Update

We've had a crazy week over here. The kids had been coughing for about three weeks (it's going arond), so we bought them a neblizer so we could give them inhalations, which cleared the coughs up right away, B"H. The kids get to choose which videos they watch while they take their medicine. Lev chose Bob the Builder and Estie chose Elmo. How do I know she wanted Elmo? Because she says it! I'm the only one who listens close enough to catch it, but she is for sure saying words. Maybe their only sounds to her, but she's using those sounds in the right context.
Estie also knows the meaning of 'no.' She walks up to the heater and oven, shakes her finger and says 'No, no, no.' If we could only get that message through about touching the computer! Oh well, at least she knows it for the dangerous stuff. She also tells me 'Up' when she wants to get on the couch or in her high chair. Like I said, you have to listen and know what to look for, but she's saying these things.
Estie started a new gan this week. She had been going to a metapellet, a babysitter who takes kids into her house and charges by the hour. This worked out great for three months, but metapellets don't engage the kids or do activities with them. It's pretty much open play the whole time, which isn't so terrible, but we knew Estie would benefit from more structure. At her new school ,there are 6 kids (including Estie). They eat breakfast, daven (pray) to Hashem, listen to music, play and do artwork. She didn't cry when I left her there, which is good. She got over that with the metapellet (she cried for about a month straight).
Lev continue to amaze us. Bubbie called me yesterday and asked for permission to brag about Lev. She said that the kids had been reading (I'm not sure exactly what that means, but I think they've begun to recognize certain words even without a picture) and that Lev was reading all these words that he shouldn't have known, so she wrote out a new word that they'd never done before, 'Bubbie Chana' and he read it right away. Then she wrote 'Morah Avital,' and he got that one too. When the other kids saw how excited she was they all started saying 'Bubbie Chana! Morah Avital.'
The other brag was about his amazing memory. I guess they were watching a dvd that they'd seen twice before and Lev needed a diaper change. They went to the other room to change his diaper and all the sudden he said 'tzedaka box." She asked him what he was talking about and he said 'On the movie." She looked over to the movie and saw that there was a tzedaka box on the screen. He had remembered the music that went with the picture of the tzedaka box!
Lev is also showing great strides in kibud av v'em (respecting his parents). We have a rule that he cannot come into our room in the morning until he hears the alarm go 'beep, beep, beep' (6:30 am) The other morning, Estie was up heand screaming at 6 and I knew Lev was up, so I called for him to come into our room and he said 'But I didn't hear the beep, beep, beep!' I told him it was a special thing and he could come in early. Isn't that great?! He always waits for the beep, beep, beep.
Have I bragged enough? I just wanted to let you all share in our pride. We're very lucky to have such amazing kids. B"H I think they got some of my father's smarts, but they also got some good people skills to go along with those smarts.
Side note- we're beginning to plan for Lev's upshern (his first hair cut once he's 3-years-old). I know it's far away, but we want to make sure that anyone who wants to come and join us (you're all invited- it's a big deal!) has enough advanced warning. We're planning for the first or second week in August. I know, his birthday is in July, but it goes by his Hebrew birthday, which is the 17 of Tamuz and the beginning of a three week period where we cannot cut hair or have celebrations (we are commemorating the three weeks before the destruction of the Temple where the Jews were trapped in the city without food). The three weeks end on 30th of July and we want to wait so that people can fly in and join us. We're planning on going up to Mt. Meron, a tradition here in Israel to have a picnic and cut hair with family and family-by-choice and then have a kids' party the next day. Lev has already started making his guest list (the kids from his gan). We discuss the party and how he'll get his hair cut and say good-bye to his tutis and that he'll be potty trained. Like I said, this birthday is a big deal!
Anyway, there's you're heads up. We'll let you know when we pick a final date.