iphone hijack

Laina LOVES playing with my phone.  She can find it no matter where I put it.  I often find lots of pictures of her toes, but on the rare occasion I find classics like these.  

These make me laugh so hard.  This is her in all her bed head glory.  :)

Sleepy Head

Aria started resisting nap time this summer since all the kids were home and she didn't want to miss out on anything. She still really could use a nap most days but it has become too much of a pain to try and make her take one. Instead she ends up falling asleep wherever she is a day or two a week. Usually it is in the car or on a couch. Sometimes she actually crawls into bed herself. But there have been a few funny moments when I have found her asleep in odd places. One time I found her in her closet (her favorite hiding place when she is playing with her sister's DSi). On our reunion she sacked out under the bar with one arm on a barstool. The funniest part about this one was that she was hiding under there from Mike because he was trying to make her take a nap. Ha!

The other day I got a picture of this.

She had fallen asleep at the bottom of the stairs. She must have been really exhausted to just fall asleep in the middle of everything. As long as she has one of her blankies, she is good to go. Does this look uncomfortable or what?

My Silly Girl

Aria makes me laugh every single day.  She is one part sunshine, one part ball of energy and one part pure silliness.  The other day I was trying to get her dressed.  I changed her diaper and as I was trying to find something for her to wear she slipped out of the room and headed for Michela's room.  She found a cute purple hat and then wandered into the boys' room for a book.  I finally found her sitting on the chaise in my bedroom reading her book.  She just looked so darn cute that I ran for the camera.  

One of her favorite things to do is look at books or be read to.  All of my kids have been this way.  I usually can't get away with reading less than 3 books every day at nap time or every night before bed.  Her favorites lately are her Disney Princess books and her "Elmo Loves You" book.  When she wakes up from her nap or in the morning I can usually hear her "reading" her books out loud.  It is so fun to listen to her.  

I often read to her and then stop in the middle of a sentence and see if she can finish it.  She has an amazing memory and often rattles it off with no problem.  The other night we were reading the Elmo book and I read, "Monsters love to ...", she chimed in "keckxercise" (exercise).  I started to giggle.  Then I read the next part, "and kids love ...", she finished, "buggle bum" (bubble gum).  That one really got me going.  And she says it in her sweet little sing song voice which makes it even cuter.  Oh, that little girl just melts my heart!

Escape Artist

So about a month ago the kids and I were watching "America's Funny Home Videos" and we saw this video of a little boy climbing out of his crib.  We all laughed at it but I noticed Aria watching it very intently.  Oh no, I thought, that's all I need is for her to start climbing out of her crib.  Nothing came of it and I put it out of my mind.  

On Saturday I put Aria down for her nap, she wasn't quite asleep yet, and I went outside to watch the kids ride their bikes.  Mike got home soon after and had the Segway with him.  So we all took turns riding the Segway around the driveway and cul-de-sac and and were having a lot of fun.  

About 20-30 minutes after I had put Aria down I heard her screaming like crazy through the intercom.  I quickly ran inside and up to her room.  When I threw the door open I stopped in surprise to not see her in her crib but I could still hear her.  I looked around the room and finally noticed a little hand poking up behind the big chair by the window.  She was behind the chair!  It suddenly dawned on me that she must have climbed out of her crib.  I asked her what had happened and she said, "I climb out my crib and I climb on my chair.  I look out my window and I fall off my chair. "  I can't believe she hadn't gotten hurt!  She must have heard Mike's voice and just couldn't stand not seeing Daddy.  

So I put her back in her crib and told her to show me how she got out.  She promptly threw her leg over the side and climbed out of the crib.  I couldn't believe it!  None of the other kids had ever tried to climb out when they were little and Chase was in there until he was 2 1/2!  So yesterday I decided to video her and here's her performance.

Ta Da!  Don't you just love her showmanship!

So the day after she first climbed out we were watching Funny Videos again.  And guess which video they showed?  I watched the little boy climbing out and he climbed out exactly the same way as Aria did.  She is so funny, she is a total copycat.  Sometimes I am amazed at what she takes in and remembers.  

She hasn't once climbed out at night or her nap time after the first time.  She still waits there patiently reading her books until I come and get her out.  The only time she does it is when someone asks her to.  The kids wanted to see her do it this afternoon.  We all laughed when she got out.  Then Michela asked her if she could climb in, so she goes over to the crib and tries it out.  She did it!  Here's the funny video of our crazy monkey climbing back into the crib.  If you notice she is always saying, "Yes!"  after she makes it in both videos.  What a character!

Whiz Kid

It is so amazing how much kids know about computers and technology these days.  And they are learning about it when they are so young!  Aria loves the computer and she is always trying to play with the mouse and the keyboard.  We have an extra keyboard so I've been letting her play with that but for Christmas she got her own little kid computer.  

It's really cute.  It has all of these little games and songs on it, some are a bit old for a two year old but I know she'll be mastering them all sooner than I think.  

It also has a little mouse attached and I can't believe how adept she is at using it.  She knows how to put her hand on it and point and click.  

So the other day I had been working on the computer on some primary stuff and she came in and wanted to crawl up in my lap.  So we sat there while I read her a book.  I noticed out of the corner of my eye that the screen was getting darker and about to go into the screen saver mode.  All of a sudden Aria looks up and reaches over to the mouse.  She gave it a little wiggle, the screen jumped back to life and  said, "That's better."  I was so surprised that she knew that moving the mouse would have that effect!  She constantly amazes me at how much she picks up from watching everyone else and how much she remembers.  Aren't kids amazing these days!

Kids are so Funny!

Our conversations in the car yesterday on the way to Bronson's Baby Blessing:

Chase:  "Mom, when I die and I'm crucified..."

Mom:   "What?  Do you mean resurrected?"

Chase:  "Oh yeah, resurrected.  When I die and I'm resurrected, I'll be a baby..."

Mom:  "No Chase, you won't be a baby, you'll be a man like Dad."

Michela:  "Yeah, you'll be an old grandpa like Dad.  He, He, He..."

Mom:  "You'll be the same age as when you die."

Hunter:  "So if I die right now, I'll be seven forever?  Cool!"

A few minutes later:

Hunter:  "I'm very sympathetic."

Michela:  "No you're not!"

Mom:  "Hunter, do you know what sympathetic means?"

Hunter:  "Uhh..."

Michela:  "It means you feel sorry for someone.  Geez!" (She totally sounds like Napoleon when she does this. )

Mom:  "Yes, it means you feel bad for someone when they get hurt or are sad and you feel like you want to help them."

Children thinking.

Mom:  "Do you know what empathy means?"

Michela:  "Is that the opposite of sympathy?"

Mom:  "Nope.  It means you know how someone feels because you've gone through the same thing.  Like if you broke your leg a little while ago and then your friend broke their leg you would feel bad for them and you would understand what they were going through."

Hunter:  "Like me and Adam (his best friend) both know what it feels like to be kicked in the back?"

Mom:  "Exactly"  (Giggling)