A Casual Day

Aiden's party was a couple of days before his actual birthday. On his birthday, we drove down and spent a relaxing day by the pool. Here's Maya having fun with the water. Jayden and Chooch take turns spraying water.

Chooch gives Maya a big hug.

Aiden's Birthday Party

My sweet nephew turned two and had an Elmo birthday party, which Jayden was looking forward to. He kept asking if it was Chooch's turn for a birthday party. Yes it is!

Here is the crew in their fancy glasses. They got a kick out of these.
Maya was hanging out in the play room.

Sebi loved his glasses too!

Chooch admires his cake, complete with Elmo, Dorothy and Mr. Noodle.

Happy Birthday to you! (Maya was having a much needed nap and therefore absent from the best part of the party!)

Icing on the nose...

Everyone takes a swing at the pinata!

Hurry! Fill the loot bags!

Sharing a Room. Sharing a Memory.

Someone once told me that it was against the law for a brother and sister to share a room. I don’t know if there is any truth to that, but I love having both of my babies in the same room together. Maya always goes to bed first. Then Jayden goes. He whispers so he doesn’t wake his sister. I get him his milk, his blanket and his Blue’s Clues plush. Then he asks for the night light and his music. I give him a hug and a kiss and say night-night. And just as I walk out of the door, he asks, “Daddy’s coming soon?” I always reassure him, put up the baby gate and leave. His version of whispering is pretty loud, but he’s so cute and Maya usually doesn’t stir very much.

I always go back to check on them and they look like two little angels. Maya is usually asleep on her tummy with her bum in the air and her arms and legs tucked under her. Other times she’s sleeping on top of her plushes and lovies. I wonder how she could possibly be comfortable and move the toys, but then she starts to scramble all over trying to find her comfy spot again. I lay the blanket on her. Then I take Jayden’s toys away. Lately, he goes to sleep with Blue and his handy dandy notebook. I give him a kiss and caress his cheek. I lay his blanket on him and when I turn around, Maya has already rolled all over and the covers have fallen off.

In the mornings, Maya wakes up first. She immediately starts to chatter and sing to herself. Sometimes she starts to whine. I usually go get her so she doesn’t wake her brother, but sometimes it’s too late. They are both awake, playing, and laughing. I wonder what they could both find so amusing, since neither of them is talking to each other. Sometimes when I get there, Jayden is still sleeping but Maya is trying to wake him. I see her standing up on the far side of the crib looking down at Jayden and making baby sounds. She doesn’t always hear me coming and the look on her face when she realizes that I’m there is just priceless. She has the widest smile and I could swear her eyes are shining.

I can’t wait to put them both to sleep at the same time so that we can do story time together. Right now, story time is very inconsistent and I rarely get to read to them both at the same time. Plus, they are both at different stages. Maya just listens and squeals. Jayden wants to interact with the book. He wants to turn the pages and point at the pictures on the pages and ask about their color or shape. Sometimes, the story morphs into a completely different story. The only time I get them both for story time is whenever we bathe them together, maybe once a week. I’ll be happy to have a more consistent bedtime ritual.

When I was growing up, my sisters and I all slept in the same room and I always had the fondest memories of our late night chats. I couldn’t possibly remember what we talked about but I remember getting shushed and threatened many times. I know Jayden and Maya can’t share a room forever, but my sisters and I enjoyed sharing rooms and I want the kids to have fond memories too.

Summer Fun

We are so happy our neighbor is back from vacation. We missed them after 3 weeks. Today, we took the kids on our usual afternoon walk, but it was stifling hot so we came back to the house and let them play on the swings while we got the water toys ready and then let them have at it. Here's Nicole, Kaylie and Maya.

Maya takes a turn in the wading pool, while Jayden decides he needs to put his shoes on.

Jayden and Maya play with their counting cups.

Jayden got this really cool beach ball on his birthday and he was just overjoyed with it. It can sit still in one place and spray water or you can fill it with water and let the kids roll it around while the water squirts out. It was a hit!

Kaylie and Jayden take turns jumping into the water jets and then running off. It was very cute and they all had a great time.

A New Look

A couple of months ago, I had to find a new hairdresser which was traumatic in itself, but luckily I found a wonderful lady. Not only could she cut hair, but she had a great personality to boot. At my first visit, I took a picture of Jessica Alba, whose hair I’ve been in love with as soon as I saw her in the new Revlon photo shoots. My hair was badly over processed from previous bad hair dying experiences and she said she wouldn’t be able to highlight it at the time. But she promised she would if I promised to use better hair products, condition my hair and use a reconstructor. So at that time, she gave me a good haircut and an overall color.

Well, I took myself in to the hairdresser for a touch up and she went ahead and did the highlights. It took a few hours, but the end result was worth it. . I was quite happy with the results. Here is a picture of me after my hair color experience gone bad. This was last summer. I went to my old hair dresser and told her I wanted a new look prior to returning to work after my maternity leave. I guess I got what I asked for.

Here is a picture after she attempted to fix it. Still red but not as bad and my hair took a beating for it. The chunks of hair that were highlighted were very dry and brittle.

Here's a picture of my hair after my first visit to my hairdresser. She gave it a good cut and got rid of most of the damaged hair. I wish you could see what a nice job she did, but since I live in the land of humidity, I put on this hanky to protect my hair. She had just blow dried it straight and it looked really good.

And here's my new color after today's visit. No haircut this time. I'm trying to let it grow so for now I'm happy with long layers.

I Inherited a Lydia

You probably have one too. Lydia was the cousin who sat at the dinner table for hours on end with the same mouthful and no one could ever understand why. Maybe it’s punishment for all the times I laughed at Lydia and poked fun at her along with the rest of my cousins. I think back and remember how funny I thought it was. There she was again, sitting at the table with the same spoonful of rice and beans in her mouth. Ha-ha-ha! Now, I have one and his name is Jayden. There is truth to the old saying. What goes around, comes around.

I dread all meal periods. Just about the only thing he eats at a normal pace is a snack food item. And because he doesn’t’ eat his meals, I refuse to reward him with yogurt or applesauce. I’m so tired of it. I am at the end of my rope. If he does it at breakfast or lunch, I never force it. If he wants to eat, great! If not, that’s ok. He’s going to be having it later at the next meal period (depending on the food item, of course). You should see the look on his face when he tells me he’s hungry and I whip out the waffle he refused at breakfast. But that doesn’t work at dinner time. Imagine if I presented him with a bowl of chicken and rice for breakfast the next day. (he-he) And because dinner takes so long, we can never get out to do anything afterwards so we are all punished.

When it comes to eating habits, he goes from bad to worse. Am I going to go through the same thing with Maya? She’s starting to drop the food items she doesn’t want off to the side of her highchair. Is she a Jayden in the making?

Happy Father's Day

On Father’s Day, I wanted to make a special breakfast for Esteban. I was planning on making stuffed french toast with fresh strawberries and bananas. I got up and quickly tended to the kids. I kept them as quiet as possible, changed diapers, got them milk and then breakfast. I jumped into the kitchen to prepare my masterpiece and Jayden and Maya were immediately getting into trouble. I was trying so hard to bite my tongue because I didn’t want to raise my voice and wake up Esteban. I started working on the batter, but had to stop every few minutes to quietly correct, discipline or separate Jayden and Maya. I kept looking at the clock because my goal was to have breakfast ready by 9:30 so we could make it to church after.

Finally, I finished the batter and I was mentally yelling at myself for not preparing it the night before when I saw Jayden pushing the high chair out of the way. He was standing next to his booster seat and he started to lure Maya there. Now, Jayden knows I don’t want Maya there because always gets into trouble. The laptop connection is there along with my breast pump bag, my purse, and the baby bag. I had moved on to the filling for my french toast when I heard Jayden whispering, “Maya, come on”. In a hushed but stern voice I said, “Jayden, no”. I was double checking my recipe and making some measurements when I turned just in time to see Maya tangled in the cord and knocking over my bag full of flyers and coupons yet to be cut! “MAYA!”

I was so mad. Can’t I do anything without having to stop a million times? I picked her up, brought her to her room and put her in the crib so of course she starts wailing. I went back for Jayden and I pull him to his room. At that point, they were both screaming and so naturally Esteban woke up. So much for a quiet morning and breakfast in bed.

All in all, it turned out well. I got breakfast ready. He enjoyed the artwork that the kids had colored for him the night before. We had our breakfast, cleaned up and went to church. Jayden cried for the first 5 minutes at the nursery and then got over it. (Yeah!) We enjoyed a wonderful service. The children’s church sang a song for all the daddies and then they shared a special presentation put together by the staff for the dads. It was full of all the things we as adults remember our dads saying to us when we were kids. It was very cool and I couldn’t help but smile. After the service, we picked up Jayden, who was now in the playground and he was having a great time. He had even made a special card for Daddy.

It was really too bad that Esteban had to leave to work, but I was happy that we had a memorable time together.