But May was very eventful. "Everything is Awesome!" as Everett (pretty much) wrote.
May 1st Everett started Kidz Love Soccer. It's a pre-soccer program that teaches kids the skills necessary for actual soccer. They play games and race and have fun. He likes it. And we're so lucky Sadie is doing Kidz Love Soccer too. So every Friday evening we get to hang out with the Hunters! Such an unusual treat.
The kids playing on the deck with toys being made for Everett's 5th birthday party! This pregnant mama gave Brian most of the work to do for the party. He created some really awesome stuff!
Bedtime reading with Grandma Kathie. Erector Set building with Grandpa George. Grandpa came over to watch the kids during a meeting I had with Lydia's speech "team."
Speaking of speech, Lydia's been doing great! It's impossible to know if it's her three sessions of speech therapy, the fluid in her ears getting cleared up, or if it was just her time to start chattering away, but she's been making amazing progress. Adding words daily and putting three and four words together. Her "favorite" word right now is "yeah," which is pretty helpful actually, even if it's not especially proper (hey, we say "yeah" all the time--bad role models). She's also learned to say "no." Happily she doesn't use it all the time. She's gotten pretty good at communicating her needs through sounds and signs, so even with the limited vocabulary, we can avoid frustration and tantrums pretty well.
My favorite phrase of hers right now is "my help me!" She uses the sign for "help" at the same time--one palm up, other hand in a thumbs up on top, lifting up. How can you not help her when she does that?!?! So cute.
That's right! 28 weeks = 3rd trimester! (I'm 31 weeks as I type--pictures at the end). It's quite a challenge to get these goofs coordinated for these shots, especially since they both want to write on the chalkboards now, and Everett thinks it's really funny to write joke numbers like 66 weeks and 101 weeks. I don't find it funny the tenth or eleventh time, unfortunately.
Proof that they're super sweet with each other sometimes (and may be going blind soon). And proof that they can't sit on the couch for long without taking cushions off. So many creative ways to watch TV!
Proof that I let them paint sometimes, in the kitchen, away from anything upholstered.
He really wished all his grandparents were there to experience his super pokey hair. He was happy to take a picture I could send to all four.
"There! Another perfect paper airplane." Ha. To have his (completely unfounded) confidence.
The day before his FIFTH BIRTHDAY(!!!) Everett did his walk around the sun, it's a Montessori tradition.
And then, on May15th, our first baby turned FIVE!! It's been an awesome five years since Everett joined our family! We love him too much to express in words.
A larger version of the picture I included in the collage and another from that time. It's unusual for me to snap such nice pictures of this big kid who's always go, go, going! Note: he was playing with a sticky lizard (like a sticky hand, but a lizard).
We started out his birthday with a visit (and presents) from Grandma Kathie! Notice the nest he built with pillows so he could listen to his book on iPod with headphones in peace?
We then met up with Grandpa George to get lunch at Sylvester's. I was feeling nostalgic for that time when I'd just had my first perfect baby. That arm motion I made to brush the hair out of Lydia's face reminded me of my favorite picture from that day. Life is very different now.
Then we went to soccer. There are a couple Hunters!! Lydia has so much fun playing with Andy and Julie when Everett and Sadie are playing soccer. Although, she'd be happy to go out and play soccer too! Soon enough!
Then to Phil and Gion's for dinner and cake. Geez we did a good job filling up that day! We were so happy to see Gion feeling better and better during her recovery. Phil made a delicious and beautiful lemon layer cake for our lemon meringue loving boy. And our first/only full-family selfie? Everett was in awe watching Phil assemble the cake.
And then we had a party to celebrate Everett with all his best friends! It was a great time. Everett had asked for an inventions and animals theme and that was pretty inspiring to me. We did a lot with simple machines (teeter totter = lever, car race = inclined plane, bucket pulleys, etc.), decorated with more complicated machines (pin the propeller on the plane, hot air balloon piñata), stations where the kids could do their own inventing (catapults, paper airplanes, and a marble run), and there were animal and invention prizes and animal decorations left over from Lydia's animal party. I'll write a whole Beyond Fine blog post about it and go over all the details.
Sweetest picture of these friends! Everett's thanking Paloma for the invention kit she gave him. They've been friends since they were babies and are lucky to go to school together. Is it an inappropriate time to point out Everett's height? He's an average height for five, but he's shorter than Brian was at five and MUCH shorter than I was at five (of course). We'll see how that ends up for him. Maybe he's due for a growth spurt!
The next morning, playing with a birthday gift on the deck. Lovely.
On May 21st, Mom got her Sylvester's party! Poor Grandma, her birthday is at the end of a long string of birthdays (Gion, Lydia, and George in February; Brian and Katie in April; add in Mother's Day; then Rachel and Everett in May), so we might be suffering from a little birthday burn out by this time. But we try to make her feel special. I think she had a nice day! Isn't this picture of Mom and Dad great!?
I usually repost kids' quotes from facebook, but this time I have a Mom quote I thought was just too good:
"My mom after listening to some of a Justin Bieber album: 'it sounds like the Carpenters. He sounds like Karen Carpenter.'"
Everett's been writing on his own a lot more lately. The first picture he wrote a shopping list completely by himself, "apples, M&Ms, grapefruit, bananas." The second picture is a thank you card to his friends Marshall and Miller. He asked for help spelling names and "wood," but I was still impressed that he wrote the whole card by himself. It says, "thank you Marshall & Miller for the wooden toy love Everett C." There's another Everett in his class now, so he's been signing his name "Everett C." even though he was told he can be simply "Everett" since he was the first.
We haven't been working on reading at home. We read to him a lot, but we're not encouraging him to read unless he's interested. But fairly frequently he'll sight read something on a sign or in a book and Brian especially will exclaim, "you just read that!! That's amazing!!"
Bob is down visiting after spending four months fixing up his Alamo house to sell. I shared the first, calm picture on social media because it was such a nice picture, but the second one is a much more classic Bob roughhousing shot.
31 weeks! It was Everett's idea to put on that tie (make that face) and kiss my belly. I never would have thought to plan that shot, but I love it. Such sweeties we have. Independent sweeties who are hard to wrangle.
Caption for this shot: Brian planted 12 basil plants with the dream of eating pesto all summer. Clean up has left him with regrets.
Maybe we can start eating outside more and just hose everything off?!?
Speaking of eating outside . . .
After all the crazy redecorating and birthday partying, we're finally finding the time to add stairs to our deck. They are so beautiful and so functional!! Brian tried to let Everett help whenever possible because he was really interested. So sweet, both of them.
"Everett's 'helping' Brian build the deck stairs. I hear:
Everett: when's the glue going to be dry?
Brian: tomorrow
Everett: TOMORROW?!?! Why didn't you just use hot glue?!
Ah . . . this crafter has taught her child well."
I'm sure Brian would appreciate me explaining that he wasn't building the deck with glue. I think he was fixing a crack in a more decorative part.
More quotes from facebook:
"Everett during Return of the Jedi, 'teddy bear fight!!'" (May the 4th)
"For Mother's Day, Brian taught the kids the 'face waterfall.' If you've seen Face/Off, you'll know if that's a good thing or the most disturbing thing on the planet. Happy Mother's Day!!"
"I was singing and Lydia shushed me! Everett: 'whatever Lydia does, mom, just keep singing.' Aww! Thanks buddy! So happy he's standing up for me. Not long ago, he was the one doing the shushing."
Until next month!! June should be a good one. More Brian time--hurray!! And I say that as myself and also as my largely pregnant and uncomfortable self.
