Theodore:
~Got baptized. Friday, September 20. Godparents are Jillian Fenton and Phil Worland. Dad flew in to perform the baptism.
~Had a check up a month ago. He was 10 pounds, 1 ounce, and 21.5 inches long. He has another check up this week, so those numbers are quite outdated.
~Began smiling a little before one month. They were quick smiles, and generally only with the right side of his mouth. I got his first real smile in response to me when he was one month and two days old, which makes him officially our earliest smiler. Despite his early smiles, however, he has not been very free with them. He would seem to be as sober and serious as his older siblings were. Except Gretchen. I remember her smiling a lot.
~Spent several weeks escaping from his swaddle in the middle of each night. At 3:30 in the morning I would hear grunting and wiggling. Other than the expended effort, he was perfectly content. About twenty minutes later, one arm free from its bonds, he would realize he might be hungry and decide to have a snack before going back to sleep.
~Had a bedtime. Theo would consistently go to sleep for the night between 7 and 8, wake up once between 3 and 4, and then get up for the day around 8.
~And then lost it. Now he goes to bed between 7 and 8 kind of, but not really. After about fifteen minutes he wakes up and is happily awake for another hour or two before going to bed again. Then he sleeps until about 5 before nursing, and then wakes up for the day around 8.
~Has longer periods of awake time. He is content to be where he can see the action (or his arch, which he's begun noticing) and hear voices. As long as he knows he's not alone, Theo will just hang out and observe the world around him.
Matthias:
~Counts, or tries to. I caught 6, 7, 8, 9, 11, 13, 13, 13, 13, 13 and 41, 46, 47, 13.
~Answers the question "what" with "because." Example: "What are you wearing?" "Because I have a cars shirt."
~Loves "moany cheese." Macaroni and cheese, for those who don't speak this dialect of toddler. He and two of his sisters (Gretchen and Kaitlyn) have finally been corrupted by Grandma and prefer boxed macaroni and cheese, though they will still happily eat the homemade kind. Olivia will not touch the boxed stuff.
~Is in a big boy bed. He went all the way, too, with no toddler bed transition. Straight from crib to junior loft. I believe he's the oldest one to transition, which may be contributing to how well it went. I also wonder how much the taller bed helped, because although he can get out by himself, it is not at all convenient to do so. Regardless of the reason, he wins all the prizes for best transitioner. He's been happily retiring to his new bed every night and staying there without a fuss. He did call it Aunt Justine's bed for several weeks because she slept in it when they were here for Theo's baptism and Matthias moved in the night they left.
~Spent the week that the Bossards visited in a pack and play in our room. This would not be noteworthy except that he's too big to fit comfortably in the pack and play, so he would wake up in the middle of the night and call for daddy until Bryan got him and brought him into our bed. Since we have a king now, we don't even notice the addition most of the time (until Matthias turns sideways and/or headbutts someone in the face). Upon moving to his own bed, Matthias did better, but he still ends up in our room about four times a week. Sometimes at 5:30ish, sometimes as early as 1. I suppose we should work on fixing it, but, like I said, he's pretty unobtrusive most of the time, and neither Bryan nor I wants to spend time in the middle of the night convincing Matthias that his own bed is fine.
~Has fat feet. We went to WalMart and I had Matthias try on every single shoe in his size. We could only squeeze his foot into one pair of boots, and the velcro wouldn't close once his foot was inside. I took him to Shoe Carnival and asked if they had any wide width kid shoes. They had wide width in exactly one style, so Matthias got Nikes in sizes 7 and 8 in order to take advantage of a sale. Name brand wide width toddler shoes are expensive and I was annoyed. I found some church shoes on ebay for a lesser amount, but I guess I will have to resign myself to buying expensive shoes until his feet lengthen out enough to fit in normal shoes.
Kaitlyn:
~Can identify the letters K, A, O, G, X, and Y. She's quite unreliable with all the rest of them, but her two most common guesses are B and E.
~Can spell her name (verbally, although if I provide the correct flashcards she can generally put them in order). She also answers the question "What does your name start with?" with "It starts with K-A-I-T-L-Y-N."
~Started Catechesis. St Charles Church is offering a new class for 3-5 year olds called Catechesis of the Good Shepherd. It's Montessori style with an emphasis on religion. Kaitlyn loves it. Her class meets on Friday mornings and she comes home each week talking about all of the hard work she had to do. After she dusted one week, she told me that the next time we were at the store we should buy dusting things (a rag is not good enough, there's a specific tool she uses, apparently) and she would dust the house for me. We were calling her class school at first, but she decided that wasn't accurate, and neither was church, so now we call it catechesis and everyone is happy. Plus, now Matthias has the distinction of being one of few two-year-olds who routinely uses the word catechesis.
~Started dance. Technically dance class started at the beginning of September, but I told Miss Lyn that Kaitlyn would not be attending until October. On the first of October, Kaitlyn excitedly entered her first official dance class. She will happily demonstrate her passe to anyone who asks her to show them a dance move.
Gretchen:
~Knows the meaning of the word "favorite" (I think), but doesn't care. Everything is Gretchen's favorite. When playing the game "Would You Rather?", she picks both choices. It doesn't matter that she's only allowed to pick one.
~Is reading quite well now. Gretchen doesn't read as voraciously as Olivia did at this point in first grade, but she is still writing plenty of titles on the list she keeps for school. Her favorite books are Elephant and Piggie. At this point, I think she has them pretty much memorized.
~Loves art class. Her favorite special is art and she's constantly doing art projects at home.
~Made a doll. Kaitlyn and Olivia did, too, but only because Gretchen made one first. Gretch wanted to make a doll, so I looked up a pattern and walked her through the steps. I ran the foot pedal on the sewing machine, but she did everything else herself. Yesterday she decided to make a pumpkin the same way she made her doll and drafted a pattern out of paper, cut out the fabric, and began cutting "fluff" (fabric scraps) for stuffing. She'll probably finish it today.
~Has fully embraced earrings. Now that Gretchen's ears are healed (they have been for months, she just didn't realize it) and we've successfully changed her earrings a few times, she is all in on the new earrings. She wears a different pair every day that she remembers, although she's going to have to start repeating pairs soon. She's just begun trying to take them out and put them in herself, so soon she won't even need me to help her with them.
~Likes scary things. Bryan took her shopping for her Halloween costume and had to talk her down from costumes covered with fake blood and gore because they would have terrified her younger siblings. She came home with a phantom costume, complete with glowy eyes. She still traumatized two children (not ours) with it.
Olivia:
~Finished the soccer season strong. Bryan reports that Olivia got more aggressive as the season wound down, and in her last several games she played very well. We shall see if this increased skill level carries over into next season. :)
~Will be starting swim lessons on Tuesday. Olivia got quite comfortable in the water this past summer, so we decided a few weeks of formal swim lessons were in order. Unfortunately, they were only offered on the nights that she already had soccer. Soccer is over now, though, so she starts this week.
~Discovered graphic novels. After reading all the Rainbow Magic books she could get her hands on, Olivia was adrift looking for a new series. Despite dozens of recommendations from her mother, she stubbornly refused to try anything that looked like it might be long and/or boring. No one except perhaps Olivia knows how she came to the long and boring conclusions. Regardless, she was determined to reread Rainbow Magic for the rest of her days. But then. My Little Pony appeared on the scene in comic book form. Our library has 15 volumes of that, so she eagerly checked them out and read them all in about three days. Oh well. Now she knows that graphic novels are a thing and checks that section for interesting reading material.
~Doesn't like pants. When it was time to switch out clothes for the new season, Olivia decided she didn't want pants. Since dresses are getting hard to find in her size, she opted for skirts and shirts. Now she says, "I'm kind of just like my mom" as she walks around in her maxi skirt. :)
An event:
Bryan decided to throw a Halloween party for kids. I originally thought this would replace trick-or-treating, but apparently it is intended to be in addition to all the other Halloween festivities. The kids are very excited to get to wear their costumes another time. This was the first year, so we didn't really know what to expect. Bryan threw together some things that sounded fun and we went from there. It actually went really well. The highlight was easily the candy shop that he set up in the clubhouse. There was a flashlight scavenger hunt set up in the basement where kids collected pennies. They could then take the pennies to the clubhouse window and buy candy and toys with them. Olivia was in charge of running the store and had a grand time. There was also a laser maze set up in the garage, courtesy of a friend, a bag decorating station, and various candy deposits around the property where kids could find treats.
A story:
Whilst eating a peanut butter and banana sandwich last month, I got a large painful lump in my throat and couldn't swallow or breathe. Since insurance is already maxed out for the year, I decided it would be prudent to visit an allergist, so as not to inadvertently die of anaphylactic shock sometime in the future. I also reluctantly gave up peanuts (and, less reluctantly, bananas) for the weeks between the incident and the appointment. Since I've never had trouble with peanuts before and, in fact, ate peanut butter nearly exclusively for a few months in college, I was hopeful that there would be no allergy. I finally had my appointment on Monday and, was happily proclaimed to be in the clear. My banana pin prick showed the tiniest reaction, but not enough for the allergist to care. My peanut pin prick did nothing. I guess I'm just terrible at chewing my food. You'd think I'd be better at that by this point in my life.
Another story:
We had a meeting this past Wednesday night. I took a small, tasteful bag with two diapers, a burp cloth, and some wipes into the meeting because that's all I needed for a couple of hours. Hah. Theo exploded his diaper all up his back for the first time. All the way to his armpits. I sent Bryan to the car for the full diaper bag with its change of clothes. The whole sleeper was gross, and of course Theo managed to get his arm and pacifier tether int he poop. While I had Theo flipped onto his stomach to wipe off his back, he spit up all over himself, my arm, and the changing table. Bryan fetched paper towels to wipe up the spit so that I could lay Theo down to finish his diaper change, and Theo took that opportunity to pee all over the wall. I finally cleaned a space enough to attach a diaper, handed him to Bryan to be clothed, wiped down the changing table and wall, washed the pacifier, and made it out of the bathroom.
Pictures:
