Is it spring yet?

We're still waiting for spring to arrive.  We will get a hint of it with some sunny near-70 days, and then it will snow a couple days later.  At least this winter was tolerable.  We only had 2 snow day school closures and none of those negative-degree mornings like last year.  When I tell people I'm from Seattle, they almost always assume the weather is the same as here, except maybe with more rain.  No, no, no, I tell them.  Seattle is so temperate.  Yes, there are four seasons, but the change between one to the next is not that different.  Even if I complain about the winters in Connecticut, make no mistake, I much prefer it here.  It's just so sunny all the time, which makes a person happy.

Teagan is quite the talker now.  Her language is finally clear enough that she can carry on a conversation and she is definitely taking advantage of her new skills.  We're working on having her take turns with Claudia talking in the car.  She is also doing a lot of "baby talking", basically making her voice very high pitched.  I can't wait until she outgrows that one!  Her other skill is being able to write her name and spell it.  Her teacher has been working with her for a couple months on "chomp, chomp, like an alligator" to hold her pencil and she really has it down now.

For the winter, Claudia did a short indoor soccer skill building course.  At first she wasn't that into it and complained that it was too much running, but once she scored her first goal in a scrimmage, she got a lot more excited about going.  She keeps busy with school and her after-care program, so we don't do a lot of structured activities outside of that, as she needs her down time.

Glen made it to Germany last month for work, and he has a another European trip planned for this spring (Netherlands), along with several in-country business trips.  We weren't anticipating he would need to travel this much.  His job continues to be very demanding, but is also quite rewarding.

Our big excitement in March was Auntie Neely visiting for a whole week.  It was some much needed down time for both of us, although I managed to pack the week with a bunch of errands and chores that had been hanging over my head for awhile.  Besides a couple fun things in Connecticut, we also went to NYC for a night and got to see a taping of "Kelly & Michael" the next morning.

And, I saved the best for last.  My little sister Gina had her baby!  Ayla Elizabeth Huston, born March 26th, just shy of 7 pounds.

Claudia fell asleep practicing her penmanship.

Rockefeller Center pose-Neely

Rockefeller Center pose-Amy

Waiting to get into the studios.

And we're in.

Kelly & Michael!

The girls pretending to be kitties (a frequent game).

Selfie with Auntie Neely.  That's Claudia's famous mouth-half-open selfie pose.

Dressed green for St. Patrick's Day

Ayla

Ringing in 2016

I'm a bit behind on my posting.  We had plenty of time over the holidays (almost two weeks off work!), but I was a tad depressed and missing my family so I didn't feel like posting.  Then January hit and we were in full swing again.  Christmastime had it's fun moments for sure.  First, my friend booked out a whole carriage for us on the Essex Steam Train "North Pole Express" shortly before the holidays.  The girls had SO much fun.  It was cool to have all our friends on the same train, drinking hot chocolate, singing carols, and saying hello to Santa.  We had an unseasonably warm December, so we just had to pretend that we were in the North Pole because there was no snow.  The next weekend, a local park (Hubbard) does this massive lights display, mostly of various animals made out of lights, and you can just drive through at your leisure.  It was great to start a new tradition.  For the holiday, we dressed up and went to our local church for Christmas Eve which did a kid-friendly nativity reenactment, and then that night, of course Santa came and filled our stockings and put presents under the tree, so we had a fun Christmas morning opening presents from him, as well as from our families who mailed gifts ahead of time.  In the afternoon, we managed a 3-way Skype between Seattle, Connecticut, and Brisbane, Australia.  So amazing; go technology!  After my big Thanksgiving feast in November for 4--my first time ever cooking it, complete with turkey breast, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, stuffing, green bean casserole, and of course cranberries out of a can--I didn't do a big Christmas dinner, but we were so busy with our new toys that I don't think anyone noticed.  For New Year's Eve, I planned out several games for the girls including a laser tag maze and a silly string fight.  That night was especially hard for me because I usually spent it with my sister Neely and my best friend Amanda.  It was good to have the girls laughter to distract me.

Glen was supposed to go to Germany for a work trip, but we had Winter Storm Jonas, and his flight got canceled.  The blizzard lost steam by the time it got to Connecticut, so we only got about 7-8 inches.  Thankfully it was on a weekend, so we just had fun playing in it.  Claudia enjoyed playing with her neighbor BFF and sledding.  Teagan was a bit more cautious and mostly just liked eating the snow, but she will come around in another year or two.  Glen has started a new fitness routine for 2016.  He has a gym at work and goes most days.  I've very proud of his hard work and he's getting HUGE muscles.  I activated my YMCA gym membership that I get free with Teagan's daycare fees.  I'm going once every weekend, so not much, but it's a start.

Teagan, she is quite the talker now.  She still mumbles a lot, but when I can understand her, she says the cutest things.  Some of my favorites:

Do I have school today? (Yes) Yay! I love school.

I'm a big girl.

Mommy, you're my best friend.

Mommy, I love you so much.
Is this broccoli spicy? (No).  Are these noodles spicy? (No). Is this water spicy? (No).

In general, I'm just so happy with our current situation for Teagan.  She loves going to school every day and she's maturing right before our eyes.  About twice a month she gets pajama day or show & tell at school.  At first she was confused and uninterested, but now she is totally into it and looks forward to these special days.  We have many nicknames for her: cutie patootie, teagan beagan, and chicken nugget.  She is still a little rascal and struggles to articulate her frustrations with us other than whining, crying, or hitting.  Thankfully she doesn't hit at daycare, but she still takes it out on poor Claudia and we like to say (jokingly), "that's a bad Teagan".  We keep asking her to "use her words"... hopefully it will click soon.  When she wakes up in the mornings (or sometimes in the middle of the night), she just cries for me instead of getting out of bed and coming to get me.  Claudia and I like to laugh "are your legs broken?", but I do recall Claudia going through this same phase, around this same age.  She has a very strong attachment to me and in the mornings we sometimes have to snuggle on the couch for 5 or 10 minutes before she can get rolling.

For Claudia, I'm not sure what to report except she is such a delight.  Okay, everything, except one thing.  She is the biggest staller in the mornings.  It doesn't matter what time we get up, it's always a lot of nagging and annoyance to get her ready for school.  Please tell me this gets better?  But other than that, she is such a well behaved kid who has an excitement for life and learning.  I was a bit of a tomboy as a kid so I don't totally understand it, but she likes to be "pretty" and enjoys dressing up, wearing makeup (just at home!), and doing her hair.  She also loves to listen to music, sing, and dance.  Her friend had a roller skating birthday party, and we went a second time over the holidays too, and she loves it.  She is still mostly holding onto the side, but is getting the hang of it.  Teagan gets to have trainer skates with wider wheels, so she's just as good (a little unfair).  Glen is a good sport and walks out on the rink to help the girls while I alternate whizzing by on my roller-blades and helping the girls.

Roller skating for the first time!

Essex Steam Train

Gingerbread house making.

 Christmas Eve.

Santa came!  Lots of cards on our mantel.  Look at those giant doggie stuffed animals under the tree.

Connecticut means snow!

 It almost all melted, so we went to the park.

Then it came back!

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My baby turns 3

Teagan's 3-year well child statistics: 3 ft, 2 in. (75%), 35 lb 9 oz (85%).  She didn't even cry when she got her flu shot, mostly because Claudia did hers first and told Teagan it didn't hurt.  I was so proud of Claudia for being brave with her shot, and a little surprised that both kids did so well.  For her birthday, we had a small celebration at home with a handful of friends from our neighborhood.  The theme was "kitties and doggies" so we painted kitty and doggie masks and also played a hide & seek game where Claudia hid little plastic kitties and doggies around the house for the little kids.  Just simple stuff, but we had fun.  I think Teagan's favorite part was the cake.

We started a new daycare this fall, the Cheshire YMCA.  Even though we really liked Bright Horizons, they were super expensive and the enrollment was so low that there were only 2-4 kids in her classroom on a given day and all the kids were younger so she wasn't being given any social "push" to learn new things.  We couldn't be happier with her new situation.  Her potty training is much more solid now.  She still has some accidents because she's busy playing and doesn't want to pull herself away, but now she actually cares.  When she has an accident she gets really upset and cries, "but, I'm a big girl" whereas before she would just go and pretend it didn't happen or even hide.  At home, her favorite activity is to color.  She can sit for an hour coloring pages that I print off the internet.  She has started identifying letters, especially "T for Teagan".  She can write a T and loves to trace her whole name.

Claudia is such a great eater, I just love it.  She is occasionally picky at dinner, but that's just because she's tired and grumpy.  I've been experimenting with some random things in her lunch like feta cheese and spinach leaves and she asks for more!  Today she declared, "I love carrot sticks, please give me more" and later asked if we could have salmon for Thanksgiving dinner.  Now Teagan on the other hand, is more of a sugar kid, so all she wants is fruit, yogurt, and white rice, and rarely eats meat.  It's been hard with all the Halloween candy in the house, but at least for lunch, I try to pack her the same thing as Claudia.  We all had so much fun on Halloween this year.  It was our first year having a house, so we did Jack-O-Lanterns, Glen passed out candy, and the girls & I went Trick-or-Treating with some neighbors.  Also, since it was on a Saturday this year, our friends threw a great party so we could keep the sugar-high going late this year.

As far as us adults, here's what we have to report.  We've now transitioned to fall, so Glen got a couple new tools, a leaf blower and a water-powered gutter cleaner.  New England is famous for how beautiful it is in the fall, so just driving to work is pretty amazing to see all the deciduous trees and their changing colors.  We had one fun weekend in October when our friends from Washington DC (originally from Seattle and Eugene, Oregon) came to visit us.  They have two girls a similar age to our girls, so we have a lot in common, and it was just nice seeing old friends.  They live in Annapolis, MD which I hear is beautiful, so hopefully we can visit them next year.  Right now Teagan is still a totally handful in the car, always instigating a fight with Claudia, so I'm really hoping she outgrows that by next year so we can branch out a bit and go on some longer adventures.  We still have so much to explore out here on the East Coast.

Teagan's birthday party.  Yes, her hair is on fire.  But Glen put it out in like a second, so no harm, she didn't even know what happened.  She was really focused on the cake.

Kitty mask.

Hide & seek cats and dogs.  Claudia was so proud to organize this game herself.

Reading a birthday card from Grandma.

My friend's daughters visiting from Washington DC.  Such sweet girls.

Fall fun.

The $20 kiddie swimming pool has many uses.

Fall means illness.  Teagan got hit with an ear infection, then we all got hit with a cold the next week, and then I got pink eye (but everyone else got spared thankfully).  We're all healthy now.  Let's hope it continues that way.

My lame attempt at capturing the fall leaves.  This is out my car window stopped at a light.  New England is this times 100 surrounding you at all times.

Ah, Halloween fun.  Claudia & I carved pumpkins.

A fairy and Doc McStuffins.  The elementary school had a great carnival the week before, and then of course we had Halloween night with Trick-or-Treating.  Lots of fun.

Summer keeps going and going

Although the school calendar doesn't show it, it's still summer in Connecticut as far as I'm concerned.  The nights are getting cooler, so we had to close our swimming pool (it's not heated), but other than that, we're still in shorts & T-shirts and have the air conditioning going.  I love it!  We spend most of our weekends just hanging out in the backyard, BBQing, and doing chores and errands.  It doesn't sound that exciting, but it suits us.  Although we're a bit overwhelmed by all the work involved with having a house and large yard, we're so happy to be out of an apartment and to have so much space, so you will not hear us complaining (much).  Like a tree that fell down in our yard that needed to be professionally removed.  (I said not much!)

Claudia started 1st grade at the end of August and we were surprised that they took the 40 kids and spread them into 3 classes instead of 2 like last year.  So we get the benefit of a small class size, in addition to an already fabulous school.  We couldn't be happier with our school and Claudia's teacher.  She jumped right back into her after-care program with her friends from last year and she is just a happy kid who looks forward to going to school every day.  Her big accomplishment for the summer is learning how to ride her bike without training wheels.  Glen taught her and now she can ride around the neighborhood, no problem.  Teagan likes to follow her pushing "baby Asher" (her baby doll) in his doll-sized stroller.

Teagan is officially a "big girl" and not a toddler anymore.  She will even tell you so.  She is now potty trained!  Yay!  We had a few bumps in the road to start because she's not all that bothered by going in her pants, but now we've made it to the other side and she actually asks to go instead of us having to bribe her to go (M&Ms or stickers).  Our daycare really stepped it up in August and by September we went to underwear.  Which leads us to our next milestone, we got rid of her binkie.  She had been down to just bedtimes and naps for awhile, but on the Friday of Labor Day weekend I "lost" her binkie and she went to bed without it.  She woke up once to ask again, but other than that, she was fine.  Then she went on a nap strike for 3 days, but by Tuesday she decided to go back to napping again.  She's asking about it a bit, but overall she's fine without it, as we knew she would be.  My baby is growing up (sniff, sniff).  A couple "Teaganisms" so that I don't forget them.  Even thought she can speak quite properly now, there are a few words she still says wrong, and it's very cute.  Water is "daugh-der" and blankie is "gankie".  Also, "cut it up" is "cat in the hat" and "Claudia" is "kai-ya".

Swimming in our 27-foot pool (Glen will get that joke).

First day of 1st grade.

Four girls grade K-3 at the bus stop this year! (Plus two little sisters for the photo).

We finally visited the shoreline.  Hammonasset Beach (I still can't pronounce it properly).  It's massive and very popular.  It's on the Long Island Sound.

The girls loved it (obviously)

Fish & chips, ice cream, and a carousal ride at Lenny & Joe's Fish Tale.

Take your daughter to work (future scientist?)  Glen and I often have to work on the weekends (boo).  Claudia enjoyed playing scientist and then watched Gonoodle.com on the computer while I worked.

The Daisy Girl Scouts toured a chocolate factory and made their own chocolate "pizza".  Yum.