Potsticker Heaven

The girls have been regularly hanging out with a friend's au pair who is from Xi'an, China. She has been teaching them some Mandarin, and today, they made an extraordinary batch of potstickers. After they were done, the girls gorged themselves on them. Seriously, I think they each ate about 8 before I stopped them. They were soooo good. And we have lots left for future meals! Yum! Now I just need to learn the art of making them too!

Party in a Box!

The girls received a box of clothing from Joe's colleague. I don't think I can even describe how excited they got about it. Maybe this set of pictures can do the talking for me?






They were giddy to receive this box of goodies!

I don't think I've ever posted this picture of Jia so I thought I'd toss it into the mix too. It makes me laugh!

We have two goofy girls!

A PSA, brought to you by Willa

Hi! It's Willa. This is my Public Service Announcement.

Did you know that cherry pits are poisonous to eat? My parents didn't either until I swallowed one. My parents called Poison Control, who told them that the inside of a cherry pit contains cyanide. Poison Control asked if I had chewed it up, and then told my mom that I'd probably be okay because I only ate one.

My parents never had to call Poison Control for Jia by the way, but they've called three times for me. I'm an overachiever.

(Amazing how this seems to directly correspond with the last post!)

Willa, Testing the Boundaries of the Human Body

Willa speaks well and often acts so mature that I sometimes forget she recently turned two. So when she does two-ish things it always surprises me. Lately, she has done the following:

She shoved a pea up her nose. She then looked directly at me, and pushed it up farther. I asked her to blow it out, and she tried, but sniffed the wrong way. And it went up farther! Then she blew it out. Whew!

She shoved a long quill of a feather right into her ear. She cried a lot over that one. We had been doing art projects with feathers and she was actually trying to stick it behind her ear but missed. Ouch.

She plays on our laptop computer. Then I noticed that the F4 and the UP key were missing. She had chewed them up.

Most recently, she told me she was going on a trip. The kids do this often and they take bags and pack them up for their adventure. She grabbed a bag and then yelled, "Look at me, Mama!" She had shoved her little body entirely into the plastic bag. She was stuck and thought it was funny.

Why now? She has eaten peas forever and never shoved them up her nose. She has messed around on the laptop for months, but why choose now to eat the keys? My girls have always considered plastic bags to be toys, ahem, but why choose now to use them improperly?

What can I say? She's acting her age.

Growing up

I tried to help Jia with something tonight and she said: "No, I don't need you to. I can take care of myself. But thanks anyway!"

I thought I would rejoice at these moments, but I'm not. Sigh.

Proud of my Girls

I've been very proud of my girls lately for different reasons, and wanted to share a little.

Jia has faced a few things that have scared her recently, but she did them anyway. I have been telling her that is the very definition of "brave." We started a Friday Morning Out program at a local church and this past Friday was our first day. I was asked to volunteer in Willa's room so I brought Jia to her room and dropped her off. She did great for the first couple of hours. Then her teacher brought her into Willa's room because she was crying a bit. She hung out with us for about fifteen minutes and then her teacher came back to see if she wanted to return to the class. She did! When I went to pick her up at the end she didn't want to leave! Jia later told me that Willa's room was "babyish" and "not as much fun!"

She was also apprehensive about going to the dentist for a check-up and told me so. We arrived and she asked the hygienist to explain the instruments to her again, and Jia proceeded to do wonderfully!

She was scared too of swimming in my parents' condo's pool this weekend. She clung to me at the beginning shouting, "I'm scared! I'm scared!" By the end of the time she was moving all around the pool, and wanted to do it by herself.

I'm also proud of Jia's drive to read. We happened to receive a first grade reading program this weekend for free, and I showed it to her. She was very interested to read the first story and struggled through it. In the end, she was so proud that she read it all by herself!

On the Willa front, she has been in undies for over two weeks! She had been using the potty regularly and I thought well, we'll give it a shot. She has essentially potty-trained herself! She truly did it on her own. Thrilled for her (and us!).

Willa has been very insistent at doing things on her own. If I put mittens on her, she will take them off and do them again by herself! Jia was also like this, but Willa's intensity about it is over the top. I have realized that she is an extremely strong-willed little girl. No mellow kids in our family! Anyway, I thought I'd share a little bit about the girls' accomplishments lately.

More stuff the girls said

Jia to Joe (who was eating candy): "Too much candy isn't good for grown-ups either!"

Me: I love you!
Willa: No, I love you!
Me: No, I love you!
Willa: Okay. You love me.

Me (Frustrated at the lack of information Jia provides about her day at preschool): Jia, why is it so hard for you to answer direct questions?
Jia: Because I might be a tiny little bit shy around people that I know.

We had an evening event planned and Jia was laying on the floor with her eyes closed. I said, "Jia, you look tired. Are you sure you want to go tonight?" Jia replied, "Yes. Is it a sleeping party?"

Jia and I were talking about how monarch butterflies migrate to Mexico for the winter. Then she said, "Someday we're going to migrate. We're going to Florida and that's migrating! We get to migrate!"