Red Ball

This morning we tried another gym place for the kids, called My Gym.  Cooper LOVED this place.  He tried everything they had, climbed a wall of ladders to the ceiling (yikes!) and loved swimming in the ball pit.  Charlotte played basketball with a red ball (it had to be the red ball) for an hour.  I think we know what to buy her for her birthday!

We liked this place better since it had more play/free time included with the learning skills time.  The class is an hour long and their are 2 teachers instead of just 1, which we also liked.  The price is more reasonable at $130/month for both kids (we get the twins discount) and it includes 1 hour of class per week per kid and 2 hours of free gym time per week per kid.  Plus they have monthly ‘mom’s/dad’s day out’ in the afternoons and monthly parents night out evenings.  We have to pay about $40 extra when we use these, but it’s nice to have another babysitter available!  Now we just have to get the schedule worked out so that Charlotte can do speech and gym.  I think this will help Chris get out of the house and meet some other parents as well.

We are busy planning Charlotte’s birthday party.  We’re doing Handy Manny theme and I’m excited to do all the fun stuff since she understands it a little more this year.  We even ordered her a special Handy Manny cake—she is going to love it!  I can’t wait to see her face that day with all the Handy Manny decorations.  I’m also excited to have some friends over to help us celebrate.

I am very proud of myself.  I have completed 3 weeks of P90X without missing a workout (Chris has done the same).  I’m feeling really good and much stronger than 3 weeks ago, and I can easily do 20 push-ups (although still modified since I still don’t have the core strength to do more than 3 traditional push-ups).  I have no idea if I’ve lost weight, inches, or reduced my body fat.  I didn’t measure any of that before I started since I figure I’ll know by how my clothes fit and how I feel.  I can say I feel great, and my clothes are fitting about the same.  Next week is sort of a rest week, so no weight training.  Then we start back in hard core again.  I actually look forward to working out, even though it takes up over an hour of my evening.

Mimics

Here’s a visual for you:

Cooper with hot pink Barbie sunglasses on top of his head (like daddy), carrying a purple flowered purse (like mommy), wearing mommy’s silver ballet flats, pushing his baby doll in his pink stroller, talking on the cell phone.  We have no idea where he gets these ideas from. ::says with sarcasm::  (Chris is slacking with the camera, so you’ll have to just use your imagination.)

Charlotte’s speech therapy went well this week.  The therapist who has done all of the therapy up until now is name Yoncoli (not loving her name, but she is super sweet!) and this week Charlotte had a new therapist introduced, Amanda.  Well, she’s not quite new since she did Charlotte’s evaluation.  We introduced Amanda back into therapy since when Charlotte goes to the center they need the flexibility of having Charlotte know and feel comfortable with at least two therapists.

On Wednesday with Amanda, they reviewed more sounds and worked a lot on mimicking.  Amanda is concerned that Charlotte isn’t mimicking as much as she should for her age and this is slowing her learning progression.  Chris brought up that she mimics Cooper all.the.time (which means for us we end up with two toddlers misbehaving instead of one), but she rarely will copy what we are doing.

Chris told Amanda that he thinks it’s a confidence issue with Charlotte.  She’s just unsure of herself and timid to try new things unless she sees that Cooper safely does something.  Amanda recommended that to build her confidence and have her identify actions better that we over-narrate her day for her.  This means we constantly need to talk her through what she’s doing, what she just did, and what she’s about to do next and then praise her tons for it.  Amanda also said that she will definitely recommend that Charlotte have in-center therapy since she seems to learn quicker with peers and will learn how to mimic since other children her age will be doing it.

Today when Yoncoli came they worked more on sounds.  She was happy to see Charlotte making progress and at least making more babbling sounds.  She still noticed that Charlotte will do or say something else when asked to make a specific sound, unless you are persistent with her.  She gave the okay to begin withholding items until she makes the proper sound.  For instance she can’t have her milk until she makes a muh-muh sound, even if she signs milk.  Luckily we have already introduced this concept and it seems to be going well.  She even gets excited to make the sound and has started making the sound without prompting.

Chris also mentioned to Yoncoli that Charlotte LOVES music and picks up on music/songs pretty quickly.  He asked Yoncoli to possibly find some songs we can use to teach her certain sounds.  We already started ‘I like to eat apples and bananas’, but if you know of any other songs, please share with us! 

Chris also let Yoncoli know that Charlotte seems less apt to learn when we have structured time, but learns better when we are on a walk, playing games, or doing something she is interested in.  Yoncoli said to follow her lead, but also try to get her interested in other activities, since she seems to be a little too self directed in her play.  It’s important to introduce her to some structured/instructional play since she will need those skills for school.

The toughest part of this therapy is to not get defensive about the things we do as parents or the decisions we make.  It is really hard to not say, ‘Well we already narrate her day’ or ‘We prefer follow our children’s lead and if they want to play independently we let them especially since they will have plenty of time to have structured play/learning’.  We have to keep reminding ourselves that our role is to learn new ways to help Charlotte learn quicker and getting her help isn’t an attack on our parenting skills. 

Protein Shake – Toddler Style

Cooper took the remainder of his spaghetti with meat sauce and put it in his apple juice.

Then he drank it. And I was completely grossed out and couldn’t even watch.

This must be the protein shake – toddler style.

Potty Training is going well

I think Charlotte has almost potty trained her Laugh and Learn Puppy.  At least somebody is taking to the potty chair well!

According to Charlotte Grandpa Larry totally looks like Santa Claus.  She pointed to a lollipop box and said clear as day ‘Bampa?’  Maybe this gives us hope to go see Santa?

Congrats to those who posted 30 times in 30 days!  It helped me post more regularly, but I don’t think I’ll continue blogging every day.  I have too many things going on!

Un-decorating the tree

Today we un-decorated the Christmas tree!  I bought some plastic ball ornaments and then per Elsha’s suggestion bought some fabric and stuffed ornaments.  I put them on the tree and they took them off.  The ornaments bounce on the floor just like balls so they thought it was hysterical.  Chris said he is just going to hang a bag and collect the ornaments they remove throughout the day.  Then I can re-decorate at night after they go to bed.  This could be a very long month before Christmas!