Vande Berg pictures Dec 2010

Very early this year, December 3. And we've had to Skype them into our weekends and evenings when we can.

Olivia and O'Donnells Family Photos Christmas 2010

Some rockin' around that Christmas Tree that Olivia helped hunt, bag and drag home.

Daddy and LaLa

Christmas Tree Hunting

Some snaps while Christmas Tree Hunting at the O'Donnells over Thanksgiving.

Olivia at Christmas 2010

Olivia is exuberant, except when she isn't. This seems to define her mood and presentation. When she is talking about or participating in something, she is very upbeat and verbal and shouts what she is doing or wants done. If she is anxious or doesn't want to do it, she is nearly silent and clearly physically reserved and withdrawn. I sometimes wish for a middle ground, and I suppose we do see it at times when she is actually doing something like finger painting or drawing or working on her letters.
By the way, she is learning, has nearly learned, all of her letters and how they sound and how they are signed with her hands. Wonderful, she can see now how those lines of letters that she used to draw as long scribbles across a page of paper, to represent the words in a story, are put together from letters, but seems to understand that she is a long way from reading and understanding those letter combinations just yet, so she doesn't get frustrated by what she doesn't know. She is getting frustrated with her drawing. She realizes that she can't depict the detail she sees, gets mad, and states that her pictures don't turn out good.
A few weeks ago, she was in her second theatrical performance at school, giving the role of Pinkalicious' Mother a very animated turn about the kleiglights. She was so shy initially, and when she had spoken a few lines with her role-mate Lauren, she started actually shaking her hands in excitement for every other actors' lines, and tried to assist other kids with their blocking a few times mid-performance. It made me cringe a bit, watching my daughter so affected by the experience and a bit bossy. All clearly signs of shyness, and basically normal for her age. While Dad was only a bit uncomfortable with this, I was more proud at her interest and excitement and memory about and in her part and participation in general. I was and am very proud of her.
Right now, she loves all the Princesses and Fairies that the Disney corporation can provide. But rarely, when she's feeling very physically strong or excited, she is Batgirl or Supergirl. Still feminine, mind you, just stronger and able to fly. She loves books, drawing, playacting, helping. She has started to say "Actually,..." just like Dad and sometimes Mom.
I remain tremendously proud of her and interested in her. I frequently miss her voice at work on Mondays, after a weekend together.

Vande Berg Family Pictures, Thanksgiving 2010

A few shots from the family meetings pre-Christmas this year. Actually, this one was Thanksgiving at the Vande Bergs in Fort Dodge.

LaLa and Mommy, 2010

I took a picture of Olivia on her mother's shoulder when she was a few months old, and like the pose.
Here is this year's update.

Scary Princess! Jump Out At You!

Olivia and Ren found comfort and confidence in each other this year. Olivia had been nervous and scared, but when we ran into Ren, she came alive, talking up the positive aspects of this scary holiday just as we'd been saying them to her moments before. They caught on to the doorway drill quickly, and were both very polite in saying thank you and Happy Halloween to everyone that gave them candy. These pictures only show the happy excitement post-Ren, which is how she and we will remember it anyway. Many happy Halloween returns, little one. No other day of the year can you walk up to a strangers house and demand food under threat of vandalism, all condoned and protected by local gendarmes.

Henry and Audrey were just fascinated to be awake after dark.

Birthday Number 4

Olivia celebrated Four with 20 of her closest relatives and friends from school. At our house. It was harrowing, but we hope they all had fun. They are all significantly better at listening to adults and doing as we ask. And it helps if one of those adults is doing fun things with a parachute on a beautiful day.

Thanks as ever to Aunt Pam for supplying every birthday cake she's ever had, and for the Grandmas bringing food and drinks for lots of family and friends. We cannot thank you all enough.

Even More Catchup Photos

More Catchup Photos

Some other photos from earlier this summer. Family, friends, Olivia bouncing off her environment in general. Apologies for their delay.

Olivia in the Summer of 2010

This little girl is becoming a Big Girl this summer. Olivia recently moved up to the Four Year Old Room at school. She has had a very good friend move to another town. And she has had to share more time with more active siblings. This hasn't been easy for her, but I think I see her working on it every day, finding ways to calm herself down, to wait a little bit to be heard, to find something else to do until we have more time for her. Sometimes this is when we're reading books before bed, and she will hold questions until then. Not that she refrains from asking volumes of questions all the time, but the quieter times are when she asks her more important questions. She is a little worried about what Sunday School will be like. She tells us that she misses Graham. She will ask about what certain comments mean that she may have heard adults talk about during the day. I'm very proud of her for all of this: her patience, and her considered thoughts.

She is also defending her right to wear what she wants. This is probably her main means of controlling her environment or schedule right now, so she maintains this with a strong voice and sense of justice. She angles for McDonald's on the drive home from school and, when told she should use her own "stars" money for special meals like that, she gets angry with the injustice as well: "No, I don't have to buy food! Grownups are supposed to buy the food! I don't have to do that!" The stars money is a reinforcing of good behavior we have been trying for months to help inspire her in the mornings, and which has been very beneficial when we happen to be shopping: we can tell her that she should save her stars money to buy the item she happens to see and ask us for in a department store. She is surprisingly good at deferring gratification and I can't tell her often enough how proud i am of her for this, mostly because she doesn't understand yet that this is pretty difficult and that i can appreciate how difficult it must be for her.

Like i said, lots going on for Olivia right now, and I'm very proud of her for so many reasons.

Sleep-Out

Friday night turned out to be a nearly perfect night for Olivia's first (pseudo) camping experience.

Daddy set up his big tent on the back porch, so we had double bug protection, and cool night weather (60s). We both actually slept quite well, which is ideal for getting her to ever do this again, maybe actually outside next time.

She was very cute and very excited and a very good girl. Daddy appreciates this very much.

Happy Mother's Day

I am a very fortunate Daddy and husband.
I can't explain why Olivia would be wearing a poison control phone number sticker, other than it is a sticker?
Photo from March, but the kids are all so mobile now that I can't get these four together very often.

Fraternal Love

This is probably the best photodocument of how Olivia interacts with her infant siblings right now.
She gets a teeth-clenching grin on her face and shakes her head slightly as she goes in for what appears to be an intense hug around the neck. It ends up being not as severe as it started out, and the kids don't seem to mind her hugs, though they tend to push her away a bit when she comes at them like this. I don't know if she is just trying to control herself rather than tussle with them, as she would a more durable school friend?

Sleeping Beauty

She would really like the reference from the title - Olivia inhales Princesses right now, and has for about the last 6 months. We catch up to her as she has taken to sneaking into Mom and Dad's room occasionally, when she's supposed to be in bed. Kind of hard to be mad at her when seeing this. And her current and instinctive challenging of her parents means we can use all the mercy-inducing thoughts of her we can find. This meets the criteria.

LaLa You Got Some Splainin' To Do

Clearly the public service announcements or school drills or last years' storms have taken ... root?
I mean, her explanation is factually correct as long as you drop the word "tomato" and substitute "acorn squash".
I'm glad they're drilling on vegetable disasters, especially since the local news can just inflate these forecasts to gazpacho proportions.

Hand Talk

A few weeks ago, Olivia approached me in the kitchen while I was setting the table for dinner.

"Can you get me that thing up there by the fridge?" she asked while holding her hand flat on it's side and gesturing up and down.

"What thing is that, honey?"

"That thing up there...the orange and colored things..." all with the little hand gesture, and increased frustration.

From the dining room, Mommy: "She means the vitamins."

I laughed for quite a while, realizing that this was just the first demonstrated inheritance of her mother's "hand discourse" skills. Which have nothing at all to do with the sign language I described tonight for the babies in another post. Nor usually do the gestures have anything to do with the things either Olivia or Melissa are trying to indicate or describe. It is truly endearing.

And like the gestures, these pictures have nothing to do with the story I am describing here in text. The sleeping photo is the way we found her one night hours after we thought we had put her to sleep in bed. She brought these three of her friends down to the floor with her.

They are truly dedicated toys.

And the other photo is just one I like.

The photos are from late January and early February, 2010.

Winter Extravaganza

A difficult word to say, became a really wonderful charitable-donation-raising performance.

In the Iowa City Public Library this year, on Monday night, February 22, 2010, with extensive preparation and dedication from the Apple Tree faculty. Especially the two beautiful ladies pictured, Olivia's teachers Stephanie Paulsen and Megan Sieverding. You have our sincere gratitude and admiration.

Olivia was an Owl that decided to crawl into a lost mitten to escape the cold, along with 15 or so other animals, from the beautiful Jan Brett story "The Mitten". She left her costume on very well as long as was necessary, then went on to give dance and sight-reading performances with her Kindermusick class, led by her extremely talented teacher Jodi Landeros. That's right, sight reading. Rhythms of eighth and quarter notes, with rests, but still. I am extremely impressed.

Olivia was, and continues to be, wonderful. We were so proud of her.

Sledding

Just some photos to catch up with LaLa a bit. From a month ago, February 13. Our last big snows and cold, which made for nice sledding at the grade school a block away.