How’s everybody doing?

Luke and Violet have just recently decided that they like books.  We are getting hunted and then poked with books on a regular basis.  It’s funny to see the switch when their wee brains decide that books are interesting and fun.  Down by the Station and Baby Einstein: Jane's Animal Expedition are a couple of favorites (at the moment).  There is still some competition to hold the book when we read with both of them at the same time.  It’s quite exciting to referee the battle for the book while attempting to teach them how to turn pages in the correct direction and pointing out the different objects to notice on each page (they love to mimic us doing that: point point point).

Luke loves to wield the extension for the vacuum cleaner as a weapon (example below).  There have been a few close calls with the TV and Violet’s noggin, so it’s still a supervised-only “toy”.

Livvie’s had a great time lately.  Between playing at Karsten’s house at the Super Bowl and a day with Lana at babbo’s office (not this babbo, the other babbo, Mr. Matt), she’s been playing a lot.  She went to a birthday party for Marissa (friend from school) at Pump It Up last Sunday.  It was all she could talk about for days.  She’d hold up the invitation and talk about how much fun she was going to have.  Apparently, it didn’t disappoint. 

This is a shot of a calm moment in the movie room during the Super Bowl.

Scarred for Life?

I hope I’m not doing some sort of irreparable harm to my poor kids, but we still have them sleeping in the same crib at night.  The thing is, they sleep together so well.  The twins have been sleeping together since they were born.  It isn’t always hugs and sunshine in the crib; they’ve come out with war wounds each. 

I know it’s weird to say irreparable harm, but I can remember an attic door in my childhood home that was right next to my bed.  I somehow came to convince myself that I had to sleep up against that door to keep it shut (hey, I was young and imaginary monsters are scary).  That turned into years of sleeping up against a wall in any bed I found myself sleeping in.  I could make it a night or two if necessary, but I preferred to find my way back to beds up against walls.  I’m doing fine, now, thanks for asking.  It took some therapy and some healing time, but I’m off the wall.

What kind of harm might I do to these poor twins?  Imagine that they have to sleep with one hand constantly touching each other.  That turns into relationships where they must sleep touching their partner in the night.  They could lose a chance at Mr. or Mrs. Right just because they are a night-toucher.  The horror…  All due to their parents who let them sleep in the same crib for too long.

We need to work on getting some Toddler beds this year.

Sporty Liv

Livvie loves the climbing gym, The Circuit. It is basically just a warehouse of climbing rocks.  They have a kids area where the hand-holds are a little easier and closer together. 

Livvie, Kieran, and Aiden are amazing climbers.  They scamper up, over, and down the slide and do it all over again (and again, no breaks!).  It’s pretty cold in the morning in the climbing gym (it’s a large unheated space), but she didn’t seem to mind much.  We even ate lunch at the gym when Kieran and Aiden arrived.

 

Here’s Livvie hamming it up at the top of the kids area.

The camera started freaking out at one point.  I was afraid the bubble-effect below was permanent, but it came back to normal later.  I don’t know what the bubbles are about.  Condensation on the inside of the lens maybe?  Very strange.  It sort of looks like it’s snowing or raining in the gym, but I can assure you it is not.

 

Bowling

A couple of days later, Liv, Jen, Cat went bowling.  Livvie announced that she was “all done” after 3 frames.  We let her choose to go bowling or swimming and she picked bowling, go figure.

We put a short, bowling video up on Youtube

 

Violet goes sledding

I’ve been asked a couple of times this week with our huge snowstorm, “Did you take Luke and Violet out to enjoy the snow?”  Let’s just say that a couple of feet of snow is just not much fun when you’re only 1 year old.  I mean, really, is this the face of someone who is enjoying themselves?

You can’t tell, but she is perched atop Livvie’s snow fort “with a real life tunnel to crawl through!”  Violet was the only twin that braved the elements for a sleigh ride.  Luke slept through the fun.  Violet wishes she was so lucky.  This was after Michael pulled her and Olivia up and down the street for awhile. 

Olivia did a great job of holding onto her sister while sledding.  We bought a big purple sled for just this purpose, but I really didn’t think it was going to see so much action so soon.  Usually, any meaningful sledding involves a trip to Mt. Hood.  Very thankful we bought sleds early this year.  We’ve learned the hard way that in Portland there’s a short window to buy sleds, mittens and children’s snow boots.

This might be considered a smile…..perhaps.

Sledding

Michael, Papster, and Olivia went sledding on Saturday.  Michael, Jen, and Olivia went sledding again on Sunday.  And then, Michael and Olivia went again on Monday!

This hill might not look steep from this angle, but it was perfect for us.  We were on the leeward side of Franklin school which meant we weren't blasted by the wind ("it's so blustery" says Olivia).  There was also a nice arc to the hill that kept us out of 52nd (well, most of the time it did). There wasn't much snow yet, but we got plenty more in the next couple of days.

 

The twins haven't been out in the snow since Winter Storm #1 (we're on #3, but #2 was such a bust it's hard to count it).  They have made some major milestones of their own this week.  Violet is now signing "out" back to us which makes all of the months of signing to them worth it.  Luke and Violet are also making major strides across the room.  They are both comfortable walking and have been really showing off for Grammy and Papster (except when they need to get somewhere fast).

Violet has figured out how to put the big blocks together and takes short breaks from dismantling them to actually do a little assembly. 

Weather drama

Poor Eliz was forced to drive up from San Francisco.  She missed a connection in Dallas and basically couldn't get another flight into Portland before Christmas.  She was able to get to SFO, spend the night at Schnerbs' house, and then drive up without a problem today.  Deb decided to wait it out in Arcada another day and hope for a break tomorrow.  Cat's flight into Portland is late Wed. and we are due for more snow Wed. morning.  We are only thinking positive weather thoughts.

Snowing in Portland!

It doesn't snow often in Portland and when it does it tends to cripple the city. So, it was a big surprise to wake up to a couple of inches of snow this morning! The city doesn't have any plows and state law doesn't allow salt to be used on the roads, but the biggest problem is the people who abandon their cars. We're not sure where the people go once they get out of their car in a snowstorm, we've just seen the empty cars on the highway.  They don't even pull over, they just abandon their cars in the lane.

It took about 45 minutes of prep to get snowsuits, shoes, jackets, and gloves located and on.  Violet lasted about 5 minutes once we got outside. She was not amused. In this photo, you can see how they both ditched the gloves pretty quick and no amount of conversation could change their minds. Neither Luke nor Violet liked walking in hard shoes, so they attempted to crawl on naked hands. Violet complained quickly, but Luke lasted a little longer because his hands slipped inside his jacket and he crawled around on his sleeves down the street. No walking. I guess we will have to wait till next year for snow angels in triplicate.

Livvie had fun, snowballs, snow angels, writing in the snow, playing chase. But she soon was too cold and retreated inside for hot chocolate. It's cold, real cold, about 10 degrees with the wind chill. We're out of practice with this kind of gusty, frozen weather.

Naturally, we didn't have enough milk and eggs. The lack of whole milk is quite a problem when 2 members of the household still get most of their calories from milk. The first snow storm of the year and we were flat-footed and under-prepared. At least we can claim Michael's "surgery" as out excuse for not preparing for the biggest (only) snow storm of the year! Lucky for us we're only a block from the store.

For the video fans, there is a little taste of our lovely snow day over at YouTube.

MudBowl

The annual MudBowl was held in the park between Amryn and Phoebe's house on Saturday.  We arrived late (typical) and didn't play in the game, but we had a great time with the girls.  Deb left the game at half-time to join us playing catch-ball.  Olivia is starting to make up new games and new rules.  Catch-ball's rules vary by day.

 

Amryn and Olivia took Violet for a "walk".  It was maybe a tad quick for poor Violet, but I think it was mostly enjoyable because of the attention from the older girls.  We hit the playground next.  Luke and Violet got to go for a swing.  You can see how ecstatic Luke was about the opportunity below.

Luke and Violet had to endure the chilly weather without an afternoon nap.  Violet does better at this than Luke.  It started to get cold as the sun set, but we got this nice family portrait almost by accident as it went down.  Another beautiful day in Oregon!