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| Here at the the Parente house, we've recently experienced one of those rare times when all 4 kids transition into something new all at once. It's fun and poignant and it makes their mom's head spin a little! 
At the end of the last school year (which we had approached very casually), Joel was struggling over basic phonics and I was thinking, that in spite of his very verbal tendencies, that I had a very long road ahead of me in terms of teaching him to read. As it turns out, with the pressure off, Joel used the basic things we'd learned during school time to teach himself to read phonetically. By the end of the summer he could read most simple, 3-letter words and write the whole alphabet upper and lowercase with no assistance. He's continued to slowly progress and then suddenly in the last couple of weeks, he's exploded into full-blown reading, leaving my simple lessons in the dust. I thought for sure someone had clued him in when he read "Parking Entrance" to me a week ago, but that was followed with reading phrases like "The Pilgrim's Thanksgiving", "Subtract the following", and "Pirate For Hire". He's now decidedly bored with his Sing Spell Read & Write readers. 
After one tearful attempt this spring to get Seth to write his own name, I backed off completely and allowed him to "play" school along with us at his own pace. We tried to write a few letters again at the beginning of this school year and we played with letter flashcards as well, but progress was painfully slow. I bought him a Leapfrog Letter Factory DVD a few weeks ago and after watching it a few times, everything seems to have come together for him. He has memorized the sound each letter makes, he can write his name (which he has proven by writing it on the wall, the table, my notebook...), and yesterday he walked up to me holding a piece of mail and said "O-F-F. That spells off!" Fun stuff! 
I have included Mariah in our school time, mostly, I confess, to keep her out of trouble. She has seemed to enjoy participating, but most of the time she hums, fidgets or talks to herself while we do our morning review. I was stunned when I asked the boys to recite the last 4 scriptures they learned and Mariah stood up first and rattled off all 4 AND their references! I suppose someone really was listening. :) 
Elaina has been a crawling, stair-climbing, cruising maniac since before she was 6 months old. She's gradually begun to try pretty much any food the rest of the family is eating although she has only 2 tiny teeth at nearly 9 months old. (For reference, Mariah had 8 teeth at 8 months.) She doesn't have much hair either. In fact, she has significantly less than either of the boys did at her age! She is still the most needy baby I've had to date and one of her favorite pastimes is to hang on my legs and (loudly) whine while I wash dishes or cook. She says "Mama" as a general cry anytime she has a need and of course "Dada" is a happy, excited word! We're not sure if she knows who's who with the names just yet. She has been sick for over 3 weeks and at her worst, attempted to nurse only 5-6 times over a 3 day period. Just as I was resigning myself to the idea of taking her to the ER, she began to improve and it seems she's finally over the hump now. After about 24 hours of seeming much more like herself and resuming her old eating schedule, she started teething, seems to be working on 3 or 4 at once and now she's miserable again! 
Joe and I celebrated 8 years of marriage on the 27th of October and Joe turned 27 that day as well! Joel said he would like to be 27 years old and do whatever he wants. (HA!) and Seth stopped him saying "No, Joel! Then you'd be a grandpa!" We're certainly not grandparents yet, but time sure does fly! We're looking forward to Seth's Birthday on the 25th, the arrival of a new niece thereabouts and our favorite holiday, Thanksgiving! | | |
| This day did not sneak up on me... Well, not as much as birthdays usually do. Mariah is such a fun person to celebrate that we've been looking forward to her third birthday for a while and honestly, I've mistakenly thought to myself that she was already 3 more than once in the past few months. She is tall for her age, and often very grown up. She likes to get my attention by putting on her best teenager face and saying "Seriously, Mom...." before telling me something. She potty trained herself a few weeks ago and basically did so in 24 hours with very little assistance. After potty training the boys, I was delighted! She asked for baby dolls and a pink guitar for her birthday and got both wishes. She loved the dollhouse we got her and the doll from Mamala and Poppa, but the neon pink (and very loud--Thank you, Natalie and Emilie!) electric guitar was the hit of the night. I guess I shouldn't have been surprised. Months ago we were at Panera for lunch. Mariah was twirling around by our table and an older couple nearby smiled and asked her if she was a ballerina. She wrinkled up her face and said in her "cool" voice, "No, I'm a Rock Stah!" One morning I was in the shower and I heard her crying and pounding on the door. I turned off the water, grabbed my towel, yanked the door open and said "What's the matter!?" She wailed, "The boys kicked me out of the band!" She was absolutely inconsolable until she was reinstated as the drummer. Total strangers have felt the need to tell me what a funny, quirky girl she is... and they're right. She is such a unique and unpredictable little person. She has the funniest, sweetest little voice. I don't know how it's possibly for someone to have a squeaky high pitched voice and a low one at the same time, but she does. In spite of her often fierce independence, she can't bear to be separated from Joel and Seth whom she refers to as "my boys". She's only recently begun to really love playing with baby dolls and such and while she loves to do so, she's just as content (if not moreso) to tag along on an adventure with the boys and twice as likely than either of them to do something daring... unless there's a bug involved. She'll pet a giant python with no hesitation, but heaven forbid a common fly land in her general vicinity or anyone in a 3 mile radius might hear the protest. She can often be found dressed up in her Cinderella dress with a helmet on and carrying a sword. There's so much I could say about her and while I've been busy typing away, August 24th has slipped away entirely and her 4th year has begun. We love her so very much and I'll never forget the feeling of finding out that I had a daughter of my very own. Of all of the wonderful days of my life, that one is way up there! 
With the flowers Daddy got for her.
A couple weeks ago with her best buds.
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I edited some photos down to a "reasonable" size so I could post them last night, but I gave up and went to bed before I was done. Abby has inspired me to finish, so here's the official update on the Parentes. 
Joe continues to work downtown at Elias/Savion Advertising. His job has been such a blessing to us and he has earned a great deal of favor there. In his "spare" time, he is the North Braddock Campus Torch'd (youth) leader at Word & Worship where he also oversees all things technical and participates in several other ministries. (I know, you're all just shocked that he's so busy, right?) At the moment, he's up to his nose in preparations for the Reach Conference, which he puts a tremendous amount of heart and effort into every year. 
I am spending my days trying to keep up with our ever growing crew. I'm gearing up for our first "real" year of homeschooling. It's always interesting with a gradeschooler (!), a preschooler, a toddler and a baby under one roof! I'm trying to gracefully adjust to this new season of life. One big change is that I won't be working with the youth group as an official leader anymore in the fall. I'm very sad but also very confident it is the right decision. 
Joel is brimming with excitement about the start of the schoolyear. This kid loves to learn! He's enjoyed taking piano lessons for the past couple of months and now has a long list of other classes and lessons he'd like to take. Joe and I recently learned the hard way that we can no longer spell our conversations out loud if we want to keep a secret now that Joel is learning to read! 
Joel recently gave everyone in the house an "Indian" name and Seth's was "Makes-Everyone-Laugh-a-Lot." Very fitting. He loves to sing and play music and spends an hour pretty much every day standing next to the CD player with his guitar. His big excitement this month was spending the day at the hospital getting stitches after Joel hit him in the head with a golf club. (It was an accident! ;)) Most days he can't decide if he wants to be just like his big brother or do the exact opposite of whatever Joel is up to. 
Mariah has enough personality for 3 little girls, which is sometimes more than enough for her mother! She looks into the mirror most mornings and says, "Hello, my name is Mariah and I love to dance!" She's had a huge growth spurt and went from being a tad on the small side to being quite a big, tall 2 (almost 3) year old. A couple of days ago she informed me that she wanted to wear underwear and she's been using the potty since, albeit with a few accidents. 
Look at this big chubby girl! I just can't believe how quickly she's grown! Elaina spent the first 3 months of her life crying to be picked up (and continuing to cry after that) and now she cries to be put down so she can play! She seemed to transform overnight from a colicky newborn into a smiling, playful baby. She loves, loves, loves, water. She exerts so much energy in the pool and bathtub that she usually wears herself out completely. With 3 older siblings, she's got all sorts of silly nicknames and plenty of attention. One of her favorite parts of the day is greeting daddy when he comes home from work. On the rare occasion that he can't stop and pick her up right away, she puts up quite a protest! Our summer has been flying by, but we still have plans to participate in the Reach Conference, take a trip to Idlewild with friends, perhaps see a ballgame in person, and to celebrate Mariah's 3rds birthday. | | |
| Golden Corral... not my favorite place to eat, but in this case, it was totally worth it just to watch Seth eat.       
Can something be kind of disgusting and totally adorable at the same time? | | |
| Joe requested fruit salad for dinner, so last night I cut up a ton of fruit and put in bowls for the kids... Joel: Wow! Thank you for making this, Mom! Seth: This is not regular dinner... This is... yummy dinner! (Gee, thanks, Seth!) Me: Well, you can thank the Lord because tonight, He's the one that really made dinner. He made all these good fruits and all I did was wash them and cut them up. Joel: That's true... I guess even a caveman could make this for dinner. Seth: We can call it a joint effort, Mom. Joel: Seth, do you even know what a "joint effort" is? Seth: Yeah, when you do it together. Joel: Mom... Me: Yes, Joel? Joel: A caveman really could have made this dinner. | | |
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