Today Natasha did a fun craft – she made herself a personalized necklace! I bought her an alphabet-beads kit at Wal-Mart a few weeks ago and today (being as it was rainy), we decided to give it a try and see how she does. It’s funny because the packaging says ages 8+ which I think is way exaggerated age-wise if my 2.5 year old could do it. She had a little trouble with the smaller beads because the hole was practically non-existent but she did a really good job. She picked all of the colors she wanted and she found all the letters for her name as well.

We used adhesive tape to stick one end of it to the highchair tray (to prevent it from moving)
 

And showing off her finished necklace!

We still have a ton of beads left so the next project is to make a matching necklace for Veronika!

Natasha got her very 1st manicure today. She was very happy! We’ve tried it several weeks before, actually, but she didn’t quite get the part where you have to sit and let them air dry. Instead, she ran to play and smudged them off in seconds. Today, however, she asked me to “paint Tasha’s nails?” and I had to explain it to her again. And surprisingly, she sat on the sofa for entire 3 minutes with her hands on the sofa and waited. She loves it! I need to get her something more glittery and girlie though at Claire’s, this color is a bit “old” for her.

Dora’s Bedtime Adventures is Natasha’s current favourite book. Actually… the child is obsessed with this book. The funny thing is that she has 2 exact copies of this book – one was a 2nd birthday present from a friend of mine, and the second I believe my mom got her. Well, she wasn’t too interested in these books for months and months… until recently. This is a bedtime book and has 2 bedtime stories so each evening before bed, she gets Matthew to read her the entire book. Poor Matthew has the entire book memorized! Aside from that, she brings me this book every single morning during Veronika’s nap; if I ask her to bring me a different book, she gets upset. On top, she also spends a great part of each day sitting on the sofa and reading it herself. And I am not exaggerating when I say she has memorized some 90-95% of the book and can ‘read’ each page almost perfectly to what it actually reads.

Today, after reading it together 3 times during Veronika’s nap, I finally told her to PLEEEASE bring me a different book. So she agreed… But what does she bring me? A different Dora book. It’s kind of cute, though!

On Saturday, Natasha and I made Big Soft Ginger Cookies. I think it was more of an activity to keep her entertained on a very windy day than anything else, but she really enjoyed it. She loves baking or generally messing with food, and she certainly makes a fun little helper! The problem is that even though she enjoys the whole process of adding, pouring, and combining the ingredients, she doesn’t actually enjoy eating the freshly baked cookie; she took one bite and that was that. Like father like daughter? Veronika, on the other hand, stuffed an entire cookie in her mouth and was then eating crumbs of the floor. What a mess…!

I cannot believe that our wittle-baby-girl is already saying words… Wasn’t she just born? Veronika’s new vocabulary currently consists of:

• Mama
• Papa
• Baby
• Ducky
• Diaper (papper!)
• Here you go! (hee-oo-go!), when she brings you something.
• Uh-oh!, when she drops something.
• Choo-Choo!, can credit her sister for this one.
• Hi!, just randomly when she sees you.
• What’s this? (whaazeee!), when she points at something.
• Num-num, when food is about to be served.

She also understands certain words or commands but cannot say them yet:

• Stand-up! (she stands up).
• Go!
• Come here!
• Cookie (she points at the cookie box on top of our fridge).

I am sure I am forgetting a few, but it’s really fun to see her already picking up on words that aren’t just baby babble.

Yesterday we went to see the Sound of Music play at the Princess of Wales theatre. It was a 2.5 hour show and it was GREAT! For someone (like me) who watched the 1965 movie some two dozen times, it’s really difficult to not compare the two. Of course the play, in comparison to the movie, felt a bit “squished” especially since the first part of the play (prior to the break) was very detailed with the acting and singing, yet the second part felt very rushed-through. It was a bit unbalanced, but overall they did a great job. I also felt that the age difference (in the play) between Maria and Captain Von Trapp seemed like 20+ years… He appeared to be in his mid-40’s while she looked like a 20-year-old girl, not much older than his oldest daughter Liesl. Matthew also commented on how the romance between the two kind-of “fell from the sky” – one minute she was the nanny and he was engaged to the Baroness, and the next minute they’re in love and she’s leaving. But it was pretty good, regardless. It was quite impressive. I think they’ve extended the play so it won’t be ending this month. I recommend it!

Lately, Veronika has learned how to drink from Natasha’s toddler sippy cups and discovered a whole other world outside of milk, water, and diluted juices. She’s realized that there are also other things out there such as chocolate milk, lemon tea, tea with honey & milk, and un-diluted juices. And she’s been sneaking Natasha’s sippy cups ever since. And really, who can blame her?

Her sister, in the meantime, has been up to similar mischievousness. She has discovered coffee. The child loves coffee, and begs us for a sip every morning. I’ve never really heard of 2.5 year olds loving the bitter taste of coffee, but Natasha loves it. Each morning, she brings either Matthew or myself one of her little plastic toy kitchen cups and asks us for some coffee. We usually give her a sip or two, but not more than that.

Silly girls. What will they be up to next?

At 7pm last Friday night, Matthew and I got the crazy idea to finally have the girls share a bedroom. Not that we haven’t considered the idea before, but more that we planned on having them share when Veronika was closer to 18 months… and she’s only 13 months now. But we decided to give it a shot and move Veronika out of our bedroom and into the crib in Natasha’s room. We put the bumper back in the crib and changed the sheet and it was all ready!

Night #1 had a rough start. Veronika was confused and did not associate the crib with sleep-time so she screamed on & off for about 25 minutes. We went in and comforted her; she was extremely sleepy but fighting it. Natasha was just laying in her bed, waiting for her sister to fall asleep… she’s a very go-with-the-flow kinda girl, but her sister is not so much. But then I am guessing she exhausted herself from crying and went to sleep. She slept till 6am!

Night #2 was A LOT better. The girls went down at 8pm and neither one made a peep. They were both asleep within 7-10 minutes and slept (again) till 6am!

Night #3 was similar to the previous one. Just a bit of fussying going down, but no major crying or anything of that sort. WOOHOO.

… so I am guessing (knock on wood) that the transition was a success. We still keep them separate for their afternoon nap, since I just don’t see them napping at the same time. I really don’t. But night-time was a success and that’s what counts. =)