Playing Outside with Daddy

The weather was so beautiful this evening that we all played outside.  We had borrowed the bubble bag from preschool which has a big bubble blower, but even though I made the same bubble recipe, we had a hard time getting the big bubbles to stick around.

Then Amelia wanted to play t-ball, so Ben showed her the right stance.  She knocked the tee over almost every time she swung the bat, but she could hit the ball pretty far.  She's starting to remember how to hold and swing the bat, although she usually is aiming in the wrong direction.

Of course Megan had to try t-ball, too.  I think this was her first time swinging a bat, and even though Ben showed her how to do it, I don't think it sunk in very well.  But she's so cute!

Amelia then got out the golf set, and we hit the golf balls all over the yard.  Our grass was pretty long and the golf balls tended to get stuck, so we switched to playing on the sidewalk.  Ben had taken out his real golf club, and he refused to swing it on the sidewalk, so he switched to hitting t-balls over the roof with the golf club.  Thankfully, they didn't get stuck in the gutter.  :)  What do you think of Amelia's swing?  Pretty energetic, right?

And do you like her outfit?

How Megan Spends Her Mornings

Since I talked about what Amelia does in preschool, I thought I'd spend some time talking about what Megan likes to do while Amelia is gone.  This morning, she was excited to get to play with their new indoor fairy garden all by herself.  When she and Amelia try to play together with the fairy garden, Amelia usually tells Megan exactly how she can play, and Megan doesn't always agree.  So today Megan had fun moving the fairies around and adding clear marbles to act as a lake.

Her favorite toy to play with right now is the Eric Carle 1, 2, 3 Zoo puzzle that Grandma brought her last month.  She can do all four of the 12 piece animal puzzles almost entirely by herself.  I provided some help making sure the corner pieces got in the right corner, and suggesting that she put in all the border pieces before the middle pieces, but she was proud of herself when she held up a piece and said "corner piece" and then put it in the corner. 

We also went to a new park this morning because the weather was beautiful, and Megan had a great time riding on the seesaw with me and getting underdogs in the swing.  We picked up some beautiful fall leaves, too; I can't believe the trees are turning color already!

Megan's newest accomplishment is that she can count from 1 to 10.  She doesn't usually count things correctly (what did you say that's called, Becky?) but at least she says all the numbers in the right order.

Preschool Snack Helper Day

Today was Amelia's turn to be snack helper at preschool; she has been looking forward to it since last week.  We decided to bring string cheese and apples for the snack.  We brought red, yellow and green apples, and then we had a taste test to determine which apple was the favorite.  Surprisingly, green (Granny Smith) got the most votes, followed closely by red (Red Delicious), with yellow (Golden Delicious) a distant third.  I led the small group discussions, and it was so funny to hear what the kids had to say about the flavor and texture of the apples.  One boy said "This apple smells like an eyeball" and when I asked him what that smelled like, he said "It smells like a peach!"  Amelia's favorite was the red apple. 

Amelia also got to be morning message reader this week, so today she stood in front of the class and read "Hello, friends.  Amelia is the snack helper today."  Then Ms. Bottomley asked her to circle both of the "A"s in her name, and of course she got it right. 

Amelia and I spent a lot of time playing in the kitchen with three other kids.  I had to dress up with scarves, and the other kids brought us all kinds of food to eat.  I took a photo of Amelia and then she took one of me:

Finally, Amelia helped clean up after all the other kids were gone.  While I was vacuuming and washing dishes, she wiped all of the chairs and even mopped the floor!  Amelia loved mopping the floor and was upset when I told her we had to stop so that we could go home.  Perhaps I should get her to mop the floors at home!

Amelia said her favorite part of the day was getting to set the table to ready for snack time.  She laid out the placemats, and she made sure to put her best friends at her table.  She sat next to Sophia and Lucy, and put Emily next to Lucy.  Her table was almost entirely girls, and all the disruptive boys were at the other table.  It was pretty funny.  She said her second favorite part of the day was doing the apple taste test, and her third favorite part was playing with me in the kitchen.

Dinner & A Movie Night

Since Ben is gone this week, I told the girls we could have dinner and a movie night as a special treat.  While Megan and I were at the library for storytime, we picked out a Winnie the Pooh movie, and the girls are really enjoying it.  For dinner tonight, we had lima beans, tomatoes, cheese, salami log, crackers, pears and grapes.  Megan did not finish her lima beans or her salami, but she ate everything else.  Amelia must be going through a growing stage because she ate a lot!

At one point in the movie, Rabbit fell down into a hole, and Megan climbed onto Ben's chair and said, "So scared!" so Amelia got up on the chair to snuggle with her.  Then it got a little bit funny and both girls were laughing and Amelia took her arm away from Megan.  So at the next scary part, Megan said "So scared!  Arm back around!" and Amelia had to hug her again.  It was so precious! 

It reminds me of the photo of Becky and I watching Pete's Dragon.  Now, at the end of the movie, they are both jumping on the couch next to me or sitting on my arms and making it very hard to type.

Edited to add: Megan said "I love you" for the first time tonight.  Awwww!

The Summer of Dresses

Amelia has wanted to wear a dress every single day this summer and fall.  I convinced her that she had to wear shorts to go to tumbling class, and I occasionally made her wear shorts to play at the park.  But otherwise, she was happy in her dresses.  She has a few handmade dresses (thanks to both Grandmas and me), Becky lent us a few dresses that she had bought for Natalie to wear next summer, and I got a few dresses handed down from our neighbor.  I thought it would be fun to document all her cute summer dresses.

 

Amelia says her favorite dresses are the rainbow dress and the watermelon dress (but I think it depends on what she is wearing the day I ask her that question).

Now that it it getting cooler in the mornings, she likes to add non-matching tights and sweaters to her dresses.  Pretty soon I'm going to put away the sundresses and get out the fall and winter dresses.  Mom and I just found a whole bunch of cute long-sleeved dresses at Kohl's this weekend.  Amelia was so excited!

Another Concert in the Park

Sun Prairie had a last minute concert in the park on Saturday, and because it was a beautiful day, and we were already at the park for the preschool back-to-school picnic, the girls and I decided to stay and enjoy it.  It featured a bluegrass band, which played music that was perfect for dancing:

There weren't very many kids at the concert, so my girls got to do a lot of art projects (scratch-off fall leaves with rainbow colors underneath) and get a lot of tattoos.  Megan looks pensive in this photo, but she was really excited to get two tattoos on her face and two on her hands.

So that I'm fair to both kids, here's Amelia looking pensive:

We also played ladder golf, but we didn't follow the standard rules at all!  Amelia liked to wear the golf balls like jewelry, and Megan liked to hang them neatly on the ladders.

And finally, the girls enjoyed rolling down the small hills at the park:

We had a very fun day almost entirely outside, which was fitting for possibly the last really nice weather day we'll have until May.  It's been getting into the 40s every night, which makes for great sleeping weather!) but it takes a while to warm up during the day, so our mornings have been really chilly. 

Megan's Choice: Rock Painting

Megan and I have run a lot of errands while Amelia has been in preschool, but I'm trying to balance that with time spent doing things Megan enjoys.  The other day as we were coming back from a walk, Megan found a big rock in our yard.  She immediately said "paint rock" and so we went inside and got out all the colors of paint (of course) and matching colored paint brushes and she went to town.

The rock is so colorful and beautiful now, and always makes me smile when I see it in the garden.  I wish we had more big rocks to paint.  Here is the face she makes now when I tell her to give me a big smile:

This was her favorite dress during August and September.  She calls it "red blue dress" and wants to wear it every day.  She didn't like to wear dresses until I made her wear this one for the Olympics, and now it's her favorite.  Funny how quickly her mind changes.

Amelia the Ballerina

 Here is Amelia looking super excited to start ballet on her first day of class:

Amelia LOVES her ballet class!  She is so excited to go to class on Mondays, she looks forward to it all day long.  When I've peeked in the window, I've seen little girls doing a lot of spinning, which is probably Amelia's favorite thing ever.  Amelia told me on Monday that I'm not supposed to peek in the window, though, because the teacher told them they should pretend nobody is peeking.  So Megan and I have to be sneaky.  :)

Here is Amelia doing a tendu and then a passe:

 I thought it would be fun to take pictures of some of the moves she knows now, and then repeat the photos in a few years to see how much she improves.

The ballet studio has a lot of toys for siblings to play with, but so far Megan has been content going outside to eat a special snack.  This Monday she had fruit snacks, which she thinks is such a treat.

Megan tells me that she is going to take ballet when she is 3 years old.  I told her that she would probably have to be 4, but I think 3 is the only number she knows.

Grandma Jane & Grandpa Jeff's visit (part 2, finally)

After church on Sunday, we went to Angell Park to play on the playground.  They had installed a new water fountain that everybody thought was so funny:

Megan had a great time riding the "ponies" in the little kid section - she can do it all by herself now.

Meanwhile, Amelia finally decided she was brave enough to go down the dark twisty slide all by herself, and then Jeff said she went down it about 20 times in a row.

Before Grandma and Grandpa left on Monday morning, the girls spent some time roughhousing with Grandpa.  For whatever reason, the girls decided that Grandpa would make a good slide!  Amelia started it, of course, and then Megan decided that she had to join in.

We went to Panera for breakfast on Monday, and we got some good photos of the girls with Jane's iphone.  First they were both being snuggly with Grandma, and then Amelia started getting goofy and hiding under the table.

And when Grandma got home, she sent us a photo of Amelia's artwork that she had hung on the fridge.  Amelia was so excited!  The first is a picture that Amelia colored of Tinkerbell (traced from the girls' placemats) and the second is a picture Amelia painted of herself on a scooter (in the middle on the left).  This is the first time she's ever painted anything specific.