a slight shift in the lime light

I did some re-reading of previous posts & noticed a trend. Any guesses? They were ALL ABOUT THOSE TWINS! My boys give me plenty to write about but I thought the little ladies at the Valentine Nest deserved some attention too.  So, here's to.....

Eloise & Charlotte, the big sisters, my first & second born that keep me on my toes, laughing & snuggling for a good part of every day.  Side note, I came across the block set at a consignment sale a few weeks ago for $4! What a good deal! Four kids in & we still didn't own any wooden letter blocks! I LOVE these & we have had a blast learning with them. We play "I Spy" with animals, letter sounds & numbers, spell, stack & even let the baby boas chew on them every now & then. I thought they looked so pretty in the picture above but apparently Eloise did not agree because she awoke from a nap, walked into the playroom & in one quick swipe sent them flying as she laughed. Little stinker ; )

Charlotte & Eloise are excellent big sisters. They cannot get enough of their brothers & I love that about them. Rob had a last minute business trip a couple weeks ago & was gone from Sunday evening through Wednesday evening.  The girls were so helpful (for the most part) since we were dealing with some fussy boys.  Here they are snuggled up watching Babar.

There are a few special people or families that get talked about often at our house. One of these is the Lent family that is made up of Uncle Chris, Auntie Amanda & baby Audrey.  They are not officially aunt & uncle to our crew but we just call each other that anyway : ) We are the far away from home family that does much celebrating together & living life side by side.  Uncle Chris gave a triple horsey ride after our last family dinner....saddle & all!

Another popular lady is Miss Sadee.  She is a dear friend of mine that moved back to Indiana last week. We were brokenhearted to say farewell but excited to see all that the Lord has in store for her & her husband Aaron. Charlotte & Eloise have always enjoyed attention from her & there was A LOT of it directed toward those two at any given visit.  She gave Charlotte & Eloise a favorite Golden Book Collection of Eloise Wilkin stories with the sweetest handwritten note to the Valentine girls. It will be treasured for many years & read aloud when we miss Sadee. She was a trooper & met me & the fab four at the grocery store for our last bit of time together. She strapped a baby on her & chased Eloise around while I got my shopping done...now that is a good friend!

Charlotte

Our first born who is also known as Char, Char Char, Scarlett, Charlee Warlee, Charlee Noodles.  She is 4 & 1/4 years old & growing so fast!  She is helpful, thoughtful, silly, an observer, mostly a perfectionist, working on being patient & a delight to my soul.  She suddenly looks so tall & thin, pronounces so many things correctly & asks many questions all day long. 

Some things I want to remember about this girlie pie right now:

• How she picks up phrases from me.  When the boys are cooing at me & I make sounds back to them to keep'em going I usually say "Oh my, you have a lot to say today!" We were out & about just the two of us last week & she was talking my ear off from the back seat. She was quiet for a moment then said "Mommy, do I have a lot to say today?"  
• She is thoughtful & starting to think more outside of herself. I was folding clothes while she was laying on my bed quietly. She asked me "Mommy, do you have a Paw Paw?" I told her that I had a Paw Paw & a Grandpa but they both died.  She said "Oh no! They died?" I explained to her that it was okay & happened a long time ago. She was quiet for a bit then asked "What were they like?" As I shared about them she continued to ask questions like "What did he like to talk about?" & "What did he do with you?" It made me teary eyed as I was so excited to share about the grandfathers that played such a special role in my life & see that she was connecting the dots that we were all related.
• The excitability factor.  Charlotte reminds me of her Daddy in this area.  When she is excited about something, she is all in & wants others to be excited too. She is all about playing Tennis with her Dad as much as possible & is over the moon running through the house collecting her things with a giant grin on her face when he says they can go to the courts.  When our third butterfly hatched this morning she ran through the house screaming to me & Eloise "You have to come see the biggest surprise! It's in here, hurry hurry!" as if we had never seen one hatch before.
• She is funny but doesn't want anyone to think she is funny. She is finally catching on to how to joke about something & can be quick witted & hilarious (also like her Daddy).  If you dare laugh at her she will be angry with you for a week ; )
• How quickly she learns.  When my parents visited over Labor Day week, they stayed at a nearby resort due to the fact that we maxed out our bedrooms at the Valentine Nest. It worked out well for all though because they had an incredible pool & lazy river we enjoyed on more than one occasion during their visit. Charlotte basically taught herself to swim in the zero entry area.  We were so surprised since she had been terrified of anyone letting go of her in the water.  It was on her time though & she just went for it!  Another funny thing as of lately... I showed her how to make a paper airplane one time & she went bonkers. I am pretty sure she has made at least 60 in the past week. They are all over the house & some can actually fly pretty well!
• Cute things she says. I did mention that she says most things correctly but there are a few that I don't correct because they are so darn cute! The one that sticks out at the moment is how she says "lions" for "lines" which is hilarious when talking about tennis. She gives Eloise instructions like "to play tennis, you have to stand behind the lion." Yikes! Sounds a little intimidating!

She is blossoming in the small amount of time we are spending with official homeschooling for pre-kindergarten plus attending Classical Conversations once a week.  I have been completely amazed with how quickly she is learning & remembering information. She is begging to do school work every day & I am begging the boys & Eloise to comply with allowing some un-interrupted time with Char. Some days are better than others ; )  She loves to learn the history sentences each week since they go along with a catchy little tune.  She is remarkably quick at pointing out continents, oceans, European countries & bodies of water she has learned so far.  Here she is with her map from school.

Her favorite way to review is to be given a handful of Goldfish & then ask her to place them on each item named. She also can't get enough time drawing or practicing writing letters.  Poor dear is feeling the stress of having 9 letters in her name! Sometimes she gets carried away writing lots of E's along with the H, T & A making it look like her name is "Cheetah." It is getting fun to sit together & ask her to draw certain things. Last week she drew a pretty good outline of Africa & Australia completely off the cuff & then drew a giraffe for me..... 

We brought in three caterpillars from our butterfly weed & put them in a bowl with tissue paper across the top. Charlotte drew a picture of what they looked like a few days in a row as they ate leaves, got fat & made their chrysalis. Two out of the three butterflies hatched this weekend & she was brave enough to let one walk on her hand before watching it take flight. SO FUN! I love seeing her gain courage to do something she is afraid of.  Here she is drawing the caterpillars on day 2 wearing her Hello Kitty Christmas shirt (in October).

There has been quite a bit of Charlotte led imaginative play lately.  The girls spent one morning as ballerinas & then came back out of their room as squirrel hunters! Hilarious! They ran around the house looking through their binoculars shouting out that they could see squirrels. It made me excited for the Valentine family annual squirrel hunt this winter! She is soooo pretty, even in camo!

She is incredible with Owen & Anson rarely getting tired of them or frustrated like she does with the other sibling that is much more capable of disrupting her activities ; ) I am really impressed with her ability to care for them at four years old. She is so happy to be "in charge" of them while they play on a blanket with me in the next room. I love to hear her talk to them & read stories. She sometimes doesn't mind feeding them which is a huge help to me when I am trying to get food prepared for all four kids & me at the same time. The boys respond really well to her attention & it just melts my heart to see their interactions.

Eloise

The little sis/big sis, total middle child who also responds to the names Elo, Lolo, Elo-squeeze, Squishy, Pancakes & Short Stack is nearing two & a half. She is quite capable of providing enough excitement for any parent to experience on a given day.  I just giggle thinking about her antics & how I can't wait to see what her little personality has in store for us in the coming years.  She is busy, SO snuggly, goofy, dangerous, affectionate & a go-getter. 

Some things I want to remember about girlie number two right now:

• She has the cutest chubby little body. It is the same one that her big sis had at two years old. She sometimes puts her panties on backwards & we get to see more of that squishy tushy ; ) She just might be the right fit for a nudist colony as she rarely wears clothing & is as happy as a clam.
• How she says answers to her catechism questions. Question number three says "What else did God make?" & the answer is "all things." Elo likes to say "all things" to questions 2 thru 5 if you son't give her the leading sound for the correct answer.  She is remembering so much though & when you think she is not paying attention while eating her bowl of cereal she busts out with correct answers if Charlotte is too slow. When we were eating dinner the other night she loudly exclaimed "Look! God made the sky so boo-full!"
• How she is starting to "get it" in the humor department. One Sunday afternoon we were eating lunch at home.  Robby was next to Char on one side of the table & Elo was on the other side of her. Char was goofing off & not wanting to eat her two baby carrots left on her plate so she convinced her Daddy to eat one. He faked the girls out & did a sword swallowing trick with one carrot making sure he pretend crunched it up really well. Charlotte believed he really ate it & while she was laughing with her eyes closed Rob put the carrot back on her plate. When the girls noticed it, their eyes got really big like they were thinking "how did he do that?" Fast forward, Robby ate one carrot leaving the last of them on Char's plate. Charlotte was climbing under the table & being super silly when Robby swiped the lone carrot off her plate. When she returned to her spot & noticed the carrot was missing Eloise piped up with all kinds of suggestions like "Bella ate it" or "maybe Mommy ate it." We were all laughing & when Charlotte turned away for a second Eloise took a carrot off her own plate & tossed it onto Charlotte's!  Eloise could not stop laughing at how funny she was in fact, we were all laughing hard!
• How she dances. Elo squeeze loves to dance & requests for the music to be turned up louder & louder until it is deafening. She then does this strange thing where she is almost in a frozen half wink with one eye while she holds her arms out & begins spinning. She likes to hold onto the counter & put one leg up in the air & say "Cathy (one of my good friends) show me how do dat." It always makes me laugh to think about Cathy actually showing Elo how to do everything she claims she has shown her! When you are holding her & dancing she says "spin me higher" which means faster. 
• How she learns.  She is soaking up all kinds of information via Sissy's schoolwork! We had out Charlotte's map & she wasn't interested at the moment so Eloise said "I do it?!" I thought I would humor her & ask where Africa was.  She put her finger right on it! So I moved along to Europe then Asia & Australia....bam bam bam went her little finger! Robby happened to be making a coffee run (office to kitchen) & witnessed the whole thing. She went on to identify all 7 continents without missing a beat! We were shocked! I mean really, she still doesn't get her colors right half of the time but that girl knows her continents!

She frequently runs out of a room with something she has snatched while laughing hysterically. In this case it was a swaddle blanket from O & A's room which wrapped perfectly over her head & half naked body. She said "I look like Mary!" from her bible. 

She is motherly. Elo takes care of Lucy & uses all the "baby holders" in the house as much as I do.  She pretends like everything is a baby & everything is crying & needs to be cared for.  The first day we had Nicole (our new amazing babysitter) over I asked how the girls were when I woke up from my pre work nap.  She said they were great but was wondering if it was normal for Eloise to sleep with the duster. She said she insisted on sleeping with the duster while cradling it on her pillow like a little baby. HAHA! You know, she is child number two (of four) so as long as she sleeps, we don't care what she sleeps with! Once I gave it some thought I remembered that a few weeks prior, she took naps for a week with a soccer ball in her arms. If she doesn't have Lucy (the baby), Scout (the dog) & Lambie at bedtime she panics.  One day Lucy was missing & she was running all over the house saying "You-see! Come out! I yookin' for you! It's me, you mommy!"  When I finally got her in her bed she was crying saying she could hear "You-see" crying too. So sad.  Here she is strapping two of her babies into their chairs for breakfast. 

Eloise really loves Bella which I think is good for both of them.  She helps Bella get her daily exercise in her old age with a couple speedy runs around the couch. Sometimes Bella is really ambitious & takes a few death defying leaps over two babies happily playing on a blanket. Yikes! Elo is happy to get a big scoop of food for Bella twice a day & prefers to be up close & personal while the poor dog eats as pictured below. 

If the boys are awake & I cannot find the girls, I can pretty much guarantee they are all together no matter where they are! Eloise never climbed out of her crib but can get into this one so darn fast! She has so much love & affection for her brothers it is difficult to channel into appropriate interactions. When I mentioned she is dangerous, this is one of the top categories I think of! I am just thankful that the boys are getting bigger & stronger everyday & by this time next year should be able to hold their own ; )

The sisters spend a LOT of time together each day & for the most part really enjoy each others company. They are definitely capable of knock down drag out fights accompanied with screaming & I do feel like I am correcting the same things over & over which is all the more reason I am so excited when I hear them speaking kindly to one another while playing in the next room unsupervised.  There are MANY parts of the day where I need to occupy busy hands for 15 minutes blocks to feed babies, do dishes, etc. Free play works at certain parts of the day but at others can result in misbehavior or boredom depending on the moods of the girls. We added a few new learning activities to the mix this fall & the one pictured below has been a big hit.  I was actually surprised at Eloise's ability to do some herself. 

People frequently ask how I "do this." I am guessing they are mostly meaning taking care of four kids but I am sure managing a household falls into "this" as well.  Talk about being a stay at HOME mom....that's me! Most of the time, dragging everyone around town alone is not really worth the drama that occurs while in public or later in the day due to skipping naps.  We stick to our school outing Thursday & then Sunday mornings as far as being gone for a good four hour block.  The rest of the week we try to throw in a trip to the park or grab two kids & go to the grocery store or load everyone up for a trip through the drive thru lane at Chick-Fil-A which leads me to a fabulous story. 

We (me & the fab four) were on our way home from Celebration around the lunch time hour when I decided to make a pit stop for Chick-A-Lay as the girls call it : ) Prior to doubling our number of children last March we used to go in & play frequently. It is just not happening these days yet the girls never fail to ask if we can go in thinking it might be their lucky day. Anyway, we pulled up & I heard Eloise ask if we could go in. Before I could respond, Charlotte took care of it for me & said quietly "Elo, we can't go in, Mommy can't take care of us. You know that." HAHAHA! Sad but true. There are just some things (many things) I can't do right now with my little brood. I am mostly okay with that since I am energized by being at home but sometimes I wish we could be slightly spontaneous.

Thankfully my love of being at home has been passed onto the girls.  That is an almost true statement. Charlotte did tell me daily (when we were truly home bound with recent NICU grads) that our house was boring & she wanted to move to a new house. I told her I felt the same way but that a new house wouldn't fix the problem because we would bring our boring stuff & be living the same boring life there too. Well, I may not have said it just like that but I felt the boredom along with her. 

We do know how to have a good time though....

The number one boredom buster right now is pretend play.  Today we spent nearly an hour trading off being Dr. Ana from Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood & a mommy/baby pair. I got so many pretend shots I think my arms hurt as well as my collar bones & shins...When Dr. Eloise sings "Close your eyes & think of something happy!" you just never know where she is going to jab you! They had so much fun & so did I. 

I am learning more everyday that the girls just want me to be with them. Creativity is great, a little planning to have some activities to occupy our time is helpful but they just want a Mommy who takes time to snuggle, read, tell them made up stories, color or watch them do the same strange trick of hanging one leg off the chair while leaning their head back & respond with a loud cheer for the thousandth time. It is a battle for me to just be still instead of cleaning & prepping for the next thing.  I was feeling like I was keeping up with the house fairly well until I walked past the bookshelf the other day & saw this.... 

That diaper had to have been there for at least a few days & possibly longer.  Just for the record it was a wet one....if it would have been stinky I would have probably noticed it sooner ; ) So there you go, be present with your kids & leave dirty diapers all over the house.  It's worth it. 

I will leave you with one last picture of the fab fours' footsies:

I look at those & think a couple things:

1. I am SO thankful for all those little feet that are running (or will be before we know it) all over my house.  God formed each of those children & each of those tiny toes while they were in my womb. He knows them & loves them better than I do. 
2. That is a lot of nails I am responsible for clipping. Me included, hands & feet, I have 100 to keep up with at the current time. Praise God for a dog who is a nervous wreck & bites her nails daily & for a self sufficient husband ; )