Determined

I was going to entitle this post "Stubborn," but "Determined" puts a positive spin on the whole situation!

Yesterday morning, I was trying to get everyone ready so that we could take Emily to school. I asked Christian to go and get some boots on since he could put them on by himself and, since we were only going to be in the car 5 min, it shouldn't have mattered what he had on his feet.

Christian had other ideas though. His new favorite shoes are his "fire shoes" that he got for Christmas from his Auntie Erin. (They're black converse w/flames on the side.) The also have laces and require help from Mommy to get them on. I tried to explain to him that since we were only going to be dropping Emily off and them coming home, he needed to listen to Mommy and just put on his boots. Thus commenced the tantrum.

I finally helped him to get his shoes on, but left the laces untied. Well, he screamed the entire 5 minutes that we were in the car that he needed his shoes TIED!!!! I finally told him that if he wasn't going to listen to me about putting boots on, then he'd have to learn to tie his own shoes b/c I wasn't going to do it for him this time! When Emily got out of the car, I heard her say, "I'll teach you to tie your shoes on Saturday, Christian, okay?" So sweet. I wish it would've worked!

He was still fuming when we got home and decided to stand in the garage rather than come into the house when I brought Kari in. I thought to myself, "Fine. He'll come in soon b/c it is FREEZING out here!" (He did have his coat on so this wasn't unreasonable.) So, I got Kari started on breakfast. After about five minutes, he still hadn't come in so I went down and opened up the door to the garage. My sweet little boy had turned on the garage light and opened up the car door. I found him sitting inside the car, trying to tie his shoes w/tears coming down his cheeks. He looked up at me and said, "Me sorry, Mommy."

Instantly, I scooped him up, gave him a big hug and kiss, and brought him inside. I told him that I didn't realize how important wearing those shoes had been and that I was sorry for not listening better. I told him he could defintitely wear his Fire Shoes later that afternoon when we went to the library. I got another big hug. Melt my heart!

It was only later that I looked at his shoes. This is how he'd tied his shoes:

"Determined" is definitely the right word.

Ice Skating Class

Emily has recently started ice skating classes! It's one hour on Saturday afternoon for 10 weeks and she is LOVING it! This was her second week and I got to go and watch her with Grandma Karen. It was so.darn.cute! When they first got out there, it was all about getting their "skating legs" warmed up. They practiced their "step-step-gliiiiiddddee" and also the proper way to fall down (an important thing for these newbies!)

After getting warmed up, Emily really took off! It was really amazing to see how quickly she got comfortable out there. Her teachers set up a little obstacle course and they also played some games and even did some "free skating" around the rink. Emily was so excited that she went around the whole rink two times!

I must say, I was really impressed with Emily. Not only for doing so well, but for going out of her comfort zone in so many ways. She is learning a new (and difficult) skill. She is out there for the whole time (an hour is a long time for little legs on the ice!). And, she goes out there without knowing anyone or having Mom, Dad, Grandma, a friend, etc...to do this with her. She's very brave! Great job, sweetie!

Treats and Eats

Emily has been interested in cooking lately. She has wanted to help me in the kitchen and asked about cooking classes! I looked online and saw that Hy-Vee offers a kids cooking class periodically. So, back in December, she went! She was so excited and had a lot of fun! They did a hot chocolate mix, a white chili, and (below) reindeer ritz cracker faces. Emily came home with big ideas and a couple of times a week (when we remember!) she helps me out with dinner. Bon appetit!

Next up in the goodie-department was Christmas baking! As you can see below, there were some different approaches to how this baking took place....Emily helped by cutting out the cookies...While Christian helped...himself :-). Christian loves his sweets!Finally, with our little Kari's food allergies (milk, eggs, soy and corn), we've been doing our best to make food she can eat with the family. Below, I found a way to make pizza that she can eat and really seemed to enjoy it! (The "cheese" is vegetable-based (non-soy) and comes from Whole Foods. She didn't seem to mind!) So, while we wait for Kari to outgrow these allergies, it's actually been a good kind of challenge to find Kari-safe foods and has broadened my horizens on the different ways food can be made and prepared. It's certainly made me become more aware of what's in all of the food that we eat!

Hop On Over!

So, if you haven't guessed already, the theme for Kari's birthday was a Bunny theme! Her lovie is a bunny; hence, she really likes them! It gave me a chance to go very soft and very "pretty" too--a lot of fun!

My sister came over one afternoon and helped me out with the invitations--cute, aren't they? Thanks, Erin!!
Then, my friend, Jenn, came to the rescue with her cricut (sooo cool!) and I was able to make Kari's "Happy Birthday" sign. I think it turned out great! (Thanks, Jenn!!!) My mom lent me some of her pretty milk glass dishes and a bunny cake mold, I used some of our Easter (bunny) decorations and voila! A Bunny Birthday!
I also did a bit of simple decorating in our kitchen. The kids had drawn Kari some pictures (Emily made her own little sign for her) and I wanted to display them. Kari was very tickled with it all!

We had the family (and our neighbor) over for cake and presents. Simple, but really perfect for our little one-year-old. Kari just SOAKED up all of the attention. It was really darling to watch her. She loved each present so much that she wanted to share her excitement with everyone. So, she'd make her rounds, showing each person her gift (well, the smaller ones that she could carry!) It brought tears to our neighbor's eyes; it was so sweet.

Here she is, enjoying her baby doll that looks a lot like she does!

One of her big surprises--this is seriously the BEST toy for any one year old (heck, even Emily and Christian love it!)

Kari also got a new big-girl carseat! Even though she still has to ride facing backwards (not only is she not yet 20 lbs, but doctors are now recommending infants stay rear-facing until they're two.) Not as exciting to turn one as it used to be, but at least she now has a super-awesome carseat to chill in!

It was, again, such a wonderful day! Kari was the center of attention and was loving every minute of it! She is so special and we are so lucky to have such a sweet, loving baby!

ONE

Our sweet little Kari turned ONE yesterday! I can hardly believe that an entire year has gone by since she arrived! We had a fantastic day...but that will be the next post. This one, I want to record what makes Kari such a special girl!

Kari fills our life with joy. She is a cuddler and a love! Here are Kari's latest stats:

Weight: 19 lbs (17%)--our little pip-squeek!

Height: 29 1/4 in. (55%)

Head: 18 1/4 cm (84%)--ah, a true Lindseth head!

Kari can do many things at one year! Here's a rundown of her talents:

--Loves to clap and will clap on cue to the song, "If you're happy and you know it"

--Loves to wave. She is our friendliest baby yet and will wave to family, friends, people at church, old people in the grocery store...you get the idea!

--Has recently gained confidence in her walking abilities! Kari officially took her first steps just before Christmas. But, she has mostly been crawling w/taking the occasional 5-8 steps. Then, on her birthday, she began really toddling around! I really think it was her little walker toy that she got for her birthday. It seems to have given her the confidence she needed to really start moving!

--Kari loves to dance and bop along to whatever tunes seem to be on. She's got good beats!

--Kari loves to dress up and be very girlie! (see previous post :-) ). However, as a twist, she also likes Iron Man! Christian has an Iron Man toy that she really likes to play with.

--She has recently become quite the Daddy's girl. Kari gets very excited when Daddy comes home. She seems to know when it's the weekend as well and will get very grumpy during the day if Daddy's not around when he "should" be. She also prefers him to put her in bed each night. (Cubby also takes Emily and Christian to bed and so we think she likes to be one of the "big kids"!)

--Kari may be sweet, but she also has a temper! The first three and a half months of her life, she would scream anytime she had to go into her carseat (and wouldn't stop screaming until we took her out). Now, she'll throw tantrums over not being able to play with the phone (or computer), getting her diaper changed, or being put down to play when she'd rather be held. Make no mistake, Kari knows what she wants and doesn't want!

The list could go on. Kari is just such a doll, we love her so much and are so excited to watch her grow in this next year!

Sugar and Spice

First up, the SUGAR: Kari is a very girlie girl! Lately, she's taken to taking clothes (or hand towels) out of drawers or laundry baskets and draping them over her shoulders for "dress up." She LOVES it when you tell her what a pretty girl she is!




She also likes a pretty shoe! Cubby showed her these little black numbers and she didn't want to take them off. It was just so cute!





Don't let these little girlie-girl tendencies fool you into thinking that she's timid or cautious though. Here's the SPICE: Kari is a climber. She has no fear and likes to climb up onto and into everything! Tonight she climbed into the basket that we keep library books in (it's empty right now) and got stuck! It was pretty funny. She also likes to climb up this little slide that we have and, instead of going down the slide, she likes to try and climb up onto the dining room table! Thankfully, Cubby or I are always there to deter her, but man, she is brave!

Toothless

Emily has lost her first tooth today! Yup, we were driving to dancing and Emily was singing to Kari when Emily yells, "Mommy! My tooth came out! O came out!" ("O" was the letter of the alphabet that her dentist assigned to that tooth.)

Anyhow, back to the car. So, I look in the rearview mirror and see her grinning, with quite a bit of blood running down her chin--ack! Not wanting to freak out a very-easy-to-freak-out girl, I calmly reached into by bag and handed her a tissue. Thankfully, we arrived at dancing shortly afterwards and I was able to get her a fresh tissue and check out the hole in her mouth (also thankful that gums don't bleed very long). It was very impressive and she was just giddy! After dancing, she told one of the other moms that the Tooth Fairy was going to leave her $100. That fairy must be loaded! We told her that the Tooth Fairy that visits our home usually leaves more like $1 (or 25 cents).

It's just one more step toward growing up! (Sigh.)