Clark Family Blog: We've Been...

Enjoying summer and time together to the fullest!

I have a mental bucket list of the things I wanted to complete/do while on maternity leave. I think we've completed most - take care of the garden, go to the beach, SWIM (lots), pick strawberries, cherries and blueberries, make my first pie from scratch with Gavin's help (strawberry rhubarb, it was good), make strawberry jelly (with Gavin's help), make pesto (again, help from Gavin), go to the park, get back into running, start core exercises, eat sushi (boy I missed that while pregnant), go on a date, take lots of photos, see Monsters University (we went to the drive in!), drink a Rubaeus (a delicious beer from our local brewery that has been MIA for five years and is one of my faves), watch fireworks, take Gavin to zoo school and Lego camp, work with Gavin on his letters, numbers, writing, drawing and other crafts, etc. Left on the list - finish Gavin's preschool art work photo book, blog weekly (sorry about that, too little too late), go on a family vacation (Traverse City in a few weeks, a week on the bay, ahhh!), and at least one more trip to the local beach.

On the Isla front, we've just been soaking her in. She is generally a happy little girl who eats and sleeps well. She has her moments of crabbiness, but really they are quite rare. At about three weeks old, we had three evenings in a row of crabbiness for several hours, creating a nervous feeling in me that she may develop colic. Fortunately, it seems to be an isolated incident thus far. She typically is easily consoled when she gets upset and we have a good feeling for her variations of crying - what cry means what. She has her "I'm hungry cry" and her "I have to poop" cry (this one lingers for quite some time until the deed is finally done)". In general, pooping seems to upset her more than I ever remember it affecting Gavin as a newborn.

At a weigh-in today, Isla is 10 pounds 7 ounces, so she is gaining weight like a champ. She officially has rolls in her legs and they are starting on her arms. Her cheeks are chubby. I love it!

About two weeks ago, Isla began to smile - those very quiet and fleeting flashes of smile that are very difficult to capture in a photo. I've tried and tend to get it too late as it is disappearing. Just yesterday, I FINALLY captured one (see below). I love the smiley phase - almost a "thank you" for the first six weeks of pouring love into her. Today, she flashed a big smile when I went to pick her up after a nap - the smile screamed "that's my mom and I'm so glad to see her!"

On the Gavin front, he is a sweet big brother. He's pretty much through the jealousy phase which was short lived and mainly consisted of a lack of understanding that mom and dad weren't always available exclusively for him at the very moment he needed us. He's been learning to share and we've heard several "but I need SOMEONE!" in whiny voices. We're in full-on Love and Logic mode with him and it helps greatly. I love to see the confidence he is building with all of the "deposits" of choices he gets to make. It's a fun way to parent. And we've begun a reward system with a responsibility chart and tokens to be earned. He gets to collect tokens and turn them in for new Lego sets.

Speaking of Legos, the kids is in LOVE with them. Some days he spends three hours playing Legos, creating all sorts of things. Most recently, his creations have taken on a symmetrical look, with the same size and color pieces on each side. I'll post some photos. He's off to Lego Camp this coming week for a couple of hours a day.

Sorry it's taken me a while to post some real updates on the kids. So much of the blog has always revolved around our kids. I'm working, though, mentally on a post about me. Where I am at this point in our family's journey. I'll work on getting it down in writing and posted. I get a lot of questions about how I'm doing - and I'm sure many more would like to ask but don't quite know how, so I'll use the blog to fill you in.

Here's a boat load of photos from the past weeks. I have about 100 photos just trying to capture Isla's smile, all a little too early or too late. Seemed I never had the camera at just the right moment!

First walk in the double Bob. I wasn't sure I would ever be able to buy and use one of these. So worth the few hundred dollars to fill it with these two (and an occasional butterfly who wants to tag along for a ride :) ).

We waited to get most baby stuff out until Isla was home with us. Here's Gavin after he dumped an entire box of baby toys on the couch!

Butterfly fun :)

Hey, one with me in it!

First trip to the beach, a success. We went in the evening when it was cooler and Gavin had a blast splashing in the water and playing in the sand. Isla slept mostly.