Random Katrina videos

Not anything specific...just a couple quick videos of her in the swing today. I think she's 'found' her voice - she's been much more talkative the last day or two!

Kindergarten girl

Abby started kindergarten last week...and loves it, of course! We adored the teacher Gavin had for kindergarten, so we decided to send Abby just for this year since the teacher is still there. She goes two days a week (Monday/Wednesday), and occasionally on Fridays as well.

She was very confident right from the first day - the night before she said to me "mom, you're just going to drop me there, right? Like not stay?" :) I did end up staying for a few minutes, but she was quite happy to play with her little friends and didn't even notice me leaving. It's great to see her so confident.

Katrina rolling over

Baby faces

A picture's worth a thousand words, but sometimes a video is worth even more?? This is for those of you who don't get to see and snuggle Katrina in her 'newborn' stage. :)

(Sorry about the background music, I was watching the Olympic opening ceremonies on the computer...)

Abby spelling

Things seemed to have 'clicked' for Abby and she's starting to read/spell three-letter words. So fun to watch! (And yes, she's always this jumpy!). :)

Gavin the pianist

Gavin is really doing well with his piano lessons! He certainly has his days where he whines and complains and huffs and puffs through his short daily practice time, but overall I think he would say he enjoys it, and he's so fun to watch when he figures something out and gets really excited about it. :)

Here's a short video of him playing one of his recent songs - Holy, Holy, Holy. He's already played offertory in church twice, and this might be what he'll play next time it's his turn on the schedule.

Greg has a pair of oversized puppy slippers that Rachel absolutely adores! Whenever he comes out with them on, Rachel throws herself at his feet and gives the puppies hugs and kisses. I finally remembered to take a video of her playing with the puppies - she was kind of distracted, but you can see a glimpse of how much she loves them! ;)

In case you don't speak toddler-ease, she's saying 'come here' to the puppies, and then she thinks one of their mouths is 'broke.' Later on she tells them to 'stay.'

It's not funny, and yet it is...

Poor Rach. We had a busy day today - spent naptime very much awake at Gavin's hockey tournament, and then headed to Grande Prairie to do the grocery shopping. She was pretty good while we were out, but by the time we got home, she was so overtired. She started screaming when we got in the house because she wanted to play outside, and there was no calming her down. I tried just leaving her alone, I tried to pick her up to comfort her (bad idea - she thrashed so much to get away she almost injured both of us!), but nothing would work.

With that introduction, I just had to take a video of her freaking out in the living room. I'm not a mean mommy usually, I just knew there was nothing I could do for her. :) The best part is how the other kids totally ignore her.

A little holiday music courtesy of Gavin

Hours of entertainment, right here in our living room

Gavin and Abby set up this 'train' in our living room, and they're busy making tickets for their train ride (Abby keeps asking me very seriously how to spell things, and listens intently as I say each letter, it's hysterical!). However, the one having the most fun with it is Rachel!!!

Take a look...

She's been doing it for about half an hour now...I took the toothbrush away after the first time or two :) and she's since figured out how to get down (more or less) and do it all again. Funny the things that will keep them occupied...

So what do they do all day long???

Well...today they seem to be reenacting the entire Olympic games in our living room. Gavin has a schedule of all the events, and he and Abby are taking turns participating (complete with uniform changes for each sport). We've had men's boxing (apparently women don't box?), men's and women's fencing, and we've just finished men's swimming. "I have some sort of sad news," Gavin reports. "I tried my hardest, but I finished in sixth place. It was a personal best, though." Stay tuned for women's swimming - Abby's getting dressed as we speak.

Some excerpts from the Men's Fencing competition (that's Abby cheering him on in the background)

Gavin getting ready for boxing (note the garden..ahem, boxing gloves!)

Rachel walking

Who told her she was allowed to grow up???

Swimming lessons

We just finished two weeks of swimming lessons for Gavin and Abby today. We were blessed with an amazing two weeks of weather - I don't think there was one day that it was too cold to wear shorts and a tank top! Quite an amazing thing, as many years there's groups of moms watching lessons huddling together with their coffees for warmth! ;)

Gavin did an amazing job this year! Even last summer he would still get really panicky about anything that was too new - going off the slide or the diving board. But this time he did so well, I was just amazed. Here's a video (just off of my phone; with three kids to keep an eye on, I didn't get any good pictures this year) of Gavin jumping off the diving board - this was a few days ago, but today he did it several times where he jumped off and then swam to the side all by himself! They got their report cards today and he passed the level on his first try! Way to go Gavin!

This was the first year Abby has done swimming lessons on her own (I did parent and tot with her last summer). And...she started off with a great demonstration of 'like brother, like sister' and screamed her way through the first couple of lessons. If a drop of water happened to touch her face, she'd scream. When they put lifejackets on to practice floating, she clung with all four limbs to the teacher's neck (not kidding!) and screamed. We had a little talk with her after the first few days and promised her a baby ice cream cone at the store if she could go through her whole lesson without screaming at her teacher. (Yeah, I know...but we had to do something!) :)

Fortunately the bribery worked and after one more day with just a little bit of screaming, she did really well after that. I wish I could have gotten it on video, but it was the cutest thing: she would be involved in the lesson, then would suddenly turn around to look at me, grin a huge toothy smile up at me and yell out "Mommy! I am doing a great job not screaming at my teacher!" She entertained the watching parents, that's forsure. :)

Abby didn't pass her level, but she made a huge improvement in the two weeks, which was wonderful. At today's lesson she even put her face underwater a couple of times (at least one was by accident, but she was pretty calm about it), and practiced her front and back floats with the rest of the class. Granted, she was up on the second step, so the water's only about a foot deep...and she hangs onto the next step up so it's not actually floating...but she was so proud of herself, she would call the teacher and say "teacher, look at me! I am DOing it!" The fact that Gavin, the original screamer himself, is now a 'strong swimmer' according to his report card, gives me such hope for Abby! Hopefully it will work out to do some lessons in the fall for them so they don't forget everything they've learned.

Here's a short video of Abby at her lessons. That's the rest of her class there in the background, probably learning the finer points of back crawl ;) and then there's Abby, hopping happily on the stairs. She was the littlest in her class (you have to be three years old, and she was three and a week when the lessons started) and she couldn't even stand where the rest of the kids were if she wanted to since she was so short.

Here's all the kids in her class lined up waiting to get the go-ahead from their teacher to get in the water. Isn't she cute???