Fall 2010

Peek-a-boo, Callie!

Fun in the leaves together

Maia

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Callia and Maia are now approaching 2 years and 5 months and are becoming more and more independent every day. They both love building things and have a special time with Daddy playing Lego Duplo blocks making towers and tall buildings. They still love to dress up in hats, skirts and jewelry parading around the house pretending to be a character they know like Maria Von Trapp or Mary Poppins.

Callia is doing very well and we have seen such an improvement in her language development since her ear tube surgery in October. She is now saying words more clearly and using more sentences. She especially loves listening to music and singing songs. Her favorite right now is the Sound of Music and she gets to excited and expresses so much during different emotional parts of the songs. She can hardly contain her glee when Maria spins herself around at the top of the mountain and sings, "The hills are alive with the sound of music..." She often will say the cutest things like "Good idea!" after I have suggested we do a certain activity or she will ask herself something and then say, "Ok? Ok." Her love of books is still going strong and she could sit on a lap reading all day if we let her. She can also be entranced by TV and requests it quite often but we try to limit it to short amounts per day. Callie has been recognizing letters for quite awhile now but last month she surprised me by recognizing some words. She has a Halloween shirt that says "BOO" and she wore that through the month of October. We were taking a walk past a preschool a few weeks ago (in Nov) and she pointed to the window and said "BOO!" Sure enough there was the word boo in the window. Princeton, Harvard or MIT you may have to fight over her in 16 years!

Callie is getting ready for Christmas and is so excited by Santa and all the decorations. Whenever we turn on the tree lights she says, "Happy Birthday!" Looking forward to seeing her face on Christmas morning...

Maia is incredibly comical these days. She has the sweetest little voice and most of the time asks for things in such a nice way. "Mama, may I please have some more milk?" What a far cry from the screams for milky a few months ago...

We were at dinner recently and Maia kept banging her spoon on her bowl. After asking her a few times to please stop, I said to her "Maia, are you looking for some attention?"  She paused and then said with a smile "Attention, where are you?"  Maia is also a very caring little girl who thinks about others all the time. Callia got hurt and was crying one day. I was holding her and telling her that it was ok. Maia came running into the living room with "booboo ladybug" (an icepack) and said, "Here Callia." She chose that one in particular because she knows Callie loves ladybugs.  She bumped me in the head the other day and when I said "Ouch", she went to get me an ice pack too. Maia is very snugly with her mommy & daddy but does not seem to like to be hugged by anyone else. She instead offers to "high five" as an alternative.

Maia is still very active and loves to climb on anything. She mostly likes to climb on Daddy all the way up to his shoulders. Her latest accomplishment is teaching herself to ride a tricycle. This is all she wants to do when we are outside and she is so very proud of herself.

The biggest news is that the girls have been accepted to a wonderful preschool beginning next September. The teachers remarked at how well they sat through circle time during their 1st visit and how ready they seemed to be for school. I am so excited for them and am looking forward to being involved in the preschool community. 

Wishing all of our friends and family a wonderful holiday season and all the best in 2011!