SOFIA!

Sofia is almost 6 months old and she is a total joy.  She is crazy sweet and almost always happy - by far the easiest baby we've had.  When she wakes up in the morning and sees us her whole body starts to shake with excitement and she squeals and smiles.  We finally moved her into her own room a week ago mainly because Diego has been waking up with nightmares (school anxiety?) and I couldn't take so many evening events.  On a good night she can sleep from 7pm-5am.  On other nights she wakes up at 1am and 5am.  

We just started her on some oatmeal mush.  There seems to be much back and forth about the right time to start solids so I'm not in any hurry, but she loves it!  She gobbles up as much as is available.  

She loves to sit and stand up, but can't sit alone.  She rolls over, but not very willingly and isn't doing any crawling anytime soon.  I love to have a little baby in our lives so I'm not in any hurry to get her moving....

Here she is enjoying the last home Nationals game of the season.  

Reno/Tahoe

My brother Seth is married!!  We were in Reno/Tahoe to visit Carlos' family and for Seth's wedding.  The kids had so much fun in Reno for a whole week.  A pirate conveniently showed up for abuela's birthday to entertain the kids, tia Veronika took them to tahoe, abuela took them all over town and the dogs became their best friends.  Even Diego who is totally scared of dogs took to gentle Mariah.

We were all there for the hot air balloon race which was super cool.  It wasn't super great waking up at 5am to get there in time, but our clocks were all messed up anyway.  We arrived just as the sun was coming up and got to see nearly 100 hot air balloons being blown up and sent into the sky.  We went up for a tethered ride as well though Charlie was in meltdown mode by then and decided to stay on the ground.

Tia Veronika took the boys swimming in Tahoe.

The wedding was a lot of fun.  The boys helped bring the rings down the aisle (and also managed to get in the middle of the ceremony :)).  I heard there was a slight scuffle as there were 3 boys (charlie, diego and eli), but only 2 ring boxes so eli and diego carried the boxes and charlie carried the actual rings.  Luckily he didn't drop them!  It was beautiful weather and, of course, the couple looked gorgeous.  I wasn't in control of any camera, but here are a few shots.

We managed to miss our flight and there was nothing for two days out of Reno so we rented a car and headed to SF.  The delay worked well for us because Veronika checked out their teeth and took them for a sleep over.  I actually got to enjoy a morning walking (and eating) around SF - what a treat!

Labor Day

Carlos declared that he was done traveling and wouldn't leave the house to go on another trip so I bought myself and Charlie a ticket to go to Labor Day Olympics in Cleveland....at the very last minute he decided Diego would be too devastated to miss out on the fun so he sucked it up and got back in the car for the 6 hour drive to Ohio.  I can't say he was happy about those 6 hours, but the weekend was a lot of fun.  Charlie came away with at least 3 ribbons and Diego inherited at least 3 ribbons!

The first day was the pool activities and Charlie survived the swimming race and swim relays but, like a good Taft, was mostly interested in the running races.  He placed second in swimming though, in reality, he was slow to touch the wall.  Chewing the cracker and then whistling before jumping in proved easier than I figured, but the 'wear the hat and glasses race' was way harder than I expected.  He lost interest once it came to 'collect the tennis ball' game and was adamant that I shouldn't participate in the vasoline-covered watermelon game.  It is the most lethal game, but also my favorite so I jumped in.  Charlie - the vigilant eldest son - was horrified and everytime I was in ear shot he pleaded with me to get out.  I am more risk adverse these days and, it appears that the more risk adverse one is the more likely you'll get hurt.  I did in fact get a good kick in the head.  Nathan of course convinced me it was toe nail puncture and I'd likely get some terrible infection.


On Sunday Charlie and Diego both did the fun running and relay races.  Sadly Charlie wouldn't do the three-legged race with Wallis and, oddly, (at least to me) his favorite was the tug-of-war.  The sculpture contest was a lot of fun thanks to tia Veronika supplying us with a food art book for ideas!

Here is Charlie in the 5 and under race....as you can see he bites the dust at the end, but Eli graciously lets him pretend it was a "tie"

First Day of School

Charlie and Diego both started school a few weeks ago (I am really behind).  My heart almost burst watching Charlie walk to kindergarten and I really almost lost it watching Diego go into PreK 3.  Both were super excited about school - Charlie knew what he is was getting into and couldn't wait to see his friends, but it was a whole new world for Diego.  He as been watching Charlie leave for school for two years and now he was finally entering this new world.  The first day Diego was so excited that he was ready and by the front door at 7:45.  Unfortunately Diego doesn't like changes/transitions and after the first day he decided he no longer wanted to go to school.  One issue is that he apparently thought Charlie would be in his class so he was devastated to find out that Charlie's classroom in all the way around the corner from him.

It is so interesting to see how Charlie and Diego are very different people.  I can't figure out what makes Diego tick these days.  He doesn't respond to incentives or threats and seems to call my bluff (is it possible that I spoiled my bag of sugar?!?!).  If I ask him to stop doing something or else he'll have to go up to his room he will respond that he wants to go up to his room - in fact he will often even put himself up there.  We certainly can't reason with him about school.  No matter what we do or how many times he promises not to cry he still cries at school.  Here was the first day when he was very excited.