Final Gymnastics Class

Addie has loved gymnastics this year. She is actually pretty good at it, so it's too bad she has chosen to switch directions next year and try dance. But it's okay to try other activities. Here is what her "End of Year" show looked like...she was quite proud to show off her moves to Brian, Gigi and Pop Pop!

Warm ups...

pencil hops...

take a break to say hi to Daddy...

galloping...

balance beam...

handstand... 

rope swing...

 

rings...

trampoline...

and medal time! (her first ever)

 

  

 

  

 

She was so excited to show Collins her medal that night, and then continued to talk about her medal for days. I was proud of what Addie learned this year in gymnastics and happy that we got to do an activity together!

Luke at Five Months

We are loving Luke at five months. This fun baby makes us laugh and makes us talk in silly baby voices all day long. The girls adore him, and are constantly singing to him, trying to hold his hand, and being sweet to him in ways I never expected. I love seeing the three of them interact; it makes my heart happy.

 

  

In his fifth month, Daddy thought it was time for ribs and football jerseys...

 

For someone who can't even sit or crawl yet, Luke is very active at five months. He can easily roll across a room, kicks his arms and legs wildly when he sees you peek over his crib in the morning, grabs at everything in arm's reach, puts everything in his mouth, and jumps pretty hard in that Johnny Jumpup. I am a little scared for him to actually become mobile...

Unfortunately, I can't report lots of progress in the sleep department. I think we have some habits that will need to be broken soon, but this baby just charms me so that I keep getting up with him throughout the night. Sigh. Here are the official five month photos of this wiggly, smiley, fast-growing sweet little boy...

Sitting up and solid foods...here we come?!? Cannot believe our baby is almost six months old.

One Step Backwards

Addie loved swimming until she took swim lessons. Since Collins is really into swimming right now, Brian had been taking both of the girls to the indoor pool regularly on the weekends and Addie was loving it too. So she was really excited when I signed her up for swim lessons...until she met Ms. Susan (a.k.a. "the dunker").

Ms. Susan asked Addie if she wanted to go "above or below" and not really understanding what she was asking, Addie answered, "below". So Ms. Susan dunked her, and scared Addie to death. She came up screaming and screamed pretty much every class after that. It was horrible watching her be scared after knowing how comfortable she had been in the water.

Thankfully, Ms. Susan could only teach half the classes so Ms. Tricia took over below. I explained the traumatic situation to her, and she did a great job of helping bring back some confidence to Addie in the water. During her final lesson, she actually had a smile on her face and would dip her face into the water. Baby steps...

I'm guessing we will lay off swim lessons for awhile, but as summer approaches and our new pool membership is available, I'm not happy about taking one step backwards in the pool! 

Rolling Along

Yep, he's officially a roller. Happened in his fourth month- rolling in both directions. I'm not really surprised he's already doing this because he seems to be ready for these physical milestones early. I say this because he is the sturdiest, strongest baby I have ever held. Maybe my girls were just squishy, but Luke seems different. In the hospital, he had decent head control...he loves to push up and stand on his legs...he will take a couple of steps if you stand him up...and he can roll across a room pretty darn quickly. I will be really surprised if he is not walking by the time he is one!

Took him awhile to get both of those arms free, but he eventually got it!

When he rolled over from back to front the first time, I got really excited because I thought this might mean he/we would finally get some sleep! When both of the girls could roll onto their tummies, they quickly started sleeping longer stretches and through the night....so what did Luke do??

Not a darn thing different. Still is waking up every three hours to eat...sigh. Maybe he needs extra calories for all that rolling and curtain wrestling that he does during the day. Boys! :)

Strawberry Bummer

To summarize strawberry picking this year (in Addie's words), "where are all the fun stuff?!?" Apparently, picking strawberries without the corn pit, farm animals, tire swing, and ice cream is not actually that fun. We were surprised when we went to our fave Page Farm, and they informed us that none of the "fun stuff" was open for strawberry picking- only for pumpkin season this year. Bummer!

So for Collins, nothing about our farm experience was interesting this year except for this giant pile of mulch (and she actually thought it was really cool)...

and the only thing Addie cared for was eating strawberries from the patch.

She managed to get a couple in the bucket...

Yep, this picture summarizes our trip pretty well. Girls ate strawberries, Dad did the picking, Luke cried when I tried to bend over to pick a strawberry, and not much excitement was experienced by anyone. Oh well, there's always  pumpkin season to look forward to with all the "fun stuff"!

A Good Workout

 I love my Barre 3 workouts. These hour-long classes make you feel strong, centered, and sore for days. If I got to do more than one a week, I might be in good shape! :)

They recently had a "Mommy and Me" class (in honor of Mother's Day), and Collins and I went. Girlfriend surprised me. She nailed the poses and already knew the "boat" pose below from gymnastics. She was like, "I've got this!"

She claimed to want to do Mommy's Barre workout instead of Daddy's F3 workout because Daddy gets really "dirty and sweaty", but I'm not sure she still felt that way the next day when she woke up so sore!

It was fun working out with her!

Making it Work

Juggling our schedule as a family of five makes my head hurt. Doctor's appointments, playdates, work dinners, after-school activities, birthday parties, school events...it all really challenges my multi-tasking skills, and they are still little! I know it will only get worse.

A few weekends ago on Sunday morning, we all were invited to a birthday party at the park for a family friend. At that same time, we were scheduled to have several raccoons that were decaying in our chimney (long gruesome story- don't ask) to be removed, Luke was supposed to nap, and I was supposed to teach Sunday School. See what I mean? The solution? We all went to the party for a bit and then we split up. Brian and the girls headed home to meet the chimney guy, and because I was Luke's only chance for a nap (in the Ergo), he went with me to Sunday School.

I'm not sure it was appropriate to take my baby to church with me, but I didn't really have another choice. I just had to make it work, and it did! Luke slept through the whole lesson waking up at the end at the perfect time. Our lesson that day was on "Feed my Sheep", and I told the kids that Luke just happened to be wearing a sheep onesie that day. Little Zoe begged, "show us his sheep costume!". So I brought him out for the kids to see him, and they swarmed. "Can he walk yet?", "Can he talk yet?", "Luke is a book in the Bible!", "What can he do?", "I can put my toes in my mouth, too!". It was hysterical.

The kindergartners were fascinated by Luke, and Luke was fascinated by the six-year-olds. Luke became part of the lesson, and it all worked out just fine. A good lesson in just making it work!