Gymnastics

We enrolled Hannah in a gymnastics program that her "Help Me Grow" therapists recommended.  It's called Kidnetic Energy, and what is great about this program is that each child has a "helper" who goes around with them for the entire class.  The "helpers" are high school students who want community service hours, or college students enrolled in the pediatric therapy programs at OSU.  It's great for a kid like Hannah (or any 3-year old) who needs a little help staying on task.  Unfortunately, it is only for special-needs kids, so once Hannah is out of Help Me Grow (when she turns 3),  she won't be able to take the next session.  But for now, she's really enjoying it and it's nice to let her try something new.

During her hour-long class, the kids all warm up together with exercises designed by a pediatric therapist.  They do stretches and play with a parachute.  Then, the littler kids (us) head to the toddler gym for "circuits."  An instructor shows how each activity is to be done and the kids divide up into groups.  They rotate among trampoline, balance beam, bars, rings, basic tumbling (logs rolls, etc.), and other gross motor activities. 

For as small as she is, Hannah is really strong - she can hang on the bar all day!

See that rock wall behind Hannah?  Well, she just tried to climb OVER it.  The kids were climbing up and touching the top, but our Hannah attempted to go over.  She was so high up her helper only had a hand on her butt, so she was trying to coax her back down.... Only my child....

Walking on the bubbles

Rings!  More hanging for my monkey.

Darting to and fro .... the real reason a "helper" is great for Hannah.  Hannah had to be re-directed a number of times, both to stay on only the approved activities, and to stay in the "toddler" area.  She would just run anywhere (and all over) if we let her!

 

The trampoline - her favorite.  Hannah needs to be reminded to let others take a turn when she is on the trampoline.  There is also a "cheese pit" of foam blocks in the netted-off trampoline area that she especially loves.  Hannah has gotten really good at bear-crawling on two "crayons" and I think this is good for her to help learn how her body moves (and where her limbs are - she tends to just flail them about).

At the end of class, a kid-favorite - STAMPS.  The kids can even get them on their feet, which Hannah especially enjoys.  We may go back to swimming when gymnastics is done (it wore her out more), but we'll probably let her try something similar if she is still interested.  We just know we don't want to over-do it with activities.

Hannah's Concert

Hannah's Grandma Folger got her a xylophone for Christmas last year....gotta love a noise-making present with no batteries!!! (Thanks, mom!)

Hannah absolutely LOVES playing music on it and decided to give us a concert.  She was singing songs (although we weren't entirely sure what she was singing) while she pounded away....while standing on top of her toybox.  What a kid.

 

After the concert, Hannah spent her night pants-less.  Which, isn't entirely uncommon around here these days.  I'm also not sure what she was trying to get from the top of the bookcase when I caught her climbing.  Thankfully, they've been bolted to the wall since they were installed....

 

Our Snow Angel

Jon "won" these butterfly wings at a white elephant gift exchange at the Christmas party for the teachers at his school.  Actually, he may have traded to get them knowing that Hannah would love them.  She did in fact love them....so much that she wanted to wear them outside with her snowsuit.  So, we let her.

Enjoy the super-cute pictures!

 

 

 

We had a blast out in the snow.  Hannah and I even shoveled the driveway together with her wearing her wings.  I know a number of the neighbors slowed down to get a look at her with the giant shovel and her wings.  She's just too cute!

2 Months Old

Our Lauren is already two months old.  Where does time go????

Our little miss is just growing like a weed.  Just like her sister, she doesn't like pacifiers, but she loves to suck.  She is trying to get her fist to her mouth but doesn't always have the coordination. 

We haven't been able to weigh her on the baby scale, since I sent my sister's home with her after she was here, but I have no doubt that she is gaining weight.  She eats every 3 hours, but sometimes will go 4 hours at night.  On the rare "miracle nights" she will go 5 hours.  Lauren is starting to smile and coo, and I just can't wait for her to get more expressive. 

Right now she just sleeps a lot, which is fine because I know she is growing.  Her favorite position to sleep is on her tummy, laying on top of someone else's tummy.  This leads to me not getting much done at all during the day, as she'll snuggle in for a nap and if you attempt to put her down she wakes back up.  At first it frustrated me greatly because I wanted to do stuff, but I've learned (am learning is maybe the proper tense there) to just embrace it and enjoy this time while she is little and a snuggle-bug.

Happy New Year!

Jon and I had a great New Year's Eve....the first time we've gone out or done anything in ages.  We went out to dinner with our friends, the Lichtensteigers.  We've celebrated New Year's with them before....one year we went out with a giant group of friends and gave up our reservations at one place because a guy wanted to impress a girl.  We waited at a place to be seated for dinner until after 11pm!!!!  It was midnight or so by the time we were served....Not the best evening.  In 2007/2008, we all spent the evening in my hospital room together, drinking Sparkling French Lemonade and eating Toblerone candy while playing cards.  This year was a little different.  For starters, we have 4 kids now.

This year, we hired two babysitters to come to our house and we got reservations (albeit at 5pm), for a fancy restaurant downtown.  We all got dressed up and went with some gift cards (even better!).  We had a lovely evening -- from the time we left the house at 4:30pm until we got home around 7:30 or 8pm, we didn't talk about the kids - AT ALL!!!  How lovely to have an adult evening and just talk about random topics like we used to.

Some highlights of the meal:
* When Curtis received his dinner special main course, he asked us if it would be rude to ask the waiter where the rest of his food was..... Apparently a petite filet, oscar-style is not enough food for him.
* Curtis had Sheri order the 10oz filet so he could eat what she didn't finish.
* We all ordered water to drink, much to the disappointment of our server.  The drinks sounded delicious, but it is hard to justify a $14 glass of champagne with berries or a $10 glass of wine, when we could buy a bottle of either for the same price.
* Curtis quizzed the waiter on what gnocchi was....and asked more questions about the menu than I thought possible.
* We all ate some delicious steak and split a few desserts.


Of course, once we got home and rescued our sitters (who now don't ever plan on having 4 kids), we were all tired.  Jon was the only one awake to ring in the new year.  I went to bed at 9:30.  But, it was so nice to dress up and get out of the house.  We really have to remember to do it more often!!  I once read in a Parents Magazine that parents should leave their kids for 3-4 hours a week for time away.  The early weeks with a new baby certainly make it hard to do this, but now that Lauren is a little older, it's definitely getting easier to leave her.  (Of course, it would be easier if she were a little better about taking a bottle...)


Hope everyone has a great 2011!