March

31 March 2006 Dad’s birthday, my clever girls and WE CAN SAY MAMA

I can’t believe over a month has past, Katelyn is almost walking! Well that might be a bit of an exaggeration, she is cruising really well on furniture and can stand without holding onto anything for a few seconds. So I expect she will be walking in a few more months.

She also started doing high five on Sunday when Gong Gong and Por Por came over, so when you put your palm up to her she knows that you want a high five. She’s still not sleeping through the night, but I attribute that to her being very clever. I can’t remember where I read it but I read somewhere that clever people don’t need as much sleep, so if this is true then both my girls are very very clever.

Katelyn has become very clingy to me, which sometimes makes it hard to do even very simple things like going to the toilet or washing my hands – I have to wash one hand at a time as she won’t let me put her down. I don’t mind it very much I know it’s because she loves me so much and it’s a phase she’s going through. The development books say that she is only starting to learn about object permanence and when I disappear she doesn’t know if I’ll ever return (as if I could leave my precious for long).

David thinks that I spoil her, and to a certain extent I agree with him. Katelyn and I sleep in the up stairs bedroom because she’s been waking Kimberly up when she wakes up in the middle of the night. But also because sometimes David will make her wait for a bed, I can’t bare to see her upset so by sleeping upstairs I feed her when I hear her stirring. Katelyn still smiles a lot and is an absolute joy in every respect – I might of said this before but she really is.

Kimberly is my big girl, I am so proud of all her accomplishments, she is well and truly out of nappies even during the night and has been for about a month now. She’s very fussy with what undies she’s willing to wear, at the moment it’s Barbie and Hi 5 only, luckily we have quite a few pairs of these. She’s also very particular with what clothes she’s willing to wear and insists on dressing herself, her Barbie tops get a good workout but everything else which is 90% of her other clothes just sit in her wardrobe. Kimberly’s motto for clothes is, it has to be pink and skirts need to be twirly, jeans are OK but only when she’s going to be doing lots of running as you don’t get ows when you fall over wearing jeans.

Kimberly is very outgoing and intuitive, sometimes if I’ve had a stressful day at work she will give me lots of hugs without being prompted and she’ll ask me “how was your day mummy?”. I don’t know how she does it but she’s already able to read me like a book, she’s also got me wrapped around her little finger. If she shows interest in something then it’s my mission in life to hunt it down. I’ve gone through the Pooh Bear phase, the Wiggles, Hi 5, Witches and Fairies and now Barbie all in just a little over a year. I bought some Hi 5 party packs thinking that I would use them for Kim’s third birthday but now I’m wondering whether she’ll still be into Hi 5 by then.

Since going to see the Fairy show at the Fitzroy Gardens in December, Kimberly is fascinated by fairies and witches. She hasn’t been sleeping very well at night because she’s developed a deep fear of witches. Poor little thing. David and I have to either sit outside her room or on bad nights sit at the end of her bed for her to be able to fall asleep. I’ve order 200 glow sticks in hope that this will help her to sleep at night, we’re also thinking about taking Kimberly shopping to choose her own night light.

I am finding that getting the girls to sleep is the hardest part of parenting, and I know that I only have myself to blame. I’ve read many books on the topic and the majority of them recommend control crying, cry it out or the checking method. Which basically all mean to let your child cry until they get the idea that they might as well just go to sleep because mum isn’t going to do what they want. I just can’t bring myself to do it. David wants to give it a go during the Easter break but my view is that it wont last forever and I would much rather my daughters go to sleep thinking mum and dad are here for me if I need them.

I’ve been so busy that I wasn’t able to do much for David’s birthday. I didn’t buy him anything for his birthday (but only the week before gave him lots of new clothes, too many things to mention) and didn’t get around to making him a cake, although I did buy all the ingredients for a baked cheese cake I still haven’t gotten around to baking it. I’ll have to do it this weekend. We went to the rocket park in Hawthorn (next door to where Kimberly does hey Dee Ho) for a picnic with Gran and Pop. Luckily for David Gran made a fuss of him and got him cupcake and swim passes to the Ashburton pool.

We’ve been spending a lot of time having picnics at the rocket park and going to the Ashburton pool, which has a terrific play area for children with a sew-saw and slide, it’s also got a play pool with very warm water. Katelyn was terrified the first time we took her there and did not let go of me and would not let me put her in the water. But by the end of our second visit she was smiling and seems to enjoy it. Because the water is so nice and warm we are going to try to make visits to the Ashburton pool a fortnightly activity.

Aunty Rhona is no longer taking care of the girls, we have a new nanny her name is Rebecca. Kimberly is adjusting well to the change, she is used to seeing new faces and has a very outgoing personality however Katelyn is I am a bit anxious as to how Katelyn will go.

February

1 February 2006

I had a fabulous day yesterday with Kimberly, we went to Ed Gym at the Balwyn YMCA in the morning and had fun trying out all the equipment. Kimberly also did very well with the instructor lead segment were she was required to sing and dance. She even looked after her mum by getting me some pom poms for the dance. I was very impressed when she helped to tidy up when the dance was over and picked up some of the pom poms that other children had thrown to the ground and gave it to the instructor.

She went and did wees at the YMCA toilets, I told her that if she had an accident there then we’d never be able to return and she was OK with that. Afterwards we sat for a quick snack before heading off to Leaping Lizards at the Church next our local park. We got there a few minutes late so I was a bit fluster but Kimberly didn’t seemed phased when we entered the room which to me appeared to be chaotic with children running around every where and play equipment all over the floor. I asked Kim whether she’d like to play on the equipment and she quickly helped me to take off her shoes (I’ve also come to realise that most children’s activities are done in bare feet). Kim happily played on the equipment and didn’t even seem to notice how much older the other children were.

After about 10 minutes the instructor asked for everyone to go downstairs, I had to find a spot for y handbag so asked Kim to find us a spot in the circle. She is very good and I never have to ask her twice when we are out at activities. We did some floor activities where Kim sat on my lap and we bounced around, did some hand movements and then rolled a ball to each other. The everyone got up and we ran around the room, did some skipping, it was a lot of fun. After this we all went back to the room with the equipment for free play, Kim was very good at climbing the ladders and she even sat on the bike thing where you move the wheels with your hands, I wish I had my camera with me. Back to the other room where we did some balloon blowing and then they took out a huge parachute and the parents held it up why the kids went under and reach up to touch it, then they laid down and tried to touch it with there feet. Kim did everything as requested, such a good girl. I couldn’t be happier with her.

When we got back to the car to go home she told me she didn’t want to go home. I told her we had to because it was lunch time and she needed to have her afternoon nap before we go to her dance class. Getting her to sleep was a bit hard, she didn’t want me to leave the room and when I did she started to cry. She was very tired because when I went back to the room to settle her and give her a cuddle she almost fell asleep in my arms. I laid her in her bed and she went to sleep straight away.

She asked to go dancing and to see the fairies as soon as she woke up, it was hard explaining to her that the callisthenics class doesn’t start till 4.30. By this time Katie was due for her sleep and unlike the morning Rhona was finding it hard to put her to sleep and I was finding it even harder listening to the crying so I went and put her to sleep. Poor little thing had been crying to hard that she was sobbing even when I held her and she had a runny nose.

Katelyn has grown so much she definitely aware of the things that are happening around her. She always responds when I call her name and she seems to always know what moods we are in, if we’re very busy or if we need to eat dinner she always sits happily and plays on her own. We are so lucky that Katelyn has a very easy going personality and even though she is close to 7 months and still not sleeping through I wouldn’t swap her personality for the world. I am hoping that this is just a phase and that she will be sleeping at least 6 hours straight some time soon. She sleep from 10pm to 6am last Friday but this was a once off so even though she slept threw David and I were still on high alert and didn’t managed to have a good nights sleep.

Already Katelyn is starting to pull herself up, in the cot, on toys and on us when we are holding her. Katelyn now has three teeth the two on the bottom are very pronounces and are about 2-3mm long. She has one tooth on the top, might be two as on occasion I have felt a second but I’m not 100% sure. She’s been sitting up on her own for 6 weeks now, it didn’t seem to take her long to get the hang of it and when she started doing she hasn’t stopped. She is now much stronger when sitting up and doesn’t fall unless she is reaching for something and looses balance.

Kimberly is doing well with her toilet training, the other day when David was attending to Katelyn she yelled out to him that she’d done poos. David was worried that it was be every where but when he went to the bathroom to check she had managed to take her pants and nappy off and was proceeding to wipe her bottom. No mess and her training seat wasn’t even on the toilet so she had to sit on the adult toilet seat. Such a clever girl!

I am always telling Kim was a bad driver I am, because I am and on the way to callisthenics she told me that I was a good drive – “just like Daddy”. But then the only car park spot required me to parallel park and I haven’t done this for ages so needless to say I wasn’t very good at it. I was almost about to give up as the Ford seemed huge and the car park spot seemed tiny. To top things off we were running late, but Kim was so good. She gave me encouragement and told me that I could do it and just to keep trying. After a few attempts I parked the car and Kim told me that she knew I could do it, to be honest if it wasn’t for her encouragement and desire to do the dancing I was have given up.

Because we were late the other little girls had already started in their activities, the hall was huge and Kim and I were both a bit daunted. I managed to convince Kim to take her shoes off and sat next to her while we watch the other girls do summersaults, for some of the girls it was their second year and they were all considerable older than Kim (between 4 to 6 years). In my mind I was thinking we’ll give this a miss, but to my surprise Kim warmed up to it all and when the dance instructions started she did quite well. She’s even looking forward to next week so I guess I better get the application form filled in and returned.

Me – physically very tired, I am just not able to get used to the broken sleep, I might be able to managed once a night but it’s usually at least twice a night that I need to get up to feed Katelyn. I am not sure how David is coping as he not only gets up for Katelyn up also for Kimberly and at least I get to sleep in until 7ish, he’s up with Kim at 6. Apart from the lack of sleep everything else is going well, both my girls are growing up, they are both learning so many new things every day it’s been hard for me to keep up with it all. When I look at the two of them only a few months ago I can’t believe how far they’ve come. I’m just trying to slow things down and take it all in, putting it all into my memory bank before they are onto the next phase.
10 February 2006 Gran’s birthday dinner

After work today we all went out to dinner in Camberwell to celebrate Gran’s birthday. Kimberly’s is really starting to understand the concept of birthdays, she’s been talking about presents to give to Gran for the past week. Of course all of the presents that Kim suggests are things that she would like and not at all appropriate for Gran (that is unless of course Gran is secretly into Hi 5, and Wiggles).

Katelyn is such a cutie pie today she discovered her tough, she keeps poking it out. It’s so much fun to watch, and it’s so cute watching her poke up tough in and out, she looks so cute.

Kimberly is still doing all her activities, Storytime at the library on Monday’s with Aunty Rhona, Leaping Lizards and Callisthenics on Tuesday with mum (I’ve been working from home on Tuesday, which means it’s hard to get much done during the day so I work when the girls are asleep), Hey Dee Ho on Wednesday where the girls learn Auslan (signing), singing and play with percussion instruments. Thursdays and Fridays are Kindle days and because Katie is still so little we don’t have any activities planned for her (but mum is looking into it).

January

16 January 2006
Another year is upon us already, our Christmas holidays went very quickly and we managed to fill each day with at least one activity. I returned to work last week and David returned to work today so official this is the first day of us going back to our normal working week routine.

Yesterday we went to Chris and Rhona’s house for a BBQ which was very nice, it was only the second time that we’d been to there house and it was good to see all the changes that they’d made to the house since when they first bought it. Katelyn was very good and went to sleep while dinner was served, Kimberly on the other hand constantly wanted our attention so I didn’t get to spend much time in my seat. I think she was just very excited to see everyone, she was also very comfortable with the surrounds even though she wouldn’t remember the last time she was there. She kept herself busy taking games off shelves and also keeping everyone entertained by chatting away. She has become so talkative, sometimes she will come up to me and tell me a story. Then she’ll ask me whether I liked her story. Most of Kim’s stories are actual events that have occurred in the previous few days or sometimes they’re things that she is wanting to happen, like playing on the see saw with her Katelyn.

On Saturday we went to Williamstown beach for a picnic, we ate our lunch at the playground and managed to get Kim to eat all her sandwich by tell her that she wouldn’t be allowed on the playground unless she finished her lunch. She is very agile and climbed every piece of equipment. I was a bit worried as she wasn’t familiar with the playground and it equipment was also designed for older kids so I was in constant fear of her falling.

After lunch we moved to the beach, David and Kimberly played in the water while Katelyn and I watched in the comfort of our picnic rug. Usually I’d take Katelyn for a dip in the water too but the weather that day was only in the high twenties so I didn’t think it was warm enough for Katelyn. When Kimberly got out of the water we discovered that she had a cut on her big toe, but she didn’t say anything while she was in the water with David. I was quit a deep cut so we were surprised she didn’t mention is sooner, luckily I had a bandaid and some chocolate with me.

I also managed to squeeze in some sewing on the weekend, I finished two skirts that I’d been working on for Kimberly and also made her a little dress. She wasn’t really interested in one of the skirts, it’s brown (with faint blue stripes) with a pink flower that I made from the same fabric and some pink material. I thought that since most of her clothes were so girlie she might like something a bit more “classic” but no, according to Kimberly the skirt got the thumbs down as it wasn’t pink and not twirly enough. This has happened once before when I made her a handkerchief skirt, I asked her whether she liked it and she said yes but I sensed the reluctance in her voice so I told her that she didn’t have to like it. She then told me that she didn’t like it, so I said that I would give it to my cousin Emily. I asked her again a few days later about the skirt and she promptly replied give it to Emily mum. Kimberly is definitely not one of those people that find it hard to make up her mind, in fact once she’s made up her mind it’s almost impossible to change it.

On Thursday last week (12/01/06) Katelyn sat up on her own, she is so mobile I wouldn’t be surprised if she was crawling within a few weeks. She often now lifts her own body off the ground into a crawling position and rocks backwards and forwards. She can move sidewards and backwards so if we leave her in a room on her own we’ll often find her in a corner. She is so cute, her smiles are always on the ready but she’s different from Kimberly with her reaction to new people and places. Kimberly is never phased by another new, when she was 6 months old we would notice her eyes following each new person as they come into Kindle. Katelyn on the other hand seems to need a bit of time to get used to new surroundings, yesterday when we first went into Chris and Rhona’s house she started to cry. Poor little thing she was sobbing even while David and I cuddled her, it took her a good 15 minutes to calm down. Once she got used to her new surroundings she was fine and as I said previously she even managed to a two hour sleep.

April

26 April 2006: My head hurts
I think I have the flu, I haven't been felling well for about a week now but have been soldiering on. The last couple of days I have felt like my head is about to explode so I was grateful for the day off yesterday. Donna and the boys came over for a play before they left for the airport. Kimberly was very sad when they left and she just sat in the lounge room staring out the window. We told her that maybe we could go and visit the boys at their house some time soon, I think this made her feel a bit better.

In the afternoon we went to Chadstone to get some photo frames so that we can display the photos that we had taken on Sunday. Here are some sample proofs that I've recieved from Clair the photographer:

I really like the photos as I think they capture Kimberly and Katelyn's personalities really well.

Both Kimbelry and Katelyn were very good while we were at Chadstone, I had Katelyn in the sling and she was happy to observe the world from that perspective. We didn't bother with the pram so Kim just walked, we got three really big frames. David took them to the car while me and the girls "window" shopped around Myer. I told Kimberly that she was aloud to buy one thing, she chose a cute bunny photo holder but then we went to the clothes section and she found some Barbie clothing. I reminded her that she was only entitled to one thing and that if she wanted a Barbie top she couldn't get the photo holder. She decided she liked the photo holder more. I even went to the toy section and she saw a big Barbie doll (at the moment Kimberly likes everything to be Barbie) but she still chose to buy the photo holder.

While we were doing the grocery shopping Kimberly told us that she needed to go to the toilet and David took her to the toilets - no issues. She's very independant and can dress herself and go to the toilet at home on her own.

I've arranged to go to Kindle to do an activity on Friday, so I'm looking forward to that.

24 April 2006: Oliver's party
Donna and the boys are in Melbourne for a few days and we were lucky enough to be able to celebrate Oliver's birthdya at Gran's. Gran organised lots of party food and a Spiderman cake for Oliver. Kimbelry had a lovely time, David and I didn't have to look after her much at all as she was busy playing with her cousins and being fussed over especially by Charlie. Katelyn took a couple of minutes to get used to all the activity and noise level but she seemed to have enjoyed herself too.

On Sunday we had the photographer come over to take photos of the girls (also got a couple of the family too). We dressed Kimbelry in a white t-shirt and blue jeans as suggest and within minutes I heard "It doesn't matter". So I went to see what doesn't matter and Kim had paint all over her, cheeky thing. Luckily I had bought a spare set of t-shirt and jeans. She also accidently knocked a chair over which mad a big bang, David yelled at her and told her that she gave him a scare to which Kim replied "you scared me too". She is also clever and cute, David of course had to apologise for yelling at her, especially since she said sorry and really didn't mean to knock the chair over.

20 April 2006: Our Kimberly
Whilst I have been trying to ensure that Katelyn doesn't "get left out" because she is the second born, I am afraid to say that I have been "neglecting" Kim a little. So I better do an update on my precious "Big Girl", who is growing up too quickly. Yesterday morning when we said good-bye to Kimberly before leaving for work she said to us "Have a great day at work", now what two year old says that to their parents.

Kimberly is such a delight and we are always surprised by the things that she says, I was trying to find out about her day yesterday when I came home from work and was asking her lots of questions and she said to me "Mummy I can't talk while I'm eating" and then when she finished eating "Mummy I've finished eating, I can talk to you know. What do you want to talk about". Sometimes I forget that she is only two.

Last week she wet the bed in the middle of the night two nights in a row, I was really disappointed because she's been doing so well for so long. But on the weekend we spoke to Gran who told us that when children are sick it sometimes causes them to wet the bed at night. Which explained things, Kim had a bit of a cold and cough. I think she was more upset about wetting the bed than both David and I, and when I told her that she would have to start wearing a nappy at night she refused.

The Easter bunny was very good to Kimberly and she has enough chocolate to last her for the next 6 months. Rebecca got her a Barbie set with bowl, spoon, cup and chocolate egg. It was exactly the same as the one that I got for her so I wasn't sure what her reaction would be. To my delight Kimberly was thrilled to get another Barbie set, I actually think she was just as happy the second time around, and she said "Wow another Barbie set".

Easter Sunday Kimberly spent the morning at Por Por's house, and even had her afternoon nap there - I went to pick Kim up to take her home for a nap and some how got rangled into letting her stay. She got more eggs from Por Por and Gong Gong and Uncle John gave her a chocolate bunny. In the evening we went to Gran and Pops for dinner and of course both Kimberly and Katelyn got spoilt. Gran and Pop gave them a book each along with a cuddly bunny and more chololates. Katelyn got right into it and I think she ate more chololate at Gran's tha Kim. David gave both of them big white chocolate eggs which were so thick that I had to stand on it to break it, I got a dark chocolate one.

On Monday Kimberly met with Charles from Kindle at the rocket park for a play, I packed them some cupcakes and two Easter eggs. David said that she enjoyed bossing Charles around and hooning around the park. After their sleep we went to Emily's birthday party, Kimberly had a terrific time and wasn't phased at playing older children. We did an Easter egg hunt and Kimberly got more chocolate.

19 April 2006: Bye Bye
Katelyn has been able to wave for about a week now, but yesterday Por Por came over to bring us some food that she had made for us and when she left Katie said bye bye and waved her arm. We were all thrilled especially since it was at the end of the day and well past Katie's usual bed time so we expected her to be tired.
Rebecca called this morning to ask where Katie's eye drops were and to ask whether they could go down to Port Melbourne to see the boats so I'm looking forward to going home to see how they went. Will try to post updated tomorrow.