dia 8

So yesterday was Emilia’s half birthday.  In celebration (and because we had some bananas that were looking a little worse for wear) we made banana cake (recipe from Baking by Dorie Greenspan).  It turned out delish and my little helper loved adding the sprinkles and licking the beaters.

the aftermath.

I had the sprinkles (leftover from Valentine’s Day) in a bowl for Emilia to pinch and then sprinkle on the cake.  Of course my girl had other ideas and decided to upend the bowl onto the cake so of course all the sprinkles ended in a pile.

 

making sure every last sprinkle is out of the bowl.

our poor, semi-crushed cake.  at least it still tasted good!

** POTTY UPDATE: Sorry this is graphic, but whatever…As of today, Emilia is a peeing/pooping on the potty CHAMP.  She has pooped successfully twice today and came home completely dry in her pull-up.  She’s so proud of herself she could just burst, as are we.  Clearly some celebrating is in order this weekend!**

dia 7

So today’s picture is neither super artistic or, for that matter, all that flattering.  Wednesdays as I think I’ve mentioned before are CRAZY busy around here.  We hit the road early with drop off at school, Marcus picks her up while I’m still at work and then she spends the afternoon with Ana.  She refuses to nap while Ana is here so by the end of the day she’s beat (hence she was in bed tonight before her usual bedtime of 7:30).  What I think is so funny here is what she’s wearing.  Emilia has gotten in to picking out her own outfits when given the choice and this is what she put on while with Ana this afternoon.  When I asked her why she picked the pants she said “Oh I love it those pants” and the shirt “but mama I hot” (the pants are corduroy).  What a fruit loop.

Potty Update: The potty is going exceedingly well.  I’m still holding my breath for some sort of major disaster, but up to now there hasn’t been one.  This morning she wanted to go to school wearing “calzones de princesas” but I wouldn’t let her and sent her to school in a pull-up instead (with two back-up outfits, just in case).  She peed at school no problem, but pooped in her pull-up – oops.  She’s peed all day long without a single accident so I guess we’ll have to do some more work on the number 2s.  Fingers crossed!

dia 6

So a last minute picture, but I have to stick with my project…

We (and by ‘we’ I mean really Marcus) have really been pushing the whole potty issue… with limited success.  She definitely knows how to do it, but just doesn’t care to and is happy to keep her diapers on (though that’s slowly changing – she hates having a diaper put on – hurrah!)  Weekends when we’re home we try to stick with just ‘calzones de princesas’ (princess underpants).  Marcus is far better at this then I am, because I’m not willing to clean up all the little puddles.  This evening we had one of our neighborhood friends over, Connor, who’s fully potty trained.  Emilia would stalk him every time he went to the bathroom and finally went herself twice!  She’s so proud of herself (as you can tell) as are we.  Good job my Puchis!

dia 5

So this weekend was finally FINALLY a beautiful weekend – in the 60s and bright blue skies – you can’t ask for better in February.  We ‘celebrated’ with a lot of outside time and our first trip to get ice cream of the season.

Emilia loves playing ‘gol’ (aka soccer) with her Papa.  She does have pretty decent coordination, but of course, in her version of the game throwing is also allowed.

the gnomos or gnomes – she’s seriously a little obsessed with them.  oftentimes she sneaks out of the garage to say goodbye to them.  she’s till talking about how “Gnomo” (our Elf-on-a-Shelf from Christmas) is no longer here but up at the North Pole with Papa Noel.  When I snapped these pics, she was actually talking to them. 

 

of all the flavors available – of course she would pick 'cotton candy’ – yuck.

then it was off to the park for some playground fun.

dia 4

We went to storytime at Barnes & Noble this morning just Emilia and I (Marcus heard the siren call of the gym instead).  I thought she’d love it because they were reading Olivia stories (a current fave), but she was too busy playing and looking at the million other books in the Children’s Section.  Oh well. 

dia 3

No tan interesante, pero bueno… parte del proyecto es grabar la vida diaria y aqui esta…

look at those chapped lips.  so sad.  her sensitive skin is going to be a constant i fear. :(

dia 2

sitting with her babies – Tasha in carrier, bebe grande (big baby) in her arms and yes, baby Jesus (we’re still talking about him – two months after Christmas) in the stroller (with George riding shotgun)

In my update I forgot to mention several important details…

• the girl LOVES to sing – current faves are B-I-N-G-O and “Wheels on the Bus” (especially the line when the babies cry on the bus – cracks her up).
• the “I love yous” are constant (and in my mind, can’t occur often enough).  She’ll say it if you do something she wanted you to do (like give her a cookie) or if you’re scolding her for doing something naughty.  She also loves the line “you my friend” - *melt*.
• she’s all about pretending to be a baby – she’ll talk in this (annoying) baby voice and insist on being carried around like a baby.  On that subject we’re all about…
• BABIES – she’s obsessed.  If she sees babies when we’re out and about i pretty much have to hold her back from going and attacking them.  when baby Brooks is over (Kyrie’s brother) I have to remind her constantly not to get all up in his face.  She plays with her own babies all the time – feeding them, diapering them, putting them to bed and in time outs when they ‘jumpy the bed’  She calls them the names of all her friend’s baby siblings…it’s a little out of control.

Hence today’s picture…

ah yes, the velasco chin… must start saving for the jaw surgery now! 

rocking strawberry shortcake and singing a lullaby.  s.s. actually belongs to the Bug – that thing is about 30 years old at this point – a classic!

penance, dia 1

So several of my friends (both bloggers and non-bloggers alike) have either started and/or completed a “365 project” or some variation thereof.  It’s a quite popular thing for people who blog about their children to do.  Basically it entails committing to posting a picture a day for a year or for some time frame.  The latest person I know to do this Anne, Kate’s mama. 

In this season of penance and in lieu of giving something up, I’ve decided to take something on and do my own 365 project, except this will be a 40 days project.  I’m hoping to ‘atone’ for my sins of not blogging for so long and letting so many gaps go by.  Today as I watched my baby girl hop up into the car by herself and half buckle herself into her carseat (she can’t do the other half) proudly stating “I do it all my-self!” I had to choke back tears realizing it was yesterday she was this tiny little thing who couldn’t do a thing all herself.  The trite expression that “time flies” when you have children doesn’t do it justice.  Other people tell you to appreciate every second, and you think you are, until you realize you’ve gotten swept up in the minutiae of day to day life and you haven’t really been paying attention.  Time doesn’t fly – it is a blur.  One day you think “oh, I can’t wait until she can fill-in-the-blank”, the next minute you’re clutching you’re baby (who’s not such a baby anymore), and praying for time to just slow down and please let this one second last a little longer.  Time, it seems, is a heartbreaker.

Wednesday was the first day of this jobber… I’m going to be a day behind it seems already.  Wednesdays are a full day for Emilia… school in the morning, followed by an afternoon with Ana, the nanny.  Fortunately I got home early and we got some good playtime in together before it was time to start making dinner.  She spent ages quietly playing with her bracelets – moving them from arm to arm.  Girl loves to accessorize!

something old, something new

So, after much urging, I’m trying out using Windows Live for the blog.  It’s interesting – I haven’t, of course, quite gotten the hang of it, but it definitely shows potential.  I hated how slow blogger could be, hence my posts have become less and less frequent.  Here’s hoping that changes.

In my last post I mentioned that Emi went to the circus with one of our neighborhood friends, Connor.  They had a blast…

 a little pre-show dancing

A little more dancing…

29 month update

So, it's been a while... and now I'm trying to upload pictures via Flickr instead of Blogger because Blogger is so darn slow and everyone swears by Flickr. Of course, I'm not sufficiently technologically savvy to get more than one pic posted, but I'm sure I'll figure it out eventually.

I realized the other day that I have been very lax in giving monthly updates regarding our sweet girl's development. And so, without further ado...

Popular Emi-isms

* "I go peepee potty one minute/uno tres. (When we ask her when she's going to start going pee pee on the potty).

* "Silly Willy"

* "Stinky Winky" (especially when there's a stinky diaper involved).

* "Ms. susan say 'walking feet.'" (Ms. Susan is one of her teachers - her big expression is "inside voices, walking feet!")

* "I jumping like a frog... hopping like a bunny... etc"

* "I twirling like a bawaweena" (ballerina).

* "Ok... well... I just don't know."

* "Mama, are you happy?"

* "I love you." (heart melting).

*Emilia talks a lot more in English now... overall it's probably 50-50 English/Spanish, but I try to always talk to her in Spanish even if she responds in English (at least I know she understands what I'm saying to her). She has tons of new words in both languages.

*She loves to "read" - will take a book like "Oso Pardo, Oso Pardo" (Brown Bear, Brown Bear) and recite it while she flips through the pages using the pictures as cues. It's quite amazing. She'll even do it with inflection in her voice. Hilarious. Must video this.

*Talks about travels all the time - constantly talking about how we're going to the beach in a few weeks, going to Quito to see 'afia (her cousin), going to New York to see "Sebe" (our friends' daughter). Uses the phrase "last day..." a lot to mean either "yesterday" or "last time" or "one time."

*Pretty much only uses the feminine pronouns "she" and "shes" in English for everything.

*Loves to use her easel to paint with her paintbrushes or with her markers. This is a HUGE step for the girl who a few months ago didn't like to get paint on her hands or get dirty. She still doesn't like chalk (am guessing because of the messiness factor).

* Adores her ballet class.

Other notables:

* Emilia went to the circus for the first time this past month. We went with our neighbor Connor, and his mama. She loved it and didn't even notice when the kid two rows behind us projectile vomited cotton candy (only at the circus).

*She went to her first 'drop off' party this past month as well. Her friend Betsey had a ballerina party at the Y and could be left with the Y staff (and the bday girl's parents) and we could leave. Of course, Emilia wouldn't let me leave and was kind of overwhelmed by the whole 'dressing up' experience, but enjoyed herself anyway.

* We now have a new nanny. Because my schedule has changed for the rest of the year and I'll be working a full day on Wednesdays we needed someone to watch Emi Wednesday afternoons until I get home. We hired Ana, a wonderful lady from Ecuador (hurrah!) to watch Emi on those days. Marcus will still work from home those afternoons, but at least this way he'll be able to focus more on work and worry less about watching Emi.

So now, if I can just figure out Flickr, we'll be all set.