Making Juice

This is not normally an acceptable behavior.

Mommy & Reid morning

Harper had a play date this morning so Reid and I went to the indoor area at the zoo to have our own fun. Since Reid is often napping or has a sitter and am off working while Harper is in school, I feel like we don't get much one on one time. She's so sweet and inquisitive, we had a blast.

painting her face like a tiger

Putting the star on the tree

Reading a book with Papa

Last night's dinner

Snowman pizzas (Harper's has no cheese, of course) on homemade quinoa-flax pizza crust with homemade multi-vegetable pizza sauce. Sometimes I get to feel like supermom, but the feeling usually fades shortly after my children start screaming and beating on each other.

Chicago Symphony Orchestra

 Enjoying a pre-show performance by a local youth symphony group.

 Looking out over the Art Institute towards Lake Michigan.

We took the girls to the CSO over the weekend for a special children's performance, which included a 45 minute show in the theater and many pre-performance activities, including an instrument "petting zoo." It was a lot of fun and such a great experience for them. We will be back for their next children's day.

A few stories about the girls.

I have been working on potty-training Reid, with basically no success. Despite the fact that she is our genius baby, like her sister before her, speaks in full sentences and even competes with Harper to name sight words during one of our "lunch time letter quizzes," potty-training does not seem to be on her to-do list. Harper was the same way and it didn't take until she was just over 2 1/2. A mama can dream about having a potty-trained pre-2 year old, right? In any case, I heard Harper tell Reid this morning: "I'm going to call you stinky bottoms until Mommy changes your diaper, and then I will call you Reid again." and in her usual, obedient to sister way, Reid said, "Okay, Harper."

The girls have been taking full-immersion Spanish classes now for almost a year. They also had a Spanish manny for 9 months. Sadly, Fredy left to go back Spain two weeks ago. It's interesting to watch them exposed to a foreign language at such a young age, we've noticed that Reid sometimes speaks in a Spanish-English hybrid and tends to mix many Spanish words in with English. I'm very grateful that they get the opportunity to learn another language at such a young age.

I'm not really a fan of Santa. In fact, some, like my husband, might call me a Grinch - although he doesn't want the kids sitting on Santa's lap either. The holiday spirit since is so commercialized and diluted now, it just takes a lot for me to get into it. I want the focus to be on giving to others, particularly because we have more than enough. I'm also hyper-vigilant about the girls' health and the idea of them sitting on a dirty mall Santa's lap kind of makes me ill ... or makes me want to take a lot of Chinese herbs ... I should invent a Santa lap pad ... my momtreprenuer idea! Back to the story: I pulled out the Christmas decorations and among them was an "Elf on the Shelf" from last year. I have never been a fan of this idea, I would rather the kids behave because that's how they are, not because they are performing for an elf! But we got it as a present last year and it's been sitting in the box ever since and apparently even made it into the Christmas boxes in the basement! Harper immediately recognized it for what it is and said, "Mom, we got that last year from Anna! All my friends at school have an elf, I can't wait to tell them that my elf came!" So that was that, now we have an elf on the shelf. Needless to say, "Brunus" definitely isn't worth the price my mom paid for him, he doesn't seem to inspire obedience in the girls, all they are concerned with is whether or not he moved during the night.

Harper and Cora

We didn't plan for them to wear identical tops!

Trying to do one post a day until the end of the year.

I've noticed that number of annual posts I've made have declined each year. I want to change that pattern this year so I'm going to try to make a post a day for the rest of the year! We'll see how it goes.

Classic Reid face. Inquisitive. Skeptical. And certain she knows more than you.

Reid and Leo admiring the "Thanksgiving Tree"

We drove to Ohio for Thanksgiving and the girls had a good time playing with their cousins. Reid and Leo are 13 months apart and had moments of playing very nicely together.

Enjoying the holiday train display at the Arboretum

Harper's "H"

Harper's artwork has gotten very intricate recently, she wants to draw pictures and make "decorations" for the house all of the time. She doesn't write her name in a "normal" way anymore. She decorates each letter. She told me that this is how her H is going to look from now on: it's a pictures of her with a head and curly hair. I love how she makes her curls!

Little performer

Sick, sweet girl

Neither of our girls has had more than the sniffles in almost a year, so when Reid spiked a temperature of 102 today, mid-day, out of nowhere (and right after we had a play date with like 6 other families at our house, of course...), I was surprised. She took a 2.5 hour nap and was in bed at by 630.  Hoping tomorrow is a better day.

And a few more from Harper's party

A few from Harper's birthday party

We had Harper's birthday party at the Morton Arboretum, which is one of our favorite places in the Chicago area, they have a fantastic Children's Garden. Harper had a pretty large crowd of friends and they played in the garden, painted pumpkins and enjoyed each other's Halloween costumes. Harper was very into the gifts this week and we worked hard writing thank you notes together. I tried out my baking and decorating skills with a cupcake bar: we had vegan coconut, apple cider with caramel frosting and pumpkin chocolate chip with cinnamon frosting. They were a hit!

Harper, pleased with her treats.

My poor kids, I ended up giving about 99% of their 'treats' away to the kids who came to our door. One of these years they're going to figure me out!

Lollipop thief at the rec center Halloween party

Reid was dressed up as a disgruntled toddler who wouldn't wear a costume.

Our Four Year Old

Harper's School Birthday Celebration

We brought in vegan coconut cupcakes to celebrate Harper's fourth birthday with her classmates. They did what I'm guessing is a Montessori birthday celebration - First they lit four candles with baby pictures on a platform (pictured), then Harper held an "Earth" ball and walked around the "sun" (candles) four times. After each cycle, I told the class a little bit about each year of her life. Then she passed out cupcakes to her friends. It was very, very sweet and Harper was thrilled with the experience.

Harper and Aidan sharing a seat

Reid pets the goats

Harper and one of her favorite friends, Hayden

Making funny faces through the "bus" window.

Another happy girl!

Happy girl!

Visiting the nursing home

The girls and I have started working with a group of other parents/kids to visit the residents of a local nursing home on a monthly basis. We went to our first outing last week. The girls had so much fun, especially Reid, who made a new friend! She kept calling the man in the bottom picture "Papa."  This will be a great activity for us and a wonderful way to expose the girls to friends of a different generation, especially since they don't see their own grandparents very often.

Classic Harper

Me: "Tolerance is about liking people no matter what color their skin is, their hair is, what size they are, what their ethnic background is ... it's about treating everyone the nicely despite their differences."

Harper: "Mom, you told me about that the other day! I already know all about tolerance!"

Harper and Mommy's weekend away

Harper and I headed to Ohio over the weekend to visit a good friend from Colorado and her family, including their sweet new addition: a baby girl. We are passing on all of our baby girl clothes to miss Hannah, I couldn't be happier to see them go to good use. Harper and big brother Jack had a great time playing and their behavior together was almost perfect. (Perfect is impossible for two 3 year olds, right? I think that's true.) We visited a pumpkin farm, which Harper was very excited about since, according to her, "there are no pumpkins in Illinois." Who knew?

Seriously. All I do is cook.

Today I've made zucchini fries, fresh vegetable juice, peanut/hemp/almond butter and now I'm working on breakfast to last us a few days this week: squash/coconut flour/hemp seed waffles. After driving 250 miles this morning. My girls are worth it, but man, is it time-consuming!

Out for a walk on a cool, fall day.

Reid and I got to spend some quality time together this weekend while Harper and Daddy were out and about.