Mostly about my wonderful daughter, but there might be other stuff, too.
Friday, June 26, 2009
Short Sydney Story
Monday morning I turned the TV on. I usually try to leave it on ESPN when I turn it off because I know that's an okay channel for Sydney to watch no matter what time of day it is. (And it's an okay channel for me to watch, too.)
This past Monday ESPN was televising the end of the U.S. Open Golf Tournament. Sydney is aware of most of the major sports from watching ESPN or sports on TV with me. She immediately knew golf was on and watched for a few minutes with me.
At one point they showed a golfer getting ready to make a shot and Sydney said, "Daddy, is that Tiger?"
"No, Sweetie, that's not Tiger," I answered. I was, of course, talking about Tiger Woods.
"Oh," she said, sounding a bit disappointed. "Is he Kipper?"
I have two things to mention before getting into the Santa Barbara trip.
First, happy birthday today (Thursday) to my Grandma Monette. (She's Sydney's Great-Grandma.) She turned 87 today. To celebrate she had surgery and had a heart catheter and four stents put in. She seems to have come through surgery fine and when Mom (Grandma B) left the hospital a little while ago she was awake, having dinner and chatting with the cardiac nurses. (Edit: Finishing this post up on Friday, Grandma is now home and doing fine.)
Second, I need to post some pictures of stuff from our Montana trip that I forgot last post. Grandma B asked to see some pictures of the things we bought at the stone shop and I completely forgot them last post.
First up is Sydney's hedgehog. Our friend Shawna crocheted it and brought it for Sydney when we met. The hedgehog lives in a little mushroom. Sydney loves it.
Here are the stones we found in our big pile of rocks. The ones on the left are the large, good stones that could be finished. The ones one the right are the stones that are too small or flawed/cracked to be finished.
And here are the items we bought in the shop. There are two pyramids Anne got to put in her Egyptian room. There's also a little camel there. And Sydney picked out a little stone hippo. The large rock formation on the right is something I thought looked nice and bought.
So there's that. Now, Santa Barbara.
We went down to Santa Barbara the first week in May. Anne had some training to do for work. The company they bought some new lab machines from (I think hey got the ones where the lightning crackles up between two flanges) flew her down and she had to go to training for four days. They paid for the hotel so Sydney and I got tickets and went down, too.
We arrived on Sunday afternoon and immediately started to explore. We were right down at the waterfront. We were across the street from a beach and marina and a few blocks down the road was Stearn's Wharf. That's a large wharf with shops and restaurants on it.
Pelicans made a sand bar/break water out a ways from the beach home. In the late afternoon they would all get up and start flying at the same time. Then they would spread out and go fishing. It was neat to watch them dive into the water and then pop back to the surface a few seconds later.
Out near the end of Stearn's Wharf a few pelicans apparently decided it was a nice place to be rather than the sand and rocks. You could actually get pretty close to them before they seemed to care. (Though we didn't get too close.)
And sometimes they were flying close enough to be able to capture them with the telephoto lens.
The candy shop up on Stearn's Wharf had a caged Tasmanian Taffy Turkey right outside the door. It bobbed up and down at the taffy. Strangely enough, in all my time spent over at the Museum of Hoaxes I have never heard of one of these creatures. But I got a picture of it to make sure I had documentation for further study.
Anne didn't have to go to her class on Monday so we all went exploring. And if I had updated my blog earlier I'd probably remember exactly what we did. But I'm sure it was exciting and that some of the pictures came from then. In fact, I believe we walked to Stearn's Wharf and got the pictures of the pelicans and the creature outside the candy shop.
On Tuesday Anne had training so Sydney and I were on our own. We went to the Santa Barbara Zoo.
Santa Barbara was very easy to get around even though we didn't have a car. We could pretty much walk anywhere down along the shoreline or, if it was too far, they had an electric bus that ran during the day. It cost $.25 per person to ride. There was a bus that ran along the shore and one that ran up the street where Stearn's Wharf was. Up that street was the downtown area. The zoo was at the far end of Santa Barbara along the beach so Sydney and I took the bus down there.
First we walked along the beach and stopped in the Visitor's Center to get a discount coupon. Along the way I snapped a picture of the beach, Stearn's Wharf and clouds rolling down the mountains.
The big black thing near the center of the picture was a tractor that was raking the beach.
After we got to the Visitor's Center we still had to wait about a half hour before the bus started running so we checked out a park next door. There was a fountian there and Sydney always like to throw pennies into fountains so I gave her a couple.
The park ran a good length along the road and there was a playground at the far end. We didn't go down there. I figured we'd have time to play on it another day (we did on Friday) and that it might be hard to get Sydney away from it to catch the bus. So we crossed the road and found a bus stop to wait at.
Nearby where we were waiting there was a culvert that came in from the ocean. The sides of it were lined with rocks. In the spaces and cracks between rocks lived a bunch of squirrels. They had cute little baby squirrels running around too. We kept our distance but enjoyed watching them. A lady walking by fed one of the squirrels some peanuts. Sydney got slightly freaked out when, shortly after this, one of the squirrels started approaching her. It thought she had food and was coming to get it. I scared it back and we retreated to a safe distance to watch them and wait for the bus.
We reached the zoo shortly after they opened (which was the same time the buses started running) and went in. First stop was to use the bathroom. Sydney, for some reason, decided on this trip that she was going to have severe anxiety about using any toilet that wasn't in our house. And since we were in southern California and not northern Idaho that posed a bit of a problem. As the week progressed she got better about it - especially at the hotel - but early in the week she would have complete meltdowns about having to sit on a foreign toilet.
After a traumatic toilet experience we were ready to start our trek through the zoo. First stop was... Sydney tripping on the sidewalk and scraping her knee. So we headed back into the bathroom to clean it up. Then we headed out to start our zoo experience.
The zoo was good-sized, but not too big. The website said it was a good half-day trip. And it was.
We got to see California sea otters.
Madagascar hissing cockroaches.
Many types of tropical birds.
Including flamingoes.
We got to see some penguins.
And we got to hear them call out.
We got to see some elephants.
There was a nice fountain where we sat down and took a rest.
But we didn't throw any pennies in because there were koi in it.
Sydney got to ride a little rocking car ride.
We got to see some California condors.
And bald eagles.
But if you ask Sydney what her favorite part of the zoo was she will probably tell you it was the giraffes. Because she got to feed them.
When we had lunch we were sitting in a little courtyard area near the entrance of the zoo. A mother and son, about Sydney's age, were sitting at the table next to us. The son had chicken nuggets for lunch. Some type of sea bird (not a gull) was hanging around and, when no expected it, it swooped in and stole one of the boy's chicken nuggets. The mother and I found it kind of funny but tried not to laugh. Sydney was amazed and couldn't talk about anything else the rest of the meal. The little boy was traumatized and upset. He guarded his chicken nuggets closely as he finished. And when the bird finally managed to swallow the one it stole and looked like it wanted another I had to jump to the rescue and scare it away.
While we were at the zoo a forest fire started up in the hills of Santa Barbara. You might have seen something about it on the news back then. It didn't affect us that much, really, since we were down at the ocean. But in the late afternoon winds would shift and start blowing out to sea. So the smoke clouds would cover the sky above us and ash would fall from the sky.
Wednesday morning when Sydney and I were out and about there wasn't much smoke up in the hills. It seemed like the fire was mostly out. But it wasn't. We went to a park with a playground at the far end of the downtown area, so we were somewhat close to the hills. Planes and helicopters kept flying overhead. That afternoon the fire burst up again and spread as high winds hit it. The fire was still going (but mostly contained) when we left on Sunday.
But that Wednesday Sydney and I went to the downtown area. We road the bus to the far end and then took a walk a few blocks to a park. It was pretty, but pretty bland and boring for a four year old as we approached.
But once we got through those trees in the middle of the park we could see the playground.
The playground was huge. It was of the same style as the Fort Sherman playground in downtown Coeur d'Alene that we have been to many times. But it was about twice as big as Fort Sherman playground. And Fort Sherman playground is a pretty big playground.
Sydney had fun playing.
And then, without warning, Sydney was attacked by a shark. AHHHH!
But she managed to wrestle it into submission.
Thursday the company Anne was training with took us out to lunch. Here's the group picture of everyone there (except me taking the picture).
And this is a shot of the tree we were sitting under out in the back of the restaurant.
On Friday the training was canceled. The fire had forced evacuations and the company was close to one of those areas. There was a warning that they might be closing the area they were in if the fires spread more, so they just canceled the last day of training rather than risk having everyone there and then having to leave.
That was actually good because Anne started to get a bit of a cold on Friday. And Sydney hadn't really taken much of a nap all week so she and Anne took one Friday afernoon. So I went out and took a walk. I took some pictures of an interesting tree in a park around the corner from us.
Somewhere along the line the last couple months Sydney decided that she is afraid of crabs. We don't know where or how it started, but she tells us at any and every opportunity. Although crabs in cartoons don't seem to bother her.
So after I snapped pictures of the tree I took a walk down along the marina. As I went along guess what I noticed down by the water, crawling over the rocks?
So after I went and got up Anne and Sydney from their nap we went for a walk. We went to the marina and I pointed out the crabs. We were well above them and Sydney was fascinated. She wanted to watch them and point out everytime one of them moved. But she didn't want to get any closer (not that we could have).
She still says she's scared of crabs, but she seemed to enjoy the time she actually got to see real ones.
Friday night Anne and Sydney went to bed so I got to go out on my own for a while. I walked down to Stearn's Wharf to get some ice cream. On my way there I was waiting to cross the street. A guy came around the corner, did a double take at me and walked right over to me.
He was completely high on something. I was wearing my LEGOLAND baseball cap. He said he loved my hat and wanted it. He asked how much he could buy it for. I told him it wasn't for sale. There was then the minute or so of, "Dude. Really. I want the hat. You wo't sell it to me? Really? Come on. Please? I'll give you anything. I really like it. I have to have it."
He finally gave up ad turned away. But, because I'm a smart mouth and don't know when to keep my mouth shut, I said, "How about $5000.00?"
He turned around and said, "Really, man? Sure." He reached into his pocket and pulled out his driver's license and tried to hand it to me. I told him I didn't want his driver's license and he tried to stick it in my pocket. I grabbed it and he turned around and walked off to go into the restaurant we were in front of.
I said loudly that he may want his license but he didn't pay attention to me. So I flicked it in his general direction and it fell to the sidewalk outside the restaurant. I went off to get my ice cream and on my way back I didn't see the guy or his driver's license anywhere around.
That night I hung out by the pool with two of the ladies from Anne's training, Stephanie and Tanya. (They're the two girls in the foreground of the lunch picture above.) We drank wine, wine, more wine, walked over to the 7-Eleven to buy another bottle of wine and drank that.
I wasn't feeling so hot on Saturday. I went to breakfast with Anne and Sydney the next morning, but didn't get any further than that. It was back to the hotel with me to recuperate from too much wine.
On Sunday we got up way too early and flew home. Overall it was a really fun trip. It helped that we were there during a warm and sunny (around the smoke) week. We were told the week before was cool and rainy and the forecast for the following week was the same.
There are other pictures that didn't make it into the blog over at my Picturetrail photo album if you want to check them out.
It's been way too long since I've updated. It's been a little busy and hectic. And I have lots to share that I won't get to in this post. And hopefully it won't take me long before I post again. We'll see.
Before going into the promised Easter update I'll share some other stories.
The following (approximate) conversation took place in our bathroom the morning of Saturday, April 25, 2009.
Anne: What's the date today?
Me: Uh, the 25th.
Anne: Did we both completely forget our anniversary yesterday?
Me: Yep.
So happy tenth anniversary to my wonderful, beautiful wife. I love you!
Sydney had her four year check up a couple weeks after her birthday. She weighed in at 44 pounds and had a height of 44 inches. She's a well-rounded little girl.
Sydney has also completed soccer. It was six weeks long and we missed the second-to-last week when we went to Santa Barbara. But Sydney really liked playing soccer (even if she was hesitant to get in there and kick the ball when others were around) and wants to do it again. The Autumn session starts in September and we'll be signing her up for that.
So now we dial back to Easter.
On Easter morning we got up and all went downstairs to see if the Easter Bunny had visted. He had!
Then Sydney went around looking for Easter eggs.
A little later in the day we went over to Bill and Donna's house for Easter brunch. (That's where we went on Christmas Eve, too.) With all the snow melted we got to see the pond and waterfall out in the back yard. Bill let Sydney throw in fish food to see if the fish could be coaxed out of their hideaways in the rocks. And they came out.
Sydney brought her Easter bucket (that she made with Grandma B at her class) for the Easter egg hunt. After we ate the kids (Sydney and the four boys) went out in the back yard to look for eggs.
The eggs were all plastic and had money, candy or little toys in them. In addtion to the eggs there was also a large toy hidden for each of them. Sydney got an Easter Mr. Potato Head.
Here is a picture of three of the beautiful ladies at the Easter brunch: Jackie, Anne and Kathy.
And here's a picture of the cake Jackie made for dessert. Real flowers. All the other parts of the cake were edible.
And next time a post telling about our trip to Santa Barbara.
Though it was really more than ten days. And it ended a week ago. But it's been quite a week since then, too. (I spent most of last week working hard to catch up on four weeks' worth of paperwork at work, so it's been a tad busy at work with little free time.)
Anyway, we start this tale on Friday, April 3, 2009. Grandma B had arrived two days before for a visit. It just happened to coincide with Sydney's birthday weekend. It's amazing how those things work out.
When Grandma B arrived on Wednesday Sydney immediately had things for her to do. She had to see all her toys and play all sorts of games. Thursday morning Grandma B stayed home with Sydney while I went into work early so I could get things done and start my time off that much earlier.
So I guess we really started on Wednesday, April 1, 2009. But we skimmed over that and we're now at Friday, April 3, 2009.
Friday morning we didn't do our usual pre-preschool class with the kids and moms. Sydney was signed up for an Easter "Eggs-travaganza" through the Post Falls Parks & Recreation Department. It's just one of the many classes through the city we sign Sydney up for and have been taking her to for several years.
This time, though, Grandma B was in town and Sydney thought it would be grand if Grandma B took her to the class. So I dropped them off and then went home to finish straightening up for what came after. You can read about the class and more of Grandma B's visit here on her blog.
They had fun and about five minutes before I was going to leave to pick them up I got a call that they were done and one of the last ones left. So I hurried over to pick them up. Then we went to go pick up pizza. At noon we were having the pre-preschool kids and moms over for Sydney's birthday.
Seated to the right of Sydney in that picture is Sydney's oldest (length-of-time, not age) friend, Mary Jane. She's not in class but was invited to the party. And in the picture everyone is eating cupcakes and ice cream that came after the pizza.
Even though we weren't asking for or expecting any gifts from these friends Sydney did get a few. She knew that going in so was extra excited to have them. And since we knew she'd be getting a lot more gifts the next day we let her open the gift from Aunt Heather (not pictured - it was a play doctor kit. No jokes necessary - I've already made most of them).
And then there was a lot of mass chaos while the kids played. (Grandma B was smart and lucky in that she got to retreat to her bedroom for that part of it.)
On Saturday we had Sydney's birthday party with family and close friends. (You can read even more about Sydney's birthday over at Grandma B's blog.)
Around noon Sydney's birthday balloons arrived. They were a gift from Great-Grandma M (Grandma B's mother and my grandmother). Do I need to mention that Sydney really likes getting balloons?
Shortly after the balloons arrived Sydney got dressed up for her party. (See Grandma B's blog linked above.) Since Sydney's favorite foods are pizza and pasta and we had pizza on Friday Anne made an awesome baked ziti for the party. We also had fresh garlic bread made from a garlic loaf picked up at Costco.
Since everyone was stuffed on the meal we let Sydney open her presents before having cake.
Then we had cake.
Sydney picked out the design for her cake all by herself. And she wanted the white frosting on the chocolate cake with the chocolate cream filling. Mmm...
"Happy Birthday" was sung.
And candles were blown out.
On Sunday it was actually Sydney's 4th birthday. We relaxed and played with Sydney's presents. What? You thought we were going to have another party? Don't you think two is enough? Sheesh.
On Monday Grandma B went out to lunch with a friend. And we went out to lunch and then to Toys R Us so Sydney could spend her birthday money. Why, no, we don't think she got enough toys for her birthday. Why?
Sydney did do rather well in spending her money, though. (With a bit of prodding, coaching and coaxing, of course.) She bought a soccer goal for outside for when she wants to play soccer. She bought a slightly smaller and lighter basketball she can play with since Mommy's is a bit big for her. She also bought some more bubble mixture so she can blow bubbles and some cheerleader pom poms that she got extremely excited about as soon as she saw them.
Tuesday Grandma B was leaving. And Sydney was getting sick. This was bad news because we were planning and reserved to go to Fairmont Hot Springs in Montana on Wednesday for a few days. We were going to meet a couple of my online friends there.
So on Tuesday we relaxed and took things easy. Sydney got plenty of rest. On Wednesday she was much better. She wasn't completely better, but she was better enough that we decided she could travel. She relapsed a little on the drive, but we arrived safely and Sydney got a good night's sleep that night. She woke up feeling even better.
On Thursday we went swimming in the pool and spent a few hours there. Then we went outside (even though it was a little chilly and muddy) and played on the playground at the resort.
Sydney liked all the stuff there and spent some time running back and forth between things. But then she settled on the tall, metal slide. She'd climb up, slide down and then run around to repeat. She did that for about twenty minutes straight.
Long before she was tired of that Anne and I decided it was about time to think about dinner. We had contacted my friends on the road earlier and they estimated they would be in between 6:00 and 6:30. Since it was a little before 6:00 I called them and they were close. So we went inside to wait for them in the lobby.
As soon as they arrived I made them pose for a picture with me.
That is DavePrime and Crafty Dragon - Dave and Shanwa - from the Museum of Hoaxesforum. They live in Billings, MT, so had a slightly longer drive than we did to arrive at the resort.
And in case you're wondering, yes, this is the fourth time I have arranged a meeting with people I know from that forum. We have previously met Alex, the owner of the Museum, when we went to San Diego last year. I then met Oppiejoe when I went back to Michigan for my reunion last summer. In October we went over to Seattle and met Nettie and Transfrmr. And now we've met DavePrime and Crafty Dragon.
Someday I'll figure out how to meet some of the other folks from the forum. Those trips could be fun and involve various parts of Europe and Australia. (Unless they come here, like Nettie did.) Though there could be more possibility for meeting some members from here in the States.
Anyway, on Friday it was time to leave and head back home. Dave and Shawna were staying another night, but we all drove up to Philipsburg, MT for some fun.
There are two main attractions there we were interested in. The first was the candy store (we actually went there second, but I didn't take any pictures of it, so I'm mentioning it first). It's a large candy store. One of those places where you walk around and just start throwing candy into a bag. At the end they weigh it and charge you by the pound. There are hundreds of kinds of candies including handmade taffy and caramels. They also have storemade fudge in a variety of flavors (not for the same price as the other candy). And some storemade chocolates (again, not the same price). We spent a good amount of money there.
The other big attraction for us was the sapphire store right next door. For $25 you get to pick out a four-pound bag of gravel. They get it wet and sift it a little bit then plop it down on a table for you. They show you what to look for and then you pick through it with tweezers to find raw sapphires. We ended up finding five quality sapphires with a total weight of 7.55 ct. We had several others that were too small to do anything with or were flawed and cracked. We opted not to pay the extra to have them (the good ones) heat-treated and cut.
Dave and Shawna had similar luck with their bag.
The bad thing about that place is that when you first walk in you are actually in the store part. You are surrounded by stones and things carved from stone. Beautiful, exotic and sometimes rare, there are a lot of fun things to look at. Yep, we spent a good amount of money there, too.
At the end of that excursion we continued on home and Dave and Shawna went back to the resort for their second night.
The reason we couldn't get our dates to coincide for the entire trip was because we had to be home before early Saturday morning. It was Sydney's first soccer game!
Sydney had been very excited about it since we asked her and signed her up back in February. But, once we actually got there, Sydney reverted into her shell and decided she was too shy to play soccer. We explained that she was signed up and part of a team. We explained that she couldn't not play now just because she was feeling shy. We tried what we could to coax her out of her shell. She just continued to stare at the ground and mumble that she didn't want to go out and run around with the other kids and kick the ball. (This was before the start time when the kids got a few minutes to run around and kick the ball on their own.)
So I went up to Sydney's teammate who looked lonely. She was holding her pink, flowered soccer ball and looking like she wanted to kick the ball with someone but certainly did not want to go run around and kick with those boys over there. I introduced myself and got her name. I asked if she would like me to kick the ball with her. She agreed.
Strangely enough, I was standing fairly close to Sydney. The little girl kicked the ball to me and I kicked it back to her. Then I asked Sydney if she wanted to join us. She decided she did, so the little girl kicked the ball to her. Sydney kicked it back and then promptly ordered me off the field.
The first half hour of soccer (for the four year olds, at least) involves some simple drills. The coaches help them learn some of the very basics of soccer. The second half hour involves a bunch of four year olds running around the field, kicking the ball, forgetting which direction they're supposed to be kicking it, falling down (sometimes on top of the ball) and frequently looking around at anything but the soccer ball or the other kids kicking the soccer ball. (There are no goalies for this age group.)
Sydney really likes to kick the ball. Unfortunately, she's not real big on getting into the middle of things and trying to kick the ball. If it's out in the open and she's near it she will run over and try to kick it. But mostly she runs around the outer parts of the game and doesn't seem sure of what she wants to do. While a little frustrating because we know she's capable it's also quite funny.
This week was Sydney's second week of soccer. While she did the same things while playing she was completely involved in the entire process. Once she got there she was out on the field. Mommy and Daddy were almost completely forgotten (except when she came over for water). She practiced and ran around the field and had all sorts of fun.
The last day to be covered in this post was going to be Easter Sunday. But I think it's long enough so I'm going to save that for the next post.
Each year Anne and I get a pair of knitted birthday socks. Sometimes we go and pick out the yarn and colors we want at a local yarn shop and send it to Grandma B so she can make our socks with it. We pick out some yarn for Grandma B, too, to make her own birthday socks.
This year Anne decided she had enough socks and didn't need a new pair. (And then recently lost two pairs due to holes worn in the bottoms from wearing them so much.) But Sydney and I picked out yarn. Sydney even picked out yarn for Grandma B's socks. (I didn't see a post with a picture of those socks being completed, but I'm sure Grandma B will let me know if I missed it.)
This was the first time since before she was born that Grandma B was knitting socks for Sydney. I don't think she could have refused the request even if she had wanted to. Sydney picked out some pink-purple-greenish yarn for her socks.
Sydney was VERY excited when her socks arrived a few weeks ago. She jumped up and down and squealed a bit. Unfortunately, I didn't get that reaction on video. But here she is trying on her socks.
And here's Sydney happily wearing her socks.
And here's Sydney showing how much she loves her birthday socks.
My socks arrived yesterday. Mine are a beautiful green yarn. Grandma B used a cross-pattern something or other to knit the upper part of them. This uses a lot of yarn, apparently, and she had to contact her knitting friend in Idaho to get her some more of the yarn to finish the socks.
They turned out wonderfully and are absolutely gorgeous. I wore them today for St. Patrick's Day.
And since you can't see the socks very well in that picture you can see a much better picture of them over at Grandma B's knitting blog.
A couple weeks ago Sydney and I also got presents in the mail from Aunt Helena. They were either late Christmas presents or early birthday presents. I'm not sure. But Sydney and I both really like them and we don't care.
They are Washington Redskins aprons for when we grill. Washington is my (our!) favorite football team.
The koala bear Sydney is holding is the koala bear puppet my online Australian friend Nettie gave her when we met in Seattle in October.
We've had a lot going on lately. Not the least of those things is getting a new computer. Our old one died. (Yeah, it was about three months after our extended warranty expired on it, why do you ask?) And, along with a new computer comes losing all our emails.
I do have an older list of email addresses printed out, but if you are someone who has our roadrunner.com email address would you please send something to us? (I'd prefer it be non-virus, thanks.) It will be easier to get emails that way than to manually enter then all again. (And if you don't have it and feel like you should you can contact me in whatever normal way you know how to contact me and I'll give it to you.)
And all of these things are no excuse for not updating. I really don't have an excuse for that. Sorry.
Anyway, along with the new computer comes a new wireless router. So we now have wireless available in the house. Anyone coming for a visit can feel free to bring their laptop and know they will be able to use it to get on the web.
It also means I have the Wii online now so if anyone out there has a Wii and wants to share console codes let me know.
So shortly before Christmas Sydney got invited to join a home class. Her friend Hunter's mom and another mom we met at Romp & Roll (back when Sydney went to it) were doing some informal homeschooling for their kids to help them start to learn letters and numbers and to give some socializing. So Sydney and I do that now. It is usually three times a week on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. It's for about an hour and a half in the morning so I take Sydney (or we have it here - we rotate houses) then we come home for lunch and I get dressed for work.
Sydney has known her alphabet and been able to recognize numbers for a while. She's been able to count pretty consistently up to about 12 and recognize those numbers. But since we started the class she's been getting better. And, of course, she's been learning to write her letters and numbers, too.
And she's been more excited about writing them. After we did Cs she filled one of her large sheets of blank drawing paper with Cs randomly written all over it. And she's recently been wanting to learn her numbers up to 20. (She knows them all except 15. She skips that every single time.) She hasn't had much chance to practice writing the higher numbers, though, because the book we're using only goes up to 10.
But she has a dry erase book for numbers (and another for letters) she has been using more recently. That really only goes up to ten with a little bit of depth and counting, but there is a two page spread near the end that has 11-20 on it and allows for writing the numbers on it.
The class has also helped her open up a little to people beside Mommy and Daddy and to get her to play more openly with other kids. It's been nice to see her develop bit by bit that way.
Back at the end of January we got an opportunity to go to a water park. Silver Mountain Ski Resort, about an hour east of us, has an indoor water park at the hotel. They invited Resort employees to go at a discounted rate. Normally you have to be staying there to even get in.
It was a very nice water park and we had a great time. Sydney was wearing her water wings and enjoyed swimming around on her own. Particularly in the lazy river. She also enjoyed the hot tub that was not-quite-as-hot as a normal hot tub so kids wouldn't be uncomfortable in it. It was fairly large and Sydney enjoyed being in there, too.
Despite our success with her "swimming" there and her more-openness from having to be with us all the time we were unable to talk her into trying swimming classes again. We stopped the ones we were doing some time ago (over a year) because she was getting to old for them. But in order to move up to the next class she had to be able to go in the pool herself and not cling to Mommy (or Daddy). She wasn't willing to do that.
Anne may try the swim lessons anyway. We have a lead on a new place that's closer to home, cheaper, and comes with a good recommendation about the lady being really good with kids.
We did manage to get Sydney involved with something that she's really excited about, however. Starting the week after her birthday Sydney will be playing soccer! She's in the four year old league (duh!) through our city's Parks & Recreation Department. At that age it's a very casual thing and just gets the kids out there to run around, kick the ball and have fun. We asked her about it and she was really excited about wanting to play so we have high hopes for her.
There's also a Fall league that starts in late July (July = Fall? What?!) we'll plan on signing her up for. And in the Fall there's also a basketball class/camp of some type for four year olds. I saw that mentioned in the catalog today and Sydney got really excited about it. (It was just a date list so I really have no information about it yet.)
Let's see. What else has been going on? Grandma and Grandpa M are next door, but you know that. They haven't made it back to Vegas yet. Grandma M had some medical issues come up that I won't get into here and now. But until she can get some things taken care of they won't be going back to Vegas to sell the house.
Sydney really likes having them close by. Whenever they leave to go somewhere and we see them leaving she will get up in the window to wave to them.
Grandpa has started shooting dice with Sydney so whenever he comes over he has to bring them. She enjoys counting up the dots and seeing what she got.
And don't fret, Grandma B. Sydney thinks of you and mentions you often. The guest room is (and probably always will be) "Grandma's Room". And Sydney wants to know when you're coming for your next visit, so get planning.
And now for some pictures.
Last week (on Valentine's Day, actually) we had a fun function to go to. A couple of the local art groups had a Kid's Carnival at the Plaza Shops at the Resort. The main organization was Art on the Edge, which I'll let you read about if you're so inclined.
Anyway, for $5.00 the kids got to go around to a bunch of different art stations and do different things. There was some type of glass art which we passed on. We figured glass art (safety goggles required!) probably wouldn't be the best thing to get Sydney involved in at this age. They also had a clay station set up. Clay on spinning wheels. And despite Kipper the Dog having fun with it in one of his episodes Sydney decided to pass on it. She didn't want to get messy.
But she did everything else!
Here's Sydney picking out what to put on her mask. (And Mommy helping glue it.)
And skipping ahead in the pictures, here's Sydney wearing her mask after we got home.
Here's Sydney gluing stuff onto a large, paper heart.
And here's Sydney decorating some paper hands.
The hands were going to later be glued to sticks and used as paddles at an art auction. The gimmick was to have the kids decorate the hand on the condition they gave it up. But then they got to move down the table and make a mask! Of course, we came from the other end of the table so the lady let Sydney make two hands and keep one. (I'm sure she wasn't the only one.)
Here's Sydney painting part of a really large painting of a flower.
They were having the kids paint a little bit of the painting to complete the flower. The child could pick what part they wanted to paint and then the lady would give them the appropriate color paint. Here's a picture that shows the overall picture a little better.
And the final art project of the day was just some free form painting on blank paper.
So that's all for now. I promise not to be so long before another update. I still have Anne's phone videos to upload and share, so that will probably be the next one.
We had an excellent Christmas here. (Well, other than the tons of snow we've been getting and the sub-freezing temperatures.)
I had Christmas Eve off so I was able to attend the get together we have with friends each year. Like last year it was at Bill and Donna's house. Bill and Donna are the parents of our friend Kathy.
Here's Kathy (in the red) with Jackie and Anne.
Bill and Donna have an absolutely gorgeous house They also have a fairly large backyard with lots of trees. Here you can see part of it with snow (surprise!).
Mark (Jackie's husband) wore his new Christmas sweater to the party.
Mark bought it as a joke to wear for Christmas. It's a woman's sweater. I think it'd look better without the tee shirt under it.
And here's a picture of Mark, Kathy and Anne.
And Jackie and me.
Aunt Marta was visiting for the week. She and Sydney had a wonderful time playing together. They frequently sat up on the bed in "Grandma's Room" (that's what Sydney calls the guest room) looking through wrapping paper tube telescopes to try to find pirates.
Aunt Marta was at the party and Sydney brought Penguin (the one she got at Sea World in February - he's her favorite bedtime stuffed animal).
After eating and nibbling on excellent food that everyone brought we eventually got down to the present unwrapping. We let the kids go first then booted them out of the room to go play with their new stuff.
Sydney, of course, liked everything she got, but two presents stand out as apparent favorites from the party. First is a blanket that Kathy's boys made for her. They made a blanket for each of the kids (Caden and Rylan - Mark and Jackie's boys - and Sydney). Sydney really likes hers and it is a regular part of her bed now.
The other present was a little Yorkie (I think?) stuffed dog in a carrying case. She's pointing at the pink case in this picture.
We got home around 8:00 pm. Sydney spent much of the trip home looking up in the sky for any sign of Santa. When we got home she had something to eat (she wasn't that interested in the food at the party for some reason) and then we checked out NORAD on the computer to see where Santa was. Luckily he was still visiting the east coast.
Sydney went to bed and we expected her to fall right asleep despite the excitement. She only had a short nap on our way to the party earlier in the day and it was almost two hours past her bedtime. But when I went to check on her about fifteen minutes later she was still awake and had a silly grin on her face when she saw me.
I went in, tucked her in again, kissed her on the cheek and told her I thought she would be asleep. Her reply was, "Daddy, stop bothering me."
The next morning she got up at her regular time (7:00 am) and was very excited. So were we! Aunt Marta got up and we called Grandma and Grandpa to come over. (They stayed home on Christmas Eve. Partly because of various ailments that limited them and partly because of the weather.) Sydney had a bite to eat while we waited for Grandma and Grandpa M to arrive.
The first thing Sydney did when it was present time was to put on "her" Santa hat. (It is generally worn by a stuffed Snoopy Anne has, but Sydney decided she was going to wear it this year.)
She was very excited and had a good time opening presents. She got a lot of things and just about everything she opened was, "Oh, boy. Just what I wanted for Christmas!"
She was particularly excited about two of the presents she got from Santa. First was a pre-school laptop.
She's wanted one for some time and always plays with them in the toy aisles of the store when we go.
The other particularly exciting present was a new baby doll set. It is a newborn doll that comes with a stroller, crib/bassinet, car seat and diaper bag. Here is Sydney jumping up and down with joy.
Santa was also very good to the three of us by bringing us all new Redskins jerseys. Here we are wearing them while watching them lose the last regular season game on Sunday. (Sydney's is several sizes too big so she can grow into it.)
There is only one thing that Santa seems to have missed out on this Christmas and that was a purple hippo.
Sydney's favorite cartoon character, Kipper, has a purple hippo squeeze toy. Sydney has been talking a lot lately about wanting a hippo like Kipper's. After the stockings and Santa presents were opened we were ready to move on to other gifts. But Sydney had other ideas.
She was still very excited about her Santa presents and getting "just what I wanted for Christmas" as she looked at the presents still under the tree. And she asked Mommy, "which present do you think has my purple hippo in it?"
There wasn't too much of a problem with it, luckily. One thing Santa had put in Sydney's stocking was a purple snake/anemone squeeze thing. Mommy quickly explained that that was probably as close as Santa could come to a purple hippo toy. Sydney seemed satisfied with that.
(If anyone happens to find a purple hippo squeeze toy let me know. And, yes, we did also try explaining before Christmas that the purple hippo was probably a dog toy and not a little girl toy, but Sydney didn't seem to care.)
As much as Sydney loved all the presents she got from everyone there are two others that will get special mention here seeing as I have some video to go with them. First, Sydney got a harmonica from Grandpa M. He enjoys playing and she likes to listen to him. So she got one and immediately took to it. (She even "taps it out" as instructed by Grandpa every time she's done playing it.)
The other gift is the sled that Grandma and Grandpa M got her.
Between our two houses is a giant pile of snow the snow plows push up. The streets have been packed snow so it's been easy to slide down it and into the street. On Saturday, though, a plow came up our street to clear things out better since it had actually warmed up to a little above freezing. It cleared the street a lot better and pushed more snow around to make it easier to get from driveways to the street. In the process more snow got piled up on that pile. It's now over eight feet high and has a rather steep drop to the street. We won't be sledding on it anymore. But there are a couple local areas that are supposed to be good for sledding.
We had a great Christmas here and we hope everyone else did, too. Happy New Year to all of you. We wish you the best in the upcoming year and hope everyone has a great 2009.
