Ezra Lately

Ezra these days: Signs "eat." Walks over and points to fruit tier on counter. I say,"banana?" he says,"yesh." I put him in the high chair with the banana, he eats half, throws the rest on the floor and says,"Uh oh!" then he signs "more." Sigh....

Enjoying my kids...

This photo of Annie is from a couple of months ago--from a day in which I realized how fast time has gone, and how quickly it will continue to go. Annie was coming down the stairs when she exclaimed, "Oh my goodness!" I peeked around the corner to see what was up and she says, "Mommy, do you know what happens to little girls' bodies when they grow and change?" I was shocked (and appalled) by her question. I wondered which book/movie/friend I could blame for letting her in on puberty waaaaaay too early, when she continued with, "Well, they wear big girl undies to bed, and they can reach the railing on the stairs!" Whew!!!, my panicking heart slowed a few miles per hour and I mustered an, 'uh huh, honey... that's right," in response.

The truth is that I feel like the other topic is way too close in my future, and I sooo wish I could just slow time down a bit. Or at the very least, figure out how to enjoy this time that we have more fully--to be more engaged in the little everyday moments and less worried about getting stuff done.

I am a list person, and feel like I can't sit still until everything is crossed off all the lists. The silly thing is that I know I will never be free from all my 'to do's', as life is just cyclical in that way. So, I need to train myself to not care as much about the items that 'need' to be accomplished and to give focus to just being with my family. I recently attended a life and business rework conference for moms called, The Breathe Intensive, led by Natalie Norton. One of my biggest take-aways from that workshop was to be sure that your children have at least one parent available for 'facetime' at all times. In our home, most days it's me, since Ben works long hours out of the house. This means I'm either engaged in activities with the kids (which is mostly what happens here, since they are still so young), or am willing and able to drop what I am working on/doing right now if I am beckoned ;o). Well, I do usually drop whatever I am doing, but not after a few 'one minute, honey' type of phrases, and then, I am typically still thinking about the task I was working on (or the next one coming) while I am with the kids. What a waste!!!

I have come up with a sweet little exercise to help myself be truly present. I talk. I talk about the very moment I am in- I describe it, ask the kids questions, name my feelings, etc. It forces my brain to engage in the moment instead of racing through the lists and tasks lined up in my head. Here is an example:

While rocking Ezra to sleep for his nap the other day I found my thoughts wander to what I was going to accomplish during naptime. Knowing that the day will soon come that he will no longer want to be rocked and that I will so miss it, I decided to be in the moment with my little talking trick. I sang him one little lullaby, then I focused on him and softly whispered until he fell asleep. Sweet little Ezzy. Your skin is soooo soft. Mommy loves to kiss your pudgy cheeks and smooth hands. Mmmm, they smell so good. You smell like an oatmeal cookie... dipped in syrup. And look at your little creases in your chubby yummy fingers. So stinkin' cute. Ezra, your hair is so smooth. Your eyelashes are so long and lovely. My handsome little guy. Mommy loves you so much. Your weight in my arms feels perfect. Oh, I am so blessed to be your Mommy. I love you, love you, love you...

And he was asleep. I laid him in his crib, and then stood there with tears falling (and snot running, lol) as I watched his little body breath easy in his sweet slumber. I wiped my cheeks and then went and got stuff done. And at the end of the day, I counted my biggest accomplishment as the little time I spent actually engaging in the moment with my baby. So worth it.

Every moment with my kids is worth it. Worth my full attention. It's my job, and my joy as a full-time Mommy to give them my focus and to give myself the permission to really enjoy my life with them. Especially now, while they are still my 'babies'.

I do realize that I will be having the other 'big girl' talk with Annie before I know it. It's inevitable. But, also a blessing. Annie reminds me of that when she is make-believing she is a teenager. "Mommy, I am just a pretend teenager. I know you like me three. But, God doesn't just have a magic wand to make all kids grow so well. I am blessed to be growing up!" So true, my wise little, Annie. So true.

So they continue to grow. And grow. And grow! And I will continue not only to be present, but wholeheartedly engaged in all the little moments I get with them along the way.

Christmas 2011 (for the record)

Our family, in the Minneapolis airport-- we look like a parade when we travel!

Our new buddy, Elf.

Annie, posing by the tree by herself after Church.

Our Arizona tree- decorated mostly by Annie, so pretty much all the ornaments were three feet up the tree.

After having missed the first white Christmas in a loooong time right after Ezra's birth (Christmas 2010), we decided to head back to MN again for the holidays. Though we did experience the chill of winter, it wasn't really a white Christmas. The weather was really mild and it only snowed a couple of times while we were there. The prettiest snow of all was New Year's Eve- we were celebrating Jenny's birthday cozy in her house while huge lovely snowflakes fell outside. Uncle Diddy and Brian took Annie outside to make a snowman. It was a five-inch-tall 'guys' snowman, according to Annie. Haha!

The kids and I were able to stay in MN for almost three weeks, and Ben was there for about a week of it. We had Christmas with my family on Christmas Eve right after we got into MN, and then to Grand Meadow for Christmas Day. My family did 'made' Christmas gifts this year, which was really fun. It was interesting to see how 'handmade' was defined by each person, and the gifts were so meaningful! Annie even made the girls braided friendship bracelets, which she called 'french bracelets.' She was super proud of them and loved being able to give her own gifts. The next few days we spent at Ben's parents having our Grice Christmas. We took the annual sleigh ride... but in a horse-drawn wagon (not enough snow for the sleigh), we had a game night, opened lots of fun gifts, the guys grew mustaches, and we even had Santa (where was Uncle Mark???) come and visit!

Some notable moments from this Christmas include:

*Annie gave Ezra a ball and when he opened it he said, "ball!"

*Ellie shared the news that the baby she and Mark are expecting is a girl! Yay!

*Annie and Ezra wore matching 'candy cane' striped jammies, making them the snuggliest Christmas babies ever.

*Annie asked for a minivan for Christmas. She got one! It is for little dolls that go with the awesome new dollhouse set she got for Christmas. Her grandmas know her so well!

*We had an Elf (on the shelf) for the first time. He and Annie became close friends. ;o)

*The Elf brought a letter back (all the way from the North Pole) letting Annie and Ezra know that they made the nice list. Annie cheered and jumped up and down, she is a big fan of Santa.

*Benny totally surprised me with an iphone 4s. I love it!

We really had a wonderful Christmas and time spent in Minnesota this year. We are so blessed to have family that lets us practically take over their homes with kid stuff everywhere and naptime schedules, etc. I didn't do a great job of taking photos this time because I had just gotten my new iphone, so I mostly just took pictures on that instead. Mostly, I just wanted to document Christmas on the blog, for memory sake.

November 2011- Ezra turns one!

I still am having a hard time believing that my baby is one (keep in mind, I am writing this 3 months later...). Ezra had not one, but two wonderful birthday parties to celebrate his special day. The first was in Arizona, with a good amount of family, neighbors, and friends here to party with us. We had a 'guys' party for him (Sesame Street) on a Saturday morning, in our home. His second party was in Minnesota, hosted by my sweet Mama and sisters at my little sister's house. It was a super cute 'Donuts and Diggers' theme, complete with trucks all over the place!

On Ezra's actual birthday we took him to Red Robin- at big sister Annie's request. Ezra loved their sweet potato fries, and wasn't really impressed with the sing-at-your-table birthday routine the servers do at the restaurant.

At 12 months old, Ezra was saying a few words (probably not clear to anyone other than ourselves), including 'kitty,' 'mom,' and 'ball.' I'm pretty sure those three words were Annie's first words as well. ;o) These words make sense for him though, he loves Mylo and Mommy, and could play roll-the-ball all.day.long. Ezra does lots of other super cute baby tricks, like smiling a super big squinty-eyed smile when prompted. We adore him. Seriously, so cute!!!

Ezra's Arizona birthday party:

And, the Minnesota party:

Happy Holidays... New Year, Christmas, Thanksgiving, Halloween...

Um, yeah... I'm a little behind on the posts. The good news is that we are too busy having fun to get to all of our 'to do' items- including blogging. I know I could just pick up where we're at, and no one would think anything of it, but for the sake of record keeping I will do a little post for each month I missed. This one is about Halloween! As in, October 2011. ;o)

Annie chose her costume this year- she wanted to be Strawberry Shortcake. I did my best to put together a cute costume, and Annie even helped by decorating the cute hat we found online. Ezra was the Karate Kid for his very first Halloween. We went trick-or-treating in our neighborhood with some friends and then went to a little party afterwards. Annie, just like last year, wasn't interested in hitting up a lot of houses to get tons of candy. She was satisfied with just a few pieces and wanted to eat them right away. Like, 'go home now' and eat them... Ezra, on the other hand, may take after his daddy when it comes to trick-or-treating. He would say, 'Eh!!,' point to the next house, and then sort of giddy-up kick his legs against whomever was carrying him at the moment. He would clap when he got candy in his bucket... he has never even eaten so much as one bite of candy, but he knew it must be good!

Besides trick-or-treating, we visited a pumpkin patch/farm and went to our annual neighborhood Boo Bash. It was a fun time, as all holidays are when you have little ones to celebrate with!

Watching themselves on the flip...

They love watching vids of themselves on the flip. Annie, obviously, is 'in-charge' of the flip buttons because, obviously, 'Ezzy is too little to touch it.' Ahhh, good thing he is so mellow. ;o)

Ezra's new tricks

Well, first of all, he can stand up now! So far, only when he is holding on to something, but it'll be hands-free soon, I'm sure! He loves crawling (still mostly his funny 'worm' crawl) over to the stairs and attempting to climb them. His 'climbing' consists of pulling himself upright and then banging his hands on the step. It's really too funny!

He does a few other new things that are pretty funny, too. He 'talks' back and forth with us by blowing raspberries (not sure how else to describe this...you know what I mean though, right?) and babbling syllables over and over (mmmmbah, bah, bah). He kisses us with his mouth wide open. He bites me on the shoulder when I hold him and then makes the saddest face ever (his mouth like a rainbow) when I tell him 'no' then waits a beat and smiles. Stinker. And coolest trick of all - he does this thing where he holds his hand flat, palm up, and then gestures towards something. I tried to get a picture of it yesterday (see below) but it wasn't the greatest example. The picture is cute though because I was doing the gesture with my hand and his eyes are looking at my hand instead of me/camera- cuteness. Anyway, on Saturday we were at a friends house and he clapped his hands for the first time! And then on Monday morning he and I were hanging out on the couch before Annie woke up and he clapped again a couple of times. THEN, (here comes the cute part, finally), Annie comes downstairs and little Ezra gestures towards Annie and then claps his hands!!! Annie says, "Presenting Annie! Good job, buds!" Oh man, I have reason to believe she is training her poor brother up to be her future emcee...