Laneah at 3 years, 9 months

This little princess is ready to turn 4. She is smart and ornery; sugar and spice. Here are some things Laneah has been doing:

*Laneah is crazy about letters; writing letters, looking for letters, and listening for letters. She likes figuring out what letter a word starts with by sounding it out but instead of saying cat starts with c, she will she c starts with cat. Also when she sees the letter L she says "thats my name"!

*She is starting to draw a little better and showing more interest than just a quick scribble and then being done.


*Laneah likes to "help" me cook. It can get pretty messy:)

*She started preschool and loves it. It goes by too fast for her and she doesn't want to leave.

*Laneah likes looking at road signs and guessing what she thinks it means.


*She is getting better at cleaning. The motivational chart is starting to pay off:)

*Her favorite show right now is Peppa Pig (why are there so many kids cartoons with pigs as characters? It really creeps me out). They are English so sometimes she will say things the British way instead of the American way and it cracks me up.


* She says "see ya later crocodile" instead of alligator.

* Laneah likes to pretend she is a robot. She talks like a robot and moves her arms in a chopping motion. It is funny because instead of saying "I am a robot", she says "I am in a robot". She calls herself Super Robot Laneah.

*She is extremely particular about what clothes she is going wear.


*Everyone is her "best friend". She has a lot.


*She thinks that if she turns off the tv that means it is paused.


*She still mixes up a few words. She calls zucchini- bikini. I made zucchini bread a few weeks ago and she loved it. She kept saying "mom, I want more bikini bread". 

*If she sees someone with a big stomach, she says, "look mommy, they have a tummy ache". She also says it about herself if she eats too much and her stomach is a little swollen.


*"bored, difficult" are two of her favorite words. She also has been using more naughty words like dumb and hate. We are working on it.


She loves her family and is very sweet in telling us that all the time. We are very lucky to have her in our lives.

Brooklyn at 20 months

Little Brooklyn is still small, but acting like a big girl now. Here is a glimpse of Brooklyn at 20 months.


*Brooklyn likes to cuddle before bed now, but only with mommy. I just sing to her and rock her and when she is ready to go to her crib she points to it. I love cuddle time; its so peaceful. She does cuddle with daddy during the day though.

* I thought that maybe I was going to get away without things like tantrums and messes with Brooklyn, but she is just started getting  into things a little later than Laneah did. It still is only a fraction of Laneah's escapades, but a fraction is enough:) She is hitting me a lot too, which is no fun.


*She is still not talking much, hardly at all. Momma and yes are the only two words that she says consistently, although she has said probably a dozen words, she just doesn't use them. She prefers to point or grunt. Communication was as difficult before, but now I think it is the cause of most of her tantrums. She is frustrated because we don't understand what she wants all the time. We have been watching lots of Baby Signing Time and working on signs too. It is starting to help.


* She is blossoming socially. She smiles at everyone and loves to be noticed.


*Brooklyn makes some animal sounds; but they are more animal like than the normal sound; for example for dog you would teach a baby to say "woof, woof". Brooklyn makes that sound with the correct inflection, but does not say woof; it almost sounds more like a dog whimper. Her pig sound is a snort rather than "oink" and it is so cute.

*She loves trying on shoes and playing dress up with accessories. Laneah has a cowgirl hat that Brooklyn puts on all the time and she carries a purse practically everywhere.

*Brooklyn and Laneah like to copy each other and like to do the same thing. When Brooklyn got into the laundry basket, Laneah had to get one too. They like to eat the same food as well.

*She loves tv. She wakes up and runs to the tv and wants me to turn it on, the little stinker. I don't let her watch too much. Her favorite shows are Sesame Street and Baby Signing Time.


*Brooklyn likes making silly faces

 ...and she likes to look at pictures on the camera so she gets mad when I try to take her picture instead of letting her look at the pictures. I get a lot of these pictures lately:

*She loves to pretend to talk on cell phones, but if someone is actually on the other line, she freaks out a little bit and won't talk, she just throws the phone.

*She discovered stickers and is obsessed. She wants her whole body covered in stickers if possible.

*Brooklyn hums along with me when I sing to her. It is so sweet.


*Her latest food craze includes eggos multi grain blueberry waffles, animal crackers, and peanut butter. She also has become a more messy eater. She has graduated from the high chair to the booster seat as well. She is growing up!

Preschool

Laneah is getting so big! Last week we went to preschool orientation. She is going to preschool with Ms Debbie, who is an amazing miracle worker of preschool age children. We went to meet with Ms Debbie and some classmates and to get a feel of the place and what preschool would be like. Ms Debbie had a little craft waiting for the kids. She helped them spell their names with letters she had pre made and then used glue to write the first letter of their name. The kids then put sea shells on the glue. 

 Then it was circle time and they did some songs and used the calendar to see what day of the week and month it was.

 A view of part of the classroom. Ms Debbie has two gerbils in the classroom.

 Then Ms Debbie let them play. Laneah and Brooklyn went crazy. Ms Debbie has lots of stuffed animal dogs and Laneah snatched them all up. She dressed up as a Vet and gave exams to her puppies.

 Laneah and Scarlette playing restaurant. Ms Debbie said that Laneah's imagination was really great and that it would help the other kids a lot. Scarlette's mom and I are going to carpool and then do play dates so these girls are going to get lots of fun time together this year.

 Then for the kids favorite part, they got to explore the awesome playground. It is huge, I couldn't fit it all in one picture.

 The girls were sad to go, but today was Laneah's official first day of preschool!!!!!! My baby is such a big girl now. She woke up so excited. She had picked out her special first day of school outfit and couldn't wait to get out the door.

 "Mommy! Lets go!"

I dropped her off inside and she got right to it. She did really well but was upset when I came to pick her up because she wanted to paint and they had run out of time. Ms Debbie promised she would get to paint on Thursday so I can't wait to see what she paints. I am looking forward to this year of preschool and seeing Laneah progress. I know she is going to do great. 

Encore

We went to Sesame Place again because we had to use our 2nd day pass. Jason wanted to go during the week because he thought it would be less crowded and since school had started I thought it would be less crowded, but we were both wrong because it was just as packed, if not more so, than we went on a Saturday in July. But it was still fun and the girls loved it. 

 We rode a couple rides and then went to see the Elmo Rocks show. It was cute and funny and both the girls danced and laughed throughout the show.

 Laneah loved putting her hands in the characters hand prints. She had to stop and put her hands in every time we saw one.

 The girls at 123 Sesame Place. (The officially address of Sesame Street:)

 It was a pretty warm day so we spent some time at the water park after lunch and then went to ride more rides. Brooklyn lasted until 4:30 which is very late for her and then passed out. Laneah and I went to get snacks and came back to find this

 Laneah still wanted to see Elmo's World Live again, even though we saw it last month. She just loves Elmo.

 Laneah and I also ran into Abby and she gave her hugs and kisses; but I had left my camera with Jason.

 After saying all day that she didn't want to see the parade, she changed her mind as we were getting ready to leave the park. So we stayed for the night parade and was glad we did. 

Sesame Place is so fun. We were all happy to go there again and Laneah would love it if she could go every day, or so she tells me:)