Three weeks old...

Gabriel is three weeks old on Wednesday!  He has already outgrown his newborn clothes, but this also might be because he's moved up one size of diapers and the new diapers are bulkier than the newborn ones.  In weeks one and two, Gabriel was sleeping quite a lot.

Now that his jaundice has worn off, he stays awake for an hour or two about 3 or 4 times a day.  And once a day, he will stay semi-awake and be very fussy for 3 or 4 hours straight.   It's fine when this happens during the day, but painful when he does this in the middle of the night!

 

The girls' favorite activity with Gabriel is still holding him on their laps.  We've been letting them do this less, though, since he's becoming a lighter sleeper.

The girls' maternal instincts are kicking in.  Eliana will change diapers on her dolly and also breastfeed her dolly.

Here is Karina tucking in her doll to sleep.

One thing we noticed right away about Gabriel was his long fingers.  He does not have stubby baby fingers at all but it seems like his hand is already proportional like an adult hand.  The only difference is that it's only 3 inches long.

Elvin was able to take a couple weeks off work and has gone back this week, but still on a part-time basis.  With Emily busy with the baby, Elvin has been trying to spend more time with the girls and keep them occupied.  Here they are at a local farm picking strawberries.  These are Hood strawberries, which are about 3 times sweeter and 10 times more flavorful than the ones you get at the store.  They picked 6 pounds and paid about $7.50!  At home, Karina probably ate about half of them.

Elvin also took them to the zoo.  Karina has been watching her signing videos and now knows almost all the names and signs to all the animals.  Because she can only say a few consonant sounds, the name comes out garbled but it all makes sense when she signs. 



We've also been enjoying the bounty in our backyard.  We've had an extremely wet and cool spring and beginning of summer, but our raspberries have ripened nevertheless.  We were able to pick about a pint of raspberries so far.

Elvin's parents visited last week to meet Gabriel.  While they were here, we took the girls to a toy store where the girls were each allowed to pick one toy to buy.  Eliana, to our surprise, ignored the princess costumes, and picked out a veterenarian dress-up costume, complete with a cap, stethescope, and lab coat. 

Of course, Karina had to try it on too...

All in all, we are doing well and despite some hiccups, the girls seem to be adjusting well to the huge change in our household. 

Birth Day Cake

To help the girls adjust to having a new baby in the house, we decided to bake a cake to celebrate the birth of Gabriel...a birth day cake.  Our naked chef wanted to help...  Eliana (not really naked, if you count the necklace and underwear), helped by mixing the ingredients around.

Then we mixed them together.  The mixer is too heavy for her to use but enjoyed posing with it turned off. 

She said the batter smelled good.

Eliana helped spatula the batter into the pan.

Licking the mixer blades was very fun and tasty.

Then both girls helped spread icing on the cake.

And they helped spread sprinkles on it.

And voila, here is the finished product!

And after dinner, we sang Gabriel happy birth day.

Eliana, with her sweet tooth, had two pieces of cake and would have had more if we had let her.  Karina, on the other, doesn't have the same need for sugar and wouldn't touch her cake.  But when we whipped out a small bowl of cheese puffs for her, she was all over it.

Happy Birth Day, Gabriel!

One week old...

Gabriel is one week old and developing a routine at home.  He is a very good eater and a good sleeper as well.  Since he's a bigger boy, he's almost outgrown all his newborn clothes.

Part of being a third child means that he has to tolerate being manhandled by his big sisters.  Right now their favorite activity is holding on their laps.  They take turns doing this and Gabriel usually sleeps right through the whole thing.

The girls also pat him on the head, kiss him, tuck him in (one has to make sure Karina doesn't cover his face with a blanket), and otherwise smother him with little kid attention.  Gabriel is very sleepy during the day and sleeps through most of that.

 During the day, Gabriel sleeps in the living room, which also happens to be where the girls spend most of their time--running around, yelling/screaming, and otherwise making lots of noise.  Sometimes it seems that the noisier they are, the better he sleeps! 

Gabriel is here!

Gabriel Cheng-Yi (承義) Yuen is here!  He was born on Wednesday, June 6, 2012 at 8:24 pm.  He was 9 pounds 3 oz, and 22 inches long!  Karina had been the bigger baby so far and Gabriel beat her by a pound.  He's also 2 inches longer as well.  His middle name (i.e. Chinese name) means "receiving justice or righteousness". 

While Emily and Gabriel were at the hospital, Emily's parents stayed at home with the girls and Elvin shuttled back and forth.  Since the delivery went so smoothly, mom and baby were able to come home by Friday.  We are now all home and developing a new routine.  Gabriel is eating well and besides a mild case of jaundice, is doing great.

The girls have adjusted well to having a new baby in the house.  While Eliana loves her new baby brother, she also has alot of emotions going on inside of her that is making her a little more sensitive than usual.  Karina is also fascinated with the baby but doesn't understand why sometimes mommy is holding the baby instead of her.  But overall, they love their baby brother and are very doting big sisters.

Another week...

Another week has gone by.  We are done preparing the nursery and organizing the house; we are ready for the baby to come!

And so is Eliana.  She keeps asking when he will arrive and we tell her that we don't know...  But she does talk to him (or rather Emily's belly) every day and kisses him goodnight in the evenings.  Karina has since picked up the same habit, and every night kisses Emily's tummy and says "Bye, baby".  Eliana announced that she also has a baby and took her baby out with us when we when out for dinner last friday.

A while ago, Eliana got special sandals from Brazil called "Havaianas."  They were her favorite footwear even though they would sometimes make her trip when she ran and tan bark would get in on the play ground.  No matter--style over comfort of course.  But her old pair kept breaking and broke one too many times to be super glued back together.  So we ordered another pair for her...

Of course, she picked out the pink, flowery ones...

There's a preschool educational website called ABCMouse.com.  Eliana absolutely loves it.  As you do activities, you earn points, which you can spend buying pretend things.  For example, there is a virtual fish tank and Eliana has bought extra fish and decorations for the tank.  It has been interesting watching her hand-eye coordination develop.  She still does not understand that if you are trying to get the cursor to a certain spot on the screen, but that the mouse is bumping against something on the table, you can pick up the mouse and move it over.

Eliana's preschool recently took a field trip to the local fire department and Elvin accompanied as the helping parent that day.  Elvin had never been to a fire station before (that he can remember) and so thoroughly enjoyed the trip, probably  more than the kids.

He especially thought all the equipment on the fire truck was amazing.

Eliana has really, really enjoyed her preschool class.  The last day of school was this past week and there was a small performance for the parents to watch.

The kids dressed up as insects and sang insect songs...

We've had some hot days mixed in with our rainy days.  Also, the girl's room faces the west and gets the setting sun.  As a result, the room can get a little warm.  Being a Pacific Northwest kid, Eliana is not used to that and here she is trying to cope...

We moved Karina into Eliana's room about a month ago.  Karina was VERY excited to get her own bed.  The transition has been smoother than we expected and amazingly enough, Karina tends to sleep better and more soundly sharing a room with Eliana compared to in the crib in the nursery.

And when putting her down to sleep, especially if she is already pretty sleepy, she will crawl to her pillow, lay down her head and fall asleep without any protest!  This is a big change from Ellie...

Here is Karina one morning with crazy hair.

She continues to be a voracious eater.  She will eat most things and anything within reach.  Karina will be eating constantly for 30 minutes straight even while the rest of the family is done.  And she is not opposed to trying new things, such as the artichoke leaves she is munching on in the picture below.

Karina is also learning how to cut with scissors.  She can make single cuts now, with a special pair that's easier to use.

She is definetely expressing more independence.  In the mornings, Karina picks out her own clothes now, which leads to some pretty interesting combinations.  She also wants to push her tricycle herself sometimes, instead of being pushed all the time. 

And she likes putting on chapstick.  This, she picked up from her big sister.  She will put it on her lips, and cheeks, and also chin before putting the cap back on.  Here, if you look closely, you will see she actually has TWO tubes of chapstick open in her hand at once. 

Karina is still not using a whole lot of consonant sounds but we can usually understand what she is saying if she signs along with her words.  She is definetely becoming a little person!