Archive for February, 2010

“Mystery One Five”

Friday, February 26th, 2010

There are so many things I will miss when the kids are older.  So many little things.  Sure, I’ll miss being able to pick out their music and clothes, because let’s face it - teenagers are no good at that stuff, but I’ll also miss who they are right now. 

Noah has a flair for mispronunciation and made up words.  I already miss his emphatic “BA”, which could have been anything but was most often his pacifier when he was a toddler.  I still love that yellow is lello, and Ayla is Awaa but I’m sure those will change too.  His newest bump in the learning curve is telling time.  Every morning he comes into our room and announces it’s time to get up.  And every morning Walter groggily asks him what time it is.  It’s usually 5 or 6 something (but in the pattern of number number number), which means it’s not time to get up, but sometimes we get this treat – it’s mystery one five (or whatever is after the mystery).  It took us a bit to figure it out but that’s 7:15.  Apparently this – 7 – and this – ? – are pretty similar in his mind.  To me it’s  a mystery how he only manages to sleep past 7:00am once a week!  But, isn’t that the cutest thing ever?  Noah is also a huge fan of renaming people right now.  I don’t know how he chooses names, or sometimes where they come from, but it always makes us laugh.  His teach at school, Miss Molly, is Molls.  His best friend there is Charlie, Noah calls him Charles.  The other night I was Brisket but I’m most often Dads – that’s not a typo.  He loves to be silly!

Kate is still into pointing and grunting.  Her school tells us she can talk a little – Mickey, No, and Mine – but we haven’t heard it.  She mimics us sometimes and can almost get some similar sounds with the right amount of syllables out but she definitely understands.  You can tell her just about anything, or make any request, and she’s on it.  Whether or not she wants to do it remains a completely different story.  We joke that she has an attitude problem but I’m hoping it’s just that she’s opinionated.  Right now she wants to do everything Noah does, especially the dangerous stuff, and absolutely everything by herself.

All of these traits and habits will one day be a distant memory but I wanted to put them here so we never forget just how darn cute they could be!  Another thing I’m sure we’ll miss… how they enjoy Valentine’s Day…

The Queen of the Self Feed -

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Apparently not even 3.75 years of practice makes you a clean donut eater -

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What do you miss about your child’s childhood, or what do you think you will miss the most?

Bake Sale!

Thursday, February 11th, 2010

That’s it, I’m officially a mom.  In case the whole pregnancy, labor, delivery mess didn’t convince me, this is it.  I spent my day making treats for the kids’ bake sale.  Always trying hard not to take ourselves too seriously, and because I can’t eat chocolate, I didn’t “bake” just anything… Noah and I made popcorn balls! 

Popcorn balls have been one of my favorite treats for as long as I can remember.  We used to make them at my grandparents’ house every Christmas;  I have such fond memories of those times!  Today I use the same recipe written by my grandmother in pencil on an ancient index card. 

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Every time time I make them I manage to do something wrong; some things never change.  The recipe is very simple.  Make popcorn, make this eewy, gooey, sticky sauce, poor the sauce over the popcorn and form into balls.  The first year I made these on my own I let 3 milliseconds pass between pouring the boiling sauce over the popcorn and attempting to form balls.  I don’t remember having to wait for anything to cool as a kid!  I also don’t remember how long it took that to heal but I’ve never done it since!  This time I put all the ingredients in the sauce at once, two are supposed to go in at the very end of the boiling process.  Oops.  They still taste great!

And because I enjoy my memories of popcorn ball making so fondly I figured I’d pass on the tradition.  Here’s how it went down -

Noah, Monkey and I pressed the popcorn into balls.  Noah was in charge of picking stray kernels off my hands for his snack.

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He was also excellent at finding all the unpopped, hard seed kernels and putting them aside.

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Don’t you love his dimple!?

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I made a little one for him -

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In order to bribe him for this -

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Did I mention these things are sticky!?

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We also baked some double chocolate chip muffins for the boring people at the sale.

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Happy Valentine’s Day!  I hope your festivities are just as sweet!

Ants In Our Pants!

Monday, February 8th, 2010

For Christmas Noah got an ant farm from his Aunt Nikki.  At first I was a little surprised and not exactly in the fun, excited way.  Then I found out that to get the ants for the farm you had to order them BY MAIL.  Again, not excited – but, we did.  We sent away for the special ants that eat the special gel in this modern ant farm.  Did you know insects can be MAILED?!!?

Well the ants arrived and we put them in their new home (and by “we” I mean Walter).  Although they looked like big, mean, red ants, I figured so long as they were in the farm it really didn’t matter.  Once they got acclimated though and started to make this joint their home we all became fascinated.  It’s so interesting to watch them – from a distance – and see how they make tunnels and problem solve.  The very first tunnel they built went right into the wall of the farm.  D’oh!  They’ve gotten used to the surroundings though and this is what they’re up too…

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Here’s what it looks like from a little further back.  Damn, ants, they can’t get anything right – we told them to spell Noah.  They are missing the o and the a and the h is upside down!  Just kidding, we have no idea what N4 is or where they think they’re going!

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Well, hello!

Sunday, February 7th, 2010

In case you forgot, this is the Yap Family blog, yes really.  It was starting to get foggy for me too, I was afraid I’d forget how to log in!  I know I have so much catching up to do, and I plan to, but I don’t have all the photos together yet (let’s be honest, that’s why you’re here).  So I’ll share an ounce of right now and promise, once more, to update you more often.  I certainly won’t let months get in between us again!

We’ve been very busy cultivating our photography business.  We have become crazy popular but we’re loving every minute of it!  The only downside is that it really cuts into our family time on the weekends.  Last weekend we had a request for a photo session from a friend.  His wife had a bone marrow transplant a few weeks back and because of the immune system stuff and because she’s out of town for treatment, they don’t see her very often.  Of course we were excited to help with the Valentine’s photos as a surprise for her but we were feeling guilty about leaving the kids behind for another shoot.  I think we had three that weekend and this one was a favor.  So we took them!  We let them run around the park for a half an hour before the shoot and when my friend and his sons arrived the older kids raced around like crazy people!  They had such a blast and although it certainly made shooting so much more difficult I’m glad they could join us this time.

We managed to talk them into a few photos too!

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We set up a ladder/scaffolding for a few photos and the kids were under the impression we brought a jungle gym!

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Kate’s hair is getting so big and long.  She’s still not a fan of having anything to keep it out of her eyes!

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                                                                                                      H  O  N  K  !  !  !  !

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The photos of my friend and his kids came out well; the boys were super sweet!  If you want to see those you’ll have to check out the photo blog – www.yaporiginals.com

It’s great to “see” you again!