New blog address

Here's our new blog address - http://superheroesandsweetness.blogspot.com/

In case you care for the reasoning, here's why we've created a new site:

I grew up in a very fair house - as in fairness was highly regarded.  We both normally had the same number of presents under the Christmas tree.  We had one dog, and for her life she alternated between mine and my brother's room every night.  And when we turned 18, my brother and I both were generously gifted our own 1 year old white Toyota Camry with similar mileage on them!  My friends thought it was crazy that we had almost identical cars, just two years apart, but it certainly left no room to say they were playing favorites with one of us.

Which is why my dad gave me two weeks to settle into parenthood of two children before petitioning to get Maya's name included on the blog.  They can both be superheroes and both be sweet, but at the moment, Collin often chooses Robin or Spider-man as his alter ego, and Maya is just pure sweetness.  Hope you'll follow along our blog that is mostly kid pictures of the day-to-day in our home.

Happy Birthday Grammy

Wishing a very happy birthday to my wonderful mom and my kids' incredible Grammy!

Brother and sister in matching purple AND two sets of eyes staring at the camera! 

I joined in the purple theme (the one photo Collin wasn't attacking a bad guy with the stick)

Carried away with love for our Grammy!

Three years and three weeks

Collin's class had a party last week to celebrate the end of the school year and the three-year-olds were told to come dressed in their finest.  We rolled into school just before 11am - I still can't handle mornings - with Collin in the tie he wore to Alex and Coady's wedding.  Maya was sporting a cute onesie with matching bow from Cas' co-workers, so before we headed to school, we tried for a second round of sibling shots. 

 

Here's Collin at almost 3 1/2, Maya at three weeks -

The awkward "put your arm around your sister" pose -

Giving her a kiss and trying to get one back from her -

A smile from Collin and Maya looking in the direction of the camera without wailing - it was the best I could get - 

Maya with the fist-under-the-chin pose -

Collin's high one day from school was taking a nap in the tent - so when he got to school he wanted to pose in their loft-turned-tent in his classroom -

This has been such a fun year for Collin.  I'm so thankful for his sweet school and class - some of the kids have been with him since he was 8 months old.  I'm amazed by what he can do - he came home with a book of shapes he cut out when it never would have occurred to me to practice with kid scissors.  I love hearing about his day - whether he's playing duck-duck-goose or pretending to be lions or gazelles or rams with Aiden and Audrey.  His teachers are so sweet and they encourage his imaginative play and great story-telling.  I'm so thankful for my part-time schedule that gives him a great mix of playing with others and learning at school and time home with me and now Maya on my days off!

Splish, splash Maya's taking a bath

I have to admit with child #2, I mostly took first bath pictures out of obligation.  Maya's neutral so far to the bath, but I'm pretty sure she prefers the soaking bubble baths to the pre-umbilical cord sponge baths.  Lounging in her infant tub in the sink -  

We think our kids look incredibly similar!  Here's Collin with his "look of concern" in the tub, though in this picture he was 2 months old -

And little sister, with a similar "what are you guys doing to me" expression -

Collin has Cas' olive skin tone more than Maya does - so maybe that means this child will at least somewhat resemble me when she gets older!

Relaxing -

When her infant tub isn't in the sink, we have let her take baths with Collin - he in the tub, she in her infant tub.  It normally starts well and then gets hectic when Maya's clean and ready to get out but Collin's still enjoying splashing around.  Luckily both times I've tried it, Cas has come home just as I need to wash and get Collin out to lend a needed second hand.

You are my Sunshine

Collin's class performed a spring show on Friday, singing "You are my Sunshine" and doing two dances.  I was so glad I got to see him!  Cas was out of town, so my sweet Dad spent the morning with Maya so I could see the 5 minute performance.  I was glad I could video-tape it for Cas and enjoy the cookie he decorated for me afterwards (though in that respect, Collin might have rather me not been there to get the cookie all to himself). 

The sweet teachers put a lot of energy into their show.  The song lasts maybe 30 seconds, but they had flower and sun costumes, a decorated stage, picture markers for where each child should stand, and even a program!  Here was our little sun -

 And here's most of his three year old class -

On Saturday Cas checked the monitor during naptime.  When he couldn't see him as he scanned the bed, he headed into his room to tell him to go to sleep, assuming he was playing in his room.  Instead he was hidden among stuffed animals, holding onto Eric the cabbage patch that belonged to me and his silkies.

Collin continues to be so much fun.  Whenever Maya starts to fuss he'll run to her shouting, "Collin to the rescue."  Which means we hustle behind him to supervise his rescuing, though he has figured out how to put the pacifier back in her mouth which is often the fix. 

Bringing the parties to our house

Our sweet family is accomodating our newborn anti-germ paranoia and bringing get-togethers to us lately.  For Mother's Day and to celebrate Aunt Debbie's birthday, we haven't even finished cleaning our home when family swoops in, washes our dishes, and sets out food they brought, utensils, plates, etc!  It's the best.  (We'll calm down on germs once Maya starts to smile around 2 months and the doctors don't have to over-react and treat for menigitis if she spikes a fever.)

 

On Sunday we celebrated the birthday of our wonderful Aunt Debbie - who has been our life-saver too many times to count - with pizza lunch.  Everyone got some time with Maya too - here being held by Aunt Carla with the birthday girl looking on.

Napping in the arms of Great Grandma Betty - 

One of my cousins, Jasper's, friend gave her hand-me-down books including a 96-page Lion King book.  And of course the family read the entire book to him, preventing us from skimming through the words and skipping pages in future readings (his memory for the things he cares about like Simba and Scar is frighteningly great).  I offer to read the book in 10 page increments! 

Uncle Larry, Uncle Bobby and my dad -

The family in town for the celebration - Aunt Debbie with her mom and three brothers -

Birth Announcement photos and out-takes

I had several images from pinterest I was sure we could recreate at home for our birth announcement pictures.  I think we kept one of the pinterest ideas, and the rest of the sibling shots made great out-takes.  Maya was not in the mood to pose and even bribing Collin with jelly beans, we ended up with images like this:

Or we'd get shots where both kids would cooperate, but the photographer (in this case, Cas, because he was taller, which means my photo would have been worse) would cut out a chunk of the heart shape train track -

The pinterest-inspired picture -

And Collin letting us know he was done with this train track that didn't connect at the point and where we kept insisting he look at the camera and smile -

These pictures didn't turn out like the professional shots online either, but they do show how into being a big brother Collin is -

Collin did not understand that he was fake reading

So he'd turn the page or squirm as any three-year-old would do, and we got another "parents of the year" shot, with our 10-day-old rolling off his back (onto the bed, she was fine) -

We had much better success during Collin's nap and after Maya nursed with Maya-only pictures where I played dress up with my daughter.  I love that this tutu has been worn by my best friends' daughters when they were newborns and was passed down to Maya -

Our little princess -

Big bows -

On Sunday, we tried some family shots after dragging a sweaty Collin away from lizard hunting in the front yard with Brownie.  When we told him we were taking photos he exclaimed, "one photo!"

Even Cas couldn't wait to get out of his long sleeve shirt, giving us 2 minutes to get the best photo we could capture -

Mother & daughter -

In his comfy clothes - father & daughter -

My uncle snapped a photo of her closet full of clothes.  I have bought 1 dress and two other outfits - the rest were gifts or hand-me-downs . . . and often the hand-me-downs still had their tags!  She is one spoiled girl!

Pretty in pink at the park

When Maya was one week old, Cas took a short business trip and the grandmas came to the rescue, making sure I had a few extra days of two-on-two coverage.  On Thursday, Grammy and Collin attended story hour, and then Maya and I met them at a park for a picnic lunch.

For the first 30 minutes at the park, they apparently built sandcastles, using sticks as steam-rollers and bulldozers. 

 Kisses and hugs were immediately given to Maya once I set her down - he LOVES his little sister!

Of course we needed the headbow for our first trip to the park!

The next day we snapped a few more in the backyard.   I know she'll change so quickly, I want to remember what she looked like her first few days.

She's a tummy time champ!