The Burrow Girls...an update

In case you didn't get enough of them in the monster picture post, I wanted to give an actual update about my girls. I feel like I just did one of these not that long ago, but things happen so quickly!

Lila
New do

In true three year old fashion Lila has a serious case of verbal diarrhea. That sounds awful, but I mean it in the best way possible. I've had a lot of experience with kids in my life. This is the mark of a true three year old. It's like they wake up one day and realize that they have so many complete thoughts about so many things. AND they simultaneously realize that they can say all of those thoughts at once at any given moment. I plan to get this on video. Or, if you really want to see her in action just stop by. It's an all day event. She did this before turning three. But just in the past week it has become non-stop.

Along those same lines, a lot of her talking involves giving the order of things. I know I do this with her a lot so that she knows what to expect. However, now when I do it she repeats it back to me. Then, if someone else is around she repeats it again to them. Sometimes she repeats it a fourth time for good measure.

Beyond the verbal expressiveness her imagination seems to be in overdrive as well. Of course, I've seen glimpses of it all along. Now the consistency and intensity is there. Our morning routine consists of eating breakfast and then going in the playroom and playing until Evie takes her morning nap. I slowly drink my coffee and let them sort of do what they want. Sometimes they want me involved and sometimes they don't. But I love just sitting and watching. Anyway, the other day Lila decided that it was my birthday. Her birthday party is coming up and we just had Evie's. She has party on the brain. She wanted to have a party for me. Here's the result:

The empty space is where I was sitting. She kept telling me some of it was cake, cupcakes, and presents. I wasn't allowed to "open" or "eat" anything until she was done. 

Then she said all of the dress up clothes had to be out for the people to wear at the party. However, the people that were at the party (Evie and I) weren't allowed to wear any of it.

Again, the discussion and imagination aspect has been there for a while. The change is that this was a two hour event. She meticulously placed the items. She tried SO hard to be patient when Evie or Molly plowed over them.

The loyal readers of this blog may remember that Lila took survival swim lessons last year. With ISR (Infant Swimming Resource) you are supposed to take a refresher course each year. Lila started her refresher weeks ago and then she got sick. We started up again last week when I got sick. All of last week Seth took Lila to the lessons bright and early every day. By the end of the week he showed me the below video and I remembered why we started all of this in the first place. I am so proud of her. You will probably watch this video and think it's not that big of a deal. Especially if you know a little swimmer yourself. There really is quite a lot of work that goes into it to ensure that your child can save themselves in a life or death situation. She has worked so hard to get to this point!
 

Post swim lesson nap (she hasn't napped in months)

In general Lila is high energy, high enthusiasm all the time. She screams about everything in a way that is overwhelming. However, it puts a smile on my face that she feels excited enough about everything to scream about it. We tried getting her to find another way to express her excitement, but then she would just scream because we were asking her not to. We decided the screaming just out of sheer joy was better.

She is still the pickiest eater ever. Her height to weight ratio at her three year well check was actually on the very low end of the scale. I'm not going to feed her a bunch of crap so that she will eat. But, even when I do give in to the nasty food with her she doesn't really eat it. Community Q is glorious food and she ate the bread. She didn't even eat the fries. Just the bread. Not to worry. Evie helped her out ;-)

Lila's current great loves include:

- reading to Evie - she has all of the Sandra Boynton books memorized!
- putting the laundry away
- tending to our vegetable garden (even though she won't eat anything out of it)

- dressing herself in the most random and mismatched outfits
- running on "tracks" which are courses I draw in chalk on the driveway
- video chatting with aunt Sara
- watching videos of herself and Evie on my phone
- Gotye, Karmin, and a little Michael Jackson
- going to the playground and the "Botanibal Gardens"

Evie

There's lots of big stuff happening in Evie's world. I will get to the milestones in a minute. First, I want to chat about her in general. Evie is like a little explosion of sunshine all the time. Her personality is so intense in so many ways I don't even know where to start. She seems to feel and do things with such intensity that sometimes I can't keep up. Just this morning out of nowhere she started crying and put her head on the floor like the world was ending. I was sitting right next to her and I still have no idea what happened. That's really nothing new though. When she gets upset you just kind of have to watch out and let it pass.

Beyond normal tough feelings, she gets so excited and happy about so many things. I love to see her little face light up over something new she accomplishes or something Lila does. She's a daredevil in a way that I am not at all used to. At this age Lila was happy to sit and stare at you and play with toys or walk around in the yard. Evie wants to be everywhere all the time. Her first instinct is to lift a leg and try to get on top of something. She desperately wants to wash her hands standing on the stool in the bathroom like Lila does. She wants to get on the potty. She wants to get in the potty. She wants to get on tables and in the dishwasher. She has already gotten onto our Little Tikes tower and slide on our deck by herself. This took Lila and Carson much longer to accomplish. But then I am told that the second child progresses much faster. Technically, she probably feels like the third child so this isn't so surprising.

That being said, I'm happy to announce that walking is now her preferred mode of getting around.Every day she crawls a little bit less.

Evie also has more words! I am looking forward to this for her. She refuses to sign, but Lila did too. Not sure what the reason for that aversion is in my children, but it makes me sad. Not only because I think sign language is awesome, but because when Evie can't express what she wants or needs she grunts and screams loudly. Are we noticing a theme here?

Anyway, the complete list of words so far:
- Ya Ya -
Still Lila
- OK -
I have a habit of saying "it's okay" if something is wrong. She had a really bad diaper rash this week and that's when she started saying it. It's honestly really heartbreaking. She says it to calm herself down now and it's more like "aaahhhh kkkkkkk". But, sometimes she says it in response to something I have said and then she smiles because she knows she said something I understand. I love that.
- Molly -
She actually said Molly for the first time today! Molly follows me EVERYWHERE so today when I went to get Evie from her second nap Molly was right behind me. Standing in her bed she yelled Molly and was beyond proud of herself when I freaked out.
- Go -
What she used to call Molly. I am not a bad dog parent. I just don't love being followed 99% of the day. Let's just say I am not graceful so this makes for a dangerous situation.
- Cup -
I tried for a while to get her to say milk but she wasn't having it. I didn't even try for cup. It just happened somehow. But I'll take it. Knowing when she wants a drink is clutch.
- Mama -
She used to say Mama a lot, but now she really only says it when she's having a hard time going to sleep. And even then it seems that it's being replaced with aaaahhhhh kkkkkk until I go in and rock her.

Evie's current great loves include:

- Lila counting her toes. It happened a few times in the bathtub and now she wants Lila to do it every time they take a bath. It is seriously the cutest. freaking. thing. ever. She sticks her chubby little foot in the air and gets that pleased as punch look on her face before the counting even starts. I count her toes too, but nothing provides that look of awe and sheer happiness the way Lila does.
- Lila in general. She doesn't love when Lila won't let her have something, but other than that she thinks Lila hung the moon. If only Lila knew...
- Going outside. If we even step outside to get the mail I need to be prepared to stay out there for a while.
- Food - Evie is in the stage where she will eat anything and everything. I forgot how much of a bottomless pit babies can be at this age. I LOVE THIS. No guessing. No wasting. Just good old fashioned eating.
- Sandra Boynton books. Those are her favorite. She like Goodnight Moon and a few others, but the Boynton books always make her smile.
- She loves the playground and the botanical gardens too. This goes along with the being able to walk and the being outside. It's like Christmas any time we go somewhere outside that has things to climb on.

Alright, now that I've stayed up too late with another lengthy post about my children I will go. Holla Hump day is back tomorrow. Don't miss it!!!