Camp

In a little pre-preschool preparation, Harper and Lucy are doing a summer "school" with the Freas Triplets. Jessica, our rockstar nanny, was a preschool teacher and has put together a curriculum.

First we did families and babies, then bugs (and reptiles) and yesterday they did "the beach". Camp has a lot more structure and planning than I provide on a usual basis. My lack of planning has left me feeling a bit guilty. Our days should be more structured. We do art, but its impromptu. I'm not pulling out the pipecleaners and matching our creations to what we read in books from the library. I am adlibbing.

Think I'm going to spend a little time this weekend trying to plan activities and games for the week. Just to make the days a little more fun for all of us. If anyone (homeschooling mammas) has good resources for finding toddler activities, bring 'em on.

The Heat is on...

The summer heat is on for real. My car read 105 the other day. That means we need to get creative about how to get out of the house. Most things, especially any walks or trips to the park, need to be done before 10:30. Gymboree has open gym a few afternoons a week, which will be nice. I haven't figured out if/how I can take both of them to the pool by myself. I don't want to get in over my head. Even the baby pools make me nervous. There is always some 7 year old playing dinosaurs or some other annoying crap. Deep Eddy has a very gradual walk in and might work. Of course the water is 67 degrees so it will have to be 100 outside to get me in.

One fun alternative is the fountain park near the Palmer Events Center. There are baby wading pools on the outsides and an ongoing fountain show a la Bellagio. We took them there over Memorial Day and they had a ball.




We also took a trip up the hill for a panoramic view of Austin. Lucy, then Harper, had to obsessively-compulsively touch all of the lamps as we passed them by.

Princess

Lucy just said "princess" pointing out that she had the sippy cup adorned with Cinderella, Beauty (and the beast), and Sleeping Beauty. And Harper is trying to get it from her. Throwing a perfectly good Elmo cup on the floor. Princesses better than Elmo? This is trouble.

Today in music I saw a three year old girl in full princess costume and thought, "blech." Is the princess stage inevitable? And what is it all about? Is it a radical interpretation of their sexual identity? I'm a GIRL. I should wear pink and tiaras he is a boy, he likes construction equipment. I don't want to get all Gloria Steinam on them. I think you just ride it out and gently steer them toward soccer and dinosaurs and bugs and dressing up like Star Wars characters.

Vocabularies

Its been quite a while since I've done a vocab update. I'm only counting words they say independently, not repeating, which Lucy does all the time, like this;

Mom: I'm putting the milk back in the refrigerator.
Lucy: back rigerator
Mom: Now I'm wiping down the counters.
Lucy: counter.

So here is what I can recall. I'll add to this as I hear them.

Clothing and accessories: shirt, pants, shorts, diaper, socks, shoes, dress, bubble, pocket, coat, kini (bikini), bag, hat, sandal, bow, button, ring, watch, bib.

Food: milk, water, juice, cheese, apple, strawberry, nana (banana), chip, fry (french fry), pasta, puff (pirate booty), cookie, taco, cake, yogurt, dip.

Animals: dog, cat, fish, hippo, duck, pick, cow, dinosaur, bug, mouse, snake, bird, monkey, bear, turtle, butterfly, owl.

Other: hi, bye-bye, no, this, boon (balloon), tree, light, art, box, baby, doll, play doh, paint, paper, tb (tv), stars, chair, swing, jump, one, two, too, uh-oh, boo-boo, hurt, massage, cream, tubby, ponies (as in pony tails), home, inside, outside, slide, pool, ball, cup, top, kick, glasses, turn, hot, cold, book, tap, circle, blanket, potty, poopy, wet, dirty.

Body Parts: knee, elbow, toe, eye, nose, mouth, hair, back, teeth

Vehicles: bus, car, tractor, boat, truck, stroller, waggie (wagon)

Commands: up, down, off, please, go, stop, more, next, hold, help, sit, me (as in me shirt)

People: Momma, Daddy, Harper, Lucy, sister, Elmo, TJ, Leen (eileen), BB, Grammy, Murdoch, Angus, Cookie (cookie monster), Ernie, Bird (big bird), Coco (lovies), Popo (pacifier), Gymbo.

Bedtime Monkeys

Mini Matisses

Art projects are a perfect distraction when mommy is out of ideas. This weekend was beautiful, so we took our scenty, sparkly paint pens outside. Harper is particularly interested in her art projects and loves to splat her paint pens down as hard as she can. You can see the girls sniffing the pens in the photos. Mmmm, beautiful painting AND it smells like green apple.

Rasslin'

This is partially how we amused ourselves without Daddy this weekend. Lucy, the smaller one, is quite adept at the takedown.

When toddlers dress themselves

Not my Domain

Yesterday my friends wanted to go shopping at a relatively new open air mall called "The Domain". Stores include Neiman Marcus, Ralph Lauren, David Yurman, Barney's, Tiffany. H&L weren't quite the only babies there, but they were definitely the only doubles. After my friends had to open about the 17th door for the double stroller, even they were annoyed. Are automatic doors tacky? Even Old Navy does not have automatic doors. Does that seem odd to you? Can I only shop where people typically take a cart in and out? The door thing is going to have me running to the old school indoor mall. With Baby Gap and Gymboree.

Happy Mothers Day

Here's a pic of me with my Mom when I was about the girls age. My mother told me that her mother said "I've never seen anyone love a baby so much." I hope the girls know I feel that way about them despite my bad mom moments. Like letting them watch television when I just want a break. Or not watching closely enough to prevent the consumption of a skittle from the changing room bench at swim lessons. Or using bpa-full bottles. And feeding them (on occasion) fast food (today Harper said french fry).

My mom also said that raising her family was the best part of her life. And even with my exhaustion, frustration, spare tire, 1/2ed income, and lack of "important" things to talk about at MBA happy hours, I agree. Being Mommy is good stuff.

Happy (belated, hey I was napping) Mom's Day to all of you.

Swingers

We have had this swing for probably 10 months, but just now hooked it up to the tree in the backyard. They. love. it.


We have learned a lot about sharing with respect to the swing. I have to hold one and push the other. We push for a while and count to ten when their turn is over. I learned at one of my Montessori appointments to get them used to saying "next, please." Which they do.

I also, say "Who is going to go first?" and its one of the times you can get Lucy to say her own name. 90% of the time she says "Harper" either looking for her, calling for her (haaarper) or blaming her for something (like pooping on the floor).

Finally, ponytails

The Eye

The "eye" (see post below) is part of a lego set. As I have written before, we often put the eye in our eye and pretend we can see the girls with it. Consequently, Lucy has started to try to put all the legos in her eye.

does yellow work?


how about black?


or green?


white?

Exterminator

Today at the end of music class all the kids were crawling after and surrounding a tiny spider they had found. The girls were fascinated (last weeks storytime was all about bugs)and were in the mix. Then Lucy put her thumb on the spider. It was like she was the classroom hero. One 2.5 year old girl was yelling that "Lucy killed the spider! Horray!"