February 2021: a recap

I know that February is a shorter month anyway, but it felt exponentially shorter this year, somehow. We did a lot of living in those 28 days!

In an effort to spend some time with my children individually/teach them kitchen skills/put myself through forced lessons in patience and remaining calm, I invited the girls to cook or bake various and sundry things with me (this is not really a new thing; I just have several pictures of it this month, whereas I'm usually too busy to grab a picture):

This version is slightly less messy.

I've been making a point to get more and more pictures of the girls AND me:

Lily rigged this headpiece situation for me and christened me the Balloon-icorn.

February also seems to be the month of Brynn-and-Hallie photo shoots. Brad and I have been so pleasantly surprised by how much Brynn loves Hallie. Given her age, her tendency is to feel threatened by other children (particularly Lily) encroaching on her "territory" of toys or space or parental attention. This (so far) isn't the case with Hallie. She loves to entertain her, snuggle her, and chat with her. I'm praying their relationship remains so sweet and loving:

I need to print this one.

Bath/shower time can be unbelievably chaotic around here. Hallie is definitely too big for the bouncer, but we strap her in it nonetheless. I caught this sweet moment of Brynn trying to keep Hallie company while we were finishing up baths one night.

Introducing Hallie to all of the trains

The other children were up to shenanigans, as well, of course:

Claire is SUCH a helpful girl, and I'm so grateful to have her help with her sisters:

And then Daddy is everyone's favorite:

Sometimes he has "help" with exercising...

It was a good month! Our days are, indeed, long, and our years (and in this case, months) are, indeed, short. We are grateful for them (the days/month/years, as well as the children).