Kiddies

Oh my goodness, Kalea is growing up. It's funny how in the midst of all the everyday stuff when I maybe feel like nothing is really happening, I can snap a few pictures and realize just how fast these kids are changing. Kalea is surprising me so much lately. Up until this point in time she hasn't been a real sentence maker, and I've been thinking about ways to help her with it, etc... In fact I've been a bit worried about how much she actually knows & understands because her words just haven't been there the way I thought they should by now. Ha, funny me thinking that my expectations are the be all end all! Oma Behr sent these matching dresses home with Steve yesterday and when we put them on this morning Kalea says "Look mom, it's hearts!" I was floored and excited! Yay! Smarty pants kid, she refuses to repeat shape names or match shapes with me ever and then all of a sudden she knows what a heart is?! She has also been asking me to help her with a lot of things lately, and not just "Help please" but "Mom...mom... help me button?" etc... At least she's letting me know that she is indeed retaining something, I feel much better knowing that she's getting it a little bit. Kalea is also helping me keep Brynlee and her dolls on the straight and narrow. I will randomly hear her with her dolls "No, 2 minutes, stairs" today it was "No Brynlee, not nice, 2 minutes" (while pointing her bunny ear fingers towards the stairs) She's also tried to give me time-out but I am a lot more stubborn than she is. Kalea is also pretty sensitive to others. If she sees anyone crying or hurt she will look concerned and if she knows you she will come up to you, stroke your arm or leg and say "You alright/ok? You hurt?" in a mall or place where she doesn't know the person sometimes she'll go stand beside them and ask the same things or she'll ask me if they're alright, etc... it's really quite sweet. For having such an intense little personality, she is extremely aware of other people's feelings and I really hope she always has that sensitivity to the people around her.

Brynlee is definitely a "second child". She has all the classic symptoms. She is definitely an attention seeker and loves any bit of attention she can steal away from Kalea. I'm finding that she's a lot more attached to me than I thought so I find her playing around me throughout the day, and quite often she gets bumped over because she is sneaky. For being able to be so quiet she is surprisingly louder than Kalea, and let's us know when she's not happy with something. In other ways she completely goes with the flow and is a lot more flexible than I ever thought a child of mine could be. She is starting to shadow Kalea which makes for all sorts of fun and games. As much as she enjoys shadowing Kalea, she is not a push-over by any means and lately she is the "enforcer" with Kalea, which is pretty funny to watch. Still attached to her "soo soooooooooo" (I wish I could type in her voice, her inflections are so great) Brynlee will not go down without one, much like Kalea at this age. By the end of the summer I am hoping and praying to be completely done with the soother phase of our current life, although it's nice to have something to quiet Bryn's racket, most days I find it really interferes with her speech. She is definitely a talker, and thanks to Kalea talking more, Brynlee is picking up and copying words really well. She is also starting to like to play with Kalea's "Little People" and I find her under the kitchen table playing pretend with them, it's definitely one of the cutest things she does. Brynlee likes to ask me if she can "corer" (aka color/colour) but then just proceeds to eat the crayons&wrapper/pencil/marker/chalk etc... it's a never-ending cycle of eating foreign objects in this house!

This is a really great stage for both the girls, I'm enjoying it most of the time... k, well except for the times when Kalea takes off at our Mom & Tots leaving a trail of clothing and then her diaper behind her. That I don't enjoy as much, but you have to laugh (and people do) it really is hilarious. I hope nobody feels bad about laughing at her when she does stuff like that, no amount of "straight-facing" it will deter her from doing it. Laugh away people! Anyways, back to the point... These kids are awesome, they are crazy, spunky, full of attitude girls, but we are loving them so much! Some days are INTENSE, like today how they were both constantly asking me for food and snacks and I wanted to shoot myself, and then there are these magically mellow days where they listen and play so nice and give me hope that my efforts are helping to mold them into decent little human beings. I'm really hoping that we have one of those days tomorrow, please oh please!