Disneyland

I got behind on posting, but I will try to update you on the last two months.

For Claudia's 5th birthday in April, we took her to Disneyland!  We joined our friends the Martinkas and their girls and did 5 days in California, with 3 at Disney.  We're thankful for our families for helping, Glen's family for paying for our flights and my family for watching Teagan while we were away.  I've been several times as a child and adult, but it was Glen & Claudia's first time.  It ended up being unseasonably hot, in the low-100s, so we also spent a lot of time at our awesome hotel pool.  Claudia loved Dumbo of course, and by the end of our trip, got more daring and went on a ton of rides in California Adventure.  She also liked seeing palm trees everywhere we went.  Her favorite thing was just the general magic of Disneyland and she really believed in all the characters and was fascinated by them.

The girls and I are loving this warm spring/summer weather and getting out about about a lot, visiting friends and family, swimming in our pool, and going to parks.  On the rare times we're just hanging out at home, they like to pretend to be cats and they crawl around the house saying meow and eat "kitty food" (Cheerios) out of little bowls on the floor.  Their alter egos have names too, Isabelle and Lizzie.  They're surprisingly physical with each other (initiated by Teagan), which sometimes gets out of hand, and they often fight over toys.  But when it's good, it's really fun to see their kindness to one another, especially how Teagan worships Claudia and copies everything she does.

Teagan loves the TV show "Caillou" and I've created a monster by introducing her to it because she goes to the TV and begs "Caillou, Caillou" in this cute whiny voice.  Claudia had very minimal interest in TV from age 1-3, so it's yet another way that Teagan is different.  She also has a strong interest in books and will just flip through pages on her own, or ask me to read them to her.  Her favorites are one about baseball and another about a frog.  She loves frogs and tries to jump around the house like one, although she hasn't yet figured out how to get her feet off the ground.  She also has good verbal skills (amazing considering she sucks on a binkie half the day) and she's at that stage where she mixes up opposites, like hot/cold or up/down.  She doesn't mix up mommy or daddy though.  I think Claudia used to call me daddy sometimes when she was this age.

Claudia graduated from her pre-K class at Concordia Lutheran and is super excited to start Kindergarten in the fall.  She has matured so much this last year.  Her "academic" skills have not changed that much, but her social skills have improved tremulously.  She's much better at communicating with her teachers and friends and now they're all getting to see the chatty girl that Glen & I have at home.

Cousin Asher is born

We're excited to announce a new addition to our family, Asher Jackson Beltran, born March 28th to Neely & Emilio.  Teagan is now 18-months old and is officially no longer the baby of the family.  She loves to point at Asher and say "baby".  He's super cute and seems to have an equal mix of mom's and dad's looks.  We think he looks a bit like Teagan as a baby.

In other news, Claudia turned 5!  We had a low-key birthday party with family, complete with a Doc McStuffins themed birthday cake that Claudia helped make and decorate.  We also surprised her with news that we're taking her to Disneyland in two weeks.  She's not overly excited because I don't think she really knows what that means, but I'm sure once she gets there she will.  Teagan is going to stay behind with Grandpa & Grandma half the week and Gina & Chase the other half.

Teagan has been quite challenging this last month.  All four of her canine teeth erupted, which led to lots of drooling, fussiness, and nighttime awakenings.  She is also transitioning out of her morning naps, so she seems chronically tired and her acting out (hitting, biting, hair pulling) seems to increase with tiredness.  But, on the positive side, she's showing signs of wanting to potty train, so we're going to start introducing that.  She also loves to do a "nudie run" by running circles around the house naked.  We tried not to encourage this, but it must be ingrained in development, because Claudia went through a stage like this too.  I have to admit, it's adorable, but not so adorable when she pees on the floor.  So, we just have to time it right, like after bath time.  We only do baths 2-3 times a week though because Claudia has mild eczema and needs to limit her baths, and also they both get so wild splashing water everywhere, that some days I'm just not up for it.  They do love it though and when summer hits, we will definitely explore some local splash parks and wading pools.

Blanket

Teagan has entered the gatherer stage where she wants to take an armful of toys everywhere she goes, including a baby doll, purse, and of course her blanket!  She has latched onto a particular one, a green jungle-themed blanket that Claudia rejected and was stored on the bottom of the pile for the last 5 years.  So as to compete, Claudia has decided that her ladybug blanket is her favorite and now we have to drag them both everywhere.  Although it is cute that the girls go and find them for each other and know they are special.  Her other favorite thing lately is mirrors.  I think she knows how adorable she is and wants to look at herself all the time.  Although, we also have one not so pleasant stage that Teagan is going through, which is tantrums.  She struggles with transitions, especially leaving places and getting strapped in the car.  I don't blame her though because she gets strapped into the carseat a minimum of 4 times a day with drop-off and pick-up for Claudia's preschool.  She runs away, screams, and arches her back while I pin her down to get her in her seat.  Poor thing!

Claudia is super interested in reading books now and although she still doesn't have the patience to practice her words with me very often, she likes to sit down with a stack of her favorites and "read" the story to herself.  She especially likes The Berenstain Bears and (cringe) Dora the Explorer.  She borrows Glen's Kindle Fire and has her own profile to access the kid's books and games.  Teagan also loves books and her favorites are the Sunny Day Fairy series, which were Claudia's favorites at that age too.  I'm so glad Neely bought us the whole series because they're out of print now.  The stories are very basic, but the illustrations are beautiful and there are lots of animals and other common objects for us to point at and practice saying. Claudia's other new thing is telling jokes, especially Knock Knock ones.  She doesn't understand how to make them funny yet, but she keeps trying.

We're getting a couple sunny days now that it's March and a lot of rain, but when we see the sun, we run straight out to the park.  Neely is so close to having her baby, only a couple more weeks.  We're getting excited for her.  Also, my dad had a hip replacement surgery last week and it went well.  He needs to use a walker and take it very easy for 4-6 weeks for the bone to attach properly to the implant, but after that, he's hoping to get back walking without pain and playing golf by this summer.

Uh-oh Spaghetti-oh

Teagan is now 16-months old and is quite the talker.  She is adding several words every week, some more clear than others.  She has mastered "no" and says it in a very cute soft voice, unless you ignore her, then she starts waving her hands, shaking her head, and yelling, so it's best to listen to her!  She calls Claudia ga-ga or sometimes whispers her name, which sounds pretty accurate.  We have taught her to say uh-oh spaghetti-oh.  She nails the first part, but the rest is kind of slurred.  It's cute to hear her try out new words and combinations.  She's also working on animal sounds (meow, woof, baa), clothing (shoes, socks), and body parts like hair, eyes, and her favorite, belly button!  She loves books and points the objects to have me identify them.  She can now blow kisses, close her mouth to do an actual kiss, and wave bye-bye.  She seems to take a lot of pride in knowing how to do these things, and although she has never had bad separation anxiety, these new skills make it easy for us to say good-bye.  Overall, she is quite clever and a joy, except for one thing, the head butting!  Claudia went through a stage, but she would butt the ground, Teagan likes to butt people.  It especially hurts if you get it in the eye socket or nose.  It seems to be behavioral, like when Claudia is getting more attention than her, so I'm always on high alert to intervene and pull her away.

We had a small snowstorm come through in the city and we got about 2 inches, although it only lasted one day.  Just long enough for the Glen & Claudia to build a snowman.  In other news, the Seattle Seahawks won the Super Bowl for the first time ever, so that was exciting for our city.  Other smaller celebrations were a baby shower for Neely and the girls had a Valentine's Day party and sleepover at Grandpa & Grandma's house while Glen & I had a hot date.  I was still getting over a cold, so it was a pretty tame evening, but we still appreciated our night together.

Starting out 2014

Teagan is such a little girl now.  Her hair is long enough that I have to put it up every day, usually in a "whale spout" or if I have the patience, pigtails.  She is 15-months old now and here are her stats from her last appointment:
weight: 22 lbs. 12 oz (50%)
length: 31.25" (75-90%)
head: 49.25cm (97%)

She is really into carrying around objects and will drag a doll (or two), a blanket, or even a toothbrush and toothpaste out of the house every time we come and go.  She is also especially attached to her binkie now.  The doctor suggested we give it up at age 1, but she didn't use it much except at bedtime or in the car, so I didn't think we needed to.  Well, I must have missed my window because now she wants it at all time.  Luckily I think it's cute and it certainly is not hurting her language development.  She has added so many new words: strawberry, cheese, jumper, diaper, bubble, grandma, papa, woof, sock, shoe, belly button, blue, purple, and many more.  She's averaging two or three new words per week.  She is just a delight and I enjoy her so much.  How lucky am I to get to spend all this time with her.

Claudia is quite the character too.  She is like a sponge lately and is understanding so many complicated things, but it's cute that other things just totally go over her head.  We've had a dry winter, so even if it's cold, she has been doing adventures with my dad outside and learning about trees, fish, and other interesting things.  My parents (and often Neely too) still watch her twice a week while I work, so she gets lots of opportunities to do crafts, puzzles, and cooking.

As far as family news, Gina & Chase got engaged at the end of December and are planning their wedding for June 22nd.  Whew-ho, we're excited!  For New Year's, Glen had to stay home and work (boo), but the girls and I carpooled over to Alta Lake with Neely & Emilio in their new car (Nissan Pathfinder) and we spent almost a week just hanging out with our family and having fun.