Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Just keep swimming, just keep swimming...

We start "real" swim lessons tonight! The last 6 weeks was the baby/toddler class where one parent gets into the over-chlorinated 95-degree cesspool with their kid. Because Isabelle is so tall for her age, and mastered all of the baby steps that made up the intro class, they are letting her go into "Level 1" which is normally reserved for 3+ year olds.

Tonight is our first class, we're both going to go to see how our girl does without any M&D in the pool with her. After this week, we'll probably take turns the remainder of the class. I mean, it's not like she's going to be doing the backstroke next week or anything, hehehe.


Wednesday, March 24, 2010

No Way, Jose!

When I was getting Isabelle dressed for school today, she asked me if she could have a cookie (at 7:45am). I laughed and said, "No way, Jose!".

Her face scrunched up in what I thought was about to become a temper tantrum attempt to get her way. But there was no tantrum, she just distinctly explained to me, "No, Mommy, I'm not Jose. I'm IZZI!"

Friday, March 12, 2010

You are my sunshine


When Isabelle was born, I frantically scattered to try and remember the classic lullabies that I was supposed to sing. What were the words? How did that melody go? I only knew the old standby "Rock-a-bye Baby". If you know the words, sing it to yourself right now..........I'm waiting...........

It's NOT a happy song. A baby falls out of a tree when the wind blows. Ummmm, what? Is that supposed to put a baby peacefully to sleep? Or give a new mother any warm and fuzzy feelings when she tucks her newborn in at night?

It wasn't working for me. So I scattered a bit more and came up with the "You Are My Sunshine" song. (just in case you don't remember it...you make me happy, when skies are gray, you'll never know dear, how much i love you, oh please don't take my sunshine away....).

So Isabelle now knows the song and she sings it often. Singing it to her can sometimes make the difference between a temper tantrum or a near-miss situation. She loves it and I still love to sing it to (or with) her.

Recently, she decided (quite creatively) that she could substitute ANY word or item for "sunshine" in the song. So tonight we had...

you are my SOCKS, my only SOCKS, you make me happyyyyyyyy, when skies are gray......

It makes us laugh and it's such a cute game we play now. But, it does become a bit odd at times like yesterday when Ed told her to put her arms into her shirt, she started to sing the song with "arms" as the substitution word and the last line became a bit morbid when she hoped....

"...please don't take my arms away..."

Thursday, March 11, 2010

We have bubbles!


We switched our swim class from Saturday mornings to Wednesday nights. Last night was class #3. This was my first time in the pool with Izzi during class (Ed went into the pool the first two lessons).

The Instructor came over to us gals during the lesson to inquire about Isabelle's age. After I told her that Isabelle just turned 2 in November, she told me that Isabelle was ready to move to Level 2, but they don't let them take Level 2 until they are at least 3 years old.

So we'll skip signing up for future sessions this year until Fall. We will probably take the session that ends in early November so she can be acclimated with the whole 'pool thing' before we head to swimmer's utopia in beautiful Puerto Rico. Then we can jump into a Level 2 session after the craze of the holidays are over.

But last night, just 3 lessons in, Isabelle decided to try the full back float. Success at Level 1 includes full ear submersion, head back, chin up to the sky, belly up, and legs straight. She was floating on her own! (So take THAT Uncle Sean!!!).

She also astonished me with the bubbles. She still won't put her full face in the water on her own (forehead and hairline have to be submerged), but she will put her mouth/nose into the water and blow bubbles the whole lesson if we asked her to. She doesn't mind being dunked completely, if we're playing a game, and loves to jump off the wall from a seated position (on my own, Mommy!).

I look forward to the day when she can swim out of my arms and across the width of the pool on her own. Ed & I were water babies who loved to swim so I look forward to Isabelle getting to that comfort level as well.

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

The Going to Bed Book


Sandra Boynton's classic, "The Going to Bed Book", has been a favorite of Izzi's since we first started to read together (a few hours after she arrived home). Reading a book is still one of our favorite pastimes, thus the burgeoning vocabulary she has at a mere 28 months.

She started to finish the very last page of the book (they rock, and rock, and rock to sleep) on her own when she was about a year old.

Tonight, she 'read' the book in it's entirety to Ed as the rocked and rocked and rocked to READ. She obviously didn't so much read the book as much as recite it from memory. But it was still a precious thing to overhear.

Granted, that was at 7:30pm tonight and it's now 9:37pm and she's STILL AWAKE, so she certainly didn't comprehend the meaning of the story!



Wednesday, March 3, 2010

The Family That Prays Together...

I was saying goodnight to Isabelle in her big girl bed last night. We ran through the usual list of allllllllll our goodnight wishes (the list is growing every week). Anyone here reading this blog, trust me, you are covered. We say good night to you, by name, each and every night.

We end out the list of goodnight wishes with a goodnight to God and to Jesus, and ask them to "bless us every one" (aka, all of you folks).

After she said goodnight to God and Jesus last night, she added very thoughtfully, "and thank you for our food".

If Isabelle has taught me anything in her amazing 27 months on this planet, we can never give thanks or blessings enough, can we?

She's got a ticket to ride, and she don't care...


Ed and I have had our eye on this little beauty for a few months now. We wanted to buy Izzi some kind of bike this Spring, we figured Easter would be as good a time as any. I decided to order it now so we didn't run into any inventory problems in case the temperatures start to rise quickly and shoppers start stocking up on Spring's Things.

It just arrived today (yippee!) and assembly is (of course) required. So it's probably a good thing I didn't wait too long, knowing we have a penchant for procrastination around here.

I've been planting little seeds in Isabelle's brain about a new pink bike. We got the dusty helmet out to make that still fit. So she is very excited about 'maybe' getting this new pink bike one day. Being able to spoil a toddler every once in a while sure is a special treat.

(If you are reading this blog on a mobile phone, you can check out the picture on the website later at: http://thereaintnoplacelikehome.blogspot.com/)

Monday, March 1, 2010

Hey, wait just ONE second!


Isabelle and I were playing with Mega Blocks tonight, building a tunnel big enough for Diego to drive through in his Safari Animal Rescue Jeep. The stability of our architecture was very much in question, and poor Diego kept crashing into the precarious structure and causing a total tunnel collapse, which thankfully got giggles instead of tears.

At one point, Isabelle decided she needed to have a conversation with Diego, to discuss his driving skills, and encourage him to stop crashing into the tunnel. I said something to Iz, while she was in the middle of her little pep talk, and she put her hand up and asked me quite pointedly, "Hey Mommy? Could you wait just ONE second? I'm trying to have a conversation with Diego here!"

So we now know that she completely understands when we ask her to wait while we try to finish a conversation. Now that she understands, she should start to heed our requests. Right?