Church is at 9:00 A.M. this year, which means Sunday afternoon walks are a possibility if we skip naps. We went on a long one on New Year's Day, which Tyna enjoyed:
Missy (or should I spell that Miss E.?) couldn't stay awake:
Jim didn't have to work on Monday, January 2, so we went on a walk or run (I can't remember) and then hit the bagel place. Jim was not happy about feeding messy Wrenzo:
Missy wore, and fit, a hat of mine, which is confusing:
I spent many hours navigating sittercity.com and care.com, e-mailing people, making phone calls, and interviewing people looking for a new sitter. It was not my favorite thing. I hired a Spanish speaker who did not work out. Eventually I hired a 22-year-old Cal State San Marcos student named Taylor who started in January. She's totally dependable but, it turns out, not very warm. I don't know that it's an ideal situation, but it's OK for now. I started going back into the office most Tuesdays. One of the first times Taylor came over, she and Ever used the Spirograph set Coco gave Ever for her birthday:
Once I put the girls down for naps and sat down at my computer to finish some work. Before long, I heard Bear making noise. I found her buck naked, onesie and pants outside the crib, diaper sitting in the crib, and a big wet patch on her sheet. I didn't even know she could undress, and here she'd managed to get her onesie and everything off. I figured a bath was in order:
She also started using the pulls on the bathroom vanity to climb onto the counter and get into the medicine cabinet. I still remember when we were little and Christian fell and hit his chin on the bathroom counter, biting a hole out of his tongue. Wrennington, although more mischievous than Ever, still isn't so bad. I'm hoping we can avoid major accidents.
Wrenzy's age is pretty magical as far as cuteness goes. I think everything she says is the most adorable thing I've ever heard. Here's a little taste of Wrenzosa at almost 22 months:
Bear got a new favorite word: "available." She wouldn't say it in the video above, but I got this vid:
We had to take Ever in for some shots before she could start school (see below). Wrenzy was saying "available" over and over. One of the nurses walked in and was like, "Did she just say available?"
We've mostly continued our tradition of going on a family run on Saturdays. Sometimes we end up exploring nice spots. This isn't a very good picture, but this place had a nice view down below that included a body of water and mountains in the background:
A small thing that has vastly improved my life - and now I don't know how I ever survived before this development - is that Tyna started holding her own bottle. Wren and Ever didn't hold bottles until they were way older, maybe because I didn't teach them or something. In any event, on one of our Saturday runs, Jim propped up a bottle for Tyna, and she took it while we ran. So I started bringing her car seat in so I could tilt it a little and prop a bottle up for her. This time she was doing just fine, but Wren wanted to help anyway:
Before long, I was just laying Tyna on the floor on a blanket, and she was holding the bottle and feeding herself. Being able to do other things while she eats is critical.
One day while I was bathing Wren, Ever decided she wanted her hair short in the front and lopped off a bunch. Considerately, she tried to throw some of it away, but there was still a lot on the play room table and floor. She cried when she thought she was in trouble. I told her about the time I cut my bangs all crooked and short. Then she happily posed for pictures at the scene of the crime (that's some hair on the floor to the left):
Sometimes the short chunks look really bad, but she's got enough hair that they sometimes blend quite nicely. Jim thinks she might have a future in hair.
After Ever turned five, she was eligible to start transitional kindergarten (T-K). She has been anticipating T-K forever. When I asked her why she wanted to go so badly, she said she wanted homework - "like what is it when they ask you what is two plus one, and you have to guess the answer?" So apparently she was dying for math homework.
There were T-K openings at three Oceanside schools - Mission, Laurel, and San Luis Rey. All three of them are rated poorly, and they're not in nice areas (particularly Laurel and San Luis Rey). I did some research and even looked into a Spanish immersion school in Vista. JoAnn Miller (our old sitter) talked to the T-K teacher at McAuliffe Elementary (where we plan to send Ever next year) and got her input on the other T-K teachers. Ever and I did a school tour in January, with a quick lunch break at McDonald's. Ever was having a good hair day and looking rather grown-up:
We visited the Spanish immersion school first, and a mother we ran into in the office subtly indicated (trying not to offend the workers nearby) that she was not happy with the school. Based on that alone, I was pretty much out. I didn't get an amazing feeling there anyway.
We had an appointment at Laurel Elementary after that, and the principal showed us around. We didn't get to meet the teacher because she was out that day. I heard consistently rave reviews about her, though, so I'm sure Ever would have done fine there.
When we were doing paperwork at the district office, I asked if we might be able to pop over to Mission Elementary next door. I hadn't been able to get in touch with the secretary to set up an appointment there. The lady in the district office called over to the school, and the T-K teacher, Mrs. Reese, said she'd come out and meet us. We met her at the school office, and she showed us the T-K/kinder area and even took us into the T-K classroom, even though a kindergarten class was going on at the time. Mrs. Reese was very warm and wonderful. The school was renovated a few years ago, so it looks new. JoAnn's contact at McAuliffe is friends with Mrs. Reese and spoke very highly of her, and she also recommended the program at Mission because it's super-small - only a dozen kids. After our visit, Ever and I both felt good about it, so Mission it was.
Ever went to Little Bugs one last time to say goodbye, and then she started at Mission the day after MLK Day. Taylor had to take her on her first day because I was at work, but Ever did fine. I think visiting and meeting Mrs. Reese beforehand helped a lot. She absolutely loves school, and I'm really happy with how it all worked out.
Like Wrenzy before her, Tyna became a belly sleeper:
She has the most amazing cheeks in the history of the world:
She started moving a bit. I'd put her in her little pink play thing, and she'd roll onto her belly and usually head straight for the fireplace.
For a while she liked to push herself over to the table until she got stuck straddling a chair leg:
Happy baby:
We went on a walk one Saturday afternoon by the San Elijo lagoon.
We discovered that the trail by the discovery center is incredibly short - like a half mile. Jim figured out that there are more trails on the other side; you just can't get to them without going on the road for a minute. We headed that direction and saw a woman with a dog go up a narrow non-trail trail on a bank between the discovery center and the road. We followed. The way down the bank was rough going with the strollers. Jim managed to get the double stroller down the hill, but I was struggling with Tyna's; it really wants to tip over when it hits big grooves or other obstacles. Jim came back up and took over the single stroller, and I went down to the other girls. At one point, Tyna's stroller nearly tipped over (which would have sent her down the little cliff on the lagoon side), so I abandoned the double stroller to rush up and help. Ever and Wren were out of the stroller by that point, and I was worried about leaving them alone, especially since they were near the road. I hurriedly but hesitantly started up toward Jim, who was trying to right Tyna's stroller. Before I got halfway there, though, he pointed out that the double stroller was rolling. I went back down as the double stroller rolled across the street and tipped over on the other side. An older couple witnessed the whole thing and came to help. The woman told me to stay with Ever and Wren, and she fetched the double stroller. I was worried she'd get hit by a car, but somebody stopped for her (and more cars had to stop behind that car). It was all pretty humiliating. She was really nice but couldn't help make a comment about our ill-advised route choice.
After all that, we ended up crossing the street and going up into the adjacent neighborhoods rather than trying to find the rest of the trail system. Toward the end, we were walking along the side of a long shared driveway when Wrenzy fell out of the stroller onto her head in the dirt between the driveway and a stucco wall. I couldn't totally see her because she was behind Jim and the stroller, but Jim said she was doing a headstand in the dirt with her body up against the wall. She cried but was fine.
We went to Pizza Port (the original) in Solana Beach for dinner before heading home. After we get there, ordered, and sat down, we decided the littles probably needed diaper changes. Turns out we were too late for Tyna; she had soaked through/blown out. Jim dealt with that while the others and I waited for our food. Happy and grumpy:
We've had our wettest winter in a long time. The rain has been amazing. We dream about moving to a place that gets rain regularly. One afternoon Jim texted me a picture he took from the window at work:
That's a patch of hail that looks like snow. We didn't get any hail at the house that I was aware of, but Ever saw some at school.
We had some cold days. Forty-three degrees is really cold when you're not ready for it:
One day Ever and Wren held a mac and cheese march.
At the suggestion of Amera Alo, a friend from the ward, we signed Ever up for soccer through the Y. Jace Alo and Teo Clark (another kid in the ward) were playing, and Ever was up for it. We've never even kicked a ball around with her, so on the way to her first game (there was no practice first; just started with a game) we were trying to explain goals, how you can't use your hands, etc. When we got there, she was pretty freaked out by the whole situation.
For the most part, when she wasn't crying on the sidelines, she was standing on the field with her hands by her face (or in her mouth), refusing to move.
I was shocked at how good the other kids were. I thought when Rob and Christian played when they were kids, there was a lot of standing around, picking dandelions and noses. Not these kids. Some of them in the 5-6-year-old group are amazing. They've clearly played with parents, and I think a lot of them have played at the Y before. Anyway, things improved for Ever after that first day. (See next post.)
After that soccer game, we had to run to Walmart. Ever (in only socks, for some reason) was so cute with Wrenzy. I only caught a second of the dancing/hand-holding:
Goosey is the best big sister. She calls Wrenny "Sweet Girl." If Wren gets in trouble, Ever rushes to comfort her and explains things in this kind voice, like, "It's OK, Sweet Girl. It's OK. Mommy just needs to brush your teeth. If you just let Mommy brush your teeth, then you can read a book. You're the best, Sweet Girl. It's OK." Love these girls.
