Almost 12 weeks old!

Our little baby boy isn't so little anymore!  At his two month check-up, he weighed in at 17.5 lbs!  To put this into perspective, Eliana at her 2 month check-up was 12 pounds and she was at the 95th percentile.  Gabriel's pediatrician didn't believe how much he weighed; she closed his file and reloaded it on her computer because she thought there was a mistake. 

Gabriel has definetely moved out of the infant phase and into the baby phase.  He has a definite sleeping pattern now and even though he is still feeding every 3 hours, we think that he might start going longer between feedings any time now.  If you go up to him and smile, he will smile right back and tries to talk to you.  He is also starting to grip things with his little hands.  And we think he will be a thumb-sucker.  He is already trying to put his fingers in his mouth to suck on and every once in a while, he is successful.  Just today his success rate increased dramatically!

His sisters are still very fond of him and give him plenty of attention. 

We hope your summer has gone well as we head into the autumn season!

Ballet Camp

Eliana loves taking ballet classes so this summer, she went to ballet camp at one of the local studios.  It was princess themed and also a bunch of her little friends from church attended. At the end of the week, there was a little recital for the parents to watch so we all went.

In the beginning, they went up to the railing to do some warm-up exercises.

And they did some stretching. 

And then the dancing began!

And afterwards, the girls feasted on a tea party.  Besides strawberries and blueberries, there were chocolate coated pretzel sticks dipped in sprinkles.  Guess which Eliana wanted to eat first?  We all had a good time and Eliana hopes to take more ballet classes in the fall.



Summer Birthdays!

The past month has been full of birthday events for our household.  This is because Eliana's birthday is July 14th and Karina's is Aug. 6th.
Eliana wanted to have one party with her cousins and another with her little friends from church.  So in mid July, her cousins and Grandpa and Grandma came over to celebrate her 4th birthday.  Eliana was pretty happy with the presents, which included a new pair of sunglasses with pink frames.

She also got an Angelina ballerina set, including a mouse doll, doll-sized bed, pillow, clothes etc.  She loves Angelina books and videos.  The whole set is worth more than $100, but Emily found it on Craiglist for $35.  It was quite a find because it was in mint condition.

Angel food cake is the standard 'birthday cake' and Karina is very excited about that.  The kids helped put the candy letters on.

For some reason, Eliana was in a pensive mood during the singing and decided to act very non-chalant as we sang "Happy Birthday" to her.

Another very fun toy that Eliana got was a bubble gun.  It does the blowing for you and shoots a continuous stream of bubbles.  It uses a whole bottle of bubbles in about 2 minutes.

Here's a video of the girls having fun in the backyard with the bubble gun.

We also gave Eliana a gift of $4 in cash--which she was allowed on spend on anything (almost anything.)  She ended up spending $1 on the snack Yan-Yan (those edible sticks that you can dip into chocolate sauce.)  The also spent $2.50 on one of those neck pillows that you use if you want to sleep on the plane.  But she thinks it's a child-sized boppy pillow and uses it when she pretends that she's breastfeeding her doll.

And Eliana got a card from her Yeh-yeh and Nai-nai that was very...elaborate.  Part of the card is a punch out Princess crown, which looked very fancy on Eliana.

A couple wekeends laters, a bunch of Eliana's friends came over.  Per Eliana's request, it was a "costume party", so the girls came over dressed up in various costumes.  Karina, however, refused to wear anything but her favorite t-shirt with has butterflies on it.

Eliana requested a pinata and so there it is.  It was filled with Reese's peanut butter cups, Hershey's kisses, and other goodies.  Eliana took a few whacks at it, but didn't come close to breaking it open.

A couple girls later, Eliana's 3-year old friend took a whack at it and to our surprise, broke it open!   Candy spewed out and it became a free for all.

Eliana also wanted a tea party.  So the girls got lemonade in the teapot and decorated cupcakes with icing and other toppings.

And the girls also got to play Pin the Tail.  However, almost none of the girls wanted to get blindfolded.

Then Karina's birthday came around.  Overall, she didn't know what to make of it.  But she knew something was up when, in the morning, she came downstairs and saw that her chair was decorated with streamers and balloons, or "bah-oon" as she calls them.

Grandpa and Grandma came over for a simple dinner and then after that, we had cupcakes.  Karina didn't know how to react when we lit two candles in front of her.  But when it was time to blow them out, she took care of business.

Here's a video of us singing to her...



And she decimated the cupcake.  Her amazing appetite never fails her.

One present that Karina got was a piano horn.  Karina has a whistle that she loves playing, so we knew she would like this.  At first, she was only sucking inwards, but after a while got the hang of it.

Karina also got a little Calico Critters set--a family of mice.  Each mouse was wearing clothes which she proceeded to take off. 

And she got a little toy called Sew-N-Sew.  It's a wooden block with a crayon-sized stick (the "needle") attached to a string.  The block also has a bunch of holes so you can use use the stick to thread the string through the holes.  It turns out that Karina wasn't too interested in it, but Eliana loves playing with it.

So here's our little two-year old.  Karina has blossomed into a bright and cheerful little toddler.  She loves to laugh and giggle at Eliana's antics.  She has recently started jumping and actually getting air underneath her feet.  Karina loves being outside, taking walks around the block, doing puzzles, and playing with water.  She has an inexhaustible interest in being pushed on the swings, and likes slides quite a bit as well.  She has more and more words every day, but her diction is still pretty limited, so we are the only ones who understand her, with the help of sign language, and even we can't figure it out sometimes.   Karina doesn't pronounce very many consonants, so for "water", she says "ah-doo", which is also what she says when she means "other".  Her "excuse me" is "mee-mee", her "thank you" is "deeh-doo" and when she says "flip flops" it comes out as "bip bop". 

Karina doesn't throw tantrums really (at least not yet) but she cries very very hard when she doesn't get her way (like when Emily reads to Eliana instead of her).    Thankfully, she is pretty easy going overall, and contines to charm us with her cute antics and sayings.  Hard to believe she is already two!

7 weeks old!

Gabriel is now 7 weeks old!  He is fortunately developing a schedule now...  He will take naps often throughout the day.  In the evening, he might get somewhat fussy and then will fall asleep around 8pm or 9pm for good.  At night he will get up to feed but then more often than not goes right back to sleep.  He will get up at around 6am or 7am and be awake for a while.

When Gabriel is awake, he is more alert and looks around the room.  He makes eye contact with you now but doesn't smile at you yet--that is, unless you are Eliana.  Eliana has a knack with little babies; she will talk softly to Gabriel, stroke his cheek, and pat his head.  And Gabriel will coo a her and smile in return.  He doesn't do this for anyone but her, not even for Mommy. 





We like the picture below because it looks like Gabriel is waving to the camera.  We have a picture of Eliana doing the same thing.

We don't know exactly how much Gabriel weighs right now, but he is already wearing 3-6 month clothes, and some of those are tight on him.  The shirt below is pretty tight-fitting and shows off the contour of his mighty belly. 

To go along with his long fingers, he seems to have pretty long toes as well. 

Karina still enjoys holding Gabriel.  She has lots of fun doing that.  Sometimes Gabriel's arm will swing up and bonk her on her face.  She thinks that that is really funny.

And she likes delivering little kisses on to her little brother.

When putting him to sleep, we will rock Gabriel in the bathroom with the loud overhead fan on because that seems to soothe him.  Sometimes Karina will come along doing the same to her teddy bear.

Karina and Eliana are enjoying a pretty laid back summer.  So how are they spending their days?  They like doing puzzles, playing games, and listening to audible books on Mom's cell phone.



Eliana LOOOVES playing hide-and-seek with Elvin.  Can you tell where she is hiding in the picture below?

Eliana likes going outside on the plasma car that the girls got for their birthdays recently.  She got the hang of it right away and it's probably her favorite bike-type toy right now.  She also likes picking flowers from the yard; except that for this one, she uprooted the whole thing.

And Eliana continues to display her goofy side.  One day while we were setting the table she says, "Look Mommy what I can do!" and hangs the spoon onto her nose.  To our knowledge this is the first time she's done this, although the way she did it with such ease makes us think that she's been secretly practicing in a closet somewhere.  "Who taught you that, Eliana?" Emily asked.  Eliana said she saw it done in one of her Fancy Nancy books.  Go figure.

And it's been fairly hot here, so the girls have enjoyed playing the pool they inherited from their cousins.  They love to splash around in there.

They seem to be enjoying their lazy, carefree summer!  We hope you are too!

Happy July 4th!

Happy 4th of July!  As has been our tradition, we have gone on a trip for the 4th of July, which is just as well because fireworks are legal here and people spend thousands of dollars on them.  On the night of the 4th, it can sound like a war zone on our street.

We took off in the morning for the 2-hour drive to the Oregon Coast, to Lincoln City, for a reunion with all of Emily's family.  All five of her siblings plus their spouses and kids drove or flew in for the occasion.  On the way there, we stopped at a random farm stand/sundry store and had Tillamook ice cream for lunch.  It was either that or eat cherry tomatoes or green beans or raw onions.  Eliana really enjoyed this and was asking for ice cream for lunch the rest of the week.

Because there were more than 30 people gathering together, we rented two 5-bedroom houses that were side by side.  They were a stone's throw from the beach and had a beautiful view.  You can see the view from the balcony below.  In the picture, you can also see Karina's thigh and leg--she was the one that took the picture in case you were wondering.

We had nice strolls down the beach and walked to the tide pools.  It was very sunny, in the 60's and low 70's, and also very windy.  Here is Karina acting shy.  When she doesn't like what's going on, she gives you this look.

On Saturday, we drove about 40 miles south to the Newport Aquarium.  Both girls enjoyed looking at the sea lions, sea otters, and fish.

Eliana grabbed the camera and took pictures as well.  Here are a couple...

And to explain the picture above, here is the informational panel.

The cousins also came along to the Aquarium.  It's very handy having two extra set of hands.

The Aquarium has a underwater tunnel you walk through.  This is Karina's first time, as least that she could remember; she thought it was pretty cool.

This was also Gabriel's first time, but it did not impress him at all.

And the Aquarium has a nice little playground.  We have a picture of Eliana playing on the same dolphin structure when she was Karina's age.

And the girls spent plenty of time on the beach.  Karina had an aversion to sand and would not stand or sit in it.  She would only sit on someone's lap or on a towel.  On one hand, this make it real limiting for her.  On the other hand, you could leave her on the towel and know that she wouldn't wander off.

The girls enjoyed playing together.

The weather was perfect for flying kites. 

Karina is flying a kite with her cousin Erica.

Eliana went to the beach at least once a day and sometimes twice.  Here she is building sand castles with cousin Abby.

Gabriel, on the other hand, mostly stayed indoors.  He hung out with Mommy, or was being carried by one of his aunties or cousins.  Needless to say, he got lots of attention.

And this vacation was certainly different for Eliana compared to a generation ago.  Instead of playing cards or boardgames, the kids played with iPhones and iPads.

And on the last night, we joined the family on the beach for a bonfire.  Since Karina doesn't like the sand, she insisted on being carried the whole time.  We roasted marshmallows, which the girls loved gobbling up.  Overall it was great fun, but also very tiring for the girls.  The night we got home, they each slept about 12 hours!