Cheap Puzzle

Yesterday I saw a blog post that suggested buying a place mat at the dollar store and using it to make a puzzle. Today I had just 5 minutes to waste and was near a dollar store so I thought I would check out the selection. They had a princess place mat! Katherine has recently become quite interested in the Disney Princesses. When I showed her the puzzle, her first comment was, "Look, it is princess. Like my panties and my sleeping bag."Luckily I thought to take a picture of the place mat before I cut it to pieces. I will print off a picture so that she knows what it is supposed to look like. While she was napping I cut the pieces. Next time I will draw the pieces on the back before I cut them out. My pieces are odd shapes and some have pointy edges.
Katherine still needed help putting the puzzle together but when we were done she said, "That was fun" so it was a $1 well spent. I put the pieces in the baggy and it is an easy toy to take along with us to places like the doctor's office. I also bought a Dora one that I have not cut apart yet so that will be next week's surprise.

Tricycle

Katherine received a tricycle for Christmas from Nana and Pops. It is one where there is a handle for the parent to use to push and steer. Katherine has not wanted to ride in her stroller on our nightly walks for some time now so she rides her tricycle. Until this week it was mainly one of us pushing her because she could not get the tricycle to go on her own. All of a sudden she was able to do it. Now she gets mad if we touch the handle so our walks are at a much slower pace now. She still has not mastered steering so luckily our street is straight and we walk right next to her in case she accidentally turns. I realized that it had never occurred to me to get her a helmet. Now that she goes on her own we thought she needed one so we headed to target and picked out a cute helmet with butterflies on it.

Proud

Here is Katherine, holding up her completed "potty chart". She is wearing her prize - a Hello Kitty necklace and bracelet. We are still not 100% but she is doing much better.

Potty "retraining"

Katherine has had a little regression in the potty training area. She was never 100% accident free but pretty close. Since Caroline arrived she has been having many more accidents. I think it is partially due to my divided attention so I forget to remind her to go. I think she is also at an age where she does not want to stop what she is doing and take a break. It has been very frustrating for me and I desperately am wanting to have her retrained soon.

At the beginning of this week I decided to use TV watching as a motivator. If she stayed dry all morning we would watch one show before nap and if she stayed dry all afternoon she would get to watch another one before dinner. I think that the concept of delayed gratification was a little difficult for her. Every time she was dry she wanted to watch TV and she got so upset when i would not let her. She had accidents 3 of the 4 time periods we tried this even though she had more successes during that time frame so I decided I needed to switch things up. It was a little too "all or nothing" for her and she was not seeing any rewards for her successes. It was also punishing me as I was not able to have any down time during the times she usually watches some TV.
Yesterday we started our new incentive program. I have a nifty dry erase board with a grid on it. Every time she successfully is dry and goes to the potty she gets to fill in a square. Every time she has an accident I erase a square. When she fills up a column she gets to choose an item from the basket of new toys and books.
Yesterday she only had one accident but she was still able to earn a prize. She chose watercolors. I think she has used them at school but we had never used any at home. She had fun and ended up with a pretty wet piece of paper with a little color. She also decided to see if it worked with finger painting.
Today she decided to get a foam puzzle. I was much more impressed with this puzzle after we played with it than when I bought it. each puzzle piece has a square piece with a shape. The set has three triangles, circles, squares and parallelograms. One is divided in thirds, one divided in halves and the other is whole. So, what Katherine thinks is a fun colorful puzzle is actually teacher her about fractions.
Both the puzzle and watercolors are from Target's dollar spot. Currently there are a lot of art and educational things located there with Back to School.

Hopefully this new reward system will motivate Katherine to retrain herself. So far it is working. When she fills up the entire chart she will get her grand prize of a new Hermie DVD that I got on clearance.

Muffin tin meals

I read about the idea of Muffin Tin Monday on Chrys' blog last week. Basically the idea is to get a little creative in the presentation of food at mealtime for your toddler. At first the thought of it totally overwhelmed me. "You mean not only do I have to make a healthy lunch but now I have to creatively present it too?" Well, I decided to give it a try. You know what? It is no more work to put her food in a muffin tin as it was to put it on a plate. It actually helped me to make sure I was giving her more variety as there are 6 compartments.
Katherine thought it was pretty fun to eat out of the muffin tin. I can's say she ate more than usual but I told her that she needed to eat something out of each hole. She did.
She then remembered that the one cabinet that we did not baby proof and she is allowed in is the cabinet with the other muffin tins (actually silicone). So, she went and got another one and practiced her pincher grasp (long ago mastered) by moving every bit of food from one tin to the other.

What not to wear - toddler version

We don't have cable so I never actually get to see "What Not to Wear unless I am at my mom or brother's house. I would imagine though that if they had a toddler version, Katherine would have made the show today.

Of course when I dressed her she matched. She had on a tank top that was hot pink with light pink flowers with light pink shorts.
At some point this morning she traded the shorts for pants all by herself. The problem was hat those pants had a very busy floral pattern. They did have both colors of pink though so she needs to get some credit. She was so proud for getting dressed "all my byself". Later in the day she decided that she wanted to wear her rain suit and rain boots. She insisted that she would go for a walk and be able to splash in the puddles and stay dry in the rain. Hmmm, there was no rain at all today.So, she got all dressed in her rain gear and we went outside for a walk. There was no splashing but she sure looked cute. It was pretty warm and humid so when she returned from the walk she was pretty sweaty.

Target

People keep commenting on how much I am doing with the girls. Really I am just choosing stuff that is easy. I may get out a lot but typically I am going places where I will have help. I go to friends houses or meet friends at locations where Katherine will be occupied.

I knew that the ultimate challenge would be taking both kids to the grocery store or Target. Yesterday I decided to go for it and I headed to Target. Katherine sat in the back of the basket and Caroline's car seat was in the front. First stop was the dollar spot where I let Katherine choose a treat that we would keep if she cooperated. I actually spent about $15 at the dollar spot because they had a lot of great educational and art supplies for "Back to School". I was crossing stuff off the list and things were going well. Caroline was asleep and Katherine was behaving. Then I smelled it. There was a dirty diaper smell. Katherine confessed, she had gone #2. So, I had to leave all of my merchandise outside the bathroom and take both girls in to take care of it. I don't think she has ever had such a disastrous accident, let alone in public. I used all of my wipes and she had to continue the shopping trip in panties with no pants. Luckily she was wearing her cover and I had another one because later in the trip she did it again. In her defense, I think she had a little bit of a stomach bug. The rest of our outing was fine. Really both girls were very well behaved. We just had bad timing on a sick tummy.

Because of the sick tummy, I put Katherine in one of our few remaining diapers for her nap. I just was not in the mood to handle more disgusting accidents. That was a huge mistake. She has been asking to wear a diaper ever since. Potty training has regressed a bit anyway, I do not want to use diapers and continue in the wrong direction.

Katherine sayings

Katherine is a funny girl who loves to talk ALL. THE. TIME. She is constantly cracking me up both by the funny things and by the fact that she imitates what we say but sometimes in the wrong context. Here are some of the funny things she has done and said in the past few week.

"I want my 'mote" - said after we told her that she could watch TV in 5 minutes. She wanted her remote to turn it on now.

"Mommy, I want to see the thunder." - said during a thunderstorm. She knew that whatever made that loud noise must be cool. This was the week after we saw fireworks.

"Let's get in the car" - We told her we were going to have a smoothie after dinner. She wanted to get in the car to go get it. We were planning to make them at home.

"Mommy, I go peepee by myself. You wait right here."
"Do you want me to come help?"
"No Thanks."
-Sure enough she did the entire thing all by herself, including dumping the contents of the little potty into the big potty and rinsing it out with water!

I love it when she is sweet. Tonight after playing outside she asked if she could have a snack. I gave her a package of Goldfish. 5 minutes later she came up to me and said, "mommy, thank you for the goldfish you gave me".

"Mommy, baby sister is hungry. She wants to drink your milk."

"When I's a baby did I . . ."

"Daddy, you have a monster in your ear, eat it!"

"I want fresh juice." Said after I took her sippy cup out of the fridge. It had juice in it from the morning and she wanted new, fresh juice.

"Something bad happened. I have a bug bite. Medicine helps it, or my new tooth brush." She has a new toothbrush that sings.

"Mommy, let me see your belly button. Your belly button is clean, Daddy's belly button is dirty." Really I don't think Sam's belly button is dirty. More likely his tummy is just hairy!

"Mommy, I hungry. My tummy needs food!"

"Baby sister doesn't have teeth yet. She can't eat food."

8-8-08 "Mommy, when I grow up I be a pwincess like when you grow up you be a pwincess too." Funny since we really don't have many books or movies about princesses. It is just a given that all little girls want to be a princess I guess.

8-8-08 "I need to eat babies. I hungry."

8-8-08 "I need money right now mommy!" Said after I got my change from Sonic.

8-8-08 "You not have Dr. Pepper mommy. Only have water." Pretty convicting when your 2 year old tells you that you need to drink water, not Dr. Pepper as you are in line at Sonic for Happy Hour drinks.

8-10-08 Nana: "Katherine, that is a pretty new dress. Where did you get it?"
Katherine: "In my closet."

8-11-08 Sam: "Katherine, do you know where raisins come from?"
Katherine: "Yes, the box."

8-11-08 "I eat a bugger from my nose." Icky!

Train up a child

"Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it." Proverbs 22:6

As parents we have a lot of responsibility. It is scary sometimes. One responsibility is to teach our children about God and His ways, trusting that at some point they will have a personal relationship with Him by their own decision.

I realize that in some areas I have dropped the ball. Katherine is so verbal and sharp. In the past month I have realized that she has a great memory as she is reciting songs and nursery rhymes. Yesterday she said all of "Jack and Jill" and we had only been reading that story for a week. She is a sponge. I realized that I have not even started to work on scripture memory with her. I have thought about it before but now that she seems to be memorizing so many other things I know she is capable. Here are 2 cute videos of Katherine showing off her great memory. (If you read this in a reader or email, you may have to go to the blog to see the video.)





I am at a loss though with how to even start. I have one music CD that is kids Bible memory but Katherine does not really like it. I have a book with note cards but that seems a little boring and over her head. Since she memorized about 8 nursery rhymes in less than a week by reading a book with fun pictures, I think that would be a great way to do Scripture memory. All of the kids Bible's we have though are just paraphrases and not the entire verses.

We also need to start some kind of family devotion or more structured Bible time. We read from her toddler Bible but I know there are so many other things out there.

So, what works for you? Have any of you found a way that works in helping your kids to learn Bible verses? Either something you have bought or something you have done. I would love to hear your ideas. Have you found any good family devotionals that are geared toward toddlers or preschoolers?

Monsters

Katherine has recently started talking about monsters a lot. I have no idea where she has picked up on monsters and being scared. Honestly the only exposure to monsters that she has had in my presence has been the Sesame Street monsters of Elmo, Zoe, Abby, Cookie Monster, etc. I think that these monsters are pretty cute, friendly and fun. Somehow though she knows that monsters are supposed to be scary.

If we had watched Monsters, Inc. or even read Where the Wild Things Are, I could understand that she would get this but I have no idea where she has learned that monsters are scary. Maybe it was at Mother's Day Out. There are older kids in her class and she has come home with a few other things she has learned from kids there.

Sometimes talking about monsters is a fun game. She tells me that they are in my ear and I need to eat them. Sometimes we have the tickle monster. Sometimes she hides and is scared of monsters. Yesterday in the car she was hiding under her blanket and said she was hiding from a monster. I told her that we should pray that God would make her not scared of the monsters and that they would go away. She did not want to pray but a few minutes later, on her own, this is what I heard.

"Dear Jesus, help the monsters go away so I not be scared anymore. Amen"

I know that monsters are pretend but they may be real and scary to her. I want her to know that she can go to God and ask him for anything. It was sweet to hear this prayer.

Another night last week Katherine woke up crying. When Sam went in she said that she had a scary dream. So far all of her dreams have been about the ABC's and they are dancing (I think she watches too much Sesame Street). She could not tell him what this dream was about but she was certainly scared.

I know that being scared of monsters and having nightmares is a normal developmental phase. I just hope that I handle it well. How do you handle your scared toddlers?

Are all toddlers bipolar?

I seriously think that my toddler, and probably most of yours as well, exhibit "bipolar" tendencies.

One textbook definition describes bipolar disorder as a major affective disorder in which an individual alternates between states of deep depression and extreme elation.

That was Katherine today and really many days. Today we had our normal routine. I picked her up at "school" (Mother's Day Out) at 2 and we went home. After a short snack and mommy time we went to her room to read and take a nap. Today she would. not. go. to. sleep. We were in her room for about 30 minutes resting on the bed together when I left the room. She screamed at the door for 10 minutes before I went back in there. In all the two of us spent two hours (the length of her nap) laying on her bed talking, reading, cuddling and doing everything but napping. Actually, I did doze off a few times but she never did.

I had told her that she could watch Dora after her nap so of course she asked at least 100 times if she could go watch TV. Over and over I explained that she would watch TV after her nap. When we finally got up she continued to ask to watch TV and I held my ground. It was not a fun afternoon. She threw multiple tantrums over not watching TV or getting her way.

Depressed Katherine

Then I offered her ravioli and she switched from depressed to elated. She ran into the den, with her hands in the air, yelling "yeah, ravioli". She was excited until she finished it and remembered that she wanted to watch TV.

Happy Katherine

We have noticed this on numerous occasions. Katherine will be upset and throw a tantrum and then she will do a 180 and be super excited. It sure can be a challenge. Do your toddlers also show signs of "bipolar" disorder?

note: I realize that Bipolar Disorder is truly much more serious and complicated than this. I don't want anyone who suffers from this to think I am being insensitive or ignorant. Just some observations on my toddler.

BooBoo

George, Shannon and kids came over for dinner and to hang out. It has been way too long since we have been together and we wanted to spend some time before Squeak arrives. After dinner we went to the backyard to let the kids play. Well, Katherine tripped and totally fell and did a face plant on the sidewalk. I actually heard her head hit the concrete. You have never seen a pregnant lady move so fast as I ran to pick her up. She had a blue, scraped goose egg on her forehead almost immediately as well as scraped knees and elbows. Sam went to get her an ice pack which was quite humorous and I sat and cuddled with her. She was OK and went back to play after about 5 minutes.

You would never know what lurks beneath those bangs...
Look, I have a big red bump!

I tried to take a photo of the big bump but her bangs covered it just perfectly and she was not very cooperative. She has been lucky and has not had too many injuries. I just hate it when she gets hurt. She did complain a few times tonight that it hurt so we gave her some Tylenol before bed.

28 months

Katherine you are now 28 months old. Where has the time gone? You continue to amaze your daddy and me with all that you are saying and doing. This age is both the most fun and in many ways the most challenging as you are gaining new language skills and independence. These are often very enjoyable but often they can lead to disobedience and discipline. No one likes discipline but it is necessary.

This month I have seen your little brain working overtime as you process things. You have been asking who, what, and where for some time. Those are pretty straightforward and easy to answer. Sometimes though it can get a little annoying when you ask over and over "where?" even when I answer the question. You love to ask, "What's that?" and "What are you doing?" Now you are asking how and why questions which can be more difficult. I love your curiosity though. Tonight daddy was putting more dirt in the hole left when our tree was cut down. You asked "Daddy, what are you doing?" He told you and then you said, "why?" several times. He did a great explanation of the storm, why we cut down the tree and the decomposition of the tree roots. You better be careful when you ask your daddy "why?" you might get more of an answer than you were wanting.

You are becoming more imaginative. You tell long stories about what you have been doing and sometimes you insert funny things to see if we are paying attention. You are also becoming more imaginative with your play. You love to play with your doll house and with your play kitchen. You make me peanut butter and jelly, waffle, pizza sandwiches and cake soup! You are also really enjoying playing with your baby doll and pretending to take care of her.

I think that this month you have started to have dreams at night and at nap. There have been a few times when you have woken up crying differently than usual and when I went in your heart was beating fast. When I asked if you were scared you would say yes. I hate that you sometimes wake up scared. You also have some fun dreams too. The other day when you woke up from nap you were all excited to tell me about the 2 bears that were going up the ladder and one fell and bumped his head. Since we have no books or movies with this story I asked if you had a dream about it and you seemed to understand and said yes.

You are still learning the concept of sharing. Sometimes it comes easily and sometimes we have to work on it. One area of sharing that you have down is sharing food. At dinner you will give mommy something to eat from your plate and take something from her plate. Then you say that we are sharing. The problem is that often I don't want what you have given me and do not understand that sharing your peas with me in order for me to share some fruit with you is not an even trade.

You can be a pretty silly girl. You are always doing silly things in the car. Last week you decided to use your feet to hold your sippy cup. When we draw we will sometimes trace your hand or foot. The other night you wanted me to trace your head and then your bum. You stood up and put your head on the paper to trace. It was pretty silly!

You like having your desk in your room and you now are drawing pictures purposefully. You pulled out your blue crayon and drew a lot of lines and told me it was the ocean. Then you drew some circles in the water and told me they were fish. It was the first picture you drew where what you said you were drawing actually resembled what I was seeing. You are good at drawing lines and circles as well. This is a photo of you having your "little lamb" draw a picture for you. She was drawing grass to eat.

The other day you surprised me. We keep your Little People Farm in the hall closet. You went to the closet and undid the rubber band that "baby proofed" the cabinet all by yourself. I guess there is no point to having that anymore except you seemed to think it should be there when I tried to leave it off. You took out your toys and put the rubber band on and then went to play with them. 15-20 minutes later I was in the kitchen and I heard you asking for the rubber band. You had put all the pieces back in their bag and put the bag back in the cabinet. I was so proud that you cleaned up your toys on your own without me telling you to. Cleaning up toys has not been your strength, especially without being told.

As with most kids your age, you have a few sounds that you say incorrectly. I have been paying attention to some of those to make sure that they do develop. I am excited that you are now correctly saying your /k/ at least half of the time. This means that you now say "Kafrine" instead of "Fafrine" when someone asks you your name.

You have done a great job in your big girl bed. Even after we took off the bed rail you only fell out of bed once. Your daddy and I both really enjoy snuggling in bed with you to read books and have both been found guilty of falling asleep with you in bed (in fact, I think daddy is there right now). You love this and do everything you can to get us to stay with you. Sometimes it means that your bedtime gets later and later but it is so tempting for both of us to spend that extra time with you, especially knowing that in a month we will be splitting our time between you and baby sister.

You have begun to show an interest in learning the shapes of letters and numbers. You have been able to say your ABC's and count to 15 for some time but you have not been too interested in identifying their shapes. I have had several people comment that you are so smart and could learn them in a week or less if I drilled you on them. I decided not to do that though because there is really no reason to force a 2 year old to learn unless they are interested. It has nothing to do with when you will read and even if it did, you are only 2. But, now you ask me to draw specific letters and you ask me to identify certain letters. For some reason, your favorite letter is "p". You know that Katherine has a "k", Nana has an "n" and Pops has a "p". You have found a great online alphabet animal game (Thanks Holly and Bree) and you always like to play it in my computer.

I have started to notice a little loss of that sweet childhood innocence where everything in life is good. It shocked me a little when reading the fairy tale of the Little Mermaid (original, not Disney version) and you pointed out the sea witch and said "oooh, she's ugly". I wondered where in the world you learned the concept of ugly and even that word. At the pool this weekend there was a girl who was about 5-6 and kind of obnoxious. You told Nana that she was not nice. Obviously you are going to learn that there are evil things in this world and I want to help you to navigate through that discovery, I was just a little taken aback at the realization that you are aware of these things and you are attaching vocabulary to the concepts. Sometimes you don't know the word, such as "mean" but you do understand the opposite of "nice" is "not nice".

Along with your continual acquisition of new vocabulary words, I am starting to notice your intonation and expressions developing as well. There are so many times that they way you say something will make your dad and I just crack up laughing. I love all of the phrases that you say that I know you directly pick up from me, daddy or Nana. Some examples are: just a minute, be right back, in a little bit, go ahead, I don’t want to, no big deal, that’s silly, and ummmmm no.

Your "unca wheel" (Uncle Will) was in town for work a few weeks ago. You were able to spend more time with him than I was because you were staying with Nana and Pops while daddy and I were out of town. You love your "unca wheel" and have a lot of fun with him. Of course while he was in town we had to go to El Fenix. You enjoyed playing with him by the fountain before we went home.

You are getting a lot of time in the water this summer between spray parks and the pool. Each time you are more and more comfortable with getting wet and exploring. You still do not like going under but you are more interested in playing on the steps, jumping off the side and swimming with mommy. This week at Robert's pool you fell into the water out of the inflatable boat. Luckily I was standing by the boat when it happened so you were right back out of the water. You were both scared and thought it was fun.
You are excited about baby sister coming soon. You play with and nurture your baby doll so well. You are also pretending to be a baby a lot. Yesterday you pretended to be a baby by laying down on the den floor and getting under the area rug. Silly girl!
You love to talk on the phone but your conversations can be pretty difficult. Usually they require the adult on your side of the phone asking you questions so that you can tell the person something on the other side of the phone. This week when you were on the phone with Nana she asked you what you were doing. When you were done answering her, you asked, "Nana, what you doing?" Daddy and I looked at each other in amazement because you were actually keeping a phone conversation going without our help!

Like I mentioned before, we have to discipline you at times. One of the new areas that we struggle with is that you have learned to open the car door. For some reason our car does not have the child proof locks. Sometimes I will unbuckle you so you can climb out and you will scurry to the other side to open the door. You have been told that you will automatically be disciplined with no warnings if you do that. It is soooo dangerous.

You are enjoying sharp objects now. You are obsessed with trying to use a knife at the dinner table to cut things. We have 2 sets of toddler silverware that I let you use but sometimes you try to use our cutlery. You also are learning to use scissors. Again, I have a pair of child scissors but am scared you will find and try to use my scissors. I am trying so hard to keep you safe!

You have really gotten to where you love to watch TV. I was so intentional that you not watch it until you were 18 months old and we were in Norway. It seems that the older you get the more you are interested. Also the more pregnant mommy gets the more she is willing to let you watch it. I have to set limits on how much time you can watch TV or you would be there all day. I never want you to spend too much time in front of the TV or computer because there are so many other activities that are better for you and your growing mind. Your favorite shows are Sesame Street, especially the Elmo section, Bernstein Bears, Little Einsteins, Curious George, Blues Clues, Veggie Tales, Dora, and Clifford. At least they are all good programs.

You love your puppy. It is funny now that you are older that you are telling Hooligan what to do and you try to discipline her. You tell her "get down", "on the carpet", "good dog", "stay" and "no kisses". She does not always obey but then again, she does not always obey me either. The older you get the more Hooligan enjoys you because you can pet her and play with her.

You love to sing and we are constantly singing in the car. I have made you a CD with all of the classic kids songs. Your favorite is the ABC song, I'm a little teapot, and Old MacDonald. I am so glad I made the CD because I was getting tired of trying to remember more songs. I am working on a Sunday School version but I don't have as many good CD's.

Katherine, you are a constant joy. I am so enjoying seeing your personality and character develop. You will be such a great big sister. It is hard to believe that next month when I make your 29 month post you will probably be holding baby Squeak. Even though you will have tough times adjusting to having a sibling, know that your daddy and I love you very much.

Baby behavior

I was expecting Katherine to regress a little when Squeak arrived but for some reason it is already happening.

• She sometimes wants me to change her clothes while lying down on the floor like a baby.
• She will crawl across the floor and say "I'm a baby".
• She sucks her thumb if she sees a baby or a picture of a baby sucking her thumb.
• She will pretend to cry like a baby and say, "I'm a baby".
• She found a pacifier and has insisted on using it for the last 24 hours. I keep trying to put it away but she keeps asking for it.
• She wants to eat baby food. I am actually not opposed to this because she does not eat many veggies so if she will eat squash baby food she is welcome to.
• She will stand in the middle of the floor and go to the bathroom, even if I just asked her if she needed to. This is the most annoying because these are not accidents but intentional. I will ask her where she is supposed to go and she says, "in the potty, not in the panties", yet she just did exactly that.

It has been suggested that she can sense that baby sister is arriving soon. Maybe even she can tell subconsciously from the change in my hormones. Like I said, I was expecting this behavior once Squeak was here. I know most siblings will act out in some way to get attention. I just did not expect if to start a month or two before the baby came. Any suggestions from my experienced friends are welcome.

Aquarium

A few weeks ago Anne and I took the girls to the Aquarium or as Katherine called it, the "inside zoo". It was a fun day but very crowded due to 978 school children attending. There was an actual sign with the number, I did not make that up. The girls enjoyed it though it was not always easy to keep up with toddlers among all of the elementary kids. We decided that as wonderful as the Aquarium is, at their age the regular zoo is probably better because there is more room, it has more animals that they know and it is cheaper. The main bummer of the trip is that I brought my fancy camera to take wonderful photos of the exotic animals and when I pulled it out, there was no memory card. So, thanks Anne for taking some picture for me.

Sitting in front of the turtles

Katherine loved climbing on the railings. I had to be right by her at all times!

Anne caught Katherine in rare form.

Anne and Penelope both brought their baby dolls and enjoyed showing them the fish. So cute!

Naptime struggles

It seems that nap time is a roller coaster these days. Some days it is a piece of cake. We read 3 books, snuggle, turn out the light and turn on the white noise machine (rain is Katherine's favorite) and she is out for 2 hours. Then there are days like last Sunday and today where it takes a very long time to get Katherine down for a nap.

I started trying to get her down at 2:15. That is my new chosen nap time because her new MDO does not do naps and we get home at 2:15. She often takes naps that late anyway so no big deal. She finally went to sleep at 3:45. In that hour and a half between, we read books and snuggled as usual. But when I turned out the light and left, she threw a fit. Now that she is in her big girl bed instead of a crib, she can get up. I had put a child proof door knob cover on the inside of her door and she tried for 15 minutes, screaming "MOMMY" the entire time before I went to get her. She asked if we could nap in my bed. At this point I was ready to try that. So, we snuggled in my bed. I fell asleep on and off periodically waking up when she would poke my eyes or pull my hair. She never slept. Finally I told her that she had to go back into her room.

We recently took off the bed rail because she was climbing on it and I felt that it was more likely that she would fall over the bed rail while climbing and get hurt than that she would get hurt falling out of bed. She has only fallen out once and it scared her so we put her crib mattress on the floor until she learns to sleep on the side near the wall. I told her that she could sleep in her bed, on her mattress on the floor or on the carpet. She chose the mattress.

It is now 6:25 and she is still asleep! I knew she needed a nap and the effort I put in during that hour and a half was worth it.

The negative is that we were supposed to meet our community group for dinner at 5:30 and then go to the town hall meeting at church at 6:30. Obviously I missed dinner and I may miss the town hall meeting as well. The bummer is that on Sunday when we had problems we missed a swim party with these same people. I promise, Katherine really is sleeping! I wish I was with you all at Chipotle right now. I am sooooo hungry!

Happy Birthday Evan!

Saturday we attended Evan's second birthday party. It was a cookout at their house with water sprinklers for the kids. Evan was in Katherine's MDO class this year and we got to know his parents at family camp last year. It was a fun afternoon with good food, good friends and fun!

Katherine is the birthday expert. She thinks all parties are for her and she likes to help everyone blow out their candles.
Katherine and Evan sit to eat their cupcakes.
Katherine has "messy mouth".
Evan also has a messy mouth.

Katherine actually wanted to wear two pigtails which is a rare occasion. Even more rare is that they stayed in for the entire event. It had been so long since she had let me do her hair that I did not realize it was long enough for all of her hair to fit in the pigtails instead of the front part. I thought it made her look so old. It was so cute but she has not let me do it again.

The Foosball table was a hit but Katherine and Evan were more concerned about each keeping a ball than about trying to play. They would only drop their balls into the playing field at the same time and usually rather than trying to kick it to the goal they would immediately grab it back out for fear that the other child would get both balls. You got to love 2 year olds and their "ability" to share.

For lunch we had 6 kids actually sitting at a table to eat their hot dogs. Jacob actually did sit most of the time though he is standing in this photo.
Yummy

Happy Birthday Evan!