Friday, January 20, 2012

Grammy Time!

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My mom has been here for the past two weeks and the time has just flown by. She leaves on Saturday - how can that be? Didn't she just get here?! She was so excited to meet her newest Grandbaby. So sweet! I need to dig out all the pictures of my mom with the girls when they were babies. I am so glad she came out from Indiana...thankfully, airplanes make the miles shorter.

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We have been holding down the fort with Mr. M gone working on a movie. (I wish I could say what it is because I am so proud of him...but I'm not sure if he wants me to say, so I'm just going to keep my mouth shut). He comes home on the weekends, and sometimes for one evening during the week.

We are always so happy when he comes home, but even more so now that he's gone so much. It's like Christmas whenever he comes home, and the girls start talking about him coming back the second he leaves. They love their daddy so much (as Ginger would say!)

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Ginger still isn't wearing clothes. Those pics from that last post were taken at Christmas when she was still wearing dresses. Ha! I have just gotten used to taking her out in public just like this. It's just not worth the battle. Plus, isn't that one perk of living in Southern California? Summertime temperatures in January. So, I'm just going with it.

I got the girls Cardboard Houses (you can draw on them and decorate them yourself) as Christmas presents. But then, the night before Christmas, I decided they had too many presents and to save this one for Easter or Valentine's Day. Well, with Mr. M being gone so much, I have been really stretching myself to find fun things for us to do at home...and in a fit of desperation, I got the house out! So, it ended up being a surprise present for no particular reason whatsoever. But the girls loved it, and now we have a house inside our house! It's been used for everything from a nap den to a toy box...seriously, the way Ginger has "furnished" it, it could appear on an episode of Hoarders. ;-)

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Ginger is now getting a nap every day. She is so happy when she's had a nap, and so not happy on the days she doesn't nap. The downside is that even a two hour (or less) nap will cause her to be awake until the wee hours of the night. She is not falling asleep now until after 1am, and then she wakes up at 6am and runs into my bedroom and wakes up me and the baby. Well, that is not so fun. But, I am taking the tradeoff of her being happy and up all night over her sleeping more at night and being cranky.

Once she started napping, she went back to being her old self...that ball of of joy and energy that infuses happiness in everyone around her. Ginger is so loving, fun, and amazing. I think if I had 1/10th the energy she has, I could run marathons every afternoon. She is like the sun.

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Paprika has really come into her own as the big big sister of the house. She's so inclusive of her little sisters. She and Ginger are thick as thieves. She's always asking me when Violet will be big enough to play with them and go to school with her.

I enrolled Paprika in three extracurricular classes for the spring. She'll be doing ceramics, an art class, and a science class. I am hoping to get her back in swimming lessons in the spring, but right now the pool where we take lessons is closed for the winter. Boo! It's an outdoor pool, so I sorta understand. But seriously, it's the same temperature here year-round, so I just wonder what the logic is in closing the pool?!

Anyway, we are having a lot of fun hanging out around the house together and doing homeschool type stuff afterschool. Paprika is now reading phenomenally well. I can't believe she'll be in kindergarten next year, and already I would say she is reading at about a second grade level. She is getting so much more confident in her reading, and my hope is that by the time school starts in the Fall, she'll have a lot more confidence in the classroom. She is so smart and knows so much, but in the classroom she is so quiet that her voice gets lost.

At home, it's a different story. Ha! :-)

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Baby Violet is growing so much every day. She seems to go through sleeping phases. One day the girls will keep her up all day and she'll sleep hardly at all. I will get Violet to sleep, and then the big girls will run in the room to tell me something and wake her up. Or I'll get her to sleep, and then we have to go drop or pick Paprika off at school. Just stuff like that. So then the next day, Violet will be so exhausted, she'll really sleep the day away.

I basically hold her all the time. I have done this with all my girls- hold them pretty much every second of their lives as babies. It makes them not like to ever be put down, of course. But it's just how I parent, and I love knowing that I held them every chance I could. But it also gets exhausting because at some point they learn never to be put down, and well...then it makes it hard to do things like dishes and laundry, and all the million things you have to do when you're raising three small children. :-) Even so, I can't help but hold her all the time...

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Health-wise, I am doing so much better. I will probably write a post about it soon, but I am just so grateful to be feeling as good as I am now. My pelvis is about 90% healed. I still have a lot of pain sometimes, but it's miles better than it was after birth when I couldn't walk without being in excruciating pain. Health is one of those things that we take for granted until we don't have it anymore. I am just so grateful every day to be able to walk (mostly) pain-free.

I have made a bunch of goals for myself this year, and that gives me so much hope. After Violet was born, I had a period of feeling very blue. I think it was a combinaton of me being in so much physical pain, Mr. M's work schedule, and the responsibilities of home life. I am feeling so much better now than I was. I think that has a lot to do with the goals I set for myself, the expectations I have set (I've considerably lowered my expectations - ha!), and just taking better care of myself. I need to write a few posts about it, just to clear my head and remind myself in future years of how far I've come.

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In other (lighter) news, this weekend Daisy is going in for her first salon treatment. :-)

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When Mr. M was home more, Daisy got baths much more often. Now she barely gets brushed. It's so bad, I know! But that goes with my whole "lowered expectations" thing. Haha. So, this weekend, I have made her a full-service grooming appointment. Hair, nails, the whole nine yards. I will be sure to post some Before/After photos. :-) She deserves it. I can't wait to see the results!

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Have a wonderful weekend! :-)

3 comments:

FourJedis said...

Congrats to Paprika for being such a great reader. We are trekking along with Anakin and he is reading Biscuit books to us every night (Costco carries them). We have a cardboards spaceship, and my boys hoard too! Sorry your mom's visit is ending. You guys look so much alike.

Can't wait to see how Daisy looks!

Mimi said...

Your Mom has identical eyes to you!
Love all your pictures, and your account of how things are going.
I'd forgotten you had a dog too! Don't know how you keep all the balls in the air, it must be hectic!
I really like the "holding" style of parenting- I held mine a lot, moreso with each subsequent baby, and I think it's brilliant. Now they're 19, 18 and 15, I certainly don't regret it!
You're doing a brilliant job!

Carrie Reiberg said...

I just love your updates and I am glad you are starting to heal. you are an amazing mama!