Here it is! The first Rabon Fab Four update ever. This is the new version of the Rabon Hat Trick – the mission of which is this: to give updates on the kids at various points through the year. I don’t want to miss out on capturing what the kids look like, what they love, and any funny little anecdotes that I’ll want to look back on. They don’t have baby books, so this blog is where all the little things have been documented over the years. I’m going to make updates sporadic, whenever the mood strikes and the kids nap!
Jonathan [8 years old]: Our boy celebrated his eighth birthday in January. We’re entering a new realm of parenting with him, where he’s starting to search out individuality and independence. Basically, he thinks he’s far more grown than he is and is trying to test boundaries in new ways. We’ve got him started on a set list of weekly/daily chores and that’s been pretty good. He doesn’t always want to do them, but he checks his list daily and is getting better at the execution. He’s been very helpful with Noelle and she smiles so big at him. He loves that. He got a lot of art supplies for his birthday and spends quite a bit of time drawing and painting. Winter is rough on being able to spend a lot of time outside when you have a mom who hates being cold, but he’s been able to get a little time on his bike (with Abigail trying to keep up on her Strider) with his friends lately when we get a nice day. He wants to try playing basketball so he’ll be starting the Spring season next month.
Abigail [3 1/2 years old]: She’s a firecracker and a joy. Abigail seems to have grown up overnight (something about bringing home a new baby makes everyone seem so much bigger). She spends the majority of her time in princess dresses, playing with dolls and trying to go WWF on Hannah. They play decently well together but then Abigail wants to run the show and sometimes Hannah is not on board. Abigail is still trying to keep up with Jonathan at every turn – when he draws, she draws. When he does homework, she does “homework.” She loves to sing and dance and tell “Bawexa” to play music for her. She asks me every day – literally- if we’re going to see Zoe today and she just adores her cousin time. She is also notorious for stealing Zoe’s shoes every time we are together. I always thought being a shoe person was learned but maybe it is an innate quality. One of my current favorite Abigail-isms is scoop instead of scoot – such as “Mom, can you scoop my chair in?” at the table. Another is “Mom, can you take a smile” when she wants me to take a picture of her. When we pick up Jonathan and the girls we carpool with she always asks “how was your school today” to all of them which I think is pretty darn sweet.
Hannah [2 years old]: This little cherub turned two just nine days before becoming a big sister in December. I’m not sure what it is but it seems like every consecutive child grows up so much faster than the one before! Hannah definitely got her dad’s height and really isn’t much smaller than Abigail. They are already sharing clothes (Abigail’s are only a little big on Hannah) with a year and a half age difference. Hannah’s personality just keeps getting more fun as her vocabulary increases and she’s recently started telling jokes, which she thinks are the funniest of us all. Her current favorite is a knock knock joke that goes like this: “Knock, knock.” Who’s there? “Pig.” Pig, who? “Piiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiig.” Commence tons of giggles. I adore the way that she calls Noelle “Baby Well” and Abigail kind of sounds like “Eggo.” She’s also ridiculously cute singing along to songs. We spend a lot of time listening to a Disney playlist in the car. We recently started attending a church here in town and she had her first real nursery experience on her own (the world shut down when she was 3 months old so she is a bit of a quarantine baby) and it only took one week for her to adjust which was amazing! Every group experience she’s had prior she either had me or her siblings so we were a bit nervous but she’s been on board ever since. So far it seems like she may stay blonde – she’s made it longer than Jonathan did.
Noelle [2 months old]: Noelle is such a wonderful addition to the chaos of our home. She’s smiling up a storm now, and she’s so close to a real laugh. She kind of laughs in right now (sucking in air) and hopefully soon we’ll get that belly laugh going. She smiles at her siblings – especially Jonathan – and they love that. They all adore her, though we are constantly working on being gentle. At her 2 month check up she was 22.25″ and 9lbs 9.5oz which is a full pound more than Abigail weighed at that age. I think she won’t be as tall as Hannah but may fall somewhere between the girls in size. She’s our first baby to actually take a pacifier which has been pretty handy. She’s eating well and sleeping pretty well at night – her naps get interrupted a lot by the mayhem of our home but hopefully we will get better at that. I still can’t believe we have FOUR kids!
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