Making It

I haven't been blogging or even getting on my computer very much lately, or -it feels like- doing much of anything except cleaning and taking care of my little girls. Being a mom to young kids is a lot of work and I need way more sleep than what I am getting - so most of the time I opt for sleep over staying up to work on anything, particularly blogging. But I haven't given up on my blog, I just realize that this time in my children's lives it may only happen when it can. I'd like to catch up on more of the things that have been going on in this last year, but this post all about Lily has been long in the works and finishing it and posting it far overdue. So before this year ends and before I write about anything else - a post about Lily!

My first little girl has always seemed older than her age to me. People told me when you have your second one your first seems to grow gigantic overnight. In some ways this is true, she definitely seemed heavier all of a sudden :) but in some ways I feel like since the baby was born I am more able to appreciate Lily as being the little girl she is. Now that I have experience with more than one little girl. It's hard to explain, maybe things just work weird in my head. Maybe I just feel like I have a better perspective now that she's not my only one, and I am also being reminded of how quickly children grow and pass through phases as I watch her little sister who is currently in baby growing hyper-drive Lily just listens so much to everything around her and talks as though she understands so much - and even looks at you like she has an old soul. But other times she shows me just how much growing up she still has to do. I wish I could slow it down because I feel like I just can't keep up and I don't want to miss this little girl time with my big girl. I need to remember to let her be little, sometimes I think we are too strict with her and need to ease up. She knows how to work us though! I need to blog about her more so I can reflect and have a better sense of humor about all the aggravation she gives us, and focus more on all the amazing sweet aspects of her personality. I know I am her mom, but she really is quite the kid!

Lily turns 4! July 2012

Lily turned four over the summer...and turned big sister in the spring. It has been a tough adjustment being a sister, but a good one. I wasn't quite sure how Lily was going to behave once she had a sibling to share us with, but I really couldn't be happier. There have been a few jealous moments, but Lily has told me so many times how much she loves her little sister, and I can see it in her delight over Sierra, and in the sweet gentle way she treats her even when Sierra is doing something she doesn't like. So amazing for our often over-dramatic girl. Seriously, there have been many times where I am just sitting there watching them get into a situation where I might expect Lily to lash out over something her sister has done and she just gently coos at Sierra not to do whatever it is instead. Sometimes she is gentler than I am.

Anyway, I just wanted to capture a snapshot of our little Lily, age 4 to look back on as time passes by.

Lily in her favorite outfit there for a while

Lily LOVES watching shows, and has recently become the Andy Griffith show's newest fan. She is limited to 2 shows a day, and some days recently 'Opie' has been her choice. She liked watching Cosby with us, but she wouldn't request it on her own. Andy Griffith got her through my terribly long haircut experiment to get Lily's wild new curly hair under control. (Shortly before Sierra was born some of Lily's hair fell out and it grew back in curly - we are still adjusting. Curly hair is so much more complicated!) Lily's favorite TV shows right now include: Jake and the Neverland Pirates, Caillou, Doc McStuffins, Little Bear, Dinosaur Train, Word World, Sid the Science Kid, Team Umizoomi, and many more - she pretty much just loves television and will try to sneak watching anything anybody else is watching - hence the need for limitation. We are constantly having to shoo her away from Grandma's crime shows. Much too scary for a kid who gets spooked by Veggie Tales! (Yes, she is scared of Veggie Tales, but not Madagascar 3, Despicable Me, or Megamind - to name a few of her favorite movies!) Lily is learning to read and her motivation to do her lesson is that she only gets to watch her shows if her lesson is done. A friend from church recommended Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy lessons, and it has been really good for us. Doing it has helped add structure to our day and Lily is progressing really well. We have been through about 60 lessons now and she is already remembering many words or sounding them out in her head before she reads them out-loud. I have wanted to put her in preschool or do one at home, but our circumstances and my over the top expectations for how our home preschool should be...didn't work out. This was perfect for us, and I'm really glad we've had the extra time at home together getting adjusted to our new family with Sierra and working one on one together learning like we have. I've learned a lot trying to be a good teacher to her.

A collaboration between Mom & Lily

Another thing you can find Lily doing almost everyday is building some kind of fort. She loves to hide in secret spaces. She also loves to fill them with odd objects and toys. Oh, and throw parties! Tea parties, Pajama or Dance Parties. She is all about planning parties, any excuse - she would celebrate our birthdays everyday and lay out banquet tables of play food or whatever snack items I'll allow her - if I'm on top of it to notice before she's already gotten them out... Lily is a picky eater, but not so much when it comes to snacks. We had to hide the fruit snacks and things we save for when we're out and about just so she wouldn't ask for them all the time. Since Sierra's been born she has been more bold about getting into things on her own. When she gets caught she giggles and calls herself the 'secret snacker'. She also concocts 'recipes' when I'm cooking with whatever she can get her hands on that I have out, and water filled all the way to the top so spices and random ingredients get sloshed over everywhere. I can only blame myself. I should never have told her stories about the 'bug poison' I used to make as a kid out of things like peanut butter, ketchup, and shampoo. Lily also loves to get out my craft box and make cards and crafts to give away to her family and friends. She's getting pretty good at coloring and drawing things. It's been so fun to see her scribbles turn into recognizable things! She loves playing pirates, treasure hunts, and legos with Dad. She fights with him to have the coolest dance moves with a very competitive spirit. I so wish I could remember all the funny things she says and does and record it all! It's oh so fun to watch her learn and grow.

Mid haircut watching Andy Griffith

Here are some pictures from a family day we spent at Belmont Park this summer:
The park was not crowded at all so we got to ride everything as much as we wanted.

One of Lily's favorites was this ride that raises you up and drops you down. She rode a mini-version of this once at her cousin Isaac's school carnival and she wasn't scared a bit...

...she even went on it on her own.

Miss Cool

Lily was super scared to ride these one man bumper cars she had to drive on her own, but since there was hardly anyone there and her bracelet let her go unlimited times she got brave enough and soon got the hang of it. Soon she was chasing her dad around like this!

Watch out!

So happy with Hello Kitty
(Her Pity Prize - the super nice lady at the balloon game gave her when she obviously didn't want the token snake toy.
It made her day - and mine - so so nice!)

Things about Lily, age 4 I hope I will always remember...
...how her whole body shows when she's excited about something - like getting together with her cousins. I have to wait to tell her until plans are set because she gets devastated if they fall through.
... how her voice gets super high pitched when she's excited or nervous and trying to talk to or show off to people she doesn't really know.
...how she works her hand into the "I Love You" sign to wave at me across the room and how she tilts her head back and widens her eyes waiting to see if I notice.
...our little talks at bedtime about things that are worrying or exciting her and how she can ask question after question trying to keep me standing in her doorway stalling for extra time.
...her creative rhymes and songs and how she always says "That's silly, huh!?" until you answer back or "That's good that such an such a thing happened." - even when it's not really good, but just because she's always trying to look on the bright side and that's a favorite phrase. And her overuse of the word "besides!"
...all the little times we find ourselves really enjoying something together when I take the time to just sit down and spend time with her. The extra cuddles and the look I see in her eyes that makes me feel like she sees me as not just a mom doing what moms do but as someone who has likes and dislikes just like her, and someone who loves her very much. I hope she'll always know that I do!

Lily is mostly a Daddy's girl - they play together so well and she can mostly get him to do whatever she wants. If she doesn't like my answer to something she goes to him or wants to call Daddy. Sometimes I let her to give her practice using the phone and also to get her to hear from him that what mom says goes. One day she called him up and asked him to bring her donuts when he got done with work. Oh, yes - he did. Lily and her dad have a special bond, but she loves me pretty hard too! I love how she asks for two handed hugs from me when my hands are too full and I go to give her a one-armer, and how she says "There are no keys and no password!" to her Dad as she hugs him tight around the neck when he's tucking her in to bed.

There are things Lily does I almost hope I won't remember - except maybe to sympathize one day with her when she becomes a mom. Every age has it's phases and Lily certainly isn't perfect - she can be whiny and too loud or too chatty at times, we clash a lot - we are probably both too stubborn, but she is a darling girl and I love her so so much! Sometimes I get caught up in the things that frustrate me when I should really see the incredibly good points to our little character! I look forward to seeing the kind of girl she will grow up to be...but I can wait - because I am in no hurry to have her grow up faster than she already is!

Here are a ton of pictures from this September. I wanted to get a really nice photo of her, but we are on a budget so I pretended to be a professional photographer for a day and we went out and had a little photo shoot. (I had to straighten her hair.) We got lots of cute ones like the one at the top of this post, but it was a lot of me chasing her down just snapping what I could get with my little pocket camera. Here's from that day and then some by the tree this December that show our cute girl's sparkling personality!

September 2012

Making me feel like the paparazzi

December 2012

I love you Lily-girl!

I felt like a good mom today. Nothing amazing happened - we didn't even leave the house, but it was such an enjoyable day at home with my kids - it felt amazing. Lily and I did reading lessons, had a dance party, read library books, and even did crafts. I made a point to tell my kids how much I loved them and what good kids I thought they were and how grateful I was to have them. I may have taken too many pictures of the baby, but if you saw all the degrees of cuteness you could hardly blame me...other than that I really tried to put my kids first, even before housework, and my house was actually cleaner by the end of the day than usual! I made a yummy experimental dinner - stuffed shells with shredded chicken, spinach, a little carrot and Parmesan and cottage cheese baked in an Alfredo sauce with diced tomatoes and bacon sprinkled on top. Mike said it was restaurant quality and even Lily liked it. Lily ate spinach! Lily ate something other than Peanut butter and Jelly or a corn dog!!! Any mom would be proud. She ate a couple of bites and then gave me all these hugs and told me she loved me. (Yes, I do need to cook more.) Oh, how I wish every day felt like today! Usually I feel ridden with Mommy guilt for all the things I could be doing and am not. For how not cool and not fun and not patient enough I am. I overwhelm myself sometimes wanting things to be just so, and they just can't be. Today wasn't like that...wonder why it's easier to just take things as they are some days more than others? I feel on a roll and just want to get more and more done! ...But if I stay up too late it will be too hard to be a good mom again tomorrow - so Goodnight! I'll put up some of those cute baby pictures later ;)

Whew - almost a week later, but here they are: