12.25.12: Santa delivers

Stella, Fiona and Daphne loving their new animals from Santa.

Santa delivered exactly what the girls wanted.  Stella wanted a pink teddy/black bear, Fiona a blue teddy bear and Daphne a yellow dress with oranges on it...oh yes, there is a story to this request.  Santa also brought Daphne a tiger and several new toys/games for the girls to share. Santa even brought the adults a few things in their stockings.

Daphne modelling her yellow dress with oranges on it.  This past spring just Daphne and I went shopping and she got to pick out any dress she wanted and buy it herself.  She picked out a yellow dress with oranges on it (from walmart).  Then Daphne grew and grew and grew and the dress was too short.  She seemed distressed by this so I cut off the top of the dress and made it into a skirt.  While she tolerated this, it was clear she wasn't satisfied. Meanwhile all of our state was searched for the previous dress (or any dress similar) to no avail. 

 

Then about a month ago, when asking what she wanted for Christmas, the following request was made: a yellow dress with oranges on it.  Yikes, how do you find that in the winter???  I tried every tactic I knew to change her request but was rather unsuccessful.  I explained the difficulty of finding a dress in that fabric and told her that Santa suggested we take her to the fabric store to see what was available.  Sure enough, Brant and Daphne found some orange/lemon print fabric and she was very excited.  We decided that we would mail the fabric to Santa to see if he would make her the dress.  Sure enough he did!  It isn't perfect, but it completed the check box and made one little girl very happy.  Next year let's hope for something more within Santa's skill set.

 

This year the girls' enthusiasm for Christmas was contagious and invigorating, I already look forward to next year's celebrations.

12.24.12: Prep for santa

This year the girls really understood Christmas, it was magical.  Complete with advent calendar, sitting on Santa's lap, making lists, cookies, wrapping presents etc - the girls embraced the holidays.  They each made and decorated a cookie for Santa in their favorite colors (of course) and made sure to leave him some milk.  They also left a toy that they have outgrown for Santa to bring to other kids who might be in need.  Stella chose to leave the stacking cups, Daphne squishy blocks and Fiona the toy camera.  With family in town bedtime was tough, they kept getting up because they were 'too excited'. 

12.20.12: Preschool graduation

Stella, Fiona and Daphne (sitting with their teachers Mrs. Nazzaro and Mrs. Shannon) 'graduated' today from part time preschool and will be going to full time preschool after the winter break.  We expected this transition to happen next fall, but an opportunity arose and we decided to take it.  We explained to the girls that they are graduating from part time preschool and 'get' to start at a new school.  They know their new school well as we have visited monthly since last spring. Their new school is play-based and allows them endless opportunities to play inside and outside.  It is exactly the kind of school I'd love as a kid complete with a garden, chicken coop and tree house. 

 

This means big changes in our household as I prepare to re-enter the workforce and Brant takes on drop-off/pick-up duty. He is excited to have some company during his commute but I have warned him that he will no longer be listening to talk radio - the girls barely tolerate radio commercials. 

Today was also the girls christmas performance which was ridiculously adorable with ~five songs sung by 35 kids.  We videotaped the whole thing (of course) and brought the girls some flowers to celebrate this very exciting day.  So proud of my little ladies.

12.11.12: New tradition

My sister and I rememeber fondly many trips to the ice cream shop with my grandpa growing up.  Since today is the girls' three and a half year birthday I decided we needed to start a tradition of our own, so we adventured to the ice cream shop.  Stella wanted pink ice cream (strawberry), Daphne green (mint chocolate chip) and Fiona left with no blue option picked my favorite color - brown (chocolate peanut butter).  They felt very grown up and each told me how much they loved 'their' flavor. It will be interesting to see if we ever depart from our color obsession.

12.10.12: Santa attempt - take three

Well we tried once at the mall rather unsucessfully (see below) with Stella curled in a ball and Daphne refusing to make eye contact but bought the picture because we weren't sure we'd ever do better.  

 

Next we tried just visiting Santa and talking to him, no picture. Stella wouldn't even get close to him, Daphne would barely talk to him yet Fiona was chatting with Santa no problem. 

 

Finally, at the zoo we visited Santa and we had two volunteers to sit on Santa's lap!  The girls had realized from our prior year pictures that Fiona had never sat on his lap so she was more than ready and Stella wanted to join in the fun this time.  However, Daphne was definitely not excited about the whole thing and refused to let go of me.  I consider the last picture (see above) a huge success as everyone is looking at the camera.  Perhaps next year we'll be able to get a picture with just the kids????

 

12.9.12: Rockets, Cupcakes and Princesses

This weekend we had two birthday parties and the weekend before we had one. It has been crazy but the girls seem to have so much fun playing with their friends and of course, eating the desserts! 

First was Peter's rocket themed party complete with a rocket blaster that actually worked on the girls very own decorated rockets.  They were shocked when their rockets flew up into the air and I do believe their daddy was very proud as well. In the picture, Daphne is anxiously awaiting Peter to blow out his candle so she can have the cupcakes she spied within minutes of arriving. 

 

Next came a cupcake party where the girls got to mix, decorate and then eat their very own cupcakes. Don't get me started on effect of sugar with triplet three year olds.  It was interesting to watch the girls in action.  Fiona wanted to dip each piece of candy in the frosting but not eat the cupcake, Stella wanted to just eat the top/pink of the cupcake partially decorated while eating the remaining candy separately and Daphne wanted to make sure that every drop of candy was in place on the top of her cupcake before she began eating.the.entire.thing!

 

Finally we ended with a princess party. We arrived wearing our tutus and left with a new tiara and wand. In the picture on the far right is Stella, then two down in the purple tutu is Daphne and Fiona is next to her in a black tutu.  There was a dance lesson and tumbling time and the girls were very excited about both.  The girls haven't shown an interest in princess stories in the past but after this party I went home and immediately ordered some princess books.  The girls didn't even know who Cinderella was....bad mama.

12.5.12: Taking care of daddy

Brant woke up this morning with a painful migraine.  While he was curled up on the floor, Fiona (pictured) brought him her blankets and pillow.  Daphne brought him a washcloth for his head and Stella brought her pillow, bear and blanket to snuggle up next to him.  I'm always amazed at how thoughtful and caring my daughters are.

As a side note, Fiona has a small scratch on her foot preventing her from wearing a sock on her right foot all together.  She also wanted to match both of her sisters' pajamas so she is wearing the same top as Daphne and bottom as Stella.  Oh yes, we are full into dressing ourselves these days.

11.30.12: Trains!

Daphne, Stella and Fiona have really gotten into their train set lately.  Today we set up every possible toy we could think of to put inside the track.  There was a zoo, tea party, dinosaur land, farm, several tunnels and more!

11.29.12: Dressing up

My little superheros!  Fiona, Stella and Daphne are really geting into dress up.  They basically find any dress up clothes they can and create their own characters.  It's ridiculous!

Daphne as a 'Super Daph' a panda/tutu/superhero. 

Stella as 'Super Robin' a giraffe/tutu/superhero. 

Fiona as 'Super Monkey' a tutu wearing monkey.  Sometimes batman shows up as well, but not today.

11.25.12: Thanksgiving

We have so much to be thankful for and try to remind ourselves and the girls of this everyday.  For thanksgiving this year we had some friends over for our casual vegetarian dinner and football tradition.  It went really well especially considering we had 13 people (including 6 kids). 
During the long weekend home with daddy, Fiona, Daphne and Stella took full advantage of riding the 'Daddy Elephant'.  I wonder how much longer they'll all fit on Brant's back?

11.11.12: Soccer play date

Daphne/purple, Fiona/blue, Stella/pink, and Peter had a park play date.  Nicole was super thoughtful and brought four soccer balls.  The girls had so much fun chasing after the balls in the giant grassy field.  Soccer games are definitely in our future. 

11.10.12: Fort

Using the couch, chair, curtains, pillows, and blankets Stella, Daphne and Fiona made their very own fort.  They were sure to bring their camping supplies (magnifying glass, binoculars, kleenex, and flashlight) to their adventure.  After this picture was taken I was 'encouraged' to leave their fort to let them play.

11.4.12: Licks

The girls and I adventured up to Nene's house for a long weekend leaving Brant behind to work.  This was only the second time I have taken the 2.5 hour drive by myself and I am happy to report that it went much better this year compared to last. 

 

One of their favorite things we did while we were there was to visit the zoo and aquarium.  They loved the zoo because you can endlessly feed the giraffes (where endless = the number of quarters your parent has with them).  Fiona/pink and Stella/gray were really excited to have the giraffes lick their whole arm.  Daphne/pink liked feeding the giraffes but wasn't so sure about the licking.

 Stella sticking her tongue out like the giraffe.

Fiona pretending she has food even though she doesn't (she really liked the licking).

After thorough sanitation, we continued on our adventure throughout the zoo.  Daphne's favorite part was the map.  She loved consulting the map before we visited any animals.  Here she is showing Stella and Fiona our path around the zoo thus far.

 

The girls were also very excited about going swimming.  Our final attempt at using our own pool was in late September where Daphne refused to get in, Stella would only stand in the water and Fiona would go in for two minutes and then get out - all informing us the water was too cold (and I totally agreed).  Thankfully Nene's neighborhood has a heated pool so the girls were excited to show off their swimming skills.

 

Nene also acquisitioned these large paper boards from costco's recycling pile.  We assumed they'd be great to color on, but instead the girls turned them into books.  They wrote stories on the walls of the books and hid behind them.  Who knew cardboard could be so exciting?

10.31.12: Halloween

Official Halloween photo just minutes before heading out to trick-or-treat.  You can tell by their faces that they were very excited.  Fiona/blue, Daphne/green, Stella/pink raced from house to house getting as much loot as possible.  When presented with a plethora of candy to choose from what do they select?...whatever was in their favorite colors.  It was pretty hysterical because they haven't eaten any candy before so they ended up with favorites purely based on packaging.  Fiona ended up with a large amount of Crunch bars, Daphne Reese's peanut butter cups (orange and purple are also her favorite colors) and Stella Skittles (red aka dark pink in our house).

Upon returning home they spent a while sorting their candy, lining it up and trading with each other.  We had some very worn out (but happy) girls by the end of the night.

10.31.12: STELLA and FIOnA

Today Stella figured out how to write an S all on her own and thereby accomplished her ability to write her own name, legibly.

Fiona learned how to write an N on her own - the remaining challenging letter. Now all three girls can write their own names.

Next we move onto writing our last name.  This may take a little bit, nine letters is a lot for a three year old.

10.29.12: Pumpkins or drums?

This year the girls (left to right: stella, daphne, fiona) drew their own jack-o-latern faces on their pumpkins and then Brant and I went to work carving them.  We tried to get the girls to clean out their pumpkins, but they kept calling the insides...gross.  The girls were really excited to see the faces they drew carved.  They got even more excited when they learned the fun noises the pumpkins made when you hit it with the spoon.  Not sure if they were more excited about their carved pumpkins...or new drums. 

10.28.12: Marrone/Robertson Halloween

This year we celebrated our 2nd annual Marrone/Robertson adventure to the zoo for trick-or-treating.  As you can see, the girls were crayons (fiona/blue, daphne/green, stella/pink).  Brant and I were paper (or white felt painted by the girls in their crayon colors).  The crayon hats were short lived as expected but they carried their own color coordinated pumpkins most of the time this year.   We even painted fingernails and toes to match crayon colors.  Nicole was a vet, Peter an astronaut and Dan a NASA repairman.  All costumes homemade and all turned out great. I can't believe we have lived here long enough to celebrate our second Halloween already.

10.27.12: Mesmerized

What could possibly have the girls so mesmerized?  Their very first video game, Sesame Street.  Daphne, Fiona and Stella were in complete shock and couldn't even finish their cheese.  Then they learned that they could be 'IN' elmo's world and the shock turned into gigantic smiles.  Thanks Debbie!

 

10.22.12: Walking Nene

It has become a tradition when Nene comes that she always brings balloons (and takes them away upon her departure).  With balloons come strings and with strings comes the desire to 'walk' people around the house.  I don't understand it, but the girls (stella/peach, fiona/purple, daphne/pink) love it.  They walk, run, and skip around the house all while holding a string with an adult (and occasionally each other).  It is by far their favorite thing to do and typically goes on for 30+ minutes before the adult gets tired of walking in circles, never the girls.  Nene has now mastered the art of getting walked by everyone at the same time - a true feat considering they must all agree to go in the same direction at the same pace.

10.21.12: Who is the party for?

Today we went to the children's museum with Nene and arrived to a party getting setup outside.  Daphne asked me who the party was for and I suggested she go and ask someone setting up the tables (I knew there was a special event going on today)....so she did, right after she tapped the stranger on her bottom to get her attention. 

 

After spending sometime inside the museum, we went outside to discover hula hoops, balloon animals, puppets, clown noses, glitter stars, ice cream, bollywood dancing and tons more.  Below Stella/blue, Fiona/purple, Daphne/orange proudly showoff their color coordinated balloon dogs. 

10.13.12: Riding ponies

We went on a surprise trip to a farm and the girls were so excited even though they had no idea what was in store for them. We went last year but this year was magical.  The girls were old enough to understand and really enjoy all the farm had to offer.  Immediately they (daphne/pink, fiona/yellow, stella/brown) rushed toward the bounce house - always a hit. 

Next they all got to ride ponies for the first time.  This was the biggest highlight of our adventure.

After some time in a hay maze, visiting animals and nature we took a hayride out to a pumpkin patch.  In true Robertson spirit, they picked out the biggest pumpkins they could find and we attempted to carry them back to the car.  Brant and I will be sharing a pumpkin this year as the girls' pumpkins were so large we each could only carry two.  We even found ourselves wrangling children with our legs back to the car as our arms were overflowing with pumpkins.  All in all an amazing day and the girls have already requested we go back tomorrow.

10.12.12: Balance

Today we were in pursuit of an amazing park I read about online.  After some aimless driving around we did find it.  You'd think the most amazing part would be the five different play structures but instead it was the discovery of these turtles.  The girls (daphne/green, stella/pink, fiona/blue) were very excited to find a turtle in their favorite color.  I was just thankful the girls picked common colors.