Sneaky Smarty Pants

I know this is proof of what a little genius Tessa is, but it still bothers me. She is not very good at following rules when we're not in the room. If I tell her not to sit on the coffee table, the moment I leave the room, she's on it. This weekend, I had a glass of water on the coffee table and she kept wanting to drink out of it. I told her no and that was Mommy's water. I was on the floor and Ellis was next to me trying to climb onto the hearth. Tessa said "Mommy, look at Ellis" and as I tunred my head I saw her reach for my glass of water. She literally tried to bait & switch me. So now, in addition to all of the OTHER things I have to teach her, I have to teach her NOT to be sneaky.

Mr Moose

Ellis' Doctor's appointment went well. He weighed 19lb 12oz and was 29" (I think) long. This puts him in the 40% for weight and 75% for height. Long and lean, I guess. He still had an ear infection, and since he was just on Amoxicillan a month ago, they decided to put him on Augmentin. Tessa had to get tubes in her ear, so if this Augmentin doesn't work, I'm going to request that we proceed with tubes for Ellis. Tessa was on anti-biotics on and off for almost 4 months and I don't want to repeat that with Ellis.

He is flourishing though and his little personality is starting to show. He is really sweet and always smiling and laughing. But if he does not like the food, he will let you know. I spent all day yesterday making him great food with lots of texture, now that he is older and has teeth. One of the dishes I made is Butternut Squash with tomatoes, cheese, and pasta stars. When he woke up from his nap I gave him some to see how he liked it. He kept giving me this andry look and his whole body started shaking. At first I thought he was trying to poop, but he kept doing it. I finally asked Mike to hand me some mango and fed him some bites of that. He happily ate his mango. Every time I would sneak in a bite of the other stuff he would turn red and grunt and shake. They say it takes four times to get them over a new taste they don't like, but we'll see. I hope he likes the Chicken with Leek, Peas and Carrots I made for him since that's his lunch today.

Milestones

Ellis turned 9 months yesterday and we have his 9mo doctor's appointment on Friday. I cannot beleive he is already NINE months. Three more and he will be ONE. WHAT? He has really mastered crawling, but he really loves standing. He pulls himself up on everything. It makes me really nervous because he is not quite that steady yet and invariable ends up smacking his head on the table or the door or something. I fell like I have to be by his side whenever he has free reign. Somehow, I don't remember this problem with Tessa. She crawled quite early and actually was already walking by 9.5 months. Ellis also has a lot more hair than Tessa did. Tessa really didn't get her first REAL hair cut until she was almost two. Ellis looks like such a little toddler because he has so much hair. He's also big for his age, I'm curious to see where he falls on the charts this week.

Tessa continues to amaze me. She can now count in French, Spanish and German. They are also teaching her Mandarin, but I have no idea if she ever uses it as I don't speak a lick of it. I've held off on German since they are teaching her so many languages in school, but she really seems interested now all of the sudden. She also knows Cat (Katze), Dog (Hund), Duck (Ente), Frog (Frosch) and Sun (Sonne). Frosch and Katze are her favorites. She recognizes when I speak German and will immediately start counting in German. She also seems to understand that my parents friends, Gabi and Uli are German.

This morning she was counting in German and I asked her if she was my little Kraut. She replied "I not a Kraut, I'm Tessa". So there you have it.

Snowmageddon

This was our house on Monday morning.

We are still iced in here in Atlanta. Schools have been closed all week. Luckily the day care opened yesterday for a limited number of hours and was open full-time today. They have also decided to stay open on Monday (MLK Day is normally a holiday). This is good, since I have to work.

The roads are very hit or miss. Some are great and cleared and some are still completely iced over. In general Cobb COunty did a pretty decent job with out streets. From what I hear Gwinnett is in terrible shape. It's kind of silly how one day of snow and the rest of just plain cold days, has shut the city down all week. We were definitely going a little stir crazy. We need to get out this weekend and burn off some extra energy. The temps are also supposed to rise into the 50's, so most of it should melt away.

Snowpacolyps

We had some beautiful snow here Sunday night. Unfortunately, it turned to sleet/freezing rain the next day and Atlanta is living in this snow/ice state right now, and it's not supposed to get above freezing until this weekend. School has been cancelled the last two days and just found out it will be cancelled again tomorrow. Mike (and his stubborn ass) got up early this morning and drove up to Tennessee. Although it's snowed up there also, they apparently handle it a little better and life goes on.

I keep joking, but seriously, I may be hiking with the kids to Sandy Springs tomorrow to see Omi and Opa. Being cooped up in the house for this long is irritating. At least while Mike was here, we could take Tessa outside while Ellis napped. Last night before it got dark, all four of us went for a little walk through the neighborhood. It was nice to get out and get moving. I really can't do that by myself.

One of the plus sides is that I have really been able to watch Ellis develop his crawling. It's starting to look a lot better and more effective. The other thing I have notice is that he REALLY loves to stand. He is pulling himself up on everything and trying to cruise. Now on a side note, for those of you without kids, cruising is the term we use for when babies hold on to furniture and walk around. I have no earthly idea where this term comes from, but that it just what they call it. Anyway, Ellis thinks he's hot stuff just standing there and then tries to be fancy and one hand it or bend over and pick something up. Well, his little bow-legs aren't strong enough to hold himself up yet and he invariably tumbles over. He's taken a couple of falls, but bounces back right away. I finally dropped his mattress on Saturday and am so glad I did. He can sit up by himself also now, and yesterday when I went it to get him he was standing up in his crib. I predict he will be an early walker like Tessa. He just loves it too much.

And I can't remember if I already posted this or not, but another milestone he has achieved is that he now has four teeth. He started cutting that top, fourth tooth over Christmas, but you can definitely see it now. He still says Dada all the time and Rara. I'm sure he'll say Tessa, Sassafrass, Gretchen and Eat before he ever says Mama, but so be it.

Buddha

Well, my little man has started to crawl. He's been rolling around for a while, and the week before Christmas had just started to get up on his hands and knees and rock. The week in between Christmas and New Years, he started crawling. It's still not very pretty or coordinated. It's more a series of lunges, scoots, and army crawls to get to his desired goal, but it is definitely crawling. Now it's Game On!

What's funny is that when we praise Ellis and say "Good job, buddy. Nice crawl" Tessa gets on her hands and knees and starts crawling and sayd "Look at me. See mommy, see daddy." Ans we say, "Yes, good job Tessa. We don't dare want to leave you out."

Yesterday I was even more shocked. I had out Ellis on the floor in the den. He loves to crawl/roll over the fire place. We have those rubber edge/corner protectors on the brick and he like to chew it. But, when I walked back into the den he was on his KNEES! He had pulled himself up onto his knees while leaning on the hearth. He just looked so grown up. He must have some strong arms, because even before he could crawl, he would pull his body over obstacles using his arms. It was kind of funny to watch.

FYI - Buddha is one of Ellis' nicknames that I use. Tessa uses it sometimes also, but will also inform me that his name is NOT Buddha, he's Ellis. Mike like to call him Kat Daddy, which Ellis just loves. He laughs his little butt off whenever Mike calls him that.

Jingle Bells

Here's a funny clip of Tessa and her favorite Christmas song. She loves to jingle while we sing.

New Year

I was off for the week in between New Years and Christmas and had both kids home with me (I think I spent the money we saved on day-care costs on booze to survive). On the 26th Mike, Kirsten and I went to see Cirque du Soleil's Ovo. It was AMAZING and the best Christmas present. Omi and Opa watched the kids for us. On Monday we, of course, had to say bye to Aunt Kirsten and send her off on her mission in Iraq to train Iraqi pilots. It was hard to see her go, but we are very rpoud of her.

Somewhere over the Holidays Ellis got really sick. He had this terrible cough and by Monday morning had a pretty high fever going. I took both of the them to the Doctor Monday afternoon and it turns out BOTH of my kids were sick. Tessa had an ear infection (although you would have never known) and of course Ellis has a bad upper respitory infection. They both are on Amoxicillian and Ellis has to get these breathing treatments four times a day. He was so miserable on Tuesday I felt so bad for him. He didn't eat or sleep much for two days, but finally perked up towards the end of the week. He's doing much better now.

Mike and I rang in the New Years in style! I was wearing my black velour sweat suit and Mike was wearing his jeans and what else, but a 17th Street (it's a surf shop) t-shirt. I cooked our favorite Steak recipe after the kids went to bed and we just watched the "World's Dumbest Criminals" (this show is HILARIOUS) until Midnight. It was perfect.

Christmas

Well, we had a great Christmas and New Year. We went over to my parents house Christmas Eve and had this wonderful Fishermans Chowder that my mom makes. We spent the night over there, which was fun for me. It was like I was a kid again. Mom, Mike, Ellis and I were up early (6:00am) and drank our coffee in peace and quiet. Our tradition is that we can open our stockings as soon as we wake up, but have to wait for the big gifts under the tree. Ellis opened his stocking gifts and it was a really nice to just get to spend some one-on-one time with him. He eventually went back to sleep around 7:30am. Opa and Kirsten finally woke up and beleive it or not, we were all waiting for her Highness to wake up. She normally wakes up at 7:00am and I'm pretty sure Mike finally woke her at 8:45am. She LOVED opening the presents and reaching into her stocking to see what was there. Then she reached into everyone elses stocking in an attempt to get everyones candy.

I made monkey bread as always, so we had breakfast and then finally all moved into the Living Room to open our presents. In the past we always took our time, with Dad distributing the gifts. We would wait and watch everyone open thier presents. It seemed to make Christmas last longer. Well, it doesn't work like that with a 2-yr old. Ellis was still sleeping, but Tessa was in present-opening mode. She just kept picking up gifts from under the tree (it didn't matter who they belonged too) and started to open. IN an effort to remove those said gifts from her grasp, they were quickly distributed to the proper recipients. Tessa of course go to help Mommy and Daddy open thier presents also. She loved all of her presents and had a blast. Later on when Ellis finally woke up,. she helped him unwrap his presents (and showed him how to play with this new toys).

Mike went up to see his older kids later that afternoon while we all just had a lazy Christmas Day. We managed to get both kids down for a nap at the same time. At some point it started snowing, so we actually had a White Christmas (1st time in Atlanta since '93 - which I don't remember). It was the big, beautiful, fluffy kind of snow.

For Christmas Dinner, mom made Lamb Chops that Dad grilled and this wonderful potato dish that you bake in the oven with bacon and onions (YUMMY in my tummy). It was really good and we drank some really good red wine with it. Mike made it back in one piece and we decided to stay one more night because of snow.

It was a perfect Chritsmas.