Pretending

About a year ago I introduced Timothy to my pretending CD.  It is a Wee Sing Cd with all types of music and songs that encourage kids to pretend to be all sorts of things from animals to race cars.  Now that Teresa is walking, she likes to get in on the action.  She only knows how to flap her arms like a bird, but it sure makes her happy to be pretending with the whole family!

This video shows a little flapping by Teresa and Timothy.  Timothy also shows off his brontosaurus stomping.  And Teresa shows another favorite activity--carrying around the dog and cat!

Pumpkin Patch

The kids and I made the annual trip to the pumpkin patch this weekend.  It is a fun place with hay rides, a corn maze, and lots of little Halloween themed activities for kids.  Timothy's favorite parts were the hayride and being twirled around by a friend of ours.  I think Teresa liked the hayride too.  I snapped a few pictures, but it is hard to keep Teresa in one place now and Timothy wasn't too excited about pictures, so I was up against some challenges.

The best I got before Teresa fell, or walked away!

 I dressed Teresa in her Halloween costume (a Tigger sweatsuit) for the occasion.  I suppose I should have stuck a bow on the ear so she would look more girly!

Sitting on a pumpkin to eat some snack.

Ready for a wagon ride.

I went down memory lane again with these pictures.  The last two years we have been at the pumpkin patch we have snapped a picture of Timothy on the tractor.

This years tractor picture.

2010  Obviously a little warmer last year!

2009

Little Feet

I was getting the kids ready to head out the door this morning and began to reflect on how many times I see this picture.  Four little feet by the bottom step ready to go out in the world.  One day I will look back on this and marvel at how tiny my kids once were!

With Teresa walking more now, I finally pulled out Timothy's first pair of shoes for her to wear.  (They may be hand-me-downs, but they are still so little and cute--even if they are blue!)  As for Timothy, some day soon I will have to start convincing him that it is time once again to wear socks!

Walking!

Teresa has started to walk!  She has been taking 3-4 steps for awhile, but the other night she walked across the room.  She still reverts mostly to crawling and likes to hold a hand when walking, but she can go solo if she tries.  I have been trying to get some good video of her walking which is not an easy task.  The video below is the best I've taken so far. 

Birthday Time Again

I was looking back over past posts and it was fun to see how we celebrated Troy's birthday in the last few years.  There was the fiesta party, late (kids in bed) dinners, afternoon walks, (free) lunches at Paradiso and homemade cheesecakes.  A few of those things found there way into today's celebration.  Can you guess which ones!?

This year there has been lots of celebrating. We started on Monday with birthday signs painted by the kids.

Timothy hard at work on his b-day picture.

Teresa hating every minute of painting.

 On Tuesday I bought flowers for Troy.  Men never get flowers, so I thought he deserved some.  Wednesday night we had a late dinner (after kids were in bed, although Timothy tried to join several times!).  We had cheese, bread, nuts, broccoli and cheesecake (Troy picked the menu.) And today he began the day with an early bike ride under the stars. He went biking at 4:30am!!  Troy loves biking and his birthday gift this year was new biking shoes, so he had to use them.  It was only that early because he wasn't sleeping and he decided why not bike instead.  Plus he got to have an afternoon coffee with his mom which meant the promise of extra caffeine to keep him going!

Birthday morning family fun!

Besides the biking shoes, Troy got a very thoughtful gift from Timothy.  Timothy decided that Troy would want some of his trains for a birthday gift, so he wrapped them up.  He thought he and Troy could share his toy and play together! 

A new Winnipeg Jets shirt.

 We did the free lunch at Paradiso again this year.  This time with the whole family before Timothy went off to preschool.  And Timothy believes that no birthday is complete with out party games.  He made that happen by leading us in many rounds of duck, duck, goose while we waited for our babysitter to arrive.  A group of good friends joined us at a local restaurant to finish a day of celebration.  Troy had a great day and it was fun to see him enjoy it so much!