Easter Fun

My First Easter Egg Hunt when I was Mobile

We had an Easter Egg hunt in our backyard. I found a few eggs and I got to play with some large eggs. It was a fun time. I was here last year for the egg hunt but I was only 3 weeks old so I didn't do much hunting.

I was most interested in these eggs.

And sitting up here watching.

Zachary did a great job finding those eggs.

Our neighbors joined us.

Zachary decided to pose in this one. They may have bribed him, I'm not sure.

Admiring our finds.

I ran out of grass to pull out.

Playing Tee Ball

I got this baseball tee for my birthday from my Paran and Aunt Kitty. I'm hoping to play next year.

Just Hanging Around the House

I remembered how I used to love Super Why and Now I want to be a super reader again.

My favorite downstairs toy.

Doing what Brother Does

Zachary gives me so many ideas! He gives me ideas about playing, eating, signing, and all kinds of things! Watch what I learned in these two videos.

Observing

My turn to try it out!

Happy 4th Birthday to Zachary!

Happy Birthday to Me!! I turned 4 on Easter Sunday. Since it was going to be a very special day we invited both sides of the family over. Mommy, Daddy, Adelyn, Granna, Pop2, Aunt Michelle, Uncle Matthew, Uncle Brian, Krystal, Uncle Kevin, Gramsie, Pa-pa, Paran, Aunt Kitty, and Grandma Marilyn were all there. I got the Disney Cars garage with a few of the car characters for my birthday! I LOVE the movie, Cars. I also got a Spider Man, spiral art, a baseball tee, baseballs, a Berenstain Bears book, and Lincoln logs!!

Me in my birthday chair.

Our family on my 4th birthday!

I had a very special dirt cake. Do you see my letter?

Adelyn enjoyed the dirt cake too!

My new Disney cars garage!

Almost Walking!

Adelyn is taking some steps. I really think she gets so excited that she goes way to fast for herself. Sometimes she just reaches for us with her arms and leans forward without taking any steps at all! Obviously that doesn't work! She's balancing so much better when she is just standing in one spot so that she doesn't always need support. In the meantime she's extremely cute when she crawls!

Doggie and Da da

Our sweet little girl is figuring out language again! When she sees or hear Sandy she says da da. And when she sees or hears Scott she says da da or da ta! I'll have to attempt at getting this on video. I love to see her become so sweet towards Scott. She's following Zachary to the garage door when they hear him come home. She reaches toward him a lot to go see him.

Dirty

Here is our dog, Sandy. Although this day he was not worthy of his name, Sandy. He didn't have his beautiful sandy color nor did he have sand pieces stuck to him as he sometimes does. He was obviously covered from head to tail in dirt. Wet dirt. So this day his name was Dirty.

Adelyn is 1

I'm 1 now! Mama finally published my pictures! Mama didn't you know I've been 1 for over a month now?

Here's my first birthday party. Mama and Dada said it was the fastest birthday party they've ever given.

Before

Trying it out

After

Forts

This house is becoming famous for having a standing fort 24/7. Not the same one all of the time of course. They randomly pop up here and there. In the living room and the game room have been the most popular. Boxes and sheets are great toys.

Leading the Choir at Church

The other day Zachary and I were playing house. We pretended it was Saturday and had breakfast, lunch, nap time, dinner, sea world, bath and bedtime. And then it was Sunday. So we had breakfast and then hauled the 8 animals and 7 babies to church.

The large penguin was our priest and wore a Super Why cape. The altar was a turned over drawer from the plastic drawer set for the kitchen toys. And we also had a potato on a plate and a shiny square box for the chalice.

Our little stuffed skunk sat on a box for the ambo and read out of a book. Zachary was the choir director. He sang, "Glory to God in the heartest and peace to his people on earth". And then he couldn't remember the other songs so he sang it again. At that point I suppose he knew he needed to sing something different so he belted out "Mercury! Venus! Earth!..."from the cd Here Comes Science by They Might Be Giants. Which was still completely relevant I thought! After that he sang Happy Birthday, the ABCs, and one more popular selection.

What a great choir director!!! And the cutest one I've ever seen.

Language Development at almost 12 Months

Somehow I almost missed the fact that Adelyn's "ba" sound she's been making for a few months now, now means "book" or "ball". I put 2 and 2 together when I saw the ball near her when she was crawling around trying to get it. And then I also realized that she makes the sound when we do our story time or she happens to be near the books.

I think Zachary just said, "Da Da" for many months when he pointed out anything. Everything was a "Da Da". Sweet moments in watching them grow!

Trying on Hats

The other day I realized that Adelyn was examining all of the hats from our imagination basket. I saw her momentarily swing a hat onto her head. Who knew!! We don't know half of what they notice!!

"When I get Bigger"

This morning when we were getting up Zachary and Adelyn played in our bed for a while. Afterwards Zachary went to check out two drawers that we have in our dresser. One has my old brownies sash, gymnastics leotards, old class pictures and some other random things. Scott has a drawer too. It has old art projects, boyscout stuff, etc. Zachary likes to ask me things about us and today he had Scott in a conversation about a paper mache car Scott made in 95, and the classes he took. Scott was saying something like, "and one day you will go to school and take classes like art and science...".

Zachary replied, "yes and then when I get bigger I'll have a drawer with all of my old stuff".

Yeah, I guess that happens. Some of our treasured posessions or just old stuff get shoved in a drawer. I suppose we should make sure we are displaying things with honor that were special too us.

A Pilot or an Astronaut

Zachary has decided that he would like to be a pilot or an astronaut when he grows up. His goal is to be the pilot for the Thunderbirds in the air force. In addition to that he would like to play football. From what I understand, many mother's would say this would be their biggest nightmare. We have been listening to the Science CD of the group, They Might Be Giants. They have very educational songs on their that teach about different scientific concepts. I could see myself using this cd with music therapy clients.

Zachary tells me that Jupiter is his favorite planet. He observes our planets poster often in the game room.

I'm happy he's got big dreams. I can't wait to see what interests the kids pursue each year.

Growing Up Fast

Adults always say we grow up so fast. I guess we do because I'm already learning to drive!

Helping Out

Monday's are very busy days at our house. We go to the store, do laundry and sometimes do gardening outside. Zachary and I love to help!

Observations at our dirty clothes basket.

Helping out at the grocery store. We hold things for Mommy and sometimes I like to chew them a bit.

I love outside! And now it's becoming even more fun b/c I can move around on my own. They say once I start doing this thing called walking, I'll be able to do more things in the backyard. I guess I'll find out. Here I'm helping with the dirt! Yes, that is a sock in my mouth. They are so tasty, have you ever tried one?

Snow in San Antonio, TX!

We had snow in San Antonio, TX! It happened the night of February 3 and on February 4 we woke up to find snow! I had a music therapy client who once told me that San Antonio had not had snow since 1985. Houston didn't even get snow that night.

Zachary had been asking to see snow since last summer. We made plans to go to Amarillo in January thinking we had a chance of seeing snow. Well it was quite warm when we went. In fact the warmest day they had seen in winter. And then it snowed the day after we left. But who would have thought that we wouldn't have seen snow in Amarillo and that next week we would see snow in San Antonio! He got his dream.

New developments

Adelyn is doing so many new and cute things. I hope I haven't forgotten them all since it's been so long since I've written about them.

First, her hair is no longer only spikes. At the bottom it's now touching her neck and it's the same color as mine. She's not looking as much like a baby, but instead a tiny little tot. I like to look at her face when she is observing something or someone and watch those little eyes taking it all in.

Today I discovered that she knew to put some little balls into a train that takes them in and shoots them out. I have never seen her put anything in something like that. She also figured out to push the yellow button when I told her to. That one isn't mastered yet but she does it sometimes.

Last week I showed her how to play her little xylophone. She's got the concept of using the mallet! She bangs it on the xylophone, but usually it's the whole thing and not just the tip. So cute to see a young developing musician.

Something we've been doing for about a month or more is her story box. At night we always read them stories. She's always been everywhere when we've tried to read them but she has been learning about staying in one spot over these couple of months. The box helps a lot. We put a lot of her books in the box and sing the "Story Time" song. It's the same one we sing at the library story time. She knows that she gets to come over to the box, take books out and open them. She even has a favorite which she picks every time, The Itsy Bitsy Spider. This particular book has very colorful and large pictures.

It's hard to believe our sweet baby is almost a year old already and learning so fast. She's such a joy to have with us. Both of our children are. I love seeing them grow up and play together!

Swinging at North Shore Park

Here I am at Northshore Park in the Woodlands, TX.

I love to swing! Who doesn't?

I got to swing while my big brother played in the sand.