I'm writing this just about two weeks after we moved our family back home from staying with Sharon and Dean this summer. The past two months have been quite the departure from our normal routine, but so good for Wilder snd Felicity to soak up quality time with their grandparents.
Being back at home has been so good for all of us. Zach and I spent time unpacking, organizing and even hanging things on the walls. Wilder started preschool on Monday--twice a week--and we started our homeschool routine on Tuesday. The kids are getting into the groove and we're finding our rhythm again.
Earlier this month, I Wilder and Felicity to Chick Fil A in Cedar Hill and they both managed to climb UP a super tall slide. That was crazy, but they were so proud.
Wilder was missing our house this month. He would ask Zach for updates on how the leak repair was going. We would visit the house on Sundays and Wilder always pulled out his took set to hammer on the floor to help "fix" it. Now that we're back, he occasionally will talk about people having a leak in their floor that needs to be fixed! This is a vivid experience in his mind I guess.
Felicity's verbal skills crack me up right now. I feel like she's got a bit of French going on. It's S'daddy, S'mimi, S'Wilder... But I say it's French - "C'est Daddy, C'est cheerios" etc. :-) She loves to sing Itsy Bitsy Spider, Pat-a-cake (clapping her feet), Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, ABCs, Daddy Finger and others. She likes to dance to the nursery rhyme video Little Baby Bum. She just likes music and dancing a lot! She also has taken to carrying around small pieces of paper or small notebooks with a pen, piece of chalk, or crayon. It's like she's making lists all the time. She'll carry it around literally for hours.
She's also really into accessories. Hats, sunglasses, capes, butterfly wings. She LOVES playing dress up. It's so fun to watch her adorn herself to play.
We took Felicity with us to Wilder's meet the teacher day, and Felicity made a beeline for the toy kitchen. She made "piece of (pizza)" and she saw the coffee pot and ran over to me saying "Mama coffee!" She likes to pretend cook. It's so cute. She's not so much into into toys, but make believe real stuff, she really likes. And also Duplos.
Wilder and Alfred have become great friends over the summer. Felicity too--Alfred tolerates both of them now. It only took us all being displaced to force the friendship! ;-) But Wilder and Alfred hang out a lot. Wilder will pet and hug Alfred and the kitty will purr and just sit by him. This week I've been bringing Alfred in when I put Wilder down for his nap. They'll lay together for a while. I don't think Wilder can handle Alfred during actual rest time - he's way too excited about his kitty friend-- but when he's a little older, I think we'll let the door stay open so Alfred can have slumber parties with his buddy.
Yesterday Wilder asked me if he could "bring his best friend Alfred to school to meet his friends." Seriously how cute is that?? I've had Alfred for 12 years now - he's been with me since before my senior year of college, he went on my internship in Amarillo with me, he was my buddy when I was a young professional, he was our first pet as newlyweds, and now he's here with us in our home with our babies. I miss Pierre, our other cat, a lot. Pierre was always very friendly with Wilder when he was a baby, and Alfred was aloof. We lost Pierre almost 2 years ago, when he skipped out the door and never came back. Both kids desperately wanted to be friends with Alfred but, he was a cat and did what he wanted. So... now that he's friends with my babies, it really just brings me such joy.
What else... Pretty sure Wilder is trying to drop his naps. He rarely naps, but we're enforcing mandatory rest time anyway. Felicity naps for 90 minutes like clockwork, which is great. But she still has been waking up 1-3 times a night and getting up way earlier than her brother. Sigh.
We've been talking about themes for Felicity's birthday coming up in October. We decided on a butterfly theme, and Wilder decided for himself, he wants a caterpillar party. No input from us on that, but he's stuck with the idea for a month now. So I guess that's what we're doing!
Here are a few photos of the kiddos from this month!
