Isaiah's new trick

I guess it's about time we posted a video of number 4
izzy's new trick from Allison Speier on Vimeo.
Here he is trying to imitate Kateri sticking her tongue out...

Daddy love

Isaiah lights up when Luke comes home from work. He gives him this adoring smile and leans out of our arms towards him like he is trying to swim through the air to get to him. Maybe he is just happy to get a break from the smothering love of all the little mothers in his life. Either way it is pretty sweet.

A long delayed post

I have been having trouble posting of late. I think blogger and my decrepit, virus-riddled computer have teamed up to thwart me. I have tried to write a Christmas recap post many times, only to give up in frustration when I can't move photos around or accidentally delete text. So here is my last ditch effort, jumbled photos and all.


 Christmas happened: Here are the girls after Christmas Eve Mass and before setting out cookies for Santa. They decided to write last minute notes to Santa, which is always good for a parent's blood pressure. You can see excitement was running high.

 



Nanny and Papa came to stay the day after Christmas which meant stinky cheese and port for dessert.

It was a very Hobbity, Lego-y Christmas at the Speier house. Luckily I married a man who enjoys building things out of tiny pieces of plastic.

 



Isaiah got lots of adorable winter wear from his relatives.

 

Audrey followed in Lili's 2nd grade footsteps and donated her hair to Locks of Love



The girls' school put on a production of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. They had a blast.

This little man continues to grow and light up our lives. He is finally rolling around, but in general remains a sweet, contented blob of chub.



So that's it for now. Hopefully I can get back to posting more regularly

3 months

3 months gone in the blink of an eye.

Wasn't it just this morning he looked like this?

All wrinkly and sweet and tiny?

Somewhere in between the laundry and homework and cooking and cluster feeding, my little man turned into a roly poly little cherub. He traded in his skinny little chicken legs for a lovely set of cankles. 

One thing hasn't changed: we are all still madly in love with him. He has been such a joy...such a happy baby (as long as you don't try to put him in a car seat.)

Thank you, Emily, for capturing him so beautifully at these stages. If they make me all weepy now, what is going to happen in ten years when I look back on them?

M.O.M.

 So, Lili and Audrey have started having "school" for Kateri when they come home in the afternoons. They have named their program "Mary our Mother" school, aka M.O.M. as in "M.O.M. is such a slacker at homeschool preschool that we have to take matters into our own hands." I guess they can't have me embarrassing them next year when Kateri starts kindergarten woefully unprepared.
Anyway, here is the pile of supplies I found when the big girls went to school on Monday:

I especially like Lili's lesson plan...my favorite is how she wanted to start with a placement test to "see where she is at" although we may need to outsource her spelling program to someone who can, you know, spell.

Here are the rules and contract promising good behavior.

It has actually been really nice the past two afternoons. Lili gets Kateri set up with some work and then does her own homework, taking turns with Audrey, who is the "co-teacher" and handles religion and science. Religion consists of storytelling in the legendary style of the legendary Miss Stagg. I need to set up a hidden camera to catch her in action. I need a video of "choir practice" too, to catch Kateri fudging her way through the Latin hymn Lili has tried to teach her.

 

It all has made for a nice quiet pre-dinner hour.

I wonder how long they will keep it up.

A little comparison

Now that Isaiah is starting to chunk out a little, he looks a little bit more like a Speier baby.

Here he is today.

Compared to Kateri four years ago

 

 

 

Isaiah's Baptism

 Isaiah was welcomed into the Church on October 13th. He wore the gown and bonnet that my father was baptized in. It has been used by three generations, but this was the first Speier child who had a small enough head to wear the bonnet. (Much to his father's delight.)

 

With his Godparents, Uncle Steve and Aunt Cindy

the family with Fr. Vietor (and Abby in self-imposed exile in the background)

 It was a blessing to have both grandmothers there on Isaiah's big day.

 The occasion even put to rest the ancient feud between Luke and his "arch enemy" Tesfaye, who had been praying novenas that his nemesis be blessed with a male heir.

It was a beautiful day, but although the sacrament washed away his Original Sin, it didn't turn Isaiah into a perfect angel, as you can see from this shot after Mass the following week.