Sonja stands up

Monday, 9/28
Sonja stood up in the crib after her afternoon nap! She just waited there until Penelope showed up and then gave her a huge smile, 'Look at me!'

Michael crawls as fast as Sonja, still like a caterpillar. He is just starting to take a couple of 'steps' on hands and knees before he lowers on his belly.
They both follow me around the house like a tail. If I go to Nikolas's room, they show up at the door within a few minutes, both of them peaking in. When I gave Nikolas a bath, they came to the bathroom. I carried them both back to the living room 2-3 times and they would immediately head back to the bathroom, so cute! And of course, when I'm standing in the kitchen they both crawl to the gate. Sonja now climbs up the gate and holds on to the rails looking at me. She hasn't figured out how to lower herself, which is when she cries, both in her crib in the morning after she's been standing for a while (signaling to me to get up from the bed and head over to the babies' room) and at the kitchen gate.
Posing for a picture:

Sonja's first tooth

Sonja got her first tooth: bottom right:
Michael's new hairstyle:

Little rugrats

For the past week, as soon as the babies touch the floor they disperse in different directions all over the living room. Little rugrats! Sonja does the military crawl, and Michael looks like a little caterpillar--gets up on all four, pushes forward and lies down, and so on.

Babies share a ball (1) and then Sonja smacks Michael (2):


Our caterpillar and the alligator:

on all fours, plus Sonja sits up by herself

Mike, bouncing back and forth on his hands and knees:
Sonja on all fours:
It took only another week before Sonja was able to get up on tippy toes and hands in a triangle pose :)

Mike says mama and dada, while Sonja says mamamama and motions her mouth as if she is saying dadada and then also smacks her tongue against her gums as if she is eating something delicious.




We have to watch these two carefully now since they've become extremely mobile on the floor and they like to put everything in their mouths right now. Nikolas is trying to help them by offering them a teether, except that his generosity looks pretty painful: he'll shove a teether in their mouth saying, 'Nikolas daje bebama da grickaju' (Nikolas is giving something to babies to nibble on'), and he'd just hold it there pushing it in! Poor things would bend backward to get this huge teether out of their mouth...

Nikolas's first day of school (and Sonja pulls up on all four)

September 1st was Nikolas's first day at school!
Daddy dropped him off and he immediately went to the corner with trucks and started playing. Daddy told him he had to go and that mommy would pick him up later and he barely looked up, 'OK, daddy.' Well, that was easy, no tears, no fear!
Nikolas with his teacher, Ms. Sam:
Nikolas, Kyle and Aagneya, the three musketeers, in front of their classroom door:
By the way, we saw Sonja on all fours today for the first time. Apparently she practices in her bed after she wakes up.

'Camping' in the Cherokee reservation

We spent 5 days in the North Carolina Smokey Mountains at a Cherokee Reservation. It took us about 10 hours to get there by van and the kids were very good in the car. The camp had several cabins of which we rented a 2-br one to share with Joe, Amy and their little Julie. So really it was a kind of executive camping... but with the little ones I wouldn't have it any other way right now. Nikolas got to try his new fishing pole in the river. Of course he thought the bait was the fish that he was supposed to throw into the water and pull it back out. The babies spent some nice time on the front porch in a refreshing air for a change from Florida.
Daddy and Joe didn't even see a fish, let alone catch one, by the way. But we did go to the zoo where we saw several kinds of bears and a Siberian Tiger which, poor thing, was roaming inside a cage that was right next to the cage with goats, his favorite food!

Sonja and Michael start on solid food

We started with butternut squash, moved on to zucchini, then potatoes, avocado, green beans, peas.... I mixed the veggies with rice cereal and breastmilk and they loved it! The kids eat in their bouncy chairs for now, and I sit in front of them and alternate feeding each mouth with one spoon as quickly as possible since they both complain while the other is getting a bite!

Tandem eating:

Michael got his first taste of watermellon: