We started this new year by welcoming our Au Pair into our family. Our sickness from December continued and overshadowed her first week with everyone having some form of illness. Fortunately we recovered enough by the middle of the month to celebrated Anthony’s third birthday. We also got a nice amount of rain during the middle of the month.
Our Au Pair, Valeria, has been a nice addition to our household. While we are still adjusting to having another person in the house, it has been a positive addition. We are especially grateful for her arrival to help out with sick kids. While not the best introduction to our family (certainly not how Alicia had planned it) Valeria’s help and ability to stay home with the kids made it much easier for Tim and Alicia to still be able to go to work. We’re still working through all the little details of the kids and house but we hope Valeria continues to feel welcomed in our home. The kids have really been enjoying having her around. They love playing chase with her and hide-n-seek and lots of other things. They are also starting to take interest in learning and speaking Spanish.
We got back to doing some yard work this month. We ordered 3 yards of gravel and 4 yards of soil. We used the gravel to complete our side walkway from the gate to the camping area. The soil filled the raised beds, so we can start planting some veggies soon. Tim also pruned back our orchard so hopefully we will get a good crop this year.
Cordelia is very excited to have Valeria with us. Unfortunately, she suffered from a lot of sickness during the first three weeks; throwing up on two separate occasions, plus a four and half day fever, and a mild ear infection. We’re very glad she is recovered now. Corrie is starting to really understand the concept of reading and is starting to have more motivation to learn. She also really enjoys her homework, writing letters and numbers. Her favorite activity remains coloring – arts and crafts. Cordelia is also continuing to progress at swimming. She’s now using her arms and legs to propel herself forward and can swim alone over short distances. She is also doing very well at AWANA. She’s starting to feel very comfortable there and does a great job memorizing her verses.
Anthony managed to stay the healthiest of all the kids this month. He had a nasty raspy cough, a one day fever, and a mild ear infection, but he recovered pretty quickly. Anthony has also enjoyed having Valeria here, although he is not as expressive as Cordelia in showing it. He had a great time on his birthday and party day. For his birthday Alicia took the day off work and went with Anthony, Cordelia, and Grandma to Legoland. Anthony got to do Jr Drive for the first time and did not crash once! For his party he requested lots of balloons and an Olaf cake. He enjoyed celebrating with some of his friends from preschool and church, along with the Powers clan. Anthony is also progressing at swim class. He’s starting to push with his arms in the water and is getting more comfortable.
Lydia is now six months old! She had a tough start to the month with continuing sickness, causing a double ear infection. She’s still having some congestion and we’re doing our best to not have it relapse into another ear infection. In spite of the sickness she has remained mostly happy. She is also reaching some milestones. She can now sit by herself fairly well for a limited time. She is also getting up on hands and knees. While not crawling yet, she is certainly rolling and scooting around. She’s also getting more interactive playing with her toys.
Alicia had a very busy month at work. Her projects seemed to keep increasing and increasing. She had a meeting with her management to decide on a development path for her going forward. Starting in February she’s going to be ramping down on some of her tasks to support her overall development plan. With all the work stress Alicia really enjoyed the day off from work on Anthony’s birthday. It was great to spend a day celebrating him and enjoying Legoland. This year Alicia is focusing on improving her work-home balance. So far she has been mostly successful. Alicia has enjoying watching the kids at swim class and also going out for some one-on-one time with Cordelia and Anthony. Alicia has appreciated having Valeria at the home, so far it has been a great experience.
Tim’s work started out the year very slowly. Finally in the third week his work picked up with the arrival of new hardware components and some software development. He has really enjoyed doing the coding work. The lab work is also a nice change from sitting in his office. He also had a meeting with his manager to discuss his career goals. One of his projects is getting ready to do a field test, so he will likely be on travel towards the end of February. At home Tim continues to stay busy too with weekend yard projects and playing with the kids. He also takes on the responsibility of getting dinner on the table every night. Tim also helped get Valeria get set up with social security and the DMV during her first week here. Tim got to play guitar at church the first week back but has not played since then. After three weeks off he’s looking forward to getting back into playing in February.
This month turned out to be a very tumultuous month with sickness, au pair integration, and lots of tasks both at home and work. With all the stresses and to-dos it was a challenging month for Tim and Alicia to stay connected. Finally toward the end of the month things are starting to calm down and we’re looking forward to a much smoother month in February. With the addition of Valeria and our off-Friday work schedule, we’re looking forward to getting some more quality time together.
We’re also hoping to make more connections at our church. Our church is starting several types of community groups in Feb, including a MOPS and a monthly couples’ dinner. It would be great if we can start forming some deeper relationships.
We a very grateful for our loving family and wonderful friends. We are very blessed to be in a great house and community with the ability to see our families and friends more often.
