The Sunday Update

Happy Sunday, everyone!

The weather here in Germany has been rainy this past week, but we've had bits and pieces of sunshine as winter starts to close in on us.  The temperature hasn't dropped below freezing yet, but it's expected to drop significantly this week, so we'll see if we get our first snow!

This week's update is also a bit photo-heavy, but I think that's okay.  On with the show!

First, I want to start off with some self-portraits of the girls that were posted on the wall at school.  I love how Tay's drawing style has changed since she has started Kindergarten here in Germany.  She never used to draw eyes with the "whites," but now she does, and her nose has changed from just a line  to a triangle with nostrils!  I also love how she has drawn herself with really long hair, dressed herself in her favorite color dress, and even gave herself some lovely striped leggings.  The shoes she has drawn are her house-shoes that she wears indoors at school.  You can tell by the way the flaps are positioned and shaped.

Now, I'm very proud of Ri's little drawing of herself.  I know it's very faint and you can barely see it, but this is her first ever portrait of herself!  She drew a face with eyes, nose, mouth, and hair. Her arms and legs come directly out of the head, but it's adorable anyway.  I think most kids her age forget to draw the body…no?  It appears she has also given herself a few fingers, too.  She also said those giant circles underneath her head are her feet.  I'm curious how much coaching she had to draw all those features.  Normally, she draws a face with hair…but she does like drawing quite a bit these days.

See?  This is "Mommy" that she drew for me one day last week:

On with the activities this week.  We didn't do any "planned" activities this week because I've been slacking (and generally exhausted and falling asleep at night at the same time as the kids instead of staying up and planning for the next day).  I find that the girls and I are pretty good about doing things on the fly, though.  ;)

I think in this photo, we had just gotten back from the store or something, and the baby happened to be passed out, so I just laid her down on the floor with the girls and told them to play semi-quietly.  Tay played a board game by herself and Ri played with some Legos (I say Legos, but they are all really Duplos).

A better shot with better lighting.

Rea stayed out long enough for me to get the dishes done, and when I came back out to check on them, here's what they were doing.  Baby was now out of her outerwear, and the three of them were playing another game (Zingo).  Apparently, Ri was in charge of this game because the other two were both intently looking at her as she passed out the cards and worked the tokens.

Although I mentioned before that we were getting quite a bit of rain this past week, the time when we usually walked to school tended to stay dry, so we would often risk it and walk to school.  The main reason is that we don't have too many fallen leaves in our yard and don't have much opportunity for the girls to play in the leaves (I think they do at the school quite a bit, though, because most days they come home with leaves attached to their jackets).  Anyhow, here's a cute shot of Ri happily "sloshing" through the leaves on the way to school.

Tay did some more baking with her Easy-Bake Oven this week.  She made some red velvet cupcake.  As she was icing them, I noticed that she was using her finger to ice the cupcakes!  Luckily, we only shared them with family.  ;)

One morning, Ri came into the room while I was changing the baby and found my shirt folded up on my bed.  She picked it up and said, "I want to be you, Mommy" and proceeded to put the shirt on.  She put it on all by herself and let me take a photo of her.

My little helper.  One of her responsibilities after meals is to wipe down the table.  She works rapidly - wiping and smudging as she goes...

…re-folding the towel...

…look at her go!  :)

The next few pictures are of the "picnic" they set up for their "friends."  Tay was the lead on this activity and she set up the picnic and sent out the "invitations" to her guests.   

Ri had to get busy getting the baby dolls dressed because they "can't go to a tea party naked!"

Although I know making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich is not really considered "cooking," it's a skill that kids should definitely learn how to do because it's simple enough and rewarding to be able to make their own "snack."  Ri has gotten pretty good at spreading the peanut butter already.

Tay is a professional.

When using bread that hasn't been toasted, tears can happen when your bread is very soft…but Ri still went with it and finished spreading her pb&j…then used a star cutter to cut out the star.  I just wanted to take a photo of this to show you that this is not the "cleanest" activity, but it's so rewarding for the girls.  They really enjoy the fact that they can get two slices of bread, get the peanut butter from the cabinet and jelly from the fridge and make their own sandwich.  Of course, they have to ask me first…I don't let them just make their own sandwich at any time of the day.

Here, they are playing in the "snow" once more…I'm not sure why they are all bundled up, but they made snow angels for a while, and then when I came back, this is what they were doing.

The next time I came back, it's because I heard a thud and I got concerned.  This is what I saw them doing.  They were "sledding"…off the couch.  Thank goodness they didn't land on their faces…yet.  I ceased this activity quickly…much to their dismay.

One sunny morning, I got the girls fed and told them we had something to do outside.  Both girls were very excited because we had been cooped up due to the rain all of the previous couple days.  So, what did we do?  Raked the leaves on our side yard!  I have no idea where these leaves even came from, but I was thankful we had them to rake because it was a small enough amount that the girls could handle it themselves without getting sick and tired of raking leaves!

This was the first time for both of the girls, but Tay raked like a pro.  I was impressed with her work.

Look at that!  She started raking at the grey pole.

Ri needed a bit of help from me (the rake was too big!), but...

…she was our champion leaf remover as she picked up the piles and put them in the leaf bag.

Tay also helped with this, of course.  She'd rake a little pile and then carry it over to the bag.

Love these girls.

Working together to get the job done.

Squashing down the leaves.

Hm…Ri decided a great place to sit during a movie was the baby's walker.  She didn't stay long in there…she said it was too uncomfortable.  I'm thankful it didn't collapse.

Another game night…Tay playing Memory while Ri played the Ladybug game.

I don't know if it's nostalgia, but I like to introduce things to the girls that I enjoyed when I was little.  Most things revolve around songs or music that I was exposed to at a young age.  Michael Jackson was SO popular when I was younger.  We even owned the Michael Jackson movies like "Moonwalker" and "Thriller," and there was another one that I can't remember.  Anyhow, I thought it might be fun to show the moonwalk done by the originator, so I youtube-ed Billie Jean and the girls loved it!  They were trying to dance right along with him…hilarious.  :)  I wish I could have gotten a better photo when both girls were following along.

On to the littlest update.  I had to break out a bigger winter bunting for Rea this week.  It's an 18-month size, so it looks a little huge on her, but she must be on the "long" side because her feet reach clear to the bottom.  She seems to like it enough, though…the other one was starting to squash her toes whenever I carried her around.  Both are hand-me-downs from Tay since they are both March babies.  Ri was my September baby, so all the sizes/seasons were/are off by six months!

I have to include the selfies in here…just because I want to make sure the girls have photos of us together.  She's going to have millions, I tell you…MILLIONS!

I'm not sure why she found this to be so funny, but she kept doing it over and over again...

She'd smush her face on the pillow, stay there a second, then giggle and sit back up.

Here she is preparing to go again.  Who knows what's going on in that little gal's head?

She still hasn't sprouted any new teeth, but she continues to suck in her upper lip and chew a bit, so I think her gums are still itchy.

She likes to use her tongue, too.  

Streeeeeeetch!

She frequently sleeps with her foot propped up to the side…here she is just waking up and continues to keep her foot there.

Early morning conversations with Ri Unni.

Another thing she does is lie there with both her legs straight up in the air…like she's about to do ab exercises or something.  She does this so frequently that Ri asked, "Why does Shinhae make so many 'L's?"  I knew exactly what she was talking about when she asked that question…that's how frequently she does it!

Ah yes, another photo of the foot off to the side.  Hehehe...

I'm not sure why I'm including this photo, but I just liked the way her lips are so red and pouty in this photo.  Babies don't need lipstick.  :)

Last week, I showed you that the duck face was back…well, she has REALLY been working on it hard this week.  I'm not sure why and I sure am not encouraging it, but it's pretty funny.

She can actually stop herself from breathing because her upper lip blocks both nostrils!  Who does that?  My baby.  Can you do that?  I can't.  I tried, and it's not a pretty picture.  Don't worry, I won't share.

An activity I had read about a few times on Pinterest is "baby painting."  The activity is supposed to be a really good "sensory" activity for little ones, so I thought I'd give it a go.  I used baby yoghurt because it would be a cold, smooth texture, and I used warm pumpkin puree for color and a different texture (since it was a little grainier and had some small fibers.  I did this activity in the tub for my sanity.

At first, she was very timid about touching it…

 …and when it got on her hands, she smeared it on the side of the tub in an attempt to get it off.  The timidity did not last long, though…once she got a taste of what she was playing with, it was game on!

She got both hands into the bowl and covered herself in the food.  She also ate quite a bit of it, too...

She mostly enjoyed sucking whatever was on her hands.

She had it all over her face...

…mainly because she kept doing this.

She tried biting the bowl, too, but I think it's because the bowl kept slipping out of her hands.  A fun time was had by all parties involved.  :)

I thought it might be a good idea this week to try and incorporate Rea into her sisters' bedroom now that she was sleeping better on her own through the night.  So, I did some rearranging of the girls' bedroom and put Rea's sleeping mat below Ri's bed.  It seemed to be a good idea at the time…Rea seemed to like it.

She enjoyed having access to the random toys her sisters left around.  Well, turns out, it was not the right time.  Ri did not react well to having her space invaded by her sister…and reacted by trying to take over Tay's space, so after one night of this arrangement, I returned Rea's sleeping area back to the floor in our bedroom (I'm sure much to Jeff's dismay).  We'll try reintroducing Rea into the big girls' bedroom at another time.

I just found this photo to be hilarious.  It looks like her hair has been spiked up and the expression on her face is just amusing.  Her hair and eyebrows are so LIGHT!

 This is just a funny photo of what she likes to do when I put her on the bed.  She sits up, then plops down on her face.  I think she likes the plush-ness of the comforter.  Her mat is not quite as plush, of course.

Here's what Rea did while the older two sisters were raking leaves…enjoying some sunshine and brisk fall air!

She's my favorite accessory.  ;)

…how I love sleeping babies.  I would hold her all day if I could.

I love my girls…especially early in the morning when they're all piling into our bed to snuggle with us and each other.

Jeff had to leave on a quick trip to go make some speeches for Veteran's Day, so we went out to dinner the last night he was here before he left.  We miss you, Daddy!

And lastly…the food.  I made a flat apple pie this week (yummy yum yum).  The flakiest crust I've ever made so far!

And a whole bunch of oatmeal chocolate chip cookies for the girls' kindergarten tomorrow as they celebrate St. Martin's Day!  I hope to take plenty of photos tomorrow, so you may see a mid-week post from me if I have the energy.  Tay gets to be in a play and she even has a few lines in German!

Bed time!  Gute Nacht!