Monaloca

Thanks to my sis and her family, we had a fabulously relaxing Christmas in Roseville. For the first year in many, we celebrated with extended family on real Christmas day, as opposed to whatever December weekend was most convenient for us all to get together, and us to have Kai for the whole spell. Celebrating on real Christmas this year meant we didn’t get Kai at all – but as we told Kai, that only means he should get to be with us for the whole time next.

Fun Christmas moments:

– Upside-down Christmas morn: All the grown-ups besides Joey and me were up, staring at stockings from Santa, a half hour before any of the kids! They needed Kai to be their 5:30am wake-up call. They still beat Nalani and me by long enough that Melina had already gotten to the bottom of her stocking… twice.

– Festive dressing down: Stacie had wanted us all to dress up for Christmas Eve dinner. It sounded great in theory, but when on Friday night we realized it would only be “us,” it suddenly seemed silly. Nalani dined in her jammies, and the rest of us in our comfy clothes. We almost dressed up for the open house on Christmas afternoon, then thought better of it yet again.

– Cousin love: Melina and Lucas LOVED playing together, and did so – making tea parties, running a train set, and just being silly – continuously almost our entire stay. Noah, for his part, adores baby Nalani. We’ll see if it keeps up as she grows, and also if that adoration translates to his toddler sister arriving from China this spring.

We’re now ready to move on to the new year, and will kick it off by hosting a pajama and breakfast food potluck (complete with mimosas and red wine) at our place for the moms group and families. We’re all looking forward to staying in but with the excitement of going out, and this time Kai will be with us!

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At age three, Melina finally “gets” Christmas. The day we decorated our house she started asking, “Is it Christmas yet?” prompting a brief discussion of “Christmas” versus “Christmas time.” She took it to heart, and even told Dad “It’s Christmas time Daddy, not Christmas” when he tried to tell her it’s Christmas and Santa is watching her every move.

Luckily we have two advent calendars to help her count the days. Each morning Melina looks forward to opening the little advent drawer before she does anything else. The first few days she got coins or candy, so when on the third day she found only a small tangerine (stuck there in haste by yours truly) she literally burst into tears, her expectations dashed. Luckily a trade with Mama for a penny to put in her piggy bank made everything ok.

With the inside of our house fully “decked out” (as Melina likes to say, probably because that’s what I say) she’s turned to bugging Daddy to hang outside lights to compete with our neighbors, whose entire yard, trees, and front porch are lined with a blinking rainbow. I think Daddy missed the boat for this year but we’ll look forward to decking out our whole house next holiday season.

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Nothing like shiny holiday wrapping paper for motivation. Here she is!

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Nalani has turned half-toddler in the last month. She can make her way slowly around a room, and manages to get into anything in her path. She loves pulling things off the bottom of our coffee table (where we now store only big-piece puzzles and soft books), the bottom of our family room bookshelf (also replaced with nothing but board books), and before we moved them out of the way, the cables on Daddy’s record player in the corner of the room. Yup, so far we’re doing reactive baby-proofing.

Our little girl has just started forward crawling, and just a few steps at a time. But for the past few weeks she’s been able to move a couple steps backwards on all fours, push back up into sitting position, turn herself around, plop on all fours and start all over… or just roll. This gets her around a room pretty efficiently, but slowly enough that sometimes we forget she can do it and are surprised when we look over and she’s moved six feet. When we place her on a hard floor, she slides backwards quite quickly.

Nalani will play independently for up to an hour, which constantly amazes me. She’s starting to pull up, and regularly makes it to her knees where she’ll continue playing in a sort of squatting position. She turns herself on her belly in her crib (which is now at the lowest level) and prefers to sleep that way. She’s just started dropping toys repeatedly in order to see us play the pick-up game over and over again.

At mealtimes, she still loves baby carrots more than anything, plus any fruit, most veggies, smashed beans, orzo pasta, and little bits of “healthy” muffins. She now asks to be fed solids at both lunch and dinner time when she sees us eating. For some reason she’s not as interested in breakfast – yet. She also popped her second tooth – bottom right – about three weeks after the first.

While playing, grabbing and discovering new things, and moving around on the floor are her main interests these days, Nalani’s other favorites include watching or grabbing at the kitty cat (who so far has shown surprising patience with our littlest family member), laughing at her sis and bro, swinging at the park, other babies, looking at that baby in the mirror, snoozing in her stroller or Ergo, and quite simply being held. So far she goes to just about anyone, as long as Mom or Dad is near and voicing approval.

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Melina has been practicing hard for her preschool’s holiday show next week. She’s memorized two lines to recite from “Twas the Night Before Christmas,” and loads of holiday songs for a singalong with all the families.

She also visited Santa yesterday, and for the first time since she was a baby didn’t burst into tears. She sat on Mommy’s lap next to Santa, and Mommy had to relay what she wants for Christmas (“Tinkerbell and pink things”) but she smiled the whole time and said “thank you” when handed a small candy cane.

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