Weekend happenings

The weather this weekend was beautiful. It's the time of year when we get these 75 degree weekends that make it truly worth living here. We were outside all weekend...with sidewalk chalk, climbed trees and even went to the beach. Caiden managed to fall belly first into the water while he was running from the waves. He had a blast - and we had a very sandy and wet boy to take home with us!

Sophie's second time around

Sophie is finally being loved again. It took Grace a bit longer to get the hang of all the ways Sophie could make her happy...and now she stands no chance at peace again.

Mamani visits SD

Marc's mom came out to visit last week -Mamani is the closest translation to "grandmother" in Farsi and that is what Caiden calls her. We always get so much done when she comes out. Grace had a doctor appointment, I went to the eye doctor and dentist. We went up to Orange County to visit family and we had some friends over to enjoy her delish food!

Caiden also got a much needed hair cut. He did so good during the cut. We turned on an episode of Mickey Mouse and it kept him occupied. There were a few times when the hair fell on his legs and arms and he got freaked out but we quickly brushed it off. She probably cut 2 inches off the back and added a bunch of layers to thin it out. Just wait until you see the photo at the end.

Fery took Caiden to the park every morning and Marc had Monday off so they both took him to his soccer class and then to the park. He's getting so brave and will climb on and up anything.

Caiden is obsessed with putting money in his piggy bank. He got into Fery's purse one night and pulled out a handful of 20's and got so excited. He immediately stood up and looked at us with wide eyes and said, "I've got to put these monies in my piggy bank" and ran to his room. We laughed so hard. We kept telling him, you can't take all of Mamani's money and he would say, "It's my monies. Put it in my piggy bank!"

Here are a bunch of other pictures that were taken over the week.

Fery left this morning and I'm so sad. It gets harder and harder to adjust back to normal life when I have a helping hand all day. Even the little things like going out and running errands by myself is heaven. Or just taking a shower without Caiden barging in or Grace crying is like a spa retreat. Back to reality we go.

Grace 5-months

She is rolling all over the place, from her back to her belly and from her belly to her back. She started this just a few days after her 4-month post. I hate to keep comparing them -but Caiden wasn't even doing this when I posted his 6-month blog post. I was always skeptical about people saying that girls doing things sooner than boys but so far that seems to be the trend.

We pulled out the jumper a few weeks ago. She's starting to spend a little more time in it every day. She loves to be able to see everything going on around her. She pulls at all the toys and manages to hit the buttons to make the music play. She has the cutest little jump -she jumps from tip toe to tip toe back and forth on each foot (Caiden just jumped with both feet up and down).

She's still taking a short nap in the morning, around 10am, and then another one around 1pm. Then usually around 3 or 4pm I can get her to take a 1-2 hour nap. Then we put her down around 7:30/8pm, dream feed her around 10pm and then she wakes up around 3 or 4am to eat again then up for the day around 7:30/8am...then we do it all over again...just.like.clockwork. We're all done swaddling her. She would wake up in the middle of the night after two hours trying to get out then she'd be wide awake after the 5 minute struggle so we stopped and now she's sleeping four or five hours with her arms flayed out.

She is very attentive to what is going on around her, constantly watching what everyone does and grabbing anything in her reach. She's got a fist full of my mashed potatoes, grabs my glasses off my face any chance she gets and loves to put everything in her mouth -feet, fingers, blankets, my hair. I think her feet are her favorite though. We've introduced Sophie the giraffe teether but she's not very interested in it. We'll see if she likes it more when her motor skills get a little better.

We've officially gotten rid of the pacifier! Whenever we'd try to give it to her when she's cranky or tired she just spits it out and cry's louder so I told Marc this is the perfect time to get rid of it. It's been over a week so there's no going back now! But we did introduce a little blanket just like Caiden's (Graces is a pink elephant). When we put her down for a nap I'll throw it on her face and she immediately knows it's time to fall asleep and she'll sleep with it draped over her face or in her hands the entire time.

She smiles A LOT at anyone that will give her the time of day. She's way more social than Caiden was at this age...he was SO serious. She's our little sweetie, precious and darling and she just lights up our life (most of the time) ;)

Peek-a-boo

I took this video 2 weeks ago and I'm finally getting around to posting it. Grace loves when anyone, especially Caiden, plays peek-a-boo with her. This is just downright adorable!

If the video below doesn't work you can watch it here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36x-iUjS7nI