Beach Blast

Our Sunday School teachers own a house at Topsail Island and Saturday they invited us for a day of rest and relaxation after VBS. We stayed overnight Friday in Newton Grove with a dear family from church who have a little boy Leah’s age and an 8-year-old. They were so generous to cut out the hour drive back home just to turn around and come back again the next morning! Leah loved spending the night at "Grayson’s" house, even though once we were there, she spent more time with Lorin. She even ended up having a sleepover in Lorin’s room, sharing an air mattress with her. I didn’t even have to read her a book at bedtime. They ended up not going to sleep until after 10:30! (Thankfully, she was around enough friends all day Saturday that she wasn’t grumpy.)

(The Dardens, like many people at Newton Grove, live out in the country. I'm told you must own a golf cart and a tractor in order to fit in there!)

It’s only an hour and a half trip to the beach (we’ll be going there more often once we’re in Newton Grove). When we got there, we had lunch and then headed straight to the beach. Leah wouldn’t stop asking! We had a hard time keeping her out of the water! She was a fish and probably would have run right out into the water if we hadn’t stopped her. She loved sitting—or even laying—on the shore and letting the waves cover her. She built “sludge” castles with Daddy and her friends (and once we were done, I must have washed a cup full of mud out of her diaper and swimsuit!)

(Leah loves her friend Hannah and wanted to go wherever she was.)

Andrew, on the other hand, didn’t much care for the water and whimpered every time the waves came towards us. He was perfectly content sitting on a blanket on the shore digging in the dirt. And he was covered from head to toe! It didn’t take long for him to get bored, though, so we didn’t spend a whole lot of time on the beach.

We got back to the house and went for a boat ride. Leah and Grayson couldn’t resist the lull of the boat’s motor and were asleep within minutes. They must have slept the whole trip!

After the boat ride we came back and just hung out until dinner—a huge seafood broil! The kids killed time by digging in the rocks, filling up buckets and trucks. They must have spent a good hour doing this. I am so grateful that our class is like a little family-- even if I couldn't keep my eye on Leah or Andrew the whole time, I knew they were okay-- everyone was looking out for each other's kids. What a blessing to have so many people who cared for us all day!

We didn’t get home till late again, so Leah was up way past bedtime 3 nights in a row—with only short naps. She’s been a trooper, really well behaved actually, but her Mommy and Daddy are sure exhausted!

Vacation Bible School 2011

Our church’s Vacation Bible School was last week. Brett went every night, but since we’re still an hour’s drive away and it wasn’t over until 8:30 every night, I didn’t want to deal with two kids 2 hours past their bedtime for a whole week. So we went Thurs. & Fri. night. They have a great VBS program and this year there was about 40 kids every night (from nursery all the way up to middle school). Leah’s two favorite nursery teachers were her VBS teachers, and from the first minute it started, she had a blast. After we left, she said she wanted to go back to “’cation Bible School!” She didn’t even fall asleep the whole way home, even though it was after 10!



Leah was so excited to be a Princess. (Actually the theme was Big Apple Adventure-- all New York stuff, so I'm assuming she was supposed to be a movie star on Broadway?) She wore that crown all night! She and her BFF Hannah love dancing together.





Friday night was Parent’s Night, so after a short night of Bible School, each of the classes did a little presentation during the program for their parents and then we had a meal. Even Leah’s class did a little presentation. They were supposed to sing Zaccheus, and then after that, Leah broke into a chorus of “Jesus Loves Me”—solo! And then she sang it again later, with the next class. She stole the show.







And the sunset was the perfect close to a great evening and a great week for the church!

Andrew @ 11 months

Could it really be Andrew's almost a year old??! Where has the time gone?


He is already very vocal. He can say "oh no" and "uh oh"-- *usually* at appropriate times. (Sometimes he just says things just to be saying things, though.)

He loves to dance! Anytime he hears music come on, whether TV or singing, he will stop whatever he's doing, listen for a second, and start boucing his arms up and down (like a director). If he's standing, he'll move his whole body. Music always calms him down-- I usually sing him a couple hymns to help him get to sleep at night.



He is not really afraid of much. Whereas Leah used to be afraid of the vacuum, Andrew will chase it around, trying to catch it. We had an experience with a church member's dog the other day-- a very friendly shih tzu-- and Andrew let her lick him all over the face, trying to touch her nose and mouth. He wasn't in the least bit intimidated.

He is finally sleeping through the night again, although he went through another week-long period of waking up at odd hours to scream for awhile. He still wakes up early, like 5:30, but now I can usually get him to lay back down for at least another hour or so after I feed him. Unfortunately, this makes it difficult to cut down on the number of times he nurses during the day. Now he's still nursing 5 times a day-- one early morning, one breakfast, lunch, one mid-afternoon, and one bedtime. I'd really like to cut out at least 2 of those pretty soon (and I doubt he's really eating much at each feeding) but it's difficult when he's waking up so early! He drinks from a cup just fine, although I haven't really pushed him having his milk from a cup. At this rate, he won't be weaned by one, but I'm not really seeing many disadvantages to letting him go a little bit longer-- just definately not 5 times a day!!

He's eating a full stage 2 baby food at each meal, plus finger foods-- usually whatever we're having. He loves little pieces of chicken, bread, cereal, and especially macaroni & cheese! I've been freezing some of his baby food (fruits) lately in ice cube trays with a little spoon to make it a popsicle. He loved it the first few times, but now he won't touch them-- I still think it's a great idea, and Leah loves having her yogurt that way now. He still has not a single tooth popping through!

He is all over the place-- always on the move-- way more mischeivous than Leah, and into everything! He is intrigued by the bathroom right now and I've caught him playing in the toilet water more than once. Bath time is always an adventure-- he just wants to stand up in the tub, so I'm wrestling him down the whole time. He loves to just throw things and wreck things and of course put things in his mouth. I can put a handful of Cheerios on his high chair tray and within seconds he will rake them all off. (I think he prefers to eat them off the floor, anyway.) He crawls very fast, always on hands & knees, belly off the floor now. He is definately a handful, and yet he's still my sweet, cuddly (well, for about 30 seconds or so) little boy!

He was feeling much too playful to take his 11 month old pictures seriously! But at least we got a good shot with Daddy for Father's Day!!

Potty Training, Week 1

Even though we've had Leah's potty seat out for a little while & she's sat on it a few times, we decided it was time to crack down on the potty training-- really getting old having to buy 2x the diapers! I decided the best method for Leah, my people-pleaser, was to just put her underwear on her and ask her every five minutes whether she had to go or not. If she had an accident, I would express "disappointment" (without really punishing or discouraging her). Day 1 was pretty rough-- I think we went through about 4 pairs of underwear in about 2 hours. Day 2 was a little better-- half successes and half accidents. By Wednesday, she'd gone in the potty 4 times straight with no accidents.

She's still having a lot of accidents, especially with #2, but I really do think it was a successful week. I think she's starting to understand what it feels like to have to go, and to understand how yucky it feels to be wet. She loves getting praise from us when she goes (and even announces to anyone and everyone that she "peepeed in the potty!"). I haven't even attempted nighttime, or outings yet (although she has gone once or twice when we were out and about)-- we're using Pull-Ups, but I think it will only take another couple weeks to be completely diaper-free!

Meanwhile, we had to take her to the dr. again today for another red spot on her backside that looked like the MRSA infection she had back in December. Thankfully, it was not infected-- he didn't have to even touch it, but we were being extra cautious. She's taking antibiotics for a week and we have to keep it very clean. We knew the chance of it coming back was greater since she already had it, but we were praying it wouldn't. Poor chick has such sensitive skin and is always getting rashes & bumps. Plus she's always scratching something or other!!

When did she get so grown up?

NC Science Museum

Our new favorite place to go is the "zoo-me-um" (Leah's pronunciation). Raleigh has a great one that's FREE! (We pay $1/ hr. for parking, since it's downtown, but so worth it!) We've been there several times but I didn't realize they had a weekly storytime for preschool. The kids hear a story and then get to "pet" different museum animals. The first week it was a turtle, a snake and a cockroach (yes, Leah actually willingly pet this huge bug!). Last week it was all turtles and she got to try on a real turtle shell (to see how it would feel to have to carry a shell around all day). Leah loves the story time!

They also have a great room just for littler kids with lots of hands-on things to do-- Leah got to look at bugs up close with a magnifying glass.

Her other favorites are the huge dinosaur (in the picture below, Leah & Andrew are "sitting" together inside a life-sized T-rex footprint-- of course Andrew is doing what he wanted to do the whole time-- get out & crawl), the snakes, and an area where you walk through a "tunnel" like you are under the sea-- there are fake sea animals all around. Leah likes to pretend we are mermaids. Now that I know about this jewel of a place, we'll be going more often-- even when we move, probably!

What a Cool Idea: Muffin Tin Lunches!

In doing mucho research for starting Leah's homeschool preschool in September, I have come across sooo many neat websites with clever and creative ideas-- things to do, ways to make learning fun, etc. (I will be sharing much more of my research once we actually start doing school-- you will have to wait & see!) But one of the ones I came across recently is called The Muffin Tin Mom.

Basically, it is a creative way to break the regular routine of lunchtime (which, I admit is pretty boring around here), to serve foods in smaller, more manageable portions and to introduce picky eaters to new foods in a fun and interesting way. Of course, you don't have to use a muffin tin-- and I've been thinking about doing something like Laptop Lunches (an idea I found a long time ago but never did much with) anyway, so that I can prepare them in advance for the week (or at least a couple days) since I really hate preparing lunches every day! But you have to admit, the muffin tins are really cute.

I'd really like to try this-- maybe I can get my picky eater to try some new things! Of course, mine probably won't be this elaborate at first. They can be as simple or as complicated as you like. I hope to eventually do some "themed" ones, too, but I'll start simple... Now I just have to get some extra money to go get some cute cookie cutters & muffin tins.