"This is the Best Bath EVER!!!"

The other night, the girls both really needed baths so we put them both in there and they had a ball!  Sasha has taken baths with Morgan before, but just for brief moments because her wriggly, slippery body was out of control.  But now Sasha can sit up and play..... and SPLASH!  Sasha may very well be the role model in this relationship, because Morgan seems to imitate whatever baby sister does.  Like splashing!  Poor Sam was soaked after Morgan realized Sasha's splashing gave her free reign to break the rules.  And when Sasha started chewing on the foam ABC letters, Morgan thought it was a terrific idea too. 

Pretty blue eyes

Playing with (and tasting) sand for the first time

Summer time bath in the back yard

Improvised bath in Sunriver - she filled the entire sink!

Speaking of Sasha, she is NINE months already!  Whew - where did the time go?!  She is such a delight and joy, and (although I am extremely biased) such a beautiful baby.  Her little personality is starting to come through as she learns to do more and more.  She is rolling all over the place, pivoting around to get to where she wants to go, feeding herself better every day, and definitely knows how to laugh or cough loudly to get our attention.  She blows/spits raspberries quite forcefully now and finds it all hilarious.  I love the way she cocks her head at something, like the white noise machine in her room, as she tries to figure out where the sound is coming from.  Her little voice is heard more often as she babbles and tries out new sounds, in her way of talking to us.  She also still has that cute little dimple on her right cheek when she smiles.  And when I put her to bed and sing her ABCs, I swear she sometimes sings along with me in her yodely voice as she lays her head on my shoulder - that makes me melt every time.         

Catch me before I roll away!

 She is not going to be a baby much longer and I am trying to savor every moment.  When I think about all those precious little things that only a newborn does that have already passed me by, I get really sad.  Sasha is most likely our last baby, so it is even more bittersweet that the time is going so quickly.  But because I have already experienced so much with Morgan, I know what is in store and can't wait to see her learn and grow and do so many more things, like hearing her say "Mama" and walking with her hand in hand. 

Mom and Dad are so lucky that I am so chill.

So during that bath the other night, when Morgan exclaimed, "This is the best bath EVER!,"  Sam and I just looked at each other and smiled.  Those are the moments that make this whole thing so worth it.  As hard as parenting two kids can be sometimes, I am SOOO happy Morgan has a sibling now!  There are definitely times when I am pretty sure Morgan is going to cause some serious bodily harm to Sasha with her high energy levels or when she acts out on Sasha just to get our attention, however I think Morgan's patience these last nine months is starting to pay off.  Sasha is getting close to being able to play with her, and I can already imagine the fun the two of them will have together. 

Summer in Portlandia

Ahh, Portland.  It really is such a great city.  And since we wait all winter (and it was a long one this year) for the rain and clouds to leave, summer becomes such a magical time in the city.  Even though I grew up here, I still try to enjoy Portland as if I were a tourist, looking at it with fresh eyes and making the most of the different things it has to offer.  And since my international travel opportunities have dwindled radically since children entered my life, I have to love the one I'm with and make the most of it.  Fortunately, that is a pretty easy thing to do. 

With August here and fall just around the corner, I am feeling the urge to seize the day.  Just within the past week or so, I am actually pretty impressed that we have managed to do quite a few things on my summer wish list.  They make me love this beautiful city even more.  Savor summer!

Grant Park: We have had a few picnic-and-play lunches here lately.  Morgan loves it and they have a cool water feature celebrating Portland author, Beverly Cleary, and her Ramona books.  There is a fountain with statues of Ramona, Henry Huggins, and his dog Ribsy.  Today we stopped by and she had an impromptu play session with several other preschoolers in their undies. 

Taking a ride on Ribsy.

Meeting Henry Huggins.

Daddy teaches his girls about bridge

MAX:  We live only a short walk to a MAX (our light rail) station, which is something Sam loves about our house.  Being the public transport geek that he is, one of the things he wanted to do this summer was take MAX downtown with the girls.  A few weeks ago, we went for a ride and walked along the waterfront and through Saturday Market. 

At Saturday Market

Sasha did great on the 1.5 hour hike

Hiking Forest Park:  One day when Morgan was at school, Sasha got her first ride in the backpack carrier so Sam and I could hike a favorite trail through Forest Park.   It is so amazing to have a beautiful forest with a babbling stream literally right in the city.  The hike was one we used to do back when we were first married, living in NW Portland.  It brought back great memories from my 20s - life seemed a bit simpler then!  




Jamison Square:  A favorite tradition that Morgan has done since she was a baby is play in the fountain at Jamison Square.  While it may be highly chlorinated and filled with diapered tots, it is hard to beat such a well designed and beautiful place to watch your kid experiment with water and squeal with joy. 

Yummy breakfast!

Street Fairs:  "We're going to a street fair!!" Morgan shouts across the street to our neighbor.  They were going as well, so she said we'd see them there.  I don't think she really knew what a street fair was, but she was excited.  We went to the Fremont Fest last weekend, where they close ten blocks off of NE Fremont for a street fair, complete with booths, bouncy houses, and a kid and pet parade.  Morgan enjoyed the parade, which ended with a troupe of belly dancers - definitely her first.  She got to have her first Voodoo Doughnut too - I forget the fancy name, but it was chocolate with chocolate puffs cereal on top.  Very healthy.  And like all parents who take their kids to some kind of fair or carnival, there was drama.  Like when she saw the bouncy house and was dying to go in, but then we saw the crazy long line that we didn't want to stand in.  And to appease her sadness about that, we got a free balloon from a vendor, which lasted about four minutes on her wrist before it sailed away into the sky.  More drama ...and it was time to go home!

Symphony in the Park:  Something I had never done before was listen to the Portland Symphony in the park, so last Saturday (yes, after the street fair - we were on a roll!), we went to beautiful Laurelhurst Park with Kim to picnic under the trees and enjoy some classical music.  The girls did great, and Morgan enjoyed hearing all the different instruments in "Peter and the Wolf."  She came dressed in her frilly Cinderella nightgown (it was the symphony, after all), and loved spending time with her Aunt Kimmy.  When Sasha was getting a little fussy, I pushed her around the small lake listening to the music and seeing the sunlight through the trees.  Laurelhurst Park is our Central Park, our Rigerovy Sady (the park we lived across from in Prague).  So gorgeous!

Kim & Morgan both enjoy the arts...and picnics!

Sasha's first symphony

Farm Tunes:   Every Thursday in August a farm on Sauvie Island hosts a night of music, complete with tractor rides, picnicking, pigs, and berry picking.  This will definitely be one of my most cherished summer memories, not only because it was an exquisite summer evening, but because it was just "Mommy and Morgan time."  I try to plan special things we do together now that Morgan has to share me with Sasha, but I honestly haven't been that good about it.  I would have loved to have gone as a family, but since Sasha goes to bed early, Sam offered to stay behind with her, and I am so glad I got to share this time just with Morgan.  She loved the freedom to run around in the grass, run up and dance with the band, go for a real tractor ride, and stay up past her bedtime. 













I loved the freedom I had to simply observe her joy, let her take the lead, and slow down for a minute and appreciate what a perfect little human she is.  She is changing so fast, and when we seem to spend so much of our day trying to coerce the other one to do what we want, Morgan and I often miss the simple joy of each others company...or at least I do.  It is so easy to take her unconditional love for me for granted.  So, when fall is here and the weather turns, she is back in school and already four years old, in my mind I will replay that happy tractor ride with my little girl on my lap, the scratchy hay underneath us, holding on to her tight as we bumped along with Mt. Hood to the east and the gorgeous summer sun setting in the west.  Pretty. Perfect. Summer.

Gone Fishing . . .

For several months now, Papa Ron has been telling Morgan that he would love to take her fishing.  This would be another sweet grandpa-granddaughter bonding experience, to add to their traditions of visiting the ice cream shop and the telling of "Phillipii Joe"stories. 

So, Papa Ron scouted out the perfect spot months ago:  a rainbow trout farm near Mount Hood.  I have to say, it was kind of a Griswold moment, with Ron, Dinda, Kim and the four of us, caravaning in two cars.  We were lucky to have a perfect summer day in this beautiful state of ours, and to say the fish were jumping would be a vast understatement.  But considering the attention span of our daughter, the pace of this fishing excursion was just right.

Ron's childhood fishing experiences come in handy.

Kim turns out to be quite the fisherwoman.

Worms!!

Fish on!!!

Yeah - success!

Aunt Kimmy: "Fish feel like a cold, wet hot dog."

"Ewwww!!!"

"Plumpy" and "Jumpy" hang out in the bucket.

I am having flashbacks to my childhood too. 

We capped off fishing with pizza for lunch and a trip to Dairy Queen.  Morgan loved every minute of it, especially having everyone's loving attention.  Morgan and Aunt Kimmy always seem to incorporate music when they are together, so Kim sang a special fishing song while they waited for a fish to bite.  My favorite moment was when Ron tried holding the fish out for Morgan to touch and it kept jumping out of his hands and flopping all over the ground.  Dinda enjoyed that fact that she "had a Starbucks coffee in hand and we didn't get on the road until 10am."  Sam said that it was his kind of fishing - no waiting and guaranteed results!  Thanks for a great day, Papa Ron!

Summertime is here!

We recently spent an entire week at the beach house, something we have never done before.  We had two different couples down with their kids and were able to settle in and relax.  We had nice weather most of the week and only a couple days of rain. 


Morgan had a lot of fun playing with her friend, Liam, who is the same age.  We went to the beach with his family a year ago and the kids didn't play that well together.  But now that they are a bit older, they kept themselves busy and got along great! They had fun throwing rocks into the ocean and spinning in the rocking chair.  We also made a visit to the Octopus tree, which Morgan can now correctly say (last summer is was "ocapus" - always a little sad when they leave those cute little words behind).


Sasha also had a "friend" come visit later in the week.  Baby Bella is only two days older than Sasha, but was born in Myanmar (Burma) to some international teacher friends of ours.  It was fun comparing the girls and seeing how similar they are. 

On the beach, Morgan loved writing letters in the sand and walking the balance beam on the logs.  Sam helped Morgan fly a kite for the first time.  It must have been her older cousin's kite because it was a war plane with shark teeth, but Morgan didn't mind.  I think Sam had more fun with it, but seeing Morgan jump up and down after it was pretty priceless.  The last day on the beach, the weather couldn't have been better - except that there was no wind to actually fly the kite - pretty rare on the Oregon coast.  Sam took Morgan to wade in the surf (she was in her undies because her pants were wet), Sasha was sitting on the blanket chewing on a sand toy, and I looked around thinking how happy I was at that very beautiful moment. 

After we were home, we had a fun 4th of July weekend filled with a trip downtown on MAX, a cute little 4th of July parade in our friends' neighborhood, and several barbecues with family and friends.  On the 4th, Morgan got to throw some "pop-its" and we lit a few little fireworks for her.  She was much more interested this year (last year she was scared of the sparklers I got her), but she put more of her efforts into a dance show to the tune of "Yankee Doodle," while her family sang. Sasha enjoyed her first 4th of July by napping very little all day and doing back bends out of the baby carrier.  Both girls are quite acrobatic!

We were so exhausted the night of the 4th that we were all asleep before 9:00.  Of course the fireworks woke Sam and me up, but fortunately the girls' slept through it all.  We are lucky to have good friends, a great beach house to escape to, and fun times as a family.  Hopefully the good times this summer will keep coming!

Six Months of Sasha

Sasha is now six months and on the downhill side to her first birthday - so hard to believe!  The Sasha we brought home from the hospital in December is quite different from the one we have living with us today.  Sasha has really come into her own, particularly in just the past couple weeks.  She can do so many things now and is suddenly in her baby prime - rolling over, sitting up, sleeping better at night and at naps, reaching for anything she can get her hands on (often her sister's hair), preferring to stand up when we hold her, and being much more social towards new people. In fact, she is a pretty smiley kid now instead of the studious and/or bawling baby she was a few months back.  I was beginning to wonder if that was just her personality....  And this girl is big!  She is quite a bit longer than Morgan was at the same age and is already wearing size 12 month clothes!  

I love seeing her watch and laugh at things Morgan does.  Morgan is having more fun for sure, and loves to give her raspberries on her tummy, tickle her, and use her like a puppet - waving her arms around and pretending to talk in a funny Sasha voice.  Even when Morgan gets carried away and is too rough, Sasha never cries, so it's a little hard to teach Morgan about being more gentle with her sister. The other day the girls were laying on a blanket in the back yard and Sasha gabbed a handful of Morgan's hair.  Morgan screamed and started crying as if she had broken her arm and Sasha seemed quite entertained by the drama.  I found it a bit amusing that little Sasha could cause such a scene, but it made me realize that we are just around the corner from this little one wreaking havoc on her big sister's "stuff."  Not looking forward to babyproofing, mediating, and chasing after a curious mobile baby.  While Sasha is growing and doing so many new things, there are still quite a few things she is NOT doing.  She still refuses to take a bottle - from anyone but me.  Go figure.  That is making going out without kids a big challenge.  Looking back I should have given her a bottle much more early on - one of the down sides of being a nursing, stay at home mom.  But as the time passes so quickly, I am trying to look at it not as a house-arrest situation, but as a fleeting blip in my life - probably something I will never have to or get to do again.  I think I can hang in there for another six months or so.  Sasha is also not sleeping through the night.  I was so lucky with Morgan, who basically put herself on a schedule and was sleeping through the night at three months.  But after many tearful nights (for both of us) in the past couple weeks, Sasha can now fall asleep by herself with minimal crying and without being swaddled.  And she is (knock on wood) sleeping well at night and only getting up once to eat.  So I will take stretches of 4-5 hours of sleep instead of 2-3!

These past six months have taught me a lot about her as an individual, but also about being a mother.  These months have been the most challenging of motherhood yet, and it makes me realize not only how much more I can accomplish in a single day with two kids, but also how much more of myself I have to give to keep everyone happy.  And I only have two... what about my friends with three kids or twins or more! Throughout the past few years of motherhood, all those clichés about parenthood keep running through my head, but the one that I hear most often and ringing most loudly and driving me crazy is: "Every kid is different."  Duh.  That is nothing new and definitely not rocket science, but I really didn't think or choose to believe that until I met Sasha.  I get it now!!!
  
Most of all these months have been very humbling.  “You have not lived a perfect day, unless you have done something for someone who will never be able to repay you.” (Ruth Smeltzer)   Being a parent of two has taught me that this is even less about ME, a lesson we all need to keep learning over and over and over throughout our lives, whether we have children or not. 

I absolutely love raising these two beautiful daughters though.  Our family seems so much fuller and complete now that Sasha is here.  I look at my two girls and know how lucky I am and how precious this time with them is. But I better get going.... laundry to do and a baby who will be waking me up in a couple hours.  The job never ends!