Long Song Playing

Serena reads everything she can get her eyes on. She LOVES this new window into the world. It’s like a whole layer of the universe has opened a door to her. The other day during bedtime books, she read half of the book Little Island by Margaret Wise Brown. It’s a beautiful book, see: But […]

Serena, Annika and I were driving to Trader Joe’s today, practicing spelling and talking about their names. We talked about how Serena’s middle name is after her Uncle Aaron and how Annika’s middle name is after Jim’s grandmother, Lummy – whose given name was Maxine. Annika asked where Lummy is and Serena explained that she […]

A little video of the girls, hi-lighting Simone. When you ask Simone what her name is, she says, “Cu-Cu-Culkin” – because Annika always says Macauley Culkin (who is in the Nutcracker ballet video they love to watch) as “Macauley Cu-Cu-culkin”.

Look at our Center Child – so growing up! We celebrated her birthday at Original Pancake House (again – her kid party was the day before… you know, those pictures I will most certainly find and post soon…) where they gave her this beautiful, FREE crepe which she didn’t even taste. But she ate lots […]

Here’s an email I got this evening from Anne Terese, our extraordinary, awesome, fabulous caregiver for the girls: **************** Hello Michelle, I jotted these down earlier today and thought I’d send it your way while I was still thinking of it! An exchange while drawing pictures of you, Jim and myself: Annika: Daddy is a […]

When you say to Simone, “Assume the position!” (a phrase coined by Aunt Nancy Jane), she lays down and scoots her bottom toward you and her diaper. Today, Annika put Simone’s diaper on – big girl! Boo hoo. (Yet unbelievably sweet to watch.)

The other day, Simone was making that horrible noise she makes a bit too often: “eeeEEEhhhhhhHHHH… eeehhhhhHHHH!” So, I’m frantically searching around for something… anything that will make her stop making that noise (a common thing around here, that search.) I find a xylophone in the toy basket and hand it to Simone, to her […]

Uncle Greg made these really cool blocks for Serena’s first Christmas. There are rods, blocks with holes, regular blocks, blocks with large circles – then there’s this one most beautiful, long, rounded-edged block that says, “Merry Christmas, Serena. We love you.” The blocks are a beloved part of their toy mix. It gets tricky when […]

Serena has labeled her top bunk to ensure that Annika does not confuse it with her own bunk (which is, decidedly, the bottom bunk.) The 3X5 cards say. “no Annika”, “no pop”, “no top”, “iepfes” (When I said, “tell me about this sign, Serena said, “That’s to make Annika laugh.”)