William is almost 6!

We say it every year but it is hard to believe that William is turning a year older and will be 6 years old in less than two months! We are at awe at how much he has grown and how much he has learned and is learning. He is a very creative, particular, playful, polite, funny, sporty, smart and loving little boy.  He loves to color, paint, draw, play drums, and making things out of recycled materials, he also loves to read his favorite topic is animals. Loves to play as much as any 5 year old, most evenings we take walks to the golf course where William loves kicking the soccer ball, throwing the football or boomerang and running with Nora. One nice perk about living in Hawaii is being able to play outdoors all year around.  We try to make it to the beach at least once a week; he is showing interest in learning how to surf.

He has adjusted well to living on the island. We did notice that he was a little shocked to experience so much change in such a short period of time. The hardest part for him has been not being able to see the family weekly or even daily like he use to. The move to the middle of the sea is shocking to anyone, even if you love this place, which is why many people move back home within the first year. Despite the turbulence of the move he has adjusted well to life on the island.

The Hawaii public school system is not our favorite. It’s hard coming from the suburbs of Chicago which is home to some of the best public schools in the country. He is so good at making friends with good kids and thankfully got a great teacher.  He has learned so much, it is incredible. His reading and writing skills have skyrocketed in the last few months. He is so independent and takes initiative. He loves to write and will copy words or sentences he sees on magazines or books.  He has now started to do what he calls “very best guess spelling” where he spells out words to the best of his ability, he does a good job! He can now read level 1 book’s to us with minimal assistance. We will be visiting a few schools, some public and some private for the following school year and hope to find one that we are all happy with.

I could go on and on about how amazing we think William is, we are just very proud of him and look forward to watching him grow and grow!

Here is a picture that William drew. It is a chameleon trying to catch some flies. He did his very best guess spelling to write "by William Newton illustrated" and "the king chameleon". Love the chameleons crown.

 

Arrabella update.

Arrabella is a beautiful little love bug that we just adore. Over the last month she has hit some exciting milestones. She is on the go, reaching for anything in sight. She is also showing a lot of interest in crawling. In the last month she has started to sit for long periods of time and has started to say “babababa”. We have started to introduce some foods; so far she is not really into it. She loves rice cereal and smashed bananas from our back yard. She has always been a little mermaid and really enjoys bath time. She sleeps through the night but not consistently; she has always been a good sleeper, but seems to have regressed in the last month, likely due to all the new exciting milestones. She likes being read to and loves playing peek-a-boo.

She loves her big brother William and thinks he is the coolest thing on earth, she is always very interested in what he is doing and coos and smiles at him a lot. She still loves Nora dog so much. She is becoming more and more aware of her environment by the day. When we go pick up William from the bus stop, she will start to kick and wiggle with excitement when she sees the bus.

She is currently in a “mommy” phase and likes to be held by me the best. Sometimes she will cry if Chris takes her. She loves her daddy so much though and gives him the biggest smiles whenever she sees him.

Here are her 6 month stats.

Height- 27 inches, 88% percentile

Weight – 17lb 6.5oz, 71%

HC- 17inches, 76%

Arrabella is 6 Months!

Going Bananas

We got to pick our second banana bunch from the banana grove at our house. I am not totally sure what kind of bananas they are but there are two kinds and I am almost positive the little ones are apple bananas, which are our favorite and are almost ready to get picked. YUM!

Playing peek-a-boo! Nora seems to be enjoying the Hawaiian life.

As you may be able to tell this banana bunch has longer bananas. I will post a pic of the little ones. We get to make smoothies, ice cream, and many other yummy treats with these goodies.

Giants

William is on the Makawao Giants T-ball team! He is a good batter and very good on the field. He really enjoys being part of a team and is such a good sport. We love that he has turned into such a little sports dude in the last few months.

Run William, Run!

We have all enjoyed watching William play, especially Arrabella who has been there to cheer him on every game and almost every practice. 



Leader of the month.

In January William received the Leader of the month award for showing excellence in leadership in the class for the month of December. The teachers select one student each month that are proative and show leadership. We got to have lunch with William at school, it was fun for all of us! Congrats William we could not be more proud to be your parents.

Proud Dad.

William and the school principal.

 Of course sister Arrabella was there to cheer William on!