Oh-Bla-Di

We’re really in the new, post-baby schedule now.  Ava’s school hours have been cut back to just 25 a week, so that means that Fridays are no longer the solo-Mommy, get-projects-done days of yore.  But, I do have a little time during naps to post an update, so here it is…in list form, of course.

1.  Noah goes to his first day of school on Monday.  I’m both sad and totally ok with the idea.  He’ll be there for five hours, four days a week…same as Ava.  The hours he’s at school will include two naps and about an hour and a half of awake time.  I’m sad to miss that hour and a half, since I know it’ll become oh so important over the next several months, but I feel ok with these hours because we’re basically paying for him to have a safe place to sleep while I go to work.  Remind me of this next week.

2.  Noah can go to school and that means that he’s six weeks old.  Seriously, where did six weeks go?  Can’t believe it’s gone so quickly.  I remember that amount of time taking so much longer when Ava was a newborn.  He’s getting so much bigger and so much more active.  He even talks to us sometimes!  He laughs in his sleep all the time, but we haven’t seen any awake laughs since he was a week old.  Can’t wait to hear that again.

3.  We finally got photos printed from the first few weeks of being a family of four.  I’ve hung them up in all the places I’ve been planning for them to be for months.  It’s so nice to see the faces of all the people I love as I walk around doing chores and stuff.  My last maternity leave project was to create some more space for photos since we have more faces and more photos we love.  I just finished this project (about 10 minutes ago) so this maybe the fastest completion-to-blog project ever.  Best part of the project is that it was completely free!  It’s not so bad to not be able to afford expensive artwork when you’ve got such priceless people to look at instead.

4.  Speaking of priceless people, on Wednesday night, I made chili-mac for dinner.  It was pretty good considering that five minutes before I started cooking I had no idea what I was going to make.  Anyway, Ava was having none of it.  So, I made her sit at the table until she ate the small portion I pushed to the side of her plate.  An hour and a half later, she still hadn’t eaten any.  She had, however, conducted several circle time sessions with her imaginary students.  Can’t punish a kid with an overactive imagination by leaving her alone.  She just makes up friends!

“Ava, what does a three-year-old look like?”

5.  Matt’s been at work until at least 6:30 every night this week, but he was home a couple of mornings to help out with that end of the deal.  Can’t decide which I prefer – help in the morning, especially after a fairly sleepless night, or help in the evening after a long afternoon with the kiddos?  If I’m really honest, I’d have to say that I want both.  It would be awesome to actually see him in the morning and still know that the kids will see him before going to bed at night.  Maybe at the next job…

And a bonus #6…

While I was upstairs feeding Noah just now, Ava was down the hall settling in to a nap by singing to herself.  Someone rang the doorbell and set Libby off.  Being trapped under a tiny human, there wasn’t a thing I could do about any of it.  Ava’s response to the barking?  She started howling.  Yay for Fridays!

Happy weekend, everyone!

Ava’s had a pretty major break through on the creative front in the last few days.  Her imagination has always been really, really active and we’ve known for a long time that there are some major creatures banging around in there.  We just haven’t ever been able to see them the way she does because she couldn’t produce them.  We got close, maybe, but it’s not the same as when she makes things herself.

Her art grew slowly over the weekend. It started with a whale.  Matt & I were ecstatic because, you guys, it actually looks like a whale!

So.  Then Whoozy moved on to people.  Ava’s started drawing her family…as monsters.

That’s Mommy on the left, Ava on the right, and Daddy is the little blob at the top.  Noah has not yet made the ranks of either family or monster…not sure which yet.

She’s also working on drawing some of her favorite characters.  Here’s Quack from Mommy & Daddy’s favorite cartoon.

She’s working on Chirp and Peep, too, but seems a bit intimidated by the need for a beak and wings.  I’m certain, though, that those pictures will be coming soon.  We take our art seriously around here, folks.  

These two are such good buddies these days. Right now, they’re at her coloring table, drawing her monster, the one she hides from and plays with every day. What an imaginative girl and what an awesome daddy.

9/21/10 Edit:

And here are the drawings…from her words to Matt’s markers….

And these things just “keep her company.”  Not scary, not something she’d rather not see….these are her friends!  What a gal, huh?

Another lesson in parenting two children….equal blog time.    Here’s a little update on our favorite girl.

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Now that we’ve all had a couple of weeks to adjust to the idea of having another person in our house, Ava’s begun to settle down into her new normal.  She became quite the high energy kid for the couple of weeks while she was home with us, but she’s gone back to school this week and is getting a bit more back to normal.  Having a baby come to class twice a day with her has made her a bit of a rockstar at school, so I think she’s enjoying a little of that attention as well.

She’s still dressing up into a variety of costumes any time she has a chance.  Whoozy has a very active imagination and we hear all kinds of stories about princesses, monsters, spiders, and various other creatures all day long.  A few days ago, she asked for a magic wand at breakfast.  Ten minutes later, Matt & I had managed to cobble something together for her.  Seriously, happiest kid on the planet.

In spite of some of the early challenges, we’re really excited that Ava loves her baby brother so much and has found her space in our new family of four.  She’s a great helper with his diapers and she chooses his outfit every morning.  She gets excited when he’s awake to look at her and is even ok with his crying.  Just yesterday, she reminded me as I tried frantically to get him to stop before we left in the van, “Mommy, he’s ok.  He just needs a little cry.”

Our girl is wise beyond her years and turning into a wonderful big sister.  So, so proud of her.  Love you, Pappers.

As I mentioned when I wrote to Ava last week, one of the reasons I was so certain that adding another child to our family was a good idea is that it was so very clear that Ava was going to be an amazing big sister. Of course, seeing the two of them together has been a bit overwhelming to the emotions. Ava’s accepted Noah with an open and loving heart, which has made the transition just that much more easy on us all.

Ava and Noah met for the first time in the hospital, on the day he was born. We were a bit nervous about how it would go, since she’d been so determined that her new sibling was going to be a baby sister. Sarah did a great job prepping Ava for her visit, since by the time she arrived you’d never have known that her initial reaction to the news of her baby brother had put her in a state of complete shock.

Her first reaction was a little underwhelming, since a balloon was still the major attraction…

But, she warmed up to the idea of holding her baby brother and took to the activity like a fish to water.

Since we’ve been home, Ava’s been willing to help fetch things we need for Noah, to hold diapers during changes, and to just be sweet to him in general. Given how much her world has been rocked in the last few days, she’s doing really well adjusting to all the newness.

Of course, we’ve been working on keeping boundaries in place, rules the same, and as much normalcy for Ava as possible. She’s been testing us a bit and a little more needy, but we’re already seeing progress in how she’s doing. It’s amazing how big she seems now (and how heavy)! Doozy brought Ava her own baby doll when he came and that baby has been a near-permanent fixture in her arms and her bed at nighttime. Love that.

We’ve been learning to balance the needs of two also. Luckily, Noah doesn’t need much beyond the basics yet, so we have time and energy still to let Ava know she’s still our number one girl. Mostly, that just means letting her be a part of anything we can…so far, so good.

Love that our family has grown. Love that Ava loves her brother. This sibling thing is going to be pretty great, I think. Can’t wait to watch them grow together.