Easter 2015

We had a special long weekend at home. I was so relieved that we didn't have to go anywhere and be on the roads.  The inlaws came here, and it was nice to have them here longer than a usual weekend, because things were less rushed - always trying to fit the most into a weekend.  They arrived on Thursday afternoon, just in time to come and watch Mia's swimming lesson, they loved that, and Mia was in her element too!

The rest of the weekend was spent eating yummy food and copious amounts of chocolate, lots of vino, and both girlies spoilt us by sleeping well!  We went to church on Friday, and on Saturday Wyn and I went to the movies, so much fun. Watched "Ballade vir 'n Enkeling", it was brilliant, really enjoyed it!

This was our little Easter table decoration display that my MIL and I made:

Sunday's Easter Egg Hunt remains a highlight of the year!  Loved Mia's anticipation and excitement.

 

Mom's lil chocolate piggies ♥

 

We did a couple of Easter crafts.  This handprint one is an idea I saw on Pinterest ages ago - so glad I managed to convince Wyn to let me paint his hand, haha!  Want to frame this. ♥

Mia painted some polystyrene eggies and made a nest

For Easter cards, I let Mia colour one picture in, she traced the words, and then I made photocopies.  Much better than her having to colour a picture in ten times!

♥

xx

Sick girlies!

I've got my hands full with two sick girlies.

It started two weeks ago, when Mia got a tummy bug. I think it broke down her immune system, because she wasn't even completely better from that bug, then she got a cold with a runny nose and a cough.

Ella followed shortly on her heels, not only with a runny nose and a cough, but cutting four teeth at the same time. Lil miss grumpy pants!

I got a prescription from the GP that had treated Mia's tummy bug, and both girls went on a course of Celestamine and nebulising meds, Pulmicort. Also used Monte-Air sprinkles, to no avail.  Carried on with Demazin for Mia and Allergex for Ella.

Those meds didn't help.

Then last week Thursday night Mia coughed the whole night. Literally, coughing in her sleep, the whole night. Saturday night, Ella starts the same.  Last night every time Ella coughed she cried - obviously hurting her chest or throat each time.  Since Saturday night Mia had a constant low-grade fever too.  We were at Sun City for the weekend with my folks - lesson learnt - don't go anywhere with sick kiddies! Couldn't swim, couldn't sleep much...

First thing this morning I phoned for paediatrician appointments.  The girlies have different paeds - it just happened that way that when Mia was born that I took her to Unitas to Dr Engelbrecht, and since then have always gone to either her, or dr Da Gama.  Neither of them were available, so we made an appointment with dr Grobler.  Then, I couldn't get Ella an appointment there, as she's not an existing patient of theirs!  I take Ella to dr Angela Colquhoun, at Kloof Mediclinic, who was the paed present at her birth and assisted with her jaundice.  I tried to get a double appointment there, but same story - Mia isn't an existing patient so I couldn't get a slot for her!

So we had a 9am appointment for Mia at Unitas and then a 11h45 appointment for Ella at Kloof.  Goodness me!

Mia's doc listened to my long list of meds we've already given, and then listened to Mia's chest. She sent us for x-rays of her chest and sinuses - Mia was such a brave girly, so proud of her.  Results came back - thank goodness not an infection in her lungs - just a really bad sinus infection. The doc prescribed antibiotics - and sinus physio.

Then I dropped Mia off at home and fetched Ella for her appointment.  I really like dr Angela and it's a pity it's so difficult to get new patients in there - I'd literally have to book a "check-up" for Mia, because the waiting list for new patients is 4 weeks, and feels like such a waste of money, R700 for an unnecessary consultation, just to get her in the books as a patient!

Ella was diagnosed with Adenovirus, which is basically a bad cold.  Her symptoms are much the same as Mia's, except she hasn't had a fever, thankfully, but her eyes have been a lil bit gunky.  So she's on antibiotics as well, more nebulising meds, nose spray and eye drops.

I was quite relieved, dr Angela said I don't have to take Mia for sinus physio - I can just nebulise her with the same meds as Ella.  I think the physio treatment would be quite traumatic for Mia, although I've heard it to be very effective.

So! Hopefully the two littlies will be on the road to recovery quick-quick.  This mommy needs a good night of sleep...

These two, they fill my world with colour!

Every single day, I am filled with such an overwhelming feeling of love for these two lil human beings of mine. Mine! How lucky can one mommy be!

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Mia Mooi is growing so beautifully.  She is sensitive, compassionate and caring. She is so friendly, greeting people in town and even striking up conversations. (More with adults, not so much with kids!)

She talks non-stop, understands so well and asks a million questions a day. "What do bears eat? What do butterflies eat? How high can a cat jump? When are we going on a picnic?"

She loves her baby sister, plays with her, gives her hugs and kisses. And sometimes pushes her away or pulls her legs to make her fall over. Oops.

She's loving school and her self-confidence has grown in leaps and bounds.

She loves going for walks on the golf course.

She loves doing arts and crafts type things at home - colouring inside the lines so nicely now, using the correct colours for things, like green grass and blue skies.  She loves cutting out, sticking, painting.

Mia enjoys listening to my music with me in the car.  We've been stuck on Taylor Swift for a few months already now! She also loves One Republic and Bobby van Jaarsveld, hehehe!

After months and months of watching Barbie movies, she's gone off that a bit now, and mostly requests to watch Tarzan episodes, DocMcStuffins and Mickey Mouse Clubhouse.  She's not watching as much tv as she used to a while ago - prefers to be busy with other things.

She is getting very independent with things like undressing herself, bathing herself and brushing her teeth, going to the toilet, choosing what to wear, etc. Big girl!

I just love the way she gives spontaneous hugs and kisses. ♥

Ella-Bella-Bytjie has made our family complete - this little bubbling happy person.  When she gets excited, like if she sees one of her family members, or a toy she loves or a food she wants, she kicks her little leggies in glee.

She's loving being mobile and keeps her mommy on her toes!  She's exploring everywhere, and picks up the tiniest speck she can find and puts it in her mouth... She even tries to eat bubbles when we blow bubbles outside!

She loves eating, really eats so well, not interested in baby food, only wants what we're eating! She especially loves chicken, pasta, peas, mielies and sweet potato.  But her favourite treats are marie biscuits, marshmallows and droe wors - especially the marshmallows.

She says "mamma", "pappa", "baba" and "num-num" (yummy). She responds to the question "hoe maak die voeltjie?" with a hadeda sound, "ha-haaaa!"  Very vocal in other ways too, demanding attention with shouts, enjoying herself with squeals, grunts and laughs.  She also gives an open-mouth smooch if I ask for a kissy! ♥  The best.

 She loves going for walks in the pram, stares at everything in amazement, and laughs at the dog when I take Nala with us.

She sometimes laughs at the most random things, like watching her sister brush her teeth, she seems to find hilarious!

She's started showing some interest in watching some tv, especially Lollos, keeps her attention for a good 10 - 15 minutes, which helps me a lot when I'm trying to do supper prep.

She's currently teething, toofie number 3, 4, 5, AND 6 are all busy making an appearance at once.

Our Moms&Babes class once a week is a favourite for both of us, special one-on-one time for us.

She's super pleased with her latest accomplishment of standing up against furniture. Crawling isn't enough, this baba wants to stand and walk too!

She has a way of crawling up to me and putting her head down on me - makes my heart explode! ♥

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Activities for 10 month old babies

Ella is at such a busy stage now! I have to constantly be hovering around her, because she crawls to all the off-limit places, such as the dog food, cell phone chargers, dustbins and washing baskets!  She also loves to pull herself into standing position against furniture, but doesn't yet know how to get back down, so she just lets go - grey hairs for mommy!

I've spent some time looking up activities for 9 to 12 month old babies, and found lots of ideas.  I decided to put my favourite ideas together into a list for myself, and to print out for the nanny to use for ideas for baby stimulation.

(Obviously all of these need constant adult supervision, and always be mindful of choking hazards.)


Music, Hearing and Movement:

• Sing lots of nursery rhymes, especially with actions such as clapping hands, stomping feet, nodding head etc.  Or make up your own silly songs!
• Play music, any music, and dance with baby, so she can feel the rhythm
• Show baby how you knock on a door, say "Listen! Do you hear knock-knock-knock?" Do the same with different sounds, splashing water, tapping, bells, etc.
• Bang on drums, bang on pots
• Put baby on a blanket and drag the blanket, taking her on a ride!

People, Body Awareness, Object Permanence, Toys

• Play peek-a-boo - use a cloth over baby, over yourself, over baby's toys
• Stand in front of a mirror, talk about what you're looking at. "Look at this baby! Look, it's you! Look, here's your nose, your ears, your hair, your feet!" 
• Page through picture books. Point out people's face expressions
• Copy-cat games: point to your own nose, say this is mommy's nose, point to baby's nose, say this is baby's nose. Ask baby to point out mommy's nose and baby's nose.
• Hand-over-hand games. Show baby how to put her hand on top of your hand, with your next hand over her hand. Will take a while for her to grasp the concept, but repeat often.
• When baby drops a toy, lower her to the ground and let her pick it up herself
• Use double-sided tape and make toys stick to a surface, show baby how to pull the toy off and stick it again
• Show toddler a toy, and hide it behind you, getting her to look for it
• Stacking blocks and cups
• Sorting colours and shapes
• Cut a slit in a tin and show baby how to "post" Purity jar lids

Outdoors and Physical Exercise:

• Go for walks, point out trees, flowers, birds, leaves, grass, sand
• Blow bubbles
• Bury plastic animals in a bowl of sand, or floating in water, and let baby find animals
• Have a tea party!
• Crawl and chase each other!
• Create a little obstacle course for baby. Use pillows, make tunnels with blankets and chairs.
• Use an exercise ball - let baby bounce on it, lie on tummy, lie on back, move backwards and forwards. Very good for strengthening baby's core muscles!
• Play ball games, gently rolling and getting baby to roll it back
• Toss bean bags

Tactile and Sensory:

• When outside, let baby feel grass, tree bark, sand, water. Always explain what it is and how it feels. "Tree bark, feel how rough it is. A green leaf, feel how soft it is."
• Use shaving foam on a tray or a mirror
• Let baby unpack Tupperware cupboard
• Tickle with feather duster
• Let baby play with cellophane
• Create little goody baskets or boxes for baby to unpack. Put similar things together: create a box of wooden goodies, a box of plastic goodies, a box of noisy goodies!

Messy Play ideas:

• Finger painting with homemade edible fingerpaint (Will do a post on this soon, we did this last weekend, so much fun for both Ella and Mia!)
• Jelly
• Custard
• Cooked spaghetti
• Dry cereals
• Shredded paper
• Smash (instant mashed potatoes)
• Water bowls with small containers, cups and utensils
• Do hand- and footprint art - great keepsakes!

Keeping babies busy in the car:

• Listen to sing-along nursery rhymes
• Easy finger foods such as marie-biscuits or biltong sticks
• A few different bags with a few small objects to explore - best to pass these on one by one than overwhelming baby with everything at once: wooden puzzle pieces, Purity jar lids, pieces of ribbon or material, small toys and rattles, big hairclips.

These are three of my favourite blogs for some creative ideas: Kids Activities Blog, The Imagination Tree and Happy Hooligans.

Please share what your babies love to do?
xx

Ella's Baptism ♥

We did Ella's baptism on Sunday the 1st of March, in Bethlehem at the inlaws NG church - same as Mia.

It was such a beautiful, special day.  My folks and sister came all the way to be there with us, and lots of the Free State family was there too, including both of Mia and Ella's great-grandmothers.

Ella looked totally angelic in her special baptism dress, and she was so good during the ceremony. I loved that Mia also stood in front with us.

I'll let the photos tell the story!  Precious memories were made! ♥

 

 

 

Really loved the cupcake-cake!

 

Sister love ♥

 

 

Ella had fun opening her prezzies, I loved the gentle way she touched her special bangle!

 

Thank you gifts for the guests, Mia helped me make them!

 

Most special paintings that my sister did for Ella's room ♥

I found a beautiful poem online, that I wrote in a special card for Ella, and read it aloud to everybody at the tea party after the ceremony:

"Ek sien die water drup op jou voorkop:
In die naam van die Vader en die Seun en die Heilige Gees.
Ek kyk na die Here op

om by Hom hulp te vra
in hierdie taak wat Hy aan my opdra.

God het Sy water oor jou gegiet
om jou daarmee te seën.
Ons as ouers word gebied
om Hom te vrees
en te glo dat Hy altyd by jou sal wees.

Vir ons is jou doop ‘n heilige en sigbare teken
van wat jy in ons lewens beteken.

Nederig staan ons hier voor U,
van alle waardigheid gestroop.
In my keel is daar ‘n knop wat stu,
oor my wange is daar trane wat loop,
in my hart is daar onbeskryflike hoop.

Hoop vir jou, Ella my kind,
dat jy die regte pad sal vind,
want God het jou
aan ons toevertrou."

It was special to show Mia photos from her baptism day, for her to know that we also had such a special day for her too.  Here's the link to that post:  Mia's Baptism and also her special poem.

This was the invite I designed for Ella's baptism: 

 

And I made a personalised thank you message afterwards and sent it to each family:

 

Such a special time in Ella's life! ♥
xx

Ella is 9 months old!

1. How old today:  9 Months exactly

2. Current weight & length:  Just been checked at the baby clinic, she's almost exactly the same as Mia at this age! 9.9kg and 72cm.

3. Recent milestone reached:  She claps hands, she can "ta" things if I ask her to, she's started with a few words, "papa" was first, then "baba", then "mama". Cutest!

4. Next milestone:  Crawling! And hopefully sleeping through the night.

5. How is baby sleeping at night?  Some nights are better than others... it's still hit and miss.  She slept through the night once, a few weeks ago! It was amazing... but of course I lay awake waiting for her to wake up... On average she wakes about 2-4 times, then I just need to give her dummy back and reposition her. Other nights she wakes every hour...

6. Day naps?  She still has three day naps - one shorter nap in the morning, one long midday nap, and then another short late-afternoon nap.  Her awake time is roughly 2-2.5 hours, although sometimes stretch her last awake time til bedtime if needed.

7. How is feeding going? She has 4 milk bottles of 150ml each, and she eats breakfast, lunch and supper, with biscuits or fruit in between for snacks.  She eats really well - she's been pushing away her pureed baby foods in favour of our food, so the last week or so she's been having dinner with us, exactly what we eat, and she loves it!

8. Feeding times?  Not really set times, it's according to her nap and wake-up times...

9. What has been the recent baby highs? I really enjoy this stage. Her excitement, her curiosity, the way she watches her sister.

10. And baby lows? I sure would love some more sleep at night...  Also, separation anxiety seems to be kicking in, the poor body.

11. How is the rest of the family doing?  Good! Hubby's working hard, but he helps so much with the evening bath and bedtime routine, and weekends are great to all be together. Mia's a very good big sister, adjusted well and she's happy.

12. What has been working best recently, baby-related?  Having different "play-stations" set up all over the house.  Ella gets bored quickly. So we play in the lounge, then we move to my room and she plays there, then we go to her room and we read books, play with stacking cups and blocks, then we go sit outside, etc etc.

Here's Mia's update at roughly the same age. Cute to see the differences and similarities in the sisters!

Two big milestones for my two girlies!

This week had this mommy's heart bursting with love and pride. ♥

Mia wrote her name for the first time.  We've been practising for a while, I would write it out and ask her to trace it and try copy it.  She wasn't super interested or keen each time I tried, so I didn't push it, and would just often point out the letters of her name, until recently she started showing me everywhere she saw an "M" for "Mia".  Then on Tuesday she took the blackboard chalk, and proceeded to write her name. Bless! She was so pleased, even more so at her crazy mommy doing a happy dance!

Last weekend Ella said her first official word, "Pappa". She didn't say it specificially to Wyn, but repeated it a couple of times. So cute! Then, on Monday she started with "Mama-mama-mom!" Oh gosh, isn't it just the most beautiful sound ever! My heart. ♥

xx

A quick hello! :-)

Goodness me, two kiddies keep one busy!!  I have a to-do list that I made for December, meaning to complete it before the new year... still haven't ticked off half the things on that list!

The days just speed by in a blur of laughter, hugs, frustration, tears, kisses, fun and tiredness.

I'm sad that I'm not doing as many blog updates of Ella's development - I go back so often to read about Mia at the same age as Ella... but that being said, Instagram is such a wonderful way to share and document photos, so at least Ella features on there a lot! (Feel free to look me up on Instagram, my username is JessV_83!)

We're all well, healthy and settling back into routine.

I'll do my best to do blog posts more often, I love my little blog, do love sharing what we're up to in this space!
xx

Christmas crafts, holiday fun, special memories!

We've been very busy making memories!

Mia baked cookies, we used this recipe from Alton Brown. They came out really nicely! Packaged some of them for gifts.


Ella is 8 months old today, and such a happy baby.  Shame, about two weeks ago we went through a very rough phase, she had a virus that caused terrible fever blisters in her mouth, on her tongue and her chin, poor body didn't eat or drink very well for a few days. Luckily she's all better now, the horrible fever blister on her chin has just left a mark, hope it will clear up in time.

She's getting very keen to become mobile, gets quite frustrated at not being able to move to where she wants to go. She adores the walking ring and moves really fast in it, I giggle so much at how her lil leggies go!

She's a precious lil thing, she gets a million kisses a day.

Eating litchis - ultimate summer holiday snack!

Lots of fun putting up our Christmas tree - Mia did most of it herself! Such a special tradition. I loved the way she was so gentle with the ornaments, carefully hanging them, chatting about them, choosing her favourites. So special!

We made clay decorations again, this time using a different recipe from the previous two years - we tried this one this time - it came out quite nicely!

We made Christmas cards - again - Mia did a lot of the work herself! Such a big girl.

Summer fun - hubby thought he'd water the grass, Mia thought she'd get sopping wet!

A fun lunch at a restaurant with my special people. Oh I love my two girls to the moon and back!

Mia's last day of school for 2014!

Oh my big girl, what a year it has been! 
You went to school for the first time, and you became a big sister. 
You learnt how to cut with scissors, jump off steps and trace pictures. 
You lost your fear of climbing jungle gyms and your sensitivity to loud noises (mostly.)
You talk so wonderfully and say the best things. ("Hello my beautiful sunshine mommy" - this makes my day!)
You are gentle, kind, giving and loving.
You make jokes and make us laugh.
I am so proud of you!
I love you to the moon and back.
xx

Pine Lake Holiday 2014 ♥

We had a super special time in White River, as always. I'll let the piccies tell the story!

 

Such fun spending time with my hubby and two precious girlies ♥

 

Mia enjoying our tradition of visiting the chocolate shop for their melted chocolate!

 

Heaven in a cup!

 

Ella had a taste of choccie too, mmm!

 

Swim time!

 

Mia was in awe of the rhino statue

 

This view. Soulfood.  

 

Summer vibes!

 

Nom nom icecream!

 

Mia enjoyed playing putt-putt with us!

 

Much of the holiday was spent with baba in the arms, teething baby, unfamiliar surroundings... 

 

Last swim 

 

Family selfie! ♥