2015 already?

the holidays went by so fast. it is 2015!

my mom and dad were here for christmas. h enjoyed having lolo and lola visit for 2 weeks. it was long, but everyone had a nice time. got lots of yummy filipino food. we were able to do lots of fun things in dec like go to see gingerbread houses and visit santa for the first time. went to the trail of lights twice. crazy lights only once. made christmas cookies at home and also with auntie and kris. we hosted christmas eve and christmas dinner, so amy and i were in the kitchen a lot. it was frozen palooza on christmas morning. she was getting so worn out with opening gifts, she started opening gifts with her feet. it is always nice to be at home for christmas.

we had a slight set back on the potty traning. she was golden for about 8 months but then started going backwards. at first her underwear was a little wet, saying she couldnt make it to the bathroom. then she had a few full on accidents. we freaked out and started back on the pullups, which was probably not the best idea because she started getting lazy. i mean, come on, i wouldn't get up to go if i had a diaper too! so we had to re access and get back on track. gummy bears, starburst and chocolate seemed to help out. she has been doing well again since mid dec, but needs to be reminded every hour. hopefully we will be back to having her let us know when she needs to go. the teachers have been great helping us get back on track.

i think we have officially seen and read every disney princess movie/book out there. h is definitely into her princess phase. i have to say that i had not seen a lot of the classics, oddly enough. we all can't wait to take her to disney, sooner than later. could you imagine the look on her face when we do go? i don't remember being excited about all of that princess stuff when i was little, but i do remember our adventures in disney. they were so much fun!

for my birthday, i wanted to lay on the beach and do nothing. that is what we did. went to cancun for 5 days and the weather was perfect. 80 degrees and sunny. all we did was eat, lay on the beach, eat, nap and eat again. unfortunately h started getting a little snotty the day we left. then amy started coughing while we were there. then the sickness began. amy and h were down for many days after getting back home,  h with a fever of 101. then i got it and currently have it. fever, sore throat, headache. it has been so fun. the weather has been so nice here too, it is hard trying to recover. getting thrown off routine is hard.

looking forward to what 2015 brings us.

dance recital

she rocked it out with this recital. did every move with the teacher and kept the beat. we were so proud of her and i think we had the biggest crowd cheering her on. it was so, so awesome. i have to say that the hip hop dance was the best. she raised the roof and did a move called, break the stick. don't get me wrong, the ballet dance was nice too, but she was a little bad ass up there dancing with her sunglasses.

videos and pictures to cherish forever!

 

 

 

what H has been up to...

• dressed up as princess elsa for halloween. had 2 blisters on her feet after walking around all evening. she said they didn't hurt. fashion over pain i guess. her and her new friend anderson had fun going from door to door.
• had fun at the fall festival at her school. so cute to see her say hi to her friends and kids i have never seen before. lots of teachers seem to know who she is too.
• in a car ride to school, she asked if she could have chocolate milk:
• me: yes, if you are good girl
• H: i have been good
• me: you are right, you have been good in the mornings getting your clothes on and cooperating
• H: yes, i have calmed down
• me: (laughing) what? where did you hear that?
• H: (laughing) from you mama
• our little late owl has been going to bed close to 10pm these days. but gets up at 6:30am with no problem. instead of fighting with her to go to bed, we all hang out and all of us go up to bed a the same time. saves us from arguing for an hour and a half each night
• had a wonderful visit with grammy and grandfather. h stayed home from school and went on lots of adventures with them. library, wildflower center, walks and children's museum.
• framily weekend out at juniper hills farm. so nice to spend the weekend with everyone.
• doing well in swim class. she can swim a few feet, turn on her back, float and turn back over to swim a few more feet. so proud of her.
• h is looking forward to a date with her daddy and papa. they want to take her to see the nutcracker.
• went to her first wurstfest. she loves riding rides now and dancing to polka music. much crazier than the days without kids.
• had our worst tantrum on record. had to leave thunderclouds after swim because she wanted to sit at a certain table. amy carried her home kicking and screaming. she was screaming so loud that she couldn't catch her breath. it was pretty bad.
• she is able to sit thru movies now. we have seen lots of disney classics like beauty and the beast, cinderella, snow white, etc. last night, we even watched home alone. kinda nice that she pays attention for so long. can't wait to take her to the movie theaters now.
• princess this, princess that. this child loves her princess shoes and everything related to princess's. 

she is growing up

over the past few weeks, we have seen a big change in harper. she has definitely become more brave. when we went to the state fair, she wanted to ride the rides! we rode the swan, a dumbo ride and she even pointed to the gigantic ferris wheel. that may have to happen another day. she is also more vocal and talking to people when they ask her questions too. the most common thing people ask is how hold old she is. h even says hi back to people when they talk to her at school or even the random strangers in the grocery store. it is super cute. we are really proud of her not being so shy these days.

H's first assessment from school

Good morning!

Since I finally having my wonderful assistant Ms. Heather, I am able to get to my assessments on all my children. Harper just completed hers.

When it came to her alphabet she was amazing, the only thing she missed were two lowercase letters (a,b). When it came to shapes she was great, nailing all of them. She knows all her numbers past 20, with no hesitation at all. When it came to counting objects, she can count a little fast, which makes her off by 1 or so. When we went over colors, she missed the normal 3 which most of my class has missed because they are very specific. Her tracing, connecting the dots, and coloring in the lines are great, and right where it should be, if not better. Recognizing same/different was great as well. The same with directional, and knowing above, under, left and right. The only thing that she trouble on was the pattern portion. Which is what we will be able to help with. All the children are going to learn number sequence and patterns in our class, so it is not a problem. This assessment was just to see where she is at.
Which I would like to say she is among the advanced kids we do have.

Just thought I would share with the assessment with you. If you'd like a copy let me know and I'll be glad to give you one!

Have a great Friday! :)

Ms. Christabell

who needs pull ups?

one week without using pull ups during nap time.

now if only we can master going all night with out them.

first ER visit

we had our fist ER visit over the weekend. luckily, it wasn't something that was critical, causing us to rush around and get stressed out about. on friday evening, h was being swung by her arms in total fun, but it didn't end up being completely all fun and games. she started to cry, saying her arm hurt. h wasn't moving it at all. now, this has happened before where she says her arm hurts, but it was usually better the next day. this time it was different. she wouldn't even walk and was scared to move it. she went to bed that night in tears and passed out pretty quickly. we gave her tylenol for the pain and 99 fever. it was an all around long day for her. her daddy hung out with her earlier that day, took her to the zoo and had lots of fun. unfortunately, she got a little sick at one point and threw up in the car. we think it was a combination of her not having much in her stomach, hot outside and a windy road. she was ok after her nap and 1 and 1/2 sunbutter and jelly sandwich. at dinner, she was acting a little fussy and even turned down pizza! right after dinner, she hurt her arm.

the next morning, she woke up to say her arm hurt and she wanted to go to the doctor. amy and i really didn't know what to do. she definitely wasn't using it, but would it get better in a day like before? what if it was a hairline fracture? i took an old sling that i had and let her wear it. it made it feel better to be able to isolate it close to her body. but when we moved it, it was painful. she was happy otherwise, watching curious george on the tv, sitting on the couch. jean and kris came over and noticed that there was something not right, especially since h was flinching when they looked at it. so we called our friend kate, who is a pediatrician. she was out of town but said that we needed to take her in to get it looked at. she thought it was something called nursemaids arm, which is fixed by manipulation of the arm. told us that she would have been right over to help out if she could. amy looked it up on the google box and pretty much diagnosed it before the call. it was very nice of her to give us advice. around 11:30 am we headed over to Dell's children hospital. kate also works in the ER there and highly recommended it if H ever needed care. they knew how to handle kids, especially those in pain. it was a good dry run for us to see where the hospital was located, how to check in, etc. everyone was calm and it wasn't a true emergency. the staff were friendly and super helpful. we waited in the waiting room for about 5 mins tops. they took us back and everyone seemed to agree it was nursemaids arm from what we were describing and how H was acting. the doctor looked at us and said that she wasn't going to like what she was about to do, but if it works, it will be instant relief. they asked one of us to have her in our lap. i, the wimpy one commented that i gave birth and my job is done. amy is usually the stronger one when it comes to h getting shots, giving blood or in this case, having to twist her arm. the doctor pulled and twisted her arm and immediately felt the pop. harper cried for maybe 10 seconds and then was ok. if she wasn't better within mins, we would have to do xrays and more work up on what was going on. the doctor then said that we needed to trick her into moving her arm just to make sure. she asked if harper would give her mommy a high five. sure enough, she lifted her arm and did it. it was a miracle! it was nursemaids arm for sure. she was quite happy. it could have been because the pain was gone...or maybe it was the rainbow popsicle they gave her afterwards.

we went home and she took a nice long nap. no problems with her arm at all. it was a good learning experience for us. not only will we or anyone else swing her by her arms, but now we are familiar with the Dell children's hospital.