Re organization and Bunk Beds!

We have been doing a ton of transitioning and reorganizing and purging as our kids move into the next stages. We put up bunk beds and have been slowly transitioning Issie to a big girl bed, using the Super Nanny stay in bed method. She does not stay in bed, well she stays in bed but jumps around and hangs from the bars and whispers constantly which is completely distracting to Kadie. But it is a transition and as much as I want it to be easy, I understand that is the wrong expectation. The crib is still in her room for back up and for naps, I am totally not ready to tackle naps in the big girl bed.
Kadie loves the top bunk, but we did have to remove the blades on her ceiling fan so we did not have fatal injury. She is a monkey and climbs up without a ladder since we are not ready for Issie to venture up there yet. Good old IKEA, nice simple bed for a fraction of the price else where. It is not as cute as her other bed but it will work for the time being.

Issie, very excited, looks like she is saying "peace out". She ended up in her crib the first night, we were too tired and forgot to read the super nanny section on this as it has been a while since we have had to deal with it. The second night she went to bed at 7:15 and fell asleep at 9:30- about 30 min after Kadie. We are now on the third night and she went to bed at 7pm and it is 8:21 now and she is still flopping around on her bed. When I go in to lay her down she does this cute thing where she puts her hands over her eyes, thinking if she cannot see me then I cannot see her. Not really working well for her.
Had to take a picture as this room will likely not be this clean for long. My little girl is a pack rat and has an interesting way of organizing that does not really allow us to find anything.

Sisters

We reorganized both the kids closets, it looks great and every thing is easy to access.

Jack's closet too.

This is phase one of the loft. I have a before picture but it is awful so I just want to focus on the now. I will post more when we get the desk in. Busy weekend, but feels good to get organized and get rid of all the stuff we do not use or need. Off to get my toddler back in bed.....

Ages and Stages- Issie

Issie is 2 years old and a few months, and she is really something. She is definitely our most strong willed kiddo. She absolutely knows what she wants, although it does change moment by moment and often I am the only member of the family that is fully fluent in Issie talk to figure out what she really wants. She can say a lot and she will repeat ANYTHING you say, so you really need to be careful, but she has such seemingly random thoughts that you really need to spend the time with her to see what she is talking about.

She is are mathematician, she likes order and sorts things and has pairs of things or things she things should be paired together all over the house. She is likely our overachiever, she taught herself her ABC's using her sisters Barbie computer and she is constantly practicing picking out letters on signs and magazines. She is now teaching herself the sounds. I say teaching herself because she does not want help, she just uses little technology games we have had for Kadie and Jack and sits in a corner and practices. She is also potty training herself. She goes to the bathroom for all diaper changes and likes to sit there forever, only occasionally does she go in the potty but she is not open for suggestions on how this should proceed. It is really quite funny.

I know it probably sounds like we let her just dominate the family, we really try not to, but honestly it does happen at times. But usually her desires or plan are perfectly acceptable, just different from what our plans may have been to do the same thing.

She is still tiny. She has yet to gain a full pound in about a year. She does not seem underweight looking at her with her peers and she is not super skinning or boney, she is just a lightweight. She has been 25 pounds since she was 16 months old. She was running around the house with this little vest from Kadie's Paci Bear ( a build a bear outfit!) and crying because she wanted it on. I kept telling her, you are too big, it won't fit, you are too big. Then to prove it to her I tried to put it on her, and lo and behold she was not too big and it did fit, well kinda. She reminded me of one of the village people, she wore it til bedtime. So funny.

She has had some food and skin issues but we took her to a specialist and we are in the process of treating her for yeast and several food intolerances and it is really amazing how much of her attitude and "meanness" appears to be related to her food issues. She is so much happier and although she does not like other little kids coming up to her and trying to touch her in any way, she is considerably more friendly and if she initiates the move she will hug just about anyone. It is good to know she is feeling better and nice to see she can be sweet to people outside of the immediate family.
I decided to try to find some panties for her, trying to put my own thoughts in this potty training process. It is very hard to find tiny panties. She was obsessed with them, but they could not go on her bottom. She wore all three pairs at once, two over her diaper and one on her head. This is how she spent her day, saying "yeah!!! Issies panties!!!"
The funniest thing about her little potty training efforts is that she prefers to read Better Homes and Garden magazines over her board books. It is really hilarious. She is looking for letters she can spot. She has 2 issues that she likes the best and she will spend 15 min or more browsing them. Brad really thought this was sad, so I spent several days, convincing her to read her books so now she will look at Clifford or Bible Songs but I still think she would rather the magazine.

Issie is at that fun stage where she squeals with delight when you first come home.... "Daddy, daddy, daddy..." and runs to give you a hug. She loves to snuggle in our bed, although we both realize this is the ultimate stalling technique before bedtime and naptime. She love oatmeal and would eat it for every meal if we let her. She still loves for me to snuggle her before bed and she now sings along to her "Isabella" song. So sweet.

We are about to transition her up to Kadie's room. We are in the market for bunk beds as I type. She seems ready, although I may keep the crib available for naps, not sure about that one. I am so excited for her and Kadie can not wait. But I am totally grieving the finality of the nursery. No more babies, no more crib, and no more nursery. I really loved creating her nursery and it will be so sad to change it back to the guest room. But you just cannot keep them from growing up.

Love you Issie Bee.

Ages and Stages- Kadie Girl

Kadie is six and it is a hard age. Seriously, I feel like I say every age is a hard age. The truth is every age has its blessings and challenges. Kadie is in Kindergarten and she is very smart. She is not very motivated however, which is OK, I do not need her to be an overachiever but it is hard to understand how she views the world at times. She is sweet, and super creative. Her imagination is incredible and at times reality and imagination overlap and cause quite the conflict. But in most situations she seems to be a drifter. She usually is just happy to go with the flow. She has her opinions and preferences but she is a follower and content to be most of the time. She is also a pleaser, she likes to make people happy. You can see where some of these qualities may lead her to easy peer pressure and moral ambiguity. She has a super strong love for the Lord and she really has an advanced awareness of spiritual warfare, she does know right from wrong she just has a stronger desire to have people happy and have people like her. When she chooses poorly, she often will tell us the "devil made her do it". It is hard not to laugh, but she is so sincere in her explanation that it is hard to argue.

Kadie is funny, and she can make us all laugh by saying the most hilarious things. She knows she is funny but I don't think she really knows how to be funny. She just thinks about things in a funny way. I wish I had an example, I will think about it and post it later. She is super tough too, she loves to wrestle and play ball and tag with Jack, she is crazy really. She is also very dramatic, as I have said before, she feels things very strongly. She can be very mad, very angry, very excited, very forgiving, and very happy in the same 20 minutes. It really keeps you on your toes.
Kadie at school with her new sunglasses. After she got her sunglasses we walked out into the cloudy, rainy weather and she says in a matter of fact voice, "now if we could just buy some sunshine". She is a nut.

Kadie is the middle child but at times she is the big sister. There are many times due to Jack going to his dad's house that Kadie is the oldest. She LOVES to take care of Issie. It is a bit smothering at times. She so wants to do everything for her and control her every move and choice (probably what Jack does for her and she does not mind), but Issie is way too independent for that. And it quickly becomes a battle. We are constantly asking her to listen to her sister the first several times and she would not get punched in the face but I am beginning to think that the natural consequences of not listening to a 2 year old when she is yelling to stop is getting hit in the face. Eventually she will learn, I hope. She does take good care of her and Issie loves her a lot, most of the time.

Kadie and Issie, cleaning my floors as Brad drags them up and down the hallway for fun. they just love this stuff. If I had to pick one thing that I most admire about Kadie Girl, I would have to say that she is very forgiving. She does feel things very strongly and her feelings get hurt and she really wants people to be nice to her, but she is so quick to forgive and so sincere in her forgiveness that it is really a blessing. She feels her pain then forgives and moves on. If only we all could do that. I love you Kadie Girl.