No Camera

My camera battery went caput last week, but a new one is one the way (my compliments to CASIO customer service) so there aren't really any pictures this week, except the one I took with my phone after church this morning. Ivy looked so sweet!

We've had a great week settling into the routine of summer. I usually get up about 7:00 (which may not sound like sleeping in, but it's 1.5 hours later than a "regular" day!) to eat breakfast and fix Ivy's lunch for school. I get her up about 8:10 and she eats breakfast, potties (this takes awhile because we have to read at least 3 books, usually more than once, and this week I had to bribe her with a band-aid to get down from the potty...she just likes being there, I think), and I chase her around until I get clothes on her. Then we head to school at 8:50. I have been going to the gym (I'm up to a 13 minute mile, woo-hoo!) and then I run errands, or I come home to work on one of my summer projects. I eat a little lunch, and then head off to pick Ivy up at 12:50. We make our visits or stop at the grocery together, and then by the time we get home she's ready for a nap and I get to watch "A Haunting." She's up between 3:30 and 4:00 and her Papa's usually home so she has snack and we make plans for the evening.

And now, just when we've finally found a little rhythm, Ivy's out of school this week. I know I shouldn't dread spending a week at home with just the two of us, but I wonder how we'll fill the hours! Next week, I'm sure I'll share a blog full of our adventures. Stay tuned!

Friends

This week our friends Annie, Jayme, and Los came to hang out. Ivy and Annie played in the splash pool...

Ivy showed Annie how to have fun on the foam blocks...

And Los captured Ivy's attention! Here she's pulled in him to a game of pee-pie! From the time they left until the time I put her in bed she kept saying, "Los. Gone. Los. Gone."

Ivy's shown more of an understanding for other's feelings in the last week or two. She'll offer you a you her toy, or she'll hand you something you've dropped. Today she gave Elmo a bite of her pretzel! So sweet!

For those I haven't told, for quite some time I've wanted to be a runner. When I was younger, I couldn't think of anything worse than running, but I find that the idea of seeing how strong I can become is quite appealing, so once upon a time I'd set a goal for myself and was running in the mornings. Two weeks later I found out I was pregnant with Ivy. Dr. F said that a newly introduced high-impact activity like running wasn't such a good idea for a pregnant gal, so I gave up before I really got started. Now, two years later, I've decided that I AM going to be a runner! I am posting it here because I think it'll give me some accountability when the road gets tough, so feel free to ask me how it's going (often) and harass me if I don't have a positive reply! I officially began training this week, and I hear that runners commonly lose toenails, so the injured toe just puts me a step ahead! Alex has been captivated by my enthusiasm and he's decided that he wants to run, too! We've chosen the Shamrock Half-Marathon in Virginia Beach as our goal. Wish us luck!

19 months

How can it be that our little one is growing up so fast? This week was very low key in comparison to last week. No newly injured parts, or snorted bugs! I finished work (praise God!) and Ivy stayed with Aunt Shirley while her school had a week off before the summer session starts. In the afternoon Ivy and her papa colored...and practiced the alfabeto...


Today we celebrated Father's Day by letting papa take it easy. Ivy and I are very lucky to have such a loyal, dedicated man in our lives. I know that the relationship that he has with each of us will make Ivy a more confident young woman as she grows, and for that I feel blessed.

What a week!!

"Wow!"

Monday I bought Ivy a little table to put in the corner of the dining room. I thought if she had a place to sit that was more her size she might be a little more independent at snack time, and it'll give us a place to play play-doh or color or paint over the summer. She really likes it!


Tuesday we had our friends Scott and Jennifer over with their twins. Ivy and the twins are just a month apart, and they've known each other since birth, so it's been fun to watch the way that their play changes...especially when they all stop to watch a bug crawling in the sand!

We missed our friends Leah, Mark, Clara, and Ben!

We had pizza for dinner that evening, and yes, I let Ivy have it too. It was from Domino's! She thought it was so great that she asked for pizza for breakfast and dinner the next day, too!
Thursday was Ivy's end of school party (she'll still go to summer school but it's the end of school for her regular class). They played outside in the sprinkler and Ivy had a BLAST! She was the only girl who would go near the water... and she went in it, around it, under it, and tried to catch it in her mouth. It was also a great opportunity for me to see her interact with some of her friends... there's this one little fellow she doesn't particularly get along with though, and that was interesting to see too. He pulled her hair several times. She let him get away with it the first 2 times, but then she had had enough and she pinched him and pushed him down the last time. He tried to take her ball and she screamed and jerked it away from him... they'll probably end up married in 25 years.

Friday Ivy stayed with Autn Shirley and Jack all day. Alex cam over after lunch and pressure washed their driveway, so I went over afterschool just to hang out with the family. As we were standing and talking (paying no attention to Ivy) she came over with a cast-iron pinecone and let it go on my toe. It turned blue within just a few minutes, on top and underneath. Sunday I had to break the blood blister underneath the nail to release some of the pressure... I'm really glad that it didn't happen to Ivy because it probably would've broken her foot, but I really wish it hadn't happend to me either! It put a definite damper on my birthday weekend, and I'm afraid it may take away from my ambitions to become a runner which I'd planned to start next week... but anyway, more about that later.

Saturday I wasn't fit to go much of anywhere but I did go out into the backyard with Ivy for a bit... does the sprinkler look familiar? She had such a good time in the one at school that we got her one to play in at home. She liked to catch water in a little spoon, then take a drink, and then shared some with her papa.
As we were coming in there was a little beetle bug (about as big as the word bug written here) crawling up the door jamb. I flicked it off to keep it from coming in as I closed the door, and apparently Ivy was looking up as I did this because the bug went straight into her nose. I didn't see it happen, but she sneezed about 10 times in a row and that's the only explanation I could think of... so I took her to suction out her nose, but no bug... about 10 minutes later she was eating dinner and she had another sneezing fit, and OUT came the bug! Wow... what a crazy weekend.

Sunday was my birthday. The biggest one I've had in 9 years... You know, when you're younger there are a lot of important birthdays all together... 16, 18, 21... but it's been a while since I'd had a MONUMENTAL birthday and apparently I remembered them to be much more MONUMENTAL than they actually are... Alex got me some clothes and we went out for breakfast, but then I spent the day cleaning house and doing laundry... hmmm... That's what I did until the pool party that my friend had for me (and for the end of school). That was the highlight of the day! It was fun to splash around in the water, eat yummy food off the grill, and drown in desserts! Of course, the best part was the cupcake contest... Brooke has handed the title of "Queen of the Cupcake Shove!" over to Melissa. Wow... is all I can say! And no one can get you presents like good girl friends can... it's quite beautiful the way that different people see and appreciate different sides of your personality. I cherish my friends more than they will ever know...



This week we've seen a bit of a vocabulary explosion. Here are the new words that I can remember: banbi....band-aid. burrfuss...breakfast. crun...crayon. penss...pencil. see-saw has been replaced with rock-rock. Elmo. more (occasionally followed with pease). wow. choc-ate. paapell...toilet paper. muffin. magsin...magazine. snik...snack. grp...grape. two. heart. I guess I'll give this part of the blog up, because she's learning more than I can keep up with these days!

Bragging

OK, so I'll be the first to admit that this little piece of cyberspace has become a bit of a brag blog for Ivy and all of her remarkableness, but to be perfectly honest, I'm ok with that. I print out these blog entries, punch holes in them and voila - Ivy's Scrapbook! So someday when she reads my memories of her she will know how special and amazing her papa and I thought she was, so just forgive me for being the doting mom and know that each week I update, the reason I ramble on about each little thing she does is because I'm her momma and I think she's the best little blessing in the world!

So this weekend I learned a little lesson about bragging... :) Ivy has done amazingly well with the potty this weekend. Several times she has said "potty" when she needed to go, and once she got out her "play" potty that we keep in the living room and sat right down on her own. When she did that I was SO amazed! A half hour later, this awe was still with me and I thought, "I need to call and share this with someone who will be as proud as I am... who else but Nanny!" However, when I placed the call my bragging was thwarted by the answering machine. Now feeling the need to boast even more strongly, I called my sister. As her phone was ringing I saw Ivy climbing up onto the kitchen table. Before I could move across half of the kitchen to scoop her up, she'd peed on right there on the glass pane. My sister's voice mail picked up, and it was just as well... clearly this was not the time for bragging!

This week's new words are: adios, brazo, dina = Madrina, beschew = bless you, plane, choo-choo, and the noise for a monkey. Also, this afternoon I found her in her room in the rocking chair with one of our favorite bedtime books and she was turn every page with earnest reading, "Our Nest". That's the title of the book. It was a very sweet scene!

And now, for something unrelated to Ivy... Since Thanksgiving I've been teaching twirling to a group of 3-5 students at my school. Only one of the girls had twirled before so we had a lot of preparation to do before the annual Talent Show which was help Friday. I'm really proud of them... it was an ambitious routine for new twirlers and I think they rose to the challenge!

Not to be outdone, Ivy and her papa showed off their talents on Guitar Hero!