Week of October 21, 2013: Audrey turns 6 months

 

What a change 6 months will bring in a baby's life.  Audrey is sitting up so well now and has started playing with Katie more and more.  We've cleaned out all the unsafe, baby swallowable toys and now the girls can play side by side.  

As you can tell Audrey is quite a fan of getting to play with her big sister.

Tot school this week was apple themed.  The kiddos made some apple booklets about a worm and an apple and then.....well, then they completely lost interest and that was the end of tot school for the day!  Oh well, they had fun playing outside :)

I was pretty disappointed in the lack of apple theme ideas for Katie's age group so we winged it this week and did a little bit of this and that.  We went outside and collected different colors of leaves...

 ...then headed back inside to examine them.

 Katie got some money as a birthday gift from her Uncle Marc and Aunt Wendy so we went to the store where Katie picked out a really cool playdoh tool that molds different types of "candy".  She's had fun all week creating different playdoh"candy" with her new toy.

 We went outside on Audrey's 6-month-old birthday to snap some pictures but the sun was so bright the poor girl had her eyes squinted or closed most of the time. 

Katie got a magnifying glass.  Who knew such a simple tool could be so much fun?  Katie has spent all week examining everything she can get her hands on from plants to playdoh.

We've changed the sensory bin, now it includes indian corn and corn kernels.  Katie and Audrey have both had fun with this sensory bin.  Katie loves pouring the corn and Audrey loves the crinkly sound the corn husks make.

Katie painted some pumpkins in preparation for our pumpkin themed week. 

We're changing around our living room and the girls' learning area so we have decided to take down our 30 gallon tank.  We have a 55 gallon cichlid tank (which we are keeping) but, our 30 gallon tank has been quite boring lately and it takes up too much room.  Katie does have a few special animals in that tank so we got her a tiny tank to house her two snails and two ghost shrimp.  We also added in our beta and an African dwarf frog.  Katie LOVES it!  She's more excited about her mini tank than the big tank.  I think since the tank is much smaller she can see all her little critters better as they have less area to hide.  I also think she feels as if this tank is really hers because it's just her little critters and not Mommy and Daddy's fish, too.

Audrey had her first taste of real food...avocados.  She loved them!  She's had a problem wanting to eat cereal or oatmeal but, she took one bite of the avocado and grabbed the spoon, trying to shovel more in her mouth.

Week of October 14, 2013: Leaf Learning and Katie's 3rd Birthday

We've enjoyed a full week getting ready for Katie's 3rd birthday party!  One of the projects on Daddy's list was getting the two trees that have died cut down.  We had a small tree in the front and a big pine tree in the back to cut down and haul off.  Katie was a big help, as usual and used her rake to help Daddy clean up all the little branches.

 Audrey loved watching Daddy and Katie while playing in her jumper.

We learned about leaves this week.  Katie made a tree using her hand and arm then added leaves using her fingerprints.

We're making future garden plans and one of the gardens is a hexagon shaped butterfly garden around a stump in the backyard.  Daddy was working on the angles of the garden using scrap trim and Katie was right there helping him.  She had fun putting the different angles together and playing with a few of Daddy's tools. 

We went to Shelli and Evan's for tot school this week and had lots of fun learning about leaves.  Katie and Evan raked up leaves and hauled them away in Evan's tractor.....

 ...they picked the letters of their name off of a tree....

 ....Audrey got to have some fun with leaves, too.

The kiddos also read a story about Clifford and leaves...

 ...and counted leaves. 

 

At home Katie made another tree using tissue paper and practiced her gluing.

Katie likes to climb into Audrey's jumper.  The little goofball, she hated this thing when she was a baby and now she loves it lol!

Audrey trying on part of her owl costume.

We learned about apples at story time.  Katie and Morgan laid on the carpet and chatted about Morgan's baby doll during story time.

 Then they made apple smiley faces for craft/snack.

 

While waiting for Cindy to come take Katie's 3-year-old pictures Daddy fell asleep while Lillie and Katie cuddled.

Katie woke up Saturday morning to the house decorated in her current favorite princess, Ariel!

 We gave her our gift early that morning so she could enjoy it before the party.

 

Caleb, Grandmother, Aunt Vicki, Daddy and Audrey relaxing in the den.  Audrey was a little overwhelmed by all the people and noise.

 The kiddos enjoyed playing outside.

I wish I would have thought and got more pictures of Katie with individual people but, I did get this adorable picture of Katie and Ms. Julie.

The kiddos wolfed down their cake then, headed back outside.

Katie did so good opening her gifts and thanking people.  We were really proud of her for being such a big girl and being so thankful to everyone.

 After the party Katie cuddled with Daddy in her new Ariel pajamas while snuggling with her new Ariel doll and blanket.

The day after the party Katie got to play with every one of her new toys.  She colored on her Cinderella art table, played with all her playsets and sang all the Ariel songs at the top of her lungs!

Audrey is now sitting up so well by herself!  Such a big girl!

One of the new things that we've been looking forward to and that is one of the best things to see as a parent is the girls playing together.  Katie hands Audrey toys and talks to her while Audrey smiles and babbles at Katie.  They are both such sweethearts I know they'll have so much fun as they grow up together.