The Stock Files

Sabrina: Prayers

2012-01-26T12:00:00.001-09:00

Last night Sabrina picked up a picture of Jesus. She pointed at His face and then folded her arms to say prayers. It was precious. This is how she folds her arms for prayer:

Alaska: Sue's visit Day 1

2012-01-25T15:40:00.001-09:00

The first day Tom's mom was here, we drove down to a wildlife refuge. We saw some ice climbers along the way, met some cute animals, went in the back door of the gift shop (with the snowy antler chandelier) and were not able to use the bathrooms (as pictured). Sunset on the mountains on the way home.

Alaska: Hoar Frost

2012-01-24T21:16:00.003-09:00

Hoar frost is one of my favorite things about winter here. When the fog rolls in and it's cold, everything becomes magical and frosty. Tom took these pictures with his phone on the walk from work to the bus stop.

And here are the girls watching the digger take away our two-story snow mountain.

Alaska: It Snows Here

2012-01-19T14:09:00.001-09:00

We've had a crazy abnormal winter. So far, Anchorage has gotten 88 inches of snow. I'm totally loving it because it feels more like what I thought I was signing up for when moving to Alaska. It's gorgeous. We had a two-story snow pile in our parking lot, but yesterday morning a loader came and filled up 5 dump trucks and 2 lawn maintenance trucks. It was an eventful morning out our window. But here are some pictures of what 88" looks like (while I took the girls on a walk with the sled, Tom took some pictures).

Though I am loving all the snow, I could do without the abnormal negative temperatures. But I guess we're grateful we're not Cordova, who, Since November 1, has gotten 176 inches of snow and 44 inches of rain. Yikes! (Photo: Reader submission adn.com)

Sabrina: Silly Faces and Stats

2012-01-16T20:34:00.001-09:00

A day in the life...

Sabrina went to the doctor today and here are her stats:
Weight: 22lb 1 oz - 60th percentile
Height: 31.25 inches - 75th percentile

She doesn't talk. She HAS said "mama" "dada" "no" "yeah" "bye" and "hi" - but not consistently. Her comprehension is good though. She communicates well through grunts, nods, and pointing and understands everything we say.

And no matter where we put Celia's M&Ms she gets for sitting on the potty, we ALWAYS catch Sabrina in a precarious position with her hand in the bowl.

Celia: The Artist

2012-01-12T15:22:00.007-09:00

Celia draws just like anyone else her age. But I want to post the pictures here so extended family can see them and so that *when* (not if) Sabrina destroys the originals, none of us are devastated.

This is Celia with Sabrina and Sabrina has "cute little hair."

Today in preschool, I taught the kids about Europe and we drew coats of arms of what's important to us. This is what Celia drew and her explanation: "Celia. Tom. Marel. Sabrina. And we're dancing." (She also pointed out that she's wearing a crown.)

"That's me ice skating!"

"The Grinch and Cindy [Lou Who] and her mom and dad." This is the scene where the Grinch is lifting up the sled on the top of the mountain (which is apparently a line) and Cindy is on top of the sled (with her pointy hair).

Recipes We Use

2012-01-08T17:36:00.001-09:00

Because I wish everyone would post a list of their most commonly used recipe links (and because I've been doing a lot of transferring of "favorites" as we juggle computers that work), here is mine (so I can look at this at the beginning of every month and have a MUCH easier time planning the month's meals). If you choose to follow suit, please leave a comment with a link to yours. That would be fun!

Vegetarian:
Creamy One-pot Pasta (PJ's Recipe Box)
Veggies and Noodles with Thai Coconut Curry Sauce (Our Best Bites)
Thai Peanut Noodles **Double the sauce-to-noodle ratio** (Our Best Bites)
Sweet Potato and Black Bean Enchiladas (Whole Foods)
Mexican Enchilada Sauce (Food.com)
Sweet Potato Pasta (this very blog)

Salmon:
Smoked Salmon Alfredo (Allrecipes.com)
Grilled Salmon with Sweet Corn and Avocado Salad (Whole Foods)
Almond Crusted Salmon with Caramelized Onion and Basil (Whole Foods)

Halibut:
Grilled Halibut with Mango Pico de Gallo (Whole Foods)

Other:
Chicken Enchilada Soup (PJ's Recipe Box)
Chicken a la King (PJ's Recipe Box) - Funny thing about this is that I'm embarrassed I like it. I don't like biscuits and gravy, but since this is the meal they served me in the hospital right after I had Sabrina (naturally, remember??), I thought it was the greatest food ever made. I've liked it ever since.
Kai Kang Dang *Chicken Curry with Coconut Milk* (Allrecipes.com)

Not online:
(At some point, maybe I'll write all these down here... but right now, I'm listing our main "go-to" meals for myself so when I plan our month's meals, I don't have to flip back through the calendar to remind me what we like)
Spaghetti Carbonara
Fajitas
HUB Cafe Chicken Tacos
Tillamook Grilled Chicken Breast (pg. 137 in Tillamook cookbook)
Foccacia Bread Pizza (using Tyler Florence's dough recipe)
Tuna Noodle Casserole
Meatloaf
Emily's Spaghetti (thanks Emily!)
Khmer Grilled Pork with Pickled Veggies
Chicken Satay and Cucumber Salad
Khmer Curry
Sweet Aromatic Chicken
Ratatoille Pasta (One Dish Heart Healthy Meals) - use full package of spaghetti and add 4Tbs butter to noodles.

Randoms:
Chet K'tis *Khmer Banana and Tapioca Dessert* (khmer krom recipes)
Mango Lassi (Simply Recipes)

What does all this say about us? We go through a lot of Coconut Milk. We have a hard time getting out of the "Mexican and Thai" rut because those are our favorites. And we eat a lot of delicious salmon. Also, if you come to visit, this is the menu. Let us know what you would prefer. :)

Meet Dorothy

2012-01-03T15:36:00.001-09:00

Part of cousin Taylor's present to my daughter was a trip to the "Clifford Store" (Petco) which she had been wanting to go to for a long time. Included was a fish, a bowl, a fish plant, rocks, and a fish ornament. She picked them all out herself. She still talks about it. And Dorothy joined our family on Saturday. (Elmo's fish is named Dorothy, so after mentioning several name possibilities - including the usual Hockadoh and Hashihan - Dorothy was the winner because if Elmo's fish is named Dorothy, all fish must be named Dorothy.) I took these pictures last night right after cleaning the bowl... you know, in case he (yes, it's a boy and Celia correctly uses "he" but still named it Dorothy) died. I was happy to see him still alive and swimming this morning.

Celia: Some funnies

2012-01-02T19:45:00.000-09:00

- Last week sometime, Celia went outside and smelled. Then she stated: "You know what snow smells like? Meat and sugar." We just thought it was a random thing she likes to say. But then a few days later, she went outside and ate some. Then she said: "Snow tastes like meat and sugar!"

- Today, after nap, Celia went to sit on the potty. After a minute, she declared: "My wet is dreaming about muscles. But my bones are trying to wake up my wet and poopies. But they're still sleeping. So I can get off the potty."

Celia's life is a constant narrative, so I could write a lengthy monologue daily that would be hilarious. But nowadays, I only think to capture the funny if it's book-ended by quiet moments or if she says it more than once. She wakes up every morning, comes upstairs to put on her crown and dancing skirt, and then starts the day. Below is her at Costco in 4 degree weather. Always the diva.

New Year's

2012-01-01T09:23:00.001-09:00

We have a benefit in Alaska of being 4 hours earlier than NYC. This means we can have an early New Year's party with children, watch the ball drop at 8, and still get the kids in bed before it stops being fun for them. So, we had some friends over around 5, ate some crepes, did some Just Dance, and said "Happy New Year." Then we remembered we had a camera. And took all these pictures just after the ball dropped and before everyone left. At least it's documented. The McGinty's brought their super newborn cutie. The Dahle's brought Eva, who loved the new kitchen (hence they adopted Sabrina for the family picture.) And Tom and the girls enjoyed some Martinelli's.

Then Tom and I watched Doctor Who: The End of Time, cleaned up the kitchen, and watched the ball drop with Dick Clark at midnight. I started 2012 with a clean house... we'll see how long I can keep that up. Happy New Year!

Remember Thanksgiving? Yeah, we went sledding.

2011-12-30T13:56:00.001-09:00

Did you spot a potential casualty? And a broken sled? Boy, did we have fun!

New Year's Resolution: Help!

2011-12-29T09:00:00.001-09:00

I'm not really one for making New Year's Resolutions ("The unaimed arrow never misses"). However, this has been a goal of mine since September and it's not really working out. So if I label it a "New Year's Resolution" and enlist some help, maybe I'll be better at it. So here it is:

Cleaning the house.

Let me clarify. I don't mean clutter. The kids produce a lot of that very quickly (Sabrina is famous for emptying entire drawers and baskets in record time) and I would be doing nothing else if I decided to stay on top of the clutter. I don't want to stress myself out like that. I mean chores. Vacuuming. Bathrooms. Mopping. I currently do them... but I do them all in one day... usually when I know people are coming over. I would like to fit those things into daily life so that I get a routine down. But nothing has worked so far. One of the problems is that I can't clean either bathtub or vacuum while the kids are sleeping. It wakes them up. And I'm great with laundry. And pretty good with the kitchen. So it's just bathrooms. Vacuuming. Mopping.

What works for you?

Christmas Day

2011-12-26T19:26:00.001-09:00

Santa came to our house and got us all just what we wanted. Sabrina got some binkies, Celia got some nail polish, Tom got a bike multi-tool, and I got Just Dance 3 for the Wii.

He also got Celia and Sabrina a play kitchen to go with the kitchen toys they've been playing with for years.

Sabrina woke up, found a bib in the hall downstairs and made us put it on her. She spent the rest of the morning wearing her big bibby. When she came upstairs, she found the Chex mix and carried that around for awhile. Celia woke up right at 8:30 and said: "I better sit on the potty so I can go upstairs and see what Santa brought me." But it still took her a full 30 minutes to get upstairs. She insisted on completing the full routine of putting the clothes on, playing around, etc etc. She finally came upstairs at 9.

When she got upstairs, we told her to look around the room for her big present from Santa. It took her awhile, but this was her face when she saw it. She was hesitant.

But then she went right up and read the tag.

And the girls got to work making breakfast.

Celia also got lots of beautiful things to wear.

Sabrina got some good books to read.

After talking Celia into putting on an appropriate dress for Church (compromising on the necklace and earrings), the girls went back to playing with the kitchen. The only pictures in the Christmas outfits we got.

Celia did some posing for the camera in her earrings when she saw the camera. And Sabrina figured out the sink can come out.

After Church, cousins Taylor and Travis came over for dinner. We warmed up on Aebleskiver and pepper jelly.

They brought a 20 pound ham for just us. We also had sweet potatoes with an orange glaze, smoked salmon scalloped potatoes, rolls, green bean casserole, and finished up with Banoffee Pie (and sent some of the apple home with T&T since we didn't get around to eating it).

Taylor and Travis gave the girls a cookie baking set. Celia put on her new apron and hat from Nana and Papa and got right to work baking us all cookies.

We got to sample her wares... and then we all had to play memory with the cookies, matching the ones with the same frostings.

Overall, we had a great day. We're grateful for Christ. Even Sabrina's new firemen were spotted visiting the new baby. Merry Christmas!

Christmas Eve

2011-12-24T15:14:00.003-09:00

For being so behind on blogging, it's shocking to actually be blogging about something that happened today... but here goes...

We just got back from a (brief) ice skating venture on the lake. The "Parks and Beautification" Department was there hot-mopping the ice so we could all play. Celia got to try out her skates for the very first time with the help of Beth and cousin Taylor. She did pretty well, but fell down once and never stopped crying again. Which got Sabrina crying. And now we're home and they're asleep. We're off to have soup at Taylor's post-nap and hopefully in better spirits!

Yesterday

2011-12-23T08:38:00.002-09:00

Celia got sick yesterday. Let me tell you, she is a dream child. Especially when sick. She just stays on the couch, watches movies, always throws up in the pot we give her, and asks to take a nap when she's tired. So Celia spent most of the day in bed. And when she came upstairs to watch brief intervals of Christmas movies between naps, Sabrina was so excited to see her, she refused to leave her side on the couch. She spent most of the time cuddling Celia and it took a great deal of effort to get her to at least sit by her feet. When we took Celia's temperature, Sabrina wanted to take a turn. The above picture is Sabrina taking her temperature and it also shows how far we could get Sabrina to stay from Celia. She wouldn't leave her side.

Here's hopin' Celia's on the mend for Christmas and that the rest of us don't get sick.

Sabrina Walks!

2011-12-22T11:54:00.001-09:00

Thought I should update about my baby... who isn't a baby anymore. Sabrina took her first unassisted steps on Thursday, November 10. When Celia took her first steps, we could officially say that she walked because she just stood up and marched around and was done crawling. Sabrina has eased herself into it. Thanksgiving Day was the first time she actually kept trying to walk. And this week marks when I can officially say she walks. She no longer crawls if she drops down. She actually gets back up and walks some more.

In other shenanigans... the first picture is from Thanksgiving weekend putting up Christmas decorations. This is the classic Sabrina talking face. I love it. She also learned at the beginning of December how to climb up the slide and go down it all by herself. And carry things up to go down with her. This has saved me a great deal of angst as she used to spend a lot of time screaming by the slide until I helped her go down a million times. And yesterday, she learned she fit in the cabinet. She loved that. And she decided to wear all the cords like necklaces and give me a "what, mom? I shouldn't play with cords? Who, me?" face. Another one of her classic faces. The last picture is from just a few minutes ago. She went and got this plate thing out of her toys and indicated that I needed to get out the black beans. Then she put them in this plate and carried them around eating them. As I type this, she is sitting in the cabinet pictured, with the plate of black beans, and wearing the cords as necklaces. Driving the point home, Sabrina. You're crazy.

Snowy Days

2011-12-15T11:58:00.000-09:00

In Alaska, we have what is called the Chinook Winds. So after having about 3.5 feet of snow on the ground, in came the Chinook Winds. They blew like crazy, reached over 110mph in some parts of town, and raised the temperature to near 50 degrees. We broke record highs. The Chinooks don't usually come this early (nor do we usually have 3.5 feet of snow by December 1), so it's been a strange winter. Anyway, the winds melted a ton of the snow, then the temperatures dropped and everything froze over. It makes the entire city an ice skating rink. Then Monday morning we woke up to over a foot of fresh snow. I was so giddy. I didn't think I would ever say "I love living in the snow!" but I do! And school was canceled (didn't really affect us, but still exciting). Now we didn't get outside on Monday to build a snowman when the temps were sitting right around 32. We waited until yesterday when the temps had dropped back down to 15 and the snow was back to being way too powdery to hold together. So I had to improvise with a pile made from the snow plow. So he looks kinda silly. But it's really hard making a snowman with this powder. Meet Hockadoh. Our snowman. And then Sabrina took a ride in the sled to the mailbox. Ah, life in Alaska. Have I mentioned how great this place is?

Two Classic Holiday Moments

2011-12-14T09:06:00.002-09:00

There are two classic holiday moments I want to remember with the girls.

First, on Thanksgiving morning, we were watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade. When the Rockettes came on, Celia got up and started mimicking their moves. She was very serious about it. Sabrina, who was sitting next to her, threw herself backwards on the floor laughing.

Second, last night we were watching the Mormon Tabernacle Choir with David Archuletta. When David started singing, I told Celia his name was David. She said: "I think David is a beautiful singing guy. He has a bow and is beautiful." Sabrina, who was sitting on my lap, started gouging out her eyes with her fingers.

Celia: Tea and Spiders

2011-12-09T11:11:00.001-09:00

Celia is always goofy. Some things we just take for granted around here now, I suppose. Because she's always silly. But here are a few favorites from this week:

- Celia always makes us tea and/or soup. They are always flavored. I've had watermelon soup, apple/squash tea, strawberry muscle (?) chocolate tea, and "Spinach-kopita" (what she calls the Greek food Spanikopita) Toast tea. Mmmmm.

- Celia was just singing eensy weensy spider and it ended like this: "And the great big hairy spider went up the water spout again." As Tom said: Yikes!

A Typical Tuesday

2011-12-07T08:06:00.001-09:00

As I was going about my day yesterday with the ladies, I thought about how typical the day was and how hilarious it all is. So I decided I'd want to remember this time and what we do every day.

6:30-7ish - I get up with Tom and work before the ladies wake up.
7:30-8:30ish - Sabrina wakes up and I go get her. Celia wakes up and reads books in her bed.
8:30 - Celia's clock says 7. She stops reading her book, yells "Mommy, I waited 'til seven!" At this point, Sabrina stops whatever she is doing upstairs with me, grunts excitedly and crawls over to me as fast as she can and we go into Celia's room. Celia hides under her blankies so I have to say "Where's Celia?" (if I don't do this, from under her blankies she will say: "Mommy, You say: 'Where's Celia? I can't find her anywhere.'") Sabrina lifts up the blankies to find her and then pretends to sleep on her pillow. I go upstairs and make oatmeal. Celia will read books to Sabrina and play with her until Sabrina gets bored and crawls up the stairs. At this point, Celia sits on the potty, puts on some clothes (a dancing skirt with either fleece pants or leggings underneath), and comes upstairs. She climbs over the gate and stands there squinting her eyes with her hand out until I compliment her clothes.
9:00 - We all eat oatmeal. I feed Sabrina while eating my own. Sabrina eats just as much as Celia.
9:20 - Sabrina and I are done eating oatmeal. I get in the shower and Sabrina crawls over to the bathroom screaming that I got in the shower. But then she finds the keyboard, turns it on, and sings into the microphone for awhile. Every minute while in the shower, I yell: "Celia, eat another bite."
9:40 - After showering and getting ready, I come to check on Celia, who still has a half a bowl of oatmeal left. (She's the slowest eater in the universe. She is only fast with mac & cheese.)
10:05 - I help Celia shove the rest of her oatmeal down her throat so she can go put on her socks and boots.
10:15 - I load the girls in the car.
10:30 - I drop Celia off at her preschool rotation (we moms rotate a twice a week preschool thing). I have to get Sabrina out of the car every time or she freaks out.
10:35 - I get Sabrina back in the car and we go home. I put Sabrina to sleep (she still sleeps swaddled with her arms swaddled to her sides. But she requires a binky in each hand in the swaddle and one in her mouth).
11:00 - I get some work done.
12:15 - I wake up Sabrina, who immediately grabs all the binkies in her crib and stands up. We go pick up Celia.
12:45 - We eat lunch. Celia always requests: "um, toast. With jam underneath and peanut butter and honey on top." We forgo the honey. But sometimes we mix it up and have quesadillas "in a half-circle moon shape" or Annie's Mac and Cheese ("Balo calls it 'Mac and cheese' and I call it 'Macaroni and Cheese' and that's okay"). Sabrina and I eat whatever Celia eats. And of course finish in a quarter of the time. Celia also gets to watch a movie at this point. Under non-Christmas circumstances, the movie usually means one of the Toy Stories, Tangled, Cars, Phineas and Ferb, Kung Fu Panda, or Wall-E. During Christmas, it is always Polar Express or Phineas and Ferb Christmas.
2:15 - The movie ends, Celia finishes her lunch and immediately asks for a snack. We play, eat, read stories, etc. Sabrina continues her full-time task of making messes, climbing on everything, and breaking things if she can.
3:30 - The girls head downstairs to get ready for nap time.
4:15 - Sabrina gets up (some days she sleeps and some days she just hangs out in bed.)
4:30-6 - Celia gets up. We tried going napless for her, but she was a total terror by 6PM, crashed at 7, and woke up at 6AM... so we do naps daily for her.
5:00-6:00 - Tom gets home (5 if he drives the car, 6 if he rides the bus or his bike). We make dinner and eat it.
7:00 - Celia helps us clean up the living room. We all try to clean faster than Sabrina can destroy. This is difficult even with all three of us. Then we play duck-duck goose until 7:30.
7:30 - Celia and I go downstairs to get her ready for bed. Tom feeds Sabrina a giant bowl of oatmeal or applesauce and then they join us downstairs. Celia sits on the potty, gets her jammies on, I read her a story, we brush her teeth, she rinses her toothbrush, we read scriptures. When Sabrina and Tom come down, we have family prayer and Sabrina gives Celia "flying hugs" three times and then Sabrina waves at Celia. Tom gets Sabrina into her jammies, Sabrina gives me a hug, then Tom swaddles her with all her binkies.
8:10 - Tom and I come back upstairs and clean up the kitchen and Tom gets ready for his workday the next day.

(Last night Tom had to help with tithing settlement, so it wasn't entirely typical, but this is how it usually goes...)

Sabrina: Champion Milk Bubble Blower

2011-11-23T09:34:00.001-09:00

From my phone

2011-11-18T13:53:00.001-09:00

We got our smart phones about a month ago. Since it allows me to be freely connected wherever I am, I have spent a lot less time on the computer. Because of that, I've found that everything is documented on my phone. And I love my phone. So here's what you missed this past month.
The first picture taken with my phone. In the mall.

Celia enjoying some cookie decorating.

Sabrina figured out she can scoot Celia's stool anywhere. This means I find her in lots if places she shouldn't be

My Rembrandt Celia. Beautiful.

My two favorite pictures of Sabrina ever. Isn't she cute?

Watching a movie and eating a flashlight...?

Sabrina getting comfortable during dinner.

Playing with Daddy. I love Sabrina's face in this one.

Celia coloring in her nice gloves.

The creepiest picture of Celia ever taken.

Sabrina is starting to get very opinionated. She insisted I put this hat on her before she took a nap.

Sabrina utilizing that bathroom stool again to take all the toothpastes out of the drawer and throw them in the sink.

And here's how I found Celia during her nap the other day. This is how she usually sleeps.

We've gotten a ton of snow. The girls really thought it was funny how Tom had to walk sideways to push the cart to the car.

Sabrina's Teeth!

2011-11-10T13:19:00.001-09:00

Yes, it took her over a year to finally cut those babies through, but they're coming in fast now. She got her first tooth on Saturday, October 22. Bottom middle? Nope. Top middle on the right side. She got her second tooth on Sunday, October 30. The other top middle? Nope. Bottom middle? Nope. Top right side. The other top middle tooth just broke through Tuesday, November 8. The bottom 2 and other top side teeth are all pretty close. I remember a photo shoot very similar to this one trying to capture Celia's first tooth. Here's the best I could do of those first two teeth of Sabrina. Taken on November 4th when there were only two.

Then Celia had to show us that she's a big girl so she has lots of teeth.

At this angle, they actually look like sisters. Such a great angle for both of them.

Celia: A princess

2011-11-04T12:41:00.000-08:00

Now that Halloween is over, Celia has informed us that she is no longer Rapunzel, "just Celia." Although her friend is over and they're being princesses. Celia said: "I'm a princess, and my name is Hot Cheek." Then she changed it to "hot elbow" and the game continues...

Halloween: Alaska Style

2011-11-01T11:06:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, the girls carved a pumpkin. And then played with it. Celia drew the face on and daddy helped carve it. She wanted ovals for eyes, a diamond for a nose, and lots of diamonds for a mouth. Tom got out our Dremel during naptime and did a pumpkin of his own (the lens was foggy in this picture, so it looks like an 80s throw-back. I like it.)

Then, in a minor blizzard, we went to the Church's trunk or treat event where adults bundled up in trunks and handed out candy to all the crazy kids willing to walk in the blizzard to get it. We got in and out of there in 20 minutes with a full pumpkin of candy. That's the way to do it. Fun time had by all. And yes, Rapunzel in Alaska wears snow boots, mittens, three pairs of pants and two shirts and a sweatshirt under her dress. You just can't tell in the movie.

Happy Halloween

2011-10-31T15:36:00.000-08:00

Happy Halloween from Batman and Batgirl and their two kids, Rapunzel and Pascal. That's how Rapunzel smiles. She told us.

Salmon Dinner: A Tribute to our Biggest Fillet

2011-10-27T11:00:00.000-08:00

We cooked up our biggest fillet last night... 39 ounces. Topped it with crushed almonds, honey mustard, and put carmelized onions with fresh basil on top. As Tom said: "tastes fancy." The recipe can be found here from Whole Foods.

Celia: Writing Names

2011-10-26T12:20:00.000-08:00

Celia has been really into writing names. If your name is: Celia, Sabrina, Nana, Papa, Mom, Dad, Allyson, Billy, Evan, Chris, Hilary, Balo, Grandma, Grandpa, Jack, Clara, Grandma, Grandpa, Sophie, or Claire, can you find your name?

Celia: Tonight's Prayer

2011-10-21T21:01:00.001-08:00

"Our Father who is in Heaven. Please bless our family that is on Earth. Please help us to not make bad choices about Earth because that is bad for Earth. Please bless to keep our house here. Thank you for the prophet. Thank you for Jesus. Please bless our family. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen."

Sabrina: 12 month stats

2011-10-20T15:52:00.002-08:00

Sabrina went to the doctor on Monday. She weighs 19 lbs (25th percentile) and is 30" tall (75th percentile). She doesn't talk still. Lots of grunting and lots of screaming. I thought she started to say "ma ma ma ma" last week, but then I realized it's just the noise that she makes when she's blowing spit bubbles. Disappointing.

She is still quite hilarious. Just now she put on a bib all by herself and went crawling around the house laughing. She also just found the remote and changed Celia's movie to French while it was on (I don't even know how to do this). She still doesn't walk. But she can stand up when she's holding on to a toy. Or Celia's stool. She'll just grab that stool and hold it up to her head and stand up. Impressive standing skills. But if she has nothing in her hands, she won't stand up. And she really doesn't care to walk because she can crawl so fast. Sabrina is still clingy. Sometimes she plays really well by herself, but most of the time she just wants to be held. Since she is a constant mover, she gets really bored being held and will point and dive in the direction she wants you to take her. The picture below is from October 1 when Sabrina found one of my tank tops and put it on like a necklace. And the only thing she'll let us keep on/in her hair is a clip and only for a few minutes at a time (headbands and hats come off immediately).

She sleeps from about 8:30-8:30 with a 6:30AM feeding (something I don't want to give up because I'm afraid she'll just be awake then and that can't happen). She eats everything and then throws leftovers on the floor and shakes her head because she knows she's not supposed to. Her favorite times of day are still when Celia wakes up. They'll play in Celia's room for 20-30 minutes in the morning while I make breakfast. I love these little ladies!

Alaska: This is Home

2011-10-19T14:23:00.000-08:00

This week marks our two year anniversary of living in Alaska. Yesterday was Alaska Day (yes, smart of us to move up the week of Alaska Day... helps us remember) and Tom had Monday off (because of his awesome every-other-Monday-off schedule) and so it made for a four-day weekend. To celebrate the anniversary and Alaska Day, I felt the need to blog all the reasons I don't want to move out of Alaska. Our first full year was exciting and we loved it, but I was still ready to move if an offer ever came up to do so in the Northwest. Now I'm not sure I would. (It helps that a lot of Alaskan perks kick in after you've lived here a full year.) Here are some of the things I love about it here:

(peek-a-boo Moose!)

It's gorgeous: This is true for a lot of places, I realize. But we've got it all. Within a one-hour drive of our house, we can see an ocean, an inlet, lots of glaciers, gorgeous mountains, thick forests, lakes, and plains. What are you in the mood for? We can take you to see it.
Tom's work benefits: It would take a pretty amazing job to beat out Tom's. And we're realizing it's probably impossible to do so. Tom comes home at 4:30 everyday. He never has to stay late. And he gets every other Monday off. He also gets 5 weeks of vacation a year that he can actually use when he wants and has a $1000 out of pocket medical maximum for each of us. Not shabby at all.
Salmon: Once a week we eat wild Alaskan salmon that we caught! With a big net (because we're Alaskan)! How lucky are we? It's so delicious and the girls love it. (Sabrina eats so much Salmon.) Pictured is one of the many great recipes we've been using from the Whole Foods website (though we took this picture). Salmon is so versatile.

Free Money: We pay no sales or income tax. Though things are a bit more spendy up here, the lack of taxes makes up for it. And every year, each Alaskan gets a cut of the big oil money. This year it was $1174 for every man, woman, and child. It will be pretty easy to save for the girls' college funds when they each get a big check every year.
Wildlife: While I'm partially convinced I may die of bear mauling whilst camping someday (if I don't die in a bush plane...), it's amazing to have so much wildlife. Bald eagles, moose, magpie, and caribou are so very common. If you'll recall, we even get moose in our yard occasionally.
Club 49: Okay, this isn't a huge deal... definitely not a deal-maker... but Alaska Airlines just announced Club 49 yesterday (on Alaska day). This means that Alaska residents can now check 2 bags for free on Alaska Airlines when flying to or from an Alaskan city. Tom and I spent the day yesterday dreaming of all the liquids and razors we can now bring on our vacations. And we're super pumped to fill the extra suitcases we each get with IKEA and Trader Joe's goods whenever we go "outside."
Bike Trails: I've mentioned this before. But the bike trails are amazing. And Tom still bike commutes 2-3 times a week year round. The rest of us enjoy the trails in the spring and summer.
Culture: Fur Rondy, Iditarod, low-budget TV commercials (seriously hilarious), Alaska Native influence, ice skating on frozen lakes, solstices, dipnetting, Northern Lights... we've got some great stuff happening. Also, people are different up here. It's like we're all on this big Alaskan adventure together. If you move up here, you become one of "us" and we've got your back.

What Rapunzels do

2011-10-13T12:50:00.003-08:00

Celia's now really into what Rapunzels do and don't do (I had to convince her that in the winter, Rapunzel wears pants and shirts under her dress). Above is the picture where she is looking happy like Rapunzel. "Rapunzels don't laugh. They don't show teeth." And below is her looking at the floating lights. At least she looks intrigued.

This has been going on for some time now. Often when we try to do her hair a certain way or get her to do something she responds by saying, "No, Rapunzels don't do that!"

Rapunzel Dress

2011-10-12T11:32:00.000-08:00

We finished the dress (minus the lace-up cord which we still need to purchase and the hemming of the sleeves). I'm proud. Seriously proud. Like: other than my Master's Degree and Natural Childbirth proud. Didn't think a princess dress would be the third biggest accomplishment of my life. Thanks to Joy Huffman for swooping in and doing the zipper for me (on my machine so I feel like I helped). Celia has been wearing it all morning. And then, of course, wanted to wear it watching the movie. She tested its twirling capabilities (excellent), jumping capabilities (sufficient), and the looking-like-Rapunzel factor (also excellent). Did I mention I'm pretty proud? Yeah, I've sewn curtains. And now this dress. You'll be seeing (much) more of this little beauty as Halloween approaches.

Happy Birthday Sabrina!

2011-10-06T07:55:00.002-08:00

Sabrina turned one yesterday. Crazy. We had Taylor and Travis over for Sabrina's favorite dinner (salmon!) and some cake. Unlike Celia on her first birthday, Sabrina knew just what to do and was totally into that cake! She was loving it. Then she slid the cake off the plate so she could play peek-a-boo through the plate. Funny kid.

Sabrina continues to understand so much but communicates very little. And I don't know how to teach her boundaries. She knows exactly that she's NOT supposed to do. She throws her food off her high chair and looks at me very seriously and shakes her head. That's what she does with everything she's not supposed to do: does it anyway and shakes her head to say "no." Still no walking, but she does levitate up and down when she wants toys. It's pretty funny.

Happy Birthday, Sabrina. We love you.

Celia: The Mom Around Here

2011-10-04T21:22:00.000-08:00

Celia finished her movie this morning. I was wearing my bathrobe over my clothes because I was cold. Here was our conversation:

C: I think we should go to the store now.
M: That sounds like a good idea. We'll go in a minute.
C: You need to take that off (referring to my bathrobe).
M: I will when we're ready to go.
C: Are you wearing clothes? Show me that you are wearing a shirt.
M: Yeah, I'm wearing clothes. See?
C: Well, you need to take that off.
M: We're not quite ready to go yet.
C: You take your arm out of the sleeve and you take it off.

At least Celia will keep me from wearing my bathrobe to the store. Sad she thinks I've become THAT person.

Fall Family Pics

2011-10-03T18:25:00.000-08:00

Last week we took advantage of a nice fall day and some artistic cousins and had some family photos taken. The girls are at an age where we can't get them to sit still very long so we didn't end up with any photos of all four of us smiling or looking in the general direction of the camera, but we still ended up with a few good pictures.

As we were finishing up, a moose showed up right across the pond from us. So even if we didn't end up with perfect family photos, we at least get to add to our growing collection of moose pictures.

Celia: Sabrina Works

2011-10-03T09:00:00.000-08:00

Last night, Celia was going to work, she said. In a whiny voice, she kept saying: "I have to go to a-work. I'm so sorry. I'll miss you, I promise. I can't do that thing. I'm so sorry. I have to go to a meeting. I'll be back." Then she would give me lots of kisses and hugs. Then she declared that Sabrina was going to her "tiny work. Sabrina is going where babies work." Tom said: "Where do babies work?" and she said: "If you want to go to Sabrina's work. It's a tiny work. It's called a hospital." And there you have it.

Celia: King Crab

2011-09-30T19:59:00.001-08:00

We went to the Grand Re-opening of the Safeway by our house and brought home some free soup. Celia asked what flavor it was and we told her it was tomato soup with crab in it. She immediately said: "Yeah, and the crab has big long legs because it's a King Crab." We're so proud of our little Alaskan.

Celia + Sabrina: Every Day

2011-09-26T09:58:00.000-08:00

Lest you think all we do is have crazy adventures (although that's mostly true), here are some daily life pictures of the girls.

Celia would spend all day putting on makeup if I let her:

She is obsessed with Rapunzel, has us call her Rapunzel a lot of the time, and I'm making her a Rapunzel costume for Halloween. She asked me a hundred times a day if it was done yet until I got her a Rapunzel braid (wig not completed... right now it's just a mullet braid). Now she spends all day wearing dresses and skirts and her braid. She pretends to paint on the walls and calls Sabrina Pascal. We've had to make rules with the braid (ie: no washing the windows with the braid, no wearing the braid whilst eating, etc). But on the plus side, she doesn't ask about her dress anymore.

Sabrina still climbs. Doing any dishes is impossible when she's awake. She comes crawling in as fast as she can (which is lightning fast) if she hears the dishwasher open. Then she takes everything she can out. She likes to stick big toys in the rack and little toys in the soap opening. She is so frantic about everything she does, I rarely allow her in the dishwasher. Too scary. She's always so close to flipping out backwards. Story of her life.

One day, Sabrina got her arm out of the sleeve. She thought it was funny. She crawled behind the couch so I couldn't see her, I heard some grunting, and then she crawled back out with her arm out. And this is her: "yeah, I know, I'm cool" face. We thought it was particularly funny because Celia used to do this daily at this age.

In other news for the ladies, Celia is still the slowest eater in the universe. Eating her oatmeal in the morning takes over an hour if we don't remind her to take bites and 45 minutes if we do. Right now she's singing "Finishing my oatmeal is good for Earth (?)! Finishing my oatmeal is good for Earth! I will finish my oatmeal. But it's not bad for Earth. It's just good for Earth. And I'm on Earth actually. And it's good for Earth. We're on Earth." Very melodic. Very little eating is actually occurring. And I'm glad she's so eco-conscious, though I'm not sure where she got the idea that finishing her oatmeal is good for earth (is she really aware that wasting is bad for Earth? Doubt it. Though maybe...).

Minnesota: The Rest of the Story

2011-09-24T20:52:00.004-08:00

We began our trip to MN renting a car for the first time in our lives (we're really adult now, aren't we?). The girls explored the luxurious trunk.

Balo and Celia picked up right where they left off. Their current schtick was looking out the window and yelling "WHOA! A Big Motorhome!"

There were a lot of stories told to lots of children in pajamas both before and after bed times.

We took the obligatory trip to Mall of America. Basically, it was just a giant super crowded mall without any clearance sections. Totally tiring and overrated. However, the kids did get to play a bit at Legoland. Celia met Kanani, the American Girl of the year 2011 at American Girl World and Balo met Cha Cha the frog from Rainforest Cafe.

On Monday when I was at the office, Tom took the girls to the Como Park Gardens and Zoo.

This is Celia demonstrating her ability to stand like a flamingo. This is a skill she learned in her ballet class.

This is Celia pretending to be a Polar Bear. Sabrina thinks it's pretty hilarious.

On the way home, both girls had to prove they could fit in the overhead compartment on the plane.

We had a great time!

Minneapolis: Sculpture Garden

2011-09-23T09:41:00.007-08:00

We were in Minneapolis for about 5 days on a business trip. I've been telecommuting to Minnesota for 16 months so it was nice to be in the office for a few days. We saw the sights over the weekend and then I spent Monday and Tuesday in the office and we flew home Wednesday. My favorite thing was the Sculpture Garden. It was a bit foggy and misty when we went, but it was still a fabulous place to romp around. Here are the pictures of us all interacting with the art (and each other):

Picture of the Week

2011-09-22T15:06:00.002-08:00

We just got back from Minnesota. My sister's family drove up from Omaha to hang out with us. The kids had a blast. Obviously.

Denali: In Pictures

2011-09-12T18:14:00.019-08:00

At the end of August we took a trip up to Denali. We started our adventure cabin camping in Denali State Park. We stayed two nights facing Denali (Mt. McKinley). Here's where the mountain was supposed to be though we never actually saw it from the cabin:

Denali is notorious for being hidden in the clouds more often than not. They say in the summer it's hidden 2 days out of 3. But, we still enjoyed ourselves doing the usual campy things. Celia also spent a great deal of time having us introduce her in the "microphone" and then she would sing songs with really long names. She's destined to be a lounge singer. Her stage name is CeliaLoeyStock. And of course much of the time camping is spent eating and preparing to eat.

We all spent a lot of time looking for glimpses of the mountain to appear through the clouds. We got rather excited when we saw some peak or dark spot in the clouds that we hadn't seen before.

It was a little chilly in the mornings, but only a little.

We also enjoyed watching the beavers build their lodge and play in the water:

Here are some of the mountains we saw from our cabin. Though they weren't Denali, it was still a gorgeous view:

When the two nights were done, we packed our stuff back out the half mile trail to our car.

Then we continued to drive North to go to Denali National Park. You can hardly drive anywhere in Alaska without seeing a few glaciers along the way, and of course the drive is beautiful throughout.

Here are the girls checking out the pretend moose at the Denali National Park visitor's center, though we would later see plenty of live moose in the park:

We walked some beautiful trails by the visitor's center:

Then we drove into the National Park the 14 miles cars are allowed. (To drive the full 90 mile dirt road you have to take a 12 hour bus ride--we opted against that with the kids) It was gorgeous. Fall colors in all their glory. (Autumn happens in August in Denali, and September in Anchorage)

Celia spent her time in the car being silly:

And at long last...there she is! Denali! From the beginning of the park road Denali is actually pretty small off in the distance, as it is about 100 miles away, but you can still get a sense of its grandeur.

We even saw some moose in their natural habitat (rather than in our yard or crossing the highway).

On the way home we stopped to take a picture of the Alaska Highway landmark: the Igloo. It's for sale for only $500,000! Any entrepreneurs looking to move to Alaska?

Sabrina: Eleven Months

2011-09-08T13:03:00.006-08:00

Sabrina. How do I put her into words this month? She's a climber. Here's a series of things she's capable of climbing up on. (Also featured is her new squinty-eyed smile she's been doing recently.)

Child-proofing for Celia was a one-day thing. For Sabrina, we're constantly having to move things and rearrange things. Sabrina knows she's silly. She'll do something and then look at us and laugh. She still doesn't communicate. She mostly just grunts and growls (as Celia says: "She's like a bear!"). She will sign "all done" SOMETIMES and it still means a lot of things. Mostly she just grunts until we figure out what she wants. So then she tricks me into thinking she doesn't understand us. But then anytime I say: "Let's go find your sister" or "Daddy's home" she gets really excited and crawls over to me to pick her up. Also, when she's tired, we'll lay out her SwaddleMe and she'll crawl over and lie down on it. (Not sure how we'll ever wean her from the swaddle or the binky.)

She still nurses 4 times a day and sleeps from about 9-8 with a feeding at 6. Still no teeth. But she can gum anything. She's still a big eater. Salmon and avocado seem to be her favorites. She can eat a whole avocado and a salmon fillet in one meal. She is a big meat-eater which is pretty funny. And she always wants whatever Celia has.

Sabrina is really into putting things in and out of things. Yesterday, I found a toy in the dish soap spot of the dishwasher, a bunch of the train tracks in the dress-up box, and several refrigerator magnets in one of the kitchen drawers. Everything still goes in her mouth.

Sabrina is a champion crawler. So fast. And she's fearless. She's pretty sure she can go and do anything Celia can do. She doesn't seem close to walking. She walks along things but when we try to get her to walk, she dives down to crawl. I don't mind.

Sometimes, Sabrina will just throw herself backwards and start kicking the floor and cackling. (Like right now at my feet.) She's still clingy but also plays well on her own if I'm close (or completely out of sight) and if she's fed, rested, and happy. When I turn on a movie for Celia, Sabrina pulls herself up right in front of the TV to wave at it. Then she usually ignores the rest of the movie.

Celia and Sabrina are still great friends. They love taking baths together and Sabrina loves bouncing to all of Celia's silly songs. Our days are full of singing, dancing, laughing, and two crazy girls.

Celia: Reverent Prayers PART 3

2011-09-04T10:43:00.002-08:00

Celia's prayer before bed last night: "Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for this day and be reverent. And Sabrina is watching me be reverent. And mommy is being reverently and daddy is being reverently. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen." Then she quickly folded her arms and closed her eyes again like she forgot something and added "And I'm a pillow!"

** As a side note, arguing with me about how she's not a pillow is her new favorite thing. She will start the argument by saying something like: "Mommy, can you say 'You're totally a pillow?'"

Celia: Reverent Prayers PART 2

2011-08-31T10:27:00.002-08:00

This morning, Celia said the prayer for breakfast. Sabrina was busy dumping magnets out of their box and then throwing them (usual). Here was Celia's prayer:

"Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for this day and be reverent. Thank you for Sabrina will get bigger and bigger and learn to be quiet and reverent. Thank you for the oatmeal. Please bless it. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen."

Celia: Reverent Prayers

2011-08-28T19:10:00.002-08:00

We just got back from a trip to Denali where we took a million pictures. I'll get to that someday. I just wanted to document Celia's prayer for dinner tonight. As I was setting dinner on the table, I said: "Okay, let's say some prayers so we can eat dinner." Celia said: "I'm gonna say it" and then immediately started saying it. Tom was still trying to get Sabrina in the high chair, so it all went down like this:

Celia: Dear Heavenly Father, Thank You for this day and be reverent. (looking up and seeing Tom strapping Sabrina in) HEY! BE REVERENT!

Tom: Just a minute.

Me: We're not quite ready to say prayers yet, wait just a minute.

Celia: (immediately) Dear Heavenly Father, my daddy's not being reverent. Please help him to be reverent. In the name of... oh! And bless the food. The tomatoes (potatoes), green beans, and that. That food right there (pointing to stuffing on her plate). In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen."

Daddy Kisses

2011-08-19T16:40:00.004-08:00

Sabrina is a big kisser. And sometimes we don't see it coming. She just attacks our face. With tongue. And then eats our nose. Here she is in action.

Celia: She likes Tangled

2011-08-15T13:09:00.004-08:00

- Today at lunch, Celia and I were talking about movies. Apparently Sabrina's favorite is Ratatouille, Tom's favorite is Cars, and my favorite is Kung Fu Panda (I told her this one, so she got at least one right). I asked her about her favorite and this is how it went:

C: Um Tangled is my favorite.

Me: What is your second favorite movie?

C: The lantern one.

Me: Isn't that the same movie?

C: Yes.

Me: Well what other movie do you like?

C: Rapunzel.

- The other day, she looked outside and said something like: "It's a nice cold day today. The wind is blowing all around. The sun is gone. The rain is all over the ground." Our little optimist.

- Last week or so, Celia was sitting at the dinner table. Her foot fell asleep and she told us that it had "spicies" in it.

Baby Bakes!: Kid 2

2011-08-12T10:22:00.005-08:00

Other than noting how great that beach house kitchen is compared to our lovely home kitchen, there's one major difference in these pictures. With Celia, she came and clung on to me so rarely we thought it was cute. With Sabrina, this happens ALL THE TIME. I spend most of my time in the kitchen cooking saying: "Can someone come get this baby so I can finish dinner?" She's cute, but clingy. Oh so clingy. Tom took a picture because I was commenting on how much I loved it when Celia did that but am so sick of the commonality of the situation with Sabrina. Even as I type this Sabrina has pulled herself up on my knees begging me to hold her. Back to the regularly scheduled pack mule part of my day...

Giant Veggies: Please Identify

2011-08-10T22:10:00.003-08:00

We just got a box of local produce. Since everything is bigger here (seriously, our fridge has never been so full with just a few items. The cabbage and collard greens are taking over!) thanks to 24-hour sunshine, we're not sure what these are. Our best guess is a giant leek and some kohlrabi. Any ideas?

Somewhat related, here are Celia and Sabrina playing with their fruits and veggies. They play so well together these days. So fun!

Celia + Sabrina: Harry Potters

2011-08-09T15:33:00.005-08:00

Remember Celia's teeny tiny friends? Yeah, they're still around in full force. We always have to accommodate them. I've had to leave a spot empty on her plate so they can get "all noodle-y." She bites her sandwiches into a tunnel for them all to go under. They go with us everywhere. When they don't ride with us, they always meet us there. And there are hundreds of them. They have a million different names and they fly all over the world to see each other. One lives in a state I've never heard of that's "by Oregon." One of them lives in "Toyo, Japan. Just like Tokyo, Japan." Well, recently, she's added the "harry potters." They're like a different tribe of teeny tiny friends. If the teeny tiny friends want to play in the living room, the harry potters want to go play on "mommy's and daddy's bed." We have not seen the new Harry Potter film (blasphemous, I know), but we did go to a Harry Potter party for the movie. So Celia has been hearing the name. Still, I'm pretty sure she thinks she came up with it. And those harry potters are just as crazy as the teeny tiny friends.

Other funny things as of late:

- Tom was feeding Sabrina the other day and making airplane noises to get her to eat. It was something like "Bewwwww." Celia said something like: "Bew is my teeny tiny friend, Daddy. So don't say that. Say 'Kewwwww'."

- The other day we were talking to Tom's parents on Skype and Celia said to them "So...we had a nice visit to your house."

- She was sitting on the couch all meditatively and said: "You remember Mommy, it's my turn on Earth!" (We then introduced her to the cheesy soundtrack of the musical "My Turn on Earth" and it's her new favorite.)

- She asked me the other day: "Mommy, were we in space when Adam and Eve were on Earth?"

- She is in the annoying asking question phase: "Where's the hairbrush, Mommy? Oh, what bathroom? Oh where? What drawer? This one? Oh, what hairbrush?"

- She still is pretty awesome at pantomime. She loves making beaches out of pillows and blankets on the floor. Today she set it all up and went fishing with a big net (sound familiar?). She caught them, picked them up with one fingers by the gills, lifted the cooler lid to drop it in, closed the lid, and went back to pick up her net again. This happened for each one and she always remembered exactly where she put the net and where the cooler was. Then she filleted them all, "grilled them up," and we ate some with plastic lemon. Delicious.

And remember how Sabrina is our trouble maker? Here she is living on the edge:

Sabrina: Ten Months

2011-08-08T10:46:00.004-08:00

Sabrina's still our crazy little firecracker.

STATS: She went to the doctor on July 25th. She weighed 17 lbs 4 oz (10-25th percentile) and was 28 inches tall (50-75th percentile).

FOOD: She still nurses every four hours, eats a big bowl of applesauce in the morning, eats whatever she can get her hands on at lunch (usually some bread and baby food puree), finger food for dinner (peaches, avocado, black beans, and salmon are her favorites), and then a big bowl of oatmeal before bed.

SLEEP: Woof. Not sure what to say here. She's been teething really bad lately (still no teeth) which has really impacted her sleeping. Teething gives my kids coughs that they hang onto for months. So I really want to let her cry it out at night, but she gets into a coughing attack and that's not good. So, sometimes she sleeps from 9-9 and wakes up at 6, but other times she sleeps from 9-8 and wakes up at 12, 3, and 5. So it's really hard to say at this point. For naps, she usually takes two naps. A short one in the morning and a longer one in the afternoon (a little under and hour for the first and about an hour and a half for the second), but this week, that has been a little jumbled too.

SPEECH: She doesn't have any. She mostly just grunts and says "ah." I knew I would worry about this with the second child because Celia was so conversant, but I'm sure she's fine. She does sign "all done" but it sometimes means "all done," "more," or "get me out." She's starting to sign "more" but is having a hard time figuring out the difference between the sign for "more" and clapping.

TRICKS: She waves. Mostly she just sticks her hand up in the air in more of a "Whazzup" fashion than an actual wave, but she does give really enthusiastic waves to Celia in her bed and to herself in the mirror. She's also hilarious about kisses. She'll just randomly attack my lips with a giant open mouth. Sometimes with tongue. Kinda gross if she wasn't so cute. She can climb up all the stairs. She can climb up the slide (and get stuck). She can climb into the dishwasher (and get stuck). She's a climber. And a destroyer. I put all her toys in little toy bins on the shelf and she just pulls them all out and crawls away. Then she heads to the fridge where she takes off all the magnets in a frenzy and then crawls away. Then she heads to the side table where she pulls down the little tea set, the coasters, and the decorative plates and crawls away. I spend a lot of my day putting these things back together just so she'll have something else to destroy. She finds things I didn't know were hiding behind and under things and gets into everything. Every time I try to take her picture doing something crazy that she shouldn't be doing (or frankly just anytime I get out the camera), she stops what she's doing and poses. Then crawls as fast as she can to get the camera lens.

ANECDOTES: Can't really think of anything right now, specifically. She does get really excited to see Tom when he comes home. Sometimes when we're outside and she's the first one to see him ride up on his bike, she makes a really excited noise and starts freaking out. But she is still pretty clingy onto me. Annoyingly so sometimes. Some days she'll just crawl around pulling things down. Other days she has to be in my arms the whole day. If she just settled there, it would be one thing. But she gets bored and tries to dive out of my arms to get things but then when I set her down so she can get them, she cries. But she is very sweet. And a total flirt. And we love her. How could we not? Look at that smile.

Gone Fishing, Need Babysitter

2011-08-03T10:30:00.001-08:00

So who is coming up next year to watch the kids on the beach so Tom and I can both get in the water? We'll pay you back with delicious salmon dinners!

Dipnetting: The Real Alaskan Adventure

2011-08-02T09:44:00.011-08:00

On the way to dipnetting, we had to pull over and see the "bore tide." When it's low tide, the entire inlet is made up of mudflats. There are signs everywhere warning you not to go into the mudflats because they are like quicksand and the tide comes in one big wave and you get caught in the mud and die. No gradual tide changes. One big wave comes in and then the tide is in. So, this one wave starts at the ocean and goes all the way up Cook inlet where we saw it on Turnagain Arm. It just keeps going. You can watch people surfing the Bore Tide on YouTube. There are only a few places in the World where this happens, and Cook Inlet, Alaska is the only place in the United States where you can see this phenomenon. And we saw it. Check. Now back on the road to start fishing!...

Intro to dipnetting: When someone has lived in Alaska for a full 12 months, he or she can purchase an Alaska Resident fishing license. This allows Alaska residents, between July 10 and July 31, to get in the water, with a net, at the mouth of the river to catch sockeye salmon ("reds"). Each head of household is allowed 25 fish per season with an additional 10 fish per family member (we could have caught 55 fish!). This year, the reds ran in record-breaking numbers. Over 230,000 fish ran up the river in one day. And nearly 1.5 million fish ran up the river in the month of July. This year we went with President Smith (member of the stake presidency). He's the king of dipnetting and he showed us the ropes. In the same amount of time we caught 27 fish, he caught 80 and threw 20 back because they were "too small." He went home with 60 giant fish. (Our 27 filled the two coolers we brought. We couldn't have fit any more fish if we wanted to!)

Since you've already seen the results of our dipnetting adventure (72 pounds of edible fillet meat!), this post will be about the "experience" of dipnetting. Tom will walk you through the process of fishing (He's wearing a yellow hat so you can follow him in all the pictures). You get suited up (preferably with a friend to join you in the water. Hi Logan!). Then you take this incredibly large and awkward net and walk it into the river as the tide goes out. You get in line and hop into the water with everyone else. You walk the net, with the current, about 300 yards. If you don't catch a fish, you pull out, walk it to the beginning, and start again. If you do feel a fish in your net, you give the net a good jerk (to get the fish caught in the net), and you try to pull the net out of the water as fast as you can before the fish gets out of the net. (This is by far the hardest part of the whole thing... we probably lost 30 fish because we never figured out the best way to get the fish caught in the net. The real pros can get a fish caught in the net and keep walking so they can catch 2-5 fish in one go.) Then you whomp the fish right on the nose (so you don't bruise the meat) and throw it in the cooler with the rest of the fish. Then you get back in the water and do it again!

When you're all done, you clean off all your fish and gut them on the beach. This means the beach is full of fish guts down by the water. And fish guts = lots of birds. Apparently real Alaskan children like to throw fresh fish guts up into the air and watch the seagulls dive bomb to get them. I'll wait a year before letting my kids be "real Alaskan children."

After the girls got in bed, it was my turn in the water. We camped right on the beach with everyone else. I got in the water at 9:30PM and fished until 11PM when all dipnets had to pull out of the water. (The day after we left, they opened it up to all night fishing for the first time in ten years because the salmon were running so thick. I'm bummed we missed that!) It looks like I'm not in the water as deep as Tom was, but all the boats were coming in and the waves were huge. I actually flooded my waders a few times (nothing major, but it was cold). I caught my first fish the second walk. It was totally by accident since I didn't really know what I was doing yet. I made Tom take a million pictures of it in case I never caught another fish. Then I caught 6 more and they were all giant compared to that first one. Fishing at night was a blast! There were less people and everyone was very into the communal experience. When I caught a big one, I felt better about the Scandanavian guy next to me saying: "Nice fish!" than I did about actually catching it. And since we all had to pull out of the water at 11PM, everyone was calling out things like: "25 minutes left!" and everyone was happy to see people pulling fish out of the water. Since only Alaska residents can dipnet, all of dipnetting is like this (people encouraging and helpful and communal), but at night, it was especially great. I felt great being an Alaskan!

Let me tell you, fishing in Alaska at 11PM was a beautiful experience!

The next morning, I got back in the water and fished another couple of hours, but it wasn't nearly as fun as night fishing.

So what did the girls do while we were fishing during the day? They played in the sand, of course (with Celia's friend, Sophie). And Sabrina also started eating it by the handful. I couldn't stop her with a binky or real food... so I banished her to the tent. Then the girls spent a long time playing in Sabrina's tent (inside our tent). They were rolling around laughing. Funny ladies. They had a great time. And other than Sabrina eating sand and Celia getting a bad sunburn on her neck (I put sunscreen on her!), it was a fabulous family outing. Definitely the same time next year!

Vacation Pictures: Final Round

2011-08-01T10:49:00.011-08:00

We took a train from Portland to Seattle. Really a great way to travel. A 3 hour airplane ride with these two is like torture, but a train is a blast! In Seattle, we enjoyed time with Tom's family. Celia enjoyed being the oldest by 2 years. She pretty much did her own thing. She went hiking with the boys, learned to play all the musical instruments at one time, got all bundled for a ride on the boat, enjoyed playing in the water with Jack, read books while Aunt Hilary did her hair, and just hung around. Because the house was full of people, Celia slept in a "fort" under the pool table. She was pretty into it. Sabrina, after spending so much time with Papa Edvalson in Portland, decided that she would try her hand (literally) at dentistry on Uncle Evan. She also spent some quality time with the Great-Grandmas, found her match with Jack (lots of food-stealing went on between high chair trays), proved that she can still touch the camera before we can take a picture of her, and showed us a bunch of cute faces that we had to document (notably all in high chairs). The rest of us hung out at the family cabin with family, hung out at the family house with family, and played the family Mario Kart Wii with the family. Grandpa Ted also had a birthday (and is so old, the candles were totally melted by the time he blew them out!). Another great adventure of a vacation. Can't wait to see everyone in one fell swoop again! Same time next year...?

Vacation Pictures: Here it Goes...

2011-07-31T16:20:00.008-08:00

A great benefit of Tom's amazing amount of vacation time is we actually get to use it when we want to. So, we headed South for nearly two weeks to see both of our families. We started with my family and the Great Trusty Family Reunion on the 4th of July (yes, I'm behind on the blogging) in Oceanside, Oregon. It was great enjoying the Oregon Coast (our old stomping grounds) and letting the cousins hang out. Celia loves hanging out with my nephew, Balo, and Sabrina quickly learned how to terrorize sweet little Clara (who is older than her, but much calmer). My sister's family just moved to Omaha which crushes my dreams of them moving in next door. As a general summary of the Oregon visit: Sabrina slept in her little tent the whole trip, can crawl to get the camera before we can take her picture, loved hanging out with the big kids, and enjoyed destroying every train track Balo set up. Celia and Balo were hilarious. They slept in bunk beds in the beach house and talked most nights until 11. They built trains, did some flying on the beach house couch, built block towers and tore them down in record time, and were in the Oceanside 4th of July Parade. The rest of us hung out at the beach, watched the kids play, dressed up matchy-matchy for the reunion, and took advantage of the beach house's famous "blue" wall and the matching shirts to take "photo booth" style photos with a feature on our camera that takes ten pictures consecutively. Definitely time well spent.

Sweet Potato Pasta

2011-07-25T13:38:00.003-08:00

We have been running at full speed since the last blog post. We went to Oregon, then Washington, and then camping on the beach catching fish. All of these events will eventually be blogged (when the amount of pictures seems less daunting). However, it's the catching of 27 fish (25 salmon and 2 flounder) which leads me to this blog post. Our 72 lbs of filleted fish meat in the freezer from last week's fishing expedition has solidified my desire to become weekday pescetarians. Sounds cooler than it is. Basically, I only want to eat two dinners a week that involve a meat other than fish. So, I'm coming up with vegetarian and fish recipes. I wanted to write down the recipe I made up for delicious sweet potato pasta before I forget it. So here it is (made up using a combination of several recipes found online):

Sweet Potato Pasta:
3 cups cooked, chopped sweet potato
1.5-2 cloves garlic
2 Tbsp olive oil
1.5 Tbsp dried basil
3 Tbsp Parmesan cheese
1/2 cup heavy cream
1-2 cups milk (until the sauce is a paste... thicker than sauce but thinner than peanut butter. Also, I'm sure you could forgo the cream and just use milk, if you so choose.)
Salt and pepper to taste.

Throw it all in a food processor and then warm it up on the stove in a saucepan (making sure that you turn off heat as soon as it gets warm so as not to actually cook the milk). This amount is perfect for a pound of pasta. Heavy pasta is preferred.

This pasta would also make a great side dish. I'm making some tonight as a side for our flounder (pictured below). Aren't flounder the ugliest fish you've ever seen?

Sundays Rock

2011-06-26T10:30:00.002-08:00

Celia: The ballerina

2011-06-25T22:14:00.004-08:00

Celia took a ballet class this week. Other than being REALLY good at doing all the ballet positions and jumping, ballet class involved a lot of looking in the mirror (despite what the rest of the class was doing) and seeing how great her skirt looked (down on the hips and up on the chest).

Celia was also quite bossy. Though she didn't pay much attention to the teacher herself, when other people weren't paying attention, she was quick to tell them so. And I do have her, on video, telling her friend Sophie: "Don't ever to pick your nose!"

Sabrina: No! We're not ready!

2011-06-24T08:49:00.006-08:00

She's not even nine months yet! She just learned to crawl! I don't know how to baby-proof! She pulled herself up for the first time on Wednesday night and has pulled herself up about ten times since then. She's moving way too fast. Now, when she wakes up, I always find her sitting up in her bed, trying to pull herself up. It makes putting her back to sleep nigh unto impossible.

And, of course, she's always a product placement for food.

This is How We Roll

2011-06-23T07:53:00.005-08:00

** Disclaimer: That is not a magazine, but our credit report from the bank. That is also NOT a Cheeto on Sabrina's table... just the Gerber Graduate equivalent (not as bad, but almost... she eats EVERYTHING IN OUR HOUSE... we're running out of ideas!).

Celia: This week

2011-06-19T17:03:00.006-08:00

Monday - Celia was dressing up, as usual, and came up with a pretty good "Cindy Lou Who" costume, we thought.

Wednesday - I got in the shower after Sabrina fell asleep and came out to find Celia sitting at the table finishing her oatmeal (that she started three hours before). It looked suspicious and there was some hair on the floor and on the table. Here was our conversation:
Me: Did you cut your hair?
Celia: It's okay, It's okay.
Me: Is this all the hair? (pointing to the little bits on the table and floor).
Celia: No, there's more. But it's okay, it's okay.
Me: Where is it?
Celia: I threw it away.
Sure enough, I found this giant wad in the garbage can. She really likes cutting yarn, and she had some yarn in her hair, so she decided she would cut it while it was in her hair. Lucky for her, she has some luscious locks that hide it all. You can't even tell!

Thursday - Celia was going downstairs and on her way, Tom said: "I'm going to tickle you first" and she said "okay!" very enthusiastically. Then she stood there, motionless while he tickled her. Then as she was going down the stairs she said: "Daddy tickled me Mommy, but I didn't laugh."

Today - Celia addressed Daddy's Father's Day card all by herself. I just told her what to write and she did it. I'm glad that her trademark is a million lines in her E rather than a heart above her i, which I'm pretty sure will happen for her in a few years. I like this better.

Oh, and she pointed the her A in "dad" and said: "That A is like a jellyfish!"

My Kids Don't Look Alike

2011-06-15T08:04:00.009-08:00

My dear Uncle Noel

2011-06-14T15:09:00.004-08:00

My Uncle Noel passed away on Sunday after a 3 month (plus maybe 2+ years) bout with Brain Cancer. I was looking through old pictures of Celia to compare to baby pictures of Sabrina (will post the match-ups tomorrow) and came across this one.

Noel lived in the basement of my parents' beach house while we lived upstairs for ten months before we moved to Alaska. He is the reason we were able to live unemployed out of college for ten months. He taught us how to revamp things found in thrift stores and that's how we made our money (we didn't make money in 10 months, but we didn't lose money either). Remember the dining room table Tom refinished? He taught us the best way to do all that. I'm glad we got to spend so much time with him before his diagnosis.

He worried that Celia wouldn't remember him when we moved away and she grew up. He came upstairs every morning and waved his hands frantically and said: "Hi baby!" But he told me his plan was to make a giant red dot that he would carry upstairs every morning so that somewhere in the back of her mind, she'd remember a big dot of a great uncle emerging from the basement. Though he never put it into action, the image stuck for me. And that's how I'll always imagine him.

So long Noel. Thanks for everything. And red dot or not, you'll always be remembered.

And ironically, this picture (doctored up by Noel himself) is one of my favorite pictures of him. Notice a giant dot?

Celia+Sabrina+Tom: Funnies

2011-06-13T13:19:00.002-08:00

Sabrina: The Oompa-Loompa

Celia: A few common funny things she's been saying as of late:
- She always says: "oh, oh excuse me Ma'am" in a somewhat British accent if we're ever in her way.
- When she's trying to pick something (like a story to read before bedtime), she will say: "I like this one better than most" and often follow it with some mumbly argument: "I like this one better than most but... mumble mumble mumble."

Tom: As a post-script to the last post, we noticed an unusual cereal box in Tom's childhood cupboard. Hot buttered Cheerios? Sound good?

Look-alikes?

2011-06-12T10:27:00.002-08:00

So, do you think Sabrina looks like her dad? Because that seems to be the consensus.

Memorial Day Tuesday

2011-06-11T15:25:00.005-08:00

Tom gets every other Monday off from work. Because of Memorial Day, he got Tuesday off too. So on "Memorial Day Tuesday" we took a fabulous family bike ride around town on some awesome bike trails. We ended up at Alaska Wild Berry Products (a candy factory and "park").

Celia showed off her fashion statement with the park's giant stone Inuksuk man (look familiar from the Vancouver Olympics?... very similar native communities as you can imagine) and again in front of the World's Largest Chocolate Fall. Celia and Sabrina met a bear, we had a picnic, and we saw some reindeer. Overall, a fabulous way to spend "Memorial Day Tuesday."

Sabrina: The Hippie Crawls!

2011-06-10T15:32:00.003-08:00

Yes, that's my hippie baby in nothing but her tie-dye tank and cloth diaper (she's sporting a fever of 102 degrees today). She may be sick, but she just figured out those knees of hers this morning and I haven't seen her this happy in a while. Now she can get to anything she wants!

Weekend plans: baby-proofing. And making a freezer full of baby food. We can't seem to make enough to feed this ravenous baby.

If Tom were to brag...

2011-06-09T17:07:00.005-08:00

He might have shown you pictures of this dining room table he refinished. Since I usually do the bragging around here (for both of us), I feel he may have gotten shafted on this one. He worked on it all last summer and finished literally 24 hours before Sabrina was born (she was a nice girl to come two weeks early and exactly a day after we checked off our "to-do" list). Since it's been 8 months since the table was finished, I thought I'd brag for Tom. Luckily, Celia staged Jessie and Bullseye before she took a nap.

This original 1950s beauty was purchased on ebay for cheap in 2009 (with 6 fabulously Mod chairs that are Tom's project for this summer) and came in pretty bad shape. Many nights of sanding and polishing and polyeurathaning (now a word) later and we now have what we will claim as our best souvenir of "The Great Recession" (because when prices bottomed out, we got this set that's worth well over $1000 for much, much less than that).

By the way, it can comfortably fit 12 (the other drop leaf isn't even up in the above pictures) and fold down to fit 4. Isn't this the coolest table you've ever seen? (Celia stood in front of it and said: "Hey, are you taking a picture of me too?" and this is the face I get when I tell her to laugh for the picture):

Celia: Underwear Pants

2011-06-08T08:50:00.003-08:00

Celia came upstairs all dressed this morning and said "Look! I'm wearing underwear pants! (Long johns)" under her Spandex shorts, of course. "I'm wearing short pants, too, so you can see my underwear pants!"

When I asked her just now if I could take her picture, she said: "Yeah, I'm pretty. Woo hoo!"

Celia: You Smell

2011-06-04T12:40:00.002-08:00

Earlier this morning, Celia said that our oatmeal smelled like chocolate. Not sure why, but apparently it did.

When we were outside, I lifted her up so she could see what we planted in our planter box (sage, rosemary, and italian oregano were the only herbs left... great ideas for these herbs? please share). Celia stuck her nose in my ear and sniffed (which tickled a lot), then we had this conversation:

Celia: Mmmm, you smell good.

Me: I do? What do I smell like?

Celia: You smell like me.

Me: What do you smell like?

Celia: I smell cold. Can I smell your other ear?

Celia: "Got-For"

2011-06-01T15:05:00.005-08:00

Celia's obsession with correct grammar and speech means that there are very few toddler words or phrases left. But "got-for" is one of them. She never says "forgot." Always "got-for." So here are a few that I "got-for" to write:

- For Tom's birthday way back in February, I walked Celia into Fred Meyer. I said: "What do you want to get daddy for his birthday? You can get him anything in the store." She gasped (which is currently her favorite word. She always gasps and then tells us: 'Can you say "Celia, did you gasp?"' Anyway... back to the original story... so she gasped...) and said: "Bananas!" So yes, Tom got a bunch of bananas for his birthday. They were a bit bruised because she went to pick them out and put them in the cart.

- About a month ago, Celia helped me change the laundry. Then she said: "I'm going to wash my teeny tiny friends. They're dirty." She shut the door, waited a minute, then opened it and stuck her head in and said: "HELP! HELP! Oh! Teeny tiny friends! Where are you? Are you in the spots? (referring to the holes in the washer.)" She slammed the door, looked at me and said: "they're still dirty."

- Celia has been refusing to say prayers for about 6 months. If Tom's around it's always "daddy's turn." When she started saying a few prayers a few months ago, it was always the same prayer: "Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for me to get my wet out and tootles out and poopies out. Please bless our family. Celia and Sabrina and Mommy and Daddy. Please Bless them. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen." When we got back from Hope, she said this prayer:

"Dear Heavenly Father, Thank you for us to go cabin camping. When we get back, we will fix my shoe (?). Please bless our family, please bless them. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen."

- Yesterday, she said this prayer... it was blessing her oatmeal if you can't tell: "Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for this day. Thank you for my teeny tiny friends to get their poopies out and hug them (which I hope is referring to hugging the teeny tiny friends while they're scared getting their poopies out). In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen." Then, as soon as she was done with the prayer she said: "That was a new one! That was a new prayer!"

- I just made us some rhubarb muffins. Celia's been eating hers at the table. Here's the conversation:

Me: "Is it good?"

Celia: "No."

Me: "It's not good?"

Celia: "Oh yeah, yeah it is. It's good AND fine."

(She's very aware of the fact that I always say "good" and Tom always says "fine." For me, "fine" is worse than "good." For Tom, "fine" is as good as it gets.)

Alaska Guidebook: Hope

2011-05-29T14:53:00.017-08:00

If you are visiting Anchorage, but want an Alaska Bush experience, Hope is your best bet. If you drive just a few miles south of Anchorage, you'll be able to see Hope across the inlet. But it takes about 1.5 hours to get there. Hope is a small gold mining town that predated the Klondike gold rush by about 30 years.

Accommodations:

I recommend staying in a cabin. It's cozy and homey. The upstairs is great for your toddler. She'll beg to go to bed (though may not actually sleep for awhile). And the little ones will love learning to use the "outhouse potty"!

(Our cabin even came with a sweet fort built in the back. When I brought Celia over to see it, I said: "Look! It's a little house made out of trees." She said: "Yup. It is. Now let's go back.")

Dining

Hope has a selection of two restaurants. We chose the Seaview Cafe right on historic mainstreet. The food was delicious and the apple pie was perfect.

This cafe is also where the Goo Goo Dolls recorded Broadway in 2002 for their Live in Alaska album.

Other Dining options include: Tito's Discovery Cafe (pictured by the Hope sign) and a pizza/ice cream shack that seems to be closed most of the time.

Amenities

Jerky, chips and candy can be purchased at the local gift shop (where you can also get your picture taken in one of these paintings):

For any other food, you'll have to choose a restaurant or cook on the camping stove. Pancakes are always a big hit with the kiddos:

The Hope gas station has also been abandoned. A local woman told us that the 150+ Hope residents drive into Anchorage for everything. Sometimes they run into eachother at Costco.

The Sights

A walk down Mainstreet is quite enjoyable and the views of the inlet and the town are breathtaking.

The Hope Museum is an outdoor collection of original buildings from historic Hope: a bunkhouse, a barn, and the original school.

Then visit Hope's second school just down the road. The kids will love the old slide and swingset. Even the babies will love to play in the grass. (Hope now has a gorgeous school further out of "downtown." Opened in 1986, it just recently became K-12 and graduated its first student in 2000.)

Oh, and be sure to enjoy some of Alaska's famous wildlife.

Recreation

Hope marks the North end of the Resurrection Pass trail from Cooper landing. Most people take 2-3 days to hike the 38-mile trail in its entirety. With kiddos, we just hiked in a little bit. We saw rock piles left over from the heavy gold mining days. Though there is still gold to be found in Resurrection creek, it takes all day and some heavy machinery to get about ten dollars worth of gold flakes (according to the prospector we talked to along the trail who showed us his $10 flakes in a vial of water... they made a cool "tink"ing noise when he shook it).

For any hike with a baby, we recommend a baby backpack so the baby can enjoy the sights:

Though she woke up with marks on her face, you can tell she had a great time:

The Girls: More of the Same

2011-05-26T09:52:00.004-08:00

Getting sick of twin pictures yet? Because I'm not. Celia picked out this outfit this morning and I told her that Sabrina had the same one. As soon as we heard Sabrina wake up in the monitor, Celia went running down to her room and found her matching shirt and pants for her to wear. She said something like: "I'm a twin. Sabrina can be one too!"

If you can't actually tell what the matching outfit looks like, here they are individually. Celia's matching outfit includes her dancing skirt and her necklace, of course. Thanks to Nana (the shirts) and Grandma (the pants) for feeding my matching outfit obsession.

Sabrina has started looking pretty hip herself. Here she is modeling her sweet jean jacket and Mariner's hat.

She's in a funk right now. She wants to crawl SO bad. She can move everywhere she wants to go, but she knows those knees are supposed to do something. So lately she just gets into crawling position and screams. She's also a total foodie. She wants to eat everything. She gets so sick of baby food but doesn't have any teeth. She's been eating every Gerber finger food we can buy, chunks of avacado and banana, and plain noodles (which she will eat one of and then look at you like you're crazy for feeding her something so bland). Oh, and she stole Celia's cup and started chugging the water. She knew how to use a straw immediately when I showed her one a few weeks ago. But this toddler cup takes some real sucking power.

Celia: She's practically raising herself.

2011-05-19T11:50:00.003-08:00

I have preface this post by saying that on Tuesday, Celia had an accident at Carl's Jr. and screamed for (not exaggerating) three hours after that. She hadn't had an accident for more than a month I would say. Anyway, it was a day where I saw into the lives of people with regular toddlers and it was not pleasant.

So yesterday, Celia went down for her nap. I had the monitor up here and listened the whole time. I heard the usual songs, stories, made-up stories, etc. but she didn't sleep. When I went down to get her, she was wearing different pants and here was our conversation:

Me: Celia, are you wearing different pants?

Celia: Yeah, I am.

Me: What happened to your other pants?

Celia: They got dirty a little bit.

Me: How did they get dirty?

Celia: I don't know.

Me: What got on them to make them dirty?

Celia: Some yucky wet got on them.

Me: Like from your bum?

Celia: Yeah.

Me: Did you have an accident?

Celia: Yeah, but I didn't cry at all!

Keep in mind I listened on the monitor the whole time... there was no indication of an accident. But apparently she had a little accident and changed her panties and her pants all by herself and left a nice little pile of the dirty ones by the door in her room (while continuing to sing and make up stories involving her "teeny tiny friends" so I had no idea what was really happening). I'm convinced if it wasn't naptime, she would have just put the clothes in the wash and then maybe cooked herself some dinner...

After Afters: The Bathrooms!

2011-05-16T20:28:00.006-08:00

Tom finally finished the bathrooms this weekend. Other than the beautiful dining room table he finished in October (the night before Sabrina was born, so I have not appropriately bragged about it), the bathrooms were our winter home project. These things used to go so fast with both of us working on it together in the evenings and on weekends during nap time. Turns out with two kids, I was remarkably unhelpful and Tom only got to work on them a few hours a week. I did, however, paint the painting in the downstairs bathroom. My contribution. Again, we only have "before before" pictures taken by my cousins after we bought the house (sight unseen), so the *stuff* in the "before" pictures is not ours. So, here you go:

The upstairs bathroom:
BEFORE:

AFTER:

The Downstairs Bathroom (the girls' bathroom):
BEFORE:

AFTER:

AND A CELIA STORY:
Today, Celia went downstairs by herself to use the potty. She had been eating a sucker and it was all over her clothes. So she used the potty. Then I heard her say: "My panties are dirty. I will put them away. My pants are dirty. I will put them away." When Tom went down a few minutes later, she had put just her panties and pants in the washing machine and started it (no soap). Then she had gotten new pants and panties and put them on. Does she even need us anymore?

Celia: Smart Girl

2011-05-14T12:36:00.007-08:00

Remember the "patter-in" Celia colored? She's been obsessed with patterns. The other day, she woke up from her nap and I went in there and she said: "Sleep, wake-up, sleep, wake-up. It's a patter-in!" Then she was playing with a toy with pictures and letters on it and she turned them and said: "letter, picture, letter, picture, letter. It's a patter-in!"

She likes to get into Sabrina's bed after Sabrina wakes up. They like to cuddle and then Sabrina likes to watch Celia play with her fishie mobile.

Celia pointed to Sabrina's sheets (which, incidentally are original to Tom's family with the blue port-a-crib from the 80s... still family favorites) and said: "open, closed, open, closed. It's a patter-in!" (referring to the babies eyes on the sheets).

Oh, and yesterday, Celia was drawing on newspaper and said: "C-E-L-I-A. I drawed my name!" Sure enough, there it was in a perfect column going up (drives me crazy because she decided to add a little squiggly right there in the middle before I could picture it in its perfection). This came out of nowhere because, although she signs all of her artwork with a C, she has never attempted her whole name (nor did I know she was capable of drawing an A intentionally). I'm. So. Proud. Moments like these make me realize that I'm not failing completely as a mom (or Celia's smarts make up for my shortcomings... but I'll stick with the former option).

Sabrina starting saying "Mama" yesterday. Another proud moment. She just stares at Tom or I if we talk like she does, but when Celia does it, she whips her head around to watch and cackles like crazy. It's hilarious.

Celia's First Haircut

2011-05-07T10:24:00.004-08:00

Last night, after dinner, we rode our bikes to Great Clips where Tom and Celia got haircuts. Celia was so excited all day. She said "yeah! I'm gonna get a haircut like Sabrina and Papa" (both are pretty bald). I had to explain to her that her hair would still be pretty long. We watched Tangled to get ready. Above is the "before" picture.

I was so nervous that her curl would leave. Tom and I don't have any curl and I love that she does. Celia did so well. She sat so still and smiled in the mirror the whole time.

The stylist said that she has deep curls and that they would stay. They may go away when she grows up, but the haircut wouldn't cut them off. And they didn't! They brought them out even more! Yay for curls!

Oh, and isn't Sabrina so cute in her little Mariners hat? What a cute skater baby ready to ride in the bike tent.

Sabrina: Seven Months

2011-05-05T19:28:00.004-08:00

Someday, I will open Sabrina's baby book and fill in all this information. But if Celia's baby book is any indication, it won't happen until I'm pregnant with the next kid (and that won't happen until Sabrina is at least 4... that's right, 4). But for now, I'll update Sabrina's info here.

Again, we're not going to the doctor until she's 9 months old, so based on home measurements, she weighs about 14.5 lbs and is 26" tall.

Sabrina is our foodie. She eats everything. Though I have to say she is much better at eating solids when Tom is feeding her... but she is improving with me. She's always STARVING. Even after I nurse her. So a typical day for Sabrina is: I nurse her at 6AM and she goes back to bed until about 9. Then I nurse her again between 9:30 and 10 AM and feed her a few bites of applesauce. She takes about a 40-minute nap around 12. Around 1:30, she eats a giant bowl of vegetables mixed with rice cereal. This week I've been giving her two ice cubes of green beans mixed with an ice cube of carrots (we make our own food and freeze it into ice cubes) mixed with rice cereal and water. It makes a ton and she eats it all. And then I nurse her again. She and Celia both take a nap around 3. She sleeps for 1-2 hours then. Between 5 and 6 she nurses again. Around 8:30, she gets a big bowl of rice cereal with a dab of applesauce mixed in. Then I nurse her to sleep at 9.

As for food, she eats it all. She's tried pears (loves), carrots (her favorite), sweet potatoes (likes a lot), green beans (likes a lot), applesauce (likes a lot), and rice cereal (which she will no longer eat unless there's just a tiny bit of applesauce or something else mixed in). She's still a big spitter-upper, so the introduction of bright orange and green foods has not been great for our carpet.

Sabrina is very mobile. She can scoot herself backwards, pull herself forward, and roll into cool angles to get where she wants to go. Yes, she can get up on all fours which makes me especially nervous. And the typical scene around here is Celia in her dancing skirt and sweet headband and Sabrina scooting, pulling, rolling to get to Celia.

Sabrina can give kisses on cheeks when you hold her up and say: "kisses, Sabrina." She just opens her mouth and leans into your face and then smiles at you like she's just done something wonderful. It's cute. And she's a champion at closing the doors on this baby toy. Impressively, actually. She closes them all in a matter of seconds. She's a fabulous baby and we'll keep her. Though that means our carpet will have to go...

Celia: Isn't she the greatest?

2011-05-04T12:16:00.004-08:00

I came upstairs after fifteen minutes of trying to get Sabrina to go to sleep (she did, finally... she's been fussy the past few days... not sure what that's about). And I found Celia quietly coloring. She looked at me and casually said: "I colored a patter-in (pattern). It's the bear's igloo. It's not a den because it's not. But the lion has a den." Then she kept coloring her patter-in (so cute when she says it this way). I'm so proud. She's so great.

In other Celia news, she used to have an imaginary lion that she would use as an excuse to not poop. "I can't. The lion told me no" or "I have to wait for the lion to come." Then one of her friends got her a set of plastic animals for her birthday. The next time she said something about the lion, Tom got the plastic lion and said: "The lion came and he says to get your poopies out." You should have seen her face... CLASSIC. She didn't know what to say. And after a few more days of using the plastic lion, the mean imaginary lion went away. Now she has a set of imaginary friends. They are known only as "my teeny tiny friends." She refers to them a lot. "Come here my teeny tiny friends." "My teeny tiny friends are hungry. I will get them some food." This morning she was coloring and all of a sudden said: "No my teeny tiny horsey. Don't eat my paper silly!"

Love her.

Spring has sprung!

2011-05-02T21:40:00.003-08:00

The snow is gone and the whole town turned out to clean up the city this weekend. They pass out plastic bags and everyone picks up all the litter that has been frozen over all winter. Though we did not participate (with plans to do so in the future... when our children will be a bit more helpful), we are grateful for how clean and beautiful the city has now become. We took the opportunity to have a family home evening bike ride tonight. The girls were in the "bike tent" (they're happy... trust me... just couldn't get them to smile until they started moving).

Not pictured is my fabulous new bike. I bought a sweet Diamondback on closeout about a week after Sabrina was born in October. It was snowy then so I got to ride it around the garage once (one week post partum). It was great to actually ride it outside! It's a comfort bike and I'm loving it. I went straight from my 11-year-old mountain bike to my dad's mountain bike, so having a cruiser that's actually my size (and new!) is fabulous. This is just the first of what we hope will be weekly family bike rides around town. With sunny weather and great trails, how could we not?

Sabrina's Room

2011-04-27T09:02:00.003-08:00

Sabrina moved to her own room last night. About time, right? Until now, it was just easier to have her in our room because we didn't wake eachother up and she was already right there when I had to feed her at 6. But the past few days she has not been sleeping well and she's hyper-aware of our presence. So, out she goes. She woke up once and put herself back to sleep within five minutes. We have all sorts of fans going downstairs so the girls didn't wake eachother up. They both did great! Hope it keeps up.

And if you're wondering why the mobile is blurry in the above picture, it's because this is Sabrina's new favorite thing to do:

She also spent most of yesterday trying to get up on her knees into crawling position. Luckily, every time she succeeded, whatever was under her hands would slide out from under her. Too early to crawl... she just sat up. The sitting-up-not-crawling stage is the greatest.

Easter!

2011-04-24T15:02:00.005-08:00

Easter hit this house (maybe literally judging by the mess in the pictures). Celia came upstairs and found her Easter basket and then found all the eggs the Easter Bunny hid. She thinks his name is "Easter" and refers to him as such. "Easter hid another egg!" Celia brought Sabrina her Easter basket as soon as she woke up, so Sabrina got to play with it in her bed. Sabrina got a toothbrush and LOVES it. She took it to Church and giggled the whole time she chewed on it. The girls are cute in their matching dresses even though Celia wants to play with Sabrina's flower and Sabrina wants to play with Celia's silly putty. Funny girls.

Last night, Tom and I went on a date. Neither of the girls took their afternoon nap, so we put them both down at 7 after dinner. Celia fed Sabrina a hearty dinner of rice cereal mixed with pears and the two of them were quite enjoying the interchange. And the good news was the both girls went down at 7 and gave the babysitter an easy night (she had to stick Sabrina's binky in her mouth 3 times). And Tom and I enjoyed some improv with friends and delectable desserts after.

Dear Earth,

2011-04-23T10:26:00.005-08:00

With Earth Day yesterday, we always like to reevaluate how we're doing on our adventure as environmentalists. As pictured, our latest adventure is cloth diapering. We just started this week, so we have no idea what we're doing yet, but we'll let you know how it goes. We've also started to eat less processed foods (for health and environmental reasons... though mainly health). Here's a picture of the 7-grain cereal that we usually eat (Tom's making us some pancakes currently... and can I just tell you that homemade turbinado syrup is the greatest thing ever?).

I'm also planning on making granola this weekend so healthy breakfasts can be more transportable for Tom to take to work. Which brings me to Tom's bike commuting. He commuted 1-2 times a week all winter with his studded tires. Sometimes, he would walk into the house and his balaclava would be covered in ice because his breath would freeze. During the beginning of break-up season, he commuted in galoshes so he could get through the deep ice puddles. And now that break-up season is coming to an end, his tires have been changed back over to regular ones and he's biking 2-3 times a week (gas prices are up to nearly $4.15). I am now on the condo association board simply because I mentioned I wanted to get recycling for the association and showed up to a meeting and was immediately voted onto the board. Still working on the recycling... (Tom currently has to load up the whole car once a month and drive it to the recycling plant on the way to work). Celia learned all about Earth yesterday. One of her favorite movies is Wall-E so she talks about Earth a lot. Yesterday, she learned that we can help Earth by "turning off things... like water and lights... the two things!" That's how she phrased it.

So Earth, we're trying to be good. CFLs and reusable grocery bags are a usual part of our lives. So stay beautiful so we can enjoy our many camping trips we have planned this summer. And can we ask a favor? Our household salmon limit this summer is 55 fish... can you give us that? Oh, and the rhubarb is growing back and the tomato plant is starting to sprout... but the peas haven't come up yet. Help them grow too. Thanks.

Love, the Stocks.

PS - Thought you'd like to see a picture of Sabrina falling asleep in between bites of Tom feeding her rice cereal because it's cute. Notice she's holding a mini sham-wow that have replaced paper towels for cleaning up our children.

Sabrina Sits!

2011-04-21T08:40:00.002-08:00

The first picture was taken on April 17 (just last Sunday) which was the first time Sabrina sat up on her own for ten minutes. She only fell over when she got so tired that she took a 2.5 hour nap. It didn't happen again until yesterday when I sat her up, jumped in the shower, and when I came back out, she was still sitting up! She then sat up all day. I didn't take another picture. Though I did take a picture of the girls in their cute matching jammies. And for good measure, I added a picture of Sabrina eating her feet in the bath. She LOVES eating her feet this week. It's a new thing.

Celia's Animal Party

2011-04-14T07:26:00.007-08:00

Yes... I know. The suspense was killing you. And now that it's been nearly a month...

On Monday, March 28th (thanks to Seward's Day), we had Celia's animal party. We bought foam animal masks for all the kids and Celia made me be the lion and Tom be the bear and she was the giraffe. The girls played Duck Duck Goose (really didn't understand it but had fun nonetheless), pretended to be animals (Sophie as a bunny and Celia as a birdie are pictured), and their favorite game was feeding the elephant. I made a cardboard elephant at 11PM the night before and hid peanuts around the house. They played it three times and then Celia played it another three times after the party was over. Big hit. Overall, successful party (thanks to Emily for the cute cupcakes) and Celia still sometimes asks to feed the elephant.

Celia: She turned 3!

2011-04-10T08:43:00.003-08:00

Celia turned 3 three weeks ago. A little behind as a mom, but here's my tribute to Celia now:

Celia is still great. She's hilarious and creative. She's always playing with characters from movies that show up to our house or imaginary friends (always named something like Hahn or Hashie-Hahn). She remembers everything she learns and is a great help with Sabrina. She loves Sabrina so much. When she hears Sabrina wake up, she gets super excited, stops everything she's doing, and runs in there yelling: "It's Sabrina! I want to see her!" She loves to hold her hand.

When Celia turned 3, diapers "didn't fit" her anymore. We had 2 days of accidents and now she's totally potty trained (pull-ups during naps and at night). It's helped with her fear of pooping, but she still has total breakdowns before she'll poop. We're praying this continues to improve...

Celia is a reader. She always has been. She can memorize any book after me reading it two times. We watched some old videos of her as a baby/toddler and found it hilarious that she's exactly the same except now she uses words to tell her stories. She's always talking about something.

Celia still takes an afternoon nap around 2 and sleeps for 1.5-2 hours usually. She went through a phase of only sleeping about half time time, but now she sleeps everyday. And Saturdays have been odd for her. Last Saturday, she went down for her nap at 4PM and didn't wake up until 8:30 the next morning. Yesterday, she took a 5 hour nap. Silly girl.

She reasons very well. Which makes disciplining really difficult because she try to reason her way out of it. But the pro to this is that she thinks things through. She had an animal birthday party. I asked her what kind of party she wanted. I figured she would say "princess" because she's been to two of those. Instead she said: "I want a camel party because I already had a ladybug party and a princess party" (I had to broaden her horizons to "all animals" - more on her party later).

Celia, you're great. I hope your 3s turn out to be as pleasant as your 2s. You're silly. As she would reply: "No, I'm great!" We love you.

Sabrina: Six Months

2011-04-09T10:26:00.008-08:00

Sabrina was officially six months five days ago. And she's a cutie. This is her signature move pictured above. When she's really excited or tired, she will do this little side flip. (Don't worry, I'm holding her in this picture.) She's still not sitting up. Even in the Boppy, she still falls over pretty fast. It's frustrating for her because she really wants to just sit up and play. She won't stay on her back for more than a few seconds at a time. She rolls right over. As pictured, she also found her feet this month (right after we got to Hawaii on March 19). She smiles at everything and everyone.

We started her on rice cereal on March 28. She ate the whole bowl. Nothing came back out. She just eats and eats and when she's done, she just arches her back away from the spoon. Then she slept like a champion that whole week from 9-9:30 and I fed her at 6:30. It was perfect. Then she got a cough and has coughing attacks at night, poor girl. She now eats sweet potatoes for lunch and rice cereal for dinner. She still nurses, but only for about 10 minutes every four hours. Not sure if that's because of the current cough/cold or because she gets distracted so easily. She still nurses for 30-40 minutes right before bed.

Through a series of rolls, flails, and scoots, Sabrina is capable of movement. In the picture where Sabrina is eating the corner of the kitchen counter, Tom set her about ten feet away and then went to cook in the kitchen and found her there. Funny kid. Tom and I can get her to laugh pretty easily, but Celia is the only one that can get her to whole-heartedly cackle. It's hilarious when those girls start laughing. They can't stop. And Celia is teaching Sabrina to be a baby Princess and let her borrow her princess sunglasses. As you can tell, Sabrina is ready.

Hawaii: Polynesian Cultural Center

2011-04-09T09:54:00.004-08:00

We stopped to see the temple. Then when we got to the Polynesian Cultural Center, Sabrina slept like an old man in the stroller, it rained on and off, we saw a man climb up a palm tree (Celia still talks about this frequently), Sabrina learned that grabbing my face and forcing my nose into her mouth is her new favorite, and we enjoyed the luau and night show.

Hawaii: Honolulu

2011-04-08T06:56:00.004-08:00

The best part of our Honolulu trip was these pictures with the birds. And the cute Hawaiian matching dresses I bought there for the girls (that they're wearing in those family pictures of us). We started at Chinatown where Tom and I bought some yummy things at the Asian market and drank sugarcane juice. Other than that, Honolulu was not that great. We drove around for an hour to find parking. Then we ate at the mall food court. Walked around. Spent 45 minutes on the super crowded beach. Then went home and Celia threw up all over in the car on the way back. Luckily, she had a towel in her lap so it wasn't that big of a mess but it just made the whole day kind of a joke. She enjoyed the movie she got to watch on her bed afterwards "because I'm sick."

Cooking with Kids: FAIL

2011-04-07T12:00:00.003-08:00

Let me just start by saying that last week, I was Super Mom. It was the first time that I was capable of getting up before my kids and working, playing in the snow, grocery shopping, doing school time with Celia, and straightening up the house and all without feeling tired. Well, Super Mom left town this weekend. This week has been long, hard, tiring, and my patience is gone. Awesome time to decide to make cookies with Celia. (Let me also add that me in the kitchen is not that great anyway. Unless there are no distractions, something major gets left out of the recipe.)

I decided that no-bake cookies (my favorite) are quick and easy. Celia and I could whip up a batch during Sabrina's short morning nap. And we did. Turned out perfect. But they looked a little odd. And just as Sabrina woke up, I realized we forgot the sugar. Yup - main ingredient left out. I got Sabrina out, put her in the Bumbo with toys and set out to whip up another batch while the girls entertained themselves. Nope. Out of oats. At this point, I would have claimed defeat... happily. But you can't do that when you've promised the 3-year-old of the house cookies. (We tasted the other no-bake cookies and learned the word "bitter.") So a Trader Joe's mix (thank you Sue!) of Christmas cookies (Super Mom was not around at Christmastime) had to save the day. By the time I got the dough mixed and rolled out, Sabrina was screaming and Celia was whining about cookies. The mix came with three cookie cutters. Celia made one of each shape and proclaimed she was done. In the chaos, I stomped on one of them so hard I now have a bloody star shape on my foot.

In the end, Celia ate three cookies (enough to entertain her while I wrote this) and I ate enough dough to make me sufficiently queasy. I'll put Tom in charge of baking the rest of the dough after all us girls go to bed tonight.

Super Mom, please come back.

Hawaii: Dole Plantation

2011-04-07T07:17:00.006-08:00

We saw some pineapples, rode the Pineapple Express, took pictures of the girls as Pineapples, and enjoyed delicious Dole floats (as is usually the case with notable food... eaten to quickly to be pictured).

Hawaii: The Pool

2011-04-06T08:05:00.008-08:00

Here's that one-foot sand-bottom pool I mentioned. We spent lots of time here. It connected to a real pool with sweet leaf chairs you could lounge on in the water. It was great.

Celia loved to roll around in the sand and then go back in the pool to wash it off.

This also marked Sabrina's first pool experience. She was not amused until she fell asleep in Tom's arms.

Celia Dailies: Popular sayings

2011-04-05T17:28:00.003-08:00

Celia's just a little bit off...

- All day she's been saying: "I'm just kidding and dying. That's all."

- Yesterday she was playing with Sabrina's toy (see earlier post on said toy) and was spinning one of the beads around. She looked at me and said: "When this goes around and around, it doesn't hurt your feelings or your ears."

- "Genius means I'm smart. Genius means you're smart to feed Sabrina." (is this really all I'm good for?)

Hawaii: The Beaches

2011-04-05T07:40:00.005-08:00

I should mention that the whole Hawaii trip happened because of the generosity of my parents. Thank you parents.

Most of the time, we spent our beach time on our little lagoon right outside our condo. It was a great place for Celia to practice being a Hawaii princess and jump waves with Papa (in the background of the umbrella picture). It was also a fabulous place for Sabrina to hang out with Nana. Albeit a bit windy, our little lagoon was perfect. Not too crowded. Nice warm water. Snorkeling. Then we have proof that Tom and I went swimming at Waikiki with some strangers (where Tom gashed open his toe on coral... more on our day to Honolulu later...) and the sweet surfers we watched on the North Shore from our car while we were eating shave ice. Mmmm.

Hawaii: Where We Stayed

2011-04-04T12:23:00.003-08:00

The greatest part of this trip to Hawaii was where we stayed. It was a 3 bed 3 bath condo on the ground floor right on the beach and with a fabulous 1-foot sand-bottom pool. Here are the pictures. There's a porch on which we could Skype Tom's parents. Then the dining area which Celia would set up every morning with coasters and apples. There's also the gourmet kitchen and the giant opening lanai which connected to the yard. Celia would run down to stand on the rock to look at the beach every morning. The views of the sunset were also fabulous from our little porch/yard area. (We're the second opening in the last picture.)

Hawaii: the airplane

2011-03-30T09:23:00.007-08:00

The airplane ride is about five hours and forty-five minutes to Hawaii. We went there right in the middle of the day. We saw the beautiful mountains peaking out from the clouds. It was Sabrina's first flight. I nursed her to sleep because I thought we were leaving, and then we ended up stuck in the airplane grounded for another hour and by the time we actually left, she was wide awake again. But she did eventually go back to sleep for 3 hours of the flight (can't get the picture to not load upside-down... odd). Then she held Celia's arm while Celia watched a movie. Celia colored, played, read, watched movies, and ate the yummy airline cookies... which, of course, fit perfectly on the tray-table cup holder. Oh, and she insisted we take a picture of her frowny face.

Hawaii Family Pics

2011-03-29T07:03:00.006-08:00

I need to post about our week-long trip to Hawaii, Celia turning 3, her animal birthday party, and Sabrina starting rice cereal, but for now, I'll post the pictures we took in the hours between taking my parents to the airport and us going ourselves. Oh, and so I don't forget, our conversation last night...

It had been a long, eventful day and it was 9PM, Sabrina was taking a bath and we were all in the bathroom watching her splash. We had forgotten Family Home Evening, so I tried to do a really fast lesson (the first line was literally the whole lesson. No mention of Jesus):

Me: For Family Home Evening, we're going to talk about Patience. Patience means...?

Celia: Waiting.

Me: Waiting nicely. Good. So what did we learn about today at Family Home Evening?

Celia: um. I dunno. Jesus?

Me: And patience. Jesus was very patient because he waited...?

Celia: I dunno. Heavenly Father?

Me: nicely. He waited nicely.

She's all ready for seminary answers...

This morning, she was desperately screaming for me in her bed. I ran down there, opened the door and say: "What's wrong?" She smiled and said: "I'm just hangin' around."

I'm trying to work on her putting her own clothes on. She's never really cared to so now I'm making her try more. I told her to try putting her pants on (she's totally capable, just lazy I guess) and I'd help her if she got stuck. She put one leg in and gave up: "No. I can't. It's too hard. I'm having a hard day."

Tom adds a Celia Daily from Hawaii:

We got sugar cane juice in Chinatown, Honolulu. She asked: "Daddy do you like your drink?"

I said: "yes, I love it."

and she said: "no, do you like it?"

and I said I loved it again

and she asked if I liked it

I said I liked it and loved it.

She thought about it for a minute and said: "but you don't hug your drink."

Sabrina's Toy

2011-03-16T08:41:00.003-08:00

Before the Iditarod started, we got a new toy for Sabrina. Celia likes it better than Sabrina. She scooted Sabrina over so she could fit in it as soon as I set it up. And then she decided it would be pretty fun to sit in Sabrina's Bumbo and play with the toy too. Sabrina loves just watching Celia play with her new toy.