born together, best friends forever

The kids are so cute with each other these days. They hug and kiss. They rub each other’s back. The other morning Steven didn’t want to wake up in the morning and he was lying on the floor in the nursery. I was rubbing his back and Amaya and Sammy came over to rub his back, too. Another time Amaya was crying in her crib and Sammy said, “Sis Sis Sad.” They’re showing so much affection for each other. It’s amazing.

In this photo, Sammy was still asleep at the end of nap time and Amaya was rubbing his back to wake him up.

Steven is officially released from physical therapy! Yay Steven!! He’ll need his ankle support braces for another 4 to 6 months but that’s separate from any more general needs for PT. These photos are from his last PT session with the wonderful Jeanette. She was teaching him to walk backwards by pulling on a weighted string, hand over hand.

We had fun at a special afternoon “school” session last Tuesday.

More fun, as always, at music. Once again, Amaya spent part of the class on the instructor’s lap.

Rub a dub dub, three Clines in a tub.

It was a big week for me, too. As follow-up to the New York Times article on the rape kit backlog in Detroit, I was invited to join MSNBC Live with Tamron Hall. It was an amazing experience and Megan was thoughtful enough to both have the kids watch and capture photos of it. I saw these right when I finished and they made me tear up.

There were teacher meetings last week so, instead of group on Thursday, everyone met at the Westland mall play area on Friday. We’ll take on every adventure that comes our way!

When we were getting ready for daylight savings time we pushed their bedtime out half an hour for a few days. During that time, Jason would eat dinner while the kids were still up. They got used to it and now, if we’re downstairs when Jason gets home, Sammy says “eat. eat”. Here everyone is gathered around begging for scraps.

And here is a post-begging-for-scraps mommy pile-on!

We LOVE to color. Especially Amaya. Sammy and Steven have waxing/waning interest but I’m not kidding when I say that Amaya spent at least 3 hours of her Saturday coloring. She’s so focused and interested. I love it.

We got lucky, lucky on Sunday with amazing weather that pushed 60 degrees. High 50’s in November! It’s almost unthinkable.

We were able to go outside twice in one day. In November! What a treat! In the morning we thought we might need our hats. We didn’t but everyone liked them so much that we kept them on after Sammy and Amaya traded. “Trade! Trade!”

In the afternoon we ended up down at the end of the block cul-de-sac with two other families. I hit the jackpot with fun families who have kids about the same age.

This is Logan. He and Amaya shared a first kiss in that hummer. No joke. They puckered up and went for it, totally unprompted. Logan’s mom and I were very sad to miss the photo op!