double four month flashback!

the goose.

the roo.

happy fourteen months sylvi!

have bag, will travel.

sitting is serious business.

and alot of fun!

HAPPY FOURTEEN MONTHS SYLVI!

i know i say this every month, but really? i cannot believe sylvi is fourteen months old already! she's been up to alot of new and fun things in the last month. it's been a blast to see her personality develop and for her to become less of a baby and more of a toddler. i am still not ready to admit that she might actually be a toddler soon, but we're working on that.

so what's she been up to? quite a bit of talking and signing, not surprisingly. she is picking up more signs in general and also starting to use several signs together to say what she thinks/feels and then what she needs. she has started signing "more" and "food" together, as well as "help" and "out" (usually in reference to the bath tub or toy basket or anything she can't crawl out of on her own). sylvi has also added a few new words to her vocabularly as well: snack, nap, out, and 'pabo' in reference to her little buddy pablo, whom she spends her wednesday mornings with.

this has also been a BIG month for mimicking and immitating. as usual, she wants to do whatever isa is doing-- this includes waddling around the house in isa's ballet skirts and sitting in the "big girl" chairs that go with the kiddie table. she also gets a kick out of wearing my clothes as well, as you can see from the hat she's sporting in these pictures. she spends alot of time going through the hat/glove basket finding everyone else's hats she wants to try on.

ah yes, good times, good times in the life of sylvi. keep it up kiddo. we love you!

soles 4 soles

isa was a big helper today! we were sorting and pairing donated shoes for Soles4Souls. thanks to some generous local friends, these shoes are on their way to Haiti, to be donated to children in the aftermath of the earthquake. a good pair of shoes can be key to keeping kids healthy and injury free after disasters, when sewage, glass, metal and other dangerous debris are everywhere. isa enjoyed matching up all the pairs (the girls loves to match things!) and sylvi was happy to supervise the operation.

have some extra shoes lying around? go to the Soles4Souls website to find out how to donate them to kids in need around the world.

speaking of Snuggles...

the time has come to make Roo a Snuggles of her own. she has a few blankets that she likes, but she is starting to really like Isa's "snuggle snuggle." as it usually goes, i am sure sylvi won't like her own new blankie nearly as much as her sister's, but we have to atleast try! so after a bit of browsing, there is some very sweet and very soft Heather Ross fabric on the way. let's hope sylvi likes these tadpoles as much as isa's bikes. pictures of the finished product and it's (hopefully) adoring owner to come...

snip, snip!

isa decided yesterday that sylvi needed a haircut and sylvi decided to play along! so they proceeded to play happily together for quite a while. isa was pleased to have a willing participant and sylvi was excited to sit in the big chair while she had her sister's full attention. and she even got to hold isa's beloved Snuggles in the process (which was being used as a smock of course). good times, good times.

cleaning the memory card

watching for daddy to come home, a nightly ritual.

hanging with our buddy natalie.

a little sunday afternoon "it's winter time!" dress up.

lounging

sylvi is role modeling for the rest of us this weekend. there's a whole lotta lounging going on around here. a little bit of work, a little bit of play, and not much else. hope your weekend is equallly enjoyable :)

flash (way!) back

sylvi at two weeks old.

isa at one week old.

we thought we'd flash way back this friday with some wee little baby shots. hard to believe they were ever that small! speaking of which, isa has had a huge growth spurt lately. the little shorty isn't so short anymore, or atleast it seems that way.

a little Etsy love...

we haven't done an Etsy love post in a while and it just so happened that i got something in the mail today that i loooooove, so the timing was good! i have been looking for a calender for isa for a while now and it just so happened that one of my favorite etsyians had her 2010 calender on super sale! woohoo! it's not exactly the "teaching calender" that i had in mind before but it was too cute, and too good of a deal, to pass up on. i knew isa would love it too, so that was even better.

it came in the mail today and it's even sweeter than expected. the quality is great and the illustrations are perfect. i am thinking of cutting off the dates and framing them when the months have passed. doesn't hurt that it came with some equally cute freebies-- an elephant and bunny bookplate and a blank notecard. most of you know how we love elephants around here so this was icing on the cake!

there are some still some calenders left, as well as an entire shop full of beautiful things... so go over to Sarah Jane Studios and check them out!

little bruiser

we thought we'd get some photos of sylvi's first significant boo boo. last night she was crawling over (and trying to stand on) some floor pillows when she took a literal nosedive onto the wood floor. ouch. the pictures don't really do it justice, but she's got a bruised nose and some swelling as well. it actually looks better today than we thought it might. poor little roo was not happy with her swollen nose last night! we don't think it's broken or anything, especially now that the bridge isn't swollen, but it seemed worthy of some blog documentation! good thing she's a tough little cookie, as she also has four top teeth all coming in as well. ouch again.

edited to add: looks like she now has a nice bruise over her left eye as well. the fun continues.

for papa bubba...

there you go-- both of them lounging around watching a cartoon. thought you might like a picture of that ;)

we went out for a walk this afternoon to look for some new bubble bath, with the idea that once we found what we were looking for we'd come home and the girls could actually take that anticipated bubble bath! unfortunately we came home to find no water in the pipes! apparently there was a big water main break on the other side of town, so the much anticipated bath must wait. luckily isa was understanding and sylvi didn't seem to care either. here's hoping all of town won't be without water for too long, because a three year old can only be so patient!

she skis!

after a few sessions of playing around in the yard, we took isa to the groomed cross country track at the golf course today. and it was AWESOME! she had so much fun, as did the rest of us (ok, sylvi was less than pleased with having to ride in the backpack most of the time). the skis worked great for allowing her to "skin" uphill, which was good for practicing keeping them under control and for keeping her balance. when it was time for the downhill she got the hang on bending her knees and leaning forward eventually (we told her to stick out her bum, and that did the trick) as well as slow herself down by making a "pizza wedge" with her skis.

after about a half hour of skiing, and a couple of runs down the sledhill, she asked for a break because, "this is really alot of work!" she also asked to take her skis off because her "toes are tired and so are these skis."

good times, good times. we are hoping to make it over to Targhee sometime soon so she can get some real skiing in, or atleast have fun on the magic carpet!

Relief for Haiti

Mountain Aven Baby is having a RELIEF FOR HAITI WEEKEND. twenty percent of all sales this weekend will be donated to Doctors Without Borders, to bring medical care to those suffering in the aftermath of the quake. Please spread the word.

flashback friday returns!

flashback friday is back! w00t w00t! now that i once again have access to older photos (they were backed up elsewhere when the old computer was crashing. now they are on the new Mac-- yay!) i can surprise the grandparents with the occasional photo flashback. it was hard to choose though, since it's been so long. here is isa at around 12 months old. sylvi actually wore this dress this week and i had to chuckle a little-- it was almost at isa's ankles when she wore it-- cleary sylvi is a bit taller than her sister at the same age!

fairyland

expensive taste and no money?

i just came across this blog and was too excited not to share it! it's perfect for folks like us-- with expensive taste, but without the budget to back it up! unfortunately i can't hammer a nail (straight) but good thing i married someone who can. here's a shout out to daddy pants! now go check out this blog :)

blanket shoot outtakes

she may be getting harder to catch without a blur, but she is still perfect for photoshoots, even if i am a little biased :) look for several new blankets to be available in the shop soon!

sibiling upside and downside

the girls have been sharing a room for about six months now and all in all it's gone really well. a friend asked the other day what it was like for both of them to sleep in the same room. my reply went something like this, "When they're sleeping well, it's great! When they aren't sleeping well, it stinks." and that pretty much sums it up.

we've had some recent developments though that are both heartwarming and incredibly trying. they both seem to be sleeping well at the moment (fingers crossed, no jinxing) and that is fabulous. they wake up at a decent hour each morning, both at about the same time, and we hear them giggling and talking and playing with each other for quite a while before they want to come out. it's beyond cute-- one of those golden moments of raising small children. but all this fun proves to be a little too much at bedtime. the normal routine is that sylvi nurses and then is put in her crib by me each night, at which time she passes out like a log-- dead asleep! then isa finishes her bath and gets her pjs on, reads a story with daddy, and we send her to bed as well. on a normal night, she passes out quickly without incident-- except several times in the last week or so, she has crawled down out of bed, turned on every light in the room, and proceeds to intentionally wake up her sister. to be fair, she is not doing it to be mean. actually quite the opposite. she wants to play! she gives sylvi stuffed animals, talks to her, makes her laugh, etc. while this might seem really cute on one hand, on the other hand it is not so cute at all. it usually ends in one upset toddler who would rather play with her sister than get back in bed and one overtired baby who can't figure out why the sudden party has ended and it's time for sleep again. oy.

sigh. there you have it. we will remind them on this one day when they are in college or maybe on prom night, while we tell every other amusing and embarrassing anecdote we can remember.

chatterbox

sunday was the day that sylvi decided to try out some of her new words. among them was: poop, yes, bubba, and eat. it may be that she is just keen on repeating things she hears often, but it really does seem that she knows what she is saying and not just repeating the sounds. she is also starting to realize the power of her words and signs and asks for things she wants more often. several times yesterday when she was upset and tired, she would walk over and sign bath-- this is her favorite part of the day, so it makes me wonder if she was done with being cranky and tired and would rather just skip straight to bathtime! ha! me too :)

isa ballerina

how cute is a room full of three year olds dancing around in pink leotards? very, very cute! isa had her first ballet class and to say that she liked it would be a huge understatement. the girl is in love. she was like a fish in water-- it was clearly her element! since it was the first class, parents were able to stay and watch (even though isa told me to leave!) so i got to catch of glimpse of it all. i was actually really surprised how well she participated. she was clearly enjoying herself.

the only problem is that now she wants to go to ballet all the time, every day. she was really disappointed to hear that the class is only one day a week. but she was pleased to come out of nap time with her own package of ballet goodies from the mail. her first pair of slippers, two skirts and some new leotards. watch out world, isa ballerina has been born!