singing

When my parents came out to visit, they brought us a couple copies of The Little Drummer Boy by Ezra Jack Keats. They were mine when I was a kid. After Hosanna sang it to Aria just once, she loved it so much that now she wants us to sing / read it to her all the time. Hosie & I made up a little harmony to it so we can sing it together.

So apparently tonight in the car on the way home from our friend Sunny's house (taco night!), Aria was singing a little bit of it. "So to honor him" and "pum pum pum." I didn't get to hear it because I was in a different car (we ran out of diapers & I had to run to the store). Hosanna said it was really something. She said it made her fall in love with our daughter "on a whole new level."

A busy month

February was pretty crazy. All three of us got sick again for a couple weeks, so there was some down time during which we pretty much didn't do anything but wish we were sleeping better. Aria had a cough and there were several nights in a row where she woke up four or five times during the night. We got a little loopy. The funny thing was, somewhere in there our chiropractor gave a 30 minute presentation in his office, the title of which was "How to get a better night's sleep." There was good information there, but I kept thinking, so little of this is actually under my control.

Aria hit some pretty amazing milestones this month. She can count to ten now. She's strung together three word phrases several times as well - e.g. this afternoon she said "socks back on," and then later this evening she said "night-night teddy bear." She's also getting more boisterous, wanting to play more vigorously, and sometimes getting melodramatic if she's not getting attention. She has thrown a few tantrums too. So things are getting pretty interesting...

When we weren't sick this month we did a few fun things. There are lots of pictures, & I will put together an album at snapfish soon. Here are a few samples:

We visited Aunt Lynn in Merced...



We got a visit from Grandma & Grandpa...



We saw the Tour of California come through both Santa Rosa and Sacramento...




we went to Santa Cruz for cousin Adamen's 7th birthday party...



...and on the way home from Santa Cruz, we stopped for a few minutes and cuddled & played a bit in the car.