coloring

The twoddlers love their crayons.  Rafa mostly moves them in and out of the box.  Sylvia enjoys coloring.  Everything.  Including tables, walls, cabinets, Rafa's back...  We try to limit the coloring to their little table.  And the bathtub, which might be where she gets the idea to color everywhere because they color on pretty much anything they can reach in the bathtub.

And, she colors with both hands.  At the same time.  Which means the cabinets get a pretty good dose of color before we start wondering whey she's so quiet.

Also note that these pictures were taken about a week before the video posted yesterday of Rafa dancing.  You can tell because in between I gave him a haircut.  His first real, all over haircut and not just the bangs.  He looks like a little boy, now!  So, his gorgeous locks are gone.  But they'll grow back.  We're just giving Sylvia a chance to catch up.

dancing!

values

One of the great challenges, burdens, and privileges of being a parent is influencing the lives and character of your children.  And pretty much everything that we do in rearing our kids influences the lives and character of our precious offspring.  If we teach them discipline, they might lose some creativity.  If we focus on academic, intellectual activities, they might lose out on the joy of free play.  And vice versa.

My dueling values struggle with this often.  The circles I run in tend to promote developmental activities for kids as early as possible.  That leads to kids at the twoddlers age who know their colors, shapes, letters, etc.  There are times when I wonder what the nanny does with the kids all day and if she has been doing any of these types of activities with them.  And then I remind myself that they will learn all of that in time and it doesn't really matter if they grasp it at 19 months or 3 years.  Maybe it's better for them to just have a day filled with laughter and joy and learn kindness and happiness from the nanny.

We obviously want the best for our kids.  The hard part of that is determining what the "best" is.  It might not be the most sought after daycare.  It might not be an ivy league school or a professional career.  It might just be discovering who they are, embracing that, and living their own dreams rather than what society tells them to do.  Of course, I'm in a position to say that because I have had the opportunity to 'achieve' professionally and make a good living and I'm not living paycheck to paycheck to keep my family fed, housed, and clothed.  Probably the richness outside of the "successful life" society preaches wouldn't be all that great if I was worried whether or not we'd have lunch the next day.

This article is a good reminder that if I really want my children to happy, I need to focus on, live out, and teach them more than just letters and numbers and colors and shapes.  I need to show them how to love others and be loved.  How to be generous and kind.  How to cherish experiences and interactions more than things.  And I need to live it.  For my joy and for theirs.

ELMO!

The creators of Sesame Street are geniuses.  There must be something scientific about the color red and the pitch of his voice and they know what they're doing because the grip this creature holds can't have just been dumb luck.  It probably only took one viewing for the twoddlers to become addicted to E-L-M-O, as we often say to avoid the desperate, addiction-like pleas and longing to be able to watch that red monster in action.

And, I must admit, D and I are impressed by the talent of the Elmo guy.  I probably shouldn't admit this in public, but we have enjoyed searching through Elmo videos (primarily the ones where he teams up with singers) to find ones to share with the kids. 

Here are some of our favorites, ok, well, so they're almost all favorites...

The classic.  Elmo's song.  One that gets stuck and you find yourself humming on your way to work...

I think I've mentioned that our kids like ducks.  So, what could be better than Elmo and ducks?

Who wouldn't love Andrea Bocelli singing them a lullaby?  And it makes us laugh pretty much every time.

Of course there's also the great combo with silly Adam Sandler.

More Jason Mraz than Elmo, but no complaints here.

Can't leave out Norah Jones.

We're also in the counting stage.

Not sure this will have any positive influence on the potty training, but it's worth a shot!

This isn't one of my faves, but the twoddlers get transfixed. 

words

Words are starting to come fast and furious.  SO MUCH FUN!  But not so fast that we're not still surprised and delighted with each new one.  Names are favorites.  For awhile, Sylvia has been running through everyone's names.  Our favorite use of names by her is "RAAAAAAAFFFFFAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!"  Whenever he has something she wants or we're doing something for him and she's being impatient for her turn or he takes a toy from her or invades her space or any number of other situations, with tears streaming down her face (they come quickly) a big open mouthed wailing cry, she points at him, trembling and wails his name.  It's horribly pitiful.  And makes us chuckle.

Rafa has started with the names and while he doesn't run through them one after another like Sylvia, he is completely delighted by saying them or having figured them out.  He has a proud, amused smile on his face when he points at himself and says "Fafa!"  I've never been a huge fan of baby talk, but I guess when it's your own kids, your heart melts a little at their attempts at pronunciation.  For whatever reason, Rafa doesn't attempt to say Mami or Papi, although we've discovered that he will say Mama and Papa.  So, we finally have names, too!

While they sometimes will repeat words that we say but not necessarily associate them with a concept or remember them the next day, here is my attempt at documenting the words they have at this stage that have meaning and they come up with without prompting.  I'm sure I've left out a few, but close enough...

Both: up, otro, mas, ball, mano, pie, pato, 'pato (zapato), (many animal sounds), agua, teche (leche), foofa (fruta), bye, Oma, Gong-Gong, luna, niño, bujas (burbujas), no, poo poo/popo, pipi, gracias, and their favorite: ELMO!

Sylvia: nose, ojo, oso, Mami, Papi, Y-ya (Sylvia), casa, God made me (sung), mono
Rafa: Mama, Papa, Sy-a (Sylvia), 'mano (hermana)

now that's style!

nanny pics

I think the nanny sent me these pics to assure me that the kids have a blast when mami is gone. Which will surely be the case for the next 17 years...

baby 3

So, the main reason that we are looking for a kids day out a couple days a week for the twins in the fall is so that our nanny will have a little break and some one on one time with baby 3!

We are waiting to find out the gender until the baby is born.  And, there's only one this time.  Whew.  Due date is August 15.  So, yes, I'll be preggo during the summer.  I think that covers most of the initial questions.  Feel free to leave more in the comments and I'm happy to respond.

The twoddlers are in for a big fall.  New baby, new room, school, lots of changes.  We might try to move them into the bigger of the bedrooms this summer so that they don't have all the changes at once.  Part of that will depend on when we can get it ready.  Mom says not to worry about having D's diplomas on the wall and books on the shelves, they won't care, anyway.  Probably true.  But, knowing me, if I don't change it to kids' decor before they move, they might get to look at all of D's degrees until they're old enough to take them down themselves...

the call

The kids got in! I just got a call and the twins are accepted into kids day out. It's a program that is recommended by many and where my sister-in-law did some teaching. I'm thrilled! Mostly because I don't have to look for another program. I guess I should probably go tour it...

cool dude

Or Elton John impersonator...

singing!

'Patos

Another of Rafa's favorite words is 'pato'. Which is both duck (pato) and shoes (zapatos). He sort of came across it babbling one day and I repeated it and he repeated it and it stuck. It probably helps that he loves both ducks and shoes. And lest you think he only wants to wear Sylvia's shoes:

bye and no

Sylvia is quite a bit more verbal than Rafa.  Girls.  She loves to mimic our words and has even started piping in as we sing songs and count to ten!

Rafa, well, Rafa is great at animal sounds, but only has a few other words.  Two of his (and our) faves are "Bye" and "No".  It's not the words themselves, but how he uses them that really tickles us.  He says bye, pretty much every time someone leaves (although most of the time, it's after they've left and he's not as shy anymore) or we leave from one place to another.  He also doesn't just say bye to people.  Things get goodbyes, too, when we go.  Our favorite, though, is when he's finished eating (or at least finished playing with the food we want him to eat), he says "bye" and waves at his plate.  It's our sign to clear the table.  We giggle every time.

We have been lucky that the twoddlers haven't started saying "No" until now.  And so far, their learning that word hasn't come back to bite us, yet.  Sylvia doesn't really say it much, but Rafa has mastered it.  And he doesn't just say it.  He commands it.  He says it with full authority.  Kind of like how his mama says it...  But he doesn't say it when he doesn't want something (they still make great use of the head shake, which is adorable).  He says it right after we tell one of them no.  Sort of like an added emphasis to our instructions.  It cracks me up.  Probably because everything else that comes out of his mouth is in such a sweet tone and this is an entirely different voice.

What will they say next?...

nanny update

For those that have wondered, the new nanny is working out well. She loves the twoddlers and is super sweet. She keeps them safe and active. She definitely hits the basics. If they learn her kindness and joy and Spanish, we're feeling good about her being such a big part of their lives. The icing is that she also loves to cook and fixes great food for them, tidies during their naps without hesitation and has a 'can do' attitude which makes us feel less guilty if we need to ask her to do something above and beyond. PLUS, there's more, her schedule is very flexible and has been a great help for babysitting.

While chatting with her after she babysat while David and I both had work events (and she emptied out most of our kitchen to prepare for the exterminators), I learned that not only is she the eldest of 10 kids (TEN!), but her mom had a set of twins when she was 8 and another when she was 10! Since she was the eldest, she was essentially her mom's extra set of hands (and feet and everything else, I imagine).

We also had a great conversation about her 'teaching' style and while I probably should have made that part of interviewing her, I didn't. I consider it extra super bonus points that she and I are on the same philosophical page on that, too.

So, I'd say things are working out jut splendidly! I know there will be times that I'll need a reminder of this. I guess it's a good thing I blog. The reminder will be in the cloud for eternity.