Buy One Get Two Free!: Ain't no mountain high enough

Like the song goes...ain't no mountain high enough to keep me from getting to you. Or your yarn. Or the remote. Or the cup of water way back there on the end table. Or the piano. The list is endless really.

Elsie has gone from amateur to skill level expert in the feeding department. She has a precise pincher and good aim to her mouth. She is feeding herself just as fast as the boys now, although cannot catch Danny in volume taken in as he still shovels in better than the rest. We have started giving them more finger foods of veggies and fruits and mealtime is slowly evolving to them doing the feeding instead of me. I have finally used up all the pureed veggies and fruits I made for them, and they now are starting to eat smaller pieces of our dinner. They continue to love to eat, and hustle into the kitchen at feeding time.

Another recent advance is heightened emotions. All the babies now flip out if someone else is playing with 'their' toy, or if you say no, or if you leave the room. We are talking fall to the floor sobbing, kicking feet, slamming head into carpet. The struggle is real folks. Dealing with all these emotions with little communication skills must be tough, and redirecting has become the main event in our house.

Sometimes the frustration is directed at each other and they will literally yank a toy that was taken from them back. Elsie was playing with a book that Danny wanted. He took it. She literally snatched it back with her left hand and straight armed him with her right simultaneously while letting out what can only be described as a death screech. I may take the responsibility for this as for the last 6 months when Child A would take Child B's toy, blanket, etc, and Child B would cry and look at me, I often uttered the phrase 'don't take that shit'. Well, glad they were listening. Here is to hoping they continue to listen to my new most common phrase of 'play nice with each other'.

Danny is now up to 4 or 5 steps at a time. I promise I will try to get a video of this and post on the next update. He is becoming more confident by the day, and continues to perfect his free standing and balancing. Elsie is a madwoman on the walker. She will plow through anything and everything those wheels will roll over. Toys, blankets, furniture, dogs...it doesn't matter, that woman is on a mission. So we have 3 walkers (see paragraph 4 for explanation of non-sharing stage we are currently in), and a motorcycle ride on/walk behind toy. Elsie is in love with the motorcycle (like her mother), and will sit on it and scream until someone pushes her around on it. Even her brothers push her to get her to shut up. Sammy is getting more confident with the walk behinds and shrieks with excitement while pushing them across the floor.

Taking pictures is becoming more elusive by the minute. I tried to take a group photo to develop for Christmas pictures, and this is how it went...

So I enlisted a professional. It goes much smoother when I can just be the distractor instead of the director, distractor, and photographer. Here were the results...

Much better. Thank you Caryn Dumas for squeezing us in before Christmas!

We had a nice visit with the Vargo's on their annual Christmas visit home. The only pictures taken were from 3 year old Rosie, but she is a pretty good photographer. Here are some pics.

Here are the rest of the pictures for the last 2 weeks. :)

Hanging with Daddy

Oh look Mommy we snuck behind the couch again. We LOVE playing with the lamp behind the piano.

What's more fun than playing with wires!!!

Sammy

We have a turtle bouncy that you sit and hold onto. The babies are not quite heavy enough to bounce it yet, so we push them up and down. Sammy loves this.

Sammy is my tactile baby. He loves to take his socks off and rub his feet on things. The play mat is silky, and I often find him sitting on it, playing and rubbing his feet on it :)