January 10,2020

Happy New Year! I hope the holidays were good for you. We’ve had a busy few months here. School is going well for both girls. Taya can already read 20 sight words and Emi has about 15. I’m not sure if I mentioned it before, but when they were under 3 the therapists were concerned that they may have some difficulty learning to read, and that school in general could be hard for them. I’m starting to believe that may not be the case. It was never a concern of intelligence, but of the way they learn. Taya’s teacher is a retired kindergarten teacher of 26 years. She told me that Taya would be fine in kindergarten right now. Even though Emi has a different teacher I believe the same could be said for her. Another great thing that the school is doing is allowing me to do aftercare one day a week, alternating the girls. The change that this has brought about is amazing. Every Thursday one of the girls stays the afternoon at school playing with other children, while I get to have a play day with the other one. We go out to lunch and then do an activity. Sometimes we stay home and bake cookies or do artwork but usually we go somewhere. I’ve been letting them pick the lunch spot but I’m going to start taking a little more control of that. Emi does not love trying new things and only wants to go to the local pizza place. I really don’t care for pizza and would be fine if I never ate it again. I think I need to nudge her a bit into trying new things. Taya is more adventurous and will let me pick more often. Her favorite place is Red Robin. Their favorite activity is going to the spca because they have a small petting zoo and they love to look at the cats. They are also big fans of the aquarium and have taken a real liking to getting pedicures. The best part of this for me is that I’m getting to know them as individuals. Emi is sensitive and loves to crack jokes. Taya is inquisitive and is always asking me a million questions. She’s currently interested in road signs and wants to know what each one means. Thursday is my favorite day of the week. It’s theirs too, but they like the staying after school part the best and hanging out with me is considered the booby prize. 😂. Tim is starting to take Thursday afternoons off every now and then so he can spend some one on one time with them as well. They’ve also opened up much more socially because of Thursdays. They’re still pretty shy but are getting better about making friends and talking to non family members.

Emi Taya
The girls were spiders for Halloween. Both of them are drawn to kind of creepy stuff. (They love the snake exhibit at the zoo.) They They are also super into dresses and girly things and couldn’t decide between spiders or princesses so I tried to combine the two. I love that they like to be a little unique. They got a ton of candy and have realized there’s more to life than suckers. Emi discovered a love for Kit Kat’s while Taya gravitated towards Twix.

Emi, me, Tas, Tim, Taya
Christmas was a lot of fun. They are both fully engaged in Santa and presents. So much so that when they would hear a commercial come on, they would run to the tv to see if it was a toy they wanted. They were also aware of the naughty or nice list. Emi told me one morning that she didn’t want to be on the nice list that day and then she proceeded to be naughty all day long. It was infuriating, but at least she’s honest and it’s pretty funny in retrospect. The main thing they both wanted this year was Barbie and LOL dolls. It wasn’t just a Barbie doll, no they wanted ALL the Barbies. They got Barbie’s Dreamhouse last year and that thing looks more like the projects than a Dreamhouse. They play with it all the time but they are not gentle and they love to strip all the decorations off of it so now it looks like an abandoned building with vagrants living in it. This year they each got a suitcase full of Barbies and accessories, as well as her planes and cars. The toy room looks like a Barbie bomb exploded in it. They love it. We went to Iowa as usual for the holiday and it was a lot of family fun. Tim heads up a gingerbread house day for all the kids and we played lots of games. My sister has a cat and they spent hours watching her. She’s not very nice and bites everyone, but she lets the girls worship her and even pet her once in a while. They were obsessed with her. They got spoiled and doted on because their next closest cousins are 17 and everybody wants to play with them. It makes coming home a little difficult because I’m not serving ice cream for breakfast like your Aunt did and I definitely can’t braid as tight or as well as their cousin. Welcome back to the world of pancakes and plain old pigtails. 😂

Taya top, Emi bottom

We went to the water park again for their birthday. It’s a nice break after all the Christmas hoopla and they love it. We also decided to let them pick out their own birthday presents this year. For Christmas they got the exact same thing because otherwise they fight. When they start fighting over a toy our rule is that no one gets it and I didn’t want that to happen with all their Christmas presents. So we let them pick out their birthday gift and that way it could be different and if a fight breaks out I know who’s toy it is. So far they haven’t fought about it. I can’t believe they’re already 5! I’m not gonna lie, 4 is not my favorite age. My son was difficult at that age too. Now that they are 5 there is so much more they can do. We start a parent child basketball class next week. Hopefully they’ll like that better than ball, which was awful. They still do dance and I’m going to sign at least Taya up for soccer in the spring. I’m not sure if Emi wants to but Taya has asked about it. I don’t care what they do, or if they’re any good at it, but I think extra curricular activities are important. Plus it burns off some of the crazy of the day.