Lydia the 4 year old

We are fortunate to get mostly this Lydia (above) but this uncooperative girl does come out and man can she dig her heels in.

I took Lydia to her **well check up last week.  She is 40.2 inches (61%) and 36 pounds (54%).  She ended up getting her last round of shots and was very sad about it and against my better judgement I had them give her a flu mist.*** She then spent the next day showing everyone who came to our house her bandaids (luckily not that many people came over) and going through what seemed like a box of tissues from the illness she got from said shot.

Lydia is thoughtful, compassionate, cheerful, sweet, helpful, friendly and silly.  She is a good friend and fairly independent. She is also stubborn and seems to care more about what she doesn't want than what she does want. I find this particularly interesting as I myself can often more quickly tell you what I don't like or want to do than I can tell you what I do want.  Whenever someone is sad she always talks about how sad she is that they feel that way and tries to find a way to make them feel better. She is not a big risk taker but not super timid either and is pretty easy going. She can also be quite the chatterbox I would not call her shy.  She has pretty much stopped napping but may take one every 10 days or so.  I still thinks could use a nap but if she does nap she then takes forever to fall asleep at night so it seems that the nap was not that beneficial. It made our evening more pleasant but didn't pay off the next day.  She is a much too early riser for us but does pretty well staying in her room until her clock reads 7:00.  She is almost always awake when I get up at 6:20 to exercise.

Lydia loves dressing up, playing with her princess's, stuffed animals, fruit, being read to, wearing leggings, writing the letter A, sweets, going to fast food play places, watching shows, and making "projects".

She does not like: cleaning up her messes, eating dinners that are not her favorites, wearing jeans and going to too many stores.

She doesn't actually sleep in this sleeper as it makes her too hot she instead uses it to slide around as we sing songs before bed. Its her "slider". 

First Sunday as a Sunbeam. 

Sunbeams:  Lydia typically does pretty well in Primary/class.  It's only been 4 weeks and it is a big transition but I think she will be just fine.  She had one really rough week but other than that she does well and is pretty happy to be there. We talked a lot about appropriate behavior and reinforced some things to her and today she was a rock star both hours. I was really proud of her.

Preschool: Academically Lydia is doing great.  I love doing learning times with her.  I have not started teaching her to read but think she is getting close.  She is showing more interest but when I asked her last week if she wanted me to teach her to read she said she did not want to. She enjoys writing her name and being shown how to write the letter and numbers.  She writes letter A's (only uppercase) all over papers and leaves them places for me. She loves making projects, notes and pictures for Mark and I and others. She has got her letters and sounds down and numbers 1-19, 20 is still a little hit and miss. She is still really enjoying preschool and loves preschool days.  Some days are harder than others but overall I think she does really well in our little class. She gets along well with the other preschool kids (the boys and girls) and has some fun little friends. We go to story time once a week at the Library and she does great there.

Jared: Lydia loves Jared.  For the past 2 months or so they have really been enjoying each other. It makes Mark and I so happy! She will drive him crazy at times and knows how to push his buttons but in general she thinks he is pretty great and loves playing with him.  He is particularly big into Star Wars now and so Lydia has really gotten into the swing of things and loves playing Star Wars with Jared.  At first she was often Princess Leia but now that she has seen Episodes 1 and 2 she loves being Queen Amidala. I was asking Mark how to describe her and Jared and he said she is really accommodating to him which is so true.  She will often do whatever he wants, she just wants to play with him.

She is really so compassionate and I love hearing her silly stories and her little voice sing songs with us. It's hard to believe that she will be 5 on her next birthday and then leaving for school.  I plan on sending her elsewhere for preschool next year so she can have that experience before Kindergarten so it's weird that I only have 7 more months with her "full time".  She is a sweetheart and loved by all who spend time with her.



** I am so ready to go to a new pediatrics office.  I feel like I always have to wait forever at our office and the Doctor I chose this office for is sadly on a leave of absence so I am not even seeing who I want to see.  The lobby part is not bad but after the nurse "checks you in" and does her part I feel like I am always waiting least 30 minute to see the Doctor and I am so over it! I wait forever for the Doctor and then after they leave after a total of 7 minutes maybe, I had to wait around for the nurse to come back with the shots. I really work myself hard to get to appointments on time so when I have to wait around forever I just get mad. I know I don't know the whole story of what they are dealing with but I know I did not wait this long at our office in Colorado Springs.  I don't know if they are just bad at scheduling here or what but I was seriously so irritated.  I don't know how clinics work so I am not really even sure why there has to be a nurse and a Doctor.  Is it below the Doctor to ask the questions the nurse asks?  I could go on and on but this is supposed to be about Lydia so I will end rant here. Oh and I am absolutely super grateful we are really pretty healthy and don't have to have frequent scary long appointments.

***She got this truly horrible cough in December (coughing so much she was throwing up) and as the Dr. was talking about flu season being at its peak in February/March here the memory of her December cough was too fresh so I caved.  I know a lot of people religiously get flus shots every year but I have never gotten them for myself or Jared and Lydia till this week.  The idea of getting a shot that is then going to make you sick seems really backwards to me. I know the point is to get time so you then do not get really sick with the flu but I still am not planning on getting one unless my future work place in day requires it.

Fun in January

Mark and I went out on a date to a basketball game at Albemarle High School.  Its fun to go to these games and feel the energy of the kids there.  The school is the Patriots yet for some reason their student body wore neon clothes.   Albemarle ended up wining and we had fun.

Scripture Power

 

Mark is currently serving as the Primary chorister.  For January he taught them "Scripture Power." Our good friends the Farnsworth's are teaching a class in there so one day after church she sent me a text talking about how they all had "Scripture Power" stuck in their heads and how it was driving her husband Josh crazy.  The song is now banned from their house.  Mark asked me to take a picture of the three of them doing the scripture power pose and send it to Laura.  I love these three so much! 

In the middle of January Albemalre County had MLK day off and then a teacher work day following that so we spent both days up in Harrisonburg. One day I met up with my friend Tara at the children's museum there.  It is a really nice fun museum. The exhibits are really up to date and well maintained. They have a science room and an incredibly well stocked art room.  They also have a theater room complete with scenery changing equipment, lots of costumes, a light/sound booth and plenty of face paint with fun mirrors. Lydia loved the costumes and face paint and Jared loved working at the ticket booth with money.  They had many more exhibits including a mechanics shop which Jared seemed to really enjoy too. We were there just over three hours and could have stayed even longer. 

Light and sound booth with great effects. 

Mechanics Garage

Mark came up with us one of the days and we went roller skating.  It was the first time we had taken Jared and Lydia and I am happy to say that they loved it! I enjoy roller skating so much and it was so great to be at an actual rink (not a rec room like Mark and I went to last January) with a DJ and disco balls.  What was really great was that the rink had plenty of "walkers" on hand for kids to use so they could skate.  At first I could tell Jared was not loving it that it was too hard but after a few laps around the rink he gained more confidence and started having a great time.  It was really heartwarming as one boy probably a year older than Jared came to talk to him and encourage him. He talked about how it was his first time too and gave Jared some good tips.  It was awesome.  Jared and I were both sad to leave and hope to go back soon.  They have asked to go the last 2 weeks so we will have to make it happen soon. Mark does not love roller skating and was such a good sport to come with us.  He was happy to "help" Lydia and use the support of the walker himself just a little. He did a great job and was happy to report that he didn't fall once.  The outing didn't end very well with Lydia having a major melt down.  Jared and I got our skates off and turned them in and then of course she was ready to skate again oh well. We will definitely be back. I particularly enjoyed skating with Jared and Lydia as it made me feel cool.  I am not super athletic. I am not going to be out making awesome shots or scoring cool goals but I have some great skating skills. Such good memories with my family and from my childhood. 

Winter Storm Jonas

The week of Lydia's birthday a big snow storm was forecasted to pass through Charlottesville.  Jared and Lydia could not wait for the snow to start. The forecasters were talking about Charlottesville getting up to 2 feet of snow! I did not doubt that snow would fall but I didn't really think that much would fall but it actually came really close to that! We got right around 20 inches of snow.  School was cancelled for Friday the 22nd on Thursday afternoon.  The snow was supposed to start falling around 11:00 Friday morning so the city and county districts smartly closed for the day.  The snow started falling at our house right around 10:45 am and kept falling through the night and for more than half of Saturday.  We have lived in snowy places (ID,UT, and CO) yet I had never seen that much snow fall in one storm.  It was so pretty. I could not wait to get out and go sledding.  We have a pretty long driveway and it is not straight.

Pictures right as I saw the first snowflakes

Fortunately the previous owners had a "cut out" made at the top of our property off the road where both our cars could fit so as long as we parked one car up there we would not be stuck in our house.  It was nice to know we could leave our house (we had quite a few friends who were really stuck in their house) if we had to because we were really pretty worried about losing power and needing to be able to leave our house.  We have talked about purchasing a generator many times (well in the 8 months we have lived here how has it already been 8 months?) but they are really expensive and I am not sure when we will get around to that. Fortunately for us we never lost power.  It looked like Northern VA had way more power outages.  Mark attempted to shovel our driveway and the area in the cut out where I parked the highlander Friday but there was just too much snow Friday night.  By the time he finished shoveling Friday evening there were almost 3 more inches on the ground.  It was amazing all the snow that fell.  We attempted to sled down our side yard but it is not ***very safe because there are trees at the bottom.  It works but you have to be really good at stopping (rolling off your sled) in time. 

After the first few hours: (Friday January 22nd) 

In between celebrating Lydia's birthday Saturday we drove over to Christ Greene Lake.  We saw the snow plow go down our street and decided to follow it and enjoy a walk in the snow.  This was during a pretty heavy snowfall.  We live less than a mile from the lake so felt fine driving over to check it out.  We had to park at the gate and then start our hike in.  Many people had mentioned to us that they loved sledding at Chris Greene Lake so we walked in with our sleds.  The snow was so deep we could not get our sleds to move.  It is a steep incline but no luck. As we were walking breaking a path through over a foot of snow, we passed  a couple heading out.  They also mentioned how great the sledding was.  It was fun to chat with them (standing in a snowstorm) and listen to their stories of their kids sledding there.  After a few more attempts we hiked back to our car and drove home.  It was really tough and Jared and Lydia to walk through all that snow and not really get to sled but they were such troopers.

The snow stopped falling just before dinner Saturday. Jared and Lydia played on our back deck while Mark and I made dinner. It was crazy to see how much snow had fallen.  It was especially deep for Lydia.  I got out some spray bottles and filled them with colored water and they played with the sandbox toys.  They walked around the deck knocking all the snow off the railing and had a great time together.  It is amazing how much more fun snow is when you have the right clothes.

We woke up to clear, sunny skies Sunday (January 24th) and church being canceled. So many people were snowed in.  I am sure the parking lot was untouched.  The thing with this much snow is not just driving safely bit really where do you put it all?  We went over to Chris Greene Lake again to try out some sledding and were not disappointed.  I really do love sledding  This time we actually made it to the sledding hill.  The lake has a dam on one side and it is a steep hill.  It also has a natural jump on it which some older kids took advantage of.  They built the jump up some and had some cool (and pretty bad) jumps.  We all had a great time and went back to do it again Monday (January 25th).  I could sled all day long if possible but eventually you get wet enough and remember that you still have to hike up a big hill to get to your car.

That is some deep snow! 

Love this cut out so much!! 

 We all had a great time sledding. Jared and Lydia (especially Lydia) ended up preferring to sled down the tracks as we called them on their bums which was actually really helpful as we broke 2 of our 3 sleds.  I had driven to so many stores Thursday night before the storm searching for sleds and finally found them at the store closest to our house, go figure.  Chris Greene Lake was an awesome place to sled and I can't wait to go again.

Bum sliding!

Older kids being crazy!  Some got some really good air. We did too and we weren't even trying.

Monday January 25th

Early Monday afternoon we decided we should be responsible and shovel our driveway. Mark worked on that while I cleared snow from the cut out so preschool families could park there.  As we were working our neighbor John (Kearns) from 2 houses down drove by.  We chatted for a minute and then he continued home.  A few minutes later he came up the street on his 4x4 with a snow plow attachment. He helped us shovel all the snow the plow had dropped at the driveway entrance and then cleared a majority of the driveway with his plow.  It was so nice of him.  We were so grateful. We then headed back over to Chris Greene Lake to sled some more.

We ended up with three tracks right by each other and had fun racing each other down. 

Jared, April, Lydia

Lydia, Jared, Mark

Besides sledding we (mostly Mark) spent a good amount of time shoveling.  We made snow ice cream and a snow cave.  We made lots of snow angels and threw lots of snowballs. I put together some snowman for breakfast, made some truly awesome forts and we did some bowling too.

Find the cleanest snow! 

She was so funny backing into the cave. 

They didn't play in it much (it was kind of smelly) but we made it happen. 

This was Jared's fort. 

He did a great job to start it but I stepped in when he wanted more rooms. This was the 3 room version. Lydia had cool one too. We love our basement. 

We did this back in Colorado and they asked if we could do it again which I was happy to set up.

It was great fun, largely because we did not lose power and Mark is a teacher so we got to enjoy the snow days with him.  I am ready for the snow to melt now and then for us to get some fresh snow again. It is supposed to be 61 tomorrow and 64 Monday with rain so I think it will mostly melt away. I do hope we can go sledding again though!

*A few days later Jared showed us how not safe it was by sledding right into a tree branch and getting a bad gash in his cheek.  We had friends over and were out playing. Mark was throwing snowballs at the boys and Jared jumped onto his sled on his stomach and slid down the hill right into the branch. It was so sad. (Warning: Gross picture below.) We took this picture to send to our friend Ashely who is an ER doctor. We weren't sure if he would need stitches.  She was so kind and came over to check it our and apply some medical tape on it.  It was so sad for him.  That was actually a really rough day for Jared. (Wednesday) First he he was not wearing his glasses and as he was climbing down from a tree branch a flake of bark got in his eye. Ensue crying and time inside trying to help him.  Next he was using his sled to block snowballs that we were throwing at him (that he asked for) and the timing was off and he got hit right under his eye. Ensue crying round 2.  Then this accident with the sled.  It was really an unfortunate hour for him.  And the next day school was back in session for the first day since last Thursday and I got called by the school nurse asking to see if I could come pick Jared up.  At first they said he looked like he might be coming down with pink eye because he had a weepy eye. I wondered if it was just irritated from the day before but as I pulled into the parking lot I got a text from my friend Julie who had just seen Jared telling me that he really didn't look well.  I chatted with her for a minute and she said that when she saw him that morning at drop off he looked like his normal chipper self but then when she saw him at lunch he looked really bad.  He had his head down on the table and was shivering and not eating.  She went to get him his coat and then talk to an aide about taking him to the nurse who then called me. I am so glad she was there to help him out/comfort him. Poor guy looked pretty bad when I saw him.  As we got to our street he told me I needed to get him home quick because he was about to throw up.  Luckily I always keep Ziploc bags on his side of the car and told him to grab one.  He threw up and then after we cleaned him up laid down and slept for 2.5 hours.  He did not eat much that afternoon and did not eat a real dinner. He dozed off and on on the couch until dinner time.  We did get him to eat some applesauce which helped him but the poor kid was exhausted.  I kept him home the next day and am so glad I did.  He threw up Friday morning at 7:50 but that was the only time that day and spent most of the day sleeping.  I was having  a preschool make up day so I put on Return of the Jedi for him and then told him when it was over to try to sleep. He then slept from 11:30 - 3:10!  It was crazy.  He slowly ate more food and seemed mostly better by the time he went to bed Friday.  I am so glad it was a quick bug but it sure came on fast!! He went to school fine Thursday and then just looked like death from lunchtime on. And a good part of Friday too.