma and Grandpa Velicer came to visit on sunday and while Nicholas and Celia were napping I could get some pictures of Aaron with Grandma and Grandpa. How wonderful that they have 4 loving Grandparents and even Great-Grandparents.

Big Beds

Friday morning at 7:15 am the Bedtime Furniture truck rolled into our driveway and brought in their 2 new twin beds, 2 mattresses, bedside table and dresser. I believe the furniture is made out of hemlock. Its really pretty. Nicholas and Celia did wonderful in their beds at nap time and for the first couple nights. Once they are sleeping, they do really well. It's more the actual going to sleep that sometimes is a bit more difficult. Sun and monday night they were jumping and being pretty silly going to bed. My nerves were fried - understatement. So.... Tuesday night I decided that I was going to TELL them to jump on the bed when it was appropriate. It worked! They jumped and played for a while, then got PJS on and brushed teeth. Bedtime went so smoothly when it was time for them to sleep.
Today I took N&C and Aaron to the grocery store (p.s. spent $83.00 and saved $82.00) and when we got home they went outside to play while I made them lunch (I can watch them from the kitchen). Then I yelled outside "Time to come in and jump on your beds". They looked at me like "WHAT!? REally!?". They ran in and jumped and played on the beds, ate lunch and then went right to sleep for nap (I rubbed their backs for about 3 minutes each).
Maybe I'm on to something???

It's DONE

The carpet was installed today and finished by 1pm. It is so wonderfully soft and cushy. And the sofa-sleeper arrived at 3pm. Whew! I'm glad we didn't need to deal with getting that beast of a couch downstairs. Its a really nice couch with a queen-sized mattress. So we can have guests stay overnight now. :) I can't believe how much I got done after the carpet was finished. I put Nicholas and Celia down for nap and luckily Aaron napped shortly afterwards. I was able to bring almost everything downstairs from the playroom and organize. I also brought down our old TV (used my muscles there) and set up some older baby toys (like excersaucer) for Aaron. Then the couch was delivered at 3pm. N&C woke up and somehow during the afternoon I was able to steam clean all 3 bedrooms, make dinner by 6pm, and have all kids asleep by 7:45pm. It's an understatement to say I need a shower.
Nicholas and Celia's bedroom furniture comes tomorrow morning bright and early at about 7am. Yikes. I'm usually just rolling out of bed at that time. Their room is clean, empty and has all the paint touched up. We're ready! Hopefully they do well in their beds. I'm 1/2 excited and 1/2 worried.
Here are the pictures! The pictures are a little dark.


from the bottom of the stairs:

our 2nd livingroom ;)

this alcove of 3 doors shows the right being the playroom, straight-ahead door is the bathroom (someday) and the door to the left that you can't quite see is the furnace room
Playroom (its a mess still)

The fine art of Toast

A sequel to the cooking show.

The kindness of strangers

Lately it seems so many people come out of no where and are so kind towards us. I don't know how we deserve their thoughtfulness, but I hope to be able to pay it forward to others somehow. Yesterday I took Nicholas and Celia on a walk. They wanted to push their little strollers on the walk and I reluctantly agreed (knowing the walk takes 3x longer with baby strollers). I had Aaron sleeping in the Ergo carrier. We took a walk up a hill and on the way down i reminded them to stay near me. Well, Nicholas got carried away with his stroller and he zoomed down the hill. I always worry a car will back out of the drive-way and not see him. A car will not see a small toddler as it backs up. So I started to yell to him to come back. His stroller was making so much noise as the wheels ran on the sidewalk and his little shoes were running that he wasn't hearing me at all. I was shouting at the top of my lungs to him. At the same time Celia fell behind me and skinned her elbow and was bleeding. I had to turn my attention to Nicholas though, because I was worried for his safety. Thankfully a lady working on her flowers stopped Nicholas and told him to come back to me. As he came back a lady across the street working on her grass asked if Celia needed a band-aid. I said 'sure' and she brought one out and put it on her elbow. Whew. Thank goodness for both women for stepping up to help me. I was a little embarressed that I had to scream through a quiet neighborhood, but the worst was running through my head seeing Nicholas zoom past all the driveways.
We made it home slowly after that.

This summer our neighbor, who paints for a living, painted our basement and kitchen for us. We gave him a giftcard for his favorite sporting store, but he almost wouldn't take that even. His reply was "I like to help out my neighbors, and its your turn". This same man and his wife surprised Jason and I last Christmas with a giftcard for groceries.

I am selling Usborne Books and I have only 10 books for my show. A lady I have never met saw on the Usborne Books message board that I was wondering if I had enough books to show and she is lending me her whole supply of books for my book show this saturday. She's never met me and is being so kind.

These are the few things that stick out in my mind right now, but we have been blessed with people giving us gifts for Aaron's birth and so many kind thoughts and words. We have kind friends and family. I sure hope we can be there for someone when they need it. Just something I have been thinking about.

Bedtime

A couple weeks ago N&C said they wanted to wear regular underwear to bed at night. We let them and they are doing very well. Nicholas hasn't had an accident since, but the 3 nights in a row Celia had small accidents. They both have been a little off the last few days, so I put a pull-up on her last night and she stayed dry. Who knows? I did give her motrin last night and she slept straight thru the night, (which she hasn't done for a week), so maybe there are more teeth coming. You'd think these kids are Great White Sharks with all the teething pain they go through since being babies. Just rows and rows of teeth popping up interrupting sleep and emotions. Ha Ha
They are both talking so well now. Each week they say new things. Last night when they were both going potty before bed this was the conversation between the two of them. Nicholas was sitting on the little potty and Celia was on the potty seat on the toilet.

Nicholas: "Celia, going pee pee on the potty?"
Celia: "No. Going poo poo"
Nicholas: "Well... (as he shrugs his shoulders with his arms outstretched)... go poo poo then"


Then they brush their teeth and head to bed. We are making the adventure to big beds on friday. Our carpet comes thursday for the basement (basement is a family/rec room and playroom and eventually another full bathroom). Then we will move all the toys to the basement. Friday their furniture comes and they will move into the blue bedroom (which has been the playroom for a year) and Aaron will have his own room. I'll still have Aaron sleep in our bedroom at night because we all get more sleep that way, but he will be able to nap in his own room during the day. Then we will sell one crib too. So this week is busy (but exciting)!

Wed: our friend, Ward, finishes putting on the moulding and finishing woodwork
Thursday: carpet install and delivery of a sleeper-sofa my mother-in-law found for a great
price and also we need to steam clean the two kid's rooms
Friday: delivery of N&C's new furniture (2 twin beds, 2 mattresses, 1 bedside table and 1 dresser)

N&C last night brushing their teeth and looking at themselves in the mirror