Happy Easter

Heritage museum

Today we went to the heritage museum with some friends. We had such a fun time in the kids section. Then we got to see the faberge eggs that are here in Hong Kong for a bit.

13 months of busyness

What Joy is doing 

• Joy is very talkative and jabbers all day long. Now when I tell her "no" or "not for Joy" she starts to jabber on and on. I bet she is telling me all the reasons why it is a good idea to touch the electrical outlet or eat dog food.
  
  • Joy's word list 
  •  "dadda" now has become "daddy". 
  • "Rudy" and "baby" sound very similar to daddy :-)

•  Joy caught Brad's cough, cold and fever a couple weeks ago. I guess her touching everything in sight, and crawling in gross places is catching up with her!  

Joy found a box of straws and loves playing with them!

• Total tooth count: Still 5

•  Crawls so fast I can barely keep up with her.
•  She is getting more interested in walking behind toys that move. She is also standing for short periods without any assistance. 

Eats

• Nursing: Joy nurses before bed but once we are back from our spring break trip to Sri Lanka she will be fully weaned.
• Solid food: Joy eats as much as me (well almost!) 
• Loves: Pretty much all food. The past month she has had some fun food experiences cucumber sushi (including the sea weed), Korean BBQ (she loves meat), chicken noodle soup (homemade Mennonite recipe!), bok choy/fruit smoothies, 
• Verdict is still out on: black beans, chick peas
• Introducing this week: trying to get her to like black beans and/or chick peas (maybe hummus?)
• Joy can hold the sippy cup and has for a while now. She doesn't really like plain cow milk but loves yogurt/smoothies and cream of wheat /oatmeal made with milk, so slowly we will get there.

Sleeps:

•  Night time: She still sleeps for 11  hours, 7pm to 6am. Although when she was sick she was so tired she was going to bed at 6:30am and was waking up at 5:30am...YIKES. 
• Naps: Joy is taking 2 naps a day, 8:30/9am and 12:30/1pm (one hour each). Her afternoon naps are going to about 1.5/2 hours, which are GREAT!

Weighs:19Lbs+ (we don't have a scale so I can't be accurate)

Likes:

*Reading: However, she will not let us pick out the books (except when Brad reads to her before bed). The girl has opinions.

 

 *I"m so thankful she likes the stroller. Carrying her in the Ergo is getting more challenging with my growing bump. I have to still strap her in with the Ergo when she is on the bus because she wants to get off my lap the whole time. 

* Her baby doll and other babies.  If I ask her to go and find her baby, she will find it....and then bash it on the head (it is how she shows she likes you..yikes).

Dislikes: Joy dislikes being alone. She had her first two timeouts this month and disliked her 30 seconds of being alone in the hallway strapped to her high chair. The girl needs boundaries set so might as well start now! We have a lot of hard work ahead of us.

Favorite event: Joy is looking forward to her first trip to Ocean Park (amusement park/zoo) on Tuesday and Sri Lanka next week! 

Reading

A little cuteness for your day

Big sister

My friend Joanna made Joy this cute "big sister " onsie. She got to wear it yesterday and looked so cute . She was playing with her dolly practicing being a good big sister

Horse stables

On Tuesday our mom's group had a field trip to the Tun Mun Horse Stables. We got to see the horses, pet a pony and enjoy a picnic in the beautiful weather.Joy wanted to touch the horses in the worst way...the girl has no fear :-) 

 Another driving accomplishment, I drove all the way there (thanks to my friend Joanna who was my navigator). I am getting more brave in driving places I haven't been before, thanks to my trusted iPhone equipped with google maps. Driving in new locations can be a bit frustrating here because the signs are TERRIBLE and construction is EVERYWHERE. 

Joy thought that this horse statue was real and didn't want to stop petting it.

Watching a demonstration....we couldn't really hear what the man was saying and Joy was being too noisy so I had to go out and look for some horses :-)

We ended with a picnic lunch, which Joy enjoyed while strapped in to her stroller because the girl can't sit still unless there is a 5 point harness :-) 

Weekend

This weekend we saw some crazy stuff while out. Granted we have all been home for DAYS since Brad and Joy have been sick so maybe we have forgotten what Hong Kong is like.
The first picture is if a man killing two snakes. His restaurant has a picture of a turtle and a snake... I always thought that was just the clip art he found ! The second is of a man who was capturing a bee hive outside our house. He was wearing short sleeves! Brave man. The last two are of the sick ones.. Who are on the mend. Joy only snuggles when she is sick so that is one nice thing in all the not nice things of having a sick baby.

Oh water

Joy keeps trying to play in Rudy's water bowl ( and eat his food). Today we had lots of discussions and discipline around the water dish. Finally I got out her tub and a bowl of water for her to play with. Note to self: next time stay in the bathroom... There was a big water mess :)

Head to Toe by Eric Carle

Grandma and Grandpa Christensen sent Joy books for her birthday (Thanks so much! Brad and I were getting so tired of our current collection). The last one (How Do Dinosaurs Love Their Dogs?) finally arrived yesterday. Joy really loves her new books especially "From Head to Toe" and "Doggies". Here are some cute videos of her reading From Head to Toe with us. We obviously think that Joy is exceptionally smart and talented :-)

She starting clapping her hands all by herself. We taught her to "thump her chest"...and we are working on waving her arms like the monkey (if you watch the second video you will see she is close!)

Growing....growing....growing

Mommy is growing....
I am 16 weeks pregnant with little Christensen #2. I feel like I am a lot bigger with this baby already but it could just be all in my mind. (There is a picture for you to compare). Everything has been going really well with this pregnancy. I am starting to feel less tired which is good (maybe because we also finally have Joy sleeping through the night as of three weeks ago). I tried to recreate the same outfit (however I wrote different pants and have had to wear my belly bands with all my pants!)

           

Me pregnant with Joy at 16 weeks(left)        Me pregnant with baby 2 (right)

Joy is growing.....
Joy has become more interested in practicing her walking. We bought her this great toy (sit to stand learning train) for her birthday and she LOVES it. She is learning to put more pressure on her feet and not her hands so the train doesn't "run away from her" :-)



Our garden is growing......
Our garden is 5 weeks old. Brad has given away a lot of seedlings and thinned out a bunch too. We even got to enjoy our first spinach salad from our garden (well the only part from our garden were the spinach leaves but it is a start!).

So many pots! (There are two layers of pots there if you can't tell)

Brad is training up the peas by the little window and on the palm tree

Brad and Rudy are not growing :-) Although Rudy is growing in his love for Joy (Thankfully Rudy is really active or with all the food that Joy is feeding him, he would be growing too!).

Snack time