And Then There Were...

Quick, before it's too far into March.... February was a busy and fast month. P traveled for about 3 weeks to Asia and South America. Cali briefly had pnemonia and is currently flirting with pink eye. We've had maybe 2 healthy weeks in the last 6. Cali is about to turn 2 (so I'll do a post all about her soon).

I have been desperately trying to read better books this year. I started with No Ordinary Time, which was a mistake. It's 800 pages or so and a bit too ambitious to fit in between things. I've made it halfway and have a mild crush on Eleanor Roosevelt (which I understand is not an uncommon reaction to her) as well as a greater understanding of the time period and the vast complexity of politics at that time. It's a bit mind-boggling and not at all surprising how long the book is. The author has tackled a crazy amount of details and put them together in a reader-friendly narrative. However, it is dense and I've decided to take a break and revisit FDR in a month or two.

As part of my strategy to tackle the 300-plus books on my to-read list, I'm enlisting Audible so I can read even when I can't (ie. driving without kids, doing laundry, cooking, etc). I'm working through Gone Girl, which I was unable to bond with when I tried reading it last year. It's much more engaging this way. I've also started Quiet, which is very interesting (although it feels a bit narcissistic) and Breakfast with Buddha. It's a good mix as I've got a book for almost any mood, but I may be stretching myself a bit thin.

P is working on building a new desk for his new office. Kind of like our house, he learned a lot from building the first one, so Desk 2.0 has been designed modularly and will have a more durable finish. He also just recieved his newest toy, a ShopBot, which is a small CNC router for wood projects. He's geeking out over it, so he spends most evenings in the shop, or raiding with his guild on WoW, or attending meetings for the School Referendum PAC. He's a busy boy. But, last night, we had a rare night out at a "House of Cards" party. I don't watch, but I made it through a few episodes and have been coached through the major plot points. I didn't ask any embarrassing questions and was able to add a little clarity to the bookends on Chapter 27 (Thank you HuffPo spoilers).

Ellie is enjoying gymnastics and takes drawing and ballet through school. She's starting to sound out words, which is amazing and terrifying. I have a feeling she'll be surgically attached to books much like I was once she can actually read to herself. Not that that's necessarily a bad thing. She is really into pretend play and enjoys stage directing little dolls (the smaller the better). They always do exactly as she demands, which makes them preferable to real playmates much of the time.

Cali has been staying full days most of the time at school. I have some mommy guilt over that, but I get a lot more done at home and haven't needed as many naps. She seems to love it. She gets to take a lunch and backpack and hold sister's hand in the car line. I'm flirting with finding an actual occupation to devote myself to now that baby days are mostly past. Her verbal development is coming along slowly. She seems a bit shy and has a tendency to whisper words. I think it's mostly a response to her gregarious sister. She's not as persistent about making herself understood as Ellie is/was and has a tendency to get frustrated. We've had to start asking Ellie to use an inside voice sometimes. She can be quite loud when she gets excited.

Big girl bed

A little stripey. Also, the best part of playdates is other people's dress up shoes.

Painted turtles in Cali's class

Ellie's face upon seeing the squid dad was NOT eating in China.

Cali's miserable face.

Change of scenery for the potty. She placed it there by herself.

Playing the piano with Stuffy

Ellie's treasures at age 4.

Our 18" blizzard covered things pretty well. Too bad this is the year we neglected to put away the outdoor furniture :(

And, upstairs.

Mostly enjoying the snow.

Meet Olaf.

Ellie's "finished" mandala. She cut it out all by herself too.

Showing something from gymnastics (box pushups?)

Snow-bathing.

Tasting snowballs.

38 bags and boxes to AmVets.

First haircut.

A gift from Thailand. Hard to top this Buddha.

Chillin' with Dad.

Ellie artwork is getting more creative.

Cali in class. Looking through a color box. She later took them all out and let a classmate pick them all up.

The family that reads together....

Parts of the horse, tracing, lettering, coloring... all sorts of things happening here.

Painted dragon for the Chinese New Year from Cali

Happy New Year, ya'll! I was able to keep my resolution last year to blog less than the year before. This year, perhaps I'll try blogging more :}

What to write.... I have so many projects in mind for the new year. I'm having trouble getting started on anything because the possibilities just are so intriguing. But first, a little wrap up of 2014.

Ellie is 4. She had a birthday after Thanksgiving. We went with a "How to Train Your Dragon" flavor this year. She abruptly decided about 2 weeks before her birthday that Toothless the Dragon was the bees knees. It stopped being all about Frozen and Doc McStuffins. Apparently, even in preschool, peer pressure is a thing. Frozen (in her class) is for 3 year-olds and nappers (the bottom rungs of Montessori society, just above the savage Toddler). Somehow, with her birthday approaching, the Kindergarteners decided to initiate her into the coolness of a certain black dragon. And, I have to admit, we were glad for a change of pace. As entertaining as Frozen is, a little variety is good. And, that's what we have now. She alternates between favoring Frozen, Sleeping Beauty, and the two How to Train Your Dragon (HTTYD) movies. She has most of the movies on her iPad, so when that magical hour of screen time rolls around, she alternates and fast forwards like a deranged monkey with a remote. It ALMOST makes me wish we had a TV set up that she couldn't mess with. ALMOST. We'll probably have to change our system here soon though since little sister is fast approaching the age of screen time. She already sits next to Ellie and sometimes gets to play with the apps. But, Ellie had a lot more practice by the same age, so Cali is still struggling with stray fingers that keep her from dragging and selecting as she wants.

Christmas brought an unsuccessful attempt at potty training. We determined that Ellie was better primed at the point of potty training, so we've stepped back to priming Cali so that the simple act of sitting on the potty isn't an act of torture. We're hoping preschool will help move things along, but we're aiming for a new attempt in the summer. We celebrated multiple Christmases with different groupings of family. For some reason, it seemed more mailing was done to and from this year. I need to internalize the goal to mail early, small, and light. And, I need to prompt my family early for gift ideas. For everyone to whom we haven't sent our thanks to yet, we love our gifts and I have the goal to write notes this weekend.

Ellie is going to try ballet through her school. I figure, it's a low risk, low cost way to try on ballet. She's asked to do it, but doesn't really dwell on it, so I think it's more that friends in her class are interested in it and she feels she should be too. She still does gymnastics once a week, although last week was the first time she seemed enthusiastic and fully participatory. We'll see tomorrow if the attitude holds or it was a fluke. She's also been doing an extra drawing class through school and so far, she loves it. Her motor skills with the pencil have improved a lot over the past few months. She tried a brief run of yoga through school and her favorite part was the one day they colored a mandala as meditation. Slowly, she's working on finishing that first mandala.

Cali is working on verbal skills. She has an adorable "YESSSh" and can say random words like "necklace" with incredible clarity. It's delightful to be able to communicate back and forth because she gets frustrated a lot. Mostly by things she isn't allowed to do (climb onto the kitchen table, stand on furniture, eat 24-7, etc...).

Over the holiday season, I had my first ever skin cancer check. They found three dodgy moles and removed them. Two were potentially troublesome, but caught in time. Therefore, I will endeavor to be more cognizant of the sun this year and cover my bits with sunscreen, hats and clothing. I encourage all of you to do the same. Because of the sites the doctor stitched up, I had a month-long moratorium from physical activity. I missed my yoga and felt guilty for not missing my strength training. I restarted last week and it was rough at first. However, I am rapidly regaining my flexibility and still can manage a supported headstand. I would like to get to an unsupported headstand and possibly a handstand this year. We'll see how it goes. I probably should try to build a home practice as well to get there faster. But, in reality, that probably won't happen.

P did a lot of wood working leading up to Christmas. He made three beautiful cutting boards (one for me), a maple learning tower for Ellie's birthday, and a last minute Greene and Greene style frame I've decided to put a mirror into. Any day now, he'll order the wood to get started on his office furniture for the new plant. He's also begun playing World of Warcraft again. It isn't all-consuming like it was. He generally beats me to bed now. Between the wood shop and WoW, it's a good thing we don't have cable anymore. We don't watch tv much anymore, although we do try to watch a movie together once a week. Last night we watched Boyhood. It had an interesting concept and I was surprised to find that the second half was filmed in my hometown of San Marcos, Texas. That gave me a bias toward the film, but P didn't care for it much. The last film we both watched and enjoyed was Chef. It's a decent feel-good movie with lots of food porn.

At Christmas, the girls got more toys than they knew what to do with. I set a limit of 5 things each from us. Santa brought 2 joint gifts (a box of books and an indoor play area) and 1 gift each. I wasn't counting on how generous our friends and family are. I'll need to pare that back to 2 parental and 1 santa, probably. It's so difficult to narrow down what will be best received and used, but it was still too much this year.

Along those lines, I've been reading more about simplifying your life/home by purging belongings and shifting to a more experience-based life than a possession-centered one. I still have a lot of work to do shifting my mindset. The UPS driver and Amazon know to what depths I consume. On my reading list is The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up as well as reading at blogs like UnFancy, Becoming Minimalist, The Art of Simple, and Into Mind. Perhaps my major project this year will be shifting from an acquirer to more of a creator. With the girls both at school more, I'll be trying to revive my artistic skills, streamline our home, and polish up some marketing skills.

Another project this year is my informal reading challenge. One of my favorite bloggers suggested a reading challenge of 12 books from different categories to bust reading ruts. I have been in an escapist "easy reader" phase for a while. Coming off the mind candy of the Dragonriders of Pern series (thanks Dad for planting that seed), I've decided it might be time to tackle some of these delicious novels that are supposed to be superlative, but don't fit into the comfortable genres I've gotten used to. I'm having trouble narrowing it down to just 12 books because there are so many interesting ones out there. Reading truly is the best hobby. Unfortunately, I chose to start with No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt.... At a whopping 700+ pages, it's a bit hefty coming off of a McCaffrey binge. It's good reading, just a little drier than I've gotten used to. I've signed up for an Audible trial (finally) so I can start listening to some of my other books at times when reading isn't feasible (i.e. folding laundry, driving, etc). First on my listening list is All the Light We Cannot See.