Samantha and Sierra celebrate birthdays

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SAMANTHA IS TWO YEARS OLD!
Samantha is a very happy girl and brings us all much joy. She is so very different from how she was a year ago you’d never know she was the same baby. She is no longer quiet, shy, lethargic or easily frightened (although she is terrified of the dark and of strangers talking to her, especially if they’re strangers to me too) nor is she meek or mild mannered. She is also no longer underweight (although getting her to eat is ssometimes still a struggle) and although she is small she is not that far off from big sis. Sierra was around 23 pounds at this age and Samantha is 21 pounds and Samantha, at 32 inches, is either 1/4 of an inch taller or 1/2 inch shorter than Sierra at this age (depending if you go by my measuring of the doctor)! She does have tiny feet though and still wears size 3 shoes (and still fits into size 2)!! She is a fabulous sleeper (after many months of much struggling) but will not go to sleep for anyone but me. She will stay awake until midnight (bedtime 8:00) waiting for me, even if she’s in bed for hours!

My sister says I have already turned her into a neat-nick clean freak and that she is another mini-me! I find that very funny and although I can't say if it's true I do know that Samantha is very neat and polite. She MUST have a bib when eating. When I say "must" I mean she will not eat if we can’t find her a bib! She also must have a napkin and always puts it in her lap (and tells us we must put our napkins in our laps)! Her table mess must be cleaned up after she is done eating and if it doesn’t get done she will attempt to do it by herself. She gets very upset if someone else makes a mess and doesn’t clean it up, even the dogs! She is very polite always asking nicely, usually saying please and always saying thank you and expecting a "you’re welcome"!

She is a little talker. She doesn’t have a huge vocabulary but a nice normal vocabulary. With Sierra I felt like we missed the toddler period altogether because she moved through every phase so quickly that she was like a five year old by age two. With Samantha we’re really enjoying the fun toddler phase. She cannot say “S” sounds (we’re hoping that’s normal) so she calls herself, “Nana”. Beginning around October she has exclusively talked in sentences, usually two to three word sentences but sometimes longer. Some of her favorite things to say are; “NO MOM” (to virtually everything, usually followed by what she wants to do/have instead, that's the only time she calls me mom otherwise it's mommy or mama!), “let go ide (outside) now, Nana put on boots” which she does, “Dad Home” (when she hears any noise outside), “nana eyes hurt” (when she’s tired), "nana poppy (potty) with mommy/jeijei now. Nana need poppy papew (tp)” She always goes to the potty when I go so I bought her a potty last fall so at least she wasn’t in my lap and now she has to wipe herself and thinks going potty is one of the most fun things ever! She also has tons of cute/funny words for things like a car is a "bye bye" and a phone is a "hello" and she'll just randomly say strange things like, "hey boy come ere", which she just said today out of the blue (she was talking to herself). Today she also said that baby yunny is her baby. She just talks and talks!

She is also a creature of habit. Every morning she asks for “egg, doat (toast), O's and juice please”. Every day at lunch she asks for “fwuit, milk and yoyo(yogurt)” in addition to what we are having. Whenever we drop off Sierra (anywhere) she screams and yells how Jeijie goen byebye, how much she loves Sissy Jei Jei and how we’ll see her doon! She is obsessed with babies, particularly Sunny (whom she calls baby yunny) and begs whomever is holding her to let her hold her. She also regularly tries to pull her out of people’s arms, while hugging, in an attempt to have her to herself. Sunny is now 3 months old, the perfect size for Samantha to carry around, but for some reason my sister won’t let her! ;-) She also adores Dodo (Logan) and will jump up and down while screaming if she knows we will be seeing him. She has only recently begun watching TV (in general we don’t watch much TV and never during the school week) and Dora is the only show she really likes. We also tried Ni Hao Kailan but for some reason she loves Dora and dislikes Kailan. She can sing the Dora song (she also has Dora singing books ) and wants the same boots as Boots!

SIERRA IS 11 YEARS OLD

Sierra had a great birthday. Her best friend was with us for the actual day. We had Japanese, her all-time favorite since she was two years old (I was reading the journal I keep for her) and I made brownies and cupcakes because she couldn't decide! We had her party at a miniature golf place. Her first time ever not having her party at home. It was also the last. She didn't enjoy being split up from her friends for the golf or not being able to socialize. I didn't enjoy it either. The only good side is there was no mess to clean up. After the party she had her three friends who moved away last summer spend the night. She was sooooo excited just to see them let alone spend the night. They used to see each other daily at school but now only every few months. They had a blast. Two of them adore Samantha so I got the night and the next morning off with so many helpers!

Sierra is doing extremely well. We are now Homeschooling because the mean girl bullying just got to be too much. I NEVER imagined I'd homeschool - it's just not me! We found a homeschool charter where she takes classes two days a week. Trying to teach her (which so far isn't difficult except the massive amount of organizing, paperwork and grading!) while still working from home full-time and taking care of Samantha is a massive challenge but I'm muddling through. She was assessed for all subjects and while I knew she was very smart I had no idea how smart! She is in the 8th and 9th grade curriculm for most subjects although she tested much higher on the Language Arts side. My biggest challenge is that she is in Algebra, which I can't help her with at all!

I can't believe my baby girl is 11 years old! Thankfully Sierra is still a mommy's girl. We've never had a real argument and she still likes to hang out with me. She is also very protective of me, as I am of her, and if I get hurt she RUNS to get me ice, a bandaid, water or whatever she thinks I need. She is also very, very polite and well mannered and always tries to help people out. She is still very, very sensitve and very, very, very observant. She is also an awesome big sister! After wanting to be a scientist (and writer and artist) for what seems like forever she now wants to be a chef! Her favorite show is now Last Restaurant Standing a British reality show. She is getting very into her Britishness (she is a British subject as well as an American citizen) as well as her various ethnic heritages. She really is a joy and brings such happiness to all of us it's impossible to express.

For some reason you must CLICK on each page of the Sierra birthday photos...no idea why since everything else I've made is automatic. I made another version of the Sierra through the years post just for her but she seems to prefer this one! Anyway...I hope you like it, especially relatives and friends who haven't been able to see Sierra as much as we would all like! FYI the VERY LONG post just before this is also new. This birthday post was initially part of that but I moved this from the other post because Sierra wanted her birthday post to be on it's own so she could read the comments!