Sunday Playdate With Clara

We had the girls' good friend, Clara, over on Sunday with her Mom (Amy) and Dad (Bo). Clara inspired Evelyn from to go to the potty and Amy took her to the potty for the first time! Clara is just a month younger than the girls, but we always learn a lot from her. She's wearing a dress her Mommy wore when she was her age! How circa 1975-ish! [Sylvia wasn't interested in being photographed.

Playing Together

The girls had a blast at a playground after naps on Saturday. They were so cute watching these bigger boys play. Then, we went for ice cream and to Trader Joes. Mommy needed a few things and then always gets them stickers. Again, sorry for the video quality, I can't see what I'm filming, so I'm lucky they are in the frame at all.

Doggie Lucy

Next weekend we are dog sitting for Mommy's friend's dog. The friend is Kamela and her dog, a cock-a-poo, is named Lucy. The girls LOVED meeting her. Evelyn is so gentle and loving to small-ish dogs. Sylvia is too, but not as interested.

Showering

When Mommy showers on the weekends, the girls like to shower too. Here are are post shower/play. Do you like Sylvia's shower cap?

Tuesday Playdate

On Tuesday, Miss JuJu, Wyatt and baby Gresham came to play! Sylvia is very interested in holding baby Gresham, who weighs about as much as she does. She's very sweet with him.

Potty Progess Report

Sylvia is doing GREAT with pee-pee training. She was awarded Dora underware and proudly wore them for 2 days (don't worry, they have 9 pairs). She tells us when she has to go and doesn't have accidents. We have the routine down when we are out. Pretty much when I have to go, I bring them to the potty with me. Girl #1 goes, the other stands by the door with their hands on their head (too much gross stuff to touch). Then girl #2 goes and the other stands at the doors. There's a lot of "don't touch that, put your hands on your head, that's yucky." Then, Mommy goes. We then wash hands (I have to pick each of them up, of course). It doesn't take too long. Besides touching things, the other thing that I have to watch out for is Evelyn peeking under nearby stalls. Some women are slightly amused and thing it's cute....others, not so much. I apologize and it's slightly embarrassing.


However, with all this success, Sylvia complains her "butt hurts." It's because she has to poop, but refuses to go (there's no diaper rash). She saves it up for naps, when she's in a pull up. Then she tells me her butt doesn't hurt anymore. Honestly, I think she's doing it while she sleeps because she wakes half into her nap crying to be changed. We'll work on it. I think we might put her in bed with her Dora underware and she if she keeps her clean. I really just want her to be grossed out enough not to do it. I doubt I will have a 3 year old pooping in her pants, so I'm not worried. She's mastered pee-pee, and I'm so proud of her. Her reward for having a big poopie on the potty is a half of an ice cream sandwich. She's very excited about that and often asks to see the sandwich in the freezer. She's never had one before, so it's new and exciting!

Little Bit of Country

Evelyn has a definite twang. I'm not sure where she's getting this cute little accent, but it's very strong when she says certain things, like "right there". I think it's her Indiana roots coming out (my Dad's side have accents). We joke that Evelyn is a little bit of country and Sylvia is a little bit of rock-n-roll. They are so funny.

Growing Feet

Around mid-June, I bought the girls some cute sandals. Sylvia's were size 5.5 and Evelyn size 5. Sylvia still wants to wear these shoes and I think she finally realized why we say no. She's now in a size 7. Evelyn's feet are so small and narrow. She can still wear her size 5's, but can manage her sisters 5.5's. Notice the painted toes. They love to be like Mommy and want me to paint their toes.

Weekend Fun

This weekend was busy and FUN! To top it off, the girls were ANGELS. I don't know if I could ever say that about an entire weekend, but they were soooo well-behaved. Almost eerie.


Friday afternoon, I took the girls to a new spray park.

Saturday morning we played downstairs (see videop of Sylvia pushing Evelyn in the wagon...she's so strong!), went to the pool, hand lunch and then got poured on! We were already wet, it didn't matter! Saturday afternoon, we had the Venner's over (Jason, Kelly, Lucas (2.5) and Marlow (9 months) and Melissa and her boyfriend. The kids played nicely (having a blast singing ring around the rosey) and then we had a great meal together.


Sunday, it was yucky weather so we took the girls to the bounce house place (tons of bounce houses). David even bounced around! We grabbed lunch at our favorite Mexican restaurant (Rio Grande). The girls were so good and Evelyn announced to everyone "bye bye everybody" when leaving and cracked up the whole place. After naps we hit the pool. They are getting so good at swimming with and without their floaties. We are continuing swim lessons into the Fall and Winter with a weekly session on Sunday morning.


Good fun!

Puppy

Evelyn loves her puppy. She calls her pup-pup. We don't let her leave the house with it (for fear it will be lost), but it's what she talks about most and carries around. She has about 12 dolls/animals in her bed, along with 2 blankets and a pillow. She has names for them all...Mommy, Daddy, Grammommy, Angela, etc. Sylvia on the other hand is a purist. She likes one blanket, her pillow (sometimes), 1 doll and a few books. If she accidently puts another doll/animal in her bed she often later cries "I don't want it" and wants us to take it out of her room. So particular these girls!

Loving Greens & Friends

My girls are oddballs, they love to eat raw spinach and lettuce of any kind. I tried to serve some up to their friend Lucas on Saturday when we had the Venner's over, but his parents just laughed at me. Sylvia is trying to "cheers" Lucas in the above picture (he didn't touch the lettuce).

Today's Play Date

Of course, their playdate involved water play too! This time nearly naked and Sylvia hoards the buckets!

Potty Progess

Sylvia did great yesterday! Until 5pm she was in her same cars underware. They went outside to play and got all sweaty and guzzled water. Then, she had a few accidents. Mostly just started to go and then had a huge pee-pee on the potty. She didn't go #2 all day on Wednesday.

Thursday morning she had a tiny #2 on the potty!!!! She earned 5 red M&Ms for her first successful #2 on the potty! Good work, Sylvia!

Also, they both earned 3 M&Ms because they went to the potty all by themselves and put on their undies and shorts back on. Sylvia did this Wednesday night and Evelyn first thing Thursday. Yeah!

Sylvia Potty Training Progress

Sylvia is doing great. She is earning M&M's all day long. Besides going #2, she is doing great! We told her the first time she goes to #2 on the potty she gets 5 M&Ms. Today she is in underware for the first time! She was excited to pick out Tinkerbell and then opted for Cars (the Disney movie...they are for girls). I have a feeling there may be some morning fights over underware (yes, they are sharing...is that gross?). And, I sold all my extra diapers so we are officially done with that phase (and spending up to $100/mo on diapers...at the beginning it was more like $150/mo). Hello big girls. I promised I would get her Dora underware, so a trip to Target is on the "to do" list.

Will post a great picture of her so proud in her undies and will keep you posted. We are also incentivizing the girls to go by themselves. Sometimes their butts, buttons or zippers get in the way of being completely independent. They are great at turning on/off the water, getting soap and washing/drying their hands. I'm so proud of my little ladies.

Summer Fun

We are spending lots of time at the pool this summer. To supplement our outdoor water fun, they enjoy going to a new spray park nearby. This week on the program, they went to a library beach party on Monday, Tuesday they went to the pool, Wednesday to the spraypark, Thursday to playgroup and the pool in the afternoon. Tons of summer water-related fun!

Obsession with Tinker Toys

Every day we play with tinker toys. They make all sorts of things with their wild imaginations. Sylvia made this cool windmill thing all by herself. Evelyn wanted to pose for a picture.

Sylvia Started Potty Training

Last week, Sylvia finally got over her fear of the potty ("No scared Mommy, No"). She had a lot of fun sitting on the potty, but nothing ever came out. After hearing great success stories from friends on their potty training efforts, we picked up some M&Ms to help incentize her along. Neither have had M&Ms, but often ask for chocolate when asked what they want for breakfast (weird...the only chocolate they get is in an occassional granola bar). Evelyn also joined in the fun (if someone knows how to not reward the other kid who's doing the same, but doesn't need to be rewarded, please tell me). So, Sylvia was told she got 1 for pee, 2 for poop. After several attempts with no success (and a few tears because she wasn't getting M&Ms) and pushing fluids, she finally got it. She went pee-pee all day on Sunday. Poop was another story. First time she almost got to the toilet, but didn't quiet get there in time. Second time she went in her pull up. It was a good start. And, you should watch how carefully they choose their prize. It takes up to 30 seconds for them to select the coveted M&M!


If she's successful for a few days, we will put her in underware! I'm pretty sure we are packing up all the diapers and giving them away.

Go Romley Girls!!! At 2 years and just over 3 months, Sylvia has jumped on the potty bandwagon. I estimate I will save about $75/month on diapers! We'll still have pullups for occassional long trips or when I don't want them to have an accident in their cute outfits and at naps and nighttime. When we transition them to a toddler bed, that's when we'll work on potty training while they sleep.

Pool & Dinner with Lemon's

We invited the Lemon's (Jon, Jen, Hanna, and baby Quinn) over to our pool and lugged stuff there to grill after naps (busy day after the bday party in the morning). Unfortunately, it rained and the pool closed. The girls still had a blast playing outside while we were hopeful it would re-open. We all got too hot and sweaty (and baby Quinn really needed to crawl around), so we finally decided to go home and the boys grilled in the downpouring rain. Good, summer fun!

Birthday Party

The girls went to Maya's 3rd birthday party on Sunday morning. It was a princess theme. They made crowns and dressed up. Can you tell Sylvia got into it? And, they loved these powered cars.

PS My flip video is partially broken, so the videos are often not centered because I can't see the frame as I film!

4-H Fair

We had a blast at the Fairfax County 4-H Fair on Saturday. The girls pet lots of animals (pigs, goats, sheep, cows, horses, baby chickens), milked a goat, went on a carousel and down a big slide. Oh, let's not forget how much of Mommy's kettlecorn they had!

Morning Learning Hijacked by Need to Clean

Today the girls had a great time painting "E"s and elephants and five (theme of week is E and 5)with colored ice (David thought they were jello shooters and wondered what Angela was up to!). Then, the cleaners came and Sylvia followed them around with her vacuum...without pants, of course. Angela said she "lost all control of learning activities" when the cleaners started to vacuum. Also, don't you dig their new art smocks?

Another Busy Weekend

Daddy has been gone a good bit lately, three whole days this week and three last week. This weekend we were happy he was home. On Friday, Mommy's very good college friend (Amy), her husband (Jason) and their 6 week old baby (Evan) came by for a visit on their way home to Chicago. The girls LOVE babies as much as puppies and want to hold, touch and kiss them. Baby Evan was very sweet and no one heard him at all at night.

Saturday, after our friends left and we had naps, we visited our friends the Turners for a fun playdate with Maya (almost 3) and unexpected gourmet dinner al fresco. What a nice treat. .

Sunday, we hit the pool in the morning (the girls are soooo good at swimming in the adult pool) and had lunch there. After naps we skped with Grammommy and Gramps and earlier we skyped with Grandpa and Debi. Mommy got a new computer so no more technical difficulties! The rest of the afternoon we rode bikes, pulled weeds, played in the sandbox and then came inside to color because it was HOT.

One picture was taken. Will post later.

Learning ABCs and Counting

I've been so impressed with Evelyn and Sylvia's learning abilities lately. Not only can they count to 10, often they go to 12, 13, 14, 15. Once Sylvia counted to 16!

As for the alphabet, somedays they can get through half of the song, or skip some of the middle. They always can say up to H. And, what's really great, is they know by sight (and out of order) ALL of the letters except J, K, Q, U, V, W, X. Yes, they know Y and start this weird arm jerking thing and yell YO, YO, YO. It's almost like they are trying to rap, but they are referring to a yo, yo. So funny.

Pretty impressive for 2 years 3 months. Well, at least, I think it's impressive.

Love to Bounce

Ever since our friends had the party with the bounce house, the girls are crazy bouncers. Angela and I took them to a place with a ton of bounce houses, so they bounced for an hour. Then, I discovered the Rody Horse and had to get one! They are still bouncing, especially Sylvia. For the first time ever, they want to play with Rody or tinkertoys BEFORE eating dinner. That's a big deal.

First Movie and TV Watching

This summer some of the local theatres are offering $1 movies. Angela took the girls to see Yogi Bear. They sat through the trailers and 40 minutes of the movie (1 hour total).

Also, in entertainment news, while the girls don't watch much TV at all, I've been trying to get them to sit down and watch while I cook dinner. Can you believe I WANT them to watch TV? It's especially important to have a few minutes to cook becuase we are now trying to eat dinner together when David is home, and by 6pm so they aren't chewing on my leg! We've been successful the last week or so. Also, on Saturday, I actually got ready while they watched Dora! 15 minutes of free time to shower and get dressed (David was traveling). It was almost liberating.

Welcome Angela

We're happy to share that Angela is now living with us. She's taken up residence in the loft, which is a big room above our main living level with a full bath and gigantic closet. We are excited to have her, for as long as she wants to stay.

Fun at Home

Wildlife Central

We've posted before about birds, deer, fox, and ducks in our yard. Here's a box turtle or Terrapene (you UMD fans) we found just hanging out by the sandbox. The girls were totally into him and tried to feed him lettuce (they are omnivores, but he wasn't interested).

Fun with Food

The girls love to help in the kitchen. Here they are making their own "face" sandwiches and ants on a log.

Weekend Update (pictures to come)

We had a blast this weekend, besides Sylvia having a little cold, which started with Angela and now David has it too. Just a matter of time for Evelyn and Mommy! Friday, after naps we had a play date with Max and Ella, along with all the other siblings (Olivia, 8 weeks; Melina, 8 months; Mia 6 years). It was full of chaos and fun, especially when they all ate dinner together! Saturday, Evelyn and Mommy ran errands, including checking out the Kid's Club at the gym Mommy just joined. She seemed to love it, but we'll see how it goes when she's dropped off there on Monday! Saturday afternoon we went to a big adult party that was incredibly kid-friendly with 2 babysitters, play area and a bounce house. The girls had a blast! Sunday, we hit the pool and then did yard work. It was sooo hot, the girls got into the kiddie pool in the backyard in their clothes.

The week ahead will include field trip to a park on Monday, play group and a pool playdate on Tuesday, library storytime on Wednesday, pool and music program on Thursday, and a trip to a big bounce house on Friday! This weekend we have visitors coming and 2 parties. I'm exhausted already!

First Bounce House

The girls have been around a few bounce houses, but not interested in getting in. Sylvia is quick to tell you when she's "Scared Mommy." Well, this time we were at a friend's party and they had a bounce house and nannies to watch the kids. We shoved them in and they had a blast. Sylvia now says "No scared bounce house Mommy." And, they stayed up the latest since they were infants (8:54pm). Did they wake up later than normal? NO!

White House 4th of July

Celebrating the 4th of July on the White House lawn is a pretty special place to be. Amos Lee and the band Train played. We had a sitter. (smile)

Trip to Michigan

We headed to Michigan to see Granny for 5 days! Grammommy, Gramps, and cousin Alexis (12) came too. Uncle Kirk was there as well (he lives up there). The last day, the Benson's came up too -- Uncle Gage, Aunt Jen and cousins Lydia (5), Calvin (3) and Vivian (1). It was so fun! Here are a few videos from our trip (note my flip video screen is broken so I can't few what I'm filming, hence the strange framing).
The girls were very excited to fly on an airplane. On the return flight the pilot let Sylvia push buttons in the cockpit and they were both given wings. They both now say they are pilots! They did great on the flights there and back, which total 7 hours...drive to the Baltimore airport (1hr), flight (1.5 hours), drive to the cottage (1.5 hours), plus the airport check-in, getting rental car, etc. Our only rough point was on the drive to the cottage (it was 1pm) and they couldn't sleep, so there was a lot of screaming.
We did so much while we were there, including lots of fun at the lake and beach (Granny's lake doesn't have a beach, just a dock, so we went to the beach down the road for fun in the sand, even in cloudy/cold days it didn't stop them from running in with dresses on), trip to the Uncle Kirk's property to see his new chickens, petted many horses at the Horse Show, made butter and fed cows at County Dairy Fair (and enjoyed lots of free ice cream). We even got to celebrate Uncle Gage's 35th birthday.
Most importantly, the girls (and Mommy) got some quality time with their amazing Great Granny (age 90!). She's in great health and sharp as a whip. At night we played a family favorite card game (backward Rummy) and she always beat us. The girls even kind of sat still for her to read stories one night.
A special thanks to Grammommy for making all this happen. She brough the packnplays, seats for eating, lots of toys, bought all the food and even retreated to a bed and breakfast when we reached capacity. She made several trips to make sure the cottage was ready (hiding medicines and breakables was a very smart thing to do!). We all know how much effort it took and we appreciated every single thing.
Not to get ahead of ourselves, but I'm starting to think about us going back sooner than next year, which was our original plan.
Pictures coming in another post.