estelle ~18 months

• pushes her head back against your chest when rocking her at night and you try to get up... loves "rocky rocky"
• hits my chest when she wants me to sing a lullaby and if she doesn't like the one i chose, hits again
• shook her head with a sturdy "yes" when asked if she wanted earrings
• told her to close her eyes, and she squints hard trying, peeking out :)  

~sara

lela (a tad over 4) and estelle (just about 16 months)

lela loves...
- hide and seek with her dad
- watching football with dad
- one on one time with mom.. "mom, i never want to leave you. i want to go wherever you go."
- playing ponies and unicorns
- playing outside with friends all day every day - the neighborhood social butterfly
- starting to ride her bike farther distances with us (i.e. to the library!)
- berenstain bears, curious george, and all books really. loves to be read to a LOT.
- dancing to kid music and mostly "let it go" from frozen (she knows every word)
- her family. she tells us this often. such a loving and compassionate girl.  i was driving toward a bird and it flew away and she said, "mom!  you scared that bird!!"  also, "mom, do you know what i love doing?  i love picking flowers for my family."
- her sister. she treats her like her little student and is overly patient and gentle with her. they are a sight to be seen together. estelle hugs and kisses on lela in return.

 lela is...
- starting to sound out words and read 2- and 3- letter words
- attending ymca preschool two times a week in the afternoons, goes to gymnastics, takes swim lessons (our FAVE day of the week!), and is about to start dance! a lot, but not really. everything is short and just enough.

 estelle loves...
- lela. holding hands with her while walking. holding hands, in general.
- looking out the window for dogs, birds, and people.
- practicing her animal noises to include cat, dog, cow, pig, lion, bear, bird, CHICKEN (the cutest), and horse
- playing with her three little piggies and their houses.
- spinning around while lela dances.
- the beach and playing in the surf. LOVES the water, swimming, diving in head first.
- snuggling and hugging our legs.
- playing in the backyard.  LOVES it.

 estelle is...
- running.
- playing more independently at the playground.
- in swim lessons and has no fear.
- understanding everything we say and can finally say "help", which alleviates some screeching!
- funny. really, really funny.

recent quips by lela

we were facetiming with nana & opi and lela noticed how beautiful the blue sky was in the background (they were at their campsite in leelanau)... she said, "mama, is there sky connected to our sky?" we were swimming at hickam beach with colleen and the boys and lela was out on her boogie board next to colleen. she started to ride a wave and said, "look, i let go of the earth and didn't fall!"

the girls lately

estelle

• 13.5 months walking all the time
• 14 months using fork solo and eating by herself
• estelle is really getting into reading, bringing books up to us and plopping down on our lap, noticing specific things on each page and trying to repeat what we say, gets giddy when asked if she wants to read a book :) 
• loves to roar like a lion, tiger, bear...
• hides behind your back when sitting on ground and peeks at you from side to side, bending her knees and putting her little face near you.... her version of hide and seek.  it is adorable.  always smiling.
• kisses frames of lela 
• serious hugger, lover, cuddler, kisser

lela

• opened the back of estelle's diaper and put the hose in it.... ON!  estelle looked at her and kept playing at the water table!

• loves playing with neighborhood friends, gymnastics, ponies, unicorns, wading in the surf, and playing in the sand

• lela was telling me that the big red ball outside target was a circle, but actually called a ball when it is that large.  i agreed, but told her we could also call it a “sphere”, which is a three-dimensional circle.  she said, “oh yeah, yeah, yeah, that’s just the word for ‘ball’ in hawaiian”

• we were driving and lela was saying how wherever we go, estelle poops.  we go to the doctor, she poops.  we go to preschool, she poops.  we go to the store, she poops.  and then she proceeded to say, “when i was little, we went to paris, ‘pfft!’, we went to france, ‘pfft!’, we went to england, ‘pfft!’, we went to a church, ‘pfft!’, we went to a city, ‘pfft!””

• lela writes constantly.  she went through an anne frank stage where during “quiet time” she would write letter after letter and seal them in envelopes and leave them outside her door.  we have close to 40 lying around.  last week, she wrote this… “today is wednesday 2014, lela"

• ponies are IT around here.  pony parties all the time.  lela even beds them all down at night.  (there’s even one sleeping under estelle’s swim hat!)  

• I hear lela in our bathroom sounding a word out..."tttt....aaa....mmm..."  thinking she's trying to sound out the word toilet paper from the package, i don't think anything of it.  later on when i am going to the bathroom, i look and she was sounding out Tampax!

they both are loving leahi swim school….. we go every thursday and it is a highlight.  estelle is the class clown of her group and is the best babe at going underwater without a qualm.  lela was freestyling to her teacher last week!  i don’t know how they do it, but the teachers are amazing.  she’d never do that for us!

snarky little girl

just moved to hawaii and lela and i went to the playground.... some girls were trying to talk and play with her, but lela wouldn't respond.  the girls would not give up, but lela, would not tell them her name or answer any of their questions (although, she knew darn well she wanted to play with them!). after awhile the girls looked at me and said, "um, excuse me, but do we need to use sign language for her?"  !!!  this was months ago and we STILL haven't stopped laughing about it.  :)

trouble!

lela went over to play at reillys' neighbors house.... she was spelling her name with the girl, piper, and playing in their playroom. when she came home, terry asked her how to spell her name. lela said, "s, h, i, t!" i walked to the other end of the house to put some laundry away and when i came back lela was nowhere to be found. frantic, i ran outside and she was ACROSS THE STREET looking to see if the artwork she taped on the neighbors' door was still there! oh my... she got in trouble.

no more naps!

so lela is about 3 1/2 now and it was time to forego naps.... she has always been a rough one in the sleep department and bedtime battles were starting to get crazy to say the least. lela would get up numerous times for every reason imaginable. well, now with naps gone and "quiet time" instituted, lela is lights out at 7pm. magic. when asked what she wants to be when she grows up, lela says, without hesitation, a baseball player. after that, a musician, then an artist. :)

two new funnies from lela

i walked into lela's room and found her sitting on her bed "breastfeeding" pooh bear... feeling like i interrupted something, i backed out. as i was leaving she says, "ouch pooh bear! NO pooh bear. we don't bite. i need to make you a bottle." :) lela walks into the kitchen to find me stuffing some of her old art in the trash. she stops in her tracks and says, "um mom, what are you doing?" caught like a deer in the headlights, i say, "ay, uh, um, ay..." she says, "mom, that is beautiful artwork, what are you doing with it?" i say, "oh, um, i didn't think you wanted it anymore." she says, "i made that. and it is beautiful. it needs to go right back up here." she takes the two sheets of paper with scribble on them and puts them on top of the five other pieces of art on the fridge and says, "there. perfect. now we can all see them... they are RIGHT where they need to be."

nighttime antics

while i was away on a girls' weekend in DC, estelle popped two teeth, and lela was up to her nighttime antics, of course.  about 30 minutes after being put to bed, she comes out of her room naked (she removes her pjs every single night) and says, "um dad, does santa use an umbrella?" and as brant walks toward her from the living room, knowing she should not be getting out of bed, she scurries back to her bed before he can reach her, hops in, and pulls the covers up... still asking the question... ;)  these little episodes are a nightly occurrence and since brant is the night watchman, he gets to field all these very important questions...

memories

lela calls estelle "booty cheeks" due to her precious pudgy cheeks

brant had to floss a booger out of lela's teeth (why on earth would a kid eat a booger??!!)

we took lela to see a musical called "the living tree" at a baptist church downtown and during the production, where there was a lull in music, she leaned over us on the pew (standing up) and farted out loud.  during the next lull in music (no idea why she feels she needs to fill these voids with talking or tooting) she looked at me and said, "mama, we don't pick our noses!"

lela got out of bed and told brant he needed to come into the room because a bird pooped on her face. she also worries about rhinos at night and other animals coming in the front door of the house.