We were getting the house ready for our Len Christmas in July and got out this ceramic tree. It’s old—my mom made it for my Grandma Katie (Len) in the ’70s and I’ve always loved it. Katie was enthralled with it, too…and one of the first things she said was “There’s no star!” My mom said that Grandma Len had said the very same thing and even attached a fake star to it. I don’t think I ever really noticed that it didn’t have a star—or I did, but didn’t think it was any big deal. Amazing how the original Katie AND her namesake both had the same thought. 🙂
Finally jumping into a pool that has a deep end! All the pools we frequent are a max of 5′ deep so he always hits bottom! This was a new experience for him and he loved it!
Showing Grannie Lin that he can really float now!
And this little stinker! Here she is jumping into the shallow end…BUT!…Earlier, she walked down to the deep end where Papa and Owen were, walked right to the edge, and jumped right in! Went completely under and everything—and came up smiling! SHE HAS NEVER DONE THIS BEFORE, even with prompting! It was so unexpected that I didn’t even have time to get a pic of it! She swam over to the ladder, got out, and DID IT AGAIN! I missed it again, too, because I had a brain fart on how to take a video with my real camera. ARGH! Of course, she refused to do it a third time!
She loves her brother!
Strangely enough, her in the pool doesn’t bother me…but her climbing up this ladder scares the crap out of me.
This is a horrible picture but I need to use it as an illustration. You can see I was a bit away from her and she had climbed up there. No biggie. Then she reached up and grabbed the first bar. Still no biggie. Then she leaned out and grabbed the second bar (as seen here) and right as I snapped the picture, she swung her legs off the bar so she was hanging there. I practically dropped the camera and rushed over there—knowing she couldn’t hang there very long on her own and not wanting her to come crashing down. EGADS. I grabbed her and she proceeded to work her way across the bars like no big deal. NO FEAR!
And Owen in the same spot back in May 2011. 🙂 (As a sidenote, I didn’t think so at the time, but looking back…HOLY WAH does Owen look like Tom at that age.)
It’s Milltown week so we took the kids downtown to Kid Fest! They had a blast!
She LOVED the popcorn. The SnoCones…not so much.
Making bracelets and necklaces with Gramma.
Then Owen got to ride in a racing canoe!! Some of the racers were the back seat paddlers and took the kids up and down the river. It was his very first time in a canoe and he loved it!
If you notice, he’s watching what the pro does and copies him to steer the boat!
He said he was a little scared at first but then he was okay! We were SO proud of him!
Owen loved sitting in the big fire truck—and even got to turn on the lights and the siren! Katie wanted NOTHING to do with any of it. 🙂
The kids had a long, busy, fun-filled weekend with our friend’s kids and the babysitter (while we were at our TiVo events) and didn’t get their normal amounts of sleep…so this happened pretty early into our trip.
She wanted to play before class! (I’m guessing because it felt like 100° in there.)
And of course she immediately swam down to where Owen was playing (his class is after hers so he gets to play for a half hour).
She’s slowly getting less panicky when floating. The instructor can almost get through the ABCs before Katie sits up.
Katie’s funny. She doesn’t mind being in the water with the instructor but after each turn in the water she comes over to me and asks if she’s done. I tell her no, she whines a little, them she goes and sits back at the edge of the pool and waits her turn while playing with water toys. Every. Single. Time. 🙂
She also normally doesn’t want to play much afterwards because she gets cold but today she was all about it! She swam down to Owen again and he taught her how to swim over the lane dividers! So, she had great fun showing me her new skill!
While she was playing, I took a moment to go watch what Owen was doing.
Subtitled: Well that’s a first.
Subtitled: That’s not how you play with Legos.
Subtitled: Owen put one up his nose, Katie ate one.
Subtitled: There will be NO pictures of this.
Subtitled: SERIOUSLY?!
Submitted: Katie ate a Lego head today.
Tom and I were in the office and Katie was watching TV. She came into the office and said she put Elsa’s head in her mouth. She knows she’s not supposed to put toys in her mouth and she usually tries to hide it, so we were interested. Tom asked where Elsa’s head was and Katie pointed to her throat.
What?!
We asked if it was in her mouth. No.
We asked her to go find Elsa. She was indeed headless.
We asked again where Elsa’s head was and she pointed to her throat.
Katie got a Frozen Lego set for her birthday, so of course Owen helped her put it together! (It was WAAAAY to old for her so I knew he’d have to help her!) We ended up having Katie pick out the pieces as we needed them and then Owen would build it. It worked pretty well.
It took two days (which drove Owen insane) and he eventually did the last part by himself…
During Katie’s party, one little girl came upstairs to tell us “there’s an emergency” and all the parents looked at her like “Oh, really?” because we didn’t hear any screaming or crying. Tom went down there and discovered two little girls stuck in the corner behind the couch. Yep, I guess that qualified as an emergency for a 3yo!
So fast forward to this afternoon post-party and I hadn’t seen Katie for awhile and then I heard crying. And I went downstairs and discovered this. 😐
I blame her friends who obviously showed her this neat trick, because that couch has been in that exact spot since we moved in a year ago and she’s never gotten stuck before! 🙂
Daddy and Owen went to pick up the cupcake cake and the pizza before the party!
We surprised the kids with a bounce house borrowed from friends!
Owen testing out the Frozen stick-on earrings!
Everyone had a good time and the bounce house was a success!! I’m losing my mind, though—I didn’t take a picture of the decorated table OR the food table! 🙂
Present #2 she picked, which was opened after dinner! Are you sensing a theme here? 🙂
And the shot that makes it all worth it! 🙂
(If you can’t tell, it’s a reversible Anna/Elsa doll. You flip the skirt over and the other doll is underneath. Her friend had one at T-ball and Katie co-opted it and carried it around forever. So I got her one off ebay probably two months ago and it’s just been waiting!)
Friends of ours came to spend the night on their way to their OBX vacation…so we took the kids to the pool. I only snapped a few pics because we were busy visiting!
We wanted to spread out her four presents from us, so we let her open one when we got home! Of course, as soon as she saw it was a dress (well, PJs), she had to put it on immediately!
On her last day of Fairy Camp: Mama, there’s a lot of tutu in here!
Waiting for class to start.
Recital time! Tom was able to get off work to come, and it was going to be a surprise for Katie! It was funny because she just kept staring out at me and then Tom and then me and then Tom. I was just happy she didn’t freeze up or cry like Owen has done!
The studio records every ceremony so this is from their YouTube channel:
I took a few still shots…
Getting her fairy wings:
Beautiful dancing:
Her fairy group:
Family selfie!
The post-recital lunch…which Katie walked in and thought it was all for her birthday! 🙂
She LOVED the experience. I would really like her to do another week (they have a Sophia the First camp in August), but full price is $175!! Even with their $25 discount for taking the Fairy class…$150 is too much. (We got this camp via a deal site and I only paid $89! so I’m a bit spoiled!)
