Happy Birthday Party

October 27 12 B (40), a photo by nathan_katrina on Flickr.

Thanks to everyone who made it to the Bronx Zoo to help us celebrate. We had a fantastic time!

3 years

I honestly cannot believe that the twins turned 3 today!  How did this:

Turn into this?

 

Here a few lessons I've learned. 

• Toys and books being misplaced or misappropriated constitutes an emergency everytime. 
• They are literally sponges, except, of course, when it comes to absorbing liquids, they can spill those pretty easily. 
• They need to know everything, which is why they ask so many questions.  I can only assume they are preparing for their teenage years during which they will reach the pinicle of their knowledge and know everything, with a particular emphasis on all of the things we couldn't possibly know. 
• Time outs for kids are ok.  Time out for toys, even better. 
• They want to help but as they get older and wiser they want to actually help... which isn't as helpful as you'd imagine.
• The first President was George Washington.  Our President is Broccoli Omamma. 
• When in doubt, trust the Force.  "This is not the toy you are looking for.  You should move on." 

In all seriousness, these kids are wonderful and we love them so much.  They are amazing kids and great older siblings.  But I am hoping that the next 3 years involve more sleep!  :)

Eli's Baek Il

For those of you who are up on your Korean (or Lee family) traditions, the Baek Il means that the baby is 100 days old!  Congrats Eli!  I stole this from Noah and Ava's post about their Baek Il (http://www.noahandavalee.blogspot.com/2010/02/happy-100-days.html):

A Baek-il is a Korean tradition to celebrate the child's health during the first 100 days. It is a tradition that stems from times when healthcare was not widely available and children were not introduced to friends and extended family until they were 100 days old. The celebration and feast is supposed to give the child luck and signify a long, healthy, prosperous life. They wear traditional han-boks as it is their official introduction to family and friends.

Thanks to the hanboks we'd gotten before from Uncle David and from our family in Korea, all the kids got to dress up for the occassion.

As with the twins, I thought this would be a good time to explain Eli's full name.

Eli: we could not decide on a name until we were hanging out in the hospital with Eli and Nathan said, "what about Eli?" and it just seemed to fit him.

KilSun: Kil means journey or path and was his Grandfather's name.  Sun means good or virtuous and is also the same as Ava's name (SunMi)

Dimitri: Dimitri was my grandfather's brother who lived in Cyprus.  My mom was christened 'Demetra" after him.  We wanted to incorporate my grandmother into his name since she so recently passed and was such a big part of our lives but Helen for a boy's name just didn't seem fair.  Instead, we chose the name of a man that we all know my grandma loved and respected.

Ava's First Boyfriend

Ava saw Liam Hemsworth's picture on the cover of Men's Health and told her Appa that he (Liam) was her boyfriend.  Who told her about boyfriends or Liam Hemsworth???  Whoever you are - you're in big trouble!!!  I gotta say though, she's got good taste!

Eli rolled over!

He did it!

Playgroups

Since Noah's blood tests haven't been as bad and since there are fewer colds and flus in the summer and because our kids really need some friends their own age, we've been trying to bring them to storytimes and playgroups.  It's been fun but nervewracking!  Keep Noah's immune system in your prayers.  Here's Noah playing with instruments at our first ever music class!

More summer adventures

We've tried to be very active this summer to take full advantage of the little time we have left when Eli will sleep anywhere and we don't have to pack any extra food for him. So we've been to:

New Jersey:

The Aquarium:

The Park:

And creating lots of fabulous artwork:

Bon Voyage!

Our good friend Nekesa just moved to Chicago. The kids still ask when Auntie Kesa is coming over - hopefully soon, I tell them!


Uncle T'Errance also just left but he's moving to Saudi Arabia and then to Jordan. Ava found his boarding pass and was very concerned about him not having it.  She said we better take it to him in Saudi Arabia but I think we'll just hang on to it until he gets back! 

I can't even explain how sad I am about all these changes but we are thankful for all of our great friends from NY and from CO.  We are very lucky!

Eli caught the monkey!

Ok, I'd love to create an awesome 80's style video montage for Eli, but let's face it, I have neither the time nor the skills for that! So here you go, Eli laughing and Eli catching the monkey. For those of you who have followed our blog at all, you know that the monkey catching is a developmental milestone in our house, so good work Eli! We are so proud of you!

A wardrobe fit for royalty

We are very lucky to have friends that travel the world. They bring back amazing stories and amazing gifts that we get to play with and talk about. It's such a neat way to start exposing them to different cultures.

Ava's sari and Noah's sherwani were brought back by Uncle Daniel when he did Semester at Sea. They fit perfectly right now but they did not seem to understand the idea of just sitting still and taking a picture... I guess they never do...! But either way, it was a lot of fun! Thanks Uncle Daniel!



*Noah had a scratch between his eyes... we weren't trying for a bindi! :)

The end of an era - almost

You may not be able to see them but Noah is wearing big boy undies now! Two down, one to go... altough that still means we have at least 2 years of diapers a head of us! :)

2 Months old

Eli has grown so much in two months! At his 2 month check up he was 13 lbs and 23 1/2 inches long! So he's put on 4 lbs, 12 oz since birth and grown 3 1/2 inches! He is such a happy baby and loves loves loves to be anywhere near Noah and Ava. It's so funny - when Ava's around he's all smiley and "talkative" and when Noah's around, he is calm and focused. It's funny what they bring out in him. We are trying to get him used to not being held all the time (the double edged sword of having grandparents come help ;p) but as long as he's near the action, he's usually ok. And he's got the best smiles and giggles!

Summer Fun

It was really hot here for a few weeks so we tried to cool down in the pool. Noah and Ava spend most of the time getting the water out of the pool but at least they are having fun!

A real photo shoot!

Our friend, David Pe, always takes amazing pictures so he agreed to take some for our birth announcements. Here are a few of my favs:

Phone pics

So when you take pics with your phone, you almost never remember to do anything with them... at least we haven't! Here are a few that I just downloaded from Nathan's phone.

Stickers (July 2011):

Our first ice cream with Uncle T'Errance (August 2011):

Sleeping in their car seats. Keep in mind that we did not have a car at the time so we took them out of the rental car in their giant car seats, carried them to our building and put them on the luggage cart to wheel them up! Oh, the adventures of life in NYC! (January 2012)

My grandma loved lions - particularly these ones in front of the NY Library in Bryant Park. (December 2010)

Kid say the darndest things!

They really do! I've tried to keep track of some of the funnier ones.

Ava: "Croutons are dirty"
Mommy: "No, croutons aren't dirty"
Ava: "Croutons have crumbs. Crumbs are dirty."
Mommy: "My bad, Ava, my bad."
(April)

Ava: "We saw a quirrel (squirrel) today."
What was he doing?
"He was putting away groceries." [He was, in fact, looking for nuts]
(April)

Mommy: "Noah, let me see your eyeballs."
Noah (while mommy is looking at his eyeballs): "Mommy, those aren't my eyeballs. Eyeballs are by my penis."
(June)

Mommy to Eli: "Why are you so cute???"
Noah: "because he looks like me" (matter of factly)
(June)

Mommy: "Where are all the burp cloths? Why do I keep loosing them? This is a silly problem to have."
Ava: "It's like they (the burpcloths) have legs."
(June)

Also, Noah's artistic skills have grown leaps and bounds in the last few months. In April, he was scribbling all over the coloring book pages with no real "focus." Last month he started coloring with focus. Last week he was drawing ovals and calling them "fishies" and random circles all over the page for eyes or nipples (yup, nipples). Today he showed me his drawing of two robots and Spiderman. Maybe it's just my own, biased, opinion but I think it's amazing!!!

Eli's photoshoots

As per Lee tradition, we have had several photoshoots since Eli has been born.  Here are a few of our favorites.  The rest are at: http://flic.kr/s/aHsjzwv25h