Anna turns three!

Turning three for Anna was a monumental occasion. A lot of things seem to happen in our house when you turn three. For example, you learn how to "play with the arrows" (meaning you get to play with all of the cards in Uno), you're old enough to change the music on your own CD player, and your special blanket stays in your room (in an effort to reduce the thumb-sucking, hopefully). I'm sure there will be plenty of other things that happen this week that will occur simply because she's three :)


Anna's actual birthday was quite an adventure. After stumbling out of her room a little after 6, she opened cards and presents from Mom and Dad before eating her birthday muffin. Then we headed off to early church before coming home to make cupcakes, find 3's, have lunch, play a couple of games of Uno, and take naps (albeit short ones ... hmmm).

My parents stopped by for awhile on their way through Madison and were able to give Anna her birthday present, a turtle maze that my dad made for her.


Just as they were leaving, she got to talk with her other grandparents on the phone before the friends showed up for Anna's party. Carly, Sadie, Audrey, and families joined us for some music crafts, playtime, pizza, and cupcakes to help Anna celebrate.


At one point, there was a jumping dance party in Anna's room on the extra mattress, complete with little girl squeals and screeches.


Notice that Kate is sitting right in the middle of four jumping three year olds; she loved it.


Just like she loved Matt bouncing her later in the evening.

Anna was a great sport through the whole day, but was obviously a bit overwhelmed by everything. In fact, after lying around in bed for awhile last night, and actually whimpering for part of the time, we had to deal with "I'm tired, but I can't fall asweep!" for a long time. Then, of course, she was up bright and early at 6 this morning ... urgh.

All in all, a good day. It's still hard to believe how much not-so-little Anna is growing up. Matt and I were looking back at some pictures the other day and were surprised by what we already seemed to have forgotten, or at least needed to be reminded of.

Backing up to Saturday, we had a great afternoon/evening as a family. After Anna rested, not napped (we're getting more and more of those days now), she and I headed off to the local outdoor pool while Kate finished her nap. Matt and Kate joined us a little later and we had a lot of fun playing in the kiddie pool as well as the big pool. Then we had our picnic dinner before playing at the park for a bit. Fun stuff.

Backing up even further, last week was good, but busy. Having swimming lessons every day from 4 until 5, in addition to various morning playdates, appointments, etc. certainly made things busier than normal.

Plus the garden is getting to the "almost out of control" stage, and it's not even July. Anna helped me freeze a bunch of broccoli last week and we've been having raspberries and snow peas virtually every day. The green beans will be ready soon, Kate and I saw some little zucchini and cucumbers earlier today, and the corn and tomatoes are taller than Anna already. It's a good thing that our neighbor, Alexia, is helping out one morning a week again this year!

Venturing out into the big, wide world

This past week saw some big events for Anna. In the past seven days, she's participated in two separate activities that were completely without mom or dad, first music camp at church, then swimming lessons. I know other kids may reach this point earlier in their lives, but for Miss Anna, these have been the first big events (besides baby-sitters, of course) ... and she's done just smashingly ;)

This year our church hosted a music camp instead of Vacation Bible School. The official cut-off age was 3, but Anna (and a couple of other kids whose birthdays are this summer) was cleared to participate. Every morning she spent two and a half hours at church playing instruments, singing songs, listening to Bible stories, doing crafts, playing games, having snacks, etc. all while Kate and I ran errands on that side of town (or hung out in the nursery with other moms). As far as we can tell, Anna did great, and came home chatting about all of the things she did.

Poor kid was so overwhelmed, however, that her naps were all messed up last week. First too short, then too long, then not at all on Thursday ... yikes! Oh, well. The week's activities culminated with all of the kids from camp leading the music portions of worship this past Sunday. Anna proudly shook her egg shakers while her class sang its song :)

Our first session of swimming lessons started this afternoon and Anna is in the 3's and 4's class, even though she won't be three until Sunday. In her class each kid gets a high schooler as their personal instructor and they take the water adjustment skills to the next level. Watching from the bleachers on the side and from what Anna told me afterwards, I think she really enjoyed her class.

The only issue was when I was in the water with Kate during her class and Anna was watching from the bleachers with neighbor Alexia. Anna slipped and bonked her head and then didn't want me to leave her alone again. So she joined Kate and me for the second half of Kate's class. It turns out this might have been a blessing in disguise, though, because the instructors for Kate's class said that Anna is more than welcome to join us, which means that Anna will be getting a full hour of water time every afternoon for the next two weeks. Kate, by the way, LOVES the water so far :)

Speaking of Kate, last week's craziness helped us make the real transition to one nap a day instead of two. What this means is that she no longer gets the pacifier in the van (which means she *usually* doesn't fall asleep), and only takes one nap in the middle of the day. The crying and yells of "BA!" (her word for pacifier), are balanced out by the fact that both girls are now napping at relatively the same time ... hooray! Just in time for gardening, right?

On a slightly different note, we went to a local farm breakfast with some neighbors this past Saturday for the third year in a row. Maybe this one is going to be a family tradition. We all ate our pancakes, eggs, and ice cream (to celebrate National Dairy Month, of course!) and then visited the animals. Kate's favorite, we think, were the ducks since she kept yelling "Duh! Duh! Duh!" Anna was most looking forward to running around with the chickens, but I think she ended up liking the baby goats best because she got to feed one a bottle. We did our traditional wagon ride around the farm and then headed home before it got too hot.


(That's neighbor Carly on the left; both of our girls started with hats, but refused to keep them on ... urgh.)

One more thing, Kate learned how to say "Whee!" yesterday while swinging at a park. It was hilarious to hear her keep saying "Whee! Whee!" both yesterday and then today when she was pushing any kind of toy swing :)

Sisters ...

Here's what the Mischnick girls are up to these days:



Anna likes to help show Kate how things are done outside. (a.k.a. showing her how to eat the strawberries, raspberries, and peas; running up and down the driveway with her; giving her wheelbarrow rides.)




We've been opening up the gate lately when the stairs are supervised so that Kate can learn the fine art of running laps on rainy days (of which we've had quite a few recently). Both girls love to chase each other around while dragging their favorite push/pull toys.



We went strawberry picking on Saturday morning and got a surprising number of berries to take home and freeze considering how much both of these girls like their strawberries. The deal with Anna was that since she's almost three she needed to put three strawberries in Matt's container before she could eat one. Then she would feed one to Kate, too :)


Who wants more strawberries? (Actually, this is the look we get from Anna now when we ask her to look up at the camera :)


After picking strawberries in the morning and having lunch at home, the girls and I went to a local bluegrass music festival on Saturday. We played at a park, listened to a friend's band, shared an ice cream cone, and then headed home. Both girls were OUT in the 15 minutes it took to get home. My favorite part is that they are sleeping in the exact same position :)

To Indiana and back

This past week was spent recovering from Memorial Day weekend, and then preparing for our trip to Indiana. Sandwiched in between those two big events were a couple of rainy days, and one absolutely beautiful Thursday.

Here's what we did on that nice day ... ate breakfast fast so we could get out of the house and actually do something before Kate's morning nap; spent about an hour and a half at Olbrich Gardens playing in the fountains, running around the rose garden, enjoying the "touch and feel" garden, and resting by the Thai pavilion; played a game or two with Anna while Kate napped; ate lunch outside at the picnic table; worked in the garden while the girls napped; then towed both girls in the bike trailer to meet Matt at our new favorite local park for a picnic dinner. While waiting for Matt, we walked out on the public pier to see some ducks, fishermen, and waterskiers, then played on the playground before we watched and heard a freight train (up close and personal) go past on the railroad tracks. All in all, a great day!

This past Sunday we drove out to Ft. Wayne to visit with my grandma and to see my aunt, cousins, and my cousin's kids. The girls did pretty well with all of the car time; Kate seems to be getting better at travelling, especially compared with how she was last summer.


It helped that we stopped at a couple of parks on the way out and back to give both girls some running around time to (as Anna likes to say) "get the wiggles out". Here's an old college favorite, Valplayso, in good ole' Valpo. We actually found this one without having to ask for directions!


While in Ft. Wayne, we visited with Grandma for awhile in the afternoon and then met up with Aunt Sandy, Leigh, Travis, Lucy, Gus, and Judson at the hotel before going out to eat.


The kids seemed to enjoy meeting each other, although Anna was already pretty tired and out of sorts by that point in the trip. Sweet Kate was just as social as she always is. We remembered at the last minute that we wanted to get pictures of all of them together, but it's REALLY hard to get 5 kids under the age of 5 to be in a picture together :)


After dinner Matt and I played around in the pool with the girls (we can't really go to a hotel and NOT play in a pool these days) before crashing. Our original plan was to take a leisurely drive back home and stop at the Northern Illinois Railway Museum, but we missed the exit and the girls happened to both be sleeping about that time anyway, so we just got home earlier than expected.

It was a nice break and mini-vacation for our family, but it's also good to be back. Anna tends to get ornery and emotional when she's low on sleep and, since she doesn't really nap in the car much anymore, she has been pretty out of sorts today. In fact, just after lunch she was leading Kate back and forth around the house (for what reason? I'm not really sure) and when Kate decided she wanted to do something else, Anna just completely melted down. Poor kid. It didn't help matters that Kate woke the whole family up at about 5:20 this morning. Hopefully we'll be back to normal soon :)

Happy Birthday, Kate ... again :)

Kate celebrated her birthday with the family this past weekend. By "the family", we mean just about the entire family! My parents came on Saturday and were in Madison until Monday afternoon; Matt's parents, sisters, and their families came on Sunday afternoon and stayed until Monday evening/Tuesday morning. Although no one extra actually slept at our house, we had additional people around for most of Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. Whew! Busy, but lots of fun and lots of memories made.

Kate's official birthday party was on Sunday evening. She loved it. I think Anna's presence and leadership helped her enjoy things more than Anna probably did at her first birthday party. Kate was only a little shy when people first started arriving; she really warmed up to everyone when Bear (Grandpa and Grandma Mischnick's dog) arrived.


Monday morning we went to the local Memorial Day parade and, though it was LONG, the cousins all loved it. Poor Kate and baby Ruth were absolutely exhausted by the end, but both took power naps on the way to our house before eating and then taking real naps in the afternoon.


Everyone gathered at our house and we spent the rest of the day just enjoying one another's company. We couldn't have had a nicer time.


Poor Anna is still recovering; that kid is TIRED. No nap yesterday plus a very early morning today made for a pretty low key kid today; at least she wasn't very cranky.

Kate, on the other hand, has been a handful today. Over the course of the weekend, she finally became very confident with walking in the grass ... and she's fast. I'd turn around and she had walked over to the strawberry patch and was trying to pick and eat pink (not quite ripe) berries. Then she'd march over to the asparagus, pick the tops, and try to eat those raw. Then she was trying to make her way through the garden. This is all after I'd moved her out of the play area because she kept eating the mulch. So we tried the front yard, but then she'd march down the driveway straight towards the road. Hmm ... we've got some training to do with this kid.

Kate's check-up

Just wanted to share Kate's 1-year check-up information before the weekend festivities (we're having Kate's family b-day party on Sunday/Monday!). Despite all of Kate's random inconsistencies when she was very young, she is now a very consistent kid with her height and weight; her height/weight/head percentages have been virtually identical for the past 6 months.

Height: 30.25 inches (81%)
Weight: 21 lb. 5 oz. (51%)
Head: 48 cm (99% ... yikes!)

Overall, the doc said she was doing great ... always good to hear :)

We've had a pretty nice week since both girls are completely over whatever fevers they had and the weather has been beautiful!

Bumps, bruises, and fevers

Bumps and bruises first - Kate has approached walking with the same attitude that she approached crawling ... go faster than you can so you end up falling a lot. She's usually a good sport about just getting right back up and plowing ahead, but she's also had quite a few nasty falls where she's toppled into furniture, doors, toys, people, etc. Needless to say, her face and other parts of her body, too, I guess, have a handful of scrapes, scratches, and bruises. Still, she's pretty tough.

Before I go through the fever saga, a few other words about Kate. This kid has quite a vocabulary already, even if most people can't understand it yet. Her favorite "word" is "go ah", which means "go out". Many times a day, often first thing in the morning, she toddles over to a door or window and points outside repeating "go ah!" over and over again. She's also got "words" for ball, balloon (bawoo), dog (woof), pacifier (pa), blanket (ba), and washing up after a meal (wah, while "washing" her hands).

Anna's (usually) such a great teacher for her. For example, the other morning Kate pointed at the toaster and said "pah" (pop?). Anna responded with "That's right, Kate. That's a toaster ... t-oast-er (clearly and slowly). We put bread in it and the toaster says pop when it's ready." Do we have a teacher in our midst?

Okay ... now the fevers ...

Kate had a mild fever (101-102) last Monday and Tuesday. She slept a lot, was pretty crabby, and had a reduced appetite those days, too. We set up a doctor's appointment for Wednesday, but by about 9 on Wednesday morning she was back to her normal self with no signs of a fever so we cancelled the appointment. Then we had about 36-48 hours of fever free time. Then Anna's started.

Thursday evening she felt a little warm, but we'd been running around outside for awhile so we thought she was just a little heated up from that. Friday morning she was okay until she asked to take a nap at 11:30, even without eating lunch. Hmmm ... She woke up with a 102 fever. We figured she'd just gotten whatever Kate did. She slept a lot on Friday night and Saturday during the day, with the same ups and downs that Kate had. She and Matt stayed home from church on Sunday (while Kate and I went to the early service), then she and I played a couple of games of Memory before she seemd to be pretty flushed again. I took her temperature and it was over 105 ... yikes! So we headed in to Urgent Care and spent about 2.5 hours there. In fact, we were there during the time we usually have lunch and start naps, so Anna was particularly hungry and tired. She actually fell asleep on the way home and, of course, woke up when we got home and then didn't take a real nap yesterday. Poor kid.

After all of the work and effort to get Anna to urinate in a collection container, the urinalysis was inconclusive about a bladder infection and, while one of her ears was slightly more red than the other, the doctor said that was also inconclusive about an ear infection. He figured she had some kind of bacterial infection to cause that high of a fever, and thought it was probably either her ears or her bladder. So Anna is currently taking the first round of antibiotics she's ever been prescribed and seems to be on the mend. No fever this morning ... more pleasant attitude ... but still tired, understandably.

Hopefully this week will have fewer bumps, bruises, and fevers! We're all a little sick and tired of being sick and tired (and we're tired of being unable to have contact with the rest of the world). At least the weather has cooperated so we've been able to spent lots of our home time outside of the house.