Audrey is 2 Months

Personality:  Flexible, social, easy going

Likes: To be nearby people, her bouncy seat, showers, pacifier, being swaddled, sitting up straight

New: Head control, smiles (though not consistent yet), sleeping through the night…wohoo!!!  (Started as of 6 weeks and is getting more consistent each week)

Routine: 8:00 wake up/nurse, 9:00 nap, 11:00 wake up/nurse, 12:00 nap, 1:30/2:00 wake up/nurse, 3:00 nap, 5:00 wake up/nap 6:00 doze on and off (usually in bouncy seat), 7:00 nurse/pj's, 8:00 nurse, 8:30 sleep (in theory…struggling with that!!), 10:00 dream feed

Stuggles: Getting her to sleep in her bed at bedtime.  She does great during her naps mostly, but does not like to be in her bed before her dream feed at night.  The times she does this successfully, she has not slept through the night 

We're loving this girl and getting to know her more each day!

Elijah is 3!

Sunday was Elijah's 3rd birthday.  We had a tiny party which Elijah loved!  He really wanted to wear a party hat and have his friend Mateus over.  Both of his wishes came true and more.

(I cheated and made cinnamon rolls instead of a cake since my cakes always flop under pressure :)

 My favorite part of the day was watching Elijah play pin the tail on the donkey for the first time.  Absolutely hilarious!

 We've been following the Ciotta family tradition of taking a birthday picture with dad so we can see how the kids are growing.  So fun to look back on over the past years.

Here's what our new 3 year old has been up to:

Personality: Happy, reserved, helpful, kind, good sense of humor, prefers stability

Likes: Playing on play equipment, hot dogs, Paw Patrol, playing with cars/trains/boats etc, going to school, playing with older kids, reading books, stickers, going to the park, running to the truck to greet Jeyson when he arrives, helping load laundry into the machine and any other household task, tools, picking out his own clothes, repetition of the same routine every day, overhearing and adding to our conversations (quite hilarious, especially when he gets the whole topic wrong!), checking out how Audrey has no teeth lol!

New:  What hasn't changed in the last year??  Potty trained, sleeping in a big boy bed, knows to wait to get out until his clock turns green, independent player, talking about everything, lots of preferences about what he wants to do, imaginative play starting, learning lots of Portuguese words, eating everything (even vegetables), retelling stories of what happened, starting to become responsible and trustworthy in some areas little by little, joining in on jokes/humor and even laughing at himself

Routine:  Up at 7:00, nap 1-3:30,  sleeping at 7:30pm

Stuggles: Obeying right away, preferences about how details should be done, learning to get dressed and use the potty all on his own

Audrey - 1 Month

Audrey Sophia is 1 month old today.  In keeping with the tradition, I decided to try to blog a little about her each month for the first year, though it's definitely more challenging with 2 on our hands this time!  Here goes:

Personality:  Easy going most of the time.  Lets anyone hold her, including Elijah.

Likes: Being held up over a shoulder, sitting in her bouncy vibrating seat, sucking a pacifier and getting swaddled when she is tired.  She also really likes to being close to us, even if is just to suck on her pacifier laying next to us…makes her so much happier than being alone.  Also likes having a night light on in her room.

Routine: Wake up time at 8 am (often wakes up an hour or two before that but I treat it as a night feed and put her back until 8).  2-3 hour cycle throughout the day of eat, play, sleep and is in bed by 9pm.  Wakes up one time at night (around 2-3 am) to eat.  Still working out more definite times of the day for naps.

Struggles:  Going to sleep in her crib at bedtime.  For naps we can easily put her down sleepy but awake, but at her bedtime she cries in her crib unless we put her down all the way asleep.  We need to work on this and making her bedtime a bit earlier too.  Another struggle is at night occasionally she wakes up to feed and then doesn't want to sleep again for another hour or two!  Happy but awake, which is better than crying, but still results in tired parents.  

We are so glad this sweetie joined our family.  It's hard to imagine how we didn't have her before.  We look forward to getting to know her more and more in the coming months and years!

Elijah is 2!

Holy cow...we have a 2 year old on our hands!

I still want to take an official 2 year pic, but here's for now

On our other blog, I posted about Elijah's birthday party, but here I thought I'd post a little update on what Elijah's up to these days.

Loves: Watching Curious George and Peppa Pig, anything related to cars, trains, planes, boats or bikes, playing with other kids, coloring with markers, doing puzzles - real and virtual on the ipad, milk, going down slides, climbing, his chewable vitamins (BEGS for more than 1 a day!), being understood now that he's talking more

New: Talking!!! He just took off at 23 months while visiting my parents in the US.  He started the visit refusing to even say words he knew and had said before, and finished the visit repeating just about anything.  Now a few weeks later he is even initiating communication, pointing at things, answering questions, and showing comprehension of non tangible concepts.  VERY cool! Also new is not being SO into his frog blanket anymore and not sucking fingers so much, or really noticeably at all.  He lets us and likes to put toys in his crib.  We keep a little hanging basket of toys he can play with when he wakes up.

Routine: Up between 7-8, nap 1-3 or 4, sleeping around 7:30pm

Struggles: Sleep, though I can't blame him.  The past few months have been crazy with guests and traveling so our routine has been totally off, but he was GREAT through the whole thing.  Then, once it was time to get back to normal, he started having sleep trouble.  For about 2 weeks he was waking up at 5:30 am and screaming!  Then it was short naps (only 1 hour ish!) and screaming when it was time to  go to sleep/nap.  It was exhausting and draining for everyone!  But we really tried to stick our routine and after a month now he is walking up solidly after 7 (we're working on getting back to our 8am wake up time) and he's back with 2 hour naps (working on getting back to 3 hours) and going down great again.  Phew that was crazy for a while!  Though I read it's common around 2 yo so maybe it doesn't have to do with the traveling.  Glad we're back to normal though!

Words Elijah says: meow, Sam, dog, woof, dad, mama, choo choo, car, counts with me to 3, go, stop, no, cup, milk, juice, more, please, shoe (hew actually :) , egg, ear, ball, moo, quack, duck, neigh, roar, poopy, star, moon, night night, bye, book, thank you, all down, down

Some of the words he shows us he knows and will repeat but doesn't say on his own: head, hands, foot, diaper, mouth, nose, belly, chicken, bread, carrot, chair, table, baby, no thank you, up, cow, horse, help, bath, and many more

More Morning Funnies

Here's another breakfast funny from this guy I don't want to forget

E stole and tried on my glasses the other day when I wasn't looking!

We were eating breakfast - crepes, bananas, and pineapple slices.

Elijah was eating his food while I decided to put jelly on my own crepe.

Elijah saw me do it and gestured for me to put some jelly on the piece of crepe in his hand.  I did.

Then he gestured for me to put jelly on the crepe in his place.  I did.

Then he held out his whole banana for me to put jelly on that too.  I did.

THEN he held out his whole pineapple slice for me to put jelly on too.  haha!  I did.

This guy is really thinking now...all kinds of fun ideas floating around in his head!

1 year 9 months

Elijah just recently turned 1 year and 9 months.  Time for a quick update so I can remember how he's growing and changing.  

First, a few sleeping shots of him OUT during a nap.  I love that bum in the air!

 And this was him hanging out in his crib kicking his feet out of the bars and chilling one morning when I went in.

Elijah and Elijah at a father's day event (the school made him pinned the tie on Jeyson).

 These last two are at least 2 months old but too cute to exclude.  We were on the way to the park to ride bikes and eat a snack.  We turned around to the back seat and E had put on his helmet (backwards!) and was eating our picnic food!

 Oh well, guess we'll keep him!

(Since personality and routine are pretty much stable now, I will exclude those subjects)

Loves: Curious George (OBSESSED!) and sometimes Peppa Pig episodes, going to "school" two mornings a week, train set, cars, playing with Jeyson's tools, breakfast, walking in puddles, drinking straight from coconuts, 

New: Appreciating humor in movies and real life situations and laughing about them even when he's alone, understanding his train set and the idea of pushing the trains along the track and downhills, ditching cloth diapers for now (life is too crazy as we adjust), saying a few words!!  holding hands when praying, 

Struggles: Temper tantrums, not wanting to stay in timeout, wanting to take his frog blanket everywhere, not wanting to sit in his seat at meals

Words said clearly everyday: bye, come, mama, (always said maMAmaMAmaMA) uh-oh, WOAH!

Words I know he's saying everyday based on his imitating our tone: all done, thank you

Words he knows but only says when he feels like it: Tschau (pronounced chow...bye in portuguese), car, ball, moo, meow, quack 

Morning Funnies

This kid brings unending joy to our lives.  He's just so goofy as he tries to figure life out.

Here he is trying to start our beetle with a key in the engine

The funniest thing happened at breakfast, and I wanted to make so I don't forget it.  

Elijah was eating a tortilla with jelly on it for breakfast (don't ask!) and I was reading him a book.  When we read books he's ALL about taking hold of our hand and using our finer as a pointer for him to point at everything for us to say what it is.  So, he took my hand and pointed at the picture of Abraham looking at stars.  

He points my finger at Abraham, I say "Abraham"

He points my finger at stars, I say "Stars"

He points my finger at a hand, I say "Hand"

He points my finger at a beard, I say "Beard"

Then, to my surprise, he points my finger on his tortilla (accidentally getting jelly on my finger), and I say "Tortilla"

Seeing the jelly on my finger, he points my finger up and into his mouth for him to lick off the jelly!

I don't know if I just needed a laugh, or if it was a you had to be there moment, or maybe it was just the factual and studious way he did it all, but I was rolling laughing.  And of course Elijah wanted to be in on the joke so he would point my finger at more things in the book and CRACK UP exaggeratedly as if he were in on the joke.  This kid is too much!  I love being his mom.