Week in Review

As you can tell from my last two posts most of this week has been taken up by working in the kitchen. We did manage to get away for a free class at the Bosch Kitchen Store on Monday on, what else, canning tomatoes. When I stopped in there earlier that morning I learned that they had a kiddie play area where I could park Ava while I watched the demo. Sign me up! We will be going to more of those in the future.

Lily has really been coming into her own this past week. She dive bombs her food and eats like a champ, even if she hasn't mastered the art of swallowing it all. She loves to sit in her Bumbo on the counter and just hang out before and after her meal, watching me cook for the rest of the family. She has been trying all sorts of flavors and, no surprise, orange vegetables are a hit. She devoured her carrots last night and when I mixed sweet potatoes with her green veggies she ate those up too, no problem. I had an old Biter Biscuit in the cupboard which I gave to her last night and she had a great time gumming on it after her dinner (which kept her entertained while I worked in the kitchen). She is much more stable in the highchair too, for when I put her in it yesterday to eat her biscuit she had no problems sitting up on her own and not falling to one side.

Lily is also following her sister in the ways of loving electronics. She loves to try and grab at the remote control and the computer keyboard as much as Ava does. I guess that is one of the characteristics of this generation - growing up around so many technological advances that we didn't. I think it's odd that Ava should say TV, email, and computer but I suppose that these are in her life every day (courtesy of me) so I shouldn't be surprised.

Lily also moved (temporarily) to her own room this week, occupying the office for awhile until she begins to routinely sleep through the night. She has done SO much better this week just being away from us, only waking up once or twice and mostly I can tell it is indeed because she is hungry. I know she has the capability to sleep through so it shouldn't be too much longer before the girls bunk up together. I have gotten their naptimes pretty much in sync this week and they sleep about the same amount of time, so when the transition happens it should be fairly smooth. Fingers crossed. And let me tell you - I LOVE HAVING MY BEDROOM CHILD-FREE! YEAH! It does make working on the computer in the office a little more difficult, but that's the price I pay.

Ava has really been practicing her independence this week in the form of trying to do things herself. "Go away Mommy (or Daddy)" and "Ada do it" are her two favorite phrases. She has been wanting to put her clothes on by herself as well as her shoes. She is getting really good at it actually. The other day she got her pants on all by herself and the Crocs that Aunt Abra gave her are her favorite shoes because they are purple (naturally) and because she doesn't need my help to get them on. She has also been putting longer and longer (complete) sentences together. For example at lunch today she called out "Daddy, I have a spoon", not just "Daddy, Ada spoon" as she has in the past. She is very good at using the right pronoun form (me or I) and loves the words "so" and "too". I can't understand how children learn to use those properly; I am just amazed!

Elliott has been working non-stop and is praying that soon it will slow down and soon her may know what is happening at the higher management level as far as replacing the Controller position. So many things unsettled make him edgy. But football season is officially here as his fantasy league draft was last week and college games have been on all day at the house. He has been getting Ava involved with "Touchdown!". She was a little confused on that though, for she climbed up in a chair and screamed out "Touchup!"

Besides putting up all the food this week I have started another blog about saving money. Although I intend for it to be geared locally, I think alot of the information on it right now applies on a national level. So for my readers far and wide, check out my other blog too, The Budgeteer, by clicking through the link in the top right corner of this page (or the link right here).