She can read!

Charlotte's a reader!

She read her first story today. It was an intriguing tale of a fat cat and a fat rat. I'm so proud of her! She's reading even younger than Eli did! But don't tell him that.

Eli's making his way through The Complete Tales of the Brothers Grimm. He's really enjoying them.

The kids have been playing (pardon me, constructing. Playing is for babies.) with Lego's. They made rocket ships and a space center. Some days I have to force them to spend time together but most of the time, they will migrate to each other on their own. There isn't much out there that's more satisfying than seeing your children get along.

One more picture

Forgot to add this one to the birthday post. I just love this photo of her.

Happy Birthday, sweet girl.

Charlotte is 5 (and has been for nearly two weeks now). She's so proud to be FIVE! Mike and I nearly can't believe it. I still remember Mike holding her at a few days old, crying because she was already getting older. And here it is now, five years later. We love that girl so much, all of her: her big heart, her big feelings, her big imagination. Nearly everything about her is bold and bright and beautiful. All wrapped up in this cute little girl.

On the day of her birthday, the girls and I were at my parents' house while the guys were home. So we had a small celebration with cupcakes that Charlotte made with me and a special "Mom and Charlie" trip to go shopping. Thanks to M, she had a gift certificate to the bookstore and some money to get her nails painted. However, at the salon, they told her that her fingernails were too short to be painted. I suggested we check her toe nails and she said, "Oh, that's a good idea! I don't chew those nearly as much as my fingernails!"

Sadly, those were also too short. She wasn't too disappointed when I suggested she could spend the money on the doll she's been asking for! So we went book shopping and dolly shopping and then we shared a pretzel.

When we got back home to our house, we had her first real birthday party. She invited five of her friends and they had such a great time. They splashed around in the pool in the backyard, played on the playground, and picked berries in the field near our house. I have alot of great pictures but they include the other children and I haven't asked permission to post them.

The Daily 'Do

Charlotte hates getting her hair done. She's not a super girly girl and she says she can't pretend to be Harry Potter when her hair is up. But I do it anyway. I probably should follow her wishes because it is her own body but at the same time, she just looks so sweet with it styled and it's something I enjoy doing. I made a pact with her. On days where we're leaving the house, she can choose her clothes and I choose her hair style or vice versa. She tried to add a clause that no dresses could be worn but I shot that down.

She's been such a smarty pants lately. In a cold section of the store, she told me she was "the opposite of sweltering." And yesterday, while planting flower seeds, she understood that the directions "tamp them down" meant she could walk all over them.

Lucy's been talking all the time lately. She's stringing her words together to make sentences. She brings a play cup and plate to us and ask us, "Want juice? It good? Yeah? Want cookie? It good? Uh-huh." She's also diligently working on her disobedience skills. She just loves to tell me NO in her grumpiest voice with her sourest face. She can be quite the handful. She's also so full of joy and excitement, especially when someone mentions going for a walk or seeing the babies next door.







Eli's been very excited about learning new songs on his flute. He's in band and their two new songs are the song from The Pink Panther and Eye of the Tiger. He really enjoys playing but is having a hard time deciding if he'd like to continue learning to play this instrument or move on to guitar or keyboard.

Bringing up a Bargain Babe

While out shopping, Charlotte spied some coupons laying on the ground. "Mom! Someone just tossed these out! Why would they do that? It's like THROWING MONEY AWAY!"

That's mah girl.

In other news, Lucy is a handful. That is all.

Shining, gleaming, streaming, waxen, flaxen

Give me down to there hair
Shoulder length or longer
Here baby, there mama
Everywhere daddy daddy

We've found some blogs online of different hair styles for little girls and we've been having some fun with it.

We took a ride to our friend's house. Janet, Autumn, and Solan have a beautiful log cabin on some hilly, grassy acres. The girls played in the mud and hunted for frogs and we all took a hike. It's gorgeous here again.

Now we're off to the dentist. Poor Charlie's cap fell off...AGAIN!

She's a star

Charlotte was on the radio! We have Sirius/XM and she listens to the Absolutely Mindy Show on Kids Place Live (channel 116). She wanted Mindy to play her favorite song (a Harry Potter Remix).

Mindy was discussing the differences in style between parents and kids and Charlotte talked about Daddy's moose pajamas. It was incredibly sweet and we were all stoked.

Changes

Charlotte has been very different lately. She's always been a bit of a tom-boy. She always pretended she was a boy character and didn't care much for dresses or girly things. Lately, though, she's been acting very different. She loves to dress herself in dresses and skirts, wants to wear makeup, and is into everything frilly. Today I found her playing school with her stuffed animals. It's just always so enjoyable to watch her grow. Eli was always so mature for his age that he never really seemed to be a little boy. In fact, the times when he acted up, getting loud and rambunctious, were a nice change of pace. Charlotte has always been such a caricature of a little girl, always playing pretend and dress up, acting silly all the time, and now playing school.



Yesterday, she was a "hair do-er" and gave us all mah-sausages (massages). Here she is "wearing" my hair.




Lucy is beginning to get very frustrated with her inability to communicate to us. She does have a few words, include calling Charlotte "Sha-zhit." Her words include (Becca, this is for you) : Mama, Dada, up, hi, bye, baby, muna (nursing), uh-oh, uh-huh and nuh-uh (yes and no), ice, water, and Sha-zhit. Still, she gets by with pointing her finger and crying. We're beginning to teach her some sign language because she seems to enjoy it. She understands them when we do them and likes when I teach her how to do them herself but she only does "more" and "down" on her own.



Eli lost another basketball game but is becoming more sure of himself. He attempted to make a basket this time and while he didn't score, he did hit the rim. This was a big deal for him because he tends to hang back and get out of the way of the ball.

Just call her Martha Stewart

We're on a roll with the decorating. Yesterday, we stopped in at Home Depot and Charlotte picked out paint and carpet for one room of her dollhouse. She's decided to decorate the girls' bedroom first.

She's chosen "sorbet" (don't call it pink or you won't hear the end of it) and some mauve carpet. This morning, she learned the ins and outs of painting, including prepping, taping, how to use a roller, and how to clean up. She did a really great job painting.

They also laid some carpet in it but didn't glue it down. Charlotte decided to keep it loose so that she could change it later if she wanted. Next up is choosing some fabric so she and I can make curtains for the windows. (That's Laura in the bed under the covers. She's sick and needs to rest.)

And just because she's cute: