Snow day!

This past week, we finally got the snow that Eliana has been wishing for.  We got 2 inches of snow overnight and in the morning, Eliana ran into our room shouting, "It's snowing!  It's snowing!".  Technically, by the morning it had actually stopped snowing and had started raining, so we bundled up quickly to play outside in the snow before everything melted.  Elvin went in to work late to spend time with the girls outside.
Here is Eliana getting bundled up.

The snow was beautiful outside.  But walking through it made you realize that there was a lot of slush at the bottom.

It is awfully hard making a snow angel on only 2 inches of snow.  But Eliana tried anyways.

Eliana and Daddy worked at making a snow man.  The snow was so wet that it wasn't hard to do at all.

Here is the final product.  We didn't have a carrot handy, so a branch from last season's collard greens made a nice stand in.  The snow man is about 4 feet tall.

Karina came out too.  But her footing was a little unsteady and she refused to budge without holding someone's hand.  All in all, it was lots of fun.  In the afternoon, it had warmed up to the 50's and the snow was all gone by then.  Crazy weather.

Because it's been rainy recently, we've had to come up with fun indoor activities.  We used a big box and made a house out of it.

At Eliana's request, Elvin cut out windows, which are very fun to look through.

Karina has to copy everything that her older sister does.  It's cozy in there, but often both girls go in there at the same time.  The girls brought in a set of silverware into the house.  Also, Eliana decorated the front door with a wreath (a holdover from Christmas, I guess.)

Karina has turned out to be quite ingenious when it comes to reaching things that she wants.  If she sees something on the counter that she wants, she will take a step stool or cardboard box, push it to the right location, and then climb on it to reach whatever she wants, in this case, grapes (a favorite snack of hers.)  We have to keep a close eye on her ALL the time.

Karina's attention span for books has also taken off recently.  Whereas before, she wouldn't read a book for more than 15 seconds, she will now flip through pages by herself for a while.  Reading a book while laying on the ground is a favorite position of Eliana's, so Karina copies her. 

Karina's language is also developing a lot too.  She can now sign "sleep", "doll", "duck", "elephant", "monkey", and "orange" (the fruit).  Also, she's gotten a lot better at mimicking words we say.

And Karina has lately been sleeping pretty well.  She is usually in bed by 8pm and the majority of the time, she sleeps through the night until about 7am the next day.  Hallelujah!  Here she is in her sleep sack (she often gets cold at night but moves around a lot in her sleep, so a normal blanket would never stay on top of her) and her favorite blankie that she sleeps with every night.

It's a boy!

We are having a boy!  Emily is 20 weeks pregnant and we just found out the gender this past week at the ultrasound.  Although we didn't have a preference for either boy or girl, it took us by surprise a little just because this will be a new experience for us--having a boy in the house. 

Eliana and Karina went along to the ultrasound appointment, and Elvin came in from work as well.  At first, the girls were content to watch whatever was going on on the computer monitor.  Eliana didn't know what to make of things but was still excited to find out she was going to have a baby brother.

Then the girls got bored and started their usual antics.  Elvin got a couple of surgical gloves and blew those up.  That kept them occupied for a little while.

The ultrasound tech was a really nice guy.  He might have small children himself because the yelling/laughing/screaming going on 5 feet away from him didn't phase him at at.  Included in the CD-ROM he gave us was a short video.  It shows our baby boy swallowing, he says.  It also shows the heart beating.

Here is one of those fancy-shmancy 3D ultrasound pictures.  It creates a picture that's a little strange, we think.

Emily is due at the very end of May or early June.  We are excited and look forward to a very busy summer!

Growing up...

Karina is now 16 months old and very much a toddler now.  She gets into everything and likes to tear or take everything apart.  If Eliana is not careful and leaves a craft project within Karina's reach, one can be sure that it will be torn apart and destroyed within the hour.

Karina right now loves to climb onto things.  She likes to stand on top of the step stools that we have around for Eliana to use.  The problem is that Karina is still not 100% reliable on her feet.  Here is Karina sitting down on a step stool--a much safer activity.

Karina also likes to try out new things.  Here are the oven mitts that go all the way up past her elbows.

The two girls can be best of friends most of the time.  Here, each is enjoying their own bowl of cheese puffs (the really yummy ones from Trader Joe's!) and so there is no fighting between the two--for now.

The girls also like to go outside to keep Daddy company while he's cleaning up the yard.  Karina is stable enough on her feet to walk on the uneven ground.  But every once in a while she does fall down and needs help getting back up.  She'll just sit there and cry.  We think she won't get up herself because she doesn't want to get her hands muddy.

You see Karina here wearing a winter cap.  It only stays on for about 10 minutes.  Then she yanks it off; she really does not like wearing hats or caps.

Karina's hairs is growing longer and longer.  The other day, Mommy did something funny to her hair.

This past weekend we went out to a Mexican restaurant for a change of pace.  The food took a looooong time to come so we dined on the free basket of chips.  Unfortunately, the salsa was very spicy and so off limits to the girls.  What's the next best thing to dip the chip into?  Mommy's glass of water, of course!

The chips were very large, but Karina's mouth is larger still.

One of Karina's favorite activities is hanging out in the fridge.  If she sees someone open the fridge door, she scurries on over, wedges her way between their legs and plops herself down before we can shut the door.  Eliana did the same thing at that age...

Karina's language abilities are growing too.  She can now sign "tree", "outside", "mommy", "daddy", "meat"  and "pray".  She also puts two words together, like "where + Mommy?"  Lately, we've been working teaching her the parts of the body.  Emily's been doing that in English and Elvin with Portuguese.  Ironically enough, she knows the words in Portuguese better than in English right now...

Karina is developing quite a playful and almost mischevious personality.  Lately, she has been stuffing her mouth full of food and then pretending to talk to get a reaction out of us.  And sometimes she just likes to show off by pretending to fall down. 

Our little Karina is growing up quickly!



12 days till Christmas...

Christmas is fast approaching and the weather here certainly reflects that.  Every morning, we have a healthy coat of frost that covers everything.

At Eliana's preschool, the kids have learned a poem about Christmas as well as a couple of songs--Jingle Bells and We Wish You a Merry Christimas.

Here is the performance on video. (and here are the words to the poem, for those who would like the "translation":

I have a little gift for you
It didn't cost a penny
I checked my pockets for some coins
But I could not find any!
And so I worked to make a gift
It wasn't hard to do
I made it with my own two hands
With love from me to you!

A couple of weeks ago, our church had an event for young families.  They had gingerbread house kits for the children to decorate.  Much of the candy made it onto the house, and some of it Eliana diverted into her mouth.

We've generally not let Karina have very much candy so far.  But at this event, it was EVERYWHERE and hard to keep it away from her.  So she got to have a taste of M&M's, mini-marshmallows, and icing.

Eliana did a good job decorating her house.

Mommy got Eliana some decals of a nativity scene that you stick onto your window.  Daddy wanted to take a picture of it after it was all completed, but she didn't want to cooperate.

Now, instead of biting back her smile, she gave Daddy a super silly grin.

Here is her innocent look... 

And finally a semi-proper smile.

And last but not least, Emily mentioned to Eliana that Emily had a mini-Christmas tree when she was young and would ask Grandma to look for it.  It was nowhere to be found, but Grandma granted Eliana's wish by buying a brand new one.  Eliana was SUPER duper excited!  It is about two feet tall and Grandma even got her little tiny mini-lights.  Eliana decorated it with ornaments ("orna-mens" she says), a garland, and a star at the top that she made.

She loves her tree and has announced that she wants to keep it out all year long. 

Sniffles

Karina has unfortunately come down with another cold.  Unlike her sister--who has an ironclad immune systerm--Karina catches colds more easily.  On Friday night, she was coughing all night, which prevented both her and her parents from getting a good night's sleep.  On Saturday, she had a fever and a runny nose--the whole works.  On Sunday, by the afternoon, the uncontrollable cough seems a lot better but she is still very congested and exhausted from two nights with very little sleep.  We hope that she'll get better soon!

November happenings...

November has flown by, hasn't it?  Even though we've had some nice sunny days, it's still been chilly outside.  One of the indoor activities that Eliana likes to do is painting.  She rolls up her sleeves, puts her creative cap on, and goes at it!

Eliana also has homework assignments once a week from her pre-school.  Here, she is supposed to color a specific number of objects on the paper.  We were impressed that she is now mostly coloring within the lines.

The girls are always copying each other.  So Karina wanted to do an activity as well and enjoyed doing the paint-with-water book that used to be Eliana's. 

Another one of Eliana's favorite activities is dressing up in her "princess dresses."  Then she dons the accessories.  Look at the size of the rock on her ring!

We recently got a big pack of Skinny Cow ice cream sandwiches from Costco.  They are great!  And almost not unhealthy.  Eliana enjoys them too, but only the vanilla ones (not the cookies-n-cream ones.)  Eating them, however, can be a messy affair.

Not only does Karina copy her older sister a lot, Eliana also copies Karina quite a bit too.  Karina loves bananas, but Eliana has never been a big fan.  But it seems like after watching Karina chomp down on bananas with so much gusto, Eliana wants to like bananas.  Here she is grabbing one for herself.  She will often take a mini-nibble, then remember that she does NOT like them after all.

In the bathtub they copy each other too.  Karina likes chewing on the rubber toys and Eliana will follow.

After bath, Karina is usually in a better mood (she doesn't like having her hair washed.)  Here she is with a silly smile.  You can sort of see that she has her four front teeth on the top, and also four front teeth on the bottom.  What you don't see is that all four of her molars have now come in.  They've been growing in in fits and spurts during the past 3 months.  After 3 months of runny noses, fevers, and some sleepless nights, it seems like the teething is over for now.  She can now chomp down on any type of food and so the range of things she can eat is much bigger now.  She's already a voracious eater (she often eats more than her sister during mealtimes) and there's nothing stopping her now.

One of Karina's more favorite activities is pushing her shopping cart around the house and adding goods to it.  In this picture, she has her sister's Crocs and her little blankie amongst other things.

In this case, Karina's loading up on a bunch of Diet Coke and beer.  We happened to have people over and there was a lot of drinks on the ground.  It seemed like Karina was loading up to go off and have her own party.  (And you might have noticed that Eliana is wearing nothing but underwear and socks.  She often does this; says that she's "too hot" with clothes on.  Because of this, we sometimes call her Mowgli, like the character in the Jungle Book.)

Karina is obviously watching everything we do because every once in a while, she will surprise us with something.  In this case, she found a kiddie sized rolling pin and started rolling away on her imaginary dough.

Or she will talk away with an imaginary person on her telephone (which in this case happens to be a remote control--but close enough, right?)

And lastly, Karina has learned the Ring Around the Rosie song--or at least the timing of when you do the certin actions or motions.  As long as Eliana gets the singing going, Karina can follow along!

Thanks for reading, hope you also had a good November!