All about the kids

Alexandra
I forgot to write a post after Alex's four month check up last month, but at the time she weighed in at 13 lbs, 14 oz and she was 25 1/4 inches long. That's a full two pounds lighter than Austin was at that age, but only half an inch shorter.

She's a very happy baby these days and is always laughing and smiling. She's discovered she has toes and is almost always grabbing at them and trying to pull them towards her mouth. She's going to get a rude awakening in a few weeks when I have to start dressing her with socks and shoes every day.

She's become a pretty good sleeper -- both during the day and at night. During the day, she's guaranteed to take at least one 2 to 3 hour nap and several other shorter naps throughout the day. And at night she'll usually sleep anywhere from 5 to 7 hours without needing a feeding. (Although many a nights she's cries out because she's lost her soother or come out from her blankets. All she wants is for me to her help her out and then she'll go right back to sleep.) And, she may be almost five months old, but she still likes to be tightly swaddled to sleep. This means she barely moves around in the crib when she's sleeping (because she can't in the swaddle) and I only have two blankets remaining that are big enough to swaddle her. I'm trying to get her out of the habit, but it's hard when I know that's the easiest and fastest way to get her to fall asleep and stay asleep. Although at least because she doesn't move around, I don't have to worry about her getting her arms or legs stuck between the bars of the crib.

And finally, she is growing some hair! It's light brown, maybe even blonde at the moment, and sticks straight up.

Austin
For Austin right now, life is a running commentary. He can't do anything or go anywhere without giving a long-winded play-by-play of what's going on. And he has a memory like his father -- he remembers everything, even the smallest detail such as the colour of the cup someone drank from three days ago. So one thing's for sure, you can't pull a fast one on him.

He also goes through phases where he repeats everything you say; which makes us watch our language all the time. I know; he copied me one day in the car when I swore under my breath for making a wrong turn!

Some things he says, or does, are very cute so I'll share a few that I can think of right now:

• Instead of saying running or run, Austin says ready set go. Everytime. So if I tell him I'm going out for a run, he'll say "mommy go out eady set go." (And yes, he says eady, not ready)
• We've taught him to say excuse me if he burps. But, what he ends up saying is "scuse me burp". (The same goes for scuse me fart)
• He used to say 'da' when he meant please, so one day we ennuciated the word for him to teach him how to say it. So now, everytime you remind him to say please, he says "pul-lease".
• Ryan will give him piggy backs around the house sometimes and he'll always say to Austin "hold on tight". So now, Austin walks around the house carrying something (a truck, a stuffed animal) and tells it to "hold on tigh".
• Yeehaw means horse. He knows how to say horse, but he still calls horses a yeehaw. And by extension, he thinks his summer hat looks like a cowboy hat, so he calls it his yeehaw hat. Alex has one too, according to Austin, although hers is pink.

If I think of any other cute tidbits I"ll add to this post in the future.