Finnegan's FIVE!

Last week Finn had a birthday. A big one in my opinion. He's a hold hand now. Next year he has to start using both hands to show 6 years. Five just sounds so significant to me. It doesn't feel like we've been in Sacramento very long. I still tend to say to people, "we just moved here". And when we moved, I felt like I was moving with 2 toddlers. Finn was 3 1/2 and Selah 1. But now Finn's 5! When did he stop being a toddler?! He's a full blown kid now! What the heck! He's on a basketball team. (more about that in a minute.)  But anyway, I know it sounds cliché, but.....where has the time gone?

We had a little (well maybe not so little) party to celebrate Finn's big day. A bunch of families we love came over, and grandparents and cousins. It was basically the same party we had for him last year but this time I was more prepared and actually got to enjoy it a bit! Plus, the weather cooperated and it was a beautiful day, making a good jumping time on the trampoline and our little play structure. The piñata was a hit. It took a while for these little 5 and unders to make a dent in the old camo jeep but in the end, cousin Michael was the one who ultimately was responsible for the carnage. And the kids descended like vultures for the goodies that spewed out.

Michael "the destroyer" and a proud King Finn

My favorite part about throwing a birthday party is making the cake! When Finn was little, I didn't even ask what kind of cake he wanted. For the first 3 years, I make cupcakes...ones the parents would like, fancy ones that didn't look like much but had a fun filling inside or a really tasty icing. But as Finn has gotten older I let him pick what we wanted the cake to look like, and I put my efforts into decorating. (The cake was from a box.) Finn has been a little obsessed with bats for a while now, so I thought I was going to be making a bat cake. But I was pleasantly surprised when this year, Finn requested an owl. They're so much cuter!

This puppet show stage that hangs from the ceiling was a great birthday gift from friends Thomas, Ramona and Wendy.  Finn treated us to an awesome puppet show last night.

Finn at Five:
*Loves bats, as I mentioned before. And he's gotten Selah in on it too now. They pretend to be bats together. They fly around the house and pretend to hang up-side-down to sleep. Finn insists on being a vampire bat and talks about sucking blood all the time. When I play with him, I'm a cute and furry little fruit bat. Selah's always with me on that one.

*Still has his beads in his hands AT ALL TIMES! In March or April it will have been a whole year of the beads. He's gone through several strands, eventually throwing them away when they get too broken. The strand he is working with at the moment has been broken so many times that now it's a simple line of 10 or 12 beads. He has back-up sets he plays with sometimes.  He pretends with his magic beads just as enthusiastically as ever - reliving movie scenes about Jimmy Neutron or The Princess and the Frog. It is really hard to explain unless you've seen Finn in person handling them. He really is in his own world with them, and he's very vocal, retelling stories or singing songs, but if he senses that you are listening in , he'll call you out. It's a solo thing. No one else is invited, no offense. Secretly, I love the beads. The whole situation is so unique.

*Along with the beads, Finn has taken up with a new friend who is with him at all times. It's a snake puppet, Sammy. It's a rubber sort of scary looking anaconda or something. It used to scare the bajeebies out of him when he was younger. But lately he has been embracing all things spooky, so here we are. Beads in one hand, Sammy the scary snake in the other. He sleeps with them both.

*He started playing basketball! Two other girl friends were starting in this league and one's dad is the coach. It's pretty low key, just 1/2 hour a week and a game on Sat morning. It is hilarious! We've had one game already. I think it deserves it's own blog entry. :-)

*Finn is a really good big brother, especially lately. He plays with Selah now more than ever. He tries to teach her things. She likes to help herself to whole apples and mandorine oragnes off the counter all the time, and he follows her around the house making sure she doesn't eat the seeds. (she doesn't...he is just so paranoid about it for some reason.)  It's really endearing. They are becoming pretty good friends now. I am SO glad, especially with the huge change approaching with baby #3.

*We've been reading chapter books with Finn this year, and he is loving it. He asks questions all the time. He is so curious. He really liked The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. We are in the middle of The Phantom Tollbooth right now. It's full of play on words and stuff, so it is quite a bit over his head. But he still enjoys it.

*Deep thoughts by Finnegan Jack:  "Mom, I don't know which mom I'm going to marry?"  I burst out laughing on the inside. But on the outside, I tried to take this question as seriously as he had asked.  I told him he didn't have to make that decision for a very long time. Plus, all the moms he knows are already married to their husbands. After some thought, he decided that he would just marry Selah then.  I told him he couldn't marry his sister. But he could marry one of his friends some day. Then he went through the list of his girl friends and settled on Ashley. She's 7. And she only lives about 4 blocks away, so he thought that would be convenient since he can't drive yet.

* Next year he starts kindergarten! This blows my mind. Nate and I are in conversations almost daily about where to send him and I'm visiting classrooms checking them all out. We've got a good local school just blocks away, and many of his preschool buddies will go there. We have the awesome charter school where Nate is the principal. And we are looking into a Montessorri charter school pretty close by too. There is so much to consider in making this decision. I think he'll do great wherever he goes though. It's just another reminder of how my baby is growing up! Yikes!

Finn is such a kind person, polite, sensitive, funny, talkative, honest, happy, curious and playful. He is such a special soul. I thank God for him daily.  We love our Finnegan Jack.

Christmas 2010

I'm really getting used to this whole not-traveling thing for all the holidays. This year was really nice. Nate had two weeks off, which he spent mostly with us and partly with our yard.  He built a fence. Yay! Now the passers by on their way to the river trail can't just glance over and peer into our whole back yard. And it's a really pretty fence too!  We had house guests for three days, which was so much fun. Our friends from Eugene OR moved in with their 8 month old, Anderson (cutest baby ever!) and they didn't mind at all when our family became a petri dish of germs! Between the stomach flu and colds, the Monleys were pretty pathetic for a few days. We still had a good time, but usually one of us was fighting something nasty.

Needless to say, Christmas morning was a little bit of a bust. (We didn't let this get us down though....Baby Jesus was born after all!) Our amazing Christmas morning breakfast was oatmeal. The kids were a little too under the weather to truly appreciate all their gifts, stockings were left half full for hours. (I think Santa will fill them a little less next year.) Nate and Selah stayed home from church to rest and since I sang in the choir, Finn was left all by himself to be a shepherd in the live nativity scene at Mass, something the kids had been asked to take part in a week prior. Selah was supposed to be an angel. (All three angels were no-shows. due to sickness......fallen angels ....) Finn did fantastic though. He was the youngest one among the group and they all looked so cute in their costumes. Our priest even sort of interviewed each child during his sermon. Trying to draw the comparison of all of us as "sheep" and Jesus as our "shepherd", Fr. Bill asked Finn what he would do if one of his sheep ran away. Finn answered (into the microphone) that he would go and find the sheep and then he would probably lock him up with a gate next time so he couldn't get out. Honest answer, but hilarious.

Never too sick to scoot!

I'm glad we tried these costumes on Christmas Even because the next morning was sort of crazy and a camera was the last thing I was thinking about.

 Sickness aside, Christmas was quite nice. The kids really soaked in the story of the birth of Jesus. They played with our little nativity scenes all month. And we got some great quality time with all of Nate's siblings (and spouses) who were in town visiting for the week. The annual caroling party was awesome as usual, with tons of folks over at the grandparents house and a whole lot of music. My parents came and my dad brought his banjo, my brother in law brought his cello, and uncle josh had his drum, aunt Mary with her mandolin, and Nate with his guitar, everyone singing...it was great. It's fun to be part of a musical family around Christmas time.

We joined my side of the family the day after Christmas, at my aunt and uncle's house/farm out in Hilmar. There were horses and 4 wheelers and the guys went out and shot clay pigeons. The kids had a blast. I love it out there.The only thing we didn't do this time is go up in my uncle's little airplane. (Nate won't get near it) But I've always thought it was the coolest thing.....a little 2-seater plane in the barn out back. Roll it out along side the orchard and up we go, flying over cows and alfalfa fields. Maybe next year.

I think we were all very alarmed when Finn declared that he did indeed want to get up on the horse. I thought for sure he would just want to sit this one out. But he got right on up there and asked for more!

I love my uncle Lloyd. He's such a cowboy.

He's already doing better than his daddy, who was on one of my uncle's mules last year (Hilary...and yes they named her after Mrs. Clinton) and she got spooked and ran into the orchard and scraped Nate all up in the face. It was funny.....but it would have freaked me out if it happened to me.

I feel the need.....the need for SPEED!

My mom, getting back to her country roots!

The thing about a farm is......sometimes there's some dirt.

Who needs a pool stick?

Selah and my cousin's daughter Trileah had fun hanging out. I wish we saw them more. I spent several summers at my cousins house out on this farm, working in the orchard. Maybe these two rag-a-muffins will do the same some day!

Babies

Today I had an ultrasound to check out the growth of this wonderful kicking baby in my ever growing belly. I already had my 20 week ultrasound 7 weeks ago, but the results showed a slightly larger ratio in head size to body size than normal (I sort of had to chuckle when they told me that because a larger Monley cranium is no news to us......) But I humored them and went along with a follow-up ultrasound for a later date (today) to see if the ratio had changed. They said they weren't worried, it's probably fine. I said I wasn't worried either. I know my kids have big heads, and I've tried shopping for hats for my husband........it's because he's so smart!  :-) You have to hand it to Kaiser for being extra extra diligent. They screen for everything under the sun. I also had a 2nd glucose test today for gestational diabetes (I had one at 16 weeks....drink nasty sugar water, wait an hour, get blood drawn) just because my babies are 9 pounders. Anyway, I think a doctor will analyze the results of today's ultrasound and give us an official report, but the tech did say that "the head matches the body more now." And then before I left he questioned how far along I was because......the baby is measuring 2 weeks larger than the due date suggests! We might be looking at a 10 pounder folks! Just when I was getting excited about a possible VBAC delivery.....yikes!

Since both later ultrasounds the baby was face down, we don't have a cool profile shot yet. So here's one from our very first ultra sound, when Baby Monley's arms and legs were still little nubs.

December has been a month of babies! Between good friends and my sister, we've welcomed 5 babies in December before Christmas (including a set of twins!). I think they delivered them all in reverse order too! The ones who were due at the end of the month, had theirs early and my sister was due a bit earlier and had hers last. All healthy! That's what matters. 

I had the honor of being present for my sister's delivery of precious little Taylor Kathleen Berry. She was born a few days before Christmas in what must have been the speediest delivery of all time. I was there along side my mother, ready to encourage my sister through this amazing experience that usually lasts more than 30 seconds...right!? Taylor was born before I could even get comfortable in my position as holder of Joanne's right leg. It was so incredible to watch and my sister made it look so easy! She's a rock star mom!

Happy family of five. And...two big proud brothers to give all of her future boyfriends a hard time.

Baby Taylor a few days old, I am in love with her!

At 8lbs 14oz I know she's a bigger newborn, but all newborns are just so tiny! She weighs nothing!

And fresh off the press, here are some professional shots of the little one-week old, Taylor. Isn't she so cute!!!!

Santa IS WATCHING YOU!

Nate and I have really tried to drive home the REAL reason for the season with the kids, in talking about Jesus' birth and the importance of Christmas to us as Christians. Now....what about all that other Christmas stuff? It must be confusing as a young kid. Maybe they just compartmentalize it all. There's Jesus, born in a stable, while three kings and shepards followed a bright star to find our Savior. And then.....there's Santa Clause...and Rudolf, and the chimney......... That stuff is so fun as a kid. I'm not ready to squash the Christmas magic for Finn & Selah just yet. The other night on Netflix instant watch, we came accross this cute movie:

 I like it! They did a good job of tying together the current idea of Santa and the story of St. Nicholas and gift-giving because of what God has given us. It was cute.

So, anyway.....Santa sent Finn a video message again this year! Finn was very attentive while watching it. He didn't say much....just in shock I think. Click HERE to see Santa's message.

Novemberness

Thanksgiving was really nice. We have so much to be thankful for. This year we headed to Chico to my cousin Avery's house. I got to catch up with a bunch of aunts and uncles and cousins and the kids just took care of themselves and each other, basically.  This was the first year in a long time that there were really no babies! But with two on the way (my sister and I) next year is back to passing a babe around, leaving mid-conversation to nurse in the other room, packing a high chair...... It was so nice this year that our "big kids" played like I remember playing with my cousins when I was little. They just ran around exploring the newly landscape huge backyard the whole time, despite the cold.

 

When Selah would come in to get warm, she stayed mostly at this window arranging and rearranging the votive candles on the windowsill.

 Finn was totally enamored by my cousin's collection of dragon stuff throughout the house, starting with this knocker. Isn't it spooky? Finn is at that stage right now where he likes scary stuff.

Finn followed slightly-older cousin Jeremy around. They made a game with 8 year old Brit, called "Get Brit!". They just chased him around....simple game. I so remember making up silly games like that. Ah...childhood.

When she wasn't rearranging the candles inside, Selah just ran around insisting that 10 yr old cousin Elaina chase her back and forth across the lawn, down the path, under the railing, onto the deck, off the deck....repeat. I would peek in on them sometimes and saw Elaina constantly being on guard for what Selah shouldn't do....like enter the coi pond, or climb too high on a big rock. We should have paid her for all the babysitting she was doing out there.

Back at home, it was so nice having Nate home more often during Thanksgiving week. We didn't go on any long trips for a change. We were home-bodies. Nate built a fence! The kids and I gardened and we all just played and enjoyed the colder weather.

If you jump on the trampoline with socks on, this is what your hair will do.

 We did head out on a couple of outings while Nate had more time off. Our late afternoon Apple Hill journey started out as a bust, as places closed early, but we happened upon a cute little market that sold hot cocoa, apple pastries and hot cider, with an outdoor fire to sit by. The weather was yucky but the treats were soooo good and the fire was cozy.

This was the view from the market in Apple Hill.

And this was the view on the way home.

The other little journey we took last week was to the SNOW!

 Our favorite sledding place on the side of the road in Strawberry (cute little name for a mountain town) was too hard to get to this time because of the snow bank that the snow-plows made that day, but we continued up the hill until we came upon "Sled World" ...part of Sierra Ski Resort. It sort of sucked to pay $10 each to slide down a hill on our own sled, but Finn did have a great time. Selah and I played in the snow and in the little play houses they had there for the little ones.

 Mostly, Selah just ate snow. When she figured out she could eat the snow, it was all over. She wouldn't stop.

I am so glad the kids loved the snow. I hope we get up there a few more times this year.