bongland: January 2015

Friday, January 23, 2015

Avika at Five Months

Here is Avika home five months.

If left unattended for two seconds Avika will immediately put on someone's shoes. She loves dress up. Here she is in my hat and shoes and then in Pop's hat.

So Avika has not added any words to her vocabulary, but she has started telling stories with her hands. She will run up and tap my leg to get my attention then show me a complicated series of made up sign language. She will repeat it over and over while we try to guess what she is "saying." I can't wait to find out what these stories mean!

Avika's new trick- forward rolls! She does them over and over again. I need to get her into a gymnastics class.

Miles and Avika can fight each other for my attention sometimes, so I love seeing them play well together. Miles is turning into a great big brother and is usually trying to make Avika laugh.

Playing with her new Legos on Christmas. I can usually talk her into playing by herself for a little bit every day, but she'd much rather be right by my side with whatever I am doing (vacuuming, cleaning the litter box, taking a shower, cooking... everything!) She's a social girl and loves to spend time with her family.

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Snow Day

A couple of weeks ago we got a bunch of snow, and our school district called a snow day! We trekked up to the park to sled with a bunch of the neighbors. It's so fun to have lots of kids on our street now.

Snowman fun with cousins!

Isaac and E worked for awhile on this tunnel. It was fun to see these two working together...

Delia did a lot of the work on the snowman w/ Aunt Nessa to help. She didn't want to take a picture until it had arms.

White Christmas

The only day of the year that I am excited to see snow is Christmas day, and this year the weather forecast came through! It started snowing just as the sun was coming up and we had a beautiful white Christmas. The kids got to sled with cousins and neighbors on Uncle Jason's driveway all morning. This was Avika's first real experience with snow. At first she seemed to love it...

So I took her on her first sled run...

Then she was done.

Christmas '14

Coming down first thing to see if Santa had come...

This is where Miles notices that the stockings are full!

Santa brought the kids fun snow toys!

Checking out the stockings...

Teaching Avika how to unload her stocking...

Avika got some cool new sunglasses and a grey kitty in her stocking!

Mojo even got to empty his stocking...

The boys checking out Miles' haul...

Isaac was desperate to get football cards for Christmas, and he was not disappointed...

Avika with her new quilt.

Annual Christmas day pictures on the couch!

Sunday, January 11, 2015

Mele Kalikimaka

As a third grader at Park this year Isaac gets to learn how to play the ukulele! They had a little concert before Christmas that was very entertaining. Unfortunately Miles' program was at the same time and I missed the New Horizon's Christmas program for the first time in seven years. :( Matt reported that Miles sang his little heart out and was a perfect angel. So proud of my boys!

Avika at 4 Months

Here is Avika home four months (this post is about a month overdue.) This picture captures her personality well! She is very mischievous!

She loves to be with her big sister and they play together very well.

Scooting around on her train. She especially loves when her brothers and sister push her around the living room fast.

Drawing on the chalkboard. She also likes to draw on the couch, the kitchen cabinets, the walls, the cat... She's very artistic!

Her first glimpse of snow. It was just a couple of flurries, but she sat at the window watching for awhile.

I think this little girl likes living in Colorado! This season was so busy in our house, full of firsts for Avika. She seems to be taking everything in well, she takes most new places and situations in stride. There are plenty of "off" days with lots of tears and tantrums- she is a typical two year old!