May 10, 2014

Brandon had a big week!   He started walking!  May 7, 2014 was the official day, and he decided to do it at Grandma and Grandpa's house when neither mom or dad were around of course.  He didn't do much of it the next couple of days, but then May 10, 2014 he is really starting to prefer to walk over crawl!   This is right about the exact same time Melanie started walking. 

 

Last weekend Melanie took a painting class!  I took a painting class at my friend, Beth's, Bachlorette party and thought it would be fun for Melanie since they had kid classes for kids 5 and up.  She was a little young for a 2 hours class attention wise, but did pretty well overall!   She was very proud of her painting and has it hanging up in her room.

 Brandon also got his first haircut on May 3rd!  He got a buzz cut!  Here is a picture before.

    And a picture after!  He's really starting to look like daddy more and more every day, especially with his haircut.   I also just discovered that he has 3 more teeth and he's had them for awhile.  We didn't realize his molar's were the next to be coming in and so we weren't looking for them.  No wonder he is drooling like crazy.  So now our 13 month old has 11 teeth! 

 

April 25, 2014

I am so sorry I have been so bad about keeping up with this blog!  In the last couple of months, Melanie turned 5 and Brandon turned 1!   

 Brandon weighed 21 lb. 3 oz at his one year old check up!  

I like this picture of them standing next to each other so you 

can really see how much a child grows in just 4 years!

Brandon has taken a couple of steps, but usually he still refuses at 13 months now.  He can stand good on his own, but he would still rather crawl. 

Melanie "curtseying".  She still loves dresses and pretending she is a queen.

 This is the face Brandon makes when you open your mouth really wide (see Melanie doing it in the background).  He is so scared of it!  I discovered this last night when he put too much food in his mouth at once and so I asked him to open his mouth wide and I demonstrated it.  Burst into tears!  And yep, still causes him to burst into tears today..  

I love his pout lip before the tears really start rolling! 

 

January 27, 2014

Messy piggy's!  Apparently Raspberry, Blueberry, Banana, Spinach Smoothies are very good!

 

(Melanie, 4 3/4 and Brandon, 10 months)

First Snowgirl of the year!

 Melanie, 4 1/2 years and Brandon 9 months - December 28,  2013

This week Brandon started sitting up really good by himself so it's goodbye baby bathtub.  Last night Brandon discovered that you can splash water so mommy got pretty wet during the bath.

(Brandon, 6 months, October 3,  2013)

 Brandon is also starting to scoot around a bit (sideways, backwards, not forwards.. yet!) when he is on his belly.  He moves his legs and gets his butt up in the air.  Only a matter of time before he is crawling...  Also new with Brandon this weekend is he tried Avocado and it's hit!  Also tonight tried pear again and he likes pear now!  Still doesn't like apple, but I'll keep trying him on it - apple is the only food he absolutely refuses to eat so far.  He did eat the apple last night when I mixed it with the Banana though.  So far Brandon has had Rice Cereal, Oatmeal Cereal, Sweet Potato, Apple, Banana (yum, his favorite) Pear and Avocado.  I'll probably try him on peas this week.  I try to introduce something new every 3 - 4 days. 

(Brandon, 6 months,  October 5,  2013)

This is the result of only taking two naps instead of his normal 3...  Sleeping on the changing table, while getting ready for bed. But he also slept for 12 hours straight so maybe it's time to get rid of the 3rd nap??  :)  Much harder to do on days that Melanie has school because he has to be woken up from his naps to go get Melanie so the naps aren't quite as long as they normally are. 

(Brandon, 6 months old, October 5,  2013)

 Mommy bought both Melanie and Brandon new winter hats this weekend so here we are trying them out.  Daddy just looks thrilled to have yet another picture.

(Brandon, 6 months, Melanie 4 1/2 years, October 5,  2013 and can't forget Daddy 33 years! )

Melanie is such a little model.  She always has to have this pose in her pictures!  She is typically either doing this pose or a really silly pose. Here she is dressed up in a interesting ensemble of hat, gloves, purse, cheerleader skirt and new slippers that mommy got her as well. 

(Melanie, 4 1/2 years,  October 5,  2013)

 Melanie attended her first birthday party of the year for new classmate Hannah.  She had a blast!  It was also nice for me to go and meet some of the parents since I don't get to see them too often. 

October 2, 2013

Here is a video of Brandon having a good laugh, as well as Sister being crazy, as usual.  It is easy to get Brandon to smile, but to get him to laugh is kind of tricky at times, so this was nice to hear!

 

We got this toy from the doctor that I work with, Nancy.  Brandon thought it was pretty cool. 

(Brandon, 6 months old)

 And Melanie got jealous that she didn't get a picture, so here she is with it.  She named her "red bounce".  She sleeps in the sleeping bag upstairs with Melanie and Melanie feeds her everyday.  They have gotten to be good friends.  Melanie is going to take care of her until Brandon is old enough to play with it she says!  I think Melanie is going to have a hard time adjusting once Brandon is old enough to start playing with toys.  She's never had to share a toy before in her life (at home anyways, other than when she has friends over).

Melanie (4 1/2 years old)

 Melanie has gotten even more talented in her art.  I love how colorful everything is and how everyone is smiling.  She says this is a picture of her and her cousin Abbi.  Today Melanie also learned how to say Mom and Dad in Spanish so I have been called Madre all night long.  She even sang happy birthday to me saying, "Happy birthday to Madre"  The lady at the restaurant got a kick out of that.

September 28, 2013

I have to be better about keeping up with this blog.  Now that life is more settled down, Brandon is on an awesome routine, and life is more calm, I'll try to keep up with this better!  :)

This was a big month for both kids.  Brandon got his first tooth!  He was only 5 months old.  It's hard not to compare them, but Melanie was 8 months old when she got her first tooth so wasn't expecting this to pop through already.  One week later the second one popped through, so Brandon has 2 teeth at 5 months old....

Melanie started 4K.  She LOVES it.  It's an adjustment for us, since she is  going 4 days a week for 3  hours only a day.  Ryan walks her there and picks her up every day with Brandon.  There isn't as much communication between parents and teachers as her preschool (actually, there is hardly any and is an issue for a lot of the parents I am hearing), but I know she's learning Spanish because she's always singing Spanish songs.  Ryan and I will be having to decide this year if we want to try to get her in the Dual Immersion Kindergarten class next year.  This basically means they speak 90% Spanish and only 10% English all day, every day.  It's totally different from everything I know and learned, but I keep thinking about how awesome it would be for her to be semi- fluent in a second language by the time she is in 3rd grade.  The main issue for me is that they don't even learn to read any English until 4th grade, only Spanish until then.  And I'm worried that she's going to get frustrated (anyone who knows Melanie she frustrates VERY easily!) and hate Kindergarten if she doesn't understand anything to start.  Maybe I'll be having to do some teaching of reading in English until then.  We still have time to decide and she might not even get into the program even if we wanted to because it's quite popular.

 

1st day of Midvale 4k  (September 4,  2013)

Ryan and I celebrated 9 years of marriage on September 18.  We celebrated it by Ryan having to go to work.  :)  Ryan's first night back at work after 12 weeks of paternity leave was September 13. 

Melanie is quite the girly girl.  She ALWAYS wants to be wearing a dress.  She refuses to wear jeans because they aren't "beautiful".  I don't know where she get this from!   She loves anything princesses.  She picks out her own outfit every night and if dad is with her picking it out mom has to go up and approve it before bed because she can come up with some interesting matches.  For tomorrow she actually picked out some grey fleece pants and a shirt with a soccer ball on it.  She said to me "if a boy thinks that I'm a boy, I'm going to have to tell him that I'm a girl".  When I asked her why she thought someone would think she was a boy she said it was because of what she was wearing - pants and a shirt with a ball on it.  It's amazing how young those images of what a boy and what a girl should wear start out, kinda of sad actually...

  

 Brandon started eating "solid" foods last week.  He has had oatmeal cereal, Sweet potato, and apples.  Oatmeal cereal is pretty good.  Loves the sweet potato and absolutely HATES the apples.  I have tried it twice on him and the face he gets is hysterical, then he starts gagging and he spits it out every time.  I mixed it in with the oatmeal and he still made his face, but he kept it in and swallowed it at least!  I used Braeborn apples to make it and I don't think it is too sour (I actually thought it tasted good!) so I don't know what he doesn't like about it.  You think most kids would like the sweet taste.  Maybe he's going to be like his daddy and prefer meat and potatoes. 

Brandon also started sitting up really good by himself this month (the last couple of days actually).  He also rolled over from back to belly today.  (although Grandma Jeanne said he did it for her a lot last month, but I've never seen it other than him doing it in his sleep in his crib!)  Brandon is napping 3 times a day and he has FINALLY figured out how to take a nap.  It only took 5 months for him to figure out how to nap more than 45 minutes at a time.  Now he wakes up, eats, stays awake for 2 hours, takes a nap for about 2 hours and does that over and over again 3 times until it is time for bed - except the 3rd nap is usually about an hour.  He rarely ever wakes up in the middle of the night anymore (that was a long 4 months!) but just started to here and there the last couple of weeks.  Usually all he wants is a cuddle and then he's back to sleep.  He LOVES to suck his thumb.  He is always sucking his thumb.  I love it, because that is when he figured out how to sleep and I talked to the doctor about it yesterday and she said most kids outgrow it by the time they are 3 and even if they don't, it usually doesn't cause any harm to their mouth anyways. He loves when it is time for bed, he starts smiling and giggling when he knows he is going to go in his crib - such a nice change from how it used to be!!  He got weighed yesterday and he is 17 lb and 2 oz, which is in the 41%.  Melanie weighed exactly 17 lb. 2 oz at 1 year!!  He is 6 months ahead of her already.  Melanie was such a little peanut!! 

 Melanie decided to make name tags for the whole family today.  She knows how to write Brandon's name from memory.  She knows how to write Melanie, Mom, Dad, Brandon and Pepper and she writes it on the back of everything she draws (which is a lot)  Now I just got to get her to learn how to write Tremelling, but she is so stubborn she won't even let me teach her how. 

She also doesn't understand that she doesn't need to write T. after her name if she is going to write out Tremelling.  Melanie knows how to write all of her letters, except J (backwards) and she has a hard time with G still. 

 I was surprised to look at the picture and see that he was smiling....  notice how he is sucking his thumb.  Brandon loves his sister.  He is always smiling and laughing at her and she loves to make him giggle.  I have a feeling when he is more mobile, he is going to be following her around and doing everything she is doing and I bet she is going to love it.  Melanie loves that she is older than him and can do things that he can't do.  She also loves that she only has to take one nap a day and he has to take 3  :)  That's it for now!!!