At The Age of Three....

• At the age of three, MK is in the 60th percentile for height and the 90th percentile for weight.
• At the age of three, MK reminds me daily, "When I was baby, you teach me to walk?" - yes, she can walk, run, twirl, roll over and dance the night away, her favorite dance being the twist.
• At the age of three, she loves music. She wakes up singing and goes to bed singing. MK sings church songs - This Little Light of Mine, Jesus Loves Me, Jesus Loves the Little Children of the World; she sings made up songs - Booty Ta-il (two syllables for tail, and we are not sure what prompted her to sing this song and we discourage her from singing this song, but admittedly so it is quite funny to hear and she dances to it as well); she sings classic childrens songs - Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star, Happy Birthday (she sings this to our entire family including the little "cha, cha, cha"), If You're Happy and You Know It - all sorts of songs; and then there is Beyonce - she even recognizes the song Halo before the words ever begin....so, in other words, she is a music, singer lover and well rounded in this category!
• At the age of three, she loves to pretend. At the doctor's office the other day, she turned my leg into a notebook with a little imagination. She was doing her speech homework and she would make this little clicking sound as she pretended to turn the pages. Pretending stretches into babies too. We always have a baby with us, most of the time in MK's little hand. She will tell us to be quiet because the baby is sleeping or she will tell us her baby is crying because she is sad or she is crying because she is in trouble or she is hiding - the baby is invisible of course so we find ourselves watching where we place things as MK gets most emotional if the baby is overlooked.
• At the age of three, MK is learning to play alone. We encourage MK to play in her room for 45 minutes each day. She does well, listens to music, plays puzzles, plays Legos, plays with her babies, etc. Although it is not an intentional thing on our parts, due to her age and her personality, she is most often the center of attention. This 45 minutes allows us all to take a step back :)
• At the age of three, MK talks about China. Her stories are most often fabricated from what she hears us talk about or what we have read about or what we have told her. Every airplane she sees is going to China. And every baby is from China.
• At the age of three, MK loves to have her nails painted, begs for lipstick, sits still to have her hair curled and prefers her plastic princess heals to most sensible, everyday shoes.
• At the age of three, MK attends speech twice a week. It has come to my attention recently that perhaps she is really taking it in when I tell her to look at me, slow down and say what she wants to say. Sometimes I have a difficult time determining who the teacher is. For example, MK will ask for something. I will have no idea what she is saying. She will say it again, slower trying to articulate better and then she will ask me, "Now, can you say that?" Her speech is coming along. At her three year check-up, the pediatrician stated to me that most often, he expects a stranger to be able to understand 75% of what a three year old says. He went on to say that he could understand 50% of what she was saying. Her speech is delayed, as expected, but it is definitely improving.
• At the age of three, MK is aware of feelings. She will tell us she is upset. She will ask if someone is happy. She will not rest easy until a crying baby has been soothed. When in trouble, she is quick to tell us, "It's not my fault." Above all, my favorite thing to hear her declare is, "I love you safe and happy!" She will look at us with those big, brown eyes (the ones that we have always adored), she will grab our cheeks with those chubby little hands and she will sweetly say, "I love you safe and happy!" At the age of three, she has quite a way with words.

Snow - Day 2

(Though MK came out later, she came prepared!)

7:00 AM our boys were up and ready for some snow action. Without breakfast, they took to the snow. We live in a very hilly neighborhood so we thought we could find a good sledding opportunity. No such luck. However, once the snow was packed down a little, the children had the most fun sledding down the hill in our front yard. Neighbors came and went on their golf carts. As time wore on, the snow began to melt. And as the snow began to melt, we all grew hungry. It was fun while it lasted.....

(The hand on the hip makes me laugh.)

Prayers

Lately Mason-Kate has been saying bedtime prayers with the boys. Rather, she has been saying their bedtime prayers for them or so she thinks. Anyway, they are quite cute and we all try hard to contain our laughter during this special time. This was her prayer tonight:
"Dear God. Thank you for today. Thank you for my family. Thank you for my friends....Sara Kate, Chloe, Colby and my Jaida. Thank you for Jaida's baby and her not be scared of da snow. Oh, her baby scared of da snow? Thank you Jaida not scared of da snow and thank you for da two monkeys jump on da bed and thank you for da two doctors who tell them NO! Amen."

Chinese New Year and/or Valentine's Day

Today we have reason to celebrate double in our home. One, it is Valentine's Day and two, it is the Chinese New Year. The children were taken with their cards they have received throughout the week as well as the gifts they were given this morning. We had a delicious breakfast and then it was off to church. We have been visiting a new church or rather, a new, very large church, one of the largest in our area. I have even taken it upon myself to nickname the church, "the city" and city it is. There are so many different routes you can take to get to one location; there are golf carts that drive you from the parking lot to the varying locations within the church that you may be visiting; there are several services of all types; it is a great, big church. That said, Pryce asked me a few weeks ago when we were going to announce to the minister who our family was; though he can be shy, he likes recognition. I pondered this question and came to the conclusion that it must be strange for Pryce to be visiting a new church. Our former church is really the only church he has ever known. We camp with our former minister and his family, we go to the beach with them, we take piano in their home, they are part of our family. It must be strange for a child to go from something so intimate to something so extraordinary. That said, today was our day. As chance would have it, as we were walking out of the building, the minister and his wife rounded the corner. He is a very pleasant man and immediately smiled and said hello. I quickly smiled back and said, "Hello. I would like for you to meet my son, Pryce." The rest is history. Pryce took it from there, had a conversation with the minister as well as his wife and then introduced the remainder of our family. We exited the church building and Pryce, with his wide, toothless grin stated, "Wow, I feel like a celebrity!" Recognition. Once we were home, the family gathered for our Chinese New Year feast. With our finest of China and the candles lit, we all sat down for our meal. MK asked to say our blessing. Because of the special occasion the boys were allowed a bottled Coke. At first Pryce questioned why about the Coke, then he asked, "Well, why exactly are we celebrating the Chinese New Year if we are American?" Colin jumped in and exclaimed, "It is because we have a sister from China!" Oh yeah. At that point, they both raised their bottles of Coke and gave a toast in honor of their baby sister!

The Snow - Day 1

Mid-afternoon on Friday, the snow began - barely. The children, thinking that this may be the only snow they may ever taste or see, quickly stopped battling to take it all in.....

Thursday afternoon I was driving the children over to a local indoor pool to swim. The sky looked grey and the clouds were thick and it was COLD. As I often do, I called Ryan to talk. I jokingly asked him if snow was in the forecast. He said, "Well, not today but tomorrow we are supposed to get 2-3 inches of snow. It will never happen." Well, 24 hours later the snow DID happen and the children were mesmerized, excited and everything in between. All of them except our little "snow plum" - MK's Chinese name translates into snow plum but a snow plum she is not.

Her initial response was overwhelming joy as seen in the pic. However, it didn't take long for her to decide that the snow was much too messy and she was in need of an umbrella.

Once again, it did not take long for her to decide that the snow was just not all that. She said, "Dis to messy. I go paint." OK.

Paint we did....with our hat on, just in case :)

Meanwhile, the boys were out back on our trampoline....I am positive this is a safe practice, right?

And then came the inevitable snow ball fighting.....

and the snow kept falling which meant there needed to be some sledding involved....

which led to much happiness.....