growing the tree

The hubby is on a quest to fill out his family tree. He tried doing this 5 years ago, but for whatever reason is back on the trail. He even found a long lost grand-aunt, a 2nd cousin to his grandfather this weekend.

Weekend was pretty low key. His brother was up here for some family gatherings including the niece's birthday party. We brought the Wii over and competed in golf and tennis matches while the girls climbed and crawled around us. The twins at least are still under swinging level.

Watching the twins play is rather funny. One adores the other, while the other seems to have a need for privacy. N really enjoys playing with her sister and often copies the things she does, even copies her crouched tantrum position as if it were a new game. And while you can ask N to throw the ball to C, which she does, C flatly refuses to throw the ball to N, though she will toss it to you. Sometimes, they play well together. But the nicety is a short lived cease fire before one of them gets grumpy or frustrated. Then you have to watch for the biting. Once we came over and N had a nice red outlined circle on her arm.

C tries to hide underneath the table or high chairs or coffee table in her own little private nook. She cries at the word "share". (They both cry at "no".) N is the more rambunctious of the two and sometimes just kind of runs or kicks or hits her sister inadvertantly, which makes C cry, then when you tell N to be careful, she cries. oh boy.

They cry differently. C cries in that "I'm dying" kind of wail regardless of the infraction. N has a lower tone longer drawn out whining lament cry.

C was successfully fed a strawberry without any adverse reaction! whoo-hoo! They both love apricots, actually, they both love food. And even though the apricots were tart, they still kept eating them. Must be that Ilokano in them.

Their older sister E is now 6 and has lost her two front teeth. We do know that she understand what we're saying despite not being able to give a reply, though the hubby seems to have these conversations with her, like the following:

Hubby: Happy Birthday E!
E: (runs around, then stops at the mirror) thank you!
Hubby: oh, so you can talk. Does your mommy know you can talk?
E: (runs around, then stops at the mirror) no.
Hubby: oh ok, so you're just playing with mommy.
E: yes

Her mom does speak with her teacher and does know that there are things and behaviors she does at school that she doesn't do at home and vice versa. Like when she doesn't like someone, she'll say, "Ayaw," I don't like. Fortunately her teacher is Filipino and understands what she's saying even though the adult she doesn't like doesn't understand her.

Rhett's brother just looks at the kids and gets tired and he wonders how they do it. From what I can tell, from my parents, and others I've watched, well, you suck it up and just do it. It's not like they can get up one morning and say, "I'm tired of taking care of my kids, so I won't."

When we used to babysit them overnight, it was quite exhausting. But I have to admit that when I'm down, I do go back through the clips of videos I've taken of them, and they always make me smile. Good thing they're so gosh darn cute!