Friday, February 27, 2015

School Dance

    Ashyln's school teaches all the students Mandarin Chinese.  I think its such a great global language to learn.  Ashlyn loves her Chinese class and is always impressing us with all the Chinese she has learned.  Since her school has such a  large focus on China, they do an annual Chinese New Year's dance every February.  Its a really fun event with "Chinese" food from Panda Express followed by a dance in the gym.  Last year, I was very pregnant and Dawson stayed with his aunt and uncle while we went.  This year, we all went.  We had such a fun time eating good food and watching the kids dance.  Dawson had a blast dancing and did not hesitate to get out there and bust a move.  I jut can't say enough wonderful things about Ashlyn's school and I'm so glad that they put on great activities like this.  


Yummy food

Dawson was most interested in the fortune cookies 

She really was having fun.  I'm not sure what that sad face is all about.

Gracie had a great time to.  She really liked the noodles.

Our little dancing boy.

Wow he is a great dancer.  LOL

Having a great time.

This was part of the Chinese ribbon dance

Gracie got sick of her stroller and wanted to walk around too.  Next year I am sure she will dancing with the rest of them. 


11 Months

 

Graceyn is now 11 months old.  She has only one more month of being an official baby.  She will always be my baby and will always be my precious sweet girl.  Our monthly pictures are getting much harder to take because she is just obsessed with grabbing the chalkboard and its hard to get a good shot before she messes it all up.  I do my best.
    Graceyn has been doing so much growing and is doing new stuff all the time.  The biggest skill she has learned is walking.  She has been taking more and more steps each day.  After today, I am officially considering her a walker.  She kind of just woke up today and decided she didn't want to crawl much anymore.  She has been walking everywhere today with a little bit of crawling thrown in here and there.  She still has to use the walls and furniture to balance herself, but she is walking so well.  She is so proud of herself when she walks and always has the biggest smile on her face.  I just can't believe she is already walking.  My how the first year flies by!
   Gracie mastered a lot of new skills this month.  She now waves like a champ and is pretty good waving hi or bye.  The other day at Costco she decided she was just going to wave at everyone.  She has also learned to give hi-fives and always give me one when I ask her to.
    She is talking up a storm.  Most is still babbling, but we are making out some words.  She says "mama", "bubba", "dadda" and "hi".  Hi is definitely her favorite.  She walks around the house all day saying, "Hi".  I think it's because I always say it to her.  I think I have heard a few more words but I'm not sure.  I swear she said "ball" today when we were playing.  I am excited to see if I hear it some more.  I love when they start talking.  Although if she is anything like her sister, she is going to start and never stop. 
     Another new thing Graceyn has been doing recently is dancing to music.  She has a little music piano that plays short songs.  She loves pushing the button over and over and dancing along.  It is the cutest thing to watch.  She has also has learned to throw a ball.  She loves playing ball with me.  I roll the ball to her and she throws it back to me.  She is pretty good at throwing a ball for just being 11 months old.  The girl impresses me daily with what she can do. 
    Gracie continues to eat so well.  She just eats whatever we serve her.  She does have some favorites.  She loves cheese.  She also continues to love meat.  We also have discovered that she loves cucumbers and hummus.  She can't get enough.  She is a big vegetable fan, but she doesn't usually show too much interest in fruit.  I keep giving them to her and I hope she will start warming up to them. 
    Sleep has been going much better.  I don't want to jinx anything, but I am praying she is finally getting sleeping through the night.  In a moment of desperation in the middle of the night, I was googling different sleep ideas.  One site I found recommended that I not feed her 20 minutes or less before bedtime . It said that it makes the associate eating with sleeping, so when they wake in the night they feel they have to eat.  I was willing to try anything, so the next night I gave it a shot.  I fed her around 6:00, then we played and got her ready for bed at 7:00.  She slept until 5:30!!! She has continued to do that every night since.  I keep telling everyone I refuse to get excited until she does it for at least 14 nights in a row.  She's gotten me excited before. This week because of snow, we have been very home bound and have not being going to the gym like we usually do.  She takes a nap around 9:00-10:00 and then another nap in the afternoon.  I think getting two good naps in a day have also helped her sleep better. 
      We are just loving this little lady to the moon and back.  She is truly the sunshine in our lives.  She is truly the sweetest and happiest baby in the world.  I thought I was biased, but people are always commenting on how smiley and happy she is.  She is literally all smiles. 
   We will be doing a lot of traveling in March.  We will be having her birthday party next weekend because it worked the best.  I am so excited for the theme I decided on and I think she's going to have a great little party. 

I will finish this post with some of her likes/dislikes:

Likes: books (especially touch and feel books), pulling all the books down from the bookcase, walking, pushing her walking toys, playing with her toys, exploring (today she discovered the baggie drawer and she was entertained for a long time), crawling up the stairs (with mom behind her), playing peek-a-boo, and trying to find me when I "hide" from her
Dislikes: eating without a sippy cup of water to drink from, eating much for breakfast, yogurt, having her nose suctioned, being bored in the car seat, when I take away something she wants to have she does a great job of letting me know when I make her mad





She's obsessed with that board

Sweetness


My happy girl

She's a girl on the move, so it's hard to even get a shot in the chair

Loved her necklace

Still has her beautiful blue eyes

Sunday, February 22, 2015

Randomness


  I wanted to blog a few random happenings from the week.  Ashlyn drew this picture on her dry erase board and wanted me to take a picture. 



   Dawson had his 100th day of school last week.  His teacher did a whole special celebration for them.  He had a great day at school and now his favorite number is a 100.


   Graceyn already looks up to her big sister a lot.  She wants to do everything Ashlyn does.  She loves to watch Ashlyn draw.  One afternoon Ashlyn was at school and Gracie crawled over to her dry erase board and got up on the stool.  She started grabbing her markers.  I took of the tops and handed them to her.  Each time I did, she would put it in her right hand and draw on the board.  She did it over and over and I got such a kick out of it.  I was pretty impressed that she could do this at just 10 months old.  She knew exactly what to do with those markers and needed no help from me aside from taking off the tops.  She is definitely going to be into art like her sister.  She also has discovered crayons and loves coloring. 

Just drawing

What a beautiful picture


Using a different color

Her finished picture

Valentine's Day

   Valentine's Day was extra special this year because it fell on a Saturday.  Usually the kids are in school or daycare so they don't get to spend the entire day with us.  Since it was on a Saturday, we decided to cram as much fun into one day as we could.  I have never been a huge fan of Valentine's Day, but I do enjoy spending the day as a family and showering one another with lots of love and mushy sentiments.   We try to keep it special, yet simple. 
    We started the day with a very special breakfast.  We had heart shaped french toast with Nutella.  It was so delicious and a very sweet way to start our day.  Dawson liked it so much he asked, "Can we have this breakfast every day Mom?" 
    We were extra blessed with some beautiful weather that day.  We knew we had to go outside and take full advantage of it.  We went to the park near Ashlyn's school.  I just love that park and we always have a great time there.  Two of Ashlyn's closest friends were able to meet her at the park for lots of play.  We stayed at the park for quite awhile and just soaked up the warm weather and had a great time with friends. 
    We spent the afternoon relaxing and hanging around the house.  The kids and I got out the Valentine's Day decorations and started to decorate for our special dinner.  We have made it a tradition now to eat in the formal dining room and decorate. It makes it feel special and it is way better than going out to eat.  The kids got to have a special heart shaped pizza from their favorite pizza place.  Joey made us some wonderful steaks topped with mushrooms.  It was delicious! 
    After we put Gracie to bed, it was time for some fun!  I had found some Minute to Win It game ideas on Pinterest.  We played several different games with candy.  We did boys against girls.  The games were a lot of fun.  In all the games you had one minute to see who could complete more of the task.  We stacked conversation hearts, tossed marshmallows into a bowl, carried conversation hearts across the room with a spoon, and picked up candy with chopsticks.  We had a blast and we laughed a ton!  The score ended up being a tie. 
    After all the fun we had playing games, we were ready to end our night with something sweet.  We had brownies topped with cookie dough ice cream and hot fudge.  A perfect ending to a very sweet and perfect day! 



Poor Gracie only got Cheerios for her breakfast

Yummy French toast

She loves books these days.  This is her favorite. 

She also loves cucumbers and loves to run around munching on one. 

Entering the park

Swing time

Loves the swing

Sisters



The dining room all decorated

About as fancy as we get around here

Yummy pizza

Daddy and his sweethearts

Mommy and her special boy who was pretending to be a monster. 

Kisses for my special boy!

We made Shirley Temples for our special drink

Gracie enjoying some pizza

He is such a silly boy

Stacking hearts

Picking up candy with chopsticks

Here they were trying to toss marshmallows into bowls


Scooping up hearts with little spoons

Time for dessert!