household going-ons

Random going-ons at the Hallam household:

Ezra took his boards a few weeks ago and recently got the results:  he passed! Yeah!

Friday Olivia got tubes put in her ears! Ezra, Olivia and I left the house at 5:45 am and were back by 8 am. Pretty quick for a surgical procedure. They used a gas mask to put her to sleep for it. She did not like waking up from that. She cried and cried. But she was perfectly fine the rest of the day.

Friday I went on a fieldtrip with Annabelle's class to the Children's Museum. It was to explore the balls and motion room. The kids loved every minute of it. They had free time to explore any other room they wanted for a while before heading back. I really enjoyed being there with the kids! So fun to see how the kids interact with each other. They all wanted to show off how much they knew and wanted to shout out their new discoveries and be in charge. I especially loved that when we had instruction time, Annabelle wanted to sit in my lap or hold my hand. So sweet!

Grandpa Arne was babysitting. Grace and Jonah had a most wonderful day with Grandpa. I’m sure Grandpa read at least 20 books and Grace still wanted more. He counted money with Jonah and built lincoln log cabins. 

I have been looking at houses with a realtor (in case we do get to stay in Iowa - we find out March 19th)! I took Ezra to see my top picks, and together we agree on 3 houses that we really like. 

Grace is having problems with markers. We keep markers put away and bring them out only at special times. The reason for this is because Grace doesn't put lids back on markers, nor put them back in the marker bucket. It was a recurring frustration for me, so I finally packed them all up and out. So now Grace seems to find permanent markers around Dad's desk.  I guess she thinks they look like dry erase markers, which sometimes the kids are allowed to use on their dry erase board. So Grace sneaks a marker and starts drawing in random spots - a few scribbles on the dry erase board, some on the bed, on the baby doll, on the remote control, a few marks on the blanket, another spot on the wall... with black permanent marker! Ahhh! She has to have big long time outs in the bathroom.

Olivia’s only word she says now is Puppy. When she sees puppies on TV or in books she lights up and says it over and over. No other words, though. She even stopped saying Uh oh. Once I thought I heard Kitty.

Visit to Ames for a day

We spent a night and a day in Ames. Grandma let the kids do experiments! She got out lots of mini paper cups, and let the kids choose what to put in each (dish soap, milk, lemon juice, vinegar, Dr Pepper), some Grandma chose some herself. Then, they submerged old pennies in each cup to see which substance would do a better job cleaning  the penny. They loved this! They didn't just get to observe, but Grandma even provided gloves so they could get their hands in and be very proactive with this.  We discovered that vinegar and Dr Pepper work great at cleaning pennies. To end the activity, Grandma mixed vinegar and baking soda to make a mini-volcano. To watch the video clip, go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHeRATIYQG4.

It was warm enough to play outside, so the kids went of course to the playhouse in the backyard. They had a picnic snack. They sure love it out there!
Early in the morning, watching cartoons. We could only find cartoons in Spanish, but they didn't seem to mind. In case you were wondering, Olivia was posed there, and stayed only long enough for the picture. She does not sit and watch TV.
We enjoyed a great day at Grandma and Grandpa's. Some more highlights are getting balloons at Hickory Park, playing in the band, and walking to the park with Grandpa in knee-deep snow and getting wet and cold.

Olivia

Olivia is 14 1/2 months old. She is playing more with her siblings! It is fun for me to watch their interactions. 

Jonah gets in front of Olivia and puts on a huge smile and makes funny faces to make her smile. This is the same approach to her as when she was a tiny baby. 

Annabelle's interactions with Olivia are like a mother to a baby. She picks her up and bounces gently up and down. Turns her upside down over and over to make her laugh. Wants Olivia to sit in her lap always.

Grace gets right in her face and laughs - way too close to her face. She tries to pick her up, too, but that doesn't work. Tries to hug her tight but gets pushed away. But Grace doesn't seem to mind. She still adores her little sister. Here is a cute moment when they were playing well together:

One day while I was washing dishes, Olivia was bored, so I pulled a chair over to the sink and let Olivia stand next to me and play with the dishes in the water while I continued to wash. She loved it! Olivia quickly learned how to climb onto the chair all by herself. So now I have keep an extra eye on her in the kitchen. She can get to things on the table now, and loves to play with plates and forks and food that didn't get put away right away.
Ever since her trip to the ER, Olivia has been attached to soft things. She loves to hold something soft as she falls asleep. When we pick her up from her crib, she likes to keep that soft thing with her and snuggle with it, sitting in our lap, for several minutes. Jen and Sungti gave Olivia a soft pink piggy mini blanket when she was born. She clutched that for a few weeks. Then we realized Olivia isn't particular about which soft thing she has, just as long as she has something to hold. Justus gave her a teddy bear for Christmas, and that is her usual cuddly toy right now.
Here Olivia has a swollen lip. Can you tell? I don't even remember what exactly it was from. She tripped on something.

Olivia has two new teeth peeking out the top!! Four teeth now!

Tooth Update

We had a party to celebrate Annabelle's first lost tooth! Cake and a movie were enough to fall into the "party" category. We made a cake to look like a tooth! What a great excuse to throw a party. It sure made the kids happy.

Annabelle wanted to save her tooth, not give it up to the tooth fairy, who didn't give hardly any money at all, so Annabelle heard. She finally agreed that when she lost her second tooth, she would put one of them under her pillow. And she did. Annabelle had lots of questions about the tooth fairy that night. I didn't have all the answers. So early the next morning I did some research. www.toothfairyland.com has a page (click on ask the tooth fairy) with all the answers to every possible question. So the tooth fairy left a note with the dollar she left ("a whole dollar bill?! for such a tiny little tooth?!").