Annea

Annea is two! (Now a bit older than that, I'm way behind in posting). She potty trained in two days right at two, and has been doing great in that department ever since-- sometimes dry at night, too.

She is funny! She loves to sing LOUDLY. "Holy God" (Trisagion Hymn), "Let it Go" (Frozen), "The Wheels on the Bus", "That Girl is on Fire" (Alicia Keys!) are some of her favorites. She belts it out, louder is better. She talks like crazy, in her own little cadence. We have all picked up on Annea-speak, gems such as: "I lak et" (I like it), "I heuh it" (I hear it), "Look. MY nails." (Look at my fingernails. Which weeks ago had nail polish on them.) She is very sweet and funny, and loves our adoration and attention--which the big girls are so happy to give.

We just finished a session of swim lessons, the Mommy-and-me class, which she loved. She eagerly wore her "wim su" everywhere. Funnily enough, Annea hates to be wet. She now knows to tell us not to get her all wet when we wash her hands or face, and if a drop of water gets onto her, she wants to change her clothes. We had to convince her while playing in our backyard little pool, that she didn't have to change swim suits every time one got wet. She is enthusiastic about kicking and will blow bubbles, but her favorite part of swimming lessons were wearing the swimsuit and the songs.

Her second birthday was super fun, her last big party, perhaps, for a while? The Lewis family's last big one for a while, I think. We decided to downsize the effort and scope of birthdays to make them a bit more manageable and less stressful. We found ourselves feeding the same people pizza over and over, in April-May- June, and decided to switch things up and pare down. So in closing our era of over-the-top seeming birthdays, we had one final fiesta. And Snow White showed up! Melissa, Laurel's faithful friend had a few glasses of wine and borrowed her cousin's costume and was the belle of the ball. So fun! It made a fun theme.

The Party:

Swimming Lessons. (Here Annea's listening to the safety talk before her lesson. I can't take pictures because I'm in the water with her. She's cute in her suit!)

Yay for Undies!!

Fun in our little pool.

Peek-a-boo!

Fun with friends from church.

Pascha, 2014

We did a little bit more for Pascha this year. It went well, and maybe we should have been doing a little bit more all along. We made it to several holy week services, and the girls did great overall.

Prostrating.

Shopping for Pascha.

Anticipating Abba throwing flowers during Saturday's service, our favorite.

Abba throwing flowers.

Mommy and Annea.

Snuggling with Daddy waiting for the rest of the service to happen. Really, for the girls, it's all about throwing the flowers.

Cute Easter photo area.

Sleeping? during the midnight service.

And then, the long awaited--the most fun event of the year-- the Pascha picnic.
Eliana egg hunting.

Eliana and Annea egg hunting.

Adessa egg hunting.

Annea and Uncle Ben.

Annea kissing chicky with godmother Amy.

Easter Photo Booth posing.

Christ is Risen! Indeed, He is Risen! It was a glorious Pascha.

Spring 2014

Some pictures from our beautiful Spring!

Parasols!

Our new neighbors, a sweet little family of house finches.

We don't have a webcam set up (yet?) but we are monitoring their progress quite studiously, especially Calvin. He actually helped build the nest, the birds had been frittering around trying to get some sticks and grass to stick up on our slick two-inch porch beam, and so he twisted together some branches for the base of their nest. Dear man!

Impromptu photo session on a family walk. So many beautiful blossoms around!

Girls with our dogwood. Traditional (yearly) shot.

We borrowed "The Prince of Egypt", a 1998 cartoon about Moses, and played it for the girls while getting stuff done around the house. We were surprised to have both girls came to us crying their eyes out, because in it Pharaoh's son turned out to be mean, just like his dad, even though he had been Moses's friend when he was younger. It made the girls so sad!! We stopped the movie and talked about it and had just finished the retreat with George Papageorge about allowing kids to feel their feelings, not just dismissing their sadness, or trying to distract them. We let them cry, especially Eliana, who then felt sad about other things she thinks about, like loosing her grandmas. She sobbed! It made me cry, we all had a good cry. After a decent interval of really empathizing and feeling our feelings, :), I talked to both girls about things we can do when we feel sad, we can talk about things, we can write our feelings down, we can draw about how we feel. The next morning, Eliana came to me and asked me how to write: "Last night I was sad". This was what she made. Go, Eliana!!

Gardening at Grandpa's-- We're gardening! Not at our house because Calvin is fundamentally opposed to having anything else to do, but Grandpa is helping us by watering and providing a plot of soil, and I'm growing seedlings in a greenhouse at school. I love it! The seedling growing has been such a kick, how rewarding, they are growing! Maybe I'm a gardener after all! And if it all grows at Grandpa's house, that's okay.

Annea with Grandpa and Carson.

Annea in the wagon.

Five K. I ran one! It was great! I had fun training, and it was the farthest I've ever run, (ran?) and I'm not sure I'm going to do it all the time, but I see the appeal.

Another family walk.

All in a line.

Family selfie!

Eliana posing on fence, Quail Hollow Ranch. I had errands to run at our district office, and on a whim we stopped off for a lovely little walk. Walking around the ranch there was a huge red pile of redwood bark/sawdust, and Eliana said: "Ooooohhh! Look!! Cinnamon!" I tried to get her to say it again for a video, and asked her on camera: "What's that big pile there?" She waited, not knowing what I was trying to get her to say, and queried: "Horse fur?" So funny.

Eliana and Annea viewing the pond.

Spring Break

I meant to write immediately after spring break, as I was awash with love for my girls and the wonderful week we spent hanging out together. It seemed the few days after, when we were back to the grind, the magic wore off a little bit and the memory of the feeling remained, but... the feeling was dimmed, perhaps due to being back to the grind, places to be, homework to do, etc. But we did have such a lovely week, I was enamored of my girls, and it felt like falling in love again. Part of it was having a moment to sit and be with them, we had no big plans, and they are at ages that are delightful. We also have been having conversations, Calvin and I, about how good our girls are. That they know we are there for them, and they respond to our guidance (most of the time), and they are disciplined and well behaved, and all without spanking or even time outs. Hopefully this trend continues!! I will work to make it so!

Adessa is much more flexible and understanding about when things don't go exactly her way. She is helpful and caring, and eager to please, hopefully in a healthy way. My friend told me that at age six or seven, kids start being "on our team". Adessa is on our side, now. She knows how things work in our family. She can see what needs to be done and volunteer to help. Especially when she has had a nap (yes, still!), she is cheerful and pleasant. She can do so much now, but understands the limits of what she is supposed to do and not supposed to do. (As opposed to four years old, the age that I have been finding the hardest, where being able to do things (open the fridge, climb on the counter, move furniture, etc.) and knowing what's allowable don't always connect and correspond in the four year old's brain. Frustrating for mom!) The first day of spring break, Adessa went to a birthday party for a girl in her class, but had to get a ride there because Calvin was doing overtime and it was nap time. He got home in time for me to drive out to the party and be there for the last 40 minutes and take her home. She was so happy. She wasn't expecting me, and she had resigned herself to being taken care of by our carpool buddies, but it was better for her when I was there. It was a little lesson for me, I was glad I made the effort. I want to make the effort for my girls!

Eliana is growing out of her four year old self (see above) and into her five year old self, her birthday is coming right up. She sometimes has lots of emotions and we are working on helping her identify them and feel them (that's the hardest part for me) before moving on to solutions. She is sometimes at odds with Annea, which was a terrible shock, and she and Adessa have moments of discord, also. Mostly I just try to hold her and take deep breaths and listen to her, because it's gotta be hard in the middle. She loves to dance, and to turn up or turn on our music. We call her the DJ. It often takes me a minute to register that our music is blasting, and I always know who is responsible. She loves to laugh and be tickled and tell long stories with many gestures and facial expressions. She loves her preschool and is also looking forward to Kindergarten in the fall.

Annea is talking and singing up a storm. She gets frustrated when we can't understand her words, or sometimes starts with screaming for what she wants and then will get around to the words when encouraged. She is funny and engaging, our obvious extrovert. It is with bittersweet joy that I think about her growing up so quickly and being our last one. I have resolved to get my face off of screens more, as the need to constantly be reading, searching, posting, surfing can't possibly help with the years going by too fast, and childhoods being over in a blink of an eye. Since my mom's death I feel like every place in the house where I might ever want to land for a moment has something distracting for me to do, Suduku, iPad, iPhone, magazine, book. I have some good books to read, too, but they are not electronic and I haven't gravitated toward them, and real books are easier to put down, somehow. Something to work on, for sure!

The first day of spring break our friend and godson Alex was here, and we took a trip to the Seymore Center, basically just your friendly neighborhood aquarium. We all had a great time, as there were exciting creatures to see and touch, and the weather outside was wild and invigorating.

We got to meet up with the old gang, my mom's group, which was so great. We don't see them much but they are dear to me.

I heard voices coming from the girls room early one morning, and went in to find Adessa reading to Eliana with her flashlight. Cute!!

The last weekend of spring break was a Lenten Retreat, a great speaker our church had two years ago (I blogged about it!), George Papageorge. He was wonderful again, talking about if we want our church, our home, our marriage to be a "museum" (cold, sterile, beautiful, on display, perfect looking) or a "hospital" (for healing, safe, messy, truth telling, problem solving, dealing with reality, nonjudgmental, compassionate, etc.) It was so great. The big deal that I got out of hearing him was how to have a "hospital" home, with parents as Emotion Coaches (not dismissing their feelings), looking at mistakes as opportunities to learn, empathizing, connecting with our kids, and having their back. Making the extra effort. I want to do it!!