been a while...

so it's been a while since the last post... thought some pictures would be better than lots of words. Since Tagen's birthday we've been on a trip to the Big Island to see Kyle's dad - the kids call him Papa and his wife Momo... we've been on an easter egg hunt... we've been to the beach plenty times... watching the little monkeys grow and develop in amazing ways. These kids are tight - they love each other so much & it's a blessing to witness...

Tagen Train Turned Tree Today!

Our little beloved Train...
Today you turned THREE years old! It really is hard to believe how quickly time can fly when moment by moment it can seem to go so slow sometimes. I measured you on our growth chart today and you are now taller than a peacock! You grow quickly little man! And you are cuter than ever in the things you think of to say. Just a few days ago you were sitting on the couch with your auntie looking at all the freckles on her arm. You laid your head in her lap and were looking up at the ceiling obviously deep in thought. The ceiling in our living room is wood with lots of knots and different shades of browns and you said, "look at all the freckles on our ceiling!"... You have also been interested in what Jesus has made. "Did Jesus make da clouds?" you ask. "Did Jesus make Beyda? me? you?! Mustard?" ... the more you've learned to talk the more and more questions you ask. I think it was just in the past few months you learned the question "why?" You used to say "where?" which never made any sense why you asked where so i usually wouldn't answer but that would obviously frustrate you because I think the whole time you meant to say "why?" oh man. So once you got that straightened out, that's taken our conversations to an entirely new level to where sometimes I just have to say "because" and thankfully, for now, you are satisfied with that answer and sweetly reply, "oh."

I was recently reading an article about the importance of raising a boy to be tough - I'm not talking about one who fights and never cries and never admits weakness because many men like that are called tough but inside are often weak and insecure. Rather the kind of boy who becomes a man who is tough in his inner being making his spirit resilient in the face of adversity. One who is so strengthened in his spirit that he will not allow obstacles to stop him or the pounding of public opinion to deter him. When everyone misunderstands, he does not succumb to self-doubt.
My son, whatever path you choose in life will be littered with signs that say, "closed to you; you can't do it; this is for people more talented or advantaged; you can't make a difference." And if you believe the signs and stop to ponder, you will hear voices saying, "You are not important; no one cares; it is not worth it; quit now." The weak ones go no further. They settle down and accept the lot that is handed to them and spend the rest of their lives unhappy and unfulfilled. Not you Tagen Train. It is my deep prayer for you today my son that YOU will never believe those signs and never slow down to listen to those voices. Granted it may be that you won't win a Nobel prize or be recognized with applause at a banquet; but how I pray that you will know in your heart that at the end of your days you have run the course and overcome the hardships to conquer, even in the little areas that only matter to a quiet few. You will not be a quitter, slacker, or buck passer. At the end of your life, you will have tasted of the sweetness, heard the music, and worn the crown of victory. It is not a tough exterior that matters in the end. It is a tough spirit, an overcoming spirit, a spirit of service. My love may you be able to say, "I have lived, and it was good... very, very good." By the grace of God we will raise you to be tough and faithful the way God wants you to be so that you will be able to reap many many good fruits from these priceless characteristics.
We love you to the moon and back our little superhero!

oh and did i mention california???

i think i forgot to mention the aveda & i traveled to california about a month ago. perhaps because only now am i just about fully recovered from this excursion. it was the first time just the boys were alone for a number of consecutive days in row and just the girls too. we went for garrett (my brother) & rachel's wedding which was awesome to witness, attend and celebrate with them and for the most part travels went well. It's a stinking long flight from hawaii to california - moreso when you have a 16 month old to travel with. But being used to toting around a 16 month old AND a 2, almost 3 year old, traveling seemed a lot easier. Until the day after the wedding (the day before we were to fly back home) and aveda started throwing up. mmm, awesome to deal with when you're away from home. By God's grace, we had already planned to drive up and see my good friend Heather for the day... so this is where we were heading when disaster struck. Blueberry throw up on the car ride up... we made it to heathers... thought maybe it was just some fluke thing... rested a little - got us all cleaned up, hopped in the car to go downtown santa barbara... got maybe 100 yards down the road and she threw up again. oh Lord... this was a nasty one. Oh how grateful i am for my dear friend Heather. Who else would have cleaned up my own child's vomit and been ok with it?! Who else would have so graciously kept me in her home all day with my sick pukey baby alongside her own two kids who easily could have caught this same bug?!
So the day went on... nothing like I had expected to spend this rare occasion of being in SB again but looking back I wouldn't have wanted to be in anyone else's home at that time. The saga continued however as we were trying so hard to delay my flight thinking I would have to travel home with a sick sick child. Did I mention Thanksgiving was 4 days later? Making it virtually impossible to change the flight. Well that and the fact that daddy wanted me back exactly when he'd expected. Ugh. ok I was thankful he was taking care of kid A and all but I wasn't really feelin' the sympathy of dealing with pukey kid B... anyways, agreeing to come home the next morning we had to do more loads of laundry, wash vomit off of blankie for the third? time, and pack up to leave for LA that evening where we would spend the night to be there in time for the flight the next morning. So we (me, aveda, heather and her baby oliver) leave the house... made it further down the freeway this time and alas, baby threw up... again. Mom starts crying - can't DO this! i cried. Did i mention Heather's an ER nurse? We go to the ER to see about getting some super pricey anti-nausea pills for aveda for the plane ride home only to find out Doc. thinks it's not the best thing to give a baby on a plane. Frustration is a word that pales in comparison to what i was feeling at this moment in time. We take a hospital sheet to cut up and use as rags if needbe on the airplane. We leave the ER and go grab some food since heather and I am so starving it's about to do us in. After one more little pukey episode just before pulling away from the curb, off we drive to LA. We make it there - not exactly a place any mom would want to stay with her sick baby for the night but mostly because NO place but home or back at Heather's would suffice at this point. We made it through the night. Next morning we're all cleaned up, packed up, ready to leave... standing in the lobby waiting for the shuttle to take us to the airport and oh no... she's making those noises again... oh Lord please no. She threw up again - all over me - neck to waist, my shirt is wet. So I had a change of clothes for the both of us in my carry on bag but here's the dilemma. What if she does this again later and it's even worse than this and then i have nothing to change into?! So I stay in my pukey shirt and off we go to the airport. HOW are we going to make it home?
I know lots of people were praying for us at this point and by the grace of God aveda did not throw up the entire plane ride. In fact, not only did she not throw up, it was probably the easiest possible plane ride that one could have with a 16 month old because she just passed out on my lap and slept nearly the ENTIRE 5+ hour ride home. incredible. Thank You Jesus.
The sickness continue with a few more throw ups back home but the point is, we made it back home. Then Aveda so graciously shared her tummy bug with her big brother Tagen. But it's all behind us now... which maybe you can understand why only now am I able to write about it.

the whole fam...

so some of you say we put lots of great pictures of the kids on this blog but none of mama and papa... soooo, these are what i could find of us... a family photo - courtesy of our good friends katie and daniel who are visiting right now... and some of daddy teaching tagen how to surf. tagen was so excited to be standing up and surfing in the shallow waters of Poipu. Until the surfboard got kicked out. Apparently surfboards aren't allowed there. oh well - it was fun while it lasted!

tagen train surfing

Tagen's swimming lesson - day 3. can you believe it?! he's NOT screaming in this one. incredible!



aveda day 3... still crying but dang... gettin' it down! don't mind tagen who walks RIGHT in FRONT of me as i'm filming but you get the idea...



and another of her...



so the kids have "graduated" from their swimming lessons. they've got it down and we are so grateful they have this life saving skill! thursay i was in the water with them... that was a traumatizing day - more for me than them i think. auntie glendy was teaching me all the skills she's taught them and i'm obviously nowhere near as pro as she so i made the kids swallow a lot of water that day. sad. then tagen threw up all over me after i brought him out of the pool. puke from my neck down to my thigh and in my bathing suit. everywhere. oh gag. we got it off though... made it through and then friday dad was in the pool with them and they did AMAZING. i'll get those videos uploaded some day...

swimming lessons... day 2

Ok so we've made it through day TWO of swim lessons.... Tagen did NOT want to go today. There was still a lot of screaming going on but they are definitely improving and by the time we were walking back out to our car to leave Tagen's words... and i quote "dat was fun mom!"
Tomorrow I will probably have to remind him he actually said these words. Anyways, brace yourself if you're willing to watch the kids get launched...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srRRwe4y7Mc

here Tagen is actually swimming to the wall without any physical support from auntie!



aveda getting tossed and coming up face up... craziness! i know there's a lot of screaming going on but really they're improving!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2cz0j5xrEsg

(sorry for the youtube confusion... sometimes it worked to post it right onto this page and other times you have to copy/link it to another page... anyways, hope you can view it ok)

aveda & tagen's 1st day of swim lessons...

aside from lots and lots of screaming and crying the 1st day of swim lessons have gone really well. I am amazed at how the kids already have learned certain techniques... i'll get better clips and pics as the days go on but for now here's one of how aveda has learned how to flip from her tummy to her back so she can breath. good thing huh?

What dis sound is mama?

Tagen Train is very attune to the world he lives in. He hears new sounds, sees new things, tastes new things, smells new things and touches new things daily. The most frequently asked question from him lately is "what dis sound is mama?" whenever he hears almost any loud... or even subtle noise. whether it's inside our outside this question is asked. It's really cute the way he says it... I've gotta get it recorded some time. Sometimes I feel like he has just stepped into a foreign country and I am his interpreter for sounds, words, smells, and so on. "what's dis called?" is another common question along with comments like mmm, i yike (like) dis. and ewwww. i no yike dis.

the funniest one lately though is how he's figured out that if another kid (his sister most often) has a toy that he wants it's not the best method to grab it out of his or her hand because that usually results in time out. So he searches the premises for another desirable toy then goes back to kid A and says "you like trade?" ... it works well with Aveda right now because she couldn't really care less what toy she's playing with as long as she's got something. I can see in the near future she's gonna figure out this sly way of Tagen and have differing opinions about this trading game. then what???
until later we here in the strange land of the maligro household sign off.

a day in the life...

6something... hear aveda and walk out in some groggy state sit on the couch to cuddle & nurse...
back to bed

7ish: hear tagen hit the wall - for whatever reason he does this every morning as he wakes up - then climbs out of bed with his 2 blankies, sippie cup, and book or toy in hand saying 'mommy, my awake... my awake mommy" the whole way walking from his room into ours. climbs in bed with us until he hears aveda wake up which then makes him say "Beyda aWAKE mama!" So he jumps out of bed and runs out to welcome her into the new glorious day. How is has so much energy first thing in the morning is beyond me.

7-8: breakfast and curious george cartoon... mom and dad drink coffee

8 to ? change diapers, playdough session, painting, playing reading, jumping, running inside/outside, tagen and aveda loving and fighting

10: aveda takes a little cat nap, Tagen watches his favorite show: Caillou. Mom and Dad look online for a battery charger to a Power Wheels mom scored from our field trip to the thrift store yesterday. It's a little power wheels race car that costs $250 brand new and I found it for $7! just need a stinking charger so it actually moves again. even so the kids have had great fun with it already.

11: mom makes a picnic lunch for the kids to eat outside under the avocado tree. kids play outside in the sprinkler and kiddie pool

11:30 aveda grinds more food than tagen and mom combined!

12:30-1: for some odd reason the kids LOVE to play on mom and dad's bed. i think they could hang out there all day probably. they wrestled and played forever up there laughing, giggling, & kung fu flighting...

1ish-3: NAPS for both kids. It is my goal every day to make sure these two kids take a nap at the same time. it happened today!
Mom packed food into mini cooler thing, cleaned up, took cat nap - oh how i love to nap!

3:30 Whole family heads off to Pikalas (Beach) with another family and their kids...

4:30 Dad takes tagen way out in the ocean to go surfing. It's his 2nd real surf session with daddy and he's loving it! They catch lots of ways and ride soooo far in. amazing!
Lots of sandy buns, swimming in the warm water and eating food... unless you're aveda. then you're eating lots of sand too.

6:30 the sun is starting to go down and since this is a beach you kinda hike into we have to start walking back to the car.

6:45 McDonalds ice cream sundae on the way home

7pm bath time, wild hyperness after baths, reading books together

7:30pm nigh-nigh beyda (she's starting to say "ny ny" and blowing a kiss)

7:45pm nigh-nigh tagen

now here i sit writing this... nigh nigh!

been a while...

So it's been a while since writing on this blog page... the biggest thing that's happened was going back to santa barbara for a couple weeks. Just me and kids along with a good friend of mine here and her kids. Somehow our husbands opted out of the whole flying with a 1,2,3 and 4 year old (ages of all our kids at the time) - who could blame em? It is indeed pretty crazy flying with two little ones. But by the grace of God we made it not only there, but back here too and we had a awesome worthwhile time going back to a town full of so many memories for us. It was wonderful to see old friends and just to get of the rock (aka Kauai) for a little while. Coming home was good too - it actually felt like we were coming "home" instead of just this cool place to vacation that has always seemed beautiful but still foreign in a sense to me. I guess after a year of living here some roots having grown deep into this place. More than that is the people I've been graced to meet and walk some of life with together. So anyways, it is good to be home again.

because things like this are a BIG change in our household...

So a little less than a week ago our son, Tagen Train, finally figured out how to crawl out of his crib. I'm actually suprised he never attempted it prior to this but we were able to keep him in it for just over 2 and 1/2 years of his life. And isn't it funny that until things like this change you don't really appreciate how wonderful it is that your two year is going to be in the same place you put him down to take a nap or go to sleep at night. He doesn't really have any other option. Now, however, we have entered a new season.
So the day he figured it out it was of course about 10 minutes before he was supposed to take a nap. I decided I had to put him down in his toddler bed for his nap. When I went in to check on him, he had crawled back into his crib to take his nap. Then when he deemed nap time was done, he crawled out, walked out into the living room like a member of the navy seal (ie: i didn't hear him coming) and walked right up behind me and said, "hi mom!" Oh, you should've seen the look on his face (and mine)... I wish I captured that on the camera... He was so proud of himself and I almost had a heart-attack.
Since then some naptimes and bedtimes have been harder than others getting him to stay put and not leave his room as he sees fit...
But even so, we are proud of Tagen Train and as we know our little boy is growing up to be a bigger boy in so many ways... this change just sticks out as a bigger one than others.

Little Miss AVM

Dear Little Miss Aveda Violet,

You are now officially a one year old. Incredible. It seems your first year of life has flown like the speed of light and yet there are moments throughout this one year you've lived where time seemed to stand still. I remember clear as day your entrance into this world and your very first days of life... we were privileged to stay at Goleta Valley Hospital for a few days where the AC was so refreshing we didn't want to leave! (You were born on a VERY hot summer day)

I remember the very first time your big brother met you and gave you a kiss welcoming you into our family. I remember sleeping on the couch with you for weeks as we were busy emptying our house of all furniture so we could move from Santa Barbara to Hawaii and how I would swaddle your tiny body up in your peach blankie making you look like the cutest little pea pod I'd ever seen. I remember the feeling of your thick silky black hair and your perfect mini eyebrows... your pinkie toenail that was as teeny as a mustard seed...

You are a smart little monkey girl... you learn so quickly. I was so excited when you learned how to sit up by yourself around 6 months of age. You were so excited too seeing the whole world from a new angle. This lasted only about a week because then you learned to crawl. Once you had that figured out nothing held you back from exploring every nook & cranny of our house. I definitely found more things in your mouth than I ever would have in Tagen's at your age. Mostly because your older brother would graciously "share" whatever he saw as good for "beyda" (as he calls you). By God's grace you never had too bad of a choking episode. thank You Lord! Anyways, by 10 months or so you started taking steps and in a flash you were walking! You watch and study all that your brother does and learn from him daily. He is a very good big brother to you and loves you so much. As you are getting older you two are playing together and cracking each other up more than ever before. You wrestle and roll and around and I'm thoroughly impressed with how you hold your own. You are a tough cookie AVM. We know when you are really truly hurt because only then do you really cry. Things that I think would hurt you... you just stand up and shake it off.



It seems you've been a water baby from day 1... or day 5 or whatever day that was when we gave you your first bath at home. You liked it then and you LOVE going to the beach and playing in the ocean here now. Even when we just have the little pool filled up in our back yard you hop on in giving no thought to whether you have clothes on or not. Maybe you'll be a lover of surfing just like your daddy...
It's a mystery to me how a little person's personality emerges but we have seen yours unfolding rapidly especially these past few months. You make us laugh hard just like your brother does and yet at the same time we call you our "serious one"... you would win at any staring contest. You are strong little one. In both the physical and the mental. We can see that you will be a leader, not a follower. We are praying for you continually, little one, that you will love Jesus above all else the world has to offer. For in Him you will be content and experience life abundant. And in Him, lead many to Grace & Truth.

We love you little miss and thank Jesus you are ours.

AVEDA TURNED ONE!

our little Aveda Violet Maligro turned ONE Wednesday July 25, 2007... how this whole year flew by so quickly is a mystery. Here's some video of a little party we had celebrating our little luv bug.

day 3 of mission bye-bye binkie

So three days ago we went for a walk down the road to feed the goats. Typical day... beautiful blue sky... nothing seemed out of the ordinary. However, while we were feeding the goats I believe Tagen, at some point, must have chucked his beloved binkie and munch munch (goats eat anything) bye-bye binkie. He didn't seem phased by this... or maybe he didn't see it happen. On the walk home he asked for his binkie and I searched and searched and alas, no binkie to be found. We even walked back to the goats and it was gone. At first, not too big a deal but come nap time... very big deal. We decided this would be the day Tagen would have to give up his binkie for good. A big transition for a little guy. A piece of growing up - even sad for mama realizing her first baby is no longer a baby. Anyways, long story shorter... Tagen gave his binkie to the goats because baby goat needed a new binkie (or so we've told him) and in return the goats gave Tagen a new Buz Lightyear toy. So just remember, when you give up this:



you get this:


(why the picture turned out sideways is beyond me... you get the idea though)

Not a bad trade huh?
Tagen would probably beg to differ but he's getting through it.

Aveda Violet is walking!

so you can see it with your own eyes - she's walking! for whatever reason she loved walking around with this Superman ball today. Maybe it gave her added superhero power to walk. She's a little unstable still and crawls a LOT faster than she walks but knowing how this girl works so far it seems that once she figures something out she masters it pretty quickly just like her daddy. So she's about 10 and 1/2 months old now, loves to wrestle with her brother. For some reason they LOVE to do this on mommy and daddy's bed. Throw them up there and they both get wild and can't stop laughing. Lately Tagen's been playing "pretend" a lot more which is so awesome and see his imagination grow and grow. He wants to be a firefighter and a superhero... maybe a superhero firefighter when he grows up. And he told me today that mommy will drive his fire truck. hmmm.

It's obvious this kid has parents who drink coffee every... single... morning.... as he's playing pretend and pouring drinks in the bath for aveda and says, "Here Bayda. coffee!"

more maligros videos...

these are some older videos i came across... mostly of tagen and his buddy josiah and a funny one of Tagen's first experience eating corn on the cob - this is definitely one of his favorite things to eat.

videooooos

ok so it's kind of pixelated but it's the best i could figure out for right now!

This picture says it all

Tagen found these pink and green goggles at the beach last weekend and has worn them ever since. He would probably even sleep with them on if we let him. It is the funniest ever watching him run around with them on... usually lop-sided but he's actually getting pretty good at putting them on by himself ("My Try!" is the latest phrase we hear 100 times a day) and getting them to go on at least one eye correctly. There's a crab and a seahorse on them too but he calls the seahorse a sea cucumber because we always find sea cucumbers at the beach here and he's never seen a seahorse before. I love the way this little mind works.

a good morning even at 6:30am

So Tagen woke up this morning at 6:30am. That's been the average wake up time in our household lately. Despite what I keep telling them, kid A or kid B decides this is a good time to get up in the morning. One or the other is my alarm clock every morning. Usually I wake up pretty groggy, stumbling toward the crib. This morning Kyle went and got Tagen and brought him back to lie in bed with us. A few minutes later Aveda woke up and so he went and got her too and brought her back in bed. So it's me, Aveda, Tagen and Kyle all squished into our queen size bed (and one wiener dog somewhere under the covers). I began to nurse Aveda and the sweetest, cutest thing ever Tagen did of his own accord. He was look down at Aveda and just started gently petting her head and whispering, "hi beyda.... hiiyyyy beyda." Every so often Aveda would stop look up at him and smile real big. So even though it was about 3 hours earlier than I really wanted to be waking up it was well worth seeing this gem of a moment. Tagen is such a good big brother and loves his little sis so much. The love is mutual seeing how much Aveda adores him as well.