The Mezgers

It's been a while since our last general kiddo update. This time, let's start with "what they're up to" randomness, and then we'll end with August and early September photo randomness...

Miss Maggie

Well, for starters, she's huge. In a perfectly healthy baby kind of way. She's huge and happy - such a sweet baby. She is now doling out her huge dimply grins to anyone who will take one. She even takes her older siblings' (well-intentioned) abuse with a smile
She wants to talk sooo badly! She's making lots of those little guttural baby squeaks - moving her mouth a lot. And the bubbles, oh, the bubbles she'll blow...
She sucks on her fists like a champ. The noise level is quite impressive.
And she has absolutely found her tongue. And she loves to do this little click/smack thing where she sucks on her top lip and it makes a funny little noise. And if you stick out your tongue, she mimics it.
Her sleeping schedule is really not much of a schedule (at least that I've paid enough attention to notice). Her bedtime is still a lot later than I would like (12 or 12:30) but she'll sleep a good 8 hours straight so I really can't complain. And she takes decent little naps throughout the day. At some point (soon?) we'll do a Ferber weekend...it's just harder to fit in that into our schedule than I like to admit. We're going to Port A with the Other Mezgers next week so maybe when we get back?...Perhaps that'll be her 4 month birthday present (to me).

Miss Rebecca

Personality. This girl it in spades. I could really leave it at that. But for those who haven't witnessed it/her in person lately...
Right now I would describe her as: happy, silly, dramatic, playful, easily entertained (by herself!), fun, fiesty - A STINKER.
She likes to get ALL of Owen's socks out of his sock cubby and put them on - layering them on her feet and hands (which she needs help with - which for some reason we always offer). Then she runs around like a little sock monster. The game ends when she gets frustrated she can't pick stuff up (like last time).
In the last month her vocabulary has really taken off. She pretty much says everything, it just may take a time or two for me to figure it out. Some of her favorite phrases:

"The question game" - this is where she says someone's name, waits for them to respond, asks them a question, they answer and the giggling begins. Example: "Owen?" - "Yes, Rebecca" - "Yont dinner?" - "Yes, I do want dinner." - hehehehehehehehe! Then it repeats with another simple questions and more laughter.
O turned to O-en and is now a very clear O-Wen (sort of makes me sad!)
Maggie is "Ah-ie" or maybe even "Ahn-ie"

Can finally say "wubbie" (for her lovie) and is very intent on making sure that Ah-ie always has hers too. "Dis wubbie fo A-hie".
Diaper adventures...she's stopped taking off her diaper at night so often, but that doesn't stop her from taking it off during the day when it's wet. I walked in on her naked in the playroom a few weeks ago - asked her where her diaper went (not really expecting an answer) and she pointed to (and said) "da tash" (and it was in the trashcan). She has started showing lots of interest in the potty - especially the "rog potty" (little frog potty used for potty training). She likes to sit on it (just for fun) and then climb up on the big potty and flush it. Hum. I'm wanting to wait as long as possible to really train her - thinking it'll shorten the duration of time it actually takes - but we'll see. When we change her diaper she says "no diaper on!!!".
She is finally letting me do stuff with her hair - she'll wear a little flower headband she picked out sometimes, or she'll let me put her hair in pig-tales. But you never know when she'll take them out. Halfway through church the pig tales come out, but then she wants them after her bath before she goes to bed (don't worry - I didn't do it). It's a love-hate relationship
Oh, the girliness. The full-on dress-up pretend play has definitely begun. The toy jewelry and dress-up clothes she got for her birthday (or stole from me) are her most used toys. She's very very fond of her purses (random bags she carries all at once, saying "my purse").
Deep Deep Water. For a while now she'd move her hands in a certain way and sing this little tune that sounded like "deep deep wah-ter" (over and over again). One day when she came up to Maggie and grabbed her hands and started moving them to the tune I realized that what she was singing all along was Itsy Bitsy Spider. Sing/say it a few times and you'll see...
She's definitely trying to mimic Owen a lot - she likes to count things (1-2-1-2-1-2!) and say her alphabet (E-R-E-R). What's funny is those are her default, but she actually can count to 10 (thanks to grandparents, not us) and sing the alphabet song, but I don't think she realizes what shes' singing. So, when she sees letters now she just says, E! R!
Rebecca LOVES to give everyone "tis" and "hud" - whenever someone comes or goes. While we find this absolutely precious with our family and friends, when she tried to give the shoe salesmen a hug last week I had to redirect her. Perhaps its time for a "stranger danger" talk...

Sir Owen

The phrases that rule our world (and that I hear approximately fifty-eight-seventy-one-hundred-thousand-eleven-twenty-seventine-million times a say--that's one of Owen's numbers by the way):

Momma, did you know.....?
I need to tell you something......
Watch what I can do!

Owen has started showing a LOT of interest in letters, they sounds they make, and how words are put together - READING! We don't want to push it and in any way hinder his excitement, and we feel like there's no real rush/benefit in getting him to read early, but we still want to answer his questions and encourage his curiosity. So, we're talking a lot about letters and the sounds they make.
His letter interest was partially brought on by a show called "Word World". We know this because Owen asked Kyle write the word balloon for him. Kyle wrote "BALOON" and Owen corrected Kyle - there are 2 L's in balloon. 2 L's and 2 O's. Kyle yells at me from the other room - Ali, how many L's are in balloon? I say 2. Owen says, "See Dadda! I was right and you were wrong". Oh boy. Respect for elders. Pride comes before the fall. Oh boy.
In the litany of things Owen says to us when we're telling him goodnight (I don't think I can go to sleep, I love you, Sweet dreams, Dont' let the bed bugs bite, I'm thirsty...) he has now added "I hope you wake up". We're not sure where that came from. We sure hope we all wake up too!
Owen is such a good big brother - to both of his sisters. He loves to (all on his own) come and "give Maggie sweet things" - which basically means he makes a bunch of funny noises and faces about 2 inches from her face.
Camp Bucknerites out there would be proud...Owen's favorite song right now (and maybe Rebecca's too) is HERMAN THE WORM. He has all sound effects down pat. Herman almost always eats the following before burping: a grape, a shoe, a big truck, a mountain.

PHOTO RANDOMNESS

Playing at Chick-Fil-A: the 100+ summer life-saver. We should own stock. Or open up a franchise.

Nana with Maggie. (FYI: This pic was taken when we were lucky enough to have Nana living with us while her house was being finished...well, it's done! She's moved in and getting settled and us Mezgers now have an AWESOME place to congregate!

Owen only had to "rescue" Rebecca from the indoor gerbil-maze type play-scape.

A little bumbo-nap. I think this was the day we were trying to keep her awake more in the evening so that maybe she would be so tired (earlier at night) that she'd actually go to bed before midnight. It didn't work so much.

Sleepy stretch.

Awake stretch.

Rebecca's favorite hiding place - I'd only know she was in there because she takes almost everything out of the bottom pantry shelf before she climbs in.

Working his magic with the hoola-hoop. Actually got the hang of it.

This girl could exist on a liquid diet - MILK. We have to majorly ration her intake so she'll get calories from other sources. But one healthy food we never have to ask her to eat twice is broccoli - whodathunkit? She loves her some broccoli! (When she doesn't want to eat something we have told her to eat, she defiantly sticks her hand - her whole hand- in her mouth, as if to say "no room!")

Dimply nakedness. (Is this the first picture I've posted of Maggie smiling?)

And this is her serious side.

We have photos of all 3 kiddos with this "jungle chair" background. Some day it'll probably hard for us ol' folks to tell them apart!

Maggie usually eats while Kyle gives the older kiddos their bath so I've missed that part of our day for a while. But here are some fun shots from a night when he was at the hospital. Good times in the tub!

Oh, happy days - PRESCHOOL! "Winter School" (what Owen calls his regular preschool - differentiating it from "summer school") has begun! Here is Rebecca meeting her teacher Miss Jessica, or "Caca" (yep!) as R calls her.

Rebecca goes MW and Owen goes MWF. Here they are together on their first morning.

Rebecca is having NO problems being dropped off...she hardly even says goodbye to me! And Owen is thrilled to be back in Ms. Joyce's class with a bunch of his buddies from last year and even a few from the year before!

We had a little swim date with a good friend of Bee's and it was Maggie's first time in the pool. She LOVED it - who wouldn't when it's this hot outside?

Another morning at Great Uncle Doug's dock - Christal and Nathan joined us. Nathan caught his first fish!!! (Owen was very protective of Nathan the entire time - making sure he didn't get too close to the edge of the dock. The little parent.)

I am VERY PROUD of this picture - because OWEN TOOK IT! With our big DSLR camera. He can barely hold the thing, but I showed him how to get look through the viewfinder and push the button. And this is his first real pic! Maybe he'll be the photographer in the family!

(He then went around with my iPhone and took pictures of "the important things" in our house - our bed, his favorite truck, the refrigerator. I'll have to post some of those for you since they're so important...

Sort of can't believe this little girl is TWO! We sort of had two celebrations - her actual birthday and her party day.

She woke up first on her birthday...so got a little special time with me before O & M joined the chaos. Here she is enjoying her "white donuts" and milk on the couch. She is donning ALL of her new birthday jewels and has a very tight grip on the string of her giant Dora balloon.

Watching Dora, holding her Dora balloon, and one of her presents. She was SO good about not opening her presents until I told her she could (and for some of them we waited until late that evening when Kyle got home)!

"Dot paint" - a birthday art activity for she and Owen.

And of course Bee had to come over to bring birthday sussies...yes, that's a hoola hoop.

But the real surprise was our last minute decision to have Bee take Rebecca and Owen to their first movie at a theater to see the Winny the Pooh movie. It was a TOTAL hit. They were both mesmerized by the big screen (and personal kid-sized popcorn).

Here's the birthday girl doing a little more dress-up.

Loves to style herself with an anklet or seven.

And FINALLY Daddy got home and we got to open presents!!! Here she is sporting some of her dress-up clothes - fairy wings, a little tutu/skirt and her new bike helmet.

Okay - PARTY DAY! (Owen had a much harder time waiting patiently for her party than Rebecca did.) Since we don't really have a house we can have all our friends and family over to (not even our family really) AND since we're in the "hottest summer on record" in Austin - we decided to try out one of our favorite local pools for the party.

Worked out well. But the amenities/decor won't get this party on "Kara's Party Ideas" any time soon...

My paper "Habby 2nd Birthday Rebecca" banner only stayed up a few minutes...no great way to secure it and it was just getting in our way. And half our balloons floated away after a few minutes - it's sort of a Mezger family birthday tradition - to (unknowingly) release balloons to the sky.

Her chocolate cupcakes with pink icing and oreos on top. Could I have at least taken a picture of one that wasn't smudged?

Her little cake.

Possibly the lamest party favors ever - oreo butterflies.

Where did the black/zebra and pink theme come from, you ask? Well...Bee (of course) bought a little outfit (zebra print with bright pink flowers on the booty) for Maggie when she was born and she had a vision for Miss M wearing it to R's birthday party. And party vision snow-ball effect...you have a theme!

Here are the two sisters...I can't believe I didn't take a picture of Maggie's bum...the flowers really make the look.

Maggie with a sweet new friend. Her momma and I are pretty sure they're destined to be lifelong friends - can't you tell how much they enjoy each others company?

Pool time!

And (finally) cupcake time. Or, as Rebecca says "cake time"!

The two "grandmas" - they both cringed when I called them when taking this picture. Both played a HUGE role in getting O & R swimming this summer!

R feeding Bee some watermelon.

R trying to blow out her candles.

She needed a little help.

But she didn't need much help destroying her cake.

She actually invited Owen to share in the destruction/eating. He was glad to oblige.

And Rebecca feeding Nana some icing. Now that's love.

Daddy eating some watermelon - a lot of watermelon actually.

Dahdo with the hardest job.

Every year I say we're not going to "do presents" at the party (because it just gets too chaotic with all the other little kids, plus I want our friends to come and just hang out without having to bring a present)...and each year I fail. Grandparent-pressure. So, after all the non-family guests left Rebecca got to open some presents (and most importantly - the grandparents got to watch)!