More About The Kids

Annika has been getting very brave the last few days. She's starting to let go of what she's holding on to and tries to balance for a few seconds before grabbing back on to whatever she let go of. She can pretty much get around the whole house (which isn't hard since it's so small) and can come find me when I'm in a different room. She prefers walking, but will also scoot along on her bottom. She just doesn't want to crawl, but will if I put her on her knees. Today, during Relief Society for the first half she didn't want to stay put on my lap. She went to go visit all the ladies in the room, walking along holding on to chairs, hands, fingers, legs, or whatever else happened to be a good handle along her way. Today, Adam and I gave the prayers in Sacrament Meeting and she was so excited to see Daddy up there. She doesn't say, "dada" yet, or at least doesn't put the word with the person, but she sure knows her daddy. She understands a lot of words, but doesn't say any words you can understand. Just baby talk still. Annika loves to give hugs. Everytime I say, "Can I have a hug?" She'll curl her head up on my shoulder. Same thing with anyone else, or her dolls or bears. She loves to give hugs. We're still working on kisses though. It's more like a mouth open on your mouth if your lucky. Annika loves to "talk on the phone." It doesn't even have to be a phone. She'll hold up certain toys to her ear, or behind or on top of her head, pretending she's using it as a phone. Than she'll hold it out to us so we can "talk on it." It's so cute. We're starting to go thru a new phase in the brother, sister arrangement. Annika is no longer content just watching whatever Nolan plays with and sitting back and playing with whatever he might hand her that he's not playing with. Most of the time now, she wants what he is playing with. This is something new for Nolan and is going to take some getting used to since he's pretty much had it his way for 5+ years. He's always been good at sharing, but now it's a whole new level. He's doing very well and would do anything to help his little sister be happy, but boy, it's sure not very convenient! :) Also, he's learning that he can't leave certain toys out, such as light brites, unless he wants to have some of the pages ripped apart. Not to mention what I've had to dig out of Annika's mouth. :P On the other hand, Nolan is such a good helper and cleans up so nicely. I don't even have to ask him. If he sees something out of place, he'll put it back where he knows it belongs. One of Annika's favorite things to do is to drop all the magnets off the fridge. I don't clean them up right away cuz I know they'll just get dropped right back on the floor by the next time I'm in the kitchen anyway. However, there's a certain fairy in the house that picks those magnets up every time he sees them on the floor. :) He doesn't like messes.
I love being Nolan's Mom. He is such a wonderful little buddy to have around. I miss him so much when he's at school, but at the same time, it's nice to have some one on one time with Annika and to be able to get some projects done while she's taking a nap. Everywhere I go, it seems like people are commenting on how Nolan says some of the cutest things or he's such a "crack-up." That hasn't happened since I picked him up after primary. Hmmm, I sure wish I was a fly on the wall to hear what he says. :P Yesterday, Nolan went to a birthday party at a boy's house who is in his primary class. I left for a little bit and when I came to pick him up, the parents of the birthday boy commented on how Nolan is such a fun kid to have around and how he says some of the cutest things. I'm so glad we're in a ward now where Nolan has so many kids his age. Today, after church Nolan told us how he was going to be the one who started reading his scriptures. They've been giving little sticker charts to the kids at church and everyday you read your scriptures you get to put a star on your chart. At the end of the month when you turn it in, you get a reward. We've always done scripture study every evening before bed, usually about a page a day and it works pretty well. Nolan always helps remind us. Today after church he was so set on reading his scriptures right away. He got them out of his book bag and on the way home he was sounding out all the words, trying to read the best he could. He recognized lots of the easy words, but there sure are a lot of tricky words in the Book of Mormon. He told us something along these lines, "Every day I'm going to go in my room, shut the door, and read my Book of Mormon." It was so cute, he even was willing to sacrifice his movie night on Friday and even computer time, so that he could read his Book of Mormon instead. This says a lot because his movie night and computer time are very special to him since he pretty much only gets to watch movies on the weekends and computer time is limited to certain times. The weather was really nice today and Nolan told us he was going to go sit out on the front patio and read his Book of Mormon for a while. I'm so glad he knows the importance of this special book and tries so hard to do what is right. I hope this sticks with him because he will sure make a good missionary some day.
Well, I'm sure I could go on and on, but I guess that's enough blabbing for now.