Lake Tahoe 2012 - Part One

How is it fall already?  

I kept meaning to, and never did, post our pictures from our wonderful two week trip to Lake Tahoe this summer.  We're so fortunate to live just a few hours away, and it happens to be the place where both Matt and I spent summer (and winter in my case) vacations as kids, (almost) where me first met -- we met in Davis the night before heading to Tahoe with friends, where we had our first date, where we got engaged, and where we were married!  Obviously, that lake holds a special spot in our hearts.  We're lucky to be able to bring the girls there as often as we do.  For the past several years, we've spent at least two weeks there each summer, and also spent a week each winter.  The girls love the escape from the fog and look forward to these vacations all year long, as do we!

The sheer number of pictures I took is a little overwhelming, so I've split the trip up into a few posts.  

We began by loading up the van and the girls with everything we'd need for two weeks.  And...that was day 1 ;)  It really did take a while, though.  Between my obsessive need to do every last bit of laundry before we left and Matt's obsessive need to organize the van just so, this took a looong time.  Interestingly, we put absolutely no effort into the girls' appearance that day, hence the shaggy looks in the packed van once we were finally off!

Fast forward a few hours, and we were magically there! (I could go on and on about the multiple bathroom pit stops we made, and the multiple fights we broke up in the back, but I won't!)

I think Matt and Mary were both happy to be out of the car!

Once we were settled, we made fast work of relaxing and playing over the course of the next week!  The girls learned the fine art of collecting as much money and property as possible with many games of Monopoly.

They also became quite obsessed with a game called Headbands, where they guessed what card they had strapped to their own head.  I'm pretty sure this used to be called Indian Poker when we were kids, but I guess that name went by the politically correct wayside around the same that "criss cross apple sauce" replaced sitting Indian style.  So, Headbands it is  :)  They loved this game, and even the twins totally got it.  It was definitely a peek into playing board games for real with them!

         

We had some good ol' iPad watching fun and lots of sticker concentration.

Mealtime is always a production, whether we're home or in Tahoe.  But, at least in Tahoe we had Mop and a big deck to spread out on.  And, did I mention Mop? :)  Mop was there most of that week with us, so the girls were in heaven!

Hello little bedhead breakfast girls!

        

Mary had her first bath in the kitchen sink in Tahoe, too!  Every little Raley baby has enjoyed the same privilege.  She loved having the bath all to herself for a change!

That's all for now!

Little Climber (and a Walker!)

Ah, my favorite age....

Climbing toddler + dining room chairs + table = exhausting combination.

It could be worse.  It could be 2 climbing toddlers.  I just have to keep reminding myself that one little Mary is a breeze compared to Tessa and Annie at the same age!  (Megan and Bridget never even thought about climbing up on the table!)

And, Mary might just be walking (sshhh!).  I made the mistake of loudly announcing Mary's first steps while I was playing with her by myself upstairs.  She just ever so casually got off the rocking chair she'd been climbing on, and walked over to me.  It was three steps.

"Girls!  Matt!!  Come in here!!  Mary just walked!"

But, then I had to correct myself when all four girls  ran into the room, so sad that they missed it.

"Did she really walk, Mommy???  Not without us seeing it!!  Mary!!"

No. No, she didn't walk at all....I must have imagined that.

She then had a full audience as she tried again.  What a ham!!  No walking for the crowd yet.  Just a lot of squatting and standing over and over again.  But we'll put it on record that she officially walked at 14.5 months :)

Sleepy Bookworms

It's not unusual for Tessa and Annie to be carrying books with them wherever they go these days!  They schlep them in their little backpacks, they bring them in the car, they carry teetering piles from room to  room,  they stack them on their respective nightstands, and they "read" them constantly.  Where are my books?? is often an ugent question around here.  I think the books have replaced cartoon watching for them since we ditched weekday TV.  Instead of waking up to watch a show while they're still a little groggy, they now wake up, immediately gather all of their books from the top of their nightstands, and sleepily stumble downstairs.  Then they proceed to read as much as they can between yawns and maybe a little snack.

It's a rough life.

A constant supply of new library books feeds this obsession.  And our new focus on letters and their sounds leaves them now asking me what the words are on their pages. If I had to guess, I'd say they will both be reading sooner than the older girls did.  Especially if I put just a little effort into it ;) 

They find most books (even those with the most mundane plots) absolutely hi-larious!  They start laughing and then they can't stop.  I am definitely the third wheel trying to read to them when they are acting so silly.

The twins definitely share their love of books with Megan and Bridget, and we love to read to all of the girls together, especially books that were written just for us with our five girls, I think :).  There are two in particular that are (my!) favorites here.  The first is All-of-a-Kind Family, written in the 50's but set in the early 1900's.  It's a good, old-fashioned story of five sisters growing up in New York City.  I love reading this one to the girls, and it's a refreshing departure from the usual Berenstain Bears or My Little Pony stories.  They love that there are five girls, and they remember the little adventures even weeks after we finish a chapter.  Truthfully, we don't read a chapter as often as I would like because of the logistics of bedtime for all five (and competing stories from Daddy who tells the best stories that he effortlessly makes up each night!), so we're slowly making our way through the book.  Luckily, there are plenty of adventures, and even a few more books in the series.

How cute is this cover?  Are there other books with five sisters as the main characters?  I may be missing some gems out there! (Pride and Prejudice is the obvious one, but I'll save that one for when they're a tad older!)

The other book that was written just for us, obviously, is Duck Dunks.  It's an adorable picture book about five little ducks going to the beach.  The watercolor illustrations are so, so cute, and each of our girls has an alter ego little duck in this book!  I think it's so perfect for them because I always call them my little ducks :)  There are a few more books in this series, too.

And...now Tessa and Annie are calling me to read them a book.  And Mary just woke up from her morning nap.  This should be interesting :)

What's Happenin'

It's the everyday stuff I want to remember when I'm looking back on this blog years from now.  Even though we haven't done anything newsworthy the last few days, I of course still took pictures.

This is a typical scene around here.  The twins are getting into puzzles lately, which is so cute to watch!  In this sitting, they completed their Three Little Pigs puzzle three times in a row, handing each other pieces and chatting the entire time.  As a puzzle lover myself, I love that they each have a puzzle buddy perfectly suited for them.  It's one of many, many things that are awesome about being a twin!  Puzzles are more fun with your twin ;)

Meanwhile, poor little Mary is excluded, down on the ground with her foot dangling out of her pajamas, drinking her milk.  Poor, poor neglected baby.

"Hi, Mommy and Daddy.  Thanks for my new baby gate!"

"Oh, I'm sorry.  Were you expecting it to keep me safe?  Ha ha ha. What's your plan to keep me from toppling off this first step? You can start by not ever leaving my side.  Good luck getting anything done around here!"

Another typical scene: someone is always playing with little dolls or dollhouses in this house.  In this case, it's Annie, and she didn't even notice I was there when I snapped the picture, so lost she was in her little doll play.

Our piano also sees a lot of playtime:

Mary is realizing she can stand, and will actually do it for up to maybe 30 seconds.  Still not walking, but getting there.

Besides, aren't other people supposed to carry you or push you everywhere you need to go, anyway?

It's exhausting learning new things.

And, soccer started!  Both girls' practices and all games take place one block from our house, which means stroller time for Mary and bike-riding for the twins.  Score!

Big M

Sometimes I can't believe we have a 6-year-old!  Six seems so old!! If the next six years pass as quickly as the last six have, we'll have all five girls in school, with a 7th grader in the mix, before we know it!  Yikes.  Every night I kiss Megan goodnight, and I'm always reminded of my little tiny baby Megan, or my 3-year-old, or even 4-year-old Megan.  Her little face is the same, just a bit bigger.  She has a way of continuing to grow while I way have a way of willing her not to.  Why do kids have to grow?

We're only a few weeks into the school year with our first grader, but already she's showing more maturity. She has homework a whopping four days a week, but she's given the whole packet at the beginning of the week.  I think it's a good sign that she asks if she can do the whole packet on the first day ;)  I love over-achieving first-graders.  Another responsibility every night is reading to us for twenty minutes.  There's something about the fact that she has to do this that makes me set aside other duties to listen to her plow through an I Can Read book.  Dishes can wait while we listen to her little voice and her laughter as she cracks up as she's reading a new story.  The twins have been steadily supplying her with library books every week too, which keeps her from memorizing anything we have around the house.

Megan's taken on the responsibility of guiding Bridget at school, too.  I think some kids might want to distance themselves from siblings while they're at school, especially siblings so close in age.  This is so not the case with these two, and I couldn't be more proud.  I love hearing about the occasional recess they share, if the schedule works out, when Megan actively seeks Bridget out (among those lowly kindergartners) and then invites her to play with the 1st grade crowd.  Thankfully, Bridget doesn't seem to be having trouble making new friends in her own class, but I'm sure her blossoming confidence has a lot to do with a certain someone making the transition as smooth as possible.  Just hearing about them waving to each other in the hallway, or playing tag at recess together makes me so happy!

Because Megan is so cute, and is so helpful and sweet (almost) all of the time, here she is doing one of her favorite things...playing Legos.  These used to be pretty foreign objects in this house, but they're making up for lost time and quickly multiplying around here.  In her elusive downtime, Megan loves to carefully build something from one of her little sets...and then build it again and again.

She's wearing her favorite get-up, too.  She loves to come home from school and change out of her uniform and into something comfy. I would say that clothing issues are the one thing that she still gets upset about, or melts down about every now and then.  If I someone tries to get her to wear something that she doesn't like, she just doesn't feel comfortable and can't get past it.  She loves her little uniform at school, thank God, but she loves her little uniform at home just as much, and it's usually leggings and a t-shirt.  Sometimes a little skirt thrown on top of her leggings, but it needs to be a short skirt.  God help you if you try to get her to wear a long skirt.

Other than that, she's just an easy girl these days, and generally a joy to be around.  I love this little baby, I mean big girl!