Julia meets pumpkin



Antonio shows gutting technique. He was very clean about it, carefully picking out seeds to roast later on.



Julia would run off to the couch with handfuls of pumpkin innards she thought no one saw her sneak and shove them under the cushions.



Just moments before total immersion



Fish'd
Antonio's pumpkin, in case you didn't notice, is the one with the enormous mouth.
But, truth be told, it could be any of our pumpkin

Last night, Antonio went to bed at his normal time, and fell asleep soon after. There must have been some secrete wink or hand signal exchanged between him and Julia, since she did not go to seep at her bedtime. Which she almost always does.

I've learned to not just lay there and get frustrated, so we get up, and head out to the living room. She will go to sleep eventually.

As Geno and I hung out, she switched between puttering around with random toys and adhering herself to my leg, lap, arm or D all of the above.
There were a few rounds of the game Let Me Down! Ohhhh! How Dare You Let Me Touch The Floor!
Dad isn't a suitable comfort person yet, man I'm hoping it happens soon though.
It's frustrating to both of us, me the touched out-ee and him the want to cuddle-er.

At one point she took off down the hall, and when I checked on her, she was quietly looking at a books in her brother's room. I say books, because she was crouched down with a few books on the floor turning pages with both hands. Antonio sleeps like a rock, and never knows she sneaks in to play.

I wonder how though. Before I went to bed, I situated him into a more comfortable sleeping position, vice the head crooked up against the wall, legs hanging over the side of the bed one he was in. As I did this, I found about 5 little wooden puzzle pieces tucked around him. Seems, Julia had brought him some of her puzzle during one of her visits in there last night.
Maybe she's trading those for her Elmo he keeps on sneaking off with.

Dad leaves for work just before I drag myself from the bed.
I've noticed that he's taken time to lay out clothes for Antonio, which is sweet and helpful.

This morning, Antonio called to me from his room, asking for help with his buttons.
I walked over to meet him in my room, and he was not wearing the jeans and orange shirt that I saw on his bed.
He was wearing, instead, faded, just about too small two toned blue shorts, a white ribbed tank top (on backwards and slept in) and the buttons that were giving him trouble were the ones on the rumpled blue Hawaiian shirt.
I asked him what the heck happened to wearing what was layed out for him, he yelled, so exasperated,
"Mom it's picture day!"

I so wanted to run and get the camera. But he started to freak out when I told him he needed to change. He was devastated, he thought he looked pretty awesome.
We did settle on jeans and a red stripey shirt with a collar & buttons at the neck.
He tried to sneak the tank top on under the shirt, but I just knew if he wore that out of the house, he'd end up taking off the red shirt just before the pictures and try and convince them that I really wanted his school picture taken in it.

Since the weather this weekend was crappy, rainy and cold, we didn't get to go a pumpkin patch. We did stop by a pumpkin lot and let Antonio pick one out, but he was distressed they were all so dirty, and only picked out one after the lady wiped it down.

Last week, he went on a fieldtrip with his kindergarten class to a farm and came home with a pumpkin. I dig Halloween and wanted to make a family trip, so this evening we headed out to one. It ended up being the same one he had gone to on the field trip, and he was feeling pretty cool to be someplace he'd been before, but without his parents, so he knew how things worked around here. Don'tcha know.

The farm had a little pumpkin patch and offered a farm tour as well. We loaded up Julia in the backpack and took the tour with this sweet Great-gramma aged couple. They told stories as they walked us around their farm. Antonio remembered most of the topics since he payed attention last week, and felt pretty smart to show us how much he had learned.

Antonio feeding goats first, they're pushy you know.



Then the sheep got their turn. Since they were so patient, they got two boy sized handfuls, each.



Then we sat on some hay bales while Farmer McGregorr* told us the story about how pumpkins grow from tiny little seeds, battle becoming crow snacks with the help of farmer friends, then once they get three leaves, they're safe because the crows think they taste nasty.

Then after a quick stop by the pigs, Streak and Half & Half, we were sent out to the corn maze.
Now, there had been a wind storm a few weeks ago, and the maze had gotten blown over in most places, but we got the idea



At the end of the corn maze was the chicken area, who Antonio got to feed as well. Seems we got to the farm at dinner time. The lady farmer,Ms. McGregor? had an apron full of eggs to show him. That pretty much ended the tour, and we headed over to the pumpkin patch to pick one out. Julia, in her first backpack trip was thrilled the entire time. The animals fascinated her, and towards the end she was starting to get the idea that it just might be possible for her to climb out of that thing, somehow.


*name changed to protect the innocent

The other afternoon, Antonio's teacher told me about this project they had done.
They were to draw a zebra, count the stripes they put on it & write down the number.
She wanted to let me know that he was the only one who made a multi-dimensional zebra.
Sounds like he got finished before most of the other kids and had some time to kill.

Laundry day

Antonio is doing so great with soccer. He scored the first three goals in his game this last Saturday. It's been fun seeing him get more understanding and how much fun he's having. It's also nice to see other five year olds and notice how goofy they all are, not just mine.

He's also starting to read!

At school, they're assigned popcorn words, which the rest of the school district calls sight words. The idea is they're supposed to become familiar enough with the words that they can just blurt out what it is without having to stop and think and do much sounding out.
I made up some flash cards and every few days Geno or I go through them with him. His teacher is only assigning 5 every few weeks, so we'll try and keep up with this.


I picked up a few easy to read books at the Goodwill this weekend, and at night him and Geno have been reading them together. As I was laying down with Julia to get her to sleep, I could hear them reading to each other. Antonio is so excited about it. Last night he read me half a page from a story.

Sunday it was discovered (by Gramma) that Julia not only waves 'bye bye', but she's down with some of the patty cake hand motions.

We may or may not have spend 20 minutes last night saying "throw it in the oven!" while Julia would stop whatever she was doing and throw up her arms. Then we may have moved on to say "Throw baby in the oven!!" while Julia, again would stop and throw up her arms all excited.

She has also figured out how to blow her nose. Poor thing seems to have inherited my allergies, so this is a vital skill. Last night, between throwing her hands up on cue, she would find bits of previously shredded napkin or tissue and come up to help me blow my nose. She'd have this tiny little shred of tissue, put it to my nose, crinkle her nose and blow.

Time has flown by since Dad came home last Wednesday night. We rolled right into family visiting from out of town and Julia's birthday. Then, a new week starts and here I sit Friday, back at work, vacation over, wondering what the heck happened for real this past week and a half.

Antonio is ecstatic to have his dad back. He has learned to throw a football better than ever, is in the planning stages for a new bike jump. Gets to go on Man Trips to the store with him, oh and the garage time.
Heaven!

Julia, who I was concerned about not warming up quickly enough to Dad, has quickly and efficiently wrapped him up around her little finger.

Her latest ploy is when she looses her balance, to completely lay sprawled out on the floor with a dramatic sigh and look up pitifully at whatever adult is around. I've seen this maneuver before, so I was not fooled, and said, "Awww the baby fell down."

She almost grumbled as she stood herself back up. Then toddled away and did the same thing next to her dad, who of course, swooped down and scooped her up, all concerned.
She does this no less than ten times a day now, more often next to dad than me.

We are so happy to have our family together again. While getting back to the swing of things is a little bumpy, it's way better than not having him around.

1 year well baby check

Julia is a well baby!
But we knew this.

Today she had her one year check up.

She weighs 23 pounds and is 29 inches long.
Just right all around.

Since she is tongue tied and I'm a bit concerned about her speech, we'll have a check up at 15 months to see how she's doing verbally. The ped thinks she should say at least 10 words by the time she's 18 months.

Right now she says Mama, Dada, KA! (kitty), EEEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!! and bub bub bub, you know, the basics.

cake chronicles

Julia's own cake, we didn't want to eat cake that has had sticky baby fingers all up in it.



First taste




Not certain she has much room left



Sugar kicked in, much yelling followed



Presents




Coolest present ever!

Happy Birthday

Today is Julia's first birthday

Here she is, just hours old. I had to recover a little bit from the surgery before I could have her. Her amazing Daddy stuck by her side from the moment she was delivered. I knew she'd be in good hands as long as he was watching over her.




Here she is this morning. She sweet talked her way into her Tio's wallet.
I tried getting her to bring it to me, but she just faked me out and strutted on by.




We have Daddy's parents and brother visiting for his homecoming & her birthday, which is such great fun for the kids. My parents will be over this afternoon for her party, after Antonio's soccer game.
Her and her brother will not be in short supply of hugs and kisses.
It's going to be great.

He made it.
He wasn't supposed to be in until late late last night, but by some amazing luck, he got on all the standby flights he tried for and was home about three hours before he was originally scheduled to be.

Here's Antonio watching the plane taxi up to the gate.



It seemed like he was the last person on the plane to get off. While people were walking off the plane, we seriously could have just hung out, had some coffee and napped, and then still waited forever.
But it was so worth it.

Tomorrow is a special day!

The Man is due to arrive at some point tomorrow evening.

We are all beyond excited about it, I have no idea how Antonio was able to get to sleep tonight. I don't know if I will be able to. Well, actually, after last nights 3 hour nap, I think I'll figure it out.

Julia has a cold, and I have caught it.
We sniffed and snuffled our way through the store, with Antonio as our well-person guide to pick up some cold medicine. He was happy to luck out and walk out with one of those black felted color in the picture art projects, and not yuk cold medicine.

Apparently, cold medicine hops up the baby. She did get a few hours of sleep, but it was restless sleep, filled with much tossing, turning and feet poking at mom.
Between the baby and my own restlessness, due in part to the dose of daytime cold medicine I took at bedtime, I didn't get much sleep either.

Here is the girl at 0430


0440, I gave in to the fact there would be no more girls sleeping tonight and turned on the coffee maker.
I think I'll go make some eggs and toast now...