Christmas Practice

This year Ella and Juju will be singing "Oh What a Special Night" in the Christmas play at church. They love to practice for Karis.

Karis

Karis loves to lie on her tummy and smile. Not seen here, but just yesterday she has started to get on all 4s and lift her tummy off the ground.

Strider Breakthrough

Juliette started to love her Strider bike last week. When we first bought it for her she didn't like it at all (you may recall a video of her having a meltdown when she received it). The other day she said she'd like to stride to the mailbox. Since then she has been choosing to stride to the park, to Morenos, anywhere she normally used to walk. It is fun for Ella to have a Strider buddy.

Houston Trail

Spencer and I love to go running together. We have continued doing this, even with our little ones. It's a great way to get exercise and have a family outing. Spencer pushes the double stroller and I push the single. The girls are all very good in the stroller. Karis loves going for walks and runs and has been our best "stroller baby". Whoever has Ella in their stroller needs to be answering questions the whole time (why are there leaves on the path? why is it fall? why isn't it winter yet? why isn't that man running? ... )

At the end of our workouts we let the girls get out and run around too. Saturday was a beautiful day and we enjoyed the sunshine.

Names

Some of the conversations that Ella and Juju have are priceless. Here Juju is asking Ella about names. "What is Dadda's name, Momma's name, etc." I love that they think Karis' name is Karis "And" (instead of Karis Ann), and I like how Juliette says "Juliette Lafleur".

Yesterday, Momma was sick with food poisoning and so Dadda was able to stay home and take care of the little girls. They had a great time going for walks and building forts!

Kelowna

Last weekend we went to Kelowna to visit Grandpa Clark.  The girls were very excited to be there!

Before our trip I painted the girls' nails. I told Ella if she stopped biting her nails so that they grew and you could "see some white" at the tips, I would paint her nails. That day came, and she chose to have them painted bright red! And, of course, Juju picked the same colour.

Grandpa gave the girls some Eiffel tower shirts and Santa slippers from Paris.

Roots of Empathy

Yesterday, Karis visited her Roots of Empathy class. The grade 2 students were very excited to see her. They spotted us from the hallway and I could hear several of them saying "baby Karis is here!"

Our visits always start with the "welcome song". Each student shakes Karis on the foot while singing "hello baby Karis and how are you, how are you today?"

Yesterday the theme of the lesson was "crying". Miss Lisa taught the students and asked me questions about how to soothe a crying baby. We also talked about how babies communicate since they can't talk yet.

We then gave Karis some tummy time and let her play with a few toys and a book. The kids thought it was very funny when Karis tried to eat the book. Some of them are also quite grossed out when Karis drools. They'll say "eww, she's drooling". I'm waiting to see their reaction if she spits up in one of our lessons, but this hasn't happened yet.

Roots of Empathy is lots of fun for me because it give me a chance to spend some time with just Karis. It's fun to study her and celebrate her milestones. She is an amazing baby and such a blessing to our family!

Happy Halloween!

Our girls were 3 butterflies for Halloween this year. They loved getting dressed up (Juliette didn't love wearing her wings at first, but warmed up to them later on) and they had fun trick-or-treating.

Below are a few pre-candy shots and then a picture of them sorting through their candy.

Karis loved her first Halloween. 

We went and had a visit with a little cow and a baby pumpkin before beginning our evening.

Ella with Hailey (2.5 weeks old)

Halloween Video

Here's a video of our 3 butterflies before going out trick-or-treating. They were so excited!