Practicing for her Gymnastics performance

Garen at Gymnastics

Garen's First Ice Skating Lessons

Garen did so good at his first ice skating lesson. He loved finding the foam matches. Luckily Maddie's lessons are at the same time. So Sophie is the only one left out and she lets me know it. She repeats the whole time the kids are getting ready, "my skates", "my ice."

After ice skating we always have to take a few minutes to play at the play place-




And here's Garen on the bar at gymnastics. He loves going and playing with his friends there!

Gymnastics

Maddie started gymnastics about 3 weeks ago and is loving it!

Gymnastics Camp

Maddie just finished up two weeks of Summer Gymnastic Camp. She's taken gymnastics since she was 2, but we took a break this last school year-I was glad to see her easily pick up where she left off.

This is what I caught her doing while she was waiting for her turn-

Maddie's Gymnastics Meet

Saturday was Maddie's Gymnastics meet. It was so fun to watch her, she did wonderful. It was cute to see her twirl her hair everytime she got nervous or forgot what came next. She was so excited to get her medal and her new Rock Springs Gymnastics shirt that says: "I run like a girl, I jump like a girl, I tumble like a girl. I do it all on a 4 inch wide plank up in the air...Just Like A Girl."

This is what Sophie did for most of the meet-

And this is what Garen did (he was kinda grumpy)-

Here are some videos of her events (I miss filming her on the uneven bars-oops)

Vault (watch her twirl her hair-I think all those people right above her in the balcony was making her shy)-

beam-

Floor-

The Kids

I usually start with Maddie when I update so we'll switch it around and start with Sophie.

She is getting so big, so fast! She now fits into her 3-6 month clothes and she is only 6 weeks old! She is smiling at everyone now and she has the cutest little coos as she tries to talk with us.
She really loves to be held, but is such a good baby! Maddie and Garen are always by her side showing her things, talking to her, and giving her hugs and kisses. It gets a little overwhelming for her sometimes, but you can tell she loves them!

I love her bald head in front and her patch of hair in back-

This is a 3-6 month outfit!-

I know she's not doing much, but I just love to watch her look around with that look of amazement- (try to ignore the messy closet and room behind her).

Garen is so fun to have around! He has been such a good boy playing quietly by himself for hours. I finally took him to playgroup last week because he has been cooped up in the house pretty much since Sophie was born. He had a blast! There were about 8 other little boys there and they build towers with the giant block then knocked them down. And they took turns pushing each other down the slide.

Also, Garen has been using the toilet everytime I put him on it! The only thing is he will never go to the bathroom on his own or tell me when he needs to go. I put him in underwear the last two days, but when I would get to busy and not take him to the bathroom every 30 minutes he would just go in his underwear. So we went back to diaper today to make my life easier and we'll keep working on it.

Andy's going to kill me for posting this picture, but Garen is just to cute!-

He is the most lovey little boy! He is always giving hugs and kisses to everyone, especially his baby sister.

Going for a ride with sister in the pink Barbie jeep-

Maddie amazes me with her increased ability to read! She can pick up almost any children's book, easy or hard, and read the whole thing with little help. She read me a long story the other day that took her 25 minutes and I think she only needed help with one word!!! She is so grown up.

Andy took Maddie on a daddy-daughter date yesterday to pizza hut. Andy Said he was asking her 'What if' questions. One question was, What if you were stranded on an island and you could only have one possession, what would it be? Maddie replied, "a magic carpet of course, then you can fly off the island."

Another funny thing; Maddie came home from school yesterday and said that her class got to vote on what kind of party they would have-a pajama party or a donut party. Maddie said she voted for a pajama party because she doesn't know what donuts are. I've never bought donuts or given one to Maddie, so is that sad that my 51/2 year old doesn't even know what they are? Also for the longest time she called other peoples pop, 'dark juice.' She didn't try a sip of pop until a few months ago when she had to flu-she doesn't like it.

Maddie also moved up to the advanced gymnastics class this week! There are girls in her class that are 11 years old. Maddie looks so little in there, but it doesn't bother her; she acts like she's best friends with all of them.
One of Maddie's new little friends-

It was funny that Maddie and her friend Brecken looked the same today with while leotards, black pants, and blond pig tails. The teacher kept mixing them up.

stretches-

At the end of class they played duck, duck goose. I didn't get it on video, but Maddie got picked like 6 times in a row by different girls. She was getting tired and the teacher had to make a rule to pick somebody besides Maddie.

This week-

Things have been pretty laid back lately. I've got a cold and have been feeling tired and unmotivated so we haven't ventured out much or done anything to exciting this week. But since this is pretty much my journal here are a few things that went on this week.

-I had a doctors appointment and everything looked good. I had a big old weight gain of 8 pounds in 3 weeks. I guess it's time to lay off the sweets. My total weight gain so far is 24 pounds and I still have 6 to 8 weeks left that usually add a pound a week. Oh well. I guess I'll worry about running after the baby comes out.

-Maddie did awesome at her tumble-a-thon. She did 100 tricks and ended up raising just over $100. Thanks so much to everyone who pledged and supported Maddie in this event. She was very excited! For doing so well she gets to pick a new gymnastics leotard, gym shorts, and a hair thing.

Maddie playing duck, duck, goose after the tumble-a-thon:

-We had a very lengthy discussion with Maddie about fires and fire drills. She's been getting stomach aches lately and I finally figured out what it was. She was feeling worried and stressed because they have been practicing fire drills at school and talking about fire safety.

She's worried about going outside without her coat and other things.

She's worried the smoke alarms won't work in our house (the firefighters stressed changing the batteries or they won't work), she's worried if they go off in the night she won't wake up. I assured her that her dad and I would not leave the house without carrying her and Garen out with us.

She found out that you could start a fire with two pieces of wood so she assumed if two of her toys hit together they too would start a fire. I keep telling her that fires don't happen to often and that we won't have one at school or at home, but she believes there will be one for sure or else they wouldn't practice so much. The things a 5 year old can conjure up in her little mind! :)

-We babysat my neighbors 5 month old baby and the kids loved it! Maddie got to feed him a bottle and hold him before she headed off t0 school. And Garen was very interested and kept bringing him toys and sticking his binki in his mouth. So I think Garen will be happy with the new baby, probably till he figures out she's staying. And Maddie said she wants to be in charge of feeding the baby a bottle each day-I haven't broke the news to her yet that the new baby probably won't be using a bottle.

-We finally carved some pumpkins. Maddie has been wanting to do this all week long, but we wanted to involve Andy and since he hasn't been getting home till it's to late we had to wait till Saturday night. Garen was super excited and stuck his hand right in the first pumpkin and yanked it right back out with a terrified look on his face. He didn't touch the slimpy things again after that. Maddie did a good job cleaning her pumpkin out and then she drew the face on for me to cut out.

Maddie's pumpkin face-

Maddies'-

Guess what Andy carved-

yep, that's me-

There's mine-

-Maddie had her primary program today at church. She said her speaking part so well from memory! And she pulled faces at her dad instead of singing the songs. :)