Gymnastics

Daniel started Gymnastics class on Saturday.  We really didn't know what to expect, but tried to talk it up quite a bit last week in hopes of getting him excited and enthusiastic for it.  There were about 10 kids in the class.  They started by running/skipping/galloping around the room.  He was a bit hesitant, but participated.  After that, they did some stretching.  He pretty much just sat there, silently refusing to do anything.  Amy and I hesitantly watched from the side lines, not really knowing what would happen.

After stretching, they lined up and took turns going across the balance beam (normally, on tip toes, sideways, etc).  After that was the trampoline and then the floor mat (log rolling, bear crawling, crab walk).  Daniel did great!  He waited in line for his turn each time and then did whatever he was supposed to do.  He had a fairly stoic look on his face throughout, but once it was over he kept saying how much fun he had.  We're hopeful that next week he will be a little more relaxed and enthusiastic.  We've also been practicing some of his 'Really Cool Gymnastic Moves' at home, so hopefully that will help too.  Overall a great success and we're looking forward to the next few weeks!

Not so into this stretching stuff...

Working on their dismounts

A sucker at the end of class never hurts!

And a couple of videos:

Daniel Update

Last week, Daniel had a DIAL (Developmental Indicators for the Assessment of Learning) Screening.  It is something provided by our school district for kids 3-5 years old.  We didn't really know what to expect, but I took the day off of work (it was also the same as Leslie's 6-month checkup) so I could take him while the girls stayed home.

We got there and almost immediately someone came to take him back.  He came over to give me a quick hug and then headed back with a teacher.  About 45 minutes later, he came running out, covered in stickers saying he had had a great time.

A few minutes later, someone came and got us to go over all of the results.  They tested him for all kinds of different things - gross and fine motor skills, concepts (colors, numbers, shapes, etc.), problem solving, speech, behavior, etc.  We have a few (age-appropriate) things to work on, but nothing big at all.  And the speech therapist (the same wonderful person who we saw over a year ago when he wasn't talking at all) would like to see him again this Fall after we spend some time working on a few of his consonant sounds.  Otherwise, it was all great things.

Some of the highlights:
He knew all his colors and shapes and easily counted to 20.  He did perfectly on rapidly identifying different objects as well as describing what each was used for.  He did great with his answers to the problem solving questions.  My favorite answer was:

Q: What do you do if you break a friends toy?  (I suspect they are expecting an answer along the lines of 'Say sorry')
Daniel's Answer:  You fix it!

That's our little project doing repairman.

The other thing they test is behavior.  Throughout the test, a score gets a point added every time they need to redirect the kid, repeat instructions, or otherwise get them to do what they are supposed to be doing.  A perfect score is 0 and 54 is when they stop counting.  I'll be honest, I was expecting Daniel to get somewhere around 20-30, but was worried she was about to tell me it was a 50 or something like that.  But no, Daniel got a 0!  The examiner said we should be very proud because they don't see too many of those at all.  He followed instructions perfectly, stayed on task, and did everything that was asked of him.  We are very proud parents!

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I've been wanting to share some Daniel-isms.  He's at the age where he is picking up on everything, but doesn't always get the phrasing quite right.  Some of my favorite recent quotes from Daniel are:

"You always have to be compared!"  (You always have to be prepared...we've been talking about severe weather awareness.)

"That's way more than I respected!" (That's way more than I expected...regarding how many fire pits they had in stock at Lowe's.)

"Can we get some ice cream at McMcDonald's?" (Not sure where that extra Mc came from, but it makes me laugh.)

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Today is Trixie's birthday!  We celebrated by getting her and Aspen some Frosty Paws ice cream for dogs.  Daniel was excited to give it to them.  In fact, before we even got it out, I heard him say to Trixie in the other room, "Trixie, you're going to get some ice cream now, are you excited?"  When she didn't immediately respond, he yelled, "Daddy, Trixie isn't excited for her ice cream!"

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And a picture of our beautiful baby girl, just because:

Leslie's 6-Month Update

Leslie turned 6-months-old on Monday.  It has been a joy to watch her grow and develop over the last six months.  Here are a few updates:

Stats - She weighed 14 lbs., 10 oz. (23rd percentile) and measured 25.5" (41st percentile).  Her head circumference was 16.25" (18th percentile).

Development - Leslie can easily roll over both ways, stand with support, transfer toys from one hand to the other, turn to see sounds she can't see, squeal and scream when happy, and is working on sitting unassisted.  She loves it when you say "ahh ahh ahh chooo" and loves to play peek-a-boo, dance, and shove anything she can in her mouth.  We're still hoping she'll start to solidly sleep through the night.  Usually she wakes once in the night to feed, but considering she's in her crib for nearly 11 hours at night (7:30-6:30), that's not so bad.  :)

Food - We introduced solids a few weeks ago.  So far she has had multi-grain cereal, peas, green beans, butternut squash, and pears.  Getting her to open her mouth wide is a little struggle, but otherwise she does well and seems eager to eat.  The pediatrician suggested we start giving her mashed foods on her tray like sweet potatoes, pears, etc. instead of always pureeing food.  It's a new school of thought - basically instead of us feeding her with a spoon and deciding how much she eats, she decides how much she wants to eat, much like breastfeeding.

We also, of course,  took a few pictures of our lovely six-month-old lady.  Without further ado:

And a bonus video of Leslie in her Jumperoo:

Leslie is 6-Months-Old!

Leslie turned 6-months-old today.  She has her pediatrician appointment on Wednesday afternoon, so we will blog afterwards with a more detailed update.  In the meantime, enjoy this picture of our baby girl:

Daniel Goes Shopping

A few months ago, we were in Target, and Daniel and I were looking at the toys.  He saw a toy backhoe and asked if he could have it.  He occasionally had asked for toys in stores before but never really minded being told 'no'...until that day.  I told him that we were just looking and not going to be getting any toys and he sort of flipped out.  I carried a very upset crying boy from Target and we went to sit in the van and wait for Mommy and Leslie to finish shopping.

After he calmed down, I had an idea.  Allowance.  Now, he's a little on the young side for when it's generally recommended to start giving a child an allowance, but I thought we'd give it a shot.  I explained to him that we would start giving him $1 each week, and he could save up his money and buy whatever he wanted.  The backhoe was $15, so once he had that much, he could buy that if he still wanted it.  He seemed to really like the idea.

Over the following weeks, we would give him a dollar every Saturday, and we would count all of his money.  When we would go to Target, we would walk around looking at toys and he would ask how much each thing he was interested in was, and then we'd talk about how long it would take him to save up that much money.  The toy he was most interested in changed most trips, but the last few weeks he had his eye on a "Play-Doh Factory" (that's what he calls the various Play-Doh sets).  It was $13, and as of yesterday, he had saved $13.

This morning we went to Target and walked around the toy department.  He saw the backhoe, but passed on it, and headed for the Play-Doh toys.  There were a couple of different "Play-Doh Factories".  The one he wanted was there, as well as one that was a few dollars more.  He had to choose whether to buy the one he had his eye on, or save for a few more weeks to have the bigger one.  Now, he's 3, so he obviously went with the immediate satisfaction of the one he had enough money for.  But he did say that he would start saving his money for the other one next.

We took the new toy to the front and he gave the cashier his money, took his receipt, and we walked out of Target with an incredibly happy, proud boy.

Cute Photos

Daniel came home from school with these notes that say "All About My Mom" and "All About My Dad."  We cracked up and thought you might enjoying seeing his responses too:

Just a few new photos of our cute kiddos:

Leslie is all ready for a walk!

We made cookies with our little Cookie Monster

I forgot to add this one on to the Easter post... This is how I found Daniel and some of his classmates at preschool when I picked him up Thursday!  If you look closely, you can tell Daniel is "trying" not to smile.  :)

Easter

We celebrated Easter at our house this year!  We were lucky enough to have my parents and my Grandma Munyon join us.

We started the morning off on Saturday by taking Daniel (and Leslie) to a neighborhood Easter egg hunt:

Let's go, Grandpa!

He found an egg hiding up in the tree!

Checking out his goodies - all chocolate!

All that egg hunting wore out Leslie!

We relaxed at the house for a bit after that.  Grandma helped feed Leslie some multi-grain cereal, and then it was time for a little Curious George while Leslie played on the playmat:

And then this happened... I still can't believe it, but my parents agreed to go to our favorite Indian restaurant Saturday evening.  If you know my parents, you know that putting onions in a dish is a bit of a stretch.  So you can believe my utter shock and disbelief when we jokingly suggested Indian food and they agreed.  They were champs and tried all sorts of new food.  I think they may have even liked a dish or two!  We had fun.  Thanks for indulging us!

Easter morning rolled around bright and early at our house.  Here's a video of what the Easter Bunny left for Daniel and Leslie:

A few photos of Easter morning too:

Finally we colored a few Easter eggs:

Phew, what a fun weekend!  Thanks for joining us, Dad, Mom, and Grandma.  Happy Easter!