Rhiannon loves Elmo

Rhiannon loves Elmo...it is her favorite word.  She points to the TV, our phones, the ipad...anything..."Elmo!"  The other night, she was tossing and turning and distressingly cried, "Elmo!"  She also loves Barney, so we are knee deep in all the traditionally loved child things that Joaquin avoided.  She has also picked up "cheese!" for pictures and flashes a crinkled nose, super enthusiastic grin.  She can point to most of her body parts and likes to dance.

Joaquin...my 4 going on 40 little boy...has started to call us mom and dad instead of mommy and daddy.  After about a week and a half of the pattern, I asked him why he was calling me mom instead of mommy.  His response was, "Well, you're my mom."  Can't argue with that, I guess.  We are in the midst of finding a kindergarten for him, which is a maddening, Hunger Games like process in Los Angeles.  There are tons and no choices all at the same time...public, private, charter, magnet, intra and inter district, and dual language are all on our list and each have a different admissions policy and procedure.  Which means visiting each and every one of them and then keeping your fingers crossed after.

Rhiannon at 13 months; Joaquin's creativity

At 13 months, Rhiannon likes to mimic and likes shoes.  She will bring us her shoes regardless of if we are getting dressed and likes to wear them around everywhere.  With Joaquin only liking to wear shirts and now Rhiannon with shoes, the joke is we need a 3rd that likes to wear pants so that we have one fully dressed child.  She also likes to mimic...blowing your nose, brushing your hair, carrying a purse.  And the other day she brought me a book with 'night night' as the final page so she could show me she could also say night night.


Joaquin is developing his creative side, making up songs and playing voices with his toys.  He has also told us that art is his favorite part of school, which is shocking since he has never had an interest in crafts.  He also identified a best friend at school (Lily and then, although not as strong, JT) and then we had tears when Lily started kinder at another school.  JT is still there, but he is still sad about Lily.  Sometimes he tells us that he doesn't have any friends left at school and we can't talk about Lily without tears.  It is a sad position to be in as a parent...and makes parallel play more and more of a wistful memory.

Rhiannon is 1!

Rhiannon turned 1 on Saturday and we had a weekend devoted to celebrating and documenting around this milestone.  We took pictures Friday at the beach and through the town of Seal Beach.  It was freezing and poor little one was shivering and a bit miserable in the backless little beach get up I put her in.  Who would have thought that Southern California at the end of July would be so cold?

On Saturday, Rhiannon decided to sleep in until 9:30.  We had scheduled the party to start at 1 as she normally wakes up at 7 and then goes down for a nap at 11, so of course today is the day she decides to snooze.  Luckily, through divide and conquer strategies and just beginning the party during nap time, we ended up alright and Rhiannon made her appearance at about 2 just in time for birthday ice cream.  We did sandwiches from BJ's (again-I guess our caterer of choice!) and ice cream with all different cones for dessert in lieu of cake.  Rhiannon doesn't like cake, but she loves ice cream and it seemed to go over well with all the guests too.  The gift of choice was definitely clothes...partly a commentary, I'm sure, on having a girl and partly a commentary on my tendency to dress her in her brother's old clothes?  The stack was incredible-probably a foot high.

At one year old, Rhiannon is spirited and has clear opinions on what she wants to spend her time doing and who she wants to do it with.  She is a mover-walking well at 10 months and now dancing regularly.  She is fearless and knows when she is pushing her limits-she runs out in the streets and at these times and other times when she knows she is doing something wrong, she just gives you a total deadpan look like, 'what are you going to do about it?'  6.5 teeth...4 on top and 2.5 on the bottom.  Loves Elmo and the songs on any other TV show.  Is a bit of a picky eater already preferring meat and cheese above all other foods.  Says mama, daddy, and that regularly with her favorite game being carried around while she points and says, 'that' and you tell her what that is.  She loves the outside, loves to dance, and loves to play with her big brother.  When she wants to be loved she wants your complete and utter devotion and when she doesn't, she generally wants to go off and play on her own. 

I had went back and read what I wrote about Joaquin's first birthday and I immediately had pangs of guilt that I wasn't waxing poetic about her first birthday like I did his.  The truth is this year and having a 2nd has been much more of a balancing act.  Whereas the experience with a first child may have been a learning experience making me kinder and gentler, the intense love I have for 2 children sometimes come in conflict with each other and inevitably create a learning experience more about balance and knowing when just enough is actually enough. 

The waxing poetic part is there, but it comes from more rare snatches of one on one time you create and-what cannot be duplicated without more than 1 child-the beautiful relationship you see them sharing with each other.  Every morning when I wake up and the kids are still asleep, they move to snuggle with each other in my absence. This is the blessing I've had for the year:

Rhiannon at 11 month; Joaquin at 4 years

Rhiannon took about 2 weeks of hesitant steps and, at 10.5 months, began walking all over the place.  Now that she can move herself, she has no patience for being indoors.  If I open the door, she is making her way outside while Joaquin is in begging to watch another show of some kind.  His favorite right now is Pinky  Dinky Doo and even when he's not watching the show, we are playing Pinky Dinky Doo on our own.  In these instances, he insists we call him Tyler, I get to be Pinky, and Rhiannon is Mr. Guinea Pig. This show emphasizes language and story structure, so our already verbose 4 year old has added great words like decay, tenacity, unique, gracious, and cacaphony correctly to his repertoire. 

Joaquin has also been very interested in death and what killing means lately and has lots of questions and ideas about it.  A convergence of factors, starting with a Lola on Gideon's side dying and us going to the wake and really reaching a height with my own Grandmother dying and me being sad about it.  He sits behind me, pulls me back so I am 'leaning' on him and says, "I am holding you so you aren't sad about Great Grandma Anathlee."  It is very sweet, which is great because the moods change in such an extreme way.  He has a memory like an elephant, so doesn't release things and he is extremely particular.  With just about every new toy, we can expect a total melt down as the toy does not act in some way that he imagined it. 

What we are not seeing from Joaquin is jealousy towards his sister...which is great, because his sister is totally jealous.  If there is something going on, she wants to be a part of it.  If I am holding Joaquin, she will literally try push herself between us.  If that doesn't work, she'll want to eat to get in as close as possible.  She's also gotten a bit clingy and now needs some warm up time in strange places or with strange people.  Still an easy going, laid back baby, but not as much as Joaquin.  She definitely has an opinion as to what she is doing and will share it. 

Summer is in full blast here and we are in the middle of birthdays and about to start evening concerts.  It's delicious and things really seem to be in place.

First steps-first joke

Just shy of her 10 month old birthday, Rhiannon took her first deliberate steps Saturday, May 19 before we got in the shower.  3 of them, which we then went out screaming to daddy (which scared the be-jeezus out of him) and then 3 more to show daddy.  Since, she has been a bit shy about doing it and wants to feel secure even if she isn't-like holding on to a T-shirt.

Yesterday, May 23, I believe Rhiannon made her first joke.  She was on the floor while I was making dinner and had her bottle leftover from school.  She looked at me, put the bottle in her ear, and broke off into peels of laughter.  Pure joy :)

Rhiannon at 9 months

Rhiannon turned 9 months old shortly after we returned from our trip to Turkey.  She says mama and daddy and bub or bub-bub for Joaquin (we think this is her trying to say bud, which we call Joaquin all the time).  She said Lola clear as day when we were in Istanbul, but hasn't repeated it.  She also has the cadence and appropriateness of hello and I love you.  And she is a mover!  She can stand up on her own for about 30 seconds at a time and is a super fast crawler/assisted walker.  Fast and ridiculously strong.  She knows clapping and is working on waving. She also lifts her hands when we say 'up!' She loves music.  Her stuffed dog offers her jams up daily. 

Turkey was a phenomenal trip and simultaneously hard.  Maybe it is because of 2 children instead of 1?  Maybe because Joaquin is a toddler and has definite ideas about what he likes or doesn't like?  Both Gid and I agreed that if you took out the hardness, it was the most amazing place we've been.  History and relics everywhere and such a combination of cultures and religions!  Coupled with mountains and canyons that looked other worldly and water that looked more like stained glass and it is a beautiful country.  And they loved children more than anywhere else in the world.  We would be in the subway station at rush hour and no less than 5 professionally dressed men would stop to give Rhiannon a coochy coo.

Next week I begin my new job which is exciting and scary at the same time.  It will be the first time in our adult life that we are only working and taking care of family-no school, no interviewing-what will we do with ourselves!

Rhiannon is 7 months old

And what a banner month it has been for her. The beginning of this month saw her cutting her first two teeth, crawling, and pulling herself up all in the same weekend. Later that week she blessed us with her first words of Mama and Daddy and two wobbly, totally unsteady steps of her own. Now the end of the month brings us the beginnings of waving and clapping. She is definitely focused on moving and has gotten quite fast and quite strong. Pulling herself up is not a problem and while Joaquin never wanted to wear a diaper because he just wanted to be naked, Rhiannon doesn't want to wear one because, well, it is just too hard to stay still long enough for us to get it on.

She has also started to show people preferences even while remaining very social. So she'll happily go to others, but when she's done, she likes to push them in the face to get away. And if she wants your attention, but you are not looking, she will pull your hair to get it. This happens quite frequently to Joaquin, who is the most hilarious person ever to her, and he has been a great sport in getting his hair pulled.

Favorite song: Head, shoulders, knees and toes
Favorite activity: Taking things out of a big container
Favorite foods: Pears, oranges, cucumbers

Joaquin's favorite joke right now: What's bigger than a submarine? A bigger submarine!

Joaquin's reasoning for whatever he wants to do or have now is that it is his favorite. Why does he want a granola bar? Because it's his favorite food! Why should he wear that hat? Because blue (or white or gray or whatever it might be) is his favorite color! Why should I stop on the PBS kids channel? Because Zula Patrol is his favorite show!

Rhiannon 5-7 months: How embarassing!

No updates from 5-7 months and 6 months seems so pivotal! For shame...I have all kinds of mommy guilt for the things that I did for Joaquin that I have not done for her. What a different life stage now with interviewing and being the boss here at work. I think I was just as busy with school and Joaquin, but that business was on the computer and staying a bit longer to post pics or put up a blog post made sense. Now I am out and about and if I finish up 30 minutes early, I'm in the car and heading home.

Rhiannon had a big 2 months. It started off with sitting at 5 months, which we had no idea she could do. As we were scheduling her 6 month photos, the photographer asked if she was sitting and we tried it that weekend. Lo and behold, up and relatively steady! This seems to fit her MO...she is definitely a mover. Starting at 6 months, she's army crawling and 6.5 months crawling backwards. She loves to push herself up to standing and has balanced on the coffee table a few times. It's usually to get something though and she promptly lets go once she's got whatever she would like. Whenever she does something like this she looks around the room at whoever is there and expects a big whopping dollop of praise, for which we are rewarded with a big (and still toothless!) grin.

She also started eating table food just after 5 months. She kept reaching and reaching and 6 months just seemed like such an arbitrary number. Her first food was banana followed by avocado, but her favorite foods by far are pear and orange. This might be because she doesn't really have much interest in eating per se, but more chewing and teething on some chunk of something. I think the pear and orange give her enough of that flavor but are soft enough to dissolve in her mouth. She seems to eat anything though-over the past 2 weeks she's even munched on lettuce and limes.

Her language is back and forth between people, but she prefers roaring, which we all think is hilarious since she is a Leo. She does make babbling noises and has said bye-bye, daddy, and as of yesterday when she is mad at me mo-mo-mo-mo-mo! No intentional language yet, but there are some bizarre coincidences like when we pulled out a library book and she said "I like that book." Craziness.

Still a very happy baby and one that is close to having some teeth, speaking some words, and moving around as she pleases. People ask me if I see big differences in her personality vs Joaquin's for this age and the biggest difference seems to be that this little girl is certain about what she wants. Gotta love that...

First day back at work

I have a little under an hour of my first day back at work. Overall, going back was easier this time although I certainly wouldn't call it easy. It was inevitably helped by the fact that Gideon did the drop off in the morning. It is much easier for my brain to trick itself when I left little one smiling with her daddy than asleep in a crib or in the arms of a teacher and hopefully she will get used to school and have a routine before I have to do the drop off in 2 weeks.

The hard part is three fold: first, it is hard knowing that she is going to have a hard time establishing a routine and getting happy. My biggest worry here is her sleep habits-she likes to be held constantly during her sleep. I received a little blessing last night though as she climbed over to her sleeper-something she never does-and dosed off by herself-another thing she never does. It was like someone reaching down to let me know that everything was going to be alright. Second, she is more awake and active now and it is hard to give up watching her discover all the time. Third, and probably the most profound for me, is how boring and meaningless it feels to be at work. I remember feeling this when I came back with Joaquin too-like this is all there is? I think-and hope-that says more about the work than it does about working.