Pinterest Mommy

With two happy children at home, time is not slowing down. Bramble Berry is blessed with systems and processes and most importantly, a team of competent leaders (knock on wood). With the support of my team, I'm taking Friday mornings off to spend with the kiddos. I have this fantasy that I'll turn into a Pinterest Mommy, doing all the cool crafts I see on that site and that Jamisen will love them and appreciate our special time together.

This week, I wrapped toilet paper rolls with origami paper, pasted numbers on them and then turned that into a matching colors game, a counting game and a physics (stacking) game. Jamisen played with the project, on an off, for two hours but other than the stacking, really didn't have the attention, focus or understanding to do much other than throw the colorful matching balls and feathers around. Oh well, we'll get 'em next time!

Here Jamisen is, pushing away his biggest competition for Ava's attentions. Oskar and Jamisen play extremely well but are quite the little rivals when it comes to both Ava and the prime toys. More on that in another blog post ...

Ava and Jamisen dominating the geodesic dome during one of our Saturday evening play dates. We served the very upscale fare of pizza on paper plates. It got the job done and the kids loved it.

Sasha and Jamisen enjoying play dough with a side of food. Sasha is a few months younger than Jamisen and they play nicely together, with only a little bit of sharing issues (on Jamisen's part) but so far, Sasha has not encroached on the fair maiden Ava, and thus, the relationship remains love-love.

 Oskar and Jamisen showcasing their little version of WWF wrestling as Ava walks away, undoubtedly in disgust over the boorish behavior exhibited by her two would-be suitors.

Gardening, Giggling and Galumping

We have spent the last few weeks of summer trying to chase off deer in our yard. Chris has purchased these hilarious motion sensing sprinklers and the deer continue to slip by him. It's so funny.

We've actually gone on a walk or three in the neighborhood and I love our neighborhood. I can't wait to ride bikes together as a family and just tool around the 'hood.

We brought the kids to the Farmer's Market a few weeks back and it wasn't quite an unmitigated disaster but it was definitely divide and conquer!

I've got the Fall crops planted, thanks to help from Grandma Faiola. We planted kale, chard, pak choy, lemon cucumbers and beets. Possibly carrots but I don't recall... we still need to harvest the last of the zucchini, yellow squash and all the potatoes and then, stake the raspberries and plant seed happy soil stuff (no idea what it's called; ground cover maybe?) to till under in the spring. Something about crop rotation and ground nutrients too ... I'm learning a lot but clearly, it's not all sinking in.

We built a second enclosed rabbit and deer proof fence for the garden. Clearly, 50% of it is working.

 

Jamisen switches classes this week to a brand new class at Hillcrest. Don't tell him but I'm scared he won't like the kids and I'm not happy about him being separated from the friends he's already made. Lily was at work 8 hours with me last week and is going to be down to just 4 this week. It's a gradual decrease and I wrestle with euphoria (8 whole hours to do work!) and guilt (8 whole hours without my baby!). It's every working Mother's dilemma.

I've been making protein shakes and freezing them as mini popsicles. Jamisen thinks he's getting away with something when he has them for breakfast. I think I'm a genius. We're both winning.

Jamisen as Personal Trainer

Ah, Jamisen loves his little sister. He wants to hold her, make her laugh and mimic what his Mommy and Daddy do. He even tried to play peek a boo with her tonight! (video above; must click through to blog to see it as it does not embed in email).

Notice the sweet car carpet? I can't wait to start bribing ... er, I mean, rewarding (!) him with Hot Wheel cars for potty training to drive around that carpet. He still shows absolutely no sign of wanting to potty train. But really, could you blame him? He would have to quit playing to go to the bathroom in the toilet.

Baby Lily continues to delight and amaze at all times. She is growing extremely slowly. She is in the bottom 5th percentile for height and weight. She is only 9 pounds, 14 ounces - and she's over 3 months old. She is just over 22" long and is perfectly proportionate for all of her measurements.

Jamisen gets more and more energy with each passing day. He literally radiates energy from his every pore and sometimes, he gets so excited that his entire body shakes - almost like those teensy dogs that can't keep it together when someone throws the ball to them multiple times. Here he is, pushing me to get back into shape after Lily.

Jamisen loves this geodesic dome that his Grandpa Faiola spent hours (FIVE!) putting together for him. He has conquered it (!) and happily climbs to the top all the time now - a full 2 years before he's supposedly ready for it.

If there was one thing that Grandpa Faiola taught me .... well, one of ten gazillion great lessons ... it was that it's fine to introduce kids (within reason) to things that are supposedly above their age group according to the 'experts' or in this case, the toy designers. We let him explore and when he's ready, he goes for it and we're right there to catch him if it doesn't work. Granted, that may jump back to bite us at some point in the future, but right now? We're going with that theory and Jamisen is thriving with it.

This picture is from a few weeks ago but the connection that Lily and Grandpa are sharing is timeless ... even a couple weeks late.

Jamisen has been missing Grandma Faiola but she will be back next week to visit. He was super lucky to get a visit from Grandma and Grandpa Renoud this week (pictures in another blog post) so that helped him missing those special people in his life. We love our family and are so thankful for all of their support.

Dressed for Success

Big thanks to Grandpa Winston and Grandma Kelly for this amazing, perfect, adorable (!!) dress for Baby Lily.

I dressed her in it to come to work today and she stole the show. It's a good thing she napped a bit or else no one would have gotten any work done for all of the cute overload happening in this one little person. Thank you Grandma Kelly and Grandpa Winston! =)

Our little happy girl is coming to the office less and less. This week, she'll only be there for 10 hours. She's only working part time now and I miss her during the day but am so happy about getting more work done than I have the last 3 months.

Blackberry Picking with the Fam

We love Uncle Erik and Aunt Cheriss but even though we live 17 minutes from each other, we don't see each other as often as we want to (busy blah blah blah kids blah blah blah work blah blah blah). Here, Chris is expressing his joy at seeing the family while simultaneously photo bombing the picture. Who knew that was his secret superhero talent?

Team Cherik invited us to go blackberry picking. They found the mother-lode of all blackberry haunts along a public trail in Bellingham, right by the freeway of all things. Jamisen was very happy to look at all the trucks and cars passing by below the freeway overpass.

Chris and Jamisen were an amazing team. I had Miss Lily in the Baby Bjorn so was a little less efficient than the dynamic duo. Picking blackberries is hard work (!!). Seriously, ridiculously hard work. I have a new respect for why organic frozen blackberries are $6 a pound in the store.

  

Little Jamisen and Little Toby had a great time racing eachother. Jamisen loves his doggie cousins and even tolerates many doggies kisses from Toby's older sister, Samantha.

 

Jamisen also had a wonderful time 'flying' - "Daddy, swing swing swinnnnnnnnng!" We all enjoyed eating the blackberries and even were able to freeze some for smoothies and protein shakes.

 

Cheriss is a natural with baby Lily. We loved spending time with Erik and Cheriss and can't wait to do it again soon.

 

Backyard Fun

 

We were so happy to have Oskar and his parents over again two weekends ago. It has been such a busy two weeks that I wasn't able to post this in a timely manner. Whoops! But, these photos were too dang cute not to post, even late. You'll notice that Jamisen is learning how to make a mess. YAY! See the red paint all over his shirt? And yes, that is his artistic genius, helped out by Oskar and his unique painting tools (play dough and play dough shape makers).

We also met a new play date buddy - JJ! Her parents, Phil and Stacey, are regulars at the social wine club that we belong to. We've seen them on and off for a couple years and finally, this week, I just happened to stop in quickly and struck up a conversation. When I realized their little one was 22 months old? Instant best friends. Duh!

The three little burgeoning maestros had a wonderful time playing a piano. For future reference, when three people play the piano, it's called "Piano Six Hands." There are actually pieces written for this type of mastery - and clearly, our children have said mastery.

 

Jamisen is getting better at NOT hopping off at the very tippy top of his see-saw apex, thus dumping his play partners. Both he and Oskar are wearing little train engineer hats (hello, cute overload!).

 

I am working on color theory with Jamisen and designed this fun little project, with the help of Pinterest, to create colorful building options using tongue depressors, food dye (Labcolors) and velcro. He loves the color matching game though I'll admit some defeat because he was more interested in trying to peel off the velcro dots than actually build. Baby steps. Baby steps.

 Jamisen loved these little egg extravaganzas and kept asking for more "cupcake." If he thinks those are cupcakes, I'll take it. #winning

Lest you think we've forgotten about our little Lily, she was present for all the fun - sitting in her chair or safely in our arms.  She is growing and our little happy girl. She giggles, coohs and absolutely fills our heart with joy and gratitude. We are so blessed and lucky as a family of four.

Team Jilly

 

Jamisen had a fun boo-boo this week. He managed to hurt himself on a plastic water sprayer. We're not quite sure how that happen but think it was a pinch hurt. He was smiling big for the camera because I told him to smile for Grandma. =) I am trying to figure out how to tell him that he can also call her the traditional Norsk term for Grandma, 'Mor Mor' but the concept of other languages is still a (eh hem) foreign concept to him. 

 

Baby Lily remains happy, cheerful and above all, a blessing in our lives. Even Jamisen seems to be growing quite fond of her. We continue to try to emphasize the 'team' aspect of them together - even giving them their own monniker "Team Jilly!" for Jamisen + Lily. That term is not fixed however and we remain open to great ideas on how to solidify their bond. 

Lily still is working full time. She is a normal little baby girl, crying, pooping and puking like a 2 month old. This is an artistic rendition of what happened this week at work - she literally puked on command on our Customer Experience Manager's desk. It was hilarious. He was making little baby faces at her and saying playfully, "Don't you puke on my desk. Don't you do it." And blacccch, she opened her mouth and sallied forth such a lovely gusher that she missed her own outfit and hit his desk squarely.

We just harvested a new crop of potatoes from our not-deer proof garden. This is maybe 1/100th of the potatoes in the garden. I'm a little terrified of all the things I'll be learning to do with them. I'm thinking that I'll end up learning how to make potato chips and give away homemade batches of potato chips for Christmas this year! =)

We were so happy and pleased when Team Cherick came to visit this week. It was great to have them over and I remain astounded at how good Uncle Erik is with toddlers. He's a natural and clearly, judging from Lily's expression, does pretty good with babies too. I think the look on Erik's face (and the look of giggly satisfaction on Lily's face) comes from a rather impressive toot that Lily had just let out =)