Juliet turns 4

Yes, our big girl turned 4 yesterday. Just a quiet family dinner with her current fave food (roast chicken) and a small birthday cake. The "real" party is next Sunday. She's counting the minutes, I think!

My mother's helper girl is turning out to be pure gold. She brought face paints over today. You can imagine the excitement - especially from Heidi who had never had her face painted before. Next week she claims she is going to make a volcano out of playdough. Good luck to her! Mind you, she does all this while holding Imogen. I wish I could afford to get her to move in for a few days a week! The girls absolutely adore her, needless to say.

Imogen's first tooth

Oh, I'm being a slack blogger these days.

Just a quick entry to say that Imogen got her first tooth today, at the ripe old age of 4.5 months. She also had her 4 month check up last week, and is now 95th percentile in height, though her weight has dropped to 80th. We think she's desperately trying to catch up to her big sisters!

A couple of miscellaneous photos (as you can see, Imogen is extremely fond of Juliet, who loves to make her laugh. She's rather nervous around Heidi though, who is yet to understand the meaning of "gentle"):

Heidiho - no more nappies!

Yesterday Heidi decided she would not wear a nappy at all. (Not a huge surprise, as she does like to strip off and run around half naked quite a lot!) Anyway, it seems that she's now toilet trained!!!

I'm so pleased (and proud). Less laundry/rubbish for starters! What a big girl. 2yrs, 3 months. Well done Heidi!

Our beautiful girls

Imogen

Mini-break

I'm going away for a a couple of days this week, down to a friend's beach house in Dromana. Just Imogen and me. I can't wait! My plan is to take a big book, do absolutely no cooking, cleaning, or anything resembling work, and just hang out. We'll go to the craft market at Red Hill, go for a stroll around Heronswood, and take it easy.

I also have a mother's help starting tomorrow. She'll be coming for just 3 hours a week, to help out with whatever needs doing. She's a 3rd year Early Childhood Education student so I imagine she'll be mostly doing activities with Juliet and Heidi, but the arrangement is very flexible. She's happy to help me with laundry and cooking as well!

Imogen is developing very well. Unfortunately she is still waking every 3 hours a night for a feed though! She loves to try and stand up, and her neck control is 95% perfect now. She's a happy little thing, though I think she gets grumpy when her big sisters take all our attention away from her!

Heidi is also very good, and very cute. And she knows it. She started swimming lessons a few weeks ago and is a complete natural. She's quite happy to put her whole face in the water, she can lie on her back in a perfect float position, and is totally fearless. Juliet isn't what you'd call a natural, but she is working hard and coming along well. She'll now jump off the deep end, despite being obviously a bit fearful. One of Juliet's best traits is that she will always listen to her teacher and do her best, whether it's at kinder, dancing or swimming. She's a bit of a swot in the making, I think! And speaking of dancing, that's definitely more Juliet's thing. She is very good (even according to her teacher), and has become mildly obsessed. She now wants a ballerina cake for her birthday!

No tomboys in this family so far!

A Quiz

A Quiz - Juliet (aged 3 yrs 10 months)

1. What is something mum always says to you?
Don’t put the cushions on the floor!

2. What makes mum happy?
Putting lids on the textas

3. What makes mum sad?
Not doing what she asks

4. How does your mum make you laugh?
By making silly faces

5. What was your mum like as a child?
Umm…you liked having your mum and dad cuddle you

6. How old is your mum?
I don’t know

7. How tall is your mum?
This tall!

8. What is her favourite thing to do?
Cook

9. What does your mum do when you're not around?
Put the baby to sleep

10. If your mum becomes famous, what will it be for?
Don’t know

11. What is your mum really good at?
Cooking

12. What is your mum not very good at?
Putting Johnny Cash on (in the car)

13. What does your mum do for her job?
Don't know

14. What is your mum's favourite food?
Roast [for the record, it isn't!]

15. What do you and your mum do together?
Reading Eggs

16. How are you and your mum the same?
Ummmm....

17. How are you and your mum different?
We have different eyes.

18. How do you know your mum loves you?
I don't know.
Come on! You do know I love you, don't you?
Yes!
How do you know?
Because I'm your child.
But how do you know? It it the cuddles and kisses?
Yes. I know you love me because of the cuddles and kisses.
[see - not prompted at all!]

19. Where is your mum's favourite place to go?
The supermarket.

Seaspray

Not much happening here. I'm trying not to go totally insane with the three of them, and probably failing dismally. Juliet in particular is being pretty hard work. I'm vaguely considering getting a childcare student to come for a few hours a week to help out at home. I don't know... I feel a bit of a failure not being able to cope with them all by myself. Maybe if I procrastinate long enough, the problem will go away. That usually works, right?

Anyway, we spent a few days down at Seaspray last week. Some pics:

Reflux

Apparently Imogen has silent reflux. Poor little mite. We'll be trying her on some over the counter medication to see if it improves things. Hopefully it will stop the screaming in any case, before her Mum has a nervous breakdown.

Little ballerinas

Getting ready for their dance class. Heidi's hair isn't quite that red; believe it or not, that's the eerie light we've been getting from the bushfires. Everything has an odd sunset glow to it. But aren't they cute :)

Our smarty pants girls

Warning: bragging to follow!

Heidi counted out 13 objects a couple of days ago. We think that's pretty special for a 26 month old. It wasn't just reciting numbers - it was counting things. Smarty pants.

And Juliet (3 yrs 9 m) is starting to read. She's read a few basic words all by herself over the last couple of days - "bat", "Spot" and the like. Very exciting! I can't wait til she can read fluently. The world will open for her. She's very enthusiastic about the whole thing, as you can imagine.

Bushfire tragedy

For those of you who aren't in Australia and might not be aware, the last few days have been a disaster in our state of Victoria. Record high temperatures (over 115F) , gusty winds and arsonists have combined to create bushfire hell. The latest estimates are putting the death toll at 230, with over 750 houses burned to the ground. The news is just so distressing - families who have lost their kids, people trapped in cars and burnt to death... it's hard to think about anything else at the moment. And still the fires burn on.

I feel a bit superficial blogging about our family's day to day life considering the news. However...

Today the girls went to a tots dance class at Jason Coleman's Ministry of Dance. Mind you, I only learned that Jason Coleman is a judge of the TV show So You Think You Can Dance a few hours ago! The class is for 2-4 year olds so I wasn't sure how Heidi would go. As it turned out, Juliet and Heidi were only joined by one other little girl, so it was a very small and non-threatening class. And boy, did they have fun. Juliet's now announced that she wants to go to dance class every day of the week. Heidi did really well too - followed the teacher's instructions and had a ball. It was great to watch. I have no idea if they will want to perservere with any form of dancing class when they are a bit older, but the dance school seems fantastic, and covers all sorts of dance from ballet to jazz and hip hop. I'm actually a little jealous that I'm not a preschooler and don't have all these great options open to me! Is it wrong to live through your children? Don't answer that ;-)

Mega mega baby

Imogen had her 8 week check up today, and yes, she is indeed large. Weight is 5.81 kg and length is 59cm, which puts her in the 95th and 90th percentile respectively. She looks like a 4 month old baby!



Just for a bit of fun, check out this photo. It's Heidi at the same age. Freaky, huh? Even James couldn't tell who it was!

Tooooo hot

After a cold start to summer in December, we're more than making up for it with the heatwave from hell this week! Three days in a row of 43-45 degree temps (that's around 111/113F). Apparently it's going to be slightly cooler tomorrow - 39 (102F). We're pretty much housebound as a result. It's just too hot to go out. The girls went to kinder/daycare today where it's nice and cool. Just as well, because I'm running out of indoor activities to do with them. There's only so much pasting, painting and craft you can do.

Imogen is coping OK. She's slept most of today in our airconditioned bedroom, so she's surviving. She does have a little heat rash though, but nothing too bad.

Here's a photo of her asleep on her daddy's chest last week. She's pretty gorgeous, if I don't say so myself!

Jail Bird

Yesterday at the supermarket:

Juliet: Can I check the eggs to see if they're broken?
Me: Sure
Juliet: These eggs are from chickens that walk around.
Me: Yep, they're called "free range".
Juliet: They aren't locked up in cages. We don't like that.
Me: No
Juliet: Neither does Johnny Cash.

(When I got home and told James this story, he explained that Johnny Cash has a song about being locked up in prison. I love to imagine what exactly that little 3 year old brain is picturing - a guy with a guitar locked up in a farmyard cage with lots of chooks?! Love it!)

Imogen's first trip to Maldon

We headed up in the heat to visit Mum and Dad at Maldon today. As usual the girls enjoyed themselves immensely. Imogen celebrated her first trip to her grandparents' house by spending almost the entire day asleep in my or James' arms. Here are some photos:







I've been very slack in reporting milestones! Imogen smiled for the first time at 4 weeks 2 days. I'd better put that in writing here, as I haven't filled out her baby book yet. She isn't smiling regularly, but we get a little one every day or so.

Heidi surprised us by confidently counting to 12 in the car on the way home. She also counted out 5 objects a few days ago, though sometimes she seems unable to count out more than 2 objects. It's a bit odd and inconsistent. Her language is racing ahead in leaps and bounds now, and she is always telling us something terribly exciting and important.

Juliet's taking an interest in learning to read, though I'm not pushing it too far. She can recognise the letters in the alphabet and knows the sounds for about half. She can count to about 70, though she often leaves out the "1s" (21, 31, 41 etc.) I sometimes do puzzle books with her during the day, and she loves the mental challenge. She's certainly a bright little thing, although she frequently claims that she "already knows everything". Hmm.

Old lady Lettie

On driving past a local park today:

"Oh look! I rode my bike there when I was a kid! Yeah... I had a lot of fun... when I was a kid..."

Imogen photos

And a couple of Heidi in the wading pool yesterday:

Chunky bub

OK, so we're no longer worried about Imogen's weight. She had her 4 week checkup today. Apparently she's put on over half a kilo in the last 10 days and is in the 90th percentile for weight. Not bad for a breastfed bub!

The girls are certainly keeping me busy (translation: going out of my mind). I'm hoping that at some point in the next few weeks I'll get the hang of it all a bit better! At the moment I feel like I'm drowning in constant housework, argument mediation and baby rocking. I'm still not really confident enough to take all 3 of them out on an excursion, which means we're missing out on trips to the zoo with friends and so on. I really should bite the bullet and just do it.

Heidi has entered a new whingy and tantrumy age. On the upside, she sounds like a character from Diff'rent Strokes which is pretty amusing. "Whatcha doin'? Who dat?"

And the trickier Heidi gets, the easier (fractionally) Juliet gets. She's been noticeably more mature over the last few days, just as Heidi has been hard work. It's like a see-saw!

Belated birthday photos

My cousin Linda took some beautiful photos of the big girls when she was in Melbourne recently. I hope she doesn't mind me publishing a few on here. She's also inspired me to buy a DSLR camera and learn how to use it - a process that might take a very long time!