Joy is...........

When Aubrey arrives at grandma and grandpa's house singing Jingle Bells loudly, and it's already the 3rd week of January

:)

Love my babes.

In our home, I like to give random hugs and kisses to my kids.

Happy 3rd Birthday, Aubrey

Aubrey had her 3rd birthday today. Small gathering at the house, but she had a lot of fun wearing her new princess dress.

It rained a lot in the morning, causing a power outage, and when it came back we got started with cooking. Party started a little late, which is okay, because it took that much time for the food to get ready.

She is much into pink anything at the moment, so a lot of her gifts are pinked out! She was the happy girl today, exclaiming "I really love this!" at just about every present she opened.

Everyday she is getting prettier in my eyes, and I love her more and more. I love both of my kids more than I can ever write in words.

No regrets

I'm watching this show, Small Space Big Style, and it's evoking this feeling that I miss my old life.

When I had no one else to account for, and no one else to make a living for. These singles and couples who own small homes and have the time to fix up their nest are getting me very jealous.

Of course I miss going out, of course I often wonder where I would be if I didn't have kids.

Our house is always a mess, there are toys everywhere, our dining table is always crumby. I am never in the mood to clean because it will just repeat itself as soon as I clean.

I miss being able to maintain a clean living space.

But at the end of the day, it doesn't matter. Everyday I look at my kids, I get high. They drive me crazy, but I am not interested in trading any of this for what I see on TV.

she just can not stop talking

she'll speak, and her eyes will move, and then she'll talk about what she's looking at and ask me a ton of questions about it

like she'd ask me about, for example, gerard's toy

and then her eyes would be looking at her poster while she's asking about the toy

then without stopping, she'll ask about the poster on her wall

and gerard's thing right now is, "i grew up from being a baby"

he's now realizing that we start out as babies, and we grow up

message to gerard

A mother will be the toughest to her rebellious son.

She will not let anyone else get as tough on you.

Atleast, that's how I am with you, Gerard.

Future geeks? :)

Not really, just future smarties I hope.

We have been teaching G & A some really interesting things about the planet. A few months ago, Gerard showed interest in tsunamis. He and Aubrey like to disturb the water in their bath to create a tsunami effect.

Lately, they have both been watching a 3-2-1 Classroom Contact segment on Earthquakes, which Gerard keeps requesting for. And even more lately, they are enjoying the original Gumby when he travelled to the moon.

Other than that, G has been getting math lessons, and he is reading now! We are utterly proud of him. Aubrey is learning most of her letters and she definitely recognizes her name written out.

Today, also, I saw that Aubrey wrote the letter "A" all on her own. She attempted a U, but lost interest and started to scribble something she called water. She continued to draw a mermaid in there.

It is weird to show them "baby" programs because it feels like they are already at the level of a 7 year old with TV. Both of them know their shapes and circles. They like to watch older kids' programs. Gerard's preferred TV: Transformers, Gundam, Macross, and other fighting robots. Aubrey's preferred TV: The Little Mermaid (still), Dora the Explorer. Both of them still like Caillou, and they really like Rugrats. Although I feel that's too much of a baby show compared to Transformers.

It's truly an amazing period of our family life.